#but her ass really could have stayed in that coma

[six-eyed-samurai]

SUMMARY: Someone turns up on Sanemi's doorstep after the final war - that someone being a part of Genya's life Sanemi regrets never knowing. A/N: NGL I lost a lot of respect for Sanemi after he tried to poke Genya's eyes out but I do feel really bad for him after the final battle with Muzan because what is he going to live for now? What's he going to do? Fall into depression, probably, and that just made me sad so here we are to be sad together. You don't have a choice. WARNINGS: Genya x GN Reader but mainly Platonic!Sanemi x Reader

Seeing as nearly everyone he had known was dead after the final war, the hesitant knocking at his door startled the wits out of one former Wind Hashira.

He probably shouldn’t have stayed up late last night drinking and wasting everything away because he could barely see straight stumbling towards the doors, cursing the early dawn, the furniture he stubbed his toe on and the pounding in his head, but nothing numbed the dull grief and pain better than being blackout drunk and coma-like sleep. At least Sanemi wasn’t seeing double like last time.

Although he was wondering if he was hallucinating shit, because ain’t no freaking way there was someone showing up at his doorstep at 6 in the morning asking if he was Shinazugawa and if he could please, if he didn’t mind, help them find someone?

“Yeah…what?”

They repeat their question, tugging nervously at their sleeves, hopeful underneath all that anxiety. “Are you Shinazugawa Sanemi? Genya told me to go find you if…”

“He’s-”

His first reaction, out of force of habit, was to deny that he had any brother, but the words glued themselves to the sides of his throat and would only spill out in the form of ugly sobbing. His second reaction was pretty much equally brutal: tell them that his brother had long died, sliced in half by the late Upper Moon One, all because he had failed in every duty possible, as a brother, as a slayer, as a human. But Sanemi, undeniably, had mellowed out and if he had to crack that porcelain-frail look of desperate hope in their eyes he too would shatter in his precarious mental state.

So he settled for delaying the inevitable. “If what? You a slayer?”

“No,” they say, shaking their head. “I…he was my, um…”

Oh.

No.

Please no.

“Your boyfriend,” he barks out bluntly, but tries to tone down and soften his expression when they wince, flustered. “That’s…”

Unexpected. He could still remember a time when Genya either beat down everyone and not gave a rat’s ass about it or when he would explode into a ripe tomato if someone good looking so much as said hello to him. Or maybe sweet. Sanemi’s always wanted him to have a normal life, go get married, have a family, live peacefully to a ripe old age while he did the bloody work of slaying. At least he got a taste of it. Most of all…sad, really. Sad that he pushed his younger brother away so much he never even know he’d fallen in love, someone new had entered his life, he’s gotten over his emotional constipation somewhat. Sad that he never got to spend the rest of his life with them like Sanemi had no doubt he had promised. Sad that they had never known, all this while, that Genya would never stagger home to them.

It seemed like this conversation would be one of trailed-off sentences.

They nod. “Yes…”

“Huh. Can see why he liked you,” Sanemi says off-handedly, but remembers he never actually knew what his brother’s type was. Funny how he only realized it was stupid of him to keep trying to cut off ties with his only brother after he died. But they are cute in their mannerisms, the air that just made you want to protect them forever, wrapped in innocence. No wonder Genya fell in love.

“Liked?” Their expression falls, but it’s still hopeful.

Sanemi can’t think what’s worse, for her to have the only option of thinking that Genya has moved on, fallen for someone else, left them behind because the other option is too terrible to contemplate. It’s the truth, however.

“Liked,” he repeats, and he can feel his mind just wanting to succumb to the hopeless pain. Sanemi digs his nails into his palm and bites the insides of his cheeks instead.

“I think I should start from the beginning.”

“Come on in, then.”

He waits until they're further into the room before he releases a breath, slumps his shoulders and stares at the sky to mouth his apologies to his brother for not giving him enough time to spend with them, to the gods for leading them on for so long, to someone, anyone, who would spare a sinner like him some forgiveness as he prepared to cry all over again about Genya.

***

“And then he told me if he isn’t at Himejima’s Estate, go find his older brother who’s probably living alone somewhere, scaring everyone away with his temper and dog.”

They laugh, clear as bells, at the memory, hiding their smile behind the steaming cup of tea, but it’s broken, like their fake grins and the mug in their hands. Sanemi wants to laugh too (is this how you really saw me, Genya, after all I did to you?), but he might actually start the waterworks. Sanemi was already halfway there, listening to his brother’s secret romance and everything he missed out because of his own foolishness.

“He said he hoped he’d finally be there with you, or if he wasn’t, you’d tell me where he went.”

I could tell you where he went, Sanemi agreed, because I saw him. When I was dying. And he was dead.

They fidgets, tugging at their clothes again. “I waited a really long time for a letter. He said he’d send me one if he could after the…after the fight, but it was so long. I checked up on Himejima’s Estate all the time, but he was never there. Nobody was. I asked around; they told me the owner had died and - and -”

“I know.” If he was a better person Sanemi would probably be reaching out to put a hand on their shoulder, assure them. If he were a better brother Genya would be alive and drinking tea with them. But he was none of those and so all he could do was awkwardly say two words. “Go on.”

“I didn’t know to look after that.” They wipe at their face, setting down the cup. “Genya said you had white hair and was covered in scars, and well, there aren’t that many of those sort of people around, but even then it took me forever to find you. I tried tracking down Muichiro, but I couldn’t either.”

Tokito. Another failure. Sanemi turned away slightly.

“Then I finally found Tanjiro last week. He’d been trying to find me as well, but heh, since I kept traveling it made it hard.” They shrug. “He told me where to find you, so here I am. Sorry for intruding…but it’s a little late for that.”

They glance around, clinging onto the belief. “Is he - is he here? Can I see him?”

“Yeah,” Sanemi whispers hoarsely. “I’ll take you to him.”

Not before he winds up sobbing himself dry on their shoulder, pathetically trying to assure them as well as tears streamed down both their faces.

***

There was no body but Sanemi had carved out a tombstone for him anyway.

It was under a tree, scattered with leaves, wilting flowers and weeds watered by his grief. Sometimes when Sanemi’s more sober and when he can light a candle without burning anything else he’ll leave some there, so waxy stubs are left over. That Kamado kid and his friends came down sometimes and left behind their mementos as well. Unlike his own home, Sanemi did his best to keep it clean.

He left to give them some privacy, walking a little further away, but even so the wind carried their words over and Sanemi couldn’t pretend he couldn’t hear them raging against fate, death, Genya.

“Why?”

“Why you?”

“Why would you do this to me?”

You and me both, kid, Sanemi thinks.

“You said you’d come back! You said you’d take me to see your aniki! We were going to - there was so much we haven’t - what am I supposed to do now, Genya? You were supposed to be here with Sanemi-san as well, not just me!”

He’s always been too caught up with himself. Damn, blind to what Genya really wanted to the end, Sanemi thinks wryly.

For a moment there seems to be someone else beside him. He turns and for a moment he sees someone’s shadow on the ground, someone smiling, someone asking. Someone who didn’t want him to go squandering his life on regrets; a favor, the silhouette seemed to say, so will you do it for me?

The answer was always yes - Sanemi blinks, and it’s gone, so he hurries back to the grave.

They're dragged out of their misery by a heavy hand, rough but gentle. “I’m sorry.”

“You shouldn’t be.” They hiccup and drag a hand across their face. “I'm sorry. Sorry for…I wish you both had gotten a chance…”

Sanemi laughed, voice scratchy. “That was my own fault.”

“You know what I mean.” They managed to roll their eyes.

“Where you going now?”

“I'm…not sure. I don't know. Back to my hometown, maybe, but there's not really anyone there.”

Anyone to go back to, they meant.

“Tch.” He began to stomp back to the house, gesturing for them to follow. Sanemi pauses at the doorway, frowning, and turns back. “You planning to sit there all day? You can stay if you like, I don't like the idea of you walking around alone and defenceless.”

“Stay - what?”

“Stay,” Sanemi agrees, exasperation in his tone at their stunned, slow reaction. “And you're having ohagi for breakfast whether you like it or not.”

***

Days fly past.

Mostly they’re spent in mourning together. Privately Sanemi preferred this to the funeral they had held with what was left of the Corps, because it feels more…closer. Similar. Here were two people that were a part of a big chunk of Genya’s life and yet never knew the other part.

They sat at the grave a lot and just…nothing. There were no tears or comfort. Just silence, never knowing what to do because you’ve been living for someone who’s now dead so you could live, but what are YOU living for? Sanemi wished time and time again he’d be the one to bite it. Not like anyone much would miss him, and maybe all those times he’d been hurting his brother was so Genya could move on in the event he died, very much unlike him right now.

On the third day they finally made conversation.

“So…” Sanemi cleared his throat. “How’d you both meet, since, y’know, he’s a slayer?”

They squint at the dirt, absently pulling up blades of grass. “I didn’t actually know he was one until a lot later, but even then he didn’t tell me much.” They tilted up their head. “He never wanted to expose that part of his life to me. I thought he was just another traveler when we first met; I offered him a room in my house.”

“House? Will you go back there?” Suddenly Sanemi is seized with panic - if they, his one and only link to Genya now, went back, and he ended up alone again…

“It’s not really my house. It’s more like…my employer’s house at that time…”

“Ah. So you’ve got nowhere to go for now?”

“Mhm. When I got fired I stayed over at Himejima’s occasionally. Then Genya sent me away before…yeah, before all that.” They blink and their eyes glisten. “What was he like, as a slayer? I knew he was different or something, because Tanjiro and his friends used a sword and some technique he couldn’t master, so the gun and all.”

Unbeknownst to everyone Sanemi had been watching his little brother train all those years ago. It’d be the first time he exposed himself. “He was really hard-working. Threw in everything he had to try and learn Breathing Techniques but he just couldn’t master it, and I think it took a big toll on Genya. I didn’t help much.”

“It’s alright. He forgives you.”

“Present tense?”

“Would he have told me to go look for you if he hadn’t?”

There. The real reason Sanemi would lose it if they left. He needed someone, something, anything to prove all the accusing, guilty voices in his head that Genya hadn’t died hating him.

“Tch. Fair enough. Tell me about his life outside the Corps now.”

***

Weeks go by.

Having them around, Sanemi discovers, is a stark reminder of what had happened to Genya, yet not in a bad way. Sanemi started forcing himself to bathe more frequently, take care of himself better - don’t want them having to put up with my stench - not just doing the bare minimum for his dog. He’d been alone and heartbroken for so long he’s honestly stopped functioning like a normal person, forgotten what Genya had died for.

Now he had to go out and buy food more consistently because he wasn’t the only one around anymore. Sanemi had to get around to repairing all those things that had fallen to ruins at the Wind Estate. Grudgingly he even agreed to let them take over cooking meals in order to get more than just ohagi in his diet.

But he only really noticed the differences when one morning Sanemi staggered into the kitchen looking for a drink after another round of restless nightmares and instead stumbled onto them dumping the contents of the sake bottle he left out down the drain.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Sanemi made a grab for it but they ducked out of reach, flinching at the sudden yell.

“Getting rid of this. You’ve been drinking a lot lately.”

“For a damn reason!”

“What reason?”

Because every day is painful and I just want it all to go away, isn’t it obvious? Sanemi dug his nails into his palm again, muttering obscenities.

“I thought you of all people should know better than to cope like this.”

“I-”

He should. He remembered the former Flame Hashira before Rengoku. He recalled Kyogo.

Sanemi had always feared he would turn out like his father and here he was proving everyone right. Genya wouldn’t have wanted that…god, what was wrong with him?

“You’re right.”

They watched uneasily as Sanemi stalked off, but they had nothing to worry about. Sanemi threw out the rest of the bottles that day and apologized to the grave.

“Bet he’s pretty mad I turned out like this after all he fought for.” A scarred hand gestures listlessly at the headstone, the other holding a cup. The both of them sat in evening silence, watching the wind flitter around from the engawa. Remaining rain droplets trickle down from the roof.

“Genya?’ They set down their cup and ponder. “Not really. He could never get mad at you.”

Sanemi snorts. “Never?”

“Never.”

“Ah, he should’ve.”

“Maybe that’s why I’m here.” They flash him a smile. In truth they could’ve been his sibling regardless - sibling-in-law, but he’d settle for surrogate now.

Sanemi rolls his eyes but likes the idea more than he admits, of Genya watching over him even now…because it has to mean he’s forgiven him, right, for everything he did wrong? “What was he like?”

“Huh?”

“Y’know.” Sanemi draws random blobs in the air, vague shapes of hearts. “When you both were-”

“SHINAZUGAWA!”

“Did you make out? At least once. You had to.”

They’re mortified and got up several times to leave but not before Sanemi’s heard everything he missed out: yes, they’d gotten to the kissing stage but no, they did not make out, why was he so vulgar, yes, Genya often had a panic attack every time they held hands, yes, they could show him all the dried flowers Genya had gifted them, stop laughing at their confession story, you’re right, Genya was horribly obvious with his blushy crush phase and NO, Shinazugawa, Genya would self combust before they ever got to the topic of marriage or starting a family!

***

Years pass.

Sanemi’s gotten married. Four mini-mes running around as well, a fifth on the way. He likes to think of it as a parallel between him and his own siblings, because his oldest is the only to inherit his shock of white hair and the second bears a striking resemblance to Genya. They think so too, written clearly on their faces every time they look at him.

Speaking of them, they hadn’t left all this while and Sanemi doesn’t want them to. Not when they’ve been there to pull him out of his depressive state, united in grief, see him fall in love with a local girl, urge him to court her despite his anxious worries, stood next to him when he was getting hitched, supported him throughout fatherhood and babysat the four hurricanes when he and his wife went out on date nights.

It’d be just as bad as losing Genya.

“You better be good for them, or I’ll string you all up by your feet.” Despite Sanemi’s threatening words he’s unusually gentle as he peels his two youngest from his legs as they cling on and whine at him and mom not to go out without them, they wanted to go see the fireworks too, can’t they stay up late this one time?

“Don’t worry, they’re all angels.” They help remove the other two older ones from their mom, rolling their eyes. “And before you say anything, yes, I’ll get them all to bed before ten.”

“Sometimes I think Sanemi nags more than I do,” his beloved jokes, taking his arm and the both of them leave, calling out to the protesting kids as they’re hauled off inside and the door closes. He’s lucky, he thinks, tucking his wife closer, that even after all this he managed to be happy. He can almost see Genya in front of him, smiling and telling Aniki not to get too naughty, not abandon them for so long to try and control four rowdy kids.

Sanemi wishes the same could be said of them, though.

When he comes back, tells his wife he’ll be back into the bedroom soon, checks on his kids and realizes they’ve disappeared again, Sanemi knows just where to look, quickly making his way to the grave, carrying a lantern and something else.

“You really have to stop coming here in the middle of the night. There’s no more demons, but ya think you’ll be safe?” Sanemi huffs, taking his seat next to them. They snort derisively. “I’m serious! What if you get mauled by some wild animal? Who am I gonna dump the kids on if you’re not here?”

“Tomioka’s around. Kamado too,” they sing-song.

“Tomioka would give my kids depression and maybe I’d trust Kamado but not his friends.”

“You give ME depression.”

“Haha, very funny.” Sanemi passes the slice of watermelon to them, taking a bite of his own. Genya’s headstone looks chipped in the yellow light, worn and old, but still lovingly cared for. “I think he might want you to move on, you know? It’s been years. He’ll understand. He’ll want you to be happy. You can’t keep waiting around, crying and wasting time.”

“You’re stealing my words.”

“Hey, it worked back then, when you told that to me. You’re a hypocrite. Use your own advice.”

“I tried. It didn’t work out. I kept coming back here.” A finger traces the stone, uncertainty in their tone.

“You feel guilty, like you’re being unfaithful to him or something?” Sanemi passes them another slice, awkwardly trying to sympathize. He wants them to be happy as well, after all.

“No, it’s just…” They shrug, head shaking from side to side. “I dunno. I can’t. Not like you did.”

Sanemi understands, suddenlyl, sort of. They gave him their heart and maybe it wasn’t theirs to take back yet. It didn’t really make sense and wasn’t enough of a reason to argue against moving on, but feelings were weird and rarely made enough reason.

“No one’s going to be like him, huh.”

“No. No one,” They agreed, and they both lapsed into silence.

“I mean, the guy we met yesterday looked like a great match-”

“Have fun taking your kids on your next date, Shinazugawa.”

“I was kidding!”

They wipe their mouth and set down their watermelon rind before, a ghost of smile tugging at their lips. “You and Genya really are the same, you know.”

“How?’ Years later and he’s still learning new things he should’ve known during all those years he wasted thinking it was a good idea to push him away. Ah well.

“Um…I guess in the way you both really suck at trying to talk about feelings.”

“You wound me.”

“You’re a former Hashira. But you both try to understand and make me feel better anyway.” They smirk. “In the form of bad jokes, usually.”

“I’m hurt.” Sanemi got the point, mouth twitching.

“So, yeah. You both don’t really know how to do it but you do your best. That’s good enough.”

Sanemi caught their eye. “…good enough for me, at least.” He stood up and picked up the rinds, returning back to his tough boy exterior. “Enough mushy stuff. Go back to bed.”

“Yessir.”

***

“You and Genya really are the same, Sanemi.”

They lean their forehead against the cool, rough headstone. The new one. It was new and clear but now it was wet with tears. “It’s gonna be hard…why did you both have to go?”

Five years later. Sanemi’s slayer mark had finally caught up with him, but not before he had gotten the chance to settle down and leave behind some kids, have another chance at enjoying life, find a new sibling. Still, no one had expected him to just…not wake up one day. It seemed a little too quiet of an ending for the tale of Shinazugawa.

“Where was all your talk about going down in a blaze of glory to the kids last night, huh?” They coughed out a laugh. “I know you must be really pissed to just die like that.”

They’ve been holding it together the past few days, for the sake of Sanemi’s children and his widow. Only now could they cry in quiet, in the same spot where Sanemi and them had cried over Genya. Tomioka’s widow and two kids had joined them as well. Three united in grief.

“I know you said you’re happy you got a chance at all this, Sanemi, but I can’t help feeling like you were robbed of having the full experience in all this. Like Genya all over again. When you see him, tell him I miss him a lot, okay? Still very much head over heels and making an absolute fool of myself…”

They laid down their bouquet, taking a breath. “You also said you were afraid Naomi, Hiroshi and Remi won’t remember you if you die so early in their childhood…it’s alright. I don’t think anyone will forget you. Least of all me. Thanks for everything.”

“I hope you and Genya finally see each other again.”

It wasn’t seen or heard, but rather, felt - a lover’s arm wrapped around their shoulders and a brotherly hand on the other.

[justporo]

Headcanons about Astarion pulling his partner out of a bad mood

I'm not feeling super great today so this is another very self indulgent headcanon post which is possibly a little unhinged but I hope you'll still enjoy it.

Astarion himself is no stranger to feeling whimsical or even throwing full blown temper tantrums; that's also why he knows how much of a drag it can be

So granted he isn't in a massively bad mood himself, he'll keep nudging you until you are out of your current bad mood

If you're both annoyed at each other though (like after an unnecessary fight) it might be that you're both sitting around brooding - that is until you can't take it anymore; Astarion might act like he's still pissed, but when you come closer (still with a pout even) and wrap your arms around him, he can't resist (even though he will make a show out of it): "Do you mind? I'm still brooding!", Astarion says but lifts up his arms crossed over his chest so you can hug him better. "Still love you though, you rat arse", you reply furrowing your brows dramatically, you don't even feel that angry anymore. "Love you too, you idiot", Astarion answers and presses a kiss to your cheek - with a teasing eyeroll and grimace. Not shortly after the mood's a lot better, the fight forgotten.

This man shows as much mercy with you when you're feeling down and grumpy as on the battlefield: none!

"I like you in bed, my love. No - in fact: I love you in bed. But not like this - get up, my sweet, you can dissolve into a puddle of misery later when I'm done with you."

He will absolutely fuss if you don't go along with what he's doing to lighten your mood; and he will keep doing it until you're either punching him or are rolling on the floor laughing

This might involve the following: "Do you know what you look like right now, my heart?", Astarion asks and then makes the most excessive grimace. You're still scowling at him. "Love" he sighs then "furrowing your brows at me will just give you wrinkles. We don't want that, do we?" And he pinches your cheek with his long fingers until you're getting up to beat his ass. "See, wasn't it easy getting out of bed after all?" "You'd also be astonished how easy it is to be put IN A COMA!" (But you have to agree with him)

He will also shower you with praise, no matter what about, until you believe him (at least for the moment)

Or he'll be so disarmingly cute until you can't help but fall into his open arms for a comforting hug

If really nothing helps, Astarion just stays with you

Maybe just talking to you so you have something to focus on, massaging your shoulders, your neck, your hands

Or just cuddling with you, holding you, until his presence alone eases the knot of negative feelings in your chest (and then maybe nibbling a bit on your ear when he feels that you're doing better)

He's also masterful in just helping you let out any anger you might feel ("That BITCH!" "Yes love, how could she!? Honestly you should've just stabbed her right then and there." "RIGHT!?")

Other ways of coping might involve a bottle of wine and him handing you some stuff you can smash angrily ("You really showed that mug, love, impressive... Remind me to net get on your bad side, darling.")

In short: Astarion is as good with putting you in a bad mood sometimes as getting you out of it

I just need Astarion to tell me "Keep going, you beautiful thing" every day for the rest of my life, is that too much to ask?? We love a supportive king.

Tag list: @spacebarbarianweird @sunfire-ancunin @tragedybunny @dependsonthedream @tallymonster @magazzne @micropoe10 @aoirohi @my-bunny-prince @lumienyx @fayeriess @azukiel

[ashen-char]

I'm obsessed with the idea of ani joining in the conversations about partners and bringing reader up like "they never let me cook! which is sweet but i want to cook too!" or "they drool a lot when they sleep!" in a innocent way not thinking much about the fact the other girls are talking about their partners and she just started yapping about reader like they're together.

I just know the fact she always brings reader up in partner conversations makes them even more confused when ani drops the information she's married and it's NOT with reader, like they're happy for her but 'what does she mean she's not with reader??' Yes, they tease her and joke about it but they fr think there's something going on with those two.

reader likes to sit close to anora when she's playing, they're reading a book or doing something job/studies related, stuff like that. They just like being around her either they have her attention or not, they just feel this comfortable aura coming from anora whenever she's close, she's home. You'll giggle about her getting mad at villagers and then ani looks at you annoyed because 'you're suppose to be on my side!' and you're like 'sorry, got to a funny part on the book...' and you're reading the saddest and most tragic book ever.

I think later on reader introduces ani to one or two more violent games where she can kick people's asses! probably Mortal Kombat, she'll definitely play this type of games when a client/her boss pissed her off badly on that particular day and she needs to punch someone to calm down, even if it's on a video game it helps her a lot! But she likes more the cozy games like animal crossing, stardew valley, even the sims (her favourite is the sims 2 because of all the attention to detail the game has).

You once tried to make her play an horror game (resident evil, until dawn, silent hill, amnesia) and she tried it, she really did but after some time she was like 'nop! I'm done! put my animal crossing NOW!'

About ivan, like I said his parents are to blame for a big part of who he is today but he's 21 already and that's old enough to at least KNOW not to leave your wife alone when she's fighting for a future with you against 3 MEN DOUBLE HER SIZE! like if you care about her and her safety you either runaway with her or you stay there with her! That scene is what makes me think that anora cares about him but he doesn't care about her or at least not as much, you know?

YES! There's nothing wrong with wanting to have fun and be free, you don't have to be serious all the time like life's too short for that shit, but the fact he doesn't take anything serious, never thinks before doing a joke or just the way he treats people bellow him (maybe besides anora) lacks sense, maybe even empathy, like why yell as a joke at this staff member who's apologising already for not having the room ready because 1. THEY DIDN'T KNOW YOU WERE COMING! and 2.BECAUSE IT WAS BEING USED!! it's a terrible joke, it can make that poor person lose their job if their superior happens to walk by, it lacks touch with reality too!

On the coke scene: if he had taken too much coke, mixed with the alchool and probably other drugs that shit could lead to his death or a coma! toros and garnick aren't stupid, they very likely know that ivan is using drugs and shit like that but if they don't know how much he has done/where he is how are they suppose to help him if it goes wrong? they are there to keep him alive, to keep him in line too, but mostly to keep his ass alive! You don't have to be serious 100% of your time but you also can't be 100% of your time acting like this petulant kid. ivan strikes me as someone who doesn't want to be treated like a kid and wants to be free but he hasn't shown any sense of responsibility to be able to take care of himself alone, like he can still have a kid spirit and be responsible AND sensible towards other people.

Oh i don't think he would even bother to ask anora about her past because like you pointed out he only calls her ani, she only started existing when ani did too. if ani did try to talk to him about it, open up about her past and stuff he wouldn't pay much attention, too distracted playing video games or on his phone. He would be like one of her friends boyfriends she heard so many complains about, you know?

it's a cute assumption but now I'm a little disgusted with it because of what I know... so embarrassing to me! i think with ivan she tried to keep it as much fairytale-ish as she could so she also tried to be a fairytale character, maybe because she felt the need she showed him her true self he would leave, while with igor she didn't want to/felt the need to put up a character, because he wouldn't leave since he understands her struggles.

I do agree that I prefer igor and ani over ivan and ani, like there's somehting more realistic about them, more personal and more 'honest-ish' for lack of a better word to express what I mean. I think ani needs someone a little more serious and responsible than ivan but also someone who can be carefree and I think if we had more time we could see igor being carefree around ani.

Anora only deserves the best and whatever or whoever that is I hope she's happy and at peace!

HELLO I DIDN'T MEAN TO LEAVE THIS ASK FOR SO LONG it kept cutting off when i tried to answer on mobile (which i was restricted to at the hospital) and eventually i decided to leave it until after i actually watched anora and had more formed thoughts!

ani's got a good rapport with the girls at HQ (barring diamond obviously). with how they flocked to see the fight, i bet they're pretty nosy too, listening intently to pick up on clues of if reader and ani are together. they'd have bets on it. lulu (who's basically the captain of the reader x ani ship) would scoff if anyone said reader's just ani's best friend, offended because obviously she is ani's best friend thank you very much.

sometimes when lulu invites ani out after work, ani says that you two have plans, excitedly yapping about how she's planning to decorate your shared sims' house or the ccs she downloaded. and lulu has this knowing look, cause that's so domestic? sweet? calm? not something ani would find fun if you weren't the one showing it too her. like, lulu finds ani in their backstage/changing room area on her switch, doing her daily fruit foraging in her ACNH island, probably cussing out tom nook for upping the house fee when she JUST paid the last one off. lulu knows all of ani's smiles and the ones about you/something you showed her are different to her performance smiles, to her flirty customer service. they're even different from when she's bragging about what a catch ivan is, about his mansion or how much he likes her.

how much he likes her. never the other way around. any other girl would be half in love with how vanya splashes out his time, attention, and cash. even if ani hasn't realised it herself, it's because her heart's already occupied with reader. imagine ani being away for that first week, apologising over and over to reader cause they already made plans while you just tell her it's ok. and then the next two weeks of their marriage, ani was happy and swept up in the excitement but also... restless? missing you? she busied herself with polishing up her russian, in the lavish new wardrobe and new life. in the dark of night wondering when it'll make her as happy as a simple day with you.

ivan's actually pretty interesting now that all the clips have context. he didn't run to not be caught, but more so to take in all the fun he could before he was whisked back - hitting up all the clubs, getting so drunk he wouldn't worry anymore. he didn't even plan to leave ani, fully wanted her to run with him. it was more... "consequences? what are those? boringgg". didn't wanna talk about his family, didn't wanna hear a word of reprimand from his parents, considers anything that isn't having fun as unnecessary. and especially him thanking ani for making his last trip fun as if he didn't ask her to MARRY him, when she was sceptical in the first place and told him not to tease her! she made sure he was sincere multiple times and he strung her along, pure and simple, knowing his parents wouldn't let that happen. knowing that he wouldn't actually fight his parents for it/for them.

gonna write some thoughts on ivan on another post this is getting too long and tbh i was more focused on anora :P (basically he's all about freedom and even argues back when they make a comment about him possibly marrying a man). the marriage was a fantasy to him, as is america, it's a freedom he won't actually pursue at the end of the day. not when being under his parents' thumb is easier. him being treated like a child is actually a privilege. ani's only two years older and knows so much more of responsibilities, of what it takes to earn and own things, of consequences. all vanya has to do is simper and follow his mom, childishly asking if her clothes are from the new collection rather than listening to her beratement.

i feel like if the marriage didn't collapse because of his parents, it'd be whenever ani decides she's had enough of the partying or the smoking and watching him play games. he asks about her parents, and she even offers to let them meet or go meet her sister. she wants to go to disneyworld for their honeymoon. but vanya would be the same vanya. show up drunk and blazed, embarrassing her in front of her mom and stepdad (while she covers his ass and lies "oh i swear he's not always like this, he's just tired"). ruining her childhood dream by letting his friends crash their honeymoon and trash the cinderella suite. she'd realise that this isn't perfect, that it isn't sustainable. it's fun, yes, ivan was right that they'd probably still have fun together if he wasn't rich. but imagine them going through the paperwork of getting that green card, of her trying to make him take it seriously so he can stay. applying, appointments, providing papers and proof... vanya would groan and act like ani's dragging him to do this. and he'd offer ani hits from his bong like he did to klara, never thinking about if something's the right time.

to contrast a relationship where ani would have to be the mature one, ani is notably different with igor (obviously). even if not romantically, having someone there that she can freely bitch at, let out her tension on, that accepts her moods must feel freeing. all these masks she puts on, be that at the club, or the perfect wife for vanya/his family. she's got her barbs, she's allowed to be prickly and abrasive and say whatever comes to her head. igor will laugh it off. she softened near the end (not the end end, i'm sure there's a lot of thoughts on that) when she brought him that blanket. wordlessly sharing blunts or taking the cig from his mouth, smiling when he laughs at a joke she slung to hurt his feelings. he doesn't just take it either. he asks why she says these things about him, asserts that he isn't (a gopnik, a f-slur ass bitch, a drug dealer, a rapist etc), but doesn't get mad at her for it. when toros or galina says "no, that didn't happen", it's to shut ani up, to not listen, to prove that she doesn't have a say/doesn't have power in the situation. when igor says it, it's on equal grounds-that he had to because he was genuinely scared about ani and that he didn't want her to hurt herself. AND after apologising multiple times, rather than jumping to "i didn't hurt you". it was "you were never in danger of being harmed".

[sunflower567]

Callsign: Umbra Chapter 13: The Specter Under the Darkness

Masterlist

Word Count: 3,036

Edited: ✅

Published: May 2nd, 2025

Last update/change: June 7th, 2025

Previous Chapter

Marine Raider Training Center, Camp Lejeune, North Carolina: 9:00 PM

After finishing up in the gym, Ghost, Soap, Umbra, and Alpha went back to their rooms to clean up and meet Price and Gaz in their living space. By now, Laswell had already left to return to D.C., having other missions and operations to supervise. 

Now, sitting on the mismatched furniture that was put together in the team room, Ghost and Soap informed Price about Davis approaching Imani. 

“Of fucking course he did,” Price sighed in frustration, rubbing his face in exhaustion. 

“But that can’t be all it right,” Imani began, “I mean, I can handle Davis in a coma. So why do I need an escort all of a sudden?”

“The joint military training event, that’s why,” Price answered. 

“The what,” Imani asked, looking around in confusion, “Ah, I forgot, yeah, that's the second biggest event here after graduation. Who is it this time? Air force? Army? Navy? Coast Guard? Who is it?”

“None of those,” Ghost answered, “They’re PMCs.”

“PMCs,” Imani exclaimed in disgust, “Who the fuck invited them?”

“Not a fan of PMCs huh,” Soap laughed because of the look on her face. 

“Not really,” Imani said matter-of-factly.

Her father warned them about PMCs when she and her brothers joined the military. He called them wannabe soldiers who wanna fight without rules. And if need be, they’d leave those in uniform for dead. 

Even though she met some PMCs who were nice to work with, she always kept an eye on them, waiting for the other shoe to drop.  

But there was a new group she had the misfortune of working with. She had to work with them and their smooth-mouthed boss for a month and a half, especially since he loved hanging around and flirting with her, even though she was 21 and he was older than her oldest brothers at 34. 

Imani remembered the relief she felt when she was finally granted an exchange. “Creepy ass, light brown haired ass, blue eyed bastard,” Imani mumbled as she remebred that asshole’s face and worse of all, his personality. 

“What was that,” Kyle asked. 

“Nothing,” Imani said quickly, “Who is it?”

“It’s KorTac,” Price answered. 

“Oh thank god,” Imani sighed in relief as she held her heart. 

“Who’d you think it was,” Soap asked. 

“Not important anymore because it ain’t him,” Imani smiled, “So what’s the issue?”

“Because we’ll have outsiders, we believe that whoever is coming after could use this to their advantage,” Price explained, “So we need you to stay with Alpha and one of us. No expectations. But for now, it’ll be just you and Ghost, so stick close to him.”

“Huh,” both Simon and Imani exclaimed. 

“Bloody hell, the both of you,” Price marvelled at how the two were basically in sync, "Shepherd called while the three of you were at the gym. He asked Gaz and me to investigate a suspected nationalist, and Soap was requested to help an old comrade of mine with a situation. So you start getting ready to head out, yeah? And dress warm.”

“Aye,” Soap replied, getting up from his chair and heading towards his room. 

Price then turns his attention to Imani and Simon, “So, Umbra, Ghost will stay here to protect you. So please, stay with him. No sneaking out.”

“Yes, sir,” Imani groaned, “Will I be confined here?”

“Over my dead body,” Price chuckled, "Ghost will be in charge of continuing the training of the recruits here. You and Alpha will be joining him.”

Looking at each other, Imani and Simon groaned, rolled their eyes, and looked away. After what happened today at the gym, neither of them was looking forward to this alone time in the slightest. If anything, this felt like fate laughing at them. 

“Well, don’t look too excited, yeah,” Price laughed at the two of them, "We shouldn’t be gone for long, nothing longer than two weeks. We should be back well before the training event starts to meet with KorTec's command staff and operatives.”

Not long after, Imani, Ghost, and Alpha had the pleasure of watching the three other members of their little crew leave them. 

As they watched the plane leave and eventually out of sight, the two just had one thought: ‘This is gonna be a long week.’ 

Looking down at the woman who stood below his shoulders, Simon sighed and asked, “You’re not gonna go easy on me, are ya?”

“No, not in the slightest, no,” Imani smiled up at him with a wicked smile, “I’m gonna have some fun with this.” 

That declaration began the longest two weeks these two soldiers had in mind. 

The Next Morning: 6:00 AM

Like Price said, Imani and Simon’s job was to keep up with the recruits' training. Since being here, Imani has had little to no contact with them. So for most, this was their first time seeing the supposed owner of the wolf that’s been chasing them for training. 

Based on what Soap and Gaz said about them, they thought it would be some badass guy who's seen the worst humanity had to offer. A true soldier. But none of the boys expected to see a woman. Much less with the wolf that’s been giving them hell for the last few days. 

“Good morning, privates,” Imani began, her voice loud and proud over the foggy air, “My name is Sergeant Imani Barnes. Callsign Umbra. For the next few days, Lieutenant Ghost and I will be in charge of your training for the joint military training event. Since I was once in your shoes and won against the Army in my event, I have nothing but the highest expectations for you and expect you all to win this upcoming event. No expectations. And the same could be said for Lieutenant.”

As Imani continued to speak about what they could expect over the next few days, Ghost watched some of the soldiers' reactions. He knew that even though most guys who come through here understand that regardless of background, gender, or whatever, you're all considered family. But he knew some can’t put that to the side, and as he looked across each row of these fresh soldiers who never once saw combat, he saw a fw who were genuinely listening to her and taking everything in. But he also saw one private whispering something in another's ear, causing them and those around them to chuckle. 

“Oi,” Simon called out, interrupting Imani and having all eyes to look at him, but he kept his eyes on the one who was talking, “You two have somethin' to say?”

“Sir, no, sir,” the privates yelled. 

“Doesn’t look like it,” Simon argued back, “See me after we dismiss.”

With that, Imani finished what she said and broke them all into teams. All but one. 

“What was that about,” Imani asked the tall brooding man. 

“He had something funny to say,” Ghost began, "I want to hear it since it was so important to say it during your debrief.”

Imani knew what he was talking about. She noticed them laughing almost the entire time she was talking. She was going to be harsh on them during their training, but then Ghost called one of them. So when the two approached them, Imani and Simon had a no-nonsense air around them. 

“So,” Imani began, “We both saw you two boys chopping it up in formation? Mind letting us in on the joke?”

“Uh,” the one who was caught laughing began, “It was nothing-”

“Oh no, it’s obviously something since you had to say it while I was talking. So say it.”

“Listen, Umbra-” the one who said the joke began. 

“That’s ma’am to you, private,” Ghost interrupted, his voice hard and firm, “Don’t forget she outranks you by a mile. Now answer the fucking question.”

“It was just something I heard, sir,” he replied. 

“What are your names privates,” Imani asked. 

“Private Matthew Dehart ma’am,” The one who told the joke answered. 

“And you?”

“Private Robert Rounds, ma’am.”

“Dehart, Rounds, let me give you a little word of advice,” Imani began, stepping closer. Even though both boys were at 5'10 and 6'0 respectively, and Imani was only 5’6, the boys felt intimidated by her presence and how she stared them down. It was like a mother reminding her kids who’s boss. 

“My job is to make sure you're prepared for the expected and unexpected. If you wanna go out there and die and have your mothers bury you, by all means. But I will not, have you two buffoons poor self control reflect bad on me.”

“Ma’am”

“Did I say you can speak,” Imani began, “Until you graduate from this program you are nothing more than my bitch, so you only speak when I say so. Now tell me, what the fuck was so funny that you couldn’t wait until you were dismiss. Right fucking now.”

The whole time she went off on the two, Ghost just watched. To everyone, he was just an unmoving statue that looked at this display with a neutral face that gave nothing away. But beneath that exterior, he’d lie to say he wasn’t a little turned on. He always loved a woman with authority. Especially one who wasn’t afraid to use it. And right now, how she got these two boys looking was enough to impress him. 

“It was a joke another soldier told us and a bunch of other guys here ma’am,” Rounds answered. 

“What was it? Private Dehart, repeat it. To my face.”

Dehart hesitated for a moment, but he knew the longer he kept silent the worse it was gonna be, “You think she’ll still be barking orders if General Barnes wasn’t her daddy or using that big ass of hers, ma’am.” 

Imani wasn’t shocked about the ass part, she’s heard that since basic. But the daddy part, now that pissed her off more than anything. She tries to keep her father down low. She wants her accomplishments to speak for themselves, not to have her father to thank. So, for a bunch of snot-nosed privates to know who her father is should be next to impossible. Unless-

‘Davis,’ both Imani and Simon thought in anger. 

“Ma’am, we’re so-” Rounds began. 

“I don’t wanna hear your half ass apologies,” Imani interrupted, “If you're truly sorry, you’d never have repeated it.”

The two soldiers didn’t know what to do. They knew better than to beg Ghost to help them out. But they fought tooth and nail to get here, and they weren’t going to make this mistake ruin them. But before they could say anything plead their case, Imani said, “If your really sorry, then you’ll win this event and beat those PMCs asses!”

That caused both to pause and look at her in confusion.

“Ma’am?”

“Tell me, how old are both of you?”

“We’re 19, ma’am,” Rounds answered. 

“Old enough to know better, but young enough to listen to those who don’t have your best interest at heart,” Imani began, “I won’t say what you said wasn’t insulting. That’d be a lie. But as someone who was once in your shoes, I understand how these types of things can get around. But in the future, know when to open your mouth and when not to. That can be the difference between you going home yourself or in a body bag.”

“Ma’am, yes ma’am,” The two said in unison.

“Good,” Imani said. 

“Don’t let this happen again, you understand,” Ghost said, speaking for the first time in a while.

“Does that mean we’re still-” 

“For now,” Ghost answered, getting so close the two boys had to crank their heads up to look him in the eyes, “But if I hear this type of language from you to blokes again, I’ll have your ranks. We clear?”

“Sir, yes, sir!”

“Good,” Imani answered, “Were you provided with bite suits by chance?”

“We were, ma’am,” Dehart answered as he and Rounds moved their collars so she could see the suits underneath their uniforms. 

“Good,” Imani smiled, “I’m gonna give ya a ten-second head start. Consider this your punishment.” 

Before they could question what, Imani whistled a quiet and fast tune. That was when they saw the Alpha, who hadn’t moved much since the beginning, start to get up. With a yawn, he walked over to Imani and sat beside her. 

“Ready for your chase down, buddy,” Imani smiled sweetly at him, scratching the back of his ears. Looking back towards the boys, who now had a horrified look on their faces, Imani still had that smile and look of glee in her eyes. And to the boys' absolute horror, she began to count down. 

Wasting no time, the two boys ran as fast as they could in the obstacle course. Once she hit one, Imani pointed to the two in the distance and told Alpha to fetch.

As he rushed ahead to handle that, Imani and Simon looked at one another. 

“Davis is a problem Lt,” Imani said. 

“Yeah,” Simon agreed, “I’ll have to have another chat with him.”

“We both do,” Imani corrected. 

“You sure you wanna be in this?”

“I already am in this Ghost,” Imani stared up at him, “At this point, I’m one second away from putting him in his place.”

Ghost and Imani continued to observe and guide the trainees through their training by making a sound that sounded like a mixture of a huff and a chuckle. If they failed to complete their task, Alpha had the time of his life while they all screamed in fear of the terrifying jaws of a wolf dragging them back to his owner for a verbal beatdown. 

But as the day went on and they continued to observe the recruits, Imani’s anger grew. So when Ghost finally dismissed everyone, the two wasted no time and went to where Davis was currently working on base. 

Administration Office: 6:00 PM

After leaving the training grounds, Ghost and Umbra began to walk to Davis’s current position as an administrative assistant in the base's headquarters. 

The two stormed into the building, ignoring all questions thrown at them. Especially Imani. But once she caught sight of the man, Imani stalked over to him and socked him right in the face with all her strength. She heard a satisfying crack after the impact. She broke his nose. 

“WHAT THE HELL,” Davis yelled, holding onto his now bloody nose. 

“YOU GOT A LOT OF SHIT TO SAY BEHIND MY BACK DAVIS,” Imani yelled as she grabbed him by the front of his uniform, “WHY DON’T YOU SAY IT TO MY FUCKING FACE HUH?”

“WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON OUT HERE,” The base commander, Colonel Samuel Wiley, came out of his office and looked at his second lieutenant being handled by the most talked-about sergeant on base. 

“Lieutenant,” Wiley looked to Ghost, “Please explain to me why your sergeant has her hands on my assistant?”

“'Cause it looks like your assistant can’t catch a hint,” Ghost answered, never taking his eyes off of Davis, “Did I tell you to leave her alone?”

“You told me to stay away from her, never said anything about telling everyone how much of a daddy’s girl she was. Hell, I’m sure she and daddy dearest loved taking baths together huh?”

That had Imani seeing red. Bringing him closer, Imani delivered one of the most satisfying (for her) and devastating (for everyone else watching) headbuts right in the nose. That caused the man to cry out even more in pain, but he was then kicked in the chest that knocked him on his ass. 

Moving her hair out of her face, Imani never took her eyes off of him, “Alpha! Pin!”

Before anyone could react, Alpha was on top of Davis, his front paws pressing down painfully on the place where Imani kicked him. Davis was lying in shock because right on top of him was a grey wolf with its teeth bared, and drool was coming trickling out. Waiting for the command to bite. 

“You see now,” Imani said, kneeling down next to him, a look of pure animosity and disgust all over her face, "This is what I can do if I really want to. I don’t need my dad to put a pathetic, insignificant, spineless man like yourself in your place.” 

“You-”

A quick and hard smack across his face had him quiet. "HEY! SPEAKING TO ME IS A PRIVILEGE! YOU DO NOT HAVE PRIVILEGES!” 

The only thing he could do was look at her in anger, while everyone but Simon looked on in shock. 

“Now then, let me tell you how this is gonna go,” Imani began, her voice stern, “I’m gonna move past the incestuous comment you just made about me and my father, a four-star general. Because if I think any more of it, I may give Alpha the order. So be grateful that you didn’t use the last of my patience. Moving forward, from now on, you’ll be living as a walking corpse. To me, my team, and even the rats in the mess hall. I don’t want to hear about you, I don’t want to see you, hell, I don’t even want to hear you breathe. Because if I hear one more comment about me from your dirty mouth, I won’t hold Alpha back, and he’ll tear out your throat before you can even scream.” 

Not waiting for an answer or comment, Imani lifted herself off the floor and looked towards Colonel Wiley. " Sorry for the disruption, Colonel. I hope you enjoy your night. Alpha, back!”

Hearing the command, Alpha gave the man one last growl and got off him. 

With that, Imani walked out of HQ, shocking the others inside. 

Simon looked to Davis like a disappointed father, “I told ya. Now look at ya.

Looking back towards Wiley, Simon said, “Keep that trollop in line. Because neither me nor our Captain will reprimand her or hold her back.”  

With that, Simon left the HQ, right behind Imani. But the whole way out, Simon couldn’t help but chuckle. ‘Man, what a woman!’

Next: Chapter 14

[quibbs126]

[NEW Cursed Rarepair is here]

Can you make the fankid of..

Dark Cacao x Moonlight?

I finally got off my ass and drew him, so finally, this is Midnight Choco Cookie

I say all that because I have had his backstory figured out for probably over a year at this point, I just never got around to drawing his design

Okay, so basically the story of Midnight Choco’s origin is that Dark Cacao Cookie had wished for a child (MC is supposed to be older than Dark Choco, so Cacao doesn’t have a kid yet at this point). Moonlight heard his wish, and felt moved by his sincerity, so she decided to grant that wish and then created and sent Midnight Choco down to him from the stars

Moonlight and Dark Cacao aren’t together in this universe, it’s just that due to making Midnight with her magic, he’s also got some of her dough in there too. She’s basically more like a magic donor

Midnight Choco here is a warrior in the World of Dreams, and he spends his days battling nightmares, whether they come to harm train passengers or the individual Cookies having those dreams. And in the latter case, he usually tries to talk with and help those Cookies overcome those fears. He’s basically like Princess Luna in Friendship is Magic

He’s got some sort of helmet and also moniker for his nightmare fighting talents, but I haven’t really figured out what those are yet, so just know he has them. He’s incredibly powerful and a skilled fighter, but he’s also a very kind and sweet soul, just wanting to help those with the power he wields

However, not all is well with Midnight Choco. As far as he’s aware, he’s merely a construction of the Dream World to protect itself, like many others that inhabit and maintain it. He never leaves the Dream World. Not only that, but he has no real memory of having any sort of family. He feels some form of connection with the Slumbering Moon, but has never quite traveled to meet her

The truth of Midnight Choco is that he has in fact, been in a coma for the past 25-30 years of his life, slumbering within the walls of the Black Citadel

He grew up with his father, being raised in the Black Citadel and learning the ways of the sword from him. His extraordinary origins and seeming connection with the stars also led to him having quite an amount of stories surrounding him, being “the prince born from the stars, gifted to the king from the heavens itself”, among other things

When he was a teenager, Dark Choco was baked, and he got along pretty well with his little brother, for what time they had together

But then a couple years later, one night, Midnight Choco went to sleep, but never woke up. That following day it was assumed he had simply overslept, but as the day, and inevitably following days went on, it became increasingly concerning. He was still alive, and seemingly fine, but he wouldn’t wake up. Dark Cacao tried methods both physical and magical, but nothing could be done. The circumstances were made even more confusing by the fact that no one knew what caused it, because there was no trace of any poison or curses in his body, or anything strange that had happened recently, Midnight simply went to sleep and didn’t wake up

He has stayed this way ever since, and Dark Cacao has him kept in a room under constant watch, should someone attack him or if he potentially wakes up. He visits him often

What actually happened to Midnight Choco is that he accidentally awakened his power to go into the World of Dreams, and in the process of doing so, since he had done it incorrectly, gave himself amnesia, basically starting his life over in the Dream World and becoming the fighter of nightmares he is today, and subsequently believing he comes from the World of Dreams

He can in fact, break this spell and wake back up in the real world, but he doesn’t know he has this ability, nor does he believe he comes from the real world, so he wouldn’t go looking for a way to access this power. Though perhaps one day, he’ll learn the truth and wake up

He’s met both his father and his brother within their dreams and nightmares, but neither parties really recognize each other, due to dream weirdness and Midnight’s knight attire covering his face. He is semi aware of what’s been going on in the Dark Cacao Kingdom, like Dark Choco’s banishment, Caramel Arrow, Affogato and the like, but it’s basically been pieced together from the secondhand dream accounts, and due to his amnesia he doesn’t feel much personal connection to these events for himself, he just knows some of what’s going on in the real world

And I think that’s about it on Midnight Choco’s character. Wow I really did have a lot to say. Well, on to design things

So I got the name Midnight Choco from an ice cream flavor that I think I’ve seen around. It’s mostly because it’s chocolate and has night connections, but it works

Midnight chocolate ice cream:

So I admit, he doesn’t look as great as I have been hoping he would, but he has a design now, so I should just be happy with that

I admit, I didn’t really know what I was doing with his armor, I was just kind of trying to make it look good. The feet may not be great though. ToA Dark Choco ended up being a good reference for me

I originally wasn’t going to have gold, but all the saturated dark blues were getting too much, so it breaks up the colors

His sword is supposed to be like a clock hand. I originally drew it for Dusk Choco, but I thought it might look cooler on Midnight, since he’s the one descended from a Legendary and all. But it was a matter of copy/paste, so I don’t know how good it looks on him. But drawing a weapon was the main reason I put off drawing him, so it’s fine I suppose

I really wanted to add some gold gradient to the pants, but it just never looked right, so they have to stay just plain. Though I did change them and subsequently his hair to be a dark purple, so it looks a bit better

I honestly don’t really know what to say in this section. He may not be my best, but he at least has a design, and it isn’t the worst thing ever, so it’s fine

And yeah, that’s Midnight Choco. I think I’m too attached to him honestly, I want fanfiction of him. But yeah, I hope you enjoy him yourselves

[gamerbot-22]

I doubt that they'll do this but I really hope that Hoyo just... keeps the old TB lines in the game.

I ask this because 1. I'm really attached to Caleb's performance as the Trailblazer (I've only heard Stelle's voice lines off-handedly online so I'm singling out Caleb and not Rachel (but obviously I think her voice lines should stay in the game too)) and 2. I think there's a precedent for it in the canon.

Idk if there's much crossover in fanbase but I feel like Hoyo could realistically pull a TMNT 2012 Season 3 recast. For those who don't know, Leonardo's VA was fully replaced in Season 3 and the change was justified in-canon as "Leo got his ass beat in the Season 2 finale and was in a coma for a while. His vocal chords have been damaged so now he sounds more gravely than he used to."

Like... I feel like saying "TB coming back to life after crashing in Amphoreus caused their voice to change, so now they sound like this" is pretty easy to do. It lessens the load on the programmers and new VAs, allows for the voices fans are attached to to remain in the game, and adds an extra layer of depth to the change in-world.

Again, I doubt they'll do it (when Tingyun/Fugue got recast, all of Tingyun's voice lines were redone by the new VA) and I'm sure that this kind of recast has as lot more riding on it by virtue of this being a video game and not a TV show, but idk. A Man Can Hope.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

reading roundup: june 2024

before I get started on June, I have to issue a correction from May: I forgot to include a book!

last year I backed Iron Circus Comics' erotic anthology My Monster Girlfriend, edited by Andrea Purcell and Amanda Lafrenais, and it finally arrived just ahead of pride. My Monster Girlfriend contains 15 stories by all by different artists, and features protagonists who get it on with everything from the classic ghosts, werewolves, and vampires to a reality-warping angel (?) who contains infinite dimensions, a sleep paralysis demon, and an all-consuming flesh monster hivemind.

while I would have liked to see a little more variety in the freakishness of the actual sex, the anthology is a lot of fun and shows off a great diversity of art styles and scenarios in which one might get down to clown with a monster girlfriend. my personal favorites were Feather by Kanesha C. Bryant, in which an intrepid pervert boldly attempts to locate their girlfriend's genitalia; MonsterHER Under the Bed by Bont and Wes Brooke, which puts a cute, sexy little spin on the monster under the bed; Forest Wedding by Otava Heikkilä, which reads like an old timey fable except it ends in a giant forest woman getting crazy fisted by her new trans husband; and Girl Fiend by InnKeeperWorm, which is infinitely jackoffable even though, frankly, the hellhound should have stayed in her more monstrous canine form to fuck.

okay, now onto the June reading! I found myself reaching the end of the month surprised that I had added so few books to my 2024 spreadsheet, and then I realized: it's fucking PRIDE MONTH and I'm a career queer. I spent most of June either busting ass working various events or in a coma recovering from said events; no wonder I didn't read as much as I thought I would. I also gave up on one novel after sinking close to 200 pages in it, which means the list is even shorter, but trust me: the DNF was the right decision.

so, who made the cut for pride?

The Monsters We Defy (Leslye Penelope, 2022) - this book was a romp! it's fun! it's a hoot, dare I say! this is a historical urban fantasy that takes place in the Black society of 1920s Washington, DC. protagonist Clara and her band of ragtag magical misfits have a heist to pull off against one of the most powerful Black women in DC, with their own curses and powers at stake. it's a fun story with a neat magic system and lots of words that are capitalized so you know they're Magical and Important, and it's a read that goes down real easy. strong recommendation if you find yourself in a slump!

Just for the Cameras (Viano Oniomoh, 2023) - my first foray into independently published romance! and it was... fine. the plot's a little patchy, sure, but it's definitely not the worst romance I've ever read, and at least a throuple made for a nice change of pace. AND nobody's seething with jealousy or insecurity about multiple partners? you love to see it. this book was apparently originally intended to be a novelette and it definitely could have stayed that way, but if bisexual Black hotties sucking and fucking is what you seek then you're going to have a great time. TW: 2/3 main characters are British.

Strange Bedfellows: Adventures in the Science, History, and Surprising Secrets of STDs (Ina Park, 2021) - to the surprise of absolutely no one who knows me, this is one of my very favorite nonfiction reads of the year so far. I cannot emphasize this enough: if you like the way that I talk about STIs and sex ed on this blog then I think you'll really like this book, because having read this book I desperately want to be her friend. she brings so much passion and energy to her work that it bursts right off the page and is - pardon this awful pun - absolutely infectious.

Survivor (Octavia E. Butler, 1978) - for those you not in the know, this book is kind of a get. it's the only book of Butler's that was never reprinted, so now you can only read it if you get ahold of a super expensive original edition OR if you, hypothetically, find a PDF online and print off the entire thing on your work printer. and I'm so glad I did the latter, because holy shit this book whips ass. the book was apparently disavowed for its lack of connection to the rest of the Patternist series, which is true but oh my god, the story is SOOOO cool anyway. we've got a human woman named Alanna who grew up feral on Earth only to be adopted by a Christian cult who are GOING INTO SPACE to preserve the human race, but it turns out there are already intelligent people on the new planet and they have Feelings about what the future of these human missionaries is going to be. it's on Alanna to navigate the clashing cultures and tension between the humans and two warring groups of aliens, and it is fucking URGENT. I don't say this lightly but I think this has ascended to be in my top three Butler novels.

No Name in the Street (James Baldwin, 1972) - ooooooh my god you guys!! oh my god!!! I've never read any of Baldwin's long form nonfiction, but within pages I knew that this was going to pretty permanently change my brain. this memoir-ish book delves into, among other things, Baldwin's witnessing of the American civil rights movement, including the deaths of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Medgar Evers. woven around that is the alienating experience of being a Black man with exactly enough cultural cache and social clout to sometimes isolate him from the people he grew up with but not nearly enough to buy acceptance or safety in a white society, emphasized by Baldwin's unfinished struggle to free a friend from prison after a wrongful murder charge. and somehow that's barely doing the book justice! it's so vast and incisive and weary and impassioned and it did, truly, have me jotting down the names of everything Baldwin ever wrote to make sure I can read it all. as much as I bemoan my habit of impulse reserving books from the library, I really am indebted to the Stacks podcast for getting this on my radar.

[disasterfandoms]

Don't Go Where I Can't Follow, Chapter Two || A Seal Team Story

A/N: This is Chapter two of the story that started this entire series: The Fix it! I will have the masterlist and the first chapter of the story linked! Reminder that this is set during/after the season 4 finale, and is based on the premise of Metal not dying. Pease note that I nor @bravo-four-seal-team are experts in medicine and therefore there are probably inconcistencies in this story.

TW: suicidal ideation, suicidal attempt. sex, pregnancy, vomit, alcohol use, description of medical procedures, death, near-death, code blue, domestic violence, PTSD, depression, anxiety, graphic language, mental abuse, hallucinations, blood, panic attacks, mention of miscarriage, mention of past abuse, mention of past injury, mention of disabilities, stalking, kidnapping, mention of ventilators, mention of comas, mention of past abuse, mention of stillborns, mention of rape, rape, mentions of gags/bondage.

AO3 Series Masterlist

Chapter 1

It was easy for her to run, she could get away from her thoughts for a while, forget about the emotions, just focus on breathing, where she was going, how she held herself, she just kept moving. They all had their own ways of coping and processing the day, running for her allowed her to escape from everything. 

She was tempted to drop Adonis back to Amelia and then just go back to base, work on the things she needed to do, but she knew that would never happen, knew Amelia would be on her ass if she decided to up and vanish, like she had done multiple times when things got tough. 

She slowed down, checking her watch and seeing the time, she’d stay out for another hour, sitting on the grass she huffed, getting the water bottle she had picked up and a collapsible bowl, popping it open then filling it so the german shepherd could drink. She never took her phone with her, it was still sitting on the table at Amelia and Trent’s place, she really wished she was overseas, least she would be able to focus and keep busy, no one would complain if she didn’t eat, there were times when they couldn’t, and they could only have protein bars, which she hated, but would eat. 

The Marine soon stood up, starting at an easy pace, before picking up speed and running with Adonis back home, well back to Amelia’s. She hated having to stay at hers, always feeling like she was just getting in the way of things. Eventually, she did get back, removing Adonis’ leash and letting him inside, she followed behind, the house was dark and quiet, so she would keep quiet as well, moving silently, locking the door and moving to get water. She was now exhausted, so sleep would hopefully come easily to her. 

“How was your run? Hi Donnie! Hi baby, you have fun? Hmm? Gonna sleep with me tonight? T’s gonna kill us when we comes back, isn’t he?” She would have laughed, seeing Ash jump a foot in the air, had the face mask she put on after her shower allowed her to.

Ash would never admit that Amelia caught her off guard, but she jumped and felt her heart rate skyrocket "the run was good, Adonis was an absolute angel, I'm gonna turn in for the night" she says "I'll need to go to...the store get things in the fridge for when they return." She speaks quietly "How was your call?" She asked as she took a drink of water. As much as she wanted to toss back a glass or two of whiskey, she couldn't, she hadn't eaten, but she also was cutting down on how much she drank "You should be in bed Ames"

“Donnie’s always a good boy, aren’t you?” Adonis barked in response, his tail wagging. Amelia nodded, and he ran upstairs to her bed, jumping on where Trent usually slept and waited. 

“Call was good, Scott was asleep, Trent looked exhausted. And it’s only… 8:30. I’m gonna have a cup of tea and work on the schematic and some ideas on trying to convince Trent on turning the formal dining room, which we don’t use, into a playroom for Willow, a place to keep all the toys her auntie Ash, Uncle Scot-Scot, and her grandparents keep supplying.” She said, poking fun at how they love to spoil her daughter.

The young woman grinned slightly, she had a habit of coming back from wherever she had been deployed to with toys and clothes. 

"Well," she says "You enjoy your tea, but I'm gonna go to sleep." Really she just couldn't continue to stay awake, letting the worry eat at her, it had gotten to the point of the feeling of being hungry and gone, the water she had drunk was the only thing she had since being told about Metal.

"Enjoy your evening Amelia" she smiled to her sister-in-law before moving to the guest room.

“Night Ash, come get me if you need me,” Amelia told the young woman, but in the back of her mind she knew Ashley would rather suffer and die than as for help. She sighed, grabbing a mug and filling it up, before heading back upstairs to Adonis and her laptop, enjoying the time alone. 

——————————————————————

Downside of sleeping on a ship, you could hear every little noise. Voices would bounce around and stop people, the crew from getting a decent sleep. 

Metal was being woken and checked on by  medical staff, which he wasn't too pleased about, however they were beginning to prepare for transport off the ship and to a plane.

The rest of Bravo had been woken and told to go pack their gear and get sorted out. There was still some tension between Clay and Sonny, which wasn't helping matters "Think he regrets his words?" Clay asked. 

"Who?" 

"Metal" Sonny added, looking over, to the others "you know 'Chernobyl of fun' from where I'm standing none of it was fun" the Texan said as he zipped his bag closed.  

Clay nodding "Pretty sure he jinxed himself" he sighed 

Jason rolled his eyes "Yeah well someone still owes him a case of beer." The others stopping and looking at Clay and Jason "Clay did the needle decompression" Bravo one informed "First time" 

"Thought I was out of firsts" Clay smirked. Trent during this time had kept quiet "How's the family holding up?" Brock asked. Drawing the attention to Trent who still looked exhausted. 

"Amelia is trying to hold it together, Ashley I'm pretty sure is on her way to a breakdown, someone else talk to that stubborn ass of a man about calling his family" Trent huffed. 

"I'll give it a shot, but I make no promises I'll get anywhere" Jason states, Soto appearing in the doorway "Be ready to go, got word that they're sending a bird for us in the next hour." He informed them. 

The team all relaxed knowing that they were getting out and away from the ship and never needed to be on one again for a long time. "Hey Brock" Sonny smirked "You still gotta tell Metal about the fun he missed out on" 

The team laughed, while the dog handler did not look too impressed to be the one to speak up and say something.

——————————

After Jason finally got all his stuff packed away, he made his way down to Medbay to see his brother. Jason, deep down, feels like shit that Metal got injured saving his and Clay’s asses from the RPG. Metal is his teammate now, he felt the need to protect him as such. It always hurts a little to go down and see him, just because, god, he must be in agony from the wounds he suffered. 

Jason walked into Medbay, finding Metal being poked and prodded by the nurses, trying to make sure he’s safe and stable for transport. He had to laugh at the sight, Metal looked terrified of needles. 

“Don’t.” Metal growled, then smiled politely at the nursing staff who seemed a bit afraid of him. 

That caused Jason to double over in laughter. “I-I’m sorry, Metal, but you’re afraid of needles?”

“Always have been. Pain in the ass to give vaccines to. Why are you here when they’re loading us all up on the same aircraft?”

“Trent asked someone to get it through your skull to call your family.”

Metal groaned, shaking his head. He didn’t want to talk to anyone yet, he’d rather just wait until they were all stateside and they could just see it for themselves. “Not happening, Hayes.”

“Why the hell not? Just send an email to the both of them saying you’re fine, you love them, and you’ll see them at the tarmac.” Jason huffed, putting his hands on his hips. He didn’t understand why Metal was being so damn stubborn about this. 

“Dammit, Jason. Not ready to talk to anyone about any of it, and I know my family. They won’t leave it alone.” Metal said, angry at the injuries, at his sister’s stubbornness. 

“They’re worried about you, Metal. Trent’s worried about all of you. Tell them you don’t want asked anything, not yet.”

Metal scoffed, “Yeah, like that’ll work. You met Amelia? Ashley? They’re both equally as annoyingly good at making someone talk.”

It hit Jason what might actually be wrong with Metal, why he won’t talk to his family. “You’re worried you won’t operate again. Is that it?”

“Hayes I swear to god, leave it alone.” Metal said menacingly, and it would have worked if he was able to do anything.

Jason just shook his head, and sighed, “Scott, send them the email. You’re alive, they don’t expect you to be 100%. Ashley, who I know you love, is going through some rough shit because you won’t talk to her.”

Metal sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, trying to get the headache to go away. He finally resigned to emailing them, nodding, and shooing Jason away before everyone gets yelled at. He then sends an email to both Amelia and Ashley, before shutting down his laptop and pulling out his book again. 

This was gonna be a long flight home.

——————————————————————

The time it took from the ship to land, to board the plane, was already hell, especially for Metal since both Clay and Sonny had begun to quote things at him, Trent silently watching from where he sat, offering no help to his friend at all. 

They had 6 hours in the air, before they landed home. 

Trent just hoped both Clay and Sonny realised that Metal could probably kill them with the book he was holding, and was trying to finish. “Bet you totally regret the fun meter idea” Sonny grinned, Clay nodding “Got jinxed man” 

“If you like living you’ll leave me alone” Metal responded, trying to focus on the page he was re-reading for the 8th time. Trent sighed “Clay, Sonny, I got watch go sleep” he suggested, no one argued, both SEALs moving towards where they had set up so they could sleep. 

“Don’t start” Metal warned, Trent raised an eyebrow “Don’t start what? I’m sitting here keeping an eye on you” he responded, almost challenging his friend to make an excuse about what he thought he was doing. 

“You sent Jase to talk to me about emailing the girls” Metal frowned “I told you I would do it when I was ready” 

“When would that be? Once you got to a hospital stateside, where, you’d deny them entry for visiting? Or maybe you plan on shutting them out fully? You do realise your gonna be stuck with them, if it wasn’t Jason, I can guarantee, Amelia would have called Blackburn to order you to make contact” 

The look on his friend's face was enough to tell him that he got off lightly with Jason talking to him “I think you’d prefer Amelia and Ashley checking on you, rather than these guys pestering you.” he said, leaning back and crossing his arms “Won’t be long until you have to deal with Amelia worrying, she’ll be at the tarmac, your girlfriend however is gonna wait until your settled in hospital to check on you. Get some sleep.” Trent stated, removing the book from Metal’s hands. 

The unimpressed look Metal shot Trent spoke a thousand words,but Trent really didn't care at this point.

______________________________________________

4:30 AM. 

She’s going to kill Trent for making this her normal. Here she was, though, wide awake before dawn, Adonis sleeping peacefully where her husband should be laying. She gives him the lightest kiss on the head, and petted him a little bit before getting up to start the day. 

She first checks on her daughter, making sure she was okay before going downstairs and starting a pot of coffee, considering what to do for food since Ashley has takeout from the night before. She also needs to go to the store, get Trent some of his favorites before he comes home, it helps him get back to normal faster after a deployment. Amelia gets a cup of coffee, sits down at the bar and opens her laptop, checking her email. 

She’s received two of importance: one from Trent, saying they were on their way home and should be there by noon; and the other from Scott. She quickly opens the email from her big brother, which reads: 

“Mellie,

You need to stop worrying about me. I’m okay! As long as they have me drugged up, I can barely feel any of it. You probably just rolled your eyes at that, and if so, then mission accomplished. 

Take care of Ashley for me while I’m stuck on this godforsaken ship, and while I’m laid up in the hospital stateside. She’ll never admit it to me, but she’s probably terrified, unnecessarily so. 

Also, where the hell have my Willow pictures and videos?!? Thought you promised me at least one video and one picture a day of my little Willow tree. Yes I still call her that, and yes it’s still hilarious to me you named her after a tree. 

Most of all: Take care of yourself while I’m trapped. Know this stuff is never easy on you, even though you hide it well. Lean on your husband, dammit, it’s what he’s there for. Well, when he is there. 

Love you, stop worrying. 

Scotty.”

Amelia’s eyes couldn’t contain her tears as she read the email, she’s been trying to keep it together since she found out, but hearing from him broke the dam. She let them fall for a few minutes, everyone was  still asleep upstairs and she didn’t need to be strong for anyone in that moment. After that, though, she wiped up those tears and went on when her morning, drinking coffee and reading the news, making a grocery list, and then getting ready to get her daughter’s morning started after she got dressed.

————————

She was never a fan of sleeping, it's always been that way, she would nap here and there, 20-40 minutes each time. 

One thing that she hated was not knowing, she preferred having a plan, routine, so by 5am she was up, bed straightened, made to military standard like how she was taught. She began with push ups, which changed to sit ups then squats. 

She would need to eat something, so she reached for her uniform pulling out one of many protein bars she carried, opening then eating it. 

Why did they all taste like paper?

Grabbing paper from her notebook she carried she wrote down things she needed to do. 

She grabbed her toothbrush from her bag sighing slightly, she was supposed to be deploying in 24 hours, now she wasn't. Going to the guest shower room, she turned the tap on, brushing her teeth, once that was down, she grabbed a quick shower, dressed in what she had, plain sandy colour t-shirt and cargo pants, tying her hair into a bun out her face. Then pulled on her boots and headed downstairs. 

Second thing on the list, make sure Amelia was ok, see if she needed anything picked up "Morning Amelia" she said when she saw her friend "I'm gonna head out, gotta feed that kids, Void got into the main container again" she says showing her the video alert she got from the feeder "You ok?" She frowned, looking at her friend "You've been crying" she states worried, watching the woman Infront of her "Trent and Scott ok?" 

Seeing her friend nod, she raised and eyebrow "So why were you crying, don't give me that look" she warns "I know you, and know what your look when you've been in tears"

“It’s nothing, I’m fine Ash. Seriously, nothing’s wrong. Got an email from Trent, they’re on their way home, said something about them touching down at noon,” Amelia says, smiling. She’s omitting Scott’s email purposely, she doesn’t want Ash to feel like something is wrong with their relationship on purpose if he for some godforsaken reason didn’t email his girlfriend too.

Ashley shrugged "Alright, you need anything picked up? I'm gonna head out, gotta drop something at base, sort out the cat feeder, actually probably replace it, then head to the store,”  she says. 

The marine leant against the wall, checking the time "I logged out of the email account, pretty sure sitting refreshing that app was not helping my sanity." She smiles slightly, clearing her throat "Better crack on with the day. See if I can get my co to let me cover any training session while I'm stateside" she hums, picking up her keys "If you need anything call or text me, I can pick up a few things to save you rushing about"

Amelia smiled, “I’m making my grocery list now, Trent has a rough time readjusting so I try and accommodate by getting his favorites for him. Me and Willa-loo are going when they open, then it’s just a matter of getting her ready to see her Dad in person for the first time in two months. He told me last night he’s worried she’ll think he’s a stranger.” Amelia chuckled, then continued, “Hey Ash? … check your email.”

“Willow will be so happy to see Trent” Ashley grinned, glancing at the time “I will check later, once I sorted out a few things required to do” she hummed. “If you need anything, let me know, I’ll see you later at some point. Gonna be a while at Base” she huffed, walking towards the front door.

“I know that, but he’s not convinced. Bye Ash, read your email and i’ll see you at the hospital later.” Ameli said, waving goodbye to her friend and getting on with her day, starting with taking Adonis out and then getting the baby’s outfit picked out.

______________________________

Time passed quickly, and soon everyone found themselves back on home soil, the team made sure Metal was safely off the plane, jokes being shared, the team laughing and smiling, promise to visit Metal when they could, of course he did not support that idea and wanted to be left alone and not be disturbed, as Medics took over the transport to the ambulance. 

Blackburn bringing Amelia and Willow over to their family, knowing that Amelia would settle better once she had eyes on her older brother, the commander of DEVGRU looking to Bravo, congratulating them on a job well done, telling everyone to go home, while he made sure everyone had downtime until they were needed again. 

Trent grinning as he saw his wife, and his daughter, who had grown since the last time he saw her.  The rest of the team moved to their own families, but told the little family to call them, if they needed anything. 

It was always like that, when someone was hurt, or it was a fresh relationship or newborn, everyone jumped in to offer a helping hand, it was always like that. 

“Hey sailor, how was your flight?” Amelia asked, laughing as Trent dropped his bag and barreled into them, giving her possibly the biggest hug she’s ever gotten in her life. 

“Fine, full of people annoying Scott while he tried to read. Hi sunshine! Can I hold?” He asked their daughter, making a “come here” motion with his hands. He was incredibly relieved when she moved her grip off of Amelia and reached for him instead. 

“Think someone missed her Daddy as much as I did.” Amelia smiled, hugging Trent on one side while Willow was happily kicking her feet, looking around the tarmac. She waved at Scott, before removing herself from Trent and walking over to him. Trent nodded at her to go, he knew she needed to see him and he was happy to just be holding his daughter. 

Holy shit, she’s grown so much since he last saw her. 

Amelia didn’t take long with Scott, just gently hugging him and telling him she’s glad he’s alive, before she nodded to the paramedics that they can take him.  She watched them be wheeled away, before walking back to her family, beyond happy her husband was home, was safe. 

“You ready to go, love?” She asked Trent, whose entire focus was on Willow, talking to her about how big she’s gotten. 

“Yeah, can we stop by the house, let me shower and change before we go?” He asked, moving to the side of the vehicle with the car seat, putting Willow in and making sure she’s secured. 

“Yeah of course. Probably easier if we let her have her morning nap at home, let her eat lunch and then leave. Gonna text Ash, tell her he’s on his way to the hospital and we’ll be there around one.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“Hey, T?”

“Yeah honey?”

“I love you, and I’m glad you’re home.”

“I love you too.”

---------------------

The second Amelia text her, she grabbed the things she knew would be needed for Metals hospital stay. It took an hour to get to the hospital.

It then took her a while to actually go into the hospital, she mostly just sat staring at the building, god she hated these places, she waited for a while so she was sure that Scott was by now in his room, probably complaining, maybe sleeping, most likely reading. 

Asking for the information, and sharing her relation to him, she made her way to the ward and then the room, taking a breath, waiting until the nurses and doctors left the room. Knocking on the door and smiling slightly “Hey” she whispered “I brought you, well things I guess you’ll need” she says, holding the bag up. 

She was surprised when he closed the book, and set it down “Have you even slept?” he asks, raising an eyebrow, Ash rolled her eyes, setting the bag down on the chair next to the bed “Few hours here and there, how are you holding up?” she asked. 

“Surviving, in a shit load of pain, but I'm alive” Metal responded, reaching out and taking Ashleys hand “Stop worrying.” 

“Oh please. We both know that I won't quit worrying about you, just like you worry about me” Ashley tuts “You know that talk.” she smirks, seeing the look of confusion cross his face “Something along the lines of, you can be heroic, but you need to deal with the consequences?” she states. 

“Ashley, don’ start” he warns, but Ashley laughed “Like I would, as much as I love you, and your need to look after the team, I need you to get better, then I’ll rip you a new one for freaking me, right, Ames says she and T will be here at one, but...I gotta bounce, finish sorting things out, but I will be back, you play nice” 

“I'm always nice”

“Only when you want to be, get some sleep.”

“You too Ashley” 

“Eh I’ll sleep when your home” 

______________________________________________________________

Coming home was always weird for Trent. He tried to spend his deployment completely focused on the present, trusting Amelia has the home front settled, so he can enjoy himself if he can and focus on getting home safely. 

That focus, however, comes with a price when he comes home. Everytime he walks through the door, for the first couple weeks, he feels like a stranger and a guest, all at the same time. Doesn’t matter the state of the deployment, home never feels like home until he gets situated again. 

This deployment is no different. Walking into the house feels foreign to him, especially since this was the first time he’s been gone for more than a week since Willow was born. Even though Amelia had cleaned before they picked him up, he still saw the toys, the playpen, not that he minded, helped him to know life went on while he was gone. 

Still, feels a little weird. 

He put his bag down in the entryway, immediately going upstairs to shower, scrub his skin raw, try to was off the stench of the ship, the memories burned into his brain. His mind kept skipping to the last mission, seeing Brock struggle with the terrorist while Ray froze. Then when he froze again in the field, only this time it was both Ray and himself in trouble. He tried to push it out of his mind, he was safe at home, with his wife and daughter. He wouldn’t be able to, though, not for a little while. 

After a while he gets out, changes into clothes that aren’t his uniform, and heads back downstairs, petting Adonis when he sees him. Amelia’s in the kitchen, the baby on her hip, making a bottle. He comes up behind them, putting one arm around Amelia’s waist and digging his face into the crook of her neck. 

“I’ll feed her, go take care of yourself,” Trent offered, letting go and backing up a few steps, letting Amelia turn around. Amelia nods, smiling and leaning her hip with Willow on it towards him, letting him grab her. She gave him the bottle once it was ready, and he went to sit on the couch, propping his feet up, laying Willow down and giving her the bottle. God she’s grown up on him, he couldn’t believe that in just two months she’s as big and strong as she's gotten. 

“I’m, uh, gonna go on a run with Adonis. He got a good one in with Ash last night but it’s been a while since it’s just been the two of us,” Amelia smiled, leaning on the doorframe, her arms crossed, Adonis’s leash in her hand. 

“Go, I got her. Gonna get some snuggling in with Willow and watch something. Have fun, and be careful.”

“We will, won’t we Donnie? Yeah? Ready to go? C’mon! Be back in like an hour.” Amelia smiled, clipping the lease to the German Shepherd and walking out the door.

Trent looked down at his daughter, her bright eyes staring back up at him. Seeing her just instantly puts a smile on his face. He tickles her leg, his fingers going up her side, then pinched her cheeks, causing her to giggle. 

Yeah, he could get used to this.

——————————————————————

Ashley had returned to the hospital, but never went in Metals room, standing watching him read, she was just glad he was relaxed. 

She kept out the way while staff checked on him, letting out a sigh, she moved forward, knocking once again on the door then entering when he looked over "Forgot how fast you get through books" she states leaning against the wall, allowing the nurse the room to move around and do the checks, the marine couldn't tell you what was being checked, all she knew was, her boyfriend was trying to hide the pain "Could he get painkillers or something? He won't ask, he's too stubborn" she grinned. 

Moving to sit down, making sure not to knock the side of the bed. "So, other than, these lovely injuries deployment go ok?" She asked 

"Was slow, boring, Brock got sea sick, Trent decided to research, think it was scurvy?" 

"...Brock got sea sick and he's in the Navy…" she blinked, smirking slightly "Course Trent was more worried about some weird sickness...I swear I thought he was the sane one in the family" seeing the small smile she got from the man. "Heard you managed to create a fight club and take down all of Bravo" 

The injured man chuckled "You'd think they'd know they can't beat me" he said, setting the book down "took the rest of them to tackle me down, somehow turned to the Bravo pile" 

"You get to fight Hayes? If not I want front row seats"

She was happy that Metal was talking to the, though she could see the energy leaving, while sleep tried to take hold. "Babe, rest up, it'll help the pain, when you wake up, I'll be here ok?" She said quietly, watching him nod slowly "Good, gotta get rest before your friends come crashing your peace" she hummed while she watched as the man fell asleep. 

Leaning back in her chair letting out a breath, and closing her eyes, counting to ten before going on her phone and researching some things.

[stuffing-seattle]

Preface: Thank you for bearing with me everyone! I did not expect this to be a 2 part story, but I’m really enjoying it. This is the first story specifically written from a request by a follower, so if you want a story, be sure to PM me. Also let’s try to have a little community fun with this one! Let me know what you want Roberta to do with Carrie. I certainly have some ideas myself 😈😈😈😈 so without further ado:

Carrie Part 1:

“You sure you’ll be ok to watch the place this weekend?” Roberta asked, a tinge of worry coloring her voice. Carrie sighed into the phone and said, “It will be fine! You don’t even have pets or plants to look after. All I have to do is not burn the place down.”

“I’m not worried about you burning the place down, I’m worried about coming home to find my pantries cleaned out again.” Roberta said tersely. “I was hungry, I might have starved.” Carrie whined. “Look, I left the second shelf on the fridge full of stuff for you, please don’t touch anything else.”

“Fine fine.” Carrie waved her hand dismissively, as if shooing a fly away, even though there was no one to see. “Look don’t worry about anything here, go and see your daughter and have fun.” Hesitantly, Roberta agreed, and they said their goodbyes and hung up the phone. Now Carrie was alone…. And terribly bored.

She had been to Roberta’s place a few times, but decided to poke around anyway, if only to relieve the boredom. Her first stop was Roberta’s bedroom. The first thing Carrie noticed was the full length mirror in the room. She took a moment to bask in her figure. She was 27 and had made a point to never miss a meal in her life.

Her body reflected this, and Carrie had been blessed with over the top assets. She had inherited her mother’s hourglass figure, but all of her extra pudge made her curves simply explode. Her breasts could best be described as overripe melons, and her hips and thighs flared so dramatically that she often had to wear skirts or find custom pants to accommodate them. To top it all off, her belly had yet to budge out into a ball, but the results of her common binges were visible. And she loved every inch of it.

*Grrrrllllll* Her belly moaned. She always got hungry when she was bored. But it was only the first hour here, and she had to house sit for three days. She needed to stay strong. To stave off the boredom and her ravenous belly, she began pulling clothes from Roberta’s wardrobe. Roberta was a runner and had maintained her lithe figure even after having her daughter.

Carrie laughed as Roberta’s jeans barely slid up her thigh calf, and outright refused to budge at her thighs. She held up one of Roberta’s A cup bras to her chest and giggled as she could have used the bra as pasties. Finally, Roberta came across what seemed to be a sun dress. Only this dress seemed to be a larger size than everything else in the closet. It dawned on Carrie that this was one of Roberta’s maternity dresses. With a morbid curiosity, Carrie slipped the garment over her head.

She struggled and sucked in and fought the dress for what felt like hours, but she did manage to cram herself in. Even so it was obvious that it was not made for her. It wrapped around her mid section as if it were soaking wet, and you could see every fold and detail of her belly through the strained fabric, including no the deep crater of her naval. Her ass was only half covered by the hem of the dress, even when she was standing upright. And her tits simply spilled out of the poor thing. Her nipples were covered, but only barley, and each step threatened to send the bouncing free of their too-small cage.

Carrie was sweating from the effort of putting on the dress, and her belly could no longer be ignored. *RRRRRRGGGGGGLLLLL* Shit. What was she going to do? She needed to ignore her tummy for as long as possible, or she’d end up cleaning out the kitchen and going into a food coma like last time.

As if someone could hear her thoughts, Carrie waddled into the living room, and saw a perfectly wrapped mini chocolate bar sitting on the ground in the middle of the carpet. Thank God for messy kids and frazzled moms. With more than a little effort, Carrie bent down, and stuffed the chocolate into her gullet. This was perfect. A little scavenger hunt would relieve her boredom, she would be rewarded with snacks, and Roberta’s house would be cleaner. Everyone wins.

So Carrie set out. She found so fallen candy in the kitchen, a piece or two on the stairs, and she followed the trail straight in to what seemed to be the playroom upstairs. Toys were scattered all around the place. *Like playing Where’s Waldo with candy* She thought. It took a lot of attention to detail, but eventually she found what she was looking for. An unopened bag of goldfish, laying forlornly in the corner, right behind a little pink plastic play castle.

Carrie made her way to the corner, but found that the castle was too cumbersome to move in her restrictive dress. She stepped back a moment to ponder what to do. That was when she noticed that the playhouse had a front door that opened perfectly to the window in the back of the house, and just beyond that lay the crackers. Perfect. Carrie got on her hands and knees, and slowly shuffled into the tiny play house. She squeezed herself through the door and her boobs and midsection barely made it through. She put her arms out ahead of her, put them through the window, then pulled the rest of her behind them.

*Thunk* Her tits had managed to flop over the sill of the little window, but her ass was simply too big to fit through the doorway. She knew her fat ass would come back to bite her in the… well… fat ass one day. No matter, she would just scoot back out. Nope. Her tits had made it out the window, but they refused to go back inside alongside her arms. She was stuck.

She was about to start panicking and thrashing, when she heard the front door open downstairs. “Carrie? You here?” Roberta called out. Carrie was embarrassed but relieved. “Up here!” She called out. Carrie could hear her friend’s footfalls as she came up the stairs. “Sorry I’m back so early.” She started to explain. “Her dad got sick and couldn’t make the drop off, so we decided to reschedule- What the fuck are you doing?”

Carrie’s face went bright red. She couldn’t see Roberta, but could hear her voice in the doorway of the playroom. “I’m stuck.” She said simply. “I see that. But how did you manage?” Carrie cleared her throat. “I was, um, cleaning. Look can you just pull me out?”

“Right yeah, of course.” Said Roberta. She came over and gave Carrie’s hips a big tug. She did not budge. She tried a few more times to no effect. “Here let me try pushing.” Roberta said as she went to squat in the corner where Carrie was facing. Before she could get into position, however, she spotted the packet of Goldfish in the corner. “Oh my fucking god.” She said. “Were you eating my kids snacks?”

“No!” Carrie tried to deny it, but her greedy gut gave her away. *RRRRRRRLLLLL* Roberta stepped away from the corner. “You fucking fatass! I can’t believe you!”

“I was hungry.” Carrie whined. “Come on, you can’t leave me like this!”

“I might leave you like that, it might force you to be less of a pig. Maybe I’ll leave you in there until you lose enough weight to get out yourself.” Scolded Roberta. “You can’t I’ll starve!” Cried Carrie. Roberta laughed incredulously. “Starve?” She asked. She bent over and put an arm through the side widow of the play house, and gave Carrie’s ample tummy a squeeze. “You think you’ll starve with all of this?” She then reached back and grabbed two handfuls of Carrie’s ass which didn’t even constitute a third of it. “What about this? You could feed an army off of this for a month.”

Carrie had been feeling a mix of fear and embarrassment up to this point, but now she was feeling something else as well: White-hot arousal. Roberta stood up and Carrie could hear her footsteps retreating. “Where are you going?” Carrie’s cried out. “I’m going to figure out how I wan to deal with you.” Replied Roberta coldly, leaving Carrie to her little plastic prison.

[ghhardysgirl]

Janggi (ch. 2) - PREVIEW - WIP

Chapter 1 HERE, Preview of Ch. 2 after Cut

SPOILERS FOR FIC BELOW

Blue Side (Cho)

Hwang In-ho was jealous of Seong Gi-hun. He didn’t dig too deeply into this emotion, but that was what he felt, if he ever sat down and really thought about it. 

He wanted something Gi-hun had that he himself had lost long ago. 

Hope.

Jealousy was an ugly emotion, one that has led to rather destructive acts throughout history. Still, perhaps it was a better alternative to the emotion In-ho had been feeling up to that point, which was an all-encompassing numbness that had threatened to stamp out any part of him that had still been human. 

He knew that part was still there because it had appeared rather violently the day he shot his brother. 

He had been very put out to discover Jun-ho’s tenacity. Half of him almost wished his brother had never pulled out of his yearlong coma, but then that would have rendered the whole getting his ass out of the water and rushing him to the hospital thing rather meaningless. 

That feeling of trapped helplessness, anything but his brother’s death -- please -- how ironic. 

How often had he seen it in the eyes of the trash here? Ignored it for the satisfaction of knowing they did not deserve to live. 

Did Jun-ho deserve to live? 

Did he deserve to live any more or less than anyone there? 

It wasn’t a question he had bothered asking himself before. 

Before Seong Gi-hun. 

There had been another vote and unsurprisingly, the majority of players -- egged on by Player 100 -- decided to play “One more game!” 

In-ho had even put on a show of telling them off. A young girl, Player 095, had wept and begged. 

“I can’t do this any more!” she cried out. 

The Os didn’t care. No, they cared. About themselves. 

He wanted to grab Gi-hun by the hair and shove his face in it. Ask him why he still believed in any of it. 

The jealousy ate away at him, made him snappy at Jung-bae, who had voted to stay. Didn’t Gi-hun tell the man he had plenty of money? What kind of idiot would risk his life when his friend said he had a stockpile of billions and was obviously willing to share? 

It was clear proof of his degenerate addiction to gambling! He obviously deserved to die, along with every other moron who chose to be there!

How could Gi-hun not see that? 

He nearly screamed it all out loud, but that would have led to his whole plan falling apart, so he settled for sniping at Jung-bae before proffering a half-hearted assurance, and then offering Jun-hee his milk. 

And that was infuriating, too. That Gi-hun had pointed out her innocence, reminded him of his wife and child. 

He supposed that was his own fault, for bringing them up. A gangrened part of him imagined grabbing a gun from a guard and shoot Jun-hee in front of Gi-hun. To tear away any semblance of faith he had that there was any good left in anyone at all. 

But he couldn’t even kill his own brother because he wasn’t numb. He was jealous of Gi-hun. 

Maybe a part of him didn’t want to be rotten flesh inside any more. 

At the moment, he didn’t have access to the whiskey that was keeping him sterilized for the longest time. And Gi-hun was too close, could sniff out the decay in him if he weren’t careful. 

He had taken off his mask with the intent of infecting Player 456 with his own sickness. So he breathed out, let the plague out of him within every false word.  ----

Red Side (Han)

Gi-hun made everyone take the mattresses out and put them below the bunks so they could sleep with more fortification. Jung-bae had complained, but he had been firm. 

The memory of that evening pounded in him, on his skin and against his teeth, nearly being beaten to death by a man with a metal piece from a bunk bed were it not for Ali, for Sang-woo who had fought the man back, who had helped him up and then he had looked around wildly for Player 001 --

-- he arranged the mattress and simply said, “Once the lights go out, somebody might attack us.” 

He explained, about the prize money, about the diabolical way the game was designed. 

And then In-ho had the nerve to say people wouldn’t do such a thing. Gi-hun wanted to prove him wrong, tackle him to the ground and choke the life out of him right then and there. 

He let a flash of fury through. 

“In the previous games,” he said, the metallic taste of it still sharp on buds scraped down to nothing, “dozens of people killed each other at night.”

He said it as a reminder to himself. In-ho didn’t need the details. He knew all about them, didn’t he? Watched it happen every year. 

Gi-hun looked into him, into the man still playing games, telling little jokes to himself, and spoke directly to the Hwang In-ho that must be underneath it all -- the one that didn’t just murder Jun-ho outright. 

“You have no idea how people can change in this place,” he said -- but In-ho knew most of all. Still, he made a show of it, contorted his face into something bewildered then apologetic. 

“All right, I guess I didn’t know what I was talking about,” In-ho replied. “I’m sorry.” 

Gi-hun, driven by Sae-byeok telling him he wasn’t that kind of person, put a hand on In-ho’s chest, felt the proof of a heart. 

“I don’t want you to come to harm,” Gi-hun said. “Your family needs you to come home.” 

He was sincere in the sentiment. In-ho wouldn’t know that he was really talking about Jun-ho, would instead take it to mean the fiction of his wife and child, but to Gi-hun they were one and the same.

In-ho lifted his eyes, then whispered, sharp and mocking. “Doesn’t yours?” 

---

Blue Side (Cho)

Maybe In-ho shouldn’t have brought up Ga-yeong like that. But, well, Gi-hun had started it. 

[harmless-spider]

imagine being lyndon in diablo iii. like.

kormac is a templar, sworn to serve the Light, and it turns out the order is a cult, but he’s still killed demons, dark mages, cultists, skeletons, and other Evil things before. he’s not prepared to fight DIABLO, but he does just in general expect to fight evil when he joins you, and you straight-up tell him that if he follows you he’s helping you kill the skeleton king.

eirena is 1500 years in the future, thanks to a magically induced coma. her sisters are dead when they weren’t supposed to be, and she’s missing a few of her memories, but she still knows that she’s here to help prevent the End of Days. she knows from the start that she’s fighting the apocalypse, you don’t have to explain that bit to her. she’s prepared for this.

lyndon, though? you just kind of stumble across him during a scam gone horribly, horribly wrong, and he decides to tag along with you because you seem like a pretty strong fighter, and you immediately bring him to ruins that only nephalem can enter. like

imagine you’re lyndon. you’re on the run from the mob after a robbery gone wrong, one that got your brother arrested and you revealed as a traitor. it’s been a couple of years since then, and you’ve been pretty good about staying ahead of them thus far. there’s a girl here with a really nice necklace, one that could go for a pretty penny, and you need money to pay off the bank you failed to rob and to try to help out your sister-in-law and her kids while her husband’s in jail. so you’re seducing this girl, right, and it works, but she’s fallen HARD. you don’t want to marry her, or have kids, but that’s okay- you can get the necklace and get out. it’s fine. but uh-oh: the mob found you, tied you up and tossed you aside for later, and are now after the girl you were seducing. you might not want to marry her, but you certainly don’t want her to die either, so when a small group of people come by who look like they can fight you ask them to help you save your friend.

they do in fact help you, but one of them is like, kinda scary, and weirdly powerful. okay. not your problem, you can worry about that some other time. for now, the girl is talking about marriage and kids again, and you’re getting uncomfortable, so you extract yourself from the situation by telling her you’ve got to head off to sell the necklace with the people who helped you.

as you’re leaving, you realise the great big diamond that makes the necklace so expensive is plastic. damn. well, you’re a decent shot, and again, these guys are pretty strong, so you figure sticking with them isn’t such a bad idea. one of them tells the scary one (who seems to be their leader) not to let you come along, but the scary one barely even argues before letting you follow them. directly to an Ancient Ruin.

now this ancient ruin could, in theory, have fun treasures inside for you to sell. however, outside of this ruin stands a whole-ass ghost. the girl who’s with them, who frankly you were starting to think was the most reasonable, immediately knows the ghost by name and goes up to start talking to him, and the scary guy doesn’t seem to question the idea of talking to the ghost.

“so you want to get into the ruin?” the ghost asks. the girl says yes, and he says “well, only a demigod can get in.”

“but no demigod has been born in over a century!” the girl says, and to be honest you were pretty sure that demigods were just myths, but the ghost just says

“that’s what you think.”

the ghost gives you a challenge, and he tells you that only a demigod can complete it. and then the scary one makes the challenge look easy, and you get into the demigod-only ruins, and you’re starting to think maybe you miscalculated when you threw your lot in with them on a whim. then, further in, a witch shows up and fights you over a fragment of a sword, which- okay, sure, whatever. then you go back to the nearby small town, which is currently being ravaged by zombies, and you’re told to go get the third sword fragment from the town across the river, which is currently On Fire.

turns out, sword piece was picked up by the witch from the ruins, and when you get back to town, an old guy gets fucking murdered by her because he wouldn’t fix the sword, and she steals the weird amnesiac you barely talked to, and also the girl turns out to have the power to just sort of Explode sometimes. as soon as the witch is gone the old guy fixes the sword, and turns out it belongs to an angel, which, okay, you did not sign up for this. except you kind of did when you decided to follow the apparently demigod. so you keep following them, because really what else are you gonna do, they don’t seem to hate you yet and they’re apparently stronger than anything else on the planet. and they run off to a mansion and kill a bunch of cultists, rescue the amnesiac, and it turns out he’s the fucking archangel of justice, except he’s human now, so okay, that’s a Thing. he says “okay, we have to go to the sahara desert to kill beelzebub” or something, and why did you decide to stay with these people again?

in the desert you meet a very pretty young woman who immediately ruins everything by saying she’s here to help the demigod stop the end of the world. you didn’t even know the end of the world was coming, much less that it could be stopped, so that’s a very sudden raising of the stakes. hooray.

there are a lot of demons in the desert, and they can disguise as people. scary! you kill the witch who was fighting you before, and then you meet a different witch, and this one apparently is the exploding girl’s mother, and she doesn’t know what the exploding is either. she tells you that you have to find the lich king though, because he’s the only one who can fix up the super special jar that can hold the souls of all the demon lords, and can people you convinced yourself were fictional stop turning out to be real? so you go off to find the lich king, and turns out he’s really annoying, and also currently in four parts scattered across the desert, but you find all of his pieces and bring him back to his mad scientist laboratory so he can bring himself back to life and fix up the demon lord firefly jar. he does, but then shocker, he betrays you, and the demigod fucking kills him, when that isn’t supposed to be possible. whatever. also, it turns out the reason the exploding girl’s witch mother wasn’t around most of her life was because she was off marking the other demon lords’ souls so that as soon as the demon lord firefly jar was complete, it would suck all of the currently dead demon lords into it. convenient!

so you kill beelzebub, and trap his soul in the jar. and then exploding girl has a vision of the last demon lord, lucifer or something, emerging with an army from the crater where mount everest used to be, so off you truck to the fortress that stands between everest crater and the rest of the world. you’ve never been under siege before, and frankly you’d rather never be under siege again.

every time you leave the fortress you watch some poor sob fucking die, and yet if you weren’t sure that the demigod was a demigod yet the swathe they cut through the demons that kill literally everybody else would have thoroughly convinced you. frankly there isn’t a lot else you do here- you raise some catapults, light some signal fires, whatever. what’s important is they find out that some of these things called sin hearts are powering the demons’ stuff, so you follow the demigod into the crater and down into LITERAL ACTUAL HELL, because apparently it was Directly beneath you this whole time. there are giants down here and they have been flayed and apparently their eternal suffering powers other demon infrastructure, but you can’t worry about that right now, because you just killed the sin hearts and also lucifer’s concubine, so he’s pissed.

anyway. the demigod kills lucifer, and traps his soul with the rest of them in the demon lord firefly jar. you’re finally done, right? wrong. turns out witch mother does in fact know where the exploding comes from: exploding girl’s father is Satan Himself, and she was born to act as his vessel to be reborn into the world as the Ultimate Demon Lord, with every other demon lord’s power inside of him. he proceeds to launch an attack on heaven, and apparently this is the apocalypse that the pretty girl from the desert was sent to help stop. how wonderful.

so now you’re in heaven, but really it looks more like hell than anything else, and you’ve never seen an angel die before and you’d much rather never see an angel die again, thank you, but unfortunately this is a war, so angels are dying all over the place. and to be honest you think maybe you should’ve bailed several months ago, but now you’re in heaven killing demons and it’s not like anywhere else will be any safer if satan wins. and really there isn’t much to do in heaven except fight, and get yelled at by an archangel for being in heaven as a human person, never mind that there are demons here and you're trying to help.

you don't even get to actually help kill satan, because you get stuck outside of the crystal arch and only the demigod goes in, so you have no fucking clue how they managed to win. but they did, and now the demon lord firefly jar is actually full of every demon lord, and now you're done. right?

wrong. the still mortal archangel of justice goes off to hide the demon lord firefly jar, and then all of a sudden the world is being attacked by something, and they look suspiciously like angels but they're also killing fucking everybody. you end up in westmarch with the rest of Everybody who was here during satan's assault on heaven, and turns out one of the archangels apparently disappeared like twenty years ago, and has now re-emerged as the Angel of Death and is killing everybody on the planet because, fun fact, humans are half-angel, half-demon. he also has the demon lord firefly jar, and is doing Something to it, but you don't know what.

your demigod friend runs off to kill the angels that are killing everybody, and you follow them because again, it's not like anywhere else is currently safer. it's sort of like the siege at everest crater again, except this time you aren't in a fortress built specifically to defend against attacks, and instead are just sort of in a square somewhere that seems to be safe mostly by virtue of being sort of out of the way, and instead of soldiers there's a bunch of civilians and half of them want to sneak back into the city where the angels are killing everybody for one reason or another. and, while all of this is happening, a bunch of people kill the king and then, when your demigod friend doesn't immediately, fully agree with murder, they try to kill you too. and ofc you win, because you have a demigod, but like it feels bad to kill people while everybody is already dying.

and then, on top of all of that, you learn that your brother, the one who got arrested way back at that failed bank robbery, has been transferred to the prisons in this city. so now you have a chance to free him, or at least talk to him, because his wife hasn't been responding to any of the letters or money you send and you're pretty sure she entirely blames you for his imprisonment. so you get your demigod friend to go with you to the prisons, and oh fuck, the mob is there. you fight your way through them and to your brother's cell, but he's fucking dead on the floor and the knife in his back is weirdly familiar. not that you want to think too hard about that, so you just take the knife, return to the "hideout", and start drinking, because frankly you'd rather not be awake right now. your brother is dead, angels are killing everybody, and the city is quite literally on fire.

eventually, your demigod friend manages to talk you into handing over the knife. they take it to the blacksmith, and he discovers a hidden compartment in the hilt, and a letter inside of it. the letter is signed by your sister-in-law, and it says she killed edlin and is waiting for you. you don't know if it was actually her, or if this is some sort of set-up, but you plan to confront her... once the angel of death is dead, because you really can't focus on anything except that at the moment, because it turns out he's altering the demon lord firefly jar to suck out the souls of every single human on earth. the only problem is you don't actually know where he is.

one of justice's friends(?) suggests you find witch mother/satan's wife in the ruins of ancient mesopotamia or something, because she might be able to find him. this is a bad plan. this is also your only plan, so off to the blood marsh you go. this is another situation in which only the demigod can reliably get into the ruins, but this time it isn't because of a Challenge but rather because the ruins are perhaps the most confusing maze anyone could ever enter, and the pedestals that show you where to go can only be activated by a demigod. so you run through the blood marsh and find all of these stupid pedestals, and then you go underground and into the ruins, and justice's friend decides, perhaps wisely, to stay outside. inside, satan's wife is looking at a map of Some Place You Don't Recognise, summoned out of Blood, because of course it is, and when she realises you're here she jumps into her blood pool and emerges with wings that are also spider legs, because nobody you fight can ever just be a normal human with magic anymore. so you kill her, without asking her to find the angel of death, but when you get back to the square the demigod tells justice that the blood map she had pulled up was of the backrooms. so now you have to go there.

the backrooms, as it turns out, are not easy to get into. first you have to go to limbo, and then you need to get some runes so you can activate grond, because the backrooms are a fortress just like the one at everest crater, except it was built by angels during the eternal war between heaven and hell, so it's a Lot sturdier. limbo is also full of demons from the aforementioned eternal war, and every so often so many of them will pop up that the archangel who yelled at you for being in heaven has to come down and save you, this time telling you that you're too weak and if you want to kill the angel of death, you'll have to do better than that. so you get the runes, and you break into the backrooms, and they are of course full of the angels that want to kill people. so you fight your way through all of that, and it turns out somewhere inside of the backrooms is a massive nexus of souls. your demigod friend talks to a ghost, and it says that the angel of death can't be touched by mortal weapons, BUT it can sort of half-kill you or something so that you will be able to hurt him. it's your only real option, so half-death, here you come.

eventually you make it to the angel of death himself, and it turns out he's already finished altering the demon lord firefly jar and sent it to earth to kill everybody. that sucks, but there's nothing you can really do about it from here, so you focus on killing him right now; when he's nearly dead, he brings the jar back to limbo, shatters it, and absorbs the demon lords' souls for himself. this Also sucks, but it does mean the jar is no longer killing everybody, and it's not like your demigod friend can't still killed him. it's HARD, but you do it. the angel of death is dead.

and now you're done. right? right? right? WRONG. the world is in chaos, partially because like half of everybody on earth just DIED, partially because demonic activity has just SKYROCKETED in the wake of the loss of all of their leaders, and the angel of death's followers didn't just give up when he died, and so you don't even get a chance to find out if your sister-in-law is among the half of people who survived because you're stuck running around killing monsters and cultists and angels forever. you just wanted to sell a necklace, man.

[punchdrunkdoc]

Part 2, Chapter 17

Summary: After the events of S3, Matt Murdock is trying to once again balance life as a lawyer and a vigilante. But he’s been scarred by loss and betrayal - will a mysterious new neighbour help him heal? Or will her secrets drag him back into the darkness?

Notes: This is a slow burn romance with an original female character, told in 3 parts. There is mystery, intrigue, action/violence and angst - all the good stuff!

Also available on AO3 and Wattpad

Masterlist

Reference pics

————–

PART 2

Chapter 17

Calina woke to find they’d shifted in the night.

She was now on her back, with Matt’s head resting on her chest. His broad shoulders blanketed her, and she couldn’t resist stroking her hand over his warm skin and running her fingers through his hair.

She was reminded of the footage she’d watched from the cabin - when they’d woken up the morning after Matt’s confession, they’d been in this exact position. She traced a finger around the shell of Matt’s damaged ear and echoed one of the lines he’d said to her that day.  “We’re apart for a few days, and look what happened.”

She didn’t add the second part - ‘I guess the sensible option is for us never to be apart again’ - because she knew that they would be parting again soon.

And she hated the idea.

She continued her idle strokes of Matt’s skin while she stared out the window. Crisp winter sunlight streamed into the room, transforming it into a bright and airy space. There was a slight chill in the air, but she was so warm beneath the covers and underneath Matt’s weight.

And so at peace.

This is where she belonged. She only wished she could stay forever.

“Ten.”

The deep grumbled word took her by surprise. Her hands froze and her breathing stopped. “What?” she choked out, afraid to believe the truth.

“You said ‘We’re apart for a few days, and look what happened.’ We were apart for ten days.”

She wrapped her arms around him, squeezing tight as sudden tears escaped her eyes. Despite her wordless attempts to reassure him last night, she’d been so scared that he would never regain his hearing.

“Hey,” he said, shifting further up the bed so he could face her. “Why are you crying?” He wiped away the moisture with his fingers, and kissed her damp cheeks.

She shook her head. “I’m just happy.” She traced her fingers over his ears again. “Is everything really okay? You’re really back to normal?”

Matt cocked his head, and she recognised it as his ‘listening mode’. He stayed that way for a few long moments, as if testing his range. Then he smiled. “Two kids are having a snow-ball fight outside the coffeeshop you used to go to, while their mom orders hot chocolate at the counter. They’re squealing with laughter.”

“Matt…that place is over a block away.”

He just shrugged. “I guess everything’s back to normal then.”

He shook her head in wonder at his abilities…then punched him in the arm.

“What was that for?” he laughed.

“That was for scaring me last night! Do you have any idea what it felt like seeing that building explode, knowing you were inside?”

“Probably the same way I felt hearing that you were in a coma after being shot.”

She opened her mouth to protest…then snapped it closed, knowing he had a point.

“Thank you, by the way,” Matt said, his voice suddenly serious. “For finding me, and getting me home. You seem to have a knack for always being in the right place at the right time to save my ass.”

“Ditto,” she whispered, meeting his serious tone. “Thank you for coming to the cabin and waking me up.”

He ran his fingers through her hair. “I didn’t do much.”

Calina shook her head. “I saw the footage. You talked to me all night. I am absolutely positive it was your words that brought me back.”

Matt’s fingers stilled in her hair. “There was footage?”

“There was a camera set up in the room to monitor me while I was unconscious.”

He leaned back, his weight now braced on the arms resting either side of her shoulders. “And you watched it? All of it? You heard…everything I said?”

Calina couldn’t interpret his tone. Was he embarrassed? Angry?  Did he regret saying it, and want to take it back?

She bit her lip and nodded, her heart fluttering with nerves.

“So, um, what did you think?” he asked, his voice unusually hesitant. And that’s when she realised - he was nervous too. He was unsure of her feelings. He was as scared of believing in this thing between them as she was.

She cradled his face in her hands, and stroked her thumbs over his temples, ready to tell him how she felt…but the words wouldn’t come. She swallowed hard, struggling to force down her fears and insecurities.

And then her thumb grazed over a faint scar hidden in his hairline. She traced over the raised line, wondering if it was a result of the beating he’d taken at the hands of those kidnappers months ago…or if it was from another one of the countless times he’d been attacked. She remembered the feel of his other scars beneath her hands last night. His body was a monument to years of suffering and pain. He’d fought and bled for this city, over and over, because he thought it was the right thing to do. He’d been blinded and orphaned and abandoned. He’d lost people and lost battles, but still he fought, every night.

He was amazing.

Brave and wonderful and kind.

And he deserved to know that he was loved.

Her fear disappeared, and she smiled up at him. “I love you, Matt Murdock.”

 ———

 Matt had been bracing himself for rejection.

Which didn’t really make sense given everything they’d shared last night, but a lifetime of being abandoned by the people he cared about had set a precedent that was hard to overcome.

And he wouldn’t have blamed Calina for wanting to guard her heart after he’d kept her at arms length for so long. But after a few moments of silent deliberation, she’d smiled…and gifted him those three amazing words:

I love you.

He felt a smile stretch over his face, so big and wide that she gasped in response. “You have dimples,” she said in delight, running her thumbs over the small hollows in his cheeks.

He dipped his head to rest his forehead against hers. “Say it again.”

“You have dimples.”

He laughed, and it was his turn to sound delighted. He gave her a quick kiss on the nose in response to her teasing, then resorted to begging. “Calina…please. Say it again.”

She lifted her head off the pillow, and brought her lips to his ear. “I love you,” she whispered. 

“Again.”

She giggled. “I love you."

“Again.”

“Hmmm, no.”

“No? What do you mean, no? Are you rationing your declarations?”

“No. But I’d like one in return. While I’m conscious, this time.”

“Ah,” he said, “I see.” He rolled off her and onto his side, then pulled her against him, drawing one of her long legs over his waist, until they were perfectly fitted together. He smoothed her hair behind her ear and dragged a finger down her neck. He tried to gauge where her eyes were, so that he could meet them with his gaze. “I love you, Calina Balashova.”

“Good,” she breathed. “I’m so glad.”

He smiled and leaned forward, capturing her lips with his. He kissed her - so, so gently - wanting the reverence of the act to tell her how precious she was to him.

But just like last night, the kiss soon transformed into something less…pure.

They’re were both so starved of touch. So starved of each other. She ended up on top of him, her breasts pressed against him and her hair forming a silken curtain around them as they kissed and kissed and kissed. He stroked his hands down her back, over her ass until he reached her thighs. Then he pulled her legs to either side of his until she was straddling him again.

She grinned into the kiss, recognising the position, and settled down against him. But she was a little too high up for the stimulation she craved, so he pressed his hand between her legs from behind. It was just a quick glancing touch - a promise of more to come - but it made her moan. A beautiful, guttural sound that fluttered through her throat and spilled between his lips.

He was hard in an instant. He groaned in response, then grabbed fistfuls of her hair and leaned up to deepen the kiss even further-

And that’s when her phone rang.

She froze, then tried to wriggle free but he followed her up to a seated posture. “Ignore it,” he mumbled against her lips, taking advantage of their new position to palm one of her breasts.

The phone kept ringing.

Calina shook her head, finally breaking the kiss. “I need to get that - it might be Foggy. I texted him when I found you last night, and he said he would check in this morning.”

“Foggy can definitely call back.”

She laughed, but there was suddenly a stilted quality to it. She scrambled off the bed and raced into the living room to grab her phone. She connected the call with a breathless, “I’m here.”

“Is he there with you?” Matt heard Foggy ask.

“Yes,” Calina replied. “We made it back safe and undetected.”

“How is he?”

“He’s fine. No permanent injuries.”

“That’s good. I’m glad he’s alive and unharmed. That means I get to kill him myself.”

Matt groaned again - for a completely different reason - and fell back on the bed. He knew Foggy would be pissed at his unauthorised excursion last night - especially after it turned out to be a trap - but he wasn’t in the mood for a lecture right now.

He was in the mood for something much more enjoyable.

He crawled out of the bed and stretched, feeling the aches from last night's collision with the rooftop stretch and burn. Then he tapped on each ear, making sure there were no lingering effects from the blast.

Everything seemed clear.

He’d felt such an intense wave of relief this morning at waking up to the sounds of New York, instead of the incessant ringing noise that had plagued him last night. He’d lain there for a long time, eyes closed, just enjoying the hum and bustle of all the life in the neighbourhood around his apartment.

And he’d listened to the beautiful thump of Calina’s heart beneath his ear, and the hum of the blood in her veins, and the rush of air in her lungs, knowing he’d never, ever get tired of the sound of her.

He padded out into the living room to find her sitting cross-legged in one of the arm chairs, still talking to Foggy. He bent over the back of the chair to press a kiss against her neck, bared by the messy bun she’d put her hair up into.

She scrunched her shoulders up as if it tickled and shooed him away.

He made himself busy, brushing his teeth and grabbing a drink of juice from the fridge. By the time he’d downed the glass, Calina was off the phone and in the bathroom. He parked himself outside the door, and the moment she opened it, he pulled her into his arms.

He pressed her against the wall and nuzzled into her neck, the scratch of his stubble catching on her soft skin. She shivered at the feel and melted against him…before suddenly tensing up.

He leaned back. “What’s wrong?”

She looked up at him and licked her lips nervously.

“Calina?”

“I- I need to tell you something.”

 ———

 She couldn’t keep it from him any longer. Not that she’d been consciously hiding it from him - she’d meant to tell him last night, but he’d started touching her…and all thoughts had escaped her. The same thing had happened this morning. She’d been all set to tell him, then he’d kissed her…

And her brain turned to mush.

But he deserved to know now, before things went any further between them. Before they took that final intimate step. She had a feeling it would be a million times harder to leave after that.

“Calina?” Matt prompted. “What is it? You’re starting to scare me.”

“I need to go.”

He took a step back as if stunned. “What do you mean?”

“I can’t stay. Here. In New York. It’s not safe.”

“You’re leaving?” he asked in a pained whisper, the sound of it breaking her heart.

She reached for his hand but he pulled away from her, crossing his arms over his chest.

“You’re leaving.” A statement this time, his voice flat.

“I don’t want to. Believe me, Matt. I don’t. But-”

“But what? Explain it to me. What exactly is the danger? Because you know I can protect you-”

“It’s not me I’m worried about.”

Matt frowned at her, looking more confused. She tugged his arms free and led him over to the couch - to their couch. She pulled him down next to her and draped her legs over his lap, prepared to use her full body weight to stop him escaping if she had to. “How much did Yelena tell you at the cabin?”

Matt scoffed. “The bare minimum. Someone found your safe house and you had to run - that’s about it.”

“That’s not exactly true. They always knew where the safe house was. They always knew where every single one of us was.” Calina explained about capturing Volkov and interrogating him, and how he told them about the tracking nanites. “Every moment I spent here with you, thinking I was starting this amazing new life - this life that was mine - they were watching me. Monitoring me. I was a dot on a screen flitting about between this apartment building and the coffee shop and the dance studio and the library…and all the time they were watching. Watching and waiting for the moment when they could swoop in and take me back. Take us all back. We’ve always just been these…things…to them. Not human beings with our own thoughts and feelings and dreams. Just…property.” 

Matt rubbed her bare leg, his rough hand providing a calming touch. “So what happened?” he asked. “I assume you were able to remove the nanites since you have another safe house now.”

“Yes, through something called plasmapheresis.” She told him about the procedure, and how her exchange had to be cut short when Volkov’s men descended on the mansion. “That’s why I was in such a bad state after being shot. I was running on empty to start with. And then the infection hit me like a freight train-“

“Wait, what infection?”

She glanced up at him, and realised that she’d never explained why it had taken her so long to come see him. “I got really sick after you left - I spent most of the last week in bed wracked with fever. I only really recovered a couple of days ago.” She reached up to cup his cheek. “And I only found out yesterday that you’d visited me in that cabin.” She couldn’t believe that only 24 hours ago she’d been in Maine, oblivious to Matt’s feelings for her. And now look where they were - half dressed and unable to keep their hands off each other.

Matt closed his eyes and rested his forehead against hers. She stroked his cheek and scratched her nails through the stubble on his jaw. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “If I’d known - and if I’d been able - I would have been here so much sooner.”

“When you didn’t call…I thought it was over. I thought I’d never see you again.” His voice was soft, but the hand gripping her thigh was anything but - as if he was subconsciously trying to pin her in place and keep her from disappearing on him again.

It was no wonder he’d looked so devastated when she’d told him she was leaving.

“You will see me again, Matt. I promise,” she vowed. “But Volkov knows that I lived here for months. And now that he’s lost track of us through the nanites, this would be the obvious place to start searching for me. I can’t stay here. It would put you - and everyone in this building, and all of my sisters - in danger. I can’t take that risk.”

Matt sighed. “You’re forgetting that it would put you at risk too. That’s all I care about.”

She smiled at him. “You’re such a liar. You care about everyone. If Volkov’s men suddenly started ransacking this building, terrorising all the residents, you would move heaven and earth to stop them. Because that’s who you are. Its one of the things I love about you.”

He smiled, as if still getting used to those words.

“It won’t be forever,” she said. “Once we find Volkov and neutralise the threat, I can come home. Then we can be together.”

“That could be weeks, Calina. Months, even.”

She looked away as he voiced one of her fears, but then tried to put on a brave face. “I hope not. We’re all pretty invested in getting our freedom back so we’re working flat out trying to find him.”

“Let me help.”

“With all due respect to your skills - and I know you have a lot of them - I’m not sure what you can do.” She cupped his cheek and stroked the delicate skin beneath his eyes, trying to soften her words with her touch. “Besides, you have your work cut out for you here - you still have to find out who’s behind those pheromones.”

Matt groaned and dropped his head back against the couch. “And I’m back to square one on that. They figured out we were tracking them, so they relocated and blew up the old lab. Now we have nothing.”

“There must be financial records for the building you could look into? A different way to trace them?”

Matt lifted his head up, as if just remembering something. “Actually…”

“What?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he levered himself off the sofa and crouched down by his suit, which he’d left crumpled on a heap on the floor last night. He removed something from his belt and turned around to show her. “I stole one their devices last night.”

He passed it to her as he sat down again. She turned the metal container over in her hands studying it. It was sleek and relatively simple, with a canister at one end and a button at the other. It looked likes something Apple would make if they started designing asthma inhalers. “Interesting,” she murmured.

“What is?”

“This device. It’s made of an expensive-looking alloy. And the design is…refined. Someone put a lot of thought into how this looks.”

“Why is that interesting?”

“Because it tells me a lot about the person behind this. For one, they have money. A lot of it. This isn’t some prototype cobbled together from scraps. They wanted something that looked good. That represented them. And they had the money to make it happen.”

“Okay, so they’re rich. That doesn’t exactly narrow it down.”

“No. But it also tells me that they’re vain. Narcissistic. As well as being a sadist for wanting to create something like this in the first place. That’s a really bad combination, Matt.”

Matt took the device and ran his fingers over it, mapping its shape. “That is interesting.” He smiled at her. “Have you moved on to reading psychology books now?”

She returned his smile, but hers was bittersweet. “No. This what I was trained to do - get inside people’s heads. It makes it easier to impersonate them. Or manipulate them.”

Matt stroked a hand down her thigh. “Well, you’re using that training for something positive now.”

Calina shrugged. “But you’re right. It doesn’t make it easy to narrow down a suspect list.”

“Analysing the contents might. I just have to figure out a way to do that.”

Calina perked up as she realised there was a much more practical way for her to help. “We have an older Widow on the team who’s a biochemist. She could analyse it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, she’s actually the one who developed the mind control serum. As penance for that, she’s been helping us take down the last of the Red Room. I’m sure she’d be happy to work on this if I ask her to.”

Matt didn’t reply straight away, so she glanced across at him. He looked uncertain. “What is it?” she asked.

“Are you sure we can trust her?”

Calina straightened up. “Why? Because she’s a Widow?”

Matt grabbed her hand. “No. I didn’t mean it that way. I’m worried about this tech falling into the wrong hands, and you just told me that she has a history of being on the wrong side of this kind of thing…”

“I only told you that so you’d know she has the expertise to deal with this. She wasn’t aware that her formula was being used to control us.”

“But she knew it was being used to control somebody.”

Calina frowned and tried to pull her hand away, but Matt held on tight. “I’m sorry,” he sighed. “I shouldn’t have said that. In my defence, I’m really not good at accepting outside help. But I trust your judgement. So if you trust hers, that’s good enough for me.”

Her frown stayed where it was as a pernicious thought crept into her head. If Matt was so wary of trusting Widows because of their background and the things they’d done in the past…did that extend to her too?

Did he trust her?

And could she blame him if he didn’t? She’d lied to him - multiple times. She’d just admitted that she was trained to manipulate people. She was a killer. A thief. A spy.

Why would he trust her?

“Hey,” Matt said softly, tipping her chin up with his finger. “Are you okay?”

She tried to smile. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

He sighed, obviously not believing her. He scooped her up with an arm under her legs and dragged her onto his lap. He held her close and and kissed her neck. “What’s wrong,” he asked.

Calina pulled at a thread on the hem of her shorts as she debated whether to tell him…

No. She needed to know. She had a feeling this would eat away at her otherwise. “Do you…do you trust me, Matt?”

It was his turn to frown. “I just told you I did.”

“No, you said you trust my judgement. Do you trust me?”

He turned her face towards him again, and kept his hand on her cheek as he spoke. “Of course I do. Calina, I love you.”

He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I trust you.”

Another kiss to her cheek. “I respect you.”

One to the tip of her nose. “I admire you.”

To her chin. ��I feel everything for you.”

He slanted his mouth over hers and kissed her deeply, as if trying to convince her of his truth.

And…it worked. When she was in his arms like this, with his whole body focused on her, and his beautiful words ringing in her ears…she believed him.

————–

Chapter 18

@hollandorks​ @chezagnes​ @stilldreaming666​ @acharliecoxedfan​ @yanna-banana​ @tearoseart-blog​ @freckledbabyyy​

[anastasiaskarsgard]

I really like the idea that after a lil while being away from the marquis, the reader ends up pregnant but can the marquis still be alive? Like in an alternative universe where he somehow survives, cop reader stays away because she finds out about the marquis’ actual job and then she gets pregnant and has to tell him?

Ion know, I just feel like he’d be really wholesome/possessive while the reader is pregnant, which I wouldn’t mind reading 🤭

It had been six months since she’d had that night with Marquis, but her heart felt like it was still in pieces and would never be whole.

She’d given him her all and he’d given just as much of himself, only to be killed the following day.

Feeling a rush of nausea, she grabbed for the wall she had been walking by, stumbling a bit.

“Miss! Are you okay? Come, let me help you sit.” An older gentlemen said kindly as he led her to a nearby bench. “There you go, easy does it. Do you need some water, or possibly to call your husband?”

She opened her mouth to deny her having one, but decided against it, and shook her head. “ I am fine, thank you!”

Blatantly staring at her stomach now, he asked. “How far along are you?”

“6 months.” She answered him.

“Well congratulations on your future family.” The man said as he took his leave.

It took all she had in her not to burst into tears. Luckily the sound of her phone snapped her out of her near breakdown.

Happy to have a distraction, she answered her phone without caring who was calling. “Hello?”

There was a pause, and then the clearing of a throat. “I have missed you.”

Her world came crashing down on her. Unable to form a sentence, she gripped the phone so tight, she could hear the device crackle.

“Are you there beautiful? I hope you are not angry. I have had a very rough time since I last saw you…”

“You’re dead. This is a mean joke. Who is this? How dare you!” She screeched into the phone, enraged that someone had somehow imitated Vincent’s voice perfectly.

The man on the line chuckled, “you are so perfect. I knew you were the one for me. I’m sorry I have not been able to call you but I have been in a coma, and only woke a few hours ago. I cannot go into detail, but I must see you. I am not at my mansion for obvious reasons, so I am sending a car for you.”

“Wait a minute! I went to a funeral for you! It was national news after the chaos! You expect me to just get in some car with a stranger, six months pregnant?” She snapped.

“What was that last part you said?”

“Pregnant. Six months. Pregnant. Knocked up. Bun in the oven. With child. Eating for two. Expecting. Pregnant!”

There was several moments of silence. “The vehicle is a black and white Mercedes that should be pulling up to the curb now.”

Glancing over, she saw that there truly was a Mercedes. “You really expect me to get in that car?”

“I would never lose my patience with you and will tolerate any sort of tantrum you send my way, but I must insist you get in the car.” He stated patiently.

“No.”

The driver of the mercedes got out and walked towards her holding a tablet that he was apparently speaking to someone in. As he got closer she stood to her feet, ready to defend herself. “Do not try anything buddy. I might be pregnant, but I’ll still kick your ass.”

Coming to a stop, he turned the tablet to face her, where she was met with the face of her lost love.

Smirking in satisfaction, the Marquis looked pale and was not dressed in one of his gorgeous suits, but it was without a doubt him.

Forgetting her earlier reservations, she ran to the man and snatched the tablet, staring wide eyed at the man in front of her. Wracking her brain for what to say, there was so much to choose from she could only get out a high pitched squeak.

“Get in the car now baby. Bring your beautiful mother too.”

[nasuversekinkmeme]

Weekly Roundup: Prompts (July 09- July 16)

Kara no Kyoukai

shiki ryougi using the mystic eyes of death perception for something silly, like killing the fact that mikiya's back was bothering him so he doesnt have back pain anymore

Tsukihime

Shiki Tohno is one of the few people allowed at Hassan (family? Work?) gatherings- his invite was from Gramps, they really see eye to eye on killing things.

Fate/Stay Night

Rin tomboyfication

Smut, A bored Gilgamesh gives Kirei the chance to his let out his sadism in a safe, conseual manner on a whim. Kirei of course is not happy with this arrangement unless he is causing real pain and goes so far that even Gilgamesh can't take it

Rin gets revenge on the "fat cow" Luvia by turning her into a fat-titted cow girl (with white and black skin and all) (Should be a mental transformation too)

Rin brings Mitsuzuri over for sex only to make her do ageplay as Rin's 10 year old little sister who looks up to her and is always cheerful and who'll she'll never be separated from and their happy childhood will last forever

Fate/Extra

fuck it , let's have BB get mindbroken by pele for being a race faking little brat.

Smut, BB finally pushes gudako too far and she decides to tame that shitty brat. and to make sure the Geneva convention violations discipline sticks , gudako decides to use foreigner molay's class card install to do the job/ whatever methods of non con gudako uses on BB is up to the author , but it should end with morgan walking in on gudako (now in molay's 3rd ascension attire ) getting ready to clip a leash on to BB and parade the now naked A I around chaldea

BB has recovered from all the sluttification, and is now tracking down the person responsible, to show them how you REALLY break someone. It's slow, you see. You wouldn't notice it, in fact day-by-day NOBODY in Chaldea would notice it. Days, weeks, whole singularities and lostbelts pass without this gradual corruption going commented upon. You don't even touch a dick for the better part of half a year, and by then... do you even remember what it was like to NOT be like this?

Someone downloads a bunch of furry porn to Chaldea's database. BB accesses it for dirt on whoever did it, and something something computer error something something she's got a cat head and tail now. Up to writer/artist's interpretation if she also goes into heat.

Smut, BB accidentally hacks herself. Un?fortunately, by the time she could realize it, she's already accidentally deleted the part that could realize it. Among other things. What is this "modesty" and "sexual restraint" thing you're talking about?

FGO

Ritsuka D. Fujimaru wants to become the Mage King, no wait wrong series

Hey, remember Agartha? Cool concepts, terrible execution- well, the Alien God was a fan, and she’s kidnapped Scheherazade in order to make a singularity for her and the Alter-Egos working for her… to basically play a game of D&D in.

In an effort get Osakabehime to come out of her shell she’s locked in a room with Camazotz until they make baby bats

Guda gets hit by a spell that puts them into a coma as it slowly erases their memories and destroys their mind in the process. To counteract this, Kadoc and a host of volunteer Servants Rayshift into Guda's mind and help reconstruct their decaying memories by playing the parts of various individuals from their old civilian life that they get subconsciously assigned as they dive deeper into Guda's head to unravel the spell affecting them, learning a lot about Guda's past in the process, for better or worse. For all their apparent normalcy, even Guda has experienced their fair share of trauma growing up, well before they got involved with Chaldea.

Arjuna, Karna, Bhima, and Duryodhana meeting again but instead of a normal meeting, it’s played like a Indian Soap Opera

Guda decides she is tired of Angra's lazy ass doing nothing, so she decides to put him through training. The training is that everyone in chaldea is trying to capture/kill him in order to gain a prize. the prize in question? The servant who wins will gain the right to be the parent of guda's first child

Smut, fergus and medb do their master a solid and try to occupy kiara for as long as possible so they can get a fucking break from her antics. kiara gets tag teamed by them in an absolute marathon of fucking. theyve strategized this shit. medbs got kiara strapped down and only interacts with her via toys and strapons, and only tags in when ferg cant keep on anymore and keeps the beast distracted until he gets his energy back to get right back to fucking her. how the marathon ends is up to writer.

Smut, Amakusa Shirou Ruler / Amakusa Shirou Avenger, Ruler tops/has a more dominant role in the relationship. Feed me and I'll love you forever.

Jaguar-Man likes bellyrubs

Hell’s Kitchen, but Beni-Enma is Gordon Ramsay. I wanna hear that dechi scream “ITS FUCKING RAW”

Smut, li shuwen loses his virginity after being summoned. old man version because its funny but also gilf.

Gudako has a huge crush on Howl from Howl's Moving Castle. So imagine her reaction when Oberon revealed his true form. (hint: a lot of hyperventilating, drooling, and oberon's screams)

Guda twins AU. Gudao successfully pulls Morgan and the two are married instantly. A few days later Morgan is talking to her new sister in law when Gudako makes a comment on how her "husband" is coming soon. Curious, Morgan asks who the lucky man is. It's Oberon. Morgan spits out her tea while Gudao apologizes for his sister's terrible taste in men.

Girls shopping trip with Gudako, Boabahn Sith, Nitocris, Nero, and other female servants!

Ritsuka Fujimaru having some very serious edipus complex about Da Vinci

ServaFes comes around again and Morgan and Lartoria decide to do outfit swap cosplay of each other (Because Rhongomyniad). It works really well. Mordred is conflicted. Saber Artoria is Conflicted. The Knights of the Round are Conflicted. Mash and Guda are dying of Laughter. Merlin is there.

Smut, incest, Percival and melusine fucking nasty. the more fucked up the better.

Chaldea is sent to yet another singularity in the Fuyuki Grail War from FSN, but oh they were not expecting who got summoned as Berserker here. Now Everyone, especially Guda, has to deal with Guda themselves being the Berserker of this timeline. And the Berserker Guda doesnt even seem to realize anythings off about this. Just what that actually means is up to the writer as is who Zerkers master is but I would humbly request Artoria still be Shirous servant and that this all take place post LB6. For Reasons. (There are two gudas just to be clear, Master Guda and Berserker Guda)

Smut, Need some Toxic yuri today, Melusine and Aurora Smut, if that's alright, (That one meme about her red flags being big but her tits are bigger that I've been seeing all day with those two has me needing)

Mashmorgan and Gudacas double date that just devolves into Morgan and Guda gushing about how cute their partners are.

Oryou and Yu get into a fight over who has a better husband. Xiang Yu and Ryouma try desperately to stop em

There's a new Mystic Code out! It's by BB! (uh oh.) Great news, those skills are utterly insane! The amount of mana you can get out of it is buckwild, and it really feels like you have near-unlimited energy! One... tiny problem, it... there's no way to sugarcoat this... that outfit leaves very little to the imagination... did BB repurpose the Dangerous Beast costume or something? But, but, the stats are so good though... and you feel SO GOOD wearing it... it can't hurt, can it?

Caligula gets a bit too weird around Artemis and Orion puts him through a fucking wall

Mash, in the pursuit of getting a proper summer form, goes to Skadi, who agrees to see what she can do. Unfortunately, in changing her into a Saber Class origin, all that winds up happening is that Mash now has a massive schlong.

Habetrot, Friend of Brides Everywhere, sees Nero Bride and has something awaken in her. A few internet searches later and she learns what a ball gag is and she's never the same again.

So Castoria is kinky and horny. We all know that. But I HIGHLY doubt she got any sort of sex ed (yet alone kink ed) growing up, considering... everything. So my request! Is for Castoria to discover something about her sexuality! It could be a new kink, it could be learning the name of one of her fetishes which she thought too weird to be widespread, it could be attending a bdsm 101 class, it could be confronting an actual sexual experience to her preconceptions on kink and/or sex, hell it could even just be discovering that she can practice kink without the sex part if she doesn't feel like it. Anything along these lines!

Koyanskaya lives her worst nightmare: a world where everyone is... GASP... communist!

After all it's done Ritsuka spends at least 2 hours of her day in the room of Chaldeas alone, nobody ever goes there during this period because it is seen as Ritsuka's alone time. One day the new intern goes there and find Ritsuka talking to themselves, except for a glimpse of a second they see a woman, extremely long white hair, she is semi-transparent, almost as if she didn't exist in this world

Mash becomes a Master. Her first Servant is Fujimaru Ritsuka. Point of order, Fujimaru Ritsuka is still alive, and Mash just summoned a post-death version of them. Chaldea now has twice as much Fujimaru Ritsuka. Cue hijinks.

Han Xin finally joins Chaldea after so long! ....Han Xin is hiding as Yu hunts him down for what he did to Xiang Yu

Smut, Caenis gets his revenge on the Dioscuri by fucking them till they can no longer walk. Bonus points for pegging cuz he deserves it

Gudako gets a new swimsuit mystic code! ...designed by medb Now half the female servants are covering their red faces, half the male servants are concealing a boner, and a Raikou and Tiamat staring down all communicating that any who dare attempt to do something lewd with Gudako will feel the wrath of two overprotective moms.

FGO again

the master of chaldea is getting a tattoo. specifically a womb tattoo. entirely unrelated but morgan has after getting started on learning to tattoo a couple months ago(coincidentally the time her spouse started talking about wanting a tattoo) mastered the art of tattooing. of course morgan does g=her beloved spouse's womb tat, but wuh oh it seems shes applied an actual magic effect to it when guda just liked the look of womb tats

Boggart gets summoned by Chaldea and ends up resuming his marriage with Mash.

due it soon being 8 years of no male swimsuit servants , gudako's mental pollution passive has gone up a few ranks. in short ,it's gotten so bad that she's deluded herself into thinking that a few of the summer servants she already has are in fact brand new servants. morgan found out about this when she found gudako addressing okita alter (saber ) as Amakusa . so for the sake of her wife's mental health morgan sets off to fix that problem.

After a good long while of being paired with Ruler Artoria as her dedicated farming support, Koyanskaya’s grown… affectionate. Of course, being of use is part of the NFF Services name, but… she’s gone a bit further than just a support, it’s more subby than that- this old fox has been DOMESTICATED. She’s began to follow Bunnytoria around everywhere, she’s gotten friendlier and softer in personality, and in partaking in the king’s tremendous appetite, she’s growing physically softer as well. As the weeks go by, Bunnytoria grows quite fond of the perfectly plump, way-past-pudgy pet she now has on her hands, and decides to make things official and crank it up a notch.

Gudako unknowingly becomes a pseudoservant of Adephagia, the Greek goddess of gluttony, resulting in occasions where she slowly gains an incredible amount of weight over the course of the day, then wakes up as if nothing happened. Mash and da Vinci eventually have to explain to her what’s going on.

A mysterious enemy has attacked Chaldea, but nobody is hurt, no things are much worse, the people that the servants loved yet were unable to save all appear before them, reminding them of their failures, the sins that are ingrained in their very souls

Morgan, after getting sick and tired of Oberon’s bullshit does some REVENGE. She gets pesticides, bug sprays, anything that is able to harm insects, and when Oberon decides to fuck with her, she goes absolutely HAM with the bug repellent and going psychical. Local Oberon found dead in Chaldea hung on a wall

Smut, Barghest is determined to make sure her romance with her Master will not end in tragedy. To that end, she tries hypnotherapy, in an attempt to help control her impulses that compel her to "devour the one she loves". To everyone's surprise, it works! However, to nobody's surprise, it also involved altering the inherent definition of what Barghest considers "devouring" her beloved means. On one hand, Ritsuka is no longer in any danger whatsoever of ending up as her lunch. On the other, his pelvis may not survive the night, but that is a sacrifice he is more than willing to make.

Any fandom

I don't know if this has been a prompt yet but I think it would be interesting/funny to see a Servant with Madness Enhancement, really doesn't matter who, just get caught doing something truly out of pocket by someone. Staff member, Master, another Servant? Who cares? Just make them do the weirdest thing you can think of and get caught. Feel free to ignore this if it doesn't fit your criteria and thanks for opening asks!

servant with mutiple classes or alters ponders whether fucking one of their doubles counts as masturbation or incest. cu artoria or anyone else with multiple copies of them, can interact with one or more of the different versions of themself in the process, can even try and fuck their double to see if it feels wrong, but importantly i want their answers to this conundrum and they gotta at least make sense for the character

Crossover

Mori Calliope x Red Hare (mod warning: keep it courteous. No smut, no heavy violence, nothing that would be disturbing to run into.)

Any fandom

Two characters having sex, written like them beating each other up

[qualityrain]

Do you have any hc on ana's relationship with the other members of the snow lotus squad? I personally think that ana was close with her first squad but not with the second.

Also, if they had more time to interact, what kind of relationship would owl and mei had?

im going to be honest ive never thought abt it until now 😭 i mean it makes sense she was closer w her old one considering it was only a year ish or else when she became the leader of the new one. (i do not know anything abt how valk school or how squads work) I think she stayed in snow lotus squad since she was 12? and grew and fought with the others and she was 16 and became the adjutant and she really looked up to the leader and they never really had anything go badly and if it did the leader was there to fix it(i think ana just did whatever the leader told her too)and the squad could go through it together anyway right!!!! cut to all of them dying in manila

i wish there was more said abt her afterwards because she basically just lost like her friends and family but she has her bio fam looking out for her and like the other valks to support her. idk abt her new squad shes probably rlly protective of them because she can’t let what happened in manila happen to them again!! cut to all of them dying because of honkai (i acrually do not rmb if ppl made it out alive. idt dudu/rita/Alvitr said anything abt it) (i wish there was more of her thoughts abt becoming a herrscher and the whole situation like i think it would be interesting!!! BUT NOOOOOO STAY IN A COMA I GUESS)

i cant decide on what rs mei and owl would have because i cant decide on whats funniest. the raven mei owl dynamic is my fav in the entire game i want them to become a wack ass found family (delusional). i think b4 coral arc if mei and owl ever met and spent more time tgt their interactions would just be like how mei interacrs w kevin its just the “….” dialogue for five hours. theyre both perfectly fine not talking to each other but i think owl would be the one she would ask if she wanted answers because yk how kevin wont say shit and raven has double meanings and tries to fight her every time i think owl gives her answers no double meaning no underlying motive. he has no business with mei and he doesnt give two shits.

i think after coral arc if owl survives i cant chose between mei being a bitch to him like how she is to raven or being normal w him because raven would be annoyed i think the latter is funnier but i think more ppl should be a annoying to owl because hes so rude for no reason LMFAO. i think mei would be slightly protective of him because yk theyre parallels of each other and she is the older one and maybe she teaches him abt herrscher powers also i think owl treats her nicely because shes not annoying like raven (affectionate) and she now knows his cringe backstory.

[augment-techs]

"Pillow Talk" Skull/Billy

"Quite the catch" Bulk/Jason

"Royal pain in the ass" Jack/Sky

Since it's a three in one, I'm going with a theoretical summary/synopsis cluster. Singles next time, please, it makes this a lot cleaner ^^; Title: reckless ambivalence Rating: M Relationships: Billy Cranston/Eugene Skollovitch; Billy Cranston & Farkas Bulkmeier; Billy Cranston & Matthew Cook & Grace Sterling; Billy Cranston & His Parents; Eugene Skullovitch & Stan Skullovitch; Ranger Ensemble. Additional Tags: Coma; Monster Attack Aftermath; Physical Abuse; Parental Neglect; Scarring; Blood; Sibling Relationship; Pining; Guilt; Hand Holding; mention of the Annual Comic that nobody ever brings up gdi; Zordon Admitting to Being a Dick; 5+1 Things. Summary: Billy keeps getting dreams that don't feel like dreams in the aftermath of getting into a verbal fight with Skull, followed by a monster smashing him so hard into a wall that the punk fell into a coma. They were too detailed and the environment felt too much like that time he and his team walked out of Drakkon's make believe world and out into the very ether of the Morphin Grid. "Why do I have to come back again? What do I have to learn?" The questions shouldn't sting so much after the second time he asks Billy, dressed in a hospital gown and draped in orange light like a sundown. Looking so tired and resigned and eyes all wide and wet. But then, Billy actually thinks about it, looks into all the stuff he's missed out on since falling out of Skull's orbit (abandoning him) and begins to feel like he can't breathe: going through Skull's overly full medicine cabinet, helping the nurses in the hospital bathe the blood and sweat off of the scars decorating his back and arms and legs, talking with Bulk about how thin Skull is because his family is always gone and not a lot of people were willing to hire him for odd jobs. What could Billy answer with that could make Eugene (come back) stay?

Title: sheets of egyptian cotton Rating: M Relationships: Farkas Bulkmeier/Jason Scott; Previous Jason Scott/Tommy Oliver/Kimberly Hart; Billy Cranston/Eugene Skullovitch; Rocky Desantos/Adam Park/Aisha Campbell; Zack Taylor/Trini. Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Underwear Model/Ambulance Driver; Kink Model/Nursing Aid; Eating Disorders; Anxiety; Mention of Physical Abuse; Meet Ugly; Substance Abuse; Frottage; Oral Sex; Cuddling. Summary: Probably the worst way to meet a model that Jason could think of was when some asshole got handsy during the after party and the biggest model on the line gets hit in the head with a champagne bottle trying to get the asshole to get the hell out. Still, Jason could kind of count himself lucky. It wasn't every day that he got to meet a plus sized model without a filter from the pain meds wearing nothing but the silky boxer briefs he had on the runway. Or his skittish friend from the BDSM showcase in the building across the street showing up at the hospital in nothing but a silk see-through kimono and an exceptionally complicated looking ensemble with leather and lace. * Title: dancing on the head of a pin Rating: T Relationships: Jack Landors/Sky Tate; Anubis "Doggie" Cruger/Kat Manx; Z Delgado & Bridge Carson & Syd Drew. Additional Tags: Heartbreak; Emotional Hurt/Comfort; That Last Episode Girlfriend Never Really Sat Right With Me; I Do Like Piggy but We ALL Know He'd Find a Way to Fuck Up; Jack Landors Needs a Hug; Sky Tate Kicks Some Ass; Z Delgado is Coming for Blood. Summary: Here's a level of hell that Jack could not imagine when he quit the SPD and went into business with a new girlfriend and Piggy that the ex-Red Ranger was not expecting: his relationship with Ally ending with her and Piggy hooking up and her cheating on him FOR MONTHS before he found out. One would think he was utterly bullet proof, but even after a whole year of taking on the worst of the worst, fighting an intergalactic menace, almost dying; Jack was as emotionally vulnerable as that kid who grew up on the street with nothing and no one. Somehow, though, Jack didn't mind Sky seeing him so vulnerable.