#but then i stop myself because uhhhh. no one has ever fucking done that in the history of earth

[cruelsister-moved2]

ngl i always find it a red flag when someone’s like viciously aggressive towards astrology bc some people’s response is so out of proportion. it’s fine to dislike it or completely disbelieve it & think it’s a waste of time but literally part of being an adult is learning to coexist with other people’s beliefs. the reason responses to astrology in particular are so telling is because you’d have to reach extremely hard to demonstrate any meaningful harm being perpetrated via so its obvious that your response to a little bit of whimsy is to act like a giant baby 

[theotherbuckley]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

tagged by @nmcggg @underwaterninja13 @saybiwithme @your-catfish-friend @jesuisici33 @cal-daisies-and-briars @perfectlysunny02 @hippolotamus @wikiangela @smilingbuckley @diazsdimples @dangerpronebuddie @tizniz

How many works do you have on ao3?

18

2. What's your total ao3 word count?

92,593 !

3. What fandoms do you write for?

9-1-1 currently (previously criminal minds and lucifer)

4. Top 5 fics by kudos:

1. Because You're Exhausting 10K words (917 kudos) 2. Pancakes, kisses, and a little bit of TLC 4.8K words bucktommy (890 kudos) 3. I'll Take Care of You 5.1K words | buddie (879 kudos) 4. Cow Eyes 2.2K words | buddie (720 kudos) 5. Tripped and Fell 5.8K | buddie | E (464 kudos)

5. Do you respond to comments?

Yes💜 i try to respond to them all but sometimes i forget and then i feel bad because i get another comment and i cant respond to it because i didn't respond to the previous one but by then an extend period of time has passed and i feel weird about replying to the previous comment so i stop responding... oops.. also that time i go a few hate comments and it made me stop responding to comments on that fic

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Because You're Exhausting - uhhhh this is depression in 10K words its so fucking sad and you will need tissues and most of the comments on this fic are people telling me they cried so... yeah sorry about this (read the tags please for the love of god read the notes there's a lot of trigger warnings)

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

There are quite a few with good happy endings but I'm especially fond of Cow Eyes i think its silly and cute

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Yeah kinda - Because You're Exhausting has got a few mostly about the ending which i to an extent can understand but if you're going to be triggered by something please for the love of god READ THE WARNINGS IN THE NOTES - i don't wanna spoil everything but the tags on its own should have been enough to go hey maybe i should read the notes too asjkdaj so yeah a few hate comments on that

9. Do you write smut?

Yes! didn't for the longest time but yes yes I do :)

10. Craziest crossover?

I don't write crossovers

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope i think if i ever did id be so honoured I'd cry

13. Have you co-written a fic before?

currently writing one with @diazsdimples <3

14. All time favorite ship?

Buddie!!! (but I am really enjoying bucktommy atm)

15. What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

Healing fic is killing me rn - I may write a lot lot of angst but seeing buck so happy on my screen is making me struggle to write depressed buck but I will write it but also uni is killing me rn. this fic is over 17K so far with no end in sight so is by far my longest which I think is why its so hard

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I'm good at writing depressing shit

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Like the rest? Idk I struggle with dialogue tags and switching from dialogue to prose I think

18. Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

I love it but too scared to do it because I just speak English. But I love pet names etc in other languages.

19. First fandom you wrote in?

I think Sherlock bbc on wattpad when I was a kid and then Lucifer first on ao3. Looking back these are pretty trash idk what I was thinking but we all start somewhere.

20. Favorite fic you've written?

Hmmm good question. Even though Because You're Exhausting is so sad I really do like it. Also running from myself (and the memories of you) (12K) which is also depressed!Buck but it's lighter and has a happy ending. Also both my chronic pain!Buck fics make me happy. Idk this is hard I can't choose.

I won't tag anyone since most people have done it but if you wanna do it then consider this your tag!

[maythearo]

Yeah! The g3!! I know it has certainly been a uhhhh controversial topic lol

Imo draculaura looks sooo cute

Certainly lolll

You know how it goes I'm gonna ramble again so I'll put the read more thing for the sake of scrolling past it 😭

Well I'll start off by saying that, in this era of reboots and mass adaptations of every mildly old franchsie ever, is kinda impossible to avoid negative reactions from the people who were fans of the first generation of such franchises, because it happens, when someone takes something you grew up with and changes it to a modern audience most people's reaction will be "what in the world that's not how it was back in my days" + the phenomenon of older generations not liking the stuff that comes all for younger generations and etc. And I mention all of this bcs this definetely affects how people's opinions on things such as design (of MH in this case) go, there's lots of strong biases in this conversation of reboots and all

And tbh I wasn't immune to that 💀 at first I didn't like a lot of small decisions they made because I was used to the old one and "the og's always better" type of opinion, monster high was a big part of my childhood and probably a big boost to my interest in art! Which is what I live for baisically nowadays so ofc I felt strongly about it 😭 but when I came back after some time I realized, hey it's not that serious. I don't even remember specifically what those things I criticized were about, so that's an indicator of how much I actually cared, deep down lol. Like, pink Lagoona did not kill me, can you believe that? /s.

My opinion as of now, is that I think the g3 designs are really cute on their own!! I'm gonna stop myself from comparing it to the first gen because for the most part that's a waste of time and also a huge tangent from where I want to get 😭 recent reboots are a product of this era and they adapt accordingly. Sometimes they hit sometimes they miss, I think g3 mh is going well mostly!

(Talking about the concept designs and doll designs in this part) g3 takes from general modern fashion, clothing-wise the characters are not draaastically different from each other, they all just dress like how teenagers nowadays do but each got their own little motifs to their wardrobes. I don't think this "lack of difference" between each other's outfits is an enormous one nor is it inherently a bad thing because hey, if it looks good it looks good, and you can distinguish their clothings between one another just fine imo. In some cases I got some nickpicking in terms of "the pattern of this shirt is not working with these pants" or "whoa there's a lot going on with these colors" or "they really love to put bright pink lipstick on everyone huh" but it's rarely something I heavily dislike (only cases I can remember are that I wasn't a fan of was Heath 💀 feels like halfway through the process of his design mattel said "no you can stop now he's good like that" nothing is happening with that look, it's crazy, what happened to my boy. And Twyla, that wasn't as bad a s Heath's, but it just didn't work for me)

I can't say anything about the quality of the material of the dolls themselves bcs I don't have any of the new ones but oh my god, I also think Draculaura is adorable 😫 I think Venus dropped too recently and I'd buy her for sure!! The braided hair is everything and her fashion sense is probably one of my favorites so far? I also love Abbey's doll, and Frankie too especially that one line that they got a guitar? Instrument? Rockstar theme I think? (I'd cosplay that, no joke) from what I can see the designs are putting a lot more variety on drawing and sculpting different body types, features and details on the dolls and I think that's super fucking awesome! G1 also experimented with facial features and details on the body every once in a while but not as nicely done as now!

For the animated series I understand they had to tone it down to some extent because inserting all details the dolls and concept art had could lead to technical trouble (I think), so it isn't fair to compare them to one another. I'm just gonna ignore the animated series in terms of design for now, cause it's in the dolls and in illustration that a franchise like monster high work best anyway. I don't think much abt the cartoon tbh and I'm also not up to most episodes, idk who else dropped recently. But honorable mention, in the standards of the animated series my favorite designs are Deuce and Medusa for sure

That's long enough of a post so I'm gonna stop right hereeee, this was more of an overview of the g3 as a whole rather than ratings of each character, but yeah! I'm no longer a hater, I'm ok 👍 (if you're one of the people who heard me extensively complain over g3 before in another social, honestly I don't even know what it could have been about but you know what, disconsider it, it's easier that way 😭) I may have more opinions about it but that's all I could remember for now. Also my brain is fried.

And I can always change my mind on this, so there's that! Someone get me a Venus and Frankie doll rn please and thank you

[gibblegabber]

i wrote most of this a month ago but might as well spill my personal nonsense regarding kick on his 14TH ANNIVERSARY WHHHHHHHH

nothing interesting it’s truly like a diary entry

i’ve been keeping to myself while i wind down from another hyperfixation with KB:SD, because it has to come to an end, because there’s very few people left in my life who were there in the fandom while it aired, because i get so fucking depressed when i think about it.

how do i describe this. Kick reminds me that i’m alive. he ALSO reminds me that i’m a failure. he’s the reason i finished art school and also (part of) the reason i stopped pursuing art as a career. the show’s run was the best time of my life and at the same time i was dealing with an overwhelming amount of trauma.

and i packed ALL of that into this silly 6.5/10 rated cartoon. why??? because it just happened to be THERE when I was going thru some shit?? sometimes i think “this could have been any cartoon, the timing is what mattered” and other times i’m like no…the adventures we had in mellowbrook were genuinely incredible and if it were any other fandom, i wouldn’t have met the same amazing people!!! do you know how thankful i am to have Kachiimi and Misha in my life still??? REALLY FUCKING THANKFUL. i don’t deserve them in the least!! they’ve known me at my worst and happened to also SEE me at my worst in person and they’re still my friends and i love them very much, i hope they know that.

and if anyone’s still following me that knew me during the KB years, or was friends with me during that time… 1.) i’m sorry. i was crazy LMAO and 2.) just know you made the whole experience so so awesome :) i appreciated so much that the fandom was a tight knit group of people, no drama, just a great place to be when my life was falling apart around me.

yea if i psychoanalyzed this whole thing i wouldn’t like the answer. but. it doesn’t change how much Kick means to me, and how much he’ll always mean to me!!

it had always been a bucket list thing of mine to be the number 1 fan of something at some point. ever since i was like nine years old i was like “man that’d be cool if it happened”. never in a million years would i have guessed that it would be this. but in a weird way Kick was exactly who i needed at that time. someone whose failures were just his fuel for success. someone who didn’t let his shortcomings stop him from achieving his goals. someone who kept going even if the world was against him. looking back it’s really no surprise that i got so attached.

obviously i’m far from the number 1 fan position now. who knows if i ever really was; i only knew a fraction of the fandom that called me the “queen of the KB fandom”, and Sandro had called me the number 1 fan at one point so i just took it all to heart. i would argue that Aisha took that position when school and jobs and life started consuming my life more than fandom did. or well, all of this is a moot point when you consider Jackie who is definitely 100% his number 1 fan LOL. but wow, what a time. we were so lucky to interact with the crew as much as we did.

it doesn’t seem like much but it really made me feel like i could do anything. if Kick had gotten a third season you KNOW i would’ve stopped at NOTHING to be on the team in some way shape or form. i would’ve flown out to LA in an instant and not looked back. despite everything. i would’ve done it.

kinda sucks considering uhhhh THINGS that got revealed about the director years later, so in the same vein i’m very happy that Kick did not get a season 3. but when the show ended something in me died, or i came to terms with something, idk what it was. something like: i knew i’d never feel the same way about a cartoon again so i didn’t bother trying. i stopped drawing almost entirely for 10 years.

aaaand it’s true. over a decade and i never came close to the level of obsession i had with Kick, and never really wanted to either. THEN i got slapped in the face with IZ and well…let that be a long and cheesy post for march 30th or something. :P and as much fun as it’s been and continues to be, it’s a DIFFERENT sort of experience from KB. it can’t compare. maybe in 10 years i’ll look back on IZ friends and fandom times and reminisce fondly on them too.

KB:SD is stuck where it was. if that makes any sense. there’s a lot in the show that i don’t think modern day fandom would take kindly to. there’s a lot of crack shipping and shenanigans we got up to back then that isn’t okay now. (god… okay i don’t miss that part LOL. i cringe painfully at a lot of it, but i DO miss when people understood the fucking difference between fiction and reality. it was a different time for sure.) it just is what it is.

and that’s okay. i’m gonna let it go, again, and i’ll be back on and off. it hurts. it hurts every time this happens but that’s okay because Kick taught us to live till it hurts. :) 🤘🏼✨

[campymoon]

Extreme TW: self unaliving thoughts, depression, BPD, just scroll. It’s a vent post

If I can post on here about wanting to be raped and yall either like or scroll I should be able to post about this too.

I think I’m going to give it another week honestly.

I told myself if like didn’t get better by my 22nd bday I’d end it but now my 24th is like a month away and… yeah. I have an amazing and wonderful partner and I promised not to because I believe in the afterlife and want us to be together forever but I believe he deserves to spend eternity with someone normal. Someone easy to love and someone who’s as pure and perfect as he is.

My family is… dysfunctional and doesn’t care about all the things I’ve done for them, sacrificed for them nor do they even listen when I speak most times unless I yell.

Multiple friends have left me and I’ve been abandoned too many times. And I wouldn’t survive if my partner one day betrayed me or left me. Sorry I love him with everything but have also been waiting to be with fully since 2019…I feel like I have to beg just to discuss our future and when we do I feel like a fucking moron because he brings up a million different points that I “don’t consider”.

And I’m painting him really harshly I’m splitting on him rn (BPD) he’s very sweet and patient and loving but I’m so alone and tired of being alone and having to struggle alone while he just gets to do whatever he wants (overdramatized but it feels that way when I’m upset).

And I’m just so so SO TIRED of being told I have to push back my passions, happiness and goals just because that’s “how it is” and I need to “sacrifice” fucking everything that brings me joy or peace. When I was a child I was SA’d. I was like 5, then again at age 9 by my stepbrother till I was like 16 but my parents didn’t believe me and made me eat alone in my room for weeks. I wasn’t allowed to go to friends houses, parties or have a bf until I was 18, no job till 19 then coerced into the military into a career I hated to be bullied and abused more by strangers. Blah blah blah sad back story bs.

I could tell any person close to me in my life that I was actively being abused and all they’d do is say “aweee I’m sorry” (I’ve literally told the closest people i know that I’m being sexually harassed and they just give me a sad face. I’ve seen people buck up faster to STOP ME from retaliating to violence or aggression more than anyone has actually protected me from any abuser).

I tried sex work but uhhhh duh. I was an obvious flop (which isn’t like a “pity me” statement it’s just the truth).

And even though I loved it without making any real money from it and without the motivation I stopped.

I’m just tired. Tired of never being put absolutely number one by anyone. I wanna be loved like how I love. Unconditionally, irrationally and with compassion and empathy. I wanna have my tears move you like yours move mine. I wanna have my laughter bring out yours. I want it all. I crave it. This isn’t about just romance either I wanna form this is about all types of love. I wanna feel it like how I give it. And I NEVER FUCKING DO!

Then my issues get accidentally used against me. And it absolutely broke my heart. Imagine not going to your dream state for your dream school for someone and that someone says that you not having a figured out career or college degree causes hesitancy in moving in with/marrying you? Ofc I wanna fucking kill myself! I don’t wanna be here NOTHING I DO IS EVER ENOUGH NOR WILL IT EVER BE ENOUGH!!! I’ve been told so many times “You are enough. You deserve to be loved.” By the SAME PEOPLE WHO LEAVE ME! Who tell me I’m too much!!! Who say they can’t handle me!?

I’m told I can’t not speak when I’m angry. Then when I speak when I’m angry I’m “being rude”/“not thinking about my words”/“mean” but when I try to slowly think out my words and explain things EXACTLY as I mean them with indicators that I don’t mean offense nor that I’m angry with anyone IM STILL IN THE WRONG?!

I just wanted to be an artist in Colorado.

And now im just gonna be another dead loser nobody will remember in a few years.

[servin-up-surveys]

survey #115

(taken february 17th; uploading surveys taken while gone)

Do you think you have an addictive personality? I'm very well aware that I do, just like my dad, and it's why I stay away from a lot of things known to trigger addiction.

Honestly, do you enjoy arguing? No, it sends my anxiety through the fucking stratosphere immediately.

Is there anyone that you truly could not live without? I refuse to ever even consider this idea EVER again.

When was the last time someone saw you naked? Totally naked, idk. I try very hard to avoid anyone seeing me like that, but I'm pretty positive it would be my mom coming into her room after I've gotten out of the shower or something.

What is the greatest loss you’ve endured? My first real boyfriend, the person I basically entirely lost my self-autonomy to. Not by his will, in his defense.

What song (or a few songs, whatever) means a lot to you and why? I absolutely cannot listen to "Stairway to Heaven" by Led Zeppelin because of a basically movie scene-worthy prom memory with Jason. I haven't heard it in years and don't plan on ever listening to it again, I just can't. It breaks me. "The Mortician's Daughter" by Black Veil Brides is also a song I generally avoid because of another memory with Jason, but I can *sometimes* listen to it. "The Ghost of You" by My Chemical Romance is yet another I'm very sensitive to because I binged the fuck outta it and cried my eyes out repeatedly to it after I learned about Jason's mom dying. That was the most painful death I have ever dealt with so far in life, and it fucking haunts me that the last thing she ever heard from me was begging to talk to her son as she talked to me well over an hour in the absolute middle of the night encouraging me to not kill myself. Then I ODed two days later. Uhhhh there's a lot of other songs but I really shouldn't have explained this one so deeply because I'm crying so we're just gonna move on.

What was the reason behind your last visit to the hospital? I was suicidal again and knew I needed to be in an environment where I couldn't be a risk to myself.

What is something you’ve done that you truly regret? Mostly things I've said. And the Joel situation when I was 12.

Do you view animals as being just as important as people? Why or why not? I sure do. I don't believe there's anything truly special or divine about humans; we're just the most advanced animals, but that doesn't make us even REMOTELY "better" than them.

What is the worst thing you’ve done to yourself? What is the worst thing someone else has done to you? Tried to kill myself. Entirely gave up on, turned on, and grew to hate myself. As for the worst thing someone else has done to me, probably how Jason left our relationship. It was SUCH a jump ship type of reaction, like he wanted to be on the other side of the world from me basically immediately, leaving me so confused and lost and hurt and just wanting to die. It's interesting to note that I didn't start healing until he actually agreed to meet with and talk to me about all this more than a year later, although I guess me also starting a strong mood stabilizer that I absolutely responded well to at the same time probably played a part, too.

What is the most personal thing you’re willing to reveal? On here, probably that I literally had surgery on my ass lmfao a pilonidal cyst is a cyst in your asscheek :^)

What made you stop talking to the last person you cut out of your life? She was/is (I 220% do not even remotely believe her claim that she's not anymore for MANY reasons) a Nazi and was also a fucking terrible "friend" to me, when it REALLY boiled down to it. She was capable of being good sometimes, yes, but our "friendship" had very serious problems in its base structure, and I was not taking her making me feel like a shitty, burdensome, annoying, and weak person anymore.

What are some kinks or turn-ons you have, if any? Sharing that kinda stuff is crossing a personal boundary for me, so skipping.

Are you one of those people that LOVE to hug others? YES. If you don't like hugs, you have to be upfront with me about that because at some point I WILL try to hug you otherwise.

Which person would you choose to travel the world with? Girt.

What is a book you can recommend to others? I will recommend Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo to literally everybody. It's an anti-war novel that leaves you feeling just plain fucking haunted and appalled by human nature.

Do you have (a) stuffed animal(s) sitting in your room? Which one(s)? I have a bunch of meerkat plushies on one shelf, as well as my favorite plush from childhood (a moose named Brownie), a fennec fox as a zoo souvenir, a Cheshire cat... maybe one or two others, idr. I now also have a giant stuffed bear sitting on a chair in this spare room because Girt got me it for Valentine's Day, haha. :') I can always see it from where I'm sitting, and I want this room to be full of stuff that motivates and makes me happy.

What do you order on a pizza? Most often I just get pepperoni, but I will also sometimes get a meat lovers-esque kind, and rarely I'll still want a jalapeno pizza.

How old was the first person you kissed? He was 18 at that time.

Last dream you had: It actually REALLY messed with me when I woke up; I remember I'd just found out I was pregnant and we were actually keeping the baby and Girt was super excited and yeah it FUCKED with me

what is the first letter of the last name of the last person you kissed? M.

Why aren’t you texting the last person you kissed? We like, never text. We almost always use Discord instead.

Have you been to a baby shower? Yeah, my sister's, and my ex's brother's wife's. Maybe one other person?

Something good going to happen tomorrow? Yeah, it's my youngest niece's birthday party and I'm really happy Girt is able to come with us. I'll get to see my dad, too.

Do you believe exes can be friends? In some cases, sure. But not always. I would probably even say not in *most* cases, but I don't know that with certainty.

Who were you with the last time you went to the movie theater? Girt.

Has anyone ever sung to you? Girt has, and I guess kinda-sorta-but-not-exactly Jason.

Do you plan on moving out within the next year? It'd... be nice, especially if I fucking finally DO find a job at some goddamn point. I'm job-hunting online literally every day. It would be nice to get a place with Girt.

List the initials of every person you have kissed, from oldest to most recent kiss. (Put “?”s in the place of initials you don’t know.) JAR, T? (more accurately, I don't remember his last name), SJM, DM.

Honestly, have you ever eaten raw cookie dough? Haha of course.

Would you stay with your bf/gf if they did drugs? I wouldn't go *into* a relationship with someone doing drugs, but if by some incredibly low, insane chance Girt started drugs for whatever reason, I'd try to stay with him as long as I could and try very hard to convince him to stop.

Where was your mom born? Somewhere I won't disclose in New York.

What about your dad? Uh, I want to say Ohio, but it's possible it's actually Michigan.

Is your tongue pierced? It used to be; I had snake eyes, and it was probably my favorite piercing, maybe tied with my lip ring. I only took it out because it was damaging my teeth.

What did you last do in your bed? I took a nap today. I've been sleeping a lot and super heavily lately...

Have you ever named any of your pets after a cartoon character? Yeah, I remember we had a black cat growing up named Taz. Odds are pretty high we probably had another pet (probably another cat) with a cartoon name, too. OH! Already thought of one lol, we also had a BEAUTIFUL Maine coon-esque boy named Eeyore. He got hit by a car and it devastated me.

What was the last thing that someone else recommended, or suggested you try? Hmmmm... can't say I remember.

What was the last podcast you listened to? Do you listen to it regularly? I don't think I've listened to a podcast since I last listened to Rhett & Link's MANY years ago.

Have you ever held a gun? Did you fire it? I did unwillingly, but I sure as hell didn't fire it. Colleen's husband needed someone to hold it while he was doing something and I was the only one there.

What did you last take painkillers for? A fucking toothache. I'm starting to get them in a specific spot again, once more where I DIDN'T get dental work done...

What did you have for lunch today and who made it? I didn't eat lunch.

What was the last candy you ate? It was a LifeSaver. I keep them on hand because of my clinically dry mouth (I'm told to keep little candies or something like that in my purse to force salivation when I'm really suffering), but I just felt like having one.

Have you ever been hit in the face? What’s the story? Maybe accidentally, but not that I remember.

Do you know anyone who is deaf? I don't believe so.

If you wear makeup, what colors do you usually wear? IF I wear makeup, it's black.

If you have more than one pet, do they ever get jealous of each other? Roman, not so much, but Cookie definitely can get jealous.

Is there a room in your house that you don’t like going in? No.

Have you ever trespassed? I think I have. I don't think I really knew we were trespassing, though.

Are you afraid of heights? Yes.

Do you walk around barefoot when you’re at home? Or do you wear socks? I'm pretty much always barefoot unless I need slippers. I hate socks.

Would you ever be a tornado chaser? Hell. Fucking. NO. I very much hate even watching VIDEOS of small tornadoes because I get extremely, extremely anxious.

What is your favorite thing to eat with bbq sauce, if you even like that stuff? I absolutely hate bbq sauce.

Have you ever had to do a class in summer school? No.

Have you ever created a website? Multiple, but none from total scratch.

Have you ever had a dream where you killed someone? I've had absolutely countless where I've TRIED to. That's pretty much the common theme of my nightmares, and I wake myself up trying to attack someone who's in some way threatened me. I'm always stuck in this state where I'm unable to defend myself, like my body is a stone that I can't make move, until I finally do manage to lash out and wake up.

Which is worse: Sick to your stomach or sore throat? SICK TO MY STOMACH. There is NO pain that I handle worse than stomach-oriented ones, and I'm also absolutely petrified of vomiting. This is gross but I am literally the person who historically has puked multiple times not in a toilet or trash can, but on the fucking floor because I just totally, completely freeze when I feel it coming, like I don't know how to handle the sensation and I am fighting vomit coming up to the VERY last fucking second. I HONESTLY think I would rather have a sore throat for my entire life than vomit once.

Do you think your last relationship was a disaster? The one before Girt? Not a "disaster," no. Our FRIENDSHIP may have been, though.

Who do you think is the easiest to talk to? Probably Girt.

Do you have a favourite metal band or do you not like metal? Ozzy Osbourne, and Rammstein if you count them as metal. Not all their songs are, but they've definitely got some that are genuinely metal.

Thick or thin blanket? It totally depends on the time of year/temperature.

How do you mark through your word search puzzles? It depends on what writing utensil I have available to me, font size, lots.

Have you ever sewn something? No, have no idea how to. I probably should take Mom up on asking to teach me though, it might come in handy one day.

What did you eat for dinner last night? It was pasta, really good pasta.

Have you seen all of the Jaws movies? I watched just one with Tyler. Can't remember which one it was, just that it was old, and it wasn't bad.

Have you ever drunk Cherry Coke? Yeah, I like it, but not more than the OG.

Have you ever had a black eye? No.

Did you ever take a cooking class in school? No.

Have you ever been called a skank/slut because of the way you dress? Uh, not that I know of, and it's incredibly unlikely anyone ever has because I've never dressed very revealingly. There are certain types of ignorant people who could argue yes because I have large breasts and wear tank tops very regularly, but the opinions of those kinds of people don't mean shit to me, at all.

Is your ex sexually attractive to you still? I haven't seen a picture of Jason in a super long time, but probably. How I remember him, he was, but I do know he's since grown full facial hair that I've only seen one candid picture of.

Describe the most romantic moment you’ve ever had. No.

When was the last time you were scared? "Scared" isn't the right word, but I was definitely nervous earlier when the sky got pretty damn dark and it became windy. I don't like being home alone in stormy weather.

What’s your favorite song by Rihanna? I have ALWAYS adored "Disturbia."

Can you speak binary? No.

Have you ever had a pet that you disliked? To be entirely honest I absolutely hated Nicole's old dog Bentley. It was one of my biggest sighs of relief ever when we FINALLY found him a new home. Nicole didn't even live with us most of the time we had him, and he was a total pain in the ass to both Mom AND me, and also Teddy. He and Teddy fucking hated each other, and I will never forget them fighting while Cali was in heat and getting fucking blood on my wall and side of my bed.

Have you ever given a nickname to your pet(s)? Oh for sure, they pretty much all have, haha.

Do you like boys with long hair? HELL FUCKING YES

[kookiecrumb]

jjk|| Your Head

"tags": @kazthebrekkerofinej

word count: uhhhh

summary: Jungkook is the heir to the throne of your Kingdom! In this tale of duty versus heart, will love prevail victorious?

tags: Royalty!Jungkook x Peasant!Reader, oneshot, smut, fluff, slight angst, some crack, pining, forbidden lovers, Jungkookie has a sweet tooth, strangers to friends to lovers

warnings: explicit language, impact play, birthday sex (technically), fingering, oral (m receiving*), love marking, alcohol consumption, s&m themes, horny grinding, praise kink/body worship

a/n:

hey guys!

Firstly, I want to say how proud I am of myself for growing so much during this fic. I learned a lot about what I'm comfortable with, what I'd like to work on, and where my confidences lie.

I won't lie and say it's been easy, because writing this meant dealing with a lot of my fears? I'm excited for all the works that are to come.

The only thing I can do is be as receptive to growth as possible, so I'm looking forward to learning...

*I actually learned that Vaseline wasn't invented until like the 1870s? The fic is written in the 1810s, so I actually had a choice between having them do it with vegetable oil or spit. Spit won.

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5 years ago

You bend over to pick up an apple that had rolled over under your father's produce cart, praying that it isn't bruised so that you have to pay for it out of your dinner, when a crumpled piece of paper hits you in the ass.

Confused, you crawl out from under the stand and unwrap the paper.

The paper itself is of the finest quality you've ever seen. It's a sturdy cardstock, bleached white with gold etchings on the borders. The print on the top of it reads "His Highness Jeon's Royal Study," and scribbled in some kid's amateur cursive below, "Nice butt."

You directed your gaze upwards, towards the towering castle walls. Sure enough, a boy no older than 15 had his noggin popping out from the top of the rampart, with two wide eyes staring down, curious as to your reaction. This was Prince Jungkook, heir to the throne of your kingdom.

"Shouldn't you be equestrian horse riding or playing polo or something?" You shout. He furrows his eyebrows, apparently offended at your assumption, and then disappears behind the edifice.

Moments later, another paper hits your shoulder as you're practicing your caligraphy behind your cart. It lands between the apples, so you reach your hand over and fish out out.

You glance up at the anticipant, and sure enough he's there with his doe eyes and his coconut head, ogling.

"No, dumbie. That's at MID-day." Well how were YOU supposed to know the royal schedule of the crown prince, it wasn't just common knowlegde you learned from being a humble farmer's daught--

Ah!

"Will you STOP?!" You put your foot down. "Unless you're here to buy my apples, then you're not getting ANY, little Prince." Oh, shit. You gave him ideas. Now it was really over for you.

In less than half an hour, half a company of men arrived at the marketplace, asking about your little old apple stand, and sure enough, Jungkook had bought out the entire cart so that you were forced to help with the transaction.

The young prince had eyes frankly too big for his head, with the most prominent cupid's bow you've ever seen. His nose slightly outgrew his face and his ears were hidden away behind his short, black hair. "Now you can talk to me." He gave you a rose he'd stolen from the royal garden. "I am Jungkook, heir to the throne of--"

"I know who you are." You interrupt him, documenting His Highness' total in your calligraphy book.

With a hand perched on his chest from surprise, he scoffed. "And I happen to think you're really pretty, so I was going to ask you to be my very first consor--"

"You're 15, you have playmates not consorts."

"And how old are you?!" He's had it, raising his voice and taking a bite out of one of your apples with force.

"16, old enough to have suitors." You tease. Jungkook hangs his head a little. He just needed someone to talk to, it would seem. Reluctantly, you scribbled down your address down on a piece of note paper and handed it to him.

"Look, if you buy more of my apples, I'll have an excuse to tell my Dad so I can hang out with you." You spoke in a low voice as to not raise suspicion.

Your dad is standing negotiating with the guards about prices, his usual embarassing haggling gruffly overpowering the guards elegant twiddle-tones.

"Wonderful! See you soon, my sweet!" He resumes his confident demeanor, tucking the paper into his overcoat with a small smile. He salutes you boyishly and marches away with a year's supply of apples.

For the next week, the royal kitchen had baked 3 apple pies, made 5 fruit salads, 4 batches of apple muffins, and threw the rest of them in Sangria; that's the same Sangria as King Jeon finds himself drinking in his wife's drawing room on Sunday.

"Call Chef, fetch him up here." He waves to his assistant, keeping his eyes on the outside. He was deep in thought, his hands stoicly behind his back.

The Kingdom had been prosperous for over many years now, and war had not come close to threatening its borders in a lifetime. Negotiations were always successful, and quality of living was high. The work of a King, in a situation such as this, was to perfect the image of the royal family as strong rulers, and to paint his daughters as desirable to foreign heirs.

"Your Grace," the assistant called his attention, "Head Chef Sung." The dainty man bows and scurries off somewhere else.

Chef Sung is a portly man, who carries himself heaving with every step, his great belly inflating with each hefty inhale. He approaches the King, and kneels down to kiss his hand with his fat lips.

The King recoils in disgust, but quickly collects himself and his words. "Where are these apples from, is it France or Spain?" He demands.

"Neither, Your Highness." Mr.Sung lifts up his eyes. "They are from our Holy Kingdom; by order of Prince Jungkook, an entire cart was purchased of these apples and we have not been able to get rid of them." Tears threatened Chef Sungs eyes at the very mention of the fruit.

'Well, there's one thing the kid's done right.' King Jeon now faces the Chef, setting down his drink on a mahogany table, leaning against it casually. "Well! Good. I'd like to meet the owner of that cart, invite him to my Sunday brunch."

"Oh, yes, of course sir! You'll never see them in our kitchen aga--What?" Chef Sung takes out his handkerchief, waving it around in the air and drying his tears at once. "So you like them! Why...Yes! Yes, of course!"

Your father thought it would be valuable to have you around the kitchen, learning from the skilled men and women employed by the Jeon family. He only visited once a week to drop off fresh produce, (he'd been officially hired to handle restocking of goods) but you, after showing promising signs of being a gifted baker during one of your father's restocks, were granted scholarship by Ms.Kang to be her aid.

You were now, officially, a resident of the Jeon Estate, residing in the servant's quarters, immediately adjacent to the kitchen. This was convenient. It was far too convenient for a certain little Prince to get the idea of wanting a midnight snack and wandering downstairs.

One day, he does just that. He finds his way into the first bedroom to the right of the stairs facing the kitchen, and that happens to be your bedroom.

He pokes you awake. "Ow! Ow, whyyy~" You whine and toss yourself over to the other side of the bed. His irritating poking persists. You grab his fingers and your eyes shatter open.

You sit up, alarmed. "You could have me arrested, what the fuck are you doing?!"

"I wanted a midnight snack! Besides, I wanna talk to you." He pouts, still holding a small teddy companion.

"Fine. I'll bake you ONE sheet of cookies." You slip on your night shoes and shuffle to the kitchen, and Jungkook tags along.

By the time Jungkook's 18th birthday comes around, he's in the kitchen helping you whisk buttercream to top his cake while having a tease at the Austrian Princess' mole.

"You have one right under your lip, look!" You take a little buttercream from the bowl and stain the dark spot with it.

He licks it up and hastens to add, "it needs more sugar, lady!" as he turns to grab a puffy bag of confection sugar.

"You're impossible to please." Snatching the sugar away from him, you smirk. "You can gobble down as many sweets as you want when the ball commences. Remember, this is the year you're supposed to be keeping your eye out for a girl of a good fam--"

"Yada yada, must have hips for childbearing, yada yada yada..." He mocks the speech his mother had told him that morning when he got dressed.

"Exactly." You set your bowl aside to fix Jungkook's tie. "Yes, and that's your duty, as our heir."

You step back and examine Jungkook one more time. He'd grown so tall in the last year, his legs like spider's and he was just beginning to grow into his features. Handsome boy.

You, too, had grown into an elegant young woman. You had a poised complexion, ready-mannered and graceful. Your hands seemed out of place in your otherwise feminine frame, carrying an extra bit of girth from baking. You were 19 years old.

Marriage was becoming an uncomfortably frequent topic during your visits home, as your mother had married young, herself, she expected the same of you.

Truth be told, there were plenty of offers for your hand. You were a skilled and very esteemed individual, who had broken into thr artisinal class. But your father knew better than put a dowry on your happiness. So long as you worked, he saw no reason to marry you off just yet.

"Now, go. Your sisters must be worried sick! Go out there." You shoo him, pushing him out the door of the kitchen despite his flailing arms.

Throughout the party, you'd been carrying a platter of your own baked goods, serving them to the aristocrats attending the Princes' coming-of-age ball. Accents from all over Europe and some from Kingdoms as far East as Cyprus jubilantly engaged in artful conversation which filled the air with good spirits.

Jungkook, himself, was busy being introduced to as many women as possible, a medley of presenting duchesses, ladies, and even Princesses of your Kingdom. They were each more qualified than you'll ever be, ten-fold.

One was a Greek Princess, her hair cascaded in darling curls down her shoulders and her eyes were deep-set, her voice a flirtatious trill.

Another, a Prussian Princess', posture radiated excellency, and whose complexion sparkled like powdered snow. Jungkook greeted her warmly, pleased with her appearance.

Distracted, you tripped up your skirt and dropped the remainder of your pastries. With that, you stepped off to use the restroom.

The sound of Strauss' Rosen aus dem Süden faintly loomed in the air as you wiped tears from your waterline in the mirror. That was just the way it was, wasn't it? Princes come of age, and they find wives who they commit their lives to.

"Married men don't have friends who are girls." You say out loud, just to realize it. Jungkook was now expected to find a mate within the season, and he was, in fact, quite the eligible bachelor.

Little did you know that Jungkook had been keeping an eye out for you throughout the party, not only because you were carrying his favorite Danish pastires, but because he knew your company was his greatest comfort.

He's in the midst of greeting the Duchess of Kent when he excuses himself to go look for you. He finds your mess first, frowning as he realizes something has gone terribly wrong.

He catches you in the hallway, face puffy and shaky. He grabs your wrist to keep you from darting back to the kitchen.

"Please don't do this, it's my birthday, y/n." It's as if an unspoken rule had been broken between you, and he feels it. Something is making you uncomfortable. "Was it the girls? You told me about this, it's my duty to at least greet them and--"

"Yeah, you sure did greet the Prussian woman nicely." You speak through tears. "She's the girl you were born to be with, huh? Your birthright?"Jungkook is silent. "Every girl at that ball wants to be your wife, want to have your children. They haven't known you for a day and yet they're ready to be your bride."

You search Jungkook's eyes for any sign of coherence, hoping that he would defend against you, that he would speak up and tell you otherwise. No such argument comes.

You yank your arm from his grip and march to the kitchen to remake the pastries you spilled.

You had the job of clearing off all the tables upon the departure of the last guests. It is midnight, and the windows of the castle stream moonlight down on the carpet beneath your feet. The glow of candles soothe you as you hum the waltzes which echo in your mind. It's a brilliant evening.

The centerpieces of the tables were gardenias, lush rose-like flowers with yellow pistils.

Summer, 1809

"Jungkook, wait! You're going to make me trip!" You shout from the top of the hill.

"You've gotta come see before the sun sets! It's the only way we'll get there on time, now run!" Jungkook's speeding down the terrain towards the Sycamore tree which grew deep and wide beneath the banks of a great rushing river.

You groan and throw caution to the wind, rolling down the steep mount in your Sunday dress. Jungkook turns to watch you, a grin spreading across his handsome face. "Look at you!"

You land on your feet at the bottom and scurry off to join Jungkook under the grandfather tree, out of breath entirely. "Now, look what you made me do. You're such a boy, you know that?! Making me come out here just to see some bloody--"

Jungkook has plucked a gardenia and placed it behind your ear. "Would you shut up? We got here on time. Behold."

In all its glory, the sun bathes you in its vivacious rays, creating a feeling of heavenly bliss as it dips below the horizon. The sky blushes pink, its clouds mere whisps above you. Wind rustles the leaves of the grand tree, rousing the birds to chirp their afternoon song.

"Mom used to come here all the time with my Dad, because of these." Jungkook clasped the blooming flower in his tender hands.

After a while, he says "the bugs will come out soon, so we ought to go back," as if he's trying not to scare something away. He helps you up, and with one last look across the valley, you walk next to each other back to the East Quarters.

You take all the silverware and plates by the tub to the dish-washing station and toss all of the linen napkins into the washing machine. All you had left was to blow out the lights in leading upstairs.

"Prince! It is very late, and there are no guests left for you to entertain. What troubles you?" Jungkook's sitting on the stairs with his head in his hands, still wearing his best suit.

"I disappointed you, y/n...I didn't like any of them." He admits, lifting his head up to sulk at you. "I should have told you then, but I didn't want to make you upset!"

Did Jungkook mistake your jealousy for disappointment?

"I'm not upset because you didn't hit it off with the girls..." You sigh. A confession is due, and he's ready to hear the truth from you about how you feel about him.

"Well, the truth is, I didn't like any of the girls because I like you, y/n. But you know that, don't you?" You pause, asking him to elaborate.

"Remember when I bought all the apples because I wanted to be with you? Like...I told you that you were my consort and I kind of meant it?" He felt pathetic now, realizing that you weren't just ignoring his advances. "So you didn't friendzone me for 2 years, you actually didn't know that I liked you."

It was almost laughable, a situation you would read in one of your illegal novels which you kept tucked away in your pillow at night. "No, Kookie, I didn't." You admit to your insolence.

You can't bear to lead him on any longer. You needed to put duty over your own self interest for the sake of the kingdom, even if it shattered his hope. It was better this way.

"But, you do know that we can't ever be a thing, right? It's just silly." Your heart tightens with the words which fall out of your mouth. "It is. Nevermind what your parents would think, what would it do for your image? You're on the world's stage, Jungkook, and you're a selfish person if you think you can just throw all of your duties away to date a scum of the Earth like-- like me!" With your heart in your throat, dry your eyes with your sleeve. "And...I want to, I really really want to, more than anything else to love you, Jungkook. I love you! I...can't." Through the blur of your tears, the shapeless blob that Jungkook has become stands up.

Taking his thumb and swiping it under your eyes, he sighs. Words escaping him, he takes your trembling body against his chest and nestles his head in the crook of your neck. Your cold hands travel underneath his overcoat to hold his waist. The Princes' lips plant a gentle kiss on your neck, chaste yet deep and satisfying.

"I will not accept any bride if not you, my love." He draws back, meeting your fervid gaze. "To the world, I remain a bachelor for a few years."

"And after those years, Jungkook?" You ride your hands up to caress the man's jaw. "You will still love me after those years, and then what?"

"I don't know," he says, voice as soft as powder. "I don't know many things, y/n, that's why I need you to teach me." His palms are rubbing at your waist, beckoning you closer.

His breath quickening as you lean your body against his hold, and you figure it must be the wine he drank to calm his nerves. That was it, wasn't it? He was drunk.

"You're not drunk, are you?" Your face sours, really hoping it's not the case as you feel your body temperature rise.

"Y/N, I've only had a glass. You saw I was a wreck back there." His lips kept chasing yours in a dance you can't quite describe. "I have wanted to hold you like this since I saw you selling apples on the street. Give me the honor..." His forehead against yours and his strong hands supporting your back, he's already fucking you with his eyes.

"The pleasure of being your lover." He squeezes your waist tight with his forearms, planting brisk kisses behind your ear and breathing in your scent. He smiles against you. Your skin pebbles at his affectionate touch, purring softly as your eyes roll back in delight.

"Kookie..." You breathe, leaning on his broad chest. "Kook, the maids are wondering where I am, I have to go..." You slur, tugging at his collar.

He grunts in protest, taking your ear between his teeth and nibbling it.

"If you let me go, I'll steal some cake for you tomorrow at breakfast." If there's anything Jungkook likes more than Cream Ice, it was cake. He unravels you from his arms and nods, his eyes softening.

"Request my service tomorrow, from Ms.Kang. She's been sweet on me lately." You peck his cheek before stepping back. Your rouge has embarrassingly stained His Grace's cheek.

Jungkook bows and presses a kiss on your hand, eyes rising to meet yours. "Til' morrow, babe."

Jiyoo shakes you awake the next morning, handing you a cake and a note that reads: "Prince Jungkook has a commission he must discuss with you. Meet him at his chamber immediately."

Lacing on a simple corset over your nightgown, you try not to look too red in the face as you climb up the stairs to His Majesty's room. You'd be up there alone, as requested. The girls would absolutely start rumors based on that alone-- rumors which you realize are probably totally true. This was stuff of scandal, after all...

'There shouldn't be anything scandalous about love.' You decide as you rap on His Highness' door.

"Please enter...but only if you have my cake!" Jungkook says in his morning voice. He's so cute.

The simplicity of Jungkook's abode takes you by surprise. His bedroom is very well lit, a capital display of the flowered valley through his bay windows washed the room in gold, painting his porcelain white carpets and his cotton sheets a warm creme color. His drawers and vanity were etched in gold, with breathtaking detailing.

The Monarch himself was splayed across the bed, laying on his side casually. He held a glass in his hand, holding a white wine. He puts down his glass and sits up as your presence.

"We both know that you didn't come here as my servant." You lock the door behind you. "And I have no such commission to give you, darling." The innocence which undertones his usual speech is missing as he coaxes you towards him.

"This much I know, Your Majesty," You say, taking a bit of frosting on your index finger and smudging it on the Princes lips. His black eyes, as cunning as a viper, watch you dangerously as you push two fingers past his plush lips. He wraps his hands around your wrist and draws your hand away, his gaze fixating on you.

"Set the cake down." At his command, you carefully place the confection down on a nearby chest, feeling Jungkook's eyes on you, drawing you back towards his grip.

"Let me pull your laces apart," with your waist held by his Herculean hand, he hums "and then let me pull you apart. I want to memorize your pleasures and gratify your desires, I need it, y/n..." Your back flush against his chest and your thighs split, his hands knead into you as he litters your collar with his mark.

You gasp softly against the crook of his neck, giving into his hold of you. His hot tongue spreads under your jaw, closing into a hard kiss as his hands travel back up to undo your corset and free your tits.

One by one, his fingers pop open the buttons left on your gown until the collar hangs off-shoulder to expose your collarbone. At the sight of new skin, Jungkook's tongue darts to stain it.

His hands stagger above your breasts. "Is it okay if I touch you here?"

"Oh, Kookie, touch me everywhere~" Your hands form fists around Jungkook's shirt, beckoning him impossibly closer.

Grasping one ever so carefully, his thumb grazes your bud as he playfully bites under your ear. "ah-- ahh,"

Jungkook groans in response, he can't believe how cute you sound. Curious, he wants to hear more, so he traces your thighs and experimentally pushes up the outside your cunt.

You squirm, tensing up immediately in response. You bring your hands down to find the latch on his trousers and dip your hands below to rub him through his undergarments. He heatedly bucks up to meet your touch, a panting mess.

You face him now as he watches you ride his fingers while you grip his girth through his clothes. He takes you by the ass and places you on his prominent bulge, hips rolling into you as he hungrily kisses you, his firm hands grinding your core on his cock.

His face is a sinful red, panting under you desperately.

"I've been wanting to do this," His voice warbles through your touch, running your thumb along his underside. It's his turn to gasp. He sits up and collapses his lips into yours, softer than rose petals and his taste faintly like wine.

You place your hand on his chest, and his heart is pounding, a thin layer of sweat already forming on his honeylike complexion.

Hastily, you pull your dress over your head and lean back to allow him to familiarize himself with your stark form, a dainty chain hanging between your bosom. Jungkook bites his lips as he wriggles out of his clothing, desposing of it beside the bed.

He's giddy behind those sultry eyes, you know him well enough that he's overexcited to get inside of you. It goes straight to his cock, your playfulness as you feel up his bare shoulders and discover his abdominals, your fingers tracing his ridges with a sense of innocent wonder.

He takes your hands and looks at you in this way-- Butterflies fill your stomach instantly. Jungkook's thumbing at your pout with his intrepid fingers.

His eyes flutter when grip his base and submerge your upper body below his hips. You lick a long, thick stripe up his underside, causing his breath to hitch and his head to fall back on to the bed.

Those goddamn cupid's bow lips of his would whisper the dirtiest things under his breath, lewd thoughts that sounded completely alien coming from His Majesty's mouth, he said for you.

"Oh, such a pretty mouth~ It's so good, y/n, you swallow me so good--" he moaned like a mantra, trying to keep his hips from snapping up into you. Your hot, wet tongue wrapped around his throbbing cock was only a fantasy to him for years.

He fills your throat with his girth, his taste tantalizingly smooth. It leaves your mouth with a 'pop.' You struggle to keep your legs apart as you crawl up to kiss him.

He takes those fingers of his and slides his index and middle into you and languidly thrusts them, smirking against your lips. "Shit, you liked that, hmm..."

"Kookie...please," you whine as he squeezes your ass hard before smacking it. You yelp, the sting of his fingers radiating from your skin.

"I like it when you beg, y/n, it's so cute..." He pulls your ass up to his thighs. He's flush hard against your abdomen, already sticky with his precum and your spit. You marvel at the self control he has.

You don't finish your thought before he has his head inside of you, impaling you on his cock and stretching your entrance, hissing at how incredible it felt to have you around him.

His shaft reached pleasure points within you had yet to discover. You clench, feeling his tip brush against your cervix. "Wh... hngh," he groans, "how did you do that, do it again--" You wrap your legs around his thighs and clench around him, biting your lip. You watch as he shivers from pleasure, feeling his skin horripilate under your touch.

His thumb is softly circling above your clit as he pulls out of you carefully. He swirls back in, nestling himself inside your heat, hissing. "Ahh~ Jungkook~!" At the sound of his first name moaned out of your mouth, he groans and rolls his hips up to create messy friction. That familiar knot in your stomach tingles as he plays with the bundle of nerves buried within you.

He glances up at your ruined lips, clashing with them again as he lifts your knees up with his hands and thrusts nice and rough, making you yell with every jolt of his cock. The smell and sound of sex fills the room as he experiments with positions, laying you on all fours.

"Get your ass up for me." You obey, ever servile. You're reminded-- you're his servant. He owns your work, he owns your services, and now he wants you in the most lucrative way, he wants your soaked cunt around his imperial cock. He gets what he wants.

Jungkook's palms smack against your ass one more time, just to watch the way it jiggles for him. He smirks a little before he shoves himself into your pretty little cunt. You bury your face into the pillows in pelasure as he chases your orgasm with vigor, fingering your clitoris while you move your hips back to meet his hard thrusts.

You whine like a harlot, his cock allowing you every satisfaction as he works a head-spinning orgasm out of that cunt. "I'm gonna cum, Kookie~!" you warn as you spasm against his length, moans ripping from your throat as you coat him with your thick juices.

His hips stutter up and he just barely pulls himself completely from you as he paints your back white, a guttural groan escaping his mouth.

After a while of loud panting and scattered giggling, Jungkook reaches over for a wet cloth and cleans the both of you gingerly. You trail your hands up to caress his jaw and kiss his lips softly.

"You need to tell everyone that I had a long and extensive request for the Harvest party, that I wanted a lot of fall fruits and vegetables featured in the baked goods, make it as specific as possible and make sure that you mention that I want to meet with you again, over dinner." His labored breathing punctuate his words, as youd kisses consume him. "And..."

"And?" You cock an eyebrow, simpering.

"Doyouthinkmaybeyoucouldbringmesomemilktogowithmycake?" He mumbles, eyes glued on the bed.

"What?" (If you give a Kookie a Cookie...)

Disgruntled, he sighs and repeats: "Milk! Milk for my cake. I know it's moist cause you made it but I'm really thirsty, especially after..." His cheeks flush a cute pink. You wait for him to continue just to fluster him a little more. "Y/N, just please!" You can't ever refuse his pouty face.

Next week, Jungkook's got you pinned against the hallway wall, making out with you hungrily as his hands ride up your dress. Just across the hall, his Dad is negotiating war with Portugal over land in the West.

The next month, you have his cock buried in your throat underneath the table at an important conference about how to create jobs.

All this while the pressure for Jungkook to find a bride continues to rise as he reaches seniority, and as his father's grey hairs pronounce themselves.

Warm touches are always hidden away to the public eye, but often shared between two kindred spirits underneath the man in the moon's watchful eye. Jungkook, as he reaches his maturity, grows strong. His jaw sharpens, and his eyes darken. His hair grows long, and he gains weight. Now at the proud age of 20, Jungkook had become a man before everyone's eyes, including the eyes of foreign monarchs and their eligible bachelorettes.

One day, you're serving the Royal family at a private dinner, when the topic of marriage comes up for the first time since his birthday.

"Your mother has made friends with the mother of the Austrian Princess, and she's invited you to the cordial ball to introduce yourself to the Princess. An allyship with Austria would prove advantageous for our relations with France, so you are to make your best impression." The King wipes his mouth. Setting his fork down, he continues: "It is in the family's best interest for you to marry her, if the French Princess, Anastasie, does not present this season or the next." The Queen holds the King's hand firmly, reassuring him from his shoulder. She wears a slight frown on her face, her eyes worrisome, somber. The King hides his anxiety, as he's been accustomed to from decades of responsibility. Would this be the face of Jungkook soon?

For now, Jungkook's face is scrunching at the thought of marrying Anastasie. She's not the most delightful young woman, her imprudence ruined her enjoyment of any event. She couldn't keep an intuitive conversation about regional politics and domestic policy for the life of her. Her people were on the brink of overthrowing the aristocracy, he was sure of it.

"Yes, father," is what you hear from him before you disappear down the stairs to fetch desserts.

Jiyoo interrupts your quest for sweets with a letter, signed by His Grace. She has a naturally innocent demeanor, her cheeks rosy and her frame as delicate as a feather. "Y/N, you have another special request from His Majesty...can I ask you why you get so many of these?" She looks genuinely curious, not a single menacing thought behind those eyes.

"It's because the Prince really really loves his cake." I mean, technically it was true. Jungkook never passed up an opportunity to squeeze, smack, or dig his fingernails into your ass during your sessions.

"Oh." Jiyoo pouts. "So it's not because you're like, in love or anything?" Her eyes are glued to the floor. You were expecting this question eventually, as the other girls in the kitchen were already suspecting it. It was only a matter of time before word slipped into the girl's ears.

"As much as I enjoy the Prince's interest in my baking, it isn't my place to confess any sort of feeling for him." Your answer is straightforward enough, so Jiyoo nods and hands you the letter. Another request.

Outside the Palace, Winter came like the wind. Lakes froze over, and couples tied up their skates and danced on the ice. The trees were bare and brown, not a single leaf persisting through the chilling breath of Jack Frost.

Jungkook had left for the Winter Palace, to volunteer and raise spirits up in the North. As heir to the throne, he was to be Commander in Chief of the Royal Armed Forces, and therefore needed to undergo intensive training in order to boost morale.

You're back home, and in your wake is your father, who has now grown tangibly tired. He's been on a strict diet of warm vegetable soup for about three months, now. His eyes are sunken, but he still wears a subtle smile even during his most trying days.

Match girls make their rounds at night, you watch as the lamplighters illuminate the streets with their tall ladders and their taller peacoats. Shop windows glow warm shades of yellow and creme; inscriptions on the glass create shadows on the white snow.

"Wow. It's almost as cold as the King's heart out here." You step outside one day with a cup of tea, sneaking in a cheeky smirk. Yeah, good one.

"I heard that!" You turn towards the little voice. A child, maybe about 9 or 10 years old is pointing at you. You squint at it.

"Well, it's true..." You mumble. You have a bit of change in your pocket, so you walk towards a stand to buy a hot bun and a paper.

"Chilly today, hon...Best you take this on the house." The tenant hands you a steaming cake wrapped in a simple cloth and your paper. You stick the paper in your dress pocket and take back your change. You nod a 'thank you.'

You spill the contents of your pockets on the dining table and snatch the paper, snapping it open. Your eyes eagerly skim the headline: "Prince Jungkook Fires Up Royal Army." Below is an article detailing the happenings of His Majesty. All of it sounded very intense, the running, strategizing, first aid training...Was there anything Prince Jeon couldn't nail on the first try?

You set the paper down and pick up your now lukewarm tea. In the back of your mind you're coping with the fact that the Spring Solstice is next week, and that marks the beginning of Jungkook's last season as a Prince.

The King is ill with tuberculosis, and recovery is unlikely. If Jungkook is to marry, it is next season and that was final.

Sitting at the window of his Winter Castle study, Jungkook plays with a ring nestled between his fingers. He looks out onto the lake, as if he's trying to reach you with his gaze. His heart is tight knowing that it would be the season he chooses his bride. Actually, he'd already made up his mind long ago. If his duty was to marry, there was no way to evade such a responsibility. He had to fulfill it, despite his anxieties.

He straightens up and walks out of the hollow room with a firm step.

You awaken with the sound of horse's hooves thudding against the Earth. It is yet to be dawn, and in the distance, thunder roars mightily.

A figure wearing a long, black hood hoists itself off of the animal, tying it to a nearby post. It walks towards an obscure entrance, unknown to many staff.

Intrigued, you wrap a blanket around yourself and peek out at the stranger. His fingers are shorter than his palms, and that's when he tosses of his hood, his eyes set on you. "Y/N..."

You're bewildered by his guise, questions filling your head.

"I was horny, so I left camp" He sits down at the counter, catapulting a cookie into his mouth.

You roll your eyes. "And the guards let you?! Jungkook!" You whisper-yelled at him, readjusting your makeshift blanket-dress.

"Obviously not!" He puffed out his chest with pride. "I bribed them," he smirks.

"You're insufferable," you scoff, your eyes wandering down to observe his physique. His shirt is anything but conservative, highlighting the muscle he'd earned through laborious, sweat-inducing drills. You can feel his eyes on your face as you observe him.

"You can't hide it either," he crosses his arms. "You're standing in the kitchen with a blanket around your naked body." He flicks his tongue. He steps forward, putting a finger under your jaw so you're looking him in the eye.

Your eyes fill with lust as he speaks over your lips. "Look at yourself..." A crash is heard in the other room.

Jungkook's head darts up and in a flash, he disappears into the night.

'Fuck.' You gather your dress from the floor and shuffle back to your chamber.

The first event of the season commences with the most exaltant of spirits as friends of old greet each other with youthful smiles. Juicy exposés, enticing tales, and thoughtful greetings are exchanged in the most formal manner, and the conversation is lively; the most controversial topic of conversation, however, is the rumor that Jungkook is to marry this season.

So far, he's been to four different private residences within his own Kingdom and has been invited, by the secretary of King Louis XVII to meet their daughter. It would be an understatement to say that stakes were high for the pending King.

You were kneading your dough a little too hard thinking about it. "Not so rough, y/n!" Ms.Kang snatches the mixture from your hands. "What is up with you lately, you're so tense! It's really disrupting the kitchen's dynamic."

You shrug it off. "It's going to be hard sedating Anastasie's sweet tooth, I suppose."

"Well, you seem to be doing just fine dealing with Jungkook's addiction to cakes...She's perfect for him, really." Ms.Kang throws more flour on your kneading table and steps off. You give up on the dough, covering it with a cloth and letting it rise.

Jungkook is tapping his feet, munching on finger sandwiches as he waits on you to make an appearance.

"Dearest Prince, look, I am wearing Mediterranean violet!" A duchess shouts as she passes by him, to which he raises his eyebrows at. Another, with dark green eyes approaches and begins speaking rapidly in French at him. Frightened and undereducated, his canned response was: "Excusez-moi, Pouvez-vous répéter plus lentement s'il vous plaît," to which the duchess furrows her eyebrows before something else catches her attention, elsewhere.

Truth is, Jungkook is incredibly shaken at the thought of announcing his engagement tonight. Well, that and the fact that you had yet to pop out of the kitchen. Man, those finger sandwiches were good.

As the night progresses, Jungkook realizes that if he doesn't get up on that platform and say what he needed to say, he'd have to say it in London. Setting his fears aside, he plants himself on top of the orchestral stage and taps a champagne glass with a cheese fork. The music comes to a stop.

With conviction, he begins: "The time has come that I announce my engagement. To all of my beloved friends, who have introduced me to the most beautiful, talented, diverse, and benevolent ladies I've come to get to know over the years, I thank you from the depths of my soul." He swallows and continues, his confident voice masking his trembling. "The life of a Prince is defined by the virtues presented to him at birth. Those virtues are: duty, responsibility, grace, kindness, mercy and integrity." Here comes the part, oh shit.

"I am abdicating my throne to my Cousin, the Duke of Namseong."

Silence sweeps the room. You poke your head out to see what was going on.

"...to marry the love of my life, y/n." He points at you. Your face is cherry red, and you find yourself dropping those same Danish fucking pastries all over the carpet.

"Shit," you fall on your knees, plucking them from the ground one by one. You don't know whether to run as fast as you can or to present yourself, but your body seems to be currently doing the latter. You go along with it.

Jungkook takes your hand tenderly on the stage. "I am unable to perform my duties as King, and therefore am ineligible for the throne." His touch gives you the will to continue beside him. You feel the pure fear rushing through your love's veins, and he knows that this is the hardest thing he'll ever have to do, yet he stands by his announcement.

So, if Jungkook doesn't get to be King of this World, he at least will forever be the King of Your Heart.

But all this, of course...is all in Your, dear reader, Head.

~

a/n:

hope you enjoyed.

[cdroloisms]

uhhhh ,, , hi ??

i feel bad bc i havent been here in. LITERALLY forever lmao - hope you guys r all doing good!! ive been working on some stuff but it’s been pretty slow going, and school is also A Thing, so i definitely havent been writing as much as i’d like. 

as an apology, have this? really self-indulgent feel-good syndicate + c!dream centric oneshot bc i felt like writing this so u know. why not. 

tws: implied torture, abuse, self-harm, disordered eating, starvation mentions, prison arc themes - overall everything’s just blink-and-you’ll-miss-it mentions, not too much angst here for once! c!sam and c!quackity critical, sorry guys but we r still in the prison arc and they still r on their “fuck human rights” arcs. 

Dream leaves.

 It’s a surprise - or maybe it isn’t one, Niki isn’t quite sure. She’d never grown to quite trust the man, she knows, and she can’t really tell if the bitter twist of emotion that swells up her chest when Phil comes to her city with the news is betrayal or resignation - what can she say. She’s gotten more than her fair share of broken promises. They don’t exactly faze her anymore. 

 None of them seem all that surprised, save Techno, who entirely fails to hide the worry that flickers over his face when he calls the Syndicate meeting to officially inform them of what’s going on. She shares quick, careful glances with the other members when his back is turned - despite how many times he’s been burned, Techno still seems so adamant at holding onto every thread, trusting all too easily those who would use and leave him behind without a second glance. He can handle himself, she knows. Still, that’s not going to stop her from slapping Dream upside the head for being yet another worthless person to betray her friend’s forgiving nature. 

 Nothing much changes in the next few weeks. Niki has to admit, it’s strange without Dream around - he’d not been an ally, much less a friend before dipping completely, but he had been some sort of constant - and Niki is self aware enough to know that she misses him, a little, the same sort of way you might miss an old routine once it’s gone, if only for the familiarity. She still visits Techno and Phil with various baked goods, knowing that Phil would have his hands full just keeping Techno from running himself ragged - makes sure to check on Ranboo, whose nerves have inevitably returned with Dream’s disappearance. To be honest, she doesn’t worry as much as he does - ally or not, she’s spent enough time with the Dream that had left prison to expect that he won’t exactly be able to get himself very far should he come for the four of them, and doesn’t particularly care about he might pull with the rest of the server - if things get bad, she’s sure Phil and Techno will have it handled. She asks Phil, once, what happened, and he shrugs. 

 “I don’t know, mate,” he heaves a chest to the side, pulling out a stack of stone blocks that Niki gladly holds for him. “One day we woke up and he was just- gone. Everything. Was like he wasn’t ever there at all.” 

 Niki hums. “Why’d you think he’d do something like that?” 

 “If I could understand half of why Dream does what he does, we wouldn’t be having this conversation now, would we?” He smiles at her from behind a crate. “Shall we bring these things upstairs and start on dinner?” 

 Niki laughs, knowing that the conversation about Dream is over. “Of course, Phil.” 

Dinner is a welcome distraction; all of them have gotten better at cooking in recent months, between her baking and the veritable library of recipes Phil knows that she’s never even heard of, but Phil is still the only one she really trusts to hold his own behind the stove - Ranboo is still a little too nervous around water, and fire, and much of everything, and though Techno can be a perfectly capable cook, he’s been distracted as of late. She has a strong feeling that left to his own devices, he’d just grab a stack of steak and disappear for another few weeks, searching the server for information. 

 Honestly, she’s a little thrown off by his behavior - he’d not done anything like this with Tommy, if she remembers right, and had hardly seemed affected by Wilbur’s betrayal on the Sixteenth at all (then again, she was a little too lost in her own head to notice if he was.) She tosses her head over to ask Phil, who’s leaning over a few carrots he’s slicing to throw into the stew he’s making, and the man pauses, frowns. 

 “From what I know,” he starts, words slow, careful, “they’d spent three months in there together, and the conditions weren’t exactly- stellar. According to what Techno said, I’d assumed they had come to some sort of understanding.” He goes back to the carrots, expression dipping into shadow and out of sight. “Guess I was wrong.” 

 Niki hums. She can see it, sort of - spending months together with someone, no matter how insufferable, probably would end with some degree of attachment - she thinks back to plotting through sleepless nights with Jack, anger and grief leaving them simmering, crabs in the same pot of boiling water, remembers looking into his dead-eyed gaze and seeing her own stare back - and feels a brief pang of guilt. Besides, Techno is Techno. She’d never met someone so willing to forgive, understand, reach out despite everything that’s happened - for Dream to take advantage of that feels almost too obvious. Of course he would - what were they all thinking?

 “He’s Dream,” she says as if that explains everything, flipping open the oven door and feeling a wave of heat blast her face. Phil hums lowly, understanding. “I hope Techno will be alright.” 

 “He’s tough,” Phil cracks a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, “And he has us on his side. He’ll get through.” 

 Niki opens her mouth to reply, only to be interrupted by the front door slamming open. Outside their quaint little cottage, the wind howls - it sounds like the beginning of a blizzard out there, flurries painting the world in a thick blanket of white. In the door, Techno strides into the entrance with loud, decisive movements, shutting the door loud enough to make the walls shake. Inadvertently, Niki finds her eyes drawn to the small pile of snow that he’s tracked into the house - Techno’s usually so careful to kick it all off on the porch, never liked it much when there was a pile of melting ice and snow dampening the floorboards and soaking into his shoes. He huffs harshly, stripping off a snow-dusted scarf from his face - a long, multicolored abomination that had been the product of her attempting to teach Ranboo how to knit. Phil has reached his side, hands splayed over his upper arms, eyes soft in the corners from concern. 

 “Techno, mate-” his tone is chiding but his movements gentle as he brushes snow off of Techno’s signature cloak, “you’ve gotten snow everywhere. What were you doing, dueling a blizzard?” 

 Techno shakes his head, not meeting Phil’s banter as usual, fur sticking up from the snow melted into it. His voice is gruff and holds little humor - unconsciously, Niki feels her shoulders tense. 

 “Phil, call a Syndicate meeting.”

 ---

 Phil, per usual, is unrelenting, so it’s not until a quick dinner and some hurried messages to their final member later that the Syndicate is gathered in their meeting room, Techno pacing the length of the room as they wait in their respective seats. He looks less frazzled than he did when he first entered the house, in part due to Phil’s sitting him down to eat and picking through his fur to smooth it out of its windblown spikes and tangles - Techno had grumbled at him to stop preening him, but looked a lot more relaxed by the time they were all finished with their food. Still, his ear flicks periodically, twitching toward ssome sound that Niki can’t hear, movements tighter and jerkier than she is used to. He’d always been a little flightier after the prison, but not quite like this - everything here feels like that but dialed up to eleven. Inexplicably, it reminds her of Dream. 

 “Techno?” Phil gestures towards his seat, prompting, and he settles into it with an obliging huff. 

 “Y’know, Phil, the code names are kinda pointless if we never use ‘em,” he says, words carrying no real heat - he looks back at the rest of them, lips thinning into a line. “Anyway. I called this meeting because I found a couple leads on Dream.” 

 “O-oh,” Ranboo stutters, tail lashing behind him. 

 “You don’t have to do anything that you don’t want to, mate,” Phil reminds him gently, a sentiment that Niki affirms with a determined nod. 

 “There’ve been some reports- rumors, really,” Techno says, calling their attention again, and they all turn towards him, “of increased activity around the prison again. The Warden spending more time on its grounds, movement seen around the walls and around the portal- so I decided to go check it out for myself.” 

 Niki frowns, and watches as Phil does the same beside her - Techno had seemed to avoid the prison if he could help it, save for when he went on the initial mission to break Dream out. It was no secret to them that he didn’t exactly like the place. 

 “We could’ve helped if you asked,” Phil reminds him, and Techno shakes his head. 

 “I know, Phil. It’s just- that place is bad news. I’d rather keep you guys away from there if I can-” his hand goes to his head with a poorly hidden wince. “Sorry, Chat’s a little- worked up, at the minute.” 

 “Sorry, we’ll stop interrupting you,” Niki says, cutting off Phil before he says anything else. “So you went to the prison?” 

 Techno takes a second to gather his thoughts, mumbling quietly in the way that usually means he’s telling off Chat. “Right- I decided to stake out the portal. The rumors were right- Sam has been hanging around there, entered and left the prison four times yesterday. And today-” he hesitates, expression visibly darkening. “This morning, about an hour after the Warden arrived, Quackity came to the prison and went through the portal. He left the grounds about six hours later.” 

 “Quackity?” Niki frowns, eyes flicking over to how Phil has stilled in his seat. “What is Quackity doing at the prison?” 

 Phil ignores her question, reaching towards Techno, something indiscernible in his gaze. “Mate…”

 “He smelled of blood when he left,” Techno says, words sharp, and Niki feels her heart skip a beat. “Warden left about half an hour after, and I came back here.” 

 Ranboo clears his throat, sounding tentative. “Okay,” he drums his hand on the table when they turn towards him, eyebrows drawn, “but what, exactly, does this have to do with, uh, Dream?” 

 Techno and Phil trade glances, one of their bouts of unspoken conversation that Niki’s grown extremely used to. They seem strangely hesitant, she notes internally, Phil looking towards Techno with a question written clearly in the planes of his face. Techno sighs, a long puff of air through his lips as he closes his eyes and turns his face towards the table. 

 “You know how Dream was- injured,” he starts slowly, looking back up at them. Niki shifts uncomfortably - of course she noticed, it was impossible not to - if not the bandages that peeked under his sleeves and the cuffs of his pants, then how skinny he’d been, all skin and bones curled up uncomfortably in a pile at the corner of Techno’s couch. She’d not know the extent, by any means, and had always assumed that they’d been self-inflicted - she’d been in a bad enough place on her own before to know how your head can make you want to hurt, sometimes, how eating food can feel like choking on sawdust and the world could feel so much smaller when focused into delicate pricks of pain. Phil’s eyes are trained on Techno - on his face, then on the pinkish raised skin of a still-healing scar along his forearm, and she feels understanding settle like a rock in her gut. 

 “The Warden had apparently been lettin’ Quackity into the cell to torture Dream for the revive book,” Techno trails off, eyes narrowed and seemingly fixed on a random point of the opposite wall. “By the time I go there, it’d been goin’ on for months.”

 “But wait,” Ranboo’s tail moves even more erratically behind him, “You mean you think he’s back- there? How?” 

 “He has to be back in the prison,” Techno points out. “I can’t imagine anyone besides him that the two of them are goin’ to just start torturin’- Sam had been iffy about the whole thing when Quackity started in on me. It has to be Dream in there again.” 

 “But how did he get in there, then?” Ranboo asks, visibly confused. “Last time it took the entire server to lock him up!”

 “There were no signs of a struggle,” Niki points out, matter of fact. “I believe you, Techno, but I don’t really know how they managed to drag him back so easily. I can’t imagine he was jumping at the chance to go back in there.” 

 Techno shakes his head with an uneasy sigh. 

 “I have a feelin’ of what might’ve happened,” he says quietly. “And I really hope that I’m wrong and he’s less of an idiot than I think he is.” 

 ---

 They set out to investigate - and maybe attack - the next day, Techno and Phil taking on the bulk of preparations as Ranboo stays behind. He’d been understandably uneasy about the whole mission, so they’d left him back by the Syndicate room to set off their pearls in case anything went wrong. (“By the end of the day,” Techno had said, giving Phil a look with the corner of his lip quirked upwards, “don’t be like Phil here and think I meant the end of the month, alright?”) They’d all be supplied with armor and weapons, thanks to Phil, but she’d been handed the bulk of their potions, arranged neatly in her inventory by type in case they’d be needed. She lingers in the back of the room as Phil and Techno chat amiably over the sound of making last minute repairs on their armor, listens to Techno’s ceaseless reminders for Phil to be careful, watches as they make sure that their stasis chambers are properly prepared should they need them.

 (She watches as Phil nudges Techno’s shoulder when he lingers behind a certain chair, empty as long as she’s been part of the Syndicate, the fountain behind it bubbling quietly without a pearl inside. Techno sighs, expression strange. 

 “Should’ve set him up with one,” he says, quiet, and Phil pats him on the back. 

 “You couldn’t have known, mate. We wanted to wait a little before telling him about the Syndicate, remember?” 

 Techno hums, noncommittal. “Still.”)

 They Nether travel to the site of Techno’s lookout, which ends up being a little shambling thing with dirt walls dug into a small hill looking towards the prison portal, having hardly enough space to fit the three of them. Phil looks at it with no small amount of apprehension, and Techno shrugs lightly, wearing an expression that makes Phil turn to him with a look that makes Niki break into giggles. Techno crosses his arms- “in my defense-” and Phil looks up at the dirt ceiling with a long-suffering sigh. 

 “You couldn’t have made this a little roomier, mate?” Phil asks, voice dry as kindling, and Techno raises his hands by his head. 

 “Hey hey, it’s discreet, it gets the job done, it’s perfectly structurally sound-” the sound of the leftmost wall crumbling, along with the cloud of dust that puffs from it and fills their tiny space, undermines the tail end of his statement and leaves him sputtering, Niki falling into another fit of quiet giggles. Underneath it all, Phil sighs again, raising his wings behind him. 

 “...these are going to take so long to clean out.” 

 To his credit, Techno looks sheepish. “Sorry, Phil.”

 They sober up quickly; Techno turns around to the opposite side of the hill, where he’s hidden some peepholes inside the dirt - Niki settles herself by one, leaning forwards to put her eye to it and catch a glimpse of the prison looming over the water. It’s been repaired since the breakout, she notes, the gaping hole in the roof completely gone and replaced with obsidian, as intimidating and undamaged as it had been before, if not more so. Phil makes a considering sound from behind her.

 “Same plan as last time?” He asks, and Techno shakes his head. 

 “They’ve probably reinforced it, and Dream’s blueprints won’t include anything new the Warden’s added. I wouldn’t be surprised if they moved Dream to a different location completely. We don’t want to draw too much attention, either, we were cutting it pretty close during the breakout.” He narrows his eyes. “I was thinking we’d try something a little stealthier, this time. “ 

 He gestures at Niki, who blinks back at him with wide eyes. 

 “You got a couple of invis potions for us?”

 She distributes the potions among them all, one regular and two splash potions of invisibility each, and Techno points towards the prison once she’s done. 

 “The most important thing is to get through the portal,” he says with a grim expression. “Worst comes to worst, once we’re inside we can always blast our way through - but gettin’ through that portal is our first priority.” 

 Phil narrows his eyes at him. “The portal is locked, though. We’ll need to follow someone else inside- and I’m pretty sure Sam uses pearls, so he’s out.” 

 Techno nods. “Which is why I’m bankin’ on the prison gettin’ another visitor today. We’ll just have to wait.” 

 Niki swallows. “Do you mean-”

 “Quackity?” Techno turns away, not quite meeting her eyes. “I’m not totally sure, but he’s not exactly the type to just give up on his goals. He’s pretty predictable- an empire needs an emperor, always needs something new to rule- you know the type,” he says, tipping his head towards Phil. “He’ll be mad at Dream for disappearin’ on him and won’t miss the opportunity to prove he has the upper hand again. I’m not sure that he’s going to come today-”

 “-but you wouldn’t really be surprised, either,” Phil finishes for him, eyes steely with cold determination. “I trust your judgement, mate. Just stay safe- from what I’ve heard, Quackity has been...erratic.” 

 “When is he not,” Techno huffs a short laugh, shaking his head. “I’ll be fine, Phil. Just be careful, both of you. Don’t get too close. And if things get messy- which is what we’re tryin’ to avoid, by the way- then don’t do anything too risky. Our priority is gettin’ in and out alive.” 

 “We can handle ourselves, Techno,” Niki reminds him with a small smile. “And Ranboo is there in case anything goes wrong.” 

 “Alright, then. Here’s the plan.” 

 ---

 It takes quite a long time for Quackity to arrive, long minutes that Niki spends fidgeting in the corner of the room, brushing her hands over seams of the netherite plates that Phil had shoved into her hands, back at the Syndicate room. The set is inexplicably light - not weightless, by any means, as it is still netherite, but not nearly as bulky as any set of netherite armor she’s owned or seen in the past. The runes are precise, lines thin and exact, written with graceful strokes of lapis. 

 “Phil’s the best metalworker I’ve ever met,” Techno tells her with a small grin, catching her in the middle of tracing what she can make out as an Unbreaking rune along the metal strapped to her forearm. “But then again, he’s had the time to practice.” 

 “Are you calling me old again?” Phil huffs, and Techno flashes a smile her direction before looking at Phil with a slight grin. 

 “Well, Chat is,” he says, lips twitching when Phil glares back. 

 “You can’t just blame Chat every time you insult me, you little shit,” Phil groans, and Techno only grins wider. 

 “Phil, my ad revenue,” he complains, a dramatic lilt to his voice that has Niki stifling a snort, and Phil’s glare only grows deadlier. 

 “You’ll have more than your ad revenue to worry about if you keep this up,” he mumbles, going back to keep watch at one of the peepholes and stilling as he does. “Shit- Techno, Quackity’s here.” 

 Techno straightens up, hindered slightly by the low ceiling of their room. “Alright- we all know the plan, right?” 

 Niki nods in the affirmative, pulling out a splash invis and letting it settle in her hand, the glass cool beneath her fingertips. She reaches into her inventory and lets her armor fade into it, takes a deep breath and watches as the two across from her do the same. She doesn’t wear armor often, but so close to the prison, feeling mining fatigue settling deep into her bones - she’s never missed the security it offers more. Techno keeps watch, waiting- drops his arm in a signal. Now. 

 Niki throws the potion at their feet, flinching back at the sound of shattering glass and feeling its effects seep into her skin. When she opens her eyes, she can’t see anything but the inside of the room that they’d holed themselves in and the faintest of wisps rising from where their feet must be, curling around the grass. 

 (Please let this work, she begs to no one in particular as they walk towards the prison. And if you can hear me- please keep us all safe.)

 She hardly breathes as they follow Quackity across the path, holding someone’s hand in her own - Phil’s, by the feel of it - careful to muffle her footsteps in the grass and stand still whenever Quackity’s eyes come a little too close. Thankfully for them, he seems focused, hardly stopping or looking around at all as he walks towards the prison’s portal, movements stiff as he walks forward. He punches the button on the wall particularly harshly, and Sam’s voice comes crackling through a speaker a second later. 

 “I’m here for my visit,” Quackity says, punctuating the sentence with a snort of laughter that doesn’t sound particularly sincere. Niki hasn’t seen him in a long while, not after everything that happened in Pogtopia, and she feels a chill worm down her spine - this man looks nothing like the one that had laughed and danced and sung at her birthday party what feels like an eternity ago. What happened? 

 Sam sighs, the sound turning into a sharp burst of static through the speakers. “Hello Quackity,” he says, voice deep and tired. “Please step into the portal after I tell you to and then wait on the other side.” 

 “I know the drill, Sam,” Quackity rolls his eyes. “Just because the bastard was gone for a few weeks doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten how this damn place works.” 

 “Just going through protocol, Quackity,” Sam replies, and something about this response has Quackity exploding into a brief fit of laughter, the sound grating against Niki’s ears. She feels her grip tighten on Phil’s hand, air caught in her throat. 

 “Protocol- ha. Whatever you wanna tell yourself, pal.” Quackity smiles, cold and cruel, and Niki tries not to think about how she’d seen that same grin on Wilbur, eyes sparkling from the light of the lanterns hung from the bridges and walls of their ravine, remember how she’d looked into them and realized her old friend wasn’t there, anymore. Quackity disappears into the portal, and after a second, the hand around her own pulls her inside of it too.

 On the other side, Quackity taps his foot impatiently, crossing his arms and waiting- Sam’s voice comes through the speakers again, words clipped. 

 “Go through the portal,” he says, and Quackity does- once again, they wait for a second for his body to disappear, then go within it themselves, pressed close enough together within its frame for Niki to feel the warmth of a wing wrap around her shoulders for a quick second before they’re out of the hot, stifling air of the Nether and into a large, neatly made lobby of blackstone and quartz. They duck into a corner, watching as Quackity moves towards the front counter, the Warden waiting there with his arms crossed over his chest. He looks- tired. His movements are slow, footsteps loud against the floor, shoulders tense and back hunched. He walks around the counter, sword strapped to his belt, and Niki feels her breath hitch at the sight of dried blood still stuck to the blade in patches and splatters.

 “He ready?” Quackity asks, holding his hands out - Niki catches a flash of metal as Sam drops something into them, watches as Quackity raises what ends up being a pair of shears, dangerous-looking and gleaming with enchants, to the light. 

 “Yes,” Sam says, side-eyeing Quackity with a small glare. “You know, it’s supposed to be your job to clean those things off when you’re done with them.”

 “I told you, busy day back in Las Nevadas yesterday,” Quackity waves a hand- “I’ll do it, alright? Don’t get all pissy now. What happened to being partners?” 

 “You said we’d be done with this months ago, Quackity,” Sam sighs, and Niki feels a light tug on her arm as Quackity and Sam begin to walk towards the wall to the right of them, breathes in slow and deep as she follows Techno and Phil towards the others. The wall yawns open with the hiss of redstone firing and pistons pulling blocks upwards, opening into a dark hallway that feels like entering the maw of some sort of giant, insatiable beast. They step inside as one, and the door shuts behind them. 

 “We’ll be done soon enough,” Quackity says, and Niki feels hairs rising on the back of her neck. “Trust me.” 

 They stalk forwards through a labyrinth of blackstone, Niki brushing the palms of her hand against her clothes when it goes clammy from adrenaline. Halfway through, she pauses to tip back a second potion of invisibility, careful to keep her movements slow and steady as not to make a sound - the liquid is silvery, cool and light on her tongue, and she lets the effects wash over her with her breath caught in her lungs before moving forward. The tunnels are simpler than she’d expected, bearing little obstacles or checkpoints - Quackity makes a wry comment a second after (“Guard tunnels today, huh? Appreciate the hustle, pal-”) that confirms her suspicions. Despite the potion particles still whirling around their bodies and the sounds of their footsteps, too loud in her own ears, they manage to make it forwards without much trouble, entering a large room with a doorway filled completely with a curtain of lava. 

 “Set your spawn,” Sam says, still stoic, and Quackity rolls his eyes again before doing as told. Niki keeps looking back at the lava flowing past the wall, its heat filling the room and making her already slick palms even worse, and Sam moves to the side to flick a lever, eyes trained on the lava slowly bubbling in front of him. 

 “Give me your tools?” Quackity asks, and Sam sighs before doing so - Niki watches as he hands over a netherite axe, then potions, then a few raw potatoes that Quackity accepts and puts into his inventory. Sam raises an eyebrow once he’s done, hand tight around the handle of his trident. 

 “You bring your own sword, today?” He asks, seeming irritated, and Quackity shrugs. 

 “Sorry pal, I need to make a new one. Guess I’m borrowing yours again.” 

 Sam sighs again, louder, and hands over his sword as well, watching as Quackity swings it a few times experimentally. The blade skims a little too close to her on one swing and she can’t quite help the squeak that escapes her lips as she throws herself out of the way, feels her heart hammer in her ears as she backs up against the wall. Please don’t hear that please don’t hear that please don’t hear that please don’t hear that-

 “Quackity, wait.” Sam raises a hand, ear twitching as he looks over in her direction with narrowed eyes. “I think I heard something.”

 Oh fuck.

 “Well, guess show’s up then,” Techno drawls, and both of them whirl towards his voice, giving Niki enough time to pull her armor back on, scrambling to get her sword and shield in her hands as Phil does the same besides her. Pieces of armor appear where Techno is standing, then a bucket of milk- oh, why must her friends be so dramatic- and Techno’s standing there, smiling sharply, with Orphan Obliterator held loosely at his side. “Let’s get this done, then.” 

 As one, Techno and Phil blur into action - Techno moves forward to catch the prongs of Sam’s trident on his blade as Phil parries Quackity’s blows with his own sword- they move fluidly, easily covering each other’s backs as the room devolves into chaos. Niki remembers their guidance as she flits in and out of the fight, scoring quick hits to keep the Warden and Quackity off balance while remaining out of range from their weapons, and it’s not long before both of them have fallen with a spray of items and experience orbs scattered all over the floor. 

 Techno moves over to block off the exposed face of the bed with a block, looking over at the two of them with an uncharacteristically severe expression. “They’ll be back soon- we have to move fast. Niki, you have those fire res, right?” 

 She nods as she reaches into her inventory, finding the potion’s orange-pink glow and smashing it at their feet. They dive into the lava together, Niki scrambling to keep up, her arms struggling to move through the thick lava, loses sight of both until she flails into something directly in front of her and hands are pulling her up out of the lava. 

 “There you go, mate,” Phil smiles down at her as hauls herself to her feet, making a face at the feeling of the lava clinging to her clothes. “Yeah, swimming through lava isn’t exactly fun. You good?” She flashes him a thumbs up, and he laughs- “Niki, you’re still invisible.” She flushes pink- right.

 A few sips of milk later, she gives him a proper thumbs up, and he laughs, loud and bright. She looks past him to where Techno’s crouched over something- someone, she realizes with a start, in the corner. Dream’s back in prison clothes, ragged and ill-fitting, and he’s curled up with his back towards the front of the cell, shaking enough to be obvious even from where she’s standing. Techno speaks lowly, voice barely more than a deep rumble in the air, almost inaudible.

 “You there, Dream?” 

 She watches as Dream turns his head, looking up with wide, bleary eyes. His hair flops in front of his face, and something within her itches to brush it out of the way. “T-Techno?”

 “Yeah nerd, who else?” Techno smiles, and Dream seems to blink awake, drawing himself up with a shuddery breath. 

 “Techno- it’s a trap- what are you doing here?” he hisses, and Techno gives him a look, deadpan.

 “Yeah, yeah, it’s a trap- come on, Dream, we’ve been over this by now, bro. You have to know that their traps aren’t goin’ to do anything to me by now,” Techno rolls his eyes, reaching forward to steady his hands on Dream’s shoulders when the other man sputters and struggles to breathe. “Easy, now. Geez, you wanted to prove me wrong about being homeless bad enough that you came back here? We could’ve just made you a house, you know. You didn’t have to go this far.” 

 “I- they were gonna kill you,” Dream breathes, face twisted up uncomfortably, and his eyes flick past Techno’s face to where Phil and Niki are standing at the opposite wall of the cell. “All of you- they said-”

 “And that’s what I thought you’d say,” Techno groans. “Come on, you idiot, I thought you were smarter than this-” 

 “They were right there, Techno!” Dream fires back, eyes alight. “You- they were right there, what were you thinking, they could’ve-!”

 “And my best friend is a necromancer, remember?” Techno shakes his head. “Come on, Dream- Sam and Quackity? You know we can handle them in a fight, especially when you can just revive us if anything goes wrong. You don’t have to do this whole self-sacrifice thing, bro- there’s only so many times I can break into the same prison, y’know.” 

 “You’re so stupid,” Dream huffs, but he leans in anyway, head just barely settling against Techno’s shoulder. “I- I can’t believe. You’re so dumb.” 

 “Hey, don’t be sayin’ that to the guy that’s breakin’ you out of prison,” Techno laughs, slinging Dream over his shoulder with an easy motion and laughing harder when it makes him yelp. “That’s just bein’ ungrateful. You’re making Chat sad, man, and when they’re sad they don’t subscribe-” 

 “I regret this entirely,” Dream says, voice muffled against Techno’s shirt, tone completely flat. “Put me down- you idiot- I’m staying here. You’re worse than Quackity.” 

 “Rude. Now you’ve really made Chat mad. I demand an apology-” 

 “Boys, boys.” Niki can’t help giggling, watching the way their gazes snap towards her, rolling her eyes as she moves forward with a few potions held loosely in her hand. “Dream, do you want a health pot?” 

 Dream seems to deliberate for a second, before nodding at her, expression slightly strained. “...sure.” 

 “You two can finish your argument after we’ve broken out of the biggest maximum security prison on the server,” Phil drawls from behind her, arms crossed at his chest. “Come on, now, before Sam gets back.” 

 “Isn’t this the only maximum security prison on the server?” Techno asks aloud, an amused expression on his face - one that only gets worse when Phil glares at him with one ice-blue eye. 

 “Shut-” he sighs, shaking his head. “You two are chaotic little shits, you know that?”

 “Don’t compare me to him, Phil,” Techno complains, Dream mirroring his words with muffled protests of his own, and Phil breathes another drawn-out, long-suffering sigh as he rubs at the bridge of his nose. 

 “Niki, give us some fire res please?” 

 She finds the potion bottle between giggles, throwing it to the ground as she tries to choke down the laughter rapidly bubbling up her throat. “Of course, Phil.” 

 She looks back at Techno and Dream before jumping into the lava, the two of them once again lost in some sort of argument, Dream draped over Techno’s shoulder. He’s breathing easier now, she notes, and Techno looks looser too - a little less tense, leaning back with a perpetual quirk to the corner of his lip as they fire insults back and forth. This is familiar, she recognizes with a soft twist in her chest, the same way that Phil and Techno can finish each other’s sentences and look at each other with laughing eyes sharing the same memories of the past, the same way Ranboo watches Techno’s every step as he adjusts his stance and lifts his sword and Techno laughs and calls him a main character in turn, the same way she and Phil will settle together on the porch over cups of tea and sit at each other’s sides for hours. The rhythm between them is one well-established, the road well-worn - she imagines them, huddled in this dingy cell for months together, and breathes in slow and deep. 

 “Come on,” she smiles, making sure to keep it on her face when Dream meets her eyes with wide, startled ones of his own. Dream still isn’t an ally, and isn’t a friend. 

 But - she watches as he smiles back, something inexplicably warm in her chest - maybe, one day, he could be.

[mde1011]

when i got into the dsmp i started a note and wrote down any quotes or moments i thought were funny, and im bored at 3 am so enjoy some of them

how is being arrested real? just walk away!!!”

⁃ “once an american always an american. go...go protests masks...or something”

⁃ “...yEAH BUT DID YOU HAVE WAP” “what’s...whats wap?” “...WORSHIP AND PRAYER”

⁃ “HOW DO YOU LIKE POLITICS MOTHERFUCKER”

⁃ “i’m naked” “...no you’re not” “i can be...”

⁃ “uhhhh i’m in a high stress situation....i deal with these poorly”

⁃ “i should go first i’m naked”

⁃ “yEAHHHH WE KILLED AN OLD MAN WITH HEART PROBLEMS”

⁃ “what are you going to do?” “i...have no idea i think i’m gonna start out by punching a tree”

⁃ “tOmmy...did i just hear you say shit ass looking mofo?”

⁃ “i aM gOinG to gEt nAkeD to iNtiMidAtE HiM”

- “...i want freedom !” “you want BALLS.”

⁃ “...down the line. yeah that’s where we discover the art of cannibalism” “oh it’s an art?” “it’s an art”

⁃ “oh there’s some logs here. wonder what they’re saying to me. uh huh. uh huh. oh yeah that’s very racist” “tommy you gotta burn those logs.” “burn ‘em before they spread their racism to other logs”

⁃ “are you pooing?” “*whisper* i’m charging up-““ “he’s ejaculating on the tent.” “he’s WHAT?”

⁃ “he’s sPEEDING. LOOK HOW FAST HES GOING” “i’ve taken so many drugs. someone tell badboyhalo”

⁃ “we should make a pact. and that pact is, uh, we make a book...and in that book...we declare that saying ‘muffin’ is a, is a slur”

⁃ “i was thinking what if one day your bladder just,,,,stopped working.....AGGGFFFFF i was tHINKING ABOUT THAT THE OTHER DAY IVE GOT TO PREPARE IVE GOT YO PREPARE thisiswhydiapersaintthatbad”

⁃ <sapnap> i think i was ordered to um

<tommyinnit> boobed

<sapnap> kill you

<tommyinnit> boobs

<sapnap> if this happens

<tommyinnit> think about boobs man

<sapnap> tsk tsk tommy

<tommyinnit> iM DISGRUNTLED

⁃ “why is this deadman so good at making drugs”

⁃ “i just learnt that a girl hero is called a heroine and it freaked me out”

⁃ “memento memento me-“ “that’s actually the worst word i know so you can’t keep saying that” “oh, really.....? have you ever heard the term ‘racist’?”

⁃ “the person who invented the phrase ‘be yourself’ hadn’t met you!”

⁃ “you seem like the type of guy whose dad would throw him overboard as a joke but he would just drown”

⁃ “shout out to dream for twerking!”

⁃ “let’s talk......let’s talk about sex” “wonderful. what do you think about sex, lazarbeam?” “i ain’t saying SHIT in front of a sixteen year old”

⁃ “what the- i think i’m seeing things” “....tommy i told you not to drink the sea water” “well i DID drink the sea water because it TOLD ME TO”

⁃ “it’s like the movie when that guy gets stranded on an island and has sex with a coconut” “whAT?? dream- dream, you vastly misinterpreted this” “it one hundred percent does”

⁃ “oh mastICATE.....isn’t that when a fish turns inside out?”

⁃ “what are some bad words YOU know, clay?” “i don’t-“ “what about ‘terrorist’?”

⁃ “my mind has to be on the same frequency as jesus when he walked on water”

⁃ “you wanna know why i was late?” “no i really do-“ “i was having a MASSIVE poo. really just a HUGE poo”

⁃ “jUST CUZ YOU TALK ABOUT POO ONCE AND THEN YOU SEE A BIG GREEN BASTARD AMD YOUR LIFE IS FLASHING BEFORE YOUR EYES AND THEN YOU CANT REMEMBER- YOU CANT REMEMBER IF IT WAS YESTERDAY OR TOMORROW YOU HURT THAT WOMAN”

⁃ “i love america. mmmmm patriotism

⁃ “LIFE IS NOT A HAPPY SONG KERMIT THE FROG”

⁃ “please stop taking the cock”

⁃ “two four six eight who do we appreciate? not the government let’s gooooooo”

⁃ “oooo look at the dogs😍” “wHAAAAAT. WHAT. THERES ACTUALLY LIKE. A MILLION DOGS HERE. WHAT THE HELL.”

⁃ “yeahhhhh bitch i stab- i don’t stab women-“ “woooooooah tommy you stab women?” “heyyyy sapnap”

⁃ “do you know what happens whne you reach the top of the ladder? there’s only one place to go.” “.....side to side😨” “down.” “...i really thought you were gonna say side to side🥺”

⁃ “one last time.” “just like in hamilton😓”

⁃ “you don’t know how many times i’ve mistaken trees for hot women”

⁃ “ i don’t feel better i just destroyed penis”

⁃ “i’ve never seen a snail with bad morals”

⁃ “awwwwwwww😢 i’m doin’ drugs🤧 just like the good ol’ days😓” “.....define the ‘good old days’” “back when i did drugs”

⁃ “have you ever fought a baby? i have and it was trivially easy to defeat, phil.”

⁃ “the only other i egg i know about was the one i learnt about in school....not allowed to say which one....”

⁃ “did you know one of my new years resolutions is to be more like 2010 justin bieber?”

⁃ “apparently cats don’t lay eggs”

⁃ “thinking about trees- if i saw a tree with a beard mmmmmm...holy shit id hit it”

⁃ “we’re in hell dude. science doesn’t matter here”

⁃ “i cant die i cant die i’m GOD”

⁃ “hey pig your letter is the same as pussy, hmm?”

⁃ “are we cool are we COOL guys? CRYSTAL COOL like CRYSTAL METH”

⁃ “he- he’s crying because - because i killed his mother isn’t that right? mother dearest mother deadest mother gonest”

⁃ “bro ive been drinking since i was six and let me tell you...it’s not good to be drinking that young. led to some poor life decisions when i was 8” “what did you do” “i cant say” “...who did you hurt” “....only myself”

⁃ “je suis” “ay i know what that mean you prick” “what does it mean” “it means you’re racist dickhead”

⁃ “i’d never poo in the presence of a women- which is why i’m scared to get a girlfriend i think i’d just explode”

⁃ “biff tannen is one of my idols”

⁃ “black widow died and i thought ‘wow it should’ve been the man’ because he’s a man”

⁃ “there’s a character called captain america and i think he’s stupid”

⁃ “i’m a GOOD LAD i’ve got GOOD MORALS and if i’ve DONE SOMETHING WRONG it WASNT MY FAULT I JUST GOT A LITTLE EXCITED”

⁃ “sam....what’s the longest you’ve ever wiped your arse? for me it’s 48 minutes”

⁃ “why are you standing in the shitter?” “....that’s a SINK” “uhhh welllll” “hAVE YOU SHAT IN THE SINK?????”

⁃ “you’re like a living ghost” “...i think that’s called a human, tubbo”

⁃ “maybe i accidentally kill ranboo and we just never see him again *laughs* ay? and then i go ‘april foooools!!!’ and then i kill their child. i kill him”

⁃ “you built a penis” “it’s a PENIS OF SAFETY”

⁃ “i saw the penis of safety and i pressed mouse button four my friend”

⁃ “the penis on the other side of the river is larger” “ive heard that before....”

⁃ “you’ve turned the penis into a wall” “a wall of safety is better than a penis of safety” “i think the penis was better”

⁃ “if you wanna make a penis i know where we can make a penis and i know how big we can make it”

⁃ “i don’t conceptualize death but i think i just saw it!”

⁃ “yeah i- yeah i know i’m- my first impression on eret was making him read a shrek fan fiction so- i’m not one for first impressions”

⁃ “i-i’m scared for him- i’m scared OF him. yknow the first thing he did when he saw me was imMEDIATELY strip down then jump off then immediately die?”

⁃ “where are you?” “getting stabbed, one second”

⁃ “you’ve seen the joker?” “yea-“ “i resonate a lot with that man” “...oH. oh. that’s- that’s not-“

⁃ “he bURNT DOWN MY HOUSE” “out of LOVE”

⁃ “ohhhh my god stop making me play with the neighbor kid” “o-okay if you don’t go play with him i’m kicking you out of the house-“ “wHAT THE FUCK???”

⁃ “there’s a STRIP CLUB” “oh yeah for wood!” “are you into strippers?” “i mean all it does is make the wood look different so....yeah it doesn’t really do much”

⁃ “no no we have categories, we have the poo-saster- you might have to take a shower after-“ “no, no i’m gonna stop you right there”

⁃ “as i was saying you can have a 1-to-3 wiper, that’s an A-tier poo, my friend”

⁃ “i want you to eat your sock”

⁃ “you know i’m a child- i’m a minor” “sO AM I DICKHEAD”

⁃ “everyone is calling you dresus” “yeah i am”

⁃ “ayyyy ayyyy los DROGAS LOS DROGAS” “no no big q- she’s thirteen- how does this happen with every 13 year old girl you meet?”

⁃ “my poo has muscles like i do”

⁃ “i cant hear the words among us without crying they’ll say there are aliens among us and in the back youll just hear me *choking noises*”

⁃ “tubbo...tubbo is like...tubbo is like mary” “.....did you just call me the Virgin Mary?”

⁃ “i’m just saying, have you ever seen me and jesus in the same room?”

⁃ “do you smoke sam” “all the time”

⁃ “i thought you were talking about the- the speeeeed drug”

⁃ “have you ever sold drugs to kids sam?” “......no”

⁃ “we can’t let the girlboss rule because she will gatekeepe my feelings” “that would not be good”

⁃ “THEY DIDNT INVITE ME TO KILL ME???? NOW I HAVE FOMO”

⁃ “you have obviously taken part in scientology-“ “i have not-“ “you’ve donated to tom cruises cult shit”

⁃ “....am i worse than david dobrik?” “are- are we worse than david dobrik?” “oh- oh god”

⁃ “he has broke one of the rules of the hit best seller ‘the bible’- this kind of looks like a cock”

⁃ “well i’ve moved now, KING”

⁃ “what is an angsty teen and am i one? because when i USED to hang out with my friends they use the word angst a lot”

⁃ “yeah yeah yeah i bench”

⁃ “sam i think i’m angsty i think i’m an angsty tik tok teen looking for a community to help me out”

⁃ “i don’t think you’ve followed the train of logic all the way-“ “there’s a TRAIN INVOLVED????????”

⁃ “i’m like the orange fucker from that animated rom com”

⁃ “i’m under the influence of big cock”

⁃ “it’s meeee big cock man”

⁃ “i cant look away” “sam please use your twitter alt for this” “he’s horny on maaaainnnnn” “and what’s wrong with that?” “.......”

⁃ “you’re a FUCKING IDIOT” “IM NOT A FUCKING IDIOT, BIG COCK”

⁃ “i’m gonna call you ‘cockity’ big cock” “sHUT THE FUCK UP SHUT THE FUCK UP-“

⁃ “STOP LOOKING AT IT” “ITS SO VIBRANT”

⁃ “at least this guy doesn’t have a cock-“ “itS NOT A COCK” “horny on main jesus-“

⁃ “is that a cock” “SHUT THE FUCK UP”

⁃ “.....i wanna see the inside of it again do a split”

⁃ “okay sam-“ “tommy that guy wants your cock-“ “no- no he doesn’t sam”

⁃ “sam, sam and i need you to hear this....dont. act. up.” “i don’t act up-“ “you were acting up-“ “i-“ “you were caught in 8k.” “but- but we both agree it’s not a tie-“

⁃ “please don’t tell me to kill cockity i am overwhelmed”

⁃ “why is there an anus in my tie?”

⁃ “what are the legal implications of this?” “...i mean besides hell you’re good”

⁃ “whatre the legal implications?” “i mean usually that’s a no-no but today, today it’s fine” “yeahhh lets go murder his family”

⁃ “i’d be an antivax landlord”

⁃ “jesus never does drugs” “well- well you turned water into wine king and wine is alcohol”

⁃ “can you put on pants i can’t- i cant stop looking at it- sorry tommy i know you said-“ “yeah sam i know you tried-“

⁃ “you know i fuck with satan”

⁃ “i’m sorry jesus lucifer is just such a good man-“ “oh you- hold me BACK FROM THIS FUCKER HOLD ME BACK ILL SEND HIM TO HELL YOU LIKE HELL-“

⁃ “are you jesus or just a man who grew a beard and put on a suit?”

⁃ “even the guy with his cock out is telling you to stop-“ “oh jesus, and i mean jesus-“ “shUT THE FUCK UP MAN”

⁃ “the best best way to slander him is to stop his offspring; we need to kick him the balls.....no? not a good....? alright us four each take a ball-“

⁃ “......why did jesus give him four scrotums man🙁🙁”

[thotsforvillainrights]

Hello so I had this random idea at 2am:

Everyone talks shit on Kai's anime hairline, right? What if he hears one of the bullets saying something and before he can take out his anger on them he sees his s/o drag them away (for example Kurono being an escort in public) and he just kinda goes to his office and sits there thinking over it and he gets insecure about it (and very confused why he's insecure about it.) And his s/o comes back and helps the man feel better about it.

Whatcha think? This possible to even happen?

(Is it possible to happen? Well it is now lol)

~Insecure Kai and His Hairline~

headcanon|scenario|imagine|match-up

4:00 p.m and the day was moving along swimmingly...well, as swimmingly as a day of business could go for the yakuza. Kai finished some morning paperwork, and set up a schedule to meet with another group that evening before his shift ended. He also scheduled a few shake downs for Setsuno, Hojo, and Tabe to handle. On top of that, he was busy moving a few things around to be pushed into other areas (he need not say). As he walked down the hallways feeling fairly proud of his achievements for the day, he caught wind of his name being thrown around from Deidoro’s mouth to Rappa. He usually didn’t care about small talk or gossip as long as the workers got their job done, but he was rather curious to see why he was apart of the conversation. Therefore, he paused and put his back against the wall just before the corner ended so he could listen to what his precepts might’ve been saying. 

“I’m just saying, if I were him that I wouldn’t try that slick back style anymore. That shit looked a little ridiculous.” Deidoro spoke in between sipping his alcohol.

“Hey watch it! If the grand and might OverHOLE catches you saying that shit, he’ll have your head on a platter.” Rappa said sarcastically.

“Ah fuck it, what are the chances of that right? Besides, he’s been killing a lot less with Y/N around. Anyway, just hear me out. The boss looking a little good in Y/N’s eyes right? I hear it from random female and male and non binary yakuza members from other groups as well. They always mention his looks and how handsome he is. But like...that recent big ass meeting we had? His haircut was NOT fucking suited for the slick back look. His hairline is like the American basketball player Lebron James.”

“Damn man, I don’t like him either but I’m not gonna roast him this bad.” 

“No serious! This aint a damn roast, it’s facts. I bet by the time boss hits 30, he’s gonna be balding.”

Both men laughed while Kai could feel his blood boiling. Was he some sort of fucking joke now?! Just because he had gone a little soft and started to show sympathy and appreciation for his men doesn’t mean he is to be taken lightly. He was slipping his gloves off at the very moment to go show Deidoro and Rappa a thing or two when suddenly your voice appeared.

“Deidoro! Get upstairs to the top level right now and clean that mess up you made, and I MEAN IT. Rappa, you’ve got to come with me today because we’re picking up some new furniture and Overhaul told me last week if we go through with it that I wasn’t allowed to lift it myself. Sorry bud.”

“Why apologize to me? I’m down for some heavy lifting any day!” And then silence as the three walked away. Kai could always wait until you leave with Rappa to handle Deidoro but there isn’t time to stalk and kill his employees. Plus this was confined talk so he’d fess up to eavesdropping and you’d probably get upset at him for it. He sighed in annoyance and stomped back to his office, silently hoping for someone to step out of line on his way so he could absolutely destroy them. Once back inside his office he buried himself in mindless busy-work to distract himself from the anger. It worked for a moment...but his anger had shifted from annoyance to some other feeling...in fact the feeling could best be known as insecurity. That couldn’t be right??? Could it? Throughout the day he found himself stopping to look at his hair in the small mirror inside his desk drawer. Eventually it became so constant that he shifted towards keeping the mirror propped up on his desk so he could work and keep peeking over and over. With each peek at his hair, his perception of himself shifted more and more until the voice in his head began nagging at him that this imperfection was real and it was very VERY obvious. At times it was the only thing he could see when he looked at himself. He couldn’t remember exactly what he looked like when the day began. He groaned and reached out to fling the mirror across the room. Just as you opened the door to greet him, it slammed against the wall next to you and shattered.

“Uhhhh...bad time?” You laughed nervously as he gripped the sides of his head and sighed. “Angel please leave...I’m not feeling very well and I think I’m sick.”

“Oh stop it, you know I can tell when you’re really sick. Anyway, I was just coming down here to tell you I was heading out to get furniture. I’m bringing Rappa with me like you asked, but I figured I could bring Deidoro instead of Nemoto since Shin has stuff to do back here and Rappa seemed attached at the hip with Deidoro today.”

“Do as you wish with them. I could care less if they died...”

“Okay now I know something is up. Chisaki please talk to me, I don’t like it when you feel like you have to hide stuff from me. I can see you’re bothered by something and I don’t think Pops or the other group’s leader will like the meeting coming up with you being so dismissive on things. Please talk to me?”

He sighed and looked up at you with dull eyes. “Angel...am I still attractive to you?” Kai silently begged you’d have the answer he wanted. “Kai if you ever ask me a question that stupid again, I will physically harm you.” He smirked and shook his head. “Well of course you’d think that. Just earlier I caught Deidoro and Rappa speaking about the current state of my hairline today and-”

“Ohhhh Oh my Gosh they were talking about it upstairs earlier and it was so funny I...” You paused when you saw his lip just barely jutting out in a pout from under his fabric mask. “Oh my God Kai, that was just locker room teasing. They were just making jokes is all. They sit around and roast everyone to keep from being bored. Y’know I didn’t think you were the type to take someone so seriously over this type of thing ESPECIALLY not Rappa and Deidoro of all people! Listen, you know as well as anyone else that not everyone is going to have a good opinion on you. I learned a long time ago that as along as I think I’m hot then no one else matter. Besides, it’s okay to get a little insecure sometimes since it’s human nature, but don’t you EVER forget how sexy you are. And anyway, I don’t know what they’re talking about hair for. Rappa’s shit is so matted up in the back, it looks like he’s starting dreads. And Deidoro...if he reached up and pulled his hair back, he would have a 12 head instead of a forehead.” You said nonchalantly while looking down at him sitting in silence. He slowly reached up to hug you with one arm before thanking you for your kindness. 

“Thank you Angel.”

»—————————–———————————————————–✄

Instagram: @pastelbattydraws & @pastelbattystore

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[loverlele]

Oblivious

Spencer Reid x Bi!Female Reader

Warnings: bad language, a bit of sex talk

A/N: Happy pride month! I know there’s lots of evil things going on in the world at the moment so I wanted to bring a bit of happiness back, even if it is just for a few minutes. I have a Bi!Spencer Reid x Male Reader one shot (possibly a mini series) coming soon, as well as a Lesbian!Emily Prentiss one shot in the works.  Let me know if you want a part 2, possibly a smutty chapter? Who knows ;) anyways enough of my rambling, enjoy :)

Word count: 2023

“Hey good job today angel face” Morgan says from opposite me as I pack up my bags to head home. “Everyone’s going for drinks in a bit, fancy coming?”

“Since when have I ever said no to drinks with my favourite man?” I sarcastically shoot back.

“Well considering Reid hasn't asked you out for drinks, I can't comment on that one sunshine.” I pick up a piece of paper from my desk and throw it at him. Unfortunately I have a shit sense of aim, so it ended up going way to the right of Derek and hitting Emily square in the forehead. 

“Oops, sorry Em!” I say, skipping over to my best friend and kissing the spot it collided with her face at. Unable to contain her laughter anymore, she erratically waved her hands in front of her face to get to back off. I do, not before messing her hair up with my fingers.

“Uhhhh, what have I walked into?” comes a voice from my left. I spin round and see Spencer stood next to my desk with a puzzled expression on my face. I sheepishly smile at him, looking at Derek for help. 

“Y/N once again tried to hit me with a flying object, but her awful aim stopped that from happening and it hit Em instead” Derek laughed out. With a fake anger look on my face I kept on Derek and held him in a fake chokehold. I didn't think twice at how immature it might make me seem, but once I heard Spencer’s adorable laugh I knew I didn't need to second guess myself.

“Hey you adorable human being, get your own man” Garcia says as she walks up to the mess that has unravelled. I rub Derek’s head firmly before sliding off his shoulders, placing my feet firmly on the ground. Well, so I thought. As it seemed though, the earth hated me. As my feet made contact with the ground, my knees buckled and I fell backwards. A firm, but soft pair of hands caught me and helped me steady myself. I didn't need to turn around to look at who had caught me, I could recognise those hands from a mile away. 

“Thanks you” I muttered slowly pulling myself off him.

“No problem.”

Feeling the tensions rise in the air I turn my attention back to Garcia, who is now perching on Emily’s desk with a smirk on her face. That little shit, I mutter to myself. Thankfully, my comment wasn't heard by anyone. “For your information Pen, I don't need no man thank you. I am perfectly capable of making my own bad decisions without a helping hand.”

“Amen to that girl!” Emily calls out.

“What about a woman?” Derek asks as we collectively make our way to the lifts. We all manage to fit into one life and I press the button before leaning around Spencer to whack his arm.

“Bite me Derek Morgan.”

“I’m sure Emily would happily do that” he retorts, smirking. This time it was Emily’s turn to whack Derek’s arm. The sounds of bickering between Emily and Derek fill the elevator.

As we get get down to the car park the bickering stops and a wave of realisation hits me like a gust of wind. “Fuck” I mutter, pulling out my phone to see who could come get me.

“Hey, you okay?” a quiet voices comes from besides me.

“Jesus Christ Spence, you scared me!”

“Sorry I didn't mean to. Seriously, are you okay? I don't see your car” he says, quickly scanning the car park for signs of my car.

“My car’s in the garage getting its suspension fixed. I forgot to ask my roommate to pick me up from work tonight and now its 10pm and she's probably already out. Oh my god, how am I going to get home-”

“Hey it’s okay, we’ll go to yours to grab what you need before heading to the bar to meet the others. Come on, hop in” he says, opening the passenger side door before scooting round to the drivers side and getting in. It didn't take long for me to make up my mind, I mean it was either go with him or try to find my own way home AND then my way to the bar we were all set to meet at 11. I got in, shooting him a smile and we head off.

        - AT THE BAR -

“Hey! Finally you showed up, we were beginning to think you weren't coming” JJ says and we approach the booth.

“Don’t be silly, we don't do this very often anymore. I wouldn't miss it for the world” I say scooting into the booth, situating myself between Emily and Spencer. Oh great, this won't be awkward at all, I say to myself. Almost as if he'd read my mind (or, most likely, the awkwardness I was displaying) Spencer’s leg shifted slightly and met mine. I looked up at him slightly, yet his focus was on Morgan and debating on what alcohol would get them drunk the fastest.

After a few drinks everyone seems to have loosened up a bit. I mean, even Spencer was on his third drink of the night. The norm for this team is as the number of drinks consumed got higher, the more secrets (or “tea” as Penelope would sometimes put it) were revealed. And tonight proved no different that normal.

“Let’s do truth or drink guys!” Penelope half shouted. The bar we were at is one of our favourite ones to go to together and tonight was pretty loud in here. Meaning as the surroundings got louder, the louder we all became. Even though every single one of us groaned at the idea, we all knew better than to disagree with a tipsy Penelope. It started off relatively innocent and calm, until it got to Derek’s turn Derek, having been waiting for 10 minutes already, knew exactly what and who he wanted to ask. It was no surprise to me when he pointed at me.

“Little miss sunshine, ready for your question?”

“I was born ready baby, give it to me.”

“Do you have a preference of who you date?And if so, what is it.”

That fucker. Not a drinking session goes by that I don't get asked about my sexuality  I mean don't get me wrong, I love educating people and I love the sight on Derek’s face when I end up getting the number of a girl he’s expressed interest in. Taking a swig of my drink, I ponder on the question for a few moments before replying,

“I have a ‘type’ of women that I find myself automatically gravitating myself towards. I mean I guess I have a type of guy I like too. I don't know, I just go with what my heart says most of the time.”

“You still need to describe it sunshine” he says, smirking into his drink. It’s not as if we haven't had this discussion before, and by ‘we’ I mean Derek and myself. He knew what it was, he just wanted to see me suffer.

“I hate you” I groan, shuffling around to get comfortable before I answer Derek’s question. I take a big swig of my drink as I go to reply “red headed girls with a quick temper.”

“And the guys?” Spencer says, breaking his silence and looking at me.

“Brown mess hair, bit of a dork, goofy, tall, thinks Halloween is the best holiday of the year” I say, drawing my lips into a small smirk and taking another sip of my drink. Spencer doesn't even blink twice at my reply. Idiot.

Everyone’s questions seemed a lot tamer than mind. For example, JJ would be asked “what's the most romantic thing Will’s ever done for you?” and Derek’s would be “so you wish you had more freedom with your work hours?”. But mine, “craziest place you've had sex?” or “one person you'd happily let jump your bones right now?” (10 points if you guess who asked that one). After a few rounds I squeezed through the crowd and up to the bar for refills, and shots. I was under strict instructions to get at least 20 shots, no less. 

“Hey can I have the same again, but with 20 shots as well?” shooting the bar tender a smile and giving the name of the open tab.

“Sure things hun, what shots do you want?” she asks.

“Surprise me,” I say, not really knowing what to order. I feel a tap on my shoulder, alerting me that someone was behind me. I spin around to see the most gorgeous red head stood in front of me. Out of the corner of my eye, the laughing was easing at the table and I could see the glances they were all giving in my direction. Great, an audience is just what I need. 

“Hey, so I hope I’m not over stepping by saying I think you're one of the most beautiful people I've ever seen here.”

“Hi, that’s so sweet of you! You are absolutely stunning yourself” I say, feeling 5 sets of eyes on me. 

“Um would it be possible for me to get your number?” she asks, tucking a piece of her hair behind her ear.

“Oh, I’m so sorry. It’s not that I don't find you ridiculously attractive, I um” I trail off slightly, glancing back and locking eyes with the messy haired brunette at my table. He flashes me a small, yet sad smile before turning his attention to JJ. “It wouldn't be fair to either of us if I did that because my hearts already with someone else.”

“It’s cool, I get it. Whoever they are is a lucky person” she says, smiling sweetly before turning and walking away. I turn back to the bar and grab the tray of drinks, slowly making my way back to the table. This time, when I reach the table, its quiet and all eyes are on me.

“What?” I ask, as I hand out the drinks and put the shots in a circe in the middle of the table. I scoot back into the booth, regaining my seat in between Spencer and Emily.

“Why did you turn her down?” Derek asks in disbelief, “in the 5 years I've known you I have never seen you turn down someone that quickly. Especially not a smoking hot red head like that!”

“You say that as if it's a crime Derek. I wasn't interested, I said no and we parted ways. End of conversation.”

“But why?” Spencer asks, “she’s exactly your type.”

“Yeah and so are you yet you're still an oblivious fuck” I mutter. Something in the air changed the second those words fell out of my mouth. I couldn't quite figure out if it was a good change or not.

“What was that Y/N?” Derek asks, smirking.

“What I said was not meant for your ears so shut it” I ramble looking over at Spencer, who’s still staring at me and seemingly in a world of his own. I try to study his face, looking for some kind of answer or reply to what I’d just said.

Sensing the obvious tension in the air Penelope did the best thing she could think of doing, shouting out the words “SHOT TIME EVERYONE!”. That seemed to do the trick as it knocked Spencer out of whatever alternate timeline he was in. He grabs 2 shots, placing one in front of you and keeping the other in his hand.

“To friendship” JJ said, raising her shot glass to the roof.

“To friendship!” the others yelled, clinking glasses and putting back the shots.

Spencer’s hand found its way to your thigh under the table, squeezing it tightly as he muttered, “to friendship.” downing the shot. His eyes locked on mine.

“To friendship” I say, pulling my lips to the glass with a smirk and downing it.  Hmm, maybe he's completely oblivious after all, I say to myself before locking hands with Spencer under the table.

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

But You Can Never Leave [Chapter 13: Paper And Ink]

A/N: Can I just take a second to say how happy I am to see all of your reactions to my little fic?! I have never been a super popular writer on Tumblr but I like to think that I have some of the cleverest, kindest, most thoughtful readers around. Your support for and emotional investment in my stories makes me so, so, so happy. Please enjoy this latest chapter...it’s the longest one yet! 💜

Also, MAJOR shout out to @writerxinthedark​ and her constant insanely astute observations!! Girl, I’m shook. Do you have ESP or what...? 👀

Chapter summary: Roger tries to reach a compromise, John tries to offer solace, Chrissie tries out some retro science, Y/N tries to process some alarming new information.

This series is a work of fiction, and is (very) loosely inspired by real people and events. Absolutely no offense is meant to actual Queen or their families.

Song inspiration: Hotel California by The Eagles.

Chapter warnings: Language! Discussion of substance abuse! Babies! Drama! Angst!!!

Chapter list (and all my writing) available HERE

Taglist: @queen-turtle-boiii​ @loveandbeloved29​ @maggieroseevans​ @imnotvibingveryguccimrstark​ @im-an-adult-ish​ @queenlover05​ @someforeigntragedy​ @imtheinvisiblequeen​ @joemazzmatazz​ @seven-seas-of-ham-on-rhye​ @namelesslosers​ @inthegardensofourminds​ @deacyblues​ @youngpastafanmug​ @sleepretreat​ @hardyshoe​ @bramblesforbreakfast​ @sevenseasofcats​ @tensecondvacation​ @queen-crue​ @jennyggggrrr​ @madeinheavxn​ @whatgoeson-itslate​ @brianssixpence​ @simonedk​ @herewegoagainniall​ @stardust-killer-queen​ @anotheronewritesthedust1​ @pomjompish​ @writerxinthedark​

Please yell at me if I forget to tag you! :)

“You can’t leave,” John pleads. One of his hands—strong, nimble, a gold band on his wedding finger—is clutching the wooden bedpost. Chrissie paces back and forth beside him, gnawing her thumbnail until it bleeds, silent tears streaking down her ruddy cheeks.

You throw your open suitcase onto the bed and start yanking things out of drawers: panties and bras—the practical ones, not the sexy ones, I won’t be needing those in the immediate future—jeans, velvet dresses, sweaters, socks, mittens, scarves. It’ll be cold in Boston. “I’m going home.”

“Love, please...” Chrissie sobs.

“I’m not staying here.” Your voice is surprisingly steady, resolved even. “I’m not going to stay in this house with him. I’m not going to follow him around the world watching him fuck other women and humiliate me in tabloids. I’m done, I’m going home.”

“You have a contract with the record company, you’re the tour nurse!” Chrissie protests. “Jesus christ, they could sue you for non-performance! When does the band leave, a week from now?!”

“Six days,” John says softly.

“Six days!” Chrissie shouts at you.

“I’m not going. They can sue me, that’s fine.” I don’t have any money anyway. None that’s actually mine.

“You can’t leave,” John says again. His greyish eyes are wide and restless, desperate; you didn’t know it was possible for him to be this agitated. He’s not Queen’s unflappable bassist today.

“Yeah? Observe.” You pick the pink conch shell up off the dresser—the one John found for you on the beach in Ostia, during a tour that feels like a lifetime ago—and tuck it gently into a corner of your suitcase where it will be cushioned by knit sweaters. “John, I have a bunch of your sketches downstairs. There’re some on the refrigerator, some framed in the living room, a couple on the dining room walls...will you go get those for me, please? I can’t leave without them.”

John just stares at you, blinking and thunderstruck.

Next to the empty space on the dresser where the conch shell once lived is the Canon F-1. You consider the camera for a moment, then snatch it up and move to hurl it out of the second-story window.

John jolts out of his paralysis. “No no no no, I think you’ll regret that.” He gently pries the Canon out of your grasp and places it back on the dresser.

“What the hell are you going to do in Boston?!” Chrissie wails. “All your friends are here now! Your life is here!”

“I’m going to get a job at the hospital and marry some boring, predictable man and get a house with a white picket fence and fill it with two exceptionally average children”—if I can have them, and that’s a big if as it turns out—“and a golden retriever and live out the rest of my days in blissful, prosaic anonymity. Thanks for asking.”

“Oh come on, you don’t want that!” Chrissie snaps. “You’ve never wanted that, that’s why you came to London with the band to begin with!”

“I don’t want to feel like this!” you scream, and all those tears you didn’t know you were biting back start spilling out in hot, torrential streams. Your breath hitches; your throat burns. Like wildfire. John pulls you to his chest, murmurs that everything will be okay, cradles the back of your head with his palm. You know he’s exchanging a glance with Chrissie over your shoulder. That’s why she brought him here, after all; to help talk you off the ledge, to help convince you to stay.

“What a fucking mess,” Chrissie says in despair.

“It’s my fault,” you choke out.

“It’s not,” John whispers.

“It is,” you insist bitterly, sobbing into him. “Everyone warned me and I ignored it because I’m a complete idiot and now I’ve gone and ruined my life.”

“You don’t have to go!” Chrissie implores. “You can stay here. With us, with me and John and Mary and Freddie and Brian. You have British citizenship, you can get a job at a hospital in London if you really want to leave the band. You can stay with me and Bri for as long as you need to until you’re back on your feet, or with Freddie...they’d give you any amount of money you needed to get started...they’d be heartbroken if you left, love, you’ve been there for them through everything, since Queen was just a bunch of nobodies, since we were all flat broke...they’re never going to forget that loyalty you showed them, that faith. They’d do anything to repay you.”

You sigh shakily as you untangle yourself from John and wipe your eyes. “If I stay here, I’ll spend the rest of my life dodging Roger at birthday parties and holidays and restaurants. And being known as the wife he fucked around on. I’ll be a pitiful mess of a person. They had a photo of me in the News Of The World, did you know that? A tiny little circular photo under a huge, glamorous one of Dominique. ‘Look everyone, check out the dashing rock star’s sad, pathetic, unremarkable, soon-to-be-ex-wife. Surely you can appreciate why he’d shop around.’”

“Yes, I saw that part,” Chrissie says softly. She understands some of what you’re feeling, surely, and yet she must also have a sensation of gratefulness; plenty of musicians wander like tornadoes, touching down and sowing chaos wherever their compulsions take them, but few wives have the misfortune of seeing their names and faces paraded through the tabloids. Suddenly, Chrissie isn’t the most-wronged wife in Queen anymore.

You bury your face in your hands. “Oh god. My parents might even hear about this. They could be buying wine and Cheetos at the grocery store and see my husband and his girlfriend on the cover of a magazine in the checkout line.”

“I’m so sorry,” Chrissie replies, her voice hoarse. John crosses his arms over his chest and says nothing; but he kicks the wooden bedframe hard enough to send a crack down the center of the footboard.

Downstairs, you hear the front door open. Chrissie and John whirl to you, panicked.

“Hey, love of my life!” Roger’s chipper voice vaults up the staircase. Someone hasn’t checked the headlines yet. “Baby? You home?”

“Do you want me to stay?” John asks you.

“No, I can handle it.”

“Are you sure? Because I’ll stay for as long as you want me to. I’ll hide in the goddamn bushes outside the window if that would be helpful.”

“No, John.” You smile and climb onto your toes to wrap your arms around the back of his neck, to hug him goodbye. He’s warm and comfortable and sheltering. He feels more like home than this house ever has, isn’t that strange? And for a second, just one, you wonder what your life would look like if there had been no Veronica, no Roger.

You’d still be in Boston, you idiot, you chastise yourself. You never would have come to London with Queen if it wasn’t for Roger. And You’re My Best Friend wasn’t about you.

“Thank you,” you tell John. “But I have to do this part myself.”

“Okay. Don’t you dare go cart yourself off to Heathrow without telling me first, alright?”

“Sure,” you say, not meaning it. I can’t let him stop me.

“Good luck,” Chrissie frets, wringing her hands, twirling her wedding ring. “Call me, okay? I’m going to be a nervous wreck until I hear from you. I’ll chew my poor fingers to the bone.”

“I’ll call. I promise.”

“Hey baby!” Roger materializes in the bedroom doorway, pushes his prescription sunglasses up into his windswept blond hair, peers around the room at you and John and Chrissie. And you’re suddenly reminded of how a room changes when Roger walks into it, how everything shifts somehow, becomes brighter, more alive, brimming with magnificent potential; how cavernously empty the world would feel without him in it. Chrissie glares at him with her arms crossed, nostrils flaring, tapping one fashionable riding boot against the hardwood floor. “Uhhhh...am I interrupting something?”

“Bye, love.” Chrissie kisses you quickly on each cheek and breezes out of the room. You hear her boots clopping as she descends down the staircase. After a moment, John follows her.

“You despicable prick,” John hisses as he passes Roger in the doorway.

Roger is mystified. “Baby, what’s going on?” His eyes flick to the hastily packed suitcase, to the cracked footboard. “What the fuck happened to the bed?”

There are so many ways to ask the same question. When did you decide that you needed to have her? Who is she to you? How could you do this to me? What did she give you that I couldn’t? Instead, what you ask him this: “Have you seen the News Of The World today?”

His brow furrows into deep grooves. “No...” But something primal flashes in his vivid blue eyes, just briefly. Something like fear. He knows he’s done things that would hurt me. And I don’t think I’ll ever be able to unearth them all.

You grab the magazine off the bed and hurl it at him. Roger picks it up off the floor and flips to the front page. His shoulders slump, one hand comes up to cover his mouth, he exhales in a deep sigh; his whole body shifts the same way a room does when he walks out of it: dims, deflates, goes bloodless. He calmly lays the News Of The World on the dresser, folds his sunglasses and sets them down as well, rubs his eyes with the heels of his calloused hands. Then he turns to you.

He’s going to deny it, you think, revolted. He’s going to deny it just like Brian did, try to patch things up in some weak and gutless way, placate me so he can drift off to sleep at night imagining he’s a good husband.  

But Roger isn’t Brian. He never has been.

He asks you quietly, in surrender: “What do you want to know?”

Your stomach plunges into freefall, because this is real. Maybe there was some part of me that was hoping this was a mistake, some naïve and hopeful sliver of idealism left over from childhood, from a time when everything in the world was either good or evil and nothing lived in the treacherous shadows in between. “How long?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes, Roger, it matters.”

“Not long.” He waves a hand glibly. “She...ah...well she thought I was pretty maddening at first. It took her a while to come around to the idea.”

You flinch like you’ve been slapped. “Jesus christ, Roger. Thank you, that’s great, thank you for that information.”

“I’m not trying to hurt you,” he protests, exasperated. “I’m really not, I don’t...I just don’t...bloody hell, I don’t know how to do this.”

“To do what? To fuck around?! Obviously that’s inaccurate—”

“No, to confess!” he shouts. “I never confess, I never admit it, I just avoid or deflect or deny it, and when that doesn’t work anymore I just walk out because usually I don’t care enough to have the conversation. But now I do so I’m really, really trying to give you what you want. I thought you wanted answers. So ask me whatever you want to and I’ll tell you the truth.”

Everyone lies. Everyone disappoints you. I knew that, I really did...but somehow I let him convince me that I didn’t. That he was built of nothing but light. “Do you love her?”

“No,” he replies instantly. “It’s a fling, that’s all.”

“So you didn’t corner her somewhere and tell her that you’re planning on breaking up with me.”

Roger winces. I wasn’t going to end up like Josephine, that was the first promise I made to myself on British soil. And look where I am now. “No. Never.”

“Why, Roger?”

He looks away, runs his hands through his hair; he genuinely doesn’t know how to answer.

You stare at him in disbelief. “Are you even sorry...?”

He speaks carefully, purposefully. “I’m sorry you had to find out, that you were hurt by it. And I’m really fucking sorry about that headline. Discretion is extremely important to me. I never would have let that happen, but you know...” He shrugs, smirking guiltily in that disarmingly bewitching way that he does. Stop, you warn yourself, feeling something in you grasping for reasons to stay. “I haven’t been thinking especially clearly lately.”

“Yes, between the coke and the drinking and the pills you’re quite the disaster, aren’t you?” Scalding tears slither down your face. “So you’re not sorry you did it. You’re not sorry that you’re an addict or a cheater.”

“It’s not about that. It’s...” He searches for the words like premonitions in tea leaves. “Yes, there are drugs and parties and women. There are a lot of those things. But I’m not addicted to any of them. I’m addicted to being Roger Taylor, drummer of one of the best bands in the world. It’s everything I am, it’s everything I’ve ever wanted to be. I never want to live in a world where that’s not who I am anymore. You understand that, what it’s like to feel caged and miserable, you know what it’s like to want to experience things. And so if it takes coke and pills to get up on that stage every night and drum under those blinding lights until it feels like my arm is split open again, okay, no problem, I’ll do it. If women are a part of the lifestyle, a part of being free, then I’ll take advantage of that. And why the fuck does it matter? Why do so many people think that fidelity is the ultimate manifestation of love? Plenty of faithful people hate each other. Plenty of people who screw around are irretrievably in love with one person, are fucking owned by them. I love you. I want to come home to you. I want to raise my children with you if that’s a possibility, and if it’s not then fine, whatever, I’m gonna love you all the same. You’re still on my list, Boston babe. You’re always going to be on my list. Why isn’t that enough?”

“John doesn’t cheat,” you object helplessly. Even if he has all the reasons in the world to.

“No, he doesn’t. But he’s a very different kind of man. A better one, probably. But you’ve always known who I was. And I never promised you an ordinary life.”

You shake your head, hide your face in your hands, can’t force the words to leave your trembling lips. It’s not enough for me. Maybe I thought it could be, but it’s just not.

Roger says, gently: “I know we said the marriage didn’t mean anything”—yes, that was your condition, wasn’t it?—“but that’s not completely true. It’s not just paper and ink. It does mean something. It means that you’re the person I want to take care of, the person I can rely on to provide for my family and friends if something ever happened to me. It means that I love and trust you in a way that is unconditional. That you’re my best friend.”

“I don’t want to live like this, Roger,” you whisper.

“So what’s next?” he demands. “So you’re going to take that suitcase and run back to the States and...what, get a job at the same hospital you were so desperate to escape from? Back out of the tour? Abandon the band and the friends you have here?”

“If that’s what it takes to get away from you.”

For the first time, you hurt him; you really hurt him. You see it ripple across his face like cold, swirling ocean waves. “Please don’t leave.”

“I’ve already decided, Roger.”

“Come on, baby, please, we can work this out—”

“I’m not interested.” You zip the suitcase closed, heave it off the bed, and drag it towards the door.

“So even if we can’t work it out,” Roger erupts, bolting to the doorway, to stand between you and whatever a life after him looks like. “Don’t leave the band. Leave me, just me, but not the band. I know you don’t want to leave them. I know they’ll be devastated if you disappear, not to mention they might legitimately murder me over it. Bri can be a twat, sure, but he’s convinced you saved his life. You and I might be the only people on the whole fucking planet who can see how brilliant John is, who understand him. Freddie’s convinced you’re some kind of good luck charm, you know how superstitious he is, he’ll start having those meltdowns again where he insists he can’t sing five minutes before a show and that the band is doomed, the tour will be a complete disaster. We need you. And I want you to keep the job you love, the travel, the mansion, the money, I want you to have all of it. You’ve earned it. You shouldn’t lose it because of me.”

And as you clutch the handle of your suitcase, your mind dashing from one logistical step to the next—grab my passport and some cash out of the safe, collect all of John’s sketches, call a cab to take me to Heathrow—you start remembering things. But you don’t see them like flashes, like misty reveries, no; you feel them like heat from a roaring fireplace, like Mediterranean pebbles digging into the wrinkled soles of your feet, like the deafening screams of crowds filling the Rainbow Theater, the Hammersmith Odeon, the Apollo, the Budokan, Madison Square Garden. Memories of excavating shards of glass from John’s hand in a New Orleans mansion crawling with fantasies and nightmares, of toasting pink champagne in the lobby of the Chelsea Register Office, of museums and parks and beaches and apartments filled with threadbare couches and extravagant dreams, of Christmases and New Year’s Eves, of Roger convincing you to come to London with Queen on a June morning in 1974, cradling your face in his rough hands, promising you everything you’ve ever wanted: ‘Love...Accept. The fucking. Offer.’ And you could run to the other side of the world, sure; but you’re never going to be able to carve those memories out of your bones.

You let go of the suitcase, and Roger’s smile lights up his face like the sun.

~~~~~~~~~~

“Careful...careful, love...” Roger contorts himself to keep the umbrella over you and the Boston cream pie you’re carrying as rain pours out of a sinister grey sky. You both hurry beneath the roof that covers the front porch and ring the doorbell. Freddie answers wearing a tight green shirt, jeans, and an enormous toothy grin.

“Oh, for me?” he squeals, eyeing the pie.

You step inside as Roger stays out on the porch to shake off the umbrella and finish his cigarette; Chrissie hates people smoking in her house, and one should get what they want on their birthday. “Obviously, it’s for Chris. But I suspect she’ll share.”

Chrissie appears in a blue dress, her wide-set pale eyes alight as she gazes at the pie. “At last! I finally get to try one of these! And yes, Freddie, I’m only going to have the teeniest tiniest piece, so there will be more than enough to go around.” She embraces you and takes the pie. “Is this homemade?! It is, isn’t it?”

“Happy birthday, Chrissie,” you announce with a tired smile. Queen leaves for the News Of The World Tour in two days. You’re leaving with them, to everyone’s palpable relief; Freddie and Brian have never mentioned the headline to you, but they know about it of course. Everybody knows. It’s an elephant in every room, an ancient beast that quakes the floor when it walks.

“I’m going to miss you like crazy,” Chrissie tells you. “I always do.” But she’s a little thankful, too; because spending months away on tour is undoubtedly preferable to a permanent absence, a visibly missing piece like a chip in a tooth.

“I know. I’ll call.”

Roger steps inside the massive Chelsea home. “Happy birthday, Chris!”

She promptly spins away, ignoring him, and ferries the pie off to the kitchen. Freddie wraps an arm around Roger’s shoulder and steers him into the living room where Mary, John, a perpetually pregnant Veronica, and a host of assorted Mullens and Mays are passing the twins around like footballs and chatting over appetizers and tea and cookies. Biscuits, you correct yourself. And the shrimp cocktail are called prawns.

“What did you say your name was?” a middle-aged, rotund, bearded man asks John disinterestedly. “Josh? James?”

“John, actually. I’m the bassist.”

The man frowns as he gobbles down a shrimp. “Oh, how odd, I’ve never even heard of you.”

“Yeah?” Roger pipes as he sails over and claps the man aggressively on the shoulder. “Well let me introduce you. This is John Richard Deacon and he wrote You’re My Best Friend, you’ve heard of that one, right? He learned the electric piano to compose it. Yes, he doesn’t just play bass, he has all sorts of gifts. He’s massively talented. He builds amps and manages finances and can sketch pictures that look like freaking photographs...”

You wander into the kitchen where Chrissie is slicing herself a miniscule portion of Boston cream pie. “Oh fuck it, it’s my birthday. I’m having a proper piece of pie, thighs be damned.” She goes in for a second attempt. “You want any?”

“No, I’m alright. I haven’t been feeling well.”

Her brows knit together in concern. “Not compulsively consuming your own weight in snacks to avoid socializing with strangers? That’s unlike you.”

Well, since you asked, I was feeling even more piggish than usual until I found out my husband was fucking somebody else, and also that the entire country knows about it. “Yeah, weird.”

Brian enters the kitchen. “Oh, pie!”

“You want a piece?” Chrissie asks cheerfully. So they’ve made up somehow. Like they always do, like they always will.

“Yes, absolutely, but I’ll get it myself, love. You go enjoy yourself. It’s your day.”

She beams up at him and journeys out to the living room. You are in no rush to join her. Watching Roger charm the crowd, allowing him to dazzle you, to lull you back into his orbit like the subsidiary moon of a vast, ringed planet...no, you have no stomach for that at all. You pour yourself a glass of red wine and try to swallow without tasting it.

Brian’s doting demeanor evaporates like he’s taken off a mask. He sighs, mixes himself a Vesper, sips it as he leans against the kitchen counter and studies you warily. “How are things?”

“Paradisiacal.” Each night you sleep in the guest room with the blue-grey walls and the seahorse-patterned blankets. Roger tried to give you the main bedroom, still sleeps in a spare room in case you ever decide you want it; but you like that the blue room is smaller, more humble, that it smells like John’s brand of cigarettes, that there is no gaping emptiness where Roger usually is. Roger doesn’t try to talk to you about Dominique. He is attentive, optimistic, easygoing, affectionate; he lights the fireplace in the living room and brings you hot chocolate, he wears the red hat you once knit him every time he leaves the house. But he left the paperwork showing he’d sold the apartment—the ‘London Love Nest,’ isn’t that what the headline called it?—out on the kitchen table where you would see it. You know he’s waiting for you to forgive him, as if that’s an inevitability. And every once in a while you feel a guttural stab of fear that he might be right. Someone puts Hotel California on the record player out in the living room. “Every time I hear this goddamn song I get acid trip flashbacks. I start thinking of sharks for some reason.”

“It reminds me of...” Brian’s gaze goes murky. “Well, of a girl from New Orleans.”

The one from the hot tub. The one with a peach tattooed on her shoulder blade.

“We have a stop there,” you say. “You know, on the tour. We’ll be there for a few nights.”

“Oh, I haven’t forgotten.”

No, perhaps that’s all he’s been thinking about.

“How are you these days, Bri? Two beautiful children, adoring wife, We Will Rock You becoming a fantastically successful single...your world must seem pretty golden.”

“You’d think so.” He peers out the window where raindrops are clinging to fogged glass and the November skies are illuminated with episodic flashes of lightning like Morse code. At last he says, very softly: “I think I married the wrong person.”

“I think I did too.”

Bri raises his eyebrows and clinks his Vesper against your wine glass. “So we were both right. Fantastic. Cheers.”

You gulp down the rest of your wine, feeling your stomach roil in protest. You pour another glass. Brian drains his Vesper.

“You want me to escort you out there?” Brian asks, gesturing towards the living room. “I’ll happily redirect everyone’s attention towards the twins if you’d like. They’re very convenient conversation starters.”

“No, thanks Bri. You go ahead.”

“Alright. If you insist.” A smile ghosts his lips. “I’m really glad you’re coming with us, love. I’m sure it wasn’t an easy decision. And I’m sure things won’t feel easy for a long time. But Queen wouldn’t be the same without you.”

“Yeah, yeah. Now get out there before I punch you in your fragile liver.”

Brian laughs, sets his glass in the sink, and disappears into the living room. You stall in the kitchen by yourself. You sip wine, browse through the family photos displayed on the refrigerator, listen to the polite chatter of the guests from a distance. Eventually you venture towards the living room before losing your nerve and veering down the hallway towards the back porch. Outside the rain is falling torrentially, the sky rumbling with thunder. John is sitting on a wooden bench under the roof and smoking as he gazes out into the storm.

“Hey,” he says, sliding over to make room for you on the bench.

You sit down beside him and hold out your hand. He stares at you for a moment, puzzled, before passing you his cigarette. You take one long drag and give it back to him. John blinks at you, stunned.

“That’s extremely bad for you,” he teases.

“So is getting hammered and driving into cop cars.”

He clutches his chest. “Ouch. I felt that in my soul.”

You shove him, chuckling. He points down at your boots. You swing your feet up to rest in his lap, and he lays his left hand on them while he smokes with his right.

“Go ahead,” he says. “I know you might not want to talk about it. That’s fine. But if there’s any baggage you’d like to unburden yourself of, I’m listening.”

I’ve got baggage, all right. I’ve got enough to fill a Boeing 747. “Everyone warned me. Everyone told me it was a terrible idea to fall in love with him. Everyone except you, John. Why is that?”

He’s slow and deliberate when he answers. “I never wanted you to be with someone because...you know...because you thought you should be with them. Because they were the ‘smart’ choice or the ‘safe’ choice or whatever. I wanted you to make your own decisions, whatever those were. I wanted you to be with someone...whoever that was...only because you wanted to be. Because you loved them.”

You nod. “That makes sense, I suppose.”

“I told you once that it didn’t mean anything to someone like Roger when he...you know. When he does what he does. I was telling the truth then, and I’m telling the truth now. I don’t think it meant anything to him. And I don’t know if that kills any of the pain I know you’re feeling, but I hope it does. Because you being in pain is the absolute last thing I’ve ever wanted. Are you angry with me for not trying to change your mind?”

“No,” you say immediately, and you mean it. “Not at all.”

“Good. Because they took away my driver’s license for a year and I’m probably going to need a lot of rides from you.”

You laugh, a brash authentic laugh, and John grins over at you.

Chrissie hauls the sliding glass door open and steps out onto the porch with a frustrated huff. “I know this party is technically for me, but when you’re the mother of infant twins sometimes all you really want is a smoke, a nap, and a bottle of vodka.” She lights a cigarette and plops down into a chair facing the bench.

“How are you, Chris?” What you mean is: Have you screamed much at your husband lately?

“I’m doing pretty well today, actually.”

“Is that because you’re genuinely happy or because you’ve trained yourself not to be sad?”

Chrissie smirks. “You’ll find those feel like the same thing after a while.”

“No, I won’t find out. Because I’m not staying with him.”

“Love...” Chrissie begins.

“I’ll stay in London. I’ll even stay with the band. But I’m not going to stay married to him.”

“Y/N, please, maybe you should think about this,” Chrissie presses. “I know you love him. And I know he makes you wonderfully happy when times are good. Maybe that’s all we can ask for, you know? Wives in our predicament. Maybe we can learn to cherish them when they’re with us, bottle up the magic, store it on a shelf to tide us over until they come back home. No one else is going to light you up the way he does. There’s only one Roger Taylor. Withdrawal from that is going to be hell.”

You glower out into the wind and rain and say nothing.

“And that woman, Dominique Beyrand? I’ve asked around about her, she’s got some husband back in France that she goes home to when she’s not working here. It’s just a fling for her too, it’s nothing serious. I don’t think there was any chance he would have ever considered actually leaving you for her.”

“He bought her an apartment, Chris.”  

“Men do stupid things that don’t mean anything all the time. Isn’t that right, John?”

“Sure,” he offers ungenerously.

You stop yourself before the words tumble recklessly from your lips: Maybe you’re trying to convince yourself more than me, Chrissie. “I’m divorcing him,” you vow quietly.

“Okay,” Chrissie capitulates. “Okay. I’m sorry, love, please forgive me. I only got two hours of sleep, Teddy was crying all night.” She puffs on her cigarette and sighs mournfully. “I hate to say it, and I don’t mean to be insensitive, but I guess it was sort of lucky you never got pregnant. Can you imagine trying to split up when you have children together? Working out custody and finances and holidays, having to pretend like you don’t want to disembowel each other all the bloody time...it would be torture.”

John glares at her, his left hand still on your boots.

“Yeah,” you respond; but now you’re distracted, because you remember the reason why you had been so determined to ignore the phone when Chrissie called to warn you about the News Of The World headline. Because the kitchen phone was right next to the calendar, and the calendar would report in no uncertain terms that your period was due.

When was that? A week ago?

You can’t be late. You’ve never been late.

“Oh god,” you breathe.

“What?” John asks, concerned.

In reply, you lurch off the bench, stumble to the edge of the porch, and vomit red wine into the wet grass like a gush of blood. Chrissie soars to you and rubs your back as you retch into her lawn. “Oh no, you poor thing!”

“John, go away,” you choke out as he approaches. “I’m humiliated, I don’t want you to see me like this.”

“You saw me in a jail cell. I’m staying.”

You turn to look up at them. They read the raw horror and shock in your eyes. John’s jaw falls open and he shakes his head, firmly in denial. You could relate.

Chrissie gasps. “Oh, bloody hell.”

“No fucking way,” you wheeze. “After all this time, after all those months of nothing...”

“You better take a test,” Chrissie says. “Come on, I have a kit upstairs.”

She pulls you to your feet and leads you to her bathroom, deftly avoiding the increasingly intoxicated crowd downstairs. John waits just outside the door as Chrissie rummages around in the closet for the test kit. It’s a contraption that looks like a chemistry set, with a dropper and a test tube and a stand with a mirror. You piss into a paper cup—successfully although not with flying colors—and wash your trembling hands in the sink with a piece of pink soap shaped like a seashell. Then you lay on the cold linoleum floor with a folded towel for a pillow and a bucket within reach. Chrissie trickles a few droplets of urine into the test tube, mixes in the contents of a small plastic vial, and places the test tube in the holder that suspends it above the mirror.

Chrissie explains to John: “If she’s pregnant, the chemicals will form a brown ring in the tube. If there’s no ring, we’re in the clear.”

“How fitting,” you chuckle from the floor, dazedly, cynically. “That would be the only ring I’ve ever gotten.”

It takes two hours. The three of you loiter in the bathroom, Chrissie and John perched on the rim of the enormous garden tub, fidgeting and chitchatting anxiously. They alternate popping downstairs, mingling just long enough to not arouse suspicions, bringing back biscuits and bits of toast that they futility try to coerce you into eating. Chrissie doesn’t like the smell of cigarettes in the house, she never has; but now both she and John are chain smoking as they wait and periodically get up to check the test tube.

“This isn’t real,” you whimper. “This can’t be real, right? There’s no way the universe has this ironic a sense of humor.”

“Wait, something’s happening.” John waves Chrissie over to the test kit. She examines it.

“Love...” Chrissie begins, her voice tentative, her eyes glossy.

“No,” you insist. “No way, no fucking way, I don’t believe this...”

Chrissie turns the kit so you can view it, so you can see what she does reflected in the tiny mirror: a single dark ring that informs you you’re carrying Roger’s child.

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #455

“but you didn’t have to cut me off  /  make it like it never happened and that we were nothing”

Are you and the last person you kissed in a relationship or just friends? We're besties! :') Has anyone ever pointed out that your laugh was unusual? No. Would you get a lip piercing? I already have a vertical labret. I've considered getting spiked snakebites (they might be called devil bites?) too, though. With a vertical labret, it looks sick as FUCK. It might be a bit much too close together for me, though, idk. Nose piercing? I want my right nostril re-pierced. What are you currently waiting for? Girt to message me back. I've decided what I want out of our relationship and just want to see him. Do you have feelings for anyone? Hit me pretty hard through a lot of examination of my feelings that yeah, I do. Have you ever run over an animal? Oh my god no, I would be DESTROYED. Have you chewed gum after someone else already has? bro what the fuck When people sneeze do you say ‘bless you’? I do only out of expectation. I don't want someone to think I'm an ass or something for not saying it. When was the last time you were on a bouncy castle? A few years ago for my niece's birthday. She was scared of how loud it was and was very reluctant to get near it, so my fat ass got in there with everyone else to show her it was fine lol. I can't remember if she eventually got in. She loves them now, though. :') Have you ever went on a bouncy castle whilst drunk? No, but thanks for the idea, ha ha. Have you ever entered an art competition? Yes. What is one thing you will never do? Try hardcore drugs. What is one food that you detest? Asparagus. Did you have a rebellious phase growing up? Not really. What religion were you brought up with? Roman Catholic. Are you still that religion? GOD NO. Do you often find yourself questioning your future? That's my full-time job. How many friends do you have on Facebook? 124. What sort of music did you listen to when you were in high school? The same I listen to now. What pet names do you use with your significant other? I'm single rn, but usually, I go for "sweetie/sweetheart," "hunny," "love," "dear," stuff like that. What’s the name of the store you usually get your groceries? Wal-Mart. Have you ever seen a theatre show? Yes. What’s your favourite vegetable? Broccoli. Have you ever missed a flight? Yes. I was SO fuckin upset because it was on Sara's birthday and planned in secret, and I was supposed to wake her up. It still wound up being a big surprise to her when she walked into her room and I was chillin' at her desk, ha ha, but I still wish it coulda gone as originally planned. Do your neighbours have any pets? Have you ever met them? Yes; they have a yappy-ass dog that doesn't shut up. I haven't met them. What color is your bedroom door? White. If you were ever to become famous, would you grow annoyed at fans? This may sound very ungrateful, but I have heard A LOT of celebrities say it: it would get old, being stopped constantly in public for signatures, pictures, etc. Like yes, I still WOULD be grateful, but I'd miss just being off the radar and able to go outside carrying out chores and stuff like a normal person. Have you ever met your favourite band/singer? No. :( Are you embarrassed by any of the songs/singers/bands you like? Nah, not nowadays. Have you ever written a story? Yes, a kinda short one when I was little. Think of the last poem you wrote: What inspired you to write it? The breakup with Jason and the fact we're just strangers again. It was really short, but I like it a lot, honestly. Do you have a chance with the person you like right now? I think so. What’s the weirdest thing you were scared of as a child? A skeleton in my closet, lol. Literally. Are there any embarrassing stories your family tells about you? alkdsjflakjwle yes In your opinion, what is the funniest TV show? That '70s Show. 3rd Rock From the Sun is high up there, too. What is the maximum number of children you’d ever have? HYPOTHETICALLY, two, but I'm pretty damn serious about having none. I just always feel kinda bad for children without a sibling, but three would make me pull my hair out. Have you ever been concerned you had a serious illness? Yes. I overreact to even minor symptoms to ANYTHING. Are you comfortable with who you are? No. Pretty much everything about myself embarrasses me, even if it shouldn't. Would you date someone even if you knew you’d get made fun of for it? Yes? Others' opinions don't affect how I feel about someone. Does popularity matter to you at all? No, outside of trying to be a successful photographer. Would you ever consider homeschooling your children? If they really wanted that and it would benefit them, yes. Who told you about the band/singer you are currently listening to? I discovered them myself. Do you ever read fanfiction? Nah. Would you rather die in a plane crash, ship wreck or fire? Jesus. A plane crash, I guess, because in a lot of cases, it would be an immediate death. What are your top five favourite TV shows? Meerkat Manor, Fullmetal Alchemist (and Brotherhood; shut up, they go together), That '70s Show, Ginga Densetsu Weed, and Deadman Wonderland. What is your favorite superhero movie? Logan. If you died next week, what would be the cause of death? Uhhhh idk... I guess maybe a heart attack? Judging by doctor appointments, my heart is just fine, but the fact still remains that I'm technically obese, so that's always a risk. Have you ever taken a break from Facebook or other social media? Why? Facebook, yes. It was just depressing me. I was playing the comparison game REAL hard. Who is the most talented person you know? I dunno. I know many people talented in a lot of areas. Are you currently platonic friends with anyone you’ve had sex with? No. Where did you and your current interest go on your first date? Bowling. Have you ever experienced two people fighting over you (physically or mentally)? What happened? Jason and Juan pursued me at the same time. They'd known each other in the past, and Juan hated him for "winning" his ex-girlfriend. Then when Jason and I got together, Juan wasn't the happiest for sure. Have your parents ever thought you were gay? What happened? Before I actually came out as bisexual, I don't think so? Are your parents more liberal or conservative? Conservative. Mom is more open, but still conservative. I think. What year are you going into at the beginning of the next academic year? I'm not in school. How far away does your closest family member live? I live with Mom. If you’ve seen both, did you prefer the Disney version or the Tim Burton version of Alice in Wonderland? I actually strongly prefer Tim Burton's. Would you have sex before marriage? Why or why not? Yeah. I just want to be in a long-term, serious, healthy relationship to reach that point and be as safe as possible about it. Are you more liberal or conservative? Liberal, but I do have some conservative beliefs, too. Who is your favorite Harry Potter character? I don't have one, given I never got into that franchise. What’s the worst that could come out of letting gays marry? Not a goddamn thing. What’s the most sexual thing you’ve done? Done "the thing." Name something that you are against. I'll go with an unconventional one that's a problem as of the late: making owning reptiles illegal. Why are you against it? Because reptiles are perfectly capable of being brilliant pets and, most importantly, can tame people's fears of them. I think that it's very important to see the worth and beauty in all animals, and reptiles are one of the most unappreciated families out there. :/ Have you ever played the Tomb Raider games? I played some of either the first or second one. I could never beat it. Old games are hard, man. Do you like it or hate it when your partner is clingy? I absolutely believe that it can get to an extreme that I don't like, but for the most part, I don't mind a clingy partner because hey, I am too. Beatles or Rolling Stones? Stonessss. When was the last time you changed your opinion on somebody? It'd been on my mind for a while, but I *officially* realized that I really do like-like Girt a couple days ago. And since then it's gotten a bit hardcore and all I wanna do is talk to him bc fuck me and how attached to people I get. What was the last thing that made you feel proud and why? Every single time I go to the gym, I feel proud of myself because it REALLY takes a lot out of me. Do you feel uncomfortable when people you hardly know confide in you? Nope. I'm willing to be a shoulder to cry on for like... anyone. If you're hurting, talk to someone. I'll be there as an easy option. What was the last thing to fascinate you? It was... INCREDIBLY disturbing and almost nauseating even for me, but I saw a video of a dead whale explode. It was GRUESOME. Guts just kept coming and coming and coming and :x Is there a certain noise/sound which scares you? Hmmm... I'm sure there is, but what, it's not coming to me. Sudden, loud noises are an obvious answer. Do you have a favourite microorganism? ... No, I can't say I do. Out of the people you know, whose birthday is next? Girt's, actually. It's in October. If you have pet fish do you bother to name them? I did when I actually had them as a kid. Do you keep your eggs in the fridge? Ye. Have you ever owned chickens? No, but that'd be cool. Fresh eggs from a properly cared for chicken taste SO much better. When did you last listen to music? Currently. NOW I'm obsessed with Melodicka Bros & Violet Orlandi's cover of "Somebody That I Used to Know." It's done in a gothic metal style and is amaaaazing.

[mandaloriandy]

Fic Writer Interview

I suppose I should... actually get around to doing this.

I was tagged by @maderilien, @stormwarnings, and @willowcrowned! (that’s what I get for putting off doing this, I get ganged up on.) (I’m just joking, I am very touched that you all thought of me)

How many works do you have on AO3?

49

What's your total AO3 word count?

339,898

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

oh fuck there's so many. uhhhh 32 apparently. big yikes. I'm just gonna copy-paste the list over, that'll be easiest. A lot of these are overlaps but alas such is life

1. Star Wars - All Media Types (24) 2. Star Wars Prequel Trilogy (18) 3. Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types (7) 4. TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms (4) 5. Homestuck (4) 6. Doctor Who & Related Fandoms (3) 7. Avatar: Legend of Korra (3) 8. Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling (3) 9. Marvel Cinematic Universe (2) 10. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV) (2) 11. The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types (2) 12. Doctor Who (2) 13. Ender Series - Orson Scott Card (1) 14. Solo: A Star Wars Story (2018) (1) 15. Iron Man (Movies) (1) 16. Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon | Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (1) 17. Original Work (1) 18. Sherlock (TV) (1) 19. Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016) (1) 20. Big Hero 6 (2014) (1) 21. Emelan - Tamora Pierce (1) 22. The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien (1) 23. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga (1) 24. The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien (1) 25. Captain America (Movies) (1) 26. Paranatural (Webcomic) (1) 27. Torchwood (1) 28. Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica (1) 29. Star Wars: Clone Wars (2003) - All Media Types (1) 30. Star Wars: Rebels (1) 31. Doctor Who (2005) (1) 32. The Hobbit - All Media Types (1)

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

To nobody's surprise, my top 5 fics by kudos are (in order) the first 5 parts to the Jedi Shmi AU.

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

Oof. I used to. But I ended up spiralling pretty badly uhhhh a couple years ago and had to stop. I feel like I should reply to comments, especially those wonderful long ones, but even though I do this whole writing thing, I always have a really hard time, like, knowing what to say to them? Like "akjsdfk;jf thank you" always feels inadequate, but writing a well thought-out reply takes a stupidly large amount of brainpower, and I'll leave them marked as unread if I want to reply to them and then they just accumulate in my inbox and I end up spiralling again, since it just continues to exist as a mental load of something I have to do and the avoidance just gets bigger and bigger the longer I put it off and–

look, I just get into my own head too much about it. I respond to questions, usually. I love all the comments but I can't let myself overthink it, and the easiest way to do that is to not let myself reply.

What's the fic you've written with the angstiest ending?

I guess Obi-Wan’s Terrible Horrible No-Good Very Bad Life doesn’t count because it... doesn’t have an ending yet? and I don’t know how angsty that ending is going to be. Even Composing Hallelujah doesn’t count because it ends happier than in canon, even though it’s... y’know, not exactly happy-ending.

Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you've written?

Hahaha I don't do crossovers often, but I have done them, and the craziest one I've actually written is probably my Sailor Moon/Puella Magi Madoka Magica fic. It’s especially crazy because I’ve only seen a few episodes of sailor moon lol

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

lmao YEP

There's this one, like Ender's Game/Doctor Who fic I wrote and posted on FFN back in middle school. And it got a ton of hate, as far as I can tell mostly from the same person, talking about like, how bad and non-canonical and whatever it was. And when I migrated over to AO3, I reposted it there too. This was in like 2012. The migration, at least, the fic was written in... idk, 2010?

And then. In 20-fucking-19.

I got a comment saying "Terrible. Makes zero sense. It’s like the author threw canon out the window and took a shit on it." like lmao what??????

(for reference: https://archiveofourown.org/works/361723?show_comments=true#comments and https://www.fanfiction.net/r/7621672/)

(like what the actual fuck was this person on)

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

Not any that I've been brave enough to post. And… also… nothing that I've actually written more than a few paragraphs on… I keep chickening out. I did recently make a deal with a friend, though, so… we'll see. If I do, it’s probably going to be quite dark, because that’s the kind of smut I like to read.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

I sincerely hope not.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes!! See how the blackbird walks into russian and just recently In all your wanderings into french!!!

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I've tried. It's never gone… especially well? I don't think any of them ever actually ended up complete, they all just petered out after a while.

What's your all time favorite ship?

I don't really have an "all-time favorite" anything, let alone a ship. I'm a horrible multishipper and I'm going to cause problems on purpose

What's a WIP that you want to finish but don't think you ever will?

Sigh. Probably my intricate, 30-something-k unpublished Silmarillion Helcaraxë fic. It has so many moving pieces. I know where most of them end up but it's going to take so much effort to get there

What are your writing strengths?

writing

What are your writing weaknesses?

writing

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

Hm. Given that I mostly write fic for SF/F, I don't run into the "real life languages" problem a lot. I end up working with conlangs of various complexity, for the most part, and for those… I'll sprinkle in a word or two if it makes sense, especially swear words and stuff. But for most of those conlangs, grammar is… less well-determined than vocabulary, so I almost never do phrases, let alone full sentences. I'll just put it in italics (if the POV character understands it) or say "and they said something unintelligible in [x language]" or the like.

What was the first fandom you wrote for?

I think………. let me check the dates on this. I think the actual first fanfiction I wrote was sometime in fifth or sixth grade, for this "Zenda" book series I read?? Either that or Harry Potter.

What's your favorite fic you've written?

A big shout-out goes to The Lichtenberg Figure, which I can’t believe is the only Tamora Pierce fanwork I’ve published, but for my favorite... it's gotta be Messenger. Like, looking back, there is a bunch about it that I am very not happy with, and a lot of things I think didn't come across the way I wanted, and things I would not write the same way now, years down the line, as I have very differently balanced understandings of… well, a lot of these same characters. But, fuck, I just can't let go of Mandalorian!Beru.

No pressure tags!! @apaladinagain @determamfidd @faeymouse @lumateranlibrarian (apologies if you’ve already done this one and I haven’t seen it!)

[macklives]

session 92 end (bye 413...)

this session was so long but so fucking hectic what the fuck

im going to try and slim it down to its bare essentials rather than go on a full rant because im pretty sure i want to make a post later on about vriska’s characterisation (not anything about me liking her/disliking her, just an analyse on her life really, so it wont be too bias because thats not the point of an analysis. i also want to do one on aradia, been meaning to for a while... hmm... damn i havent done much analogies lately, and i THINK the last long post on a character i made was about davesprite??? so its been a fucking while. that being said, ill leave a lot of details out for this end of session notes so i dont just repeat myself later on. rather will keep to plot points here and then make character points in another)

alright

first we had a page or two where aradia confided in nepeta about her being dead which means nepeta is the only one to know this revelation. im pretty sure aradia confided because there was no other way around it, since nepeta was her server player, so it was inevitable. either way, aradia still put her trust in nep, which means, if you think about it, nobody else knows and nobody else ever will. and considering aradia asked nep to keep it a secret, it probably wont get explored by others until MAYBE later on, whenever its plot relevant, so everyone will be in the dark about it for a while which ill have to remember for future dialogue and scenes with aradia in them

then we met vriska

which, yes, is a meme. i may not have been on a lot of fandom platforms, but you cant escape some of the stuff that goes around the internet. even if you dont know undertale, im pretty sure you know of sans. or komaeda if you have/havent seen danganronpa. its just.. the memes, ya know? ive heard from many sources of the “vriska did nothing wrong” quote (even through mbmbam which??? WHAT) but since i didnt even know what it meant, i never explored it so then i never knew it was a homestuck thing. imagine my surprise...... i think even at the time, i wouldnt have known what homestuck was either honestly so it wouldnt even matter. i only recently learned about the fandom.... uhh, maybe half a year ago??? yeah, august, so my knowledge was slim but vriska is a thing ive heard before, which still shocks me

goddammit

anyways back to her

so her intro was something, we pretty much found out she likes DnD (a FANATIC in fact) and feeds her lusus the flesh of living trolls. which is fucked up. but i wont get too much into detail about that until i make a post about her life on alternia and the consequences of such. or maybe just alternia in general...?? or *both* heheheh but i feel i need more information before i go off on a tangent about that

then we met??? white text dude?? who is a major asshole but an asshole with insults that hURted, to think i felt bad for VRISKA when that happened. woah.

i said before, but... karkat, he cant really hit deep because his insults are just HIM and his way to express himself. like some people find it natural to just go “FUCK YOU” to show emphasis on a point, and thats just karkats way. he may do it so aggressively that it takes you a second to realize what he said, but usually i dont take anything to heart whenever he spurts out some insults. ive progressed to the point where whatever he says, is just “karkat” and not him trying to be actively mean. rather, its now funny whenever he does say anything SOMEWHAT creative, dude has an imagination that goes on for miles

but vriska?? she IS trying to be a bully, you can tell. but i feel theres something much more to that. like shes trying to prove herself and her “blueblooded” demeanours or whatever the hierarchy is. she doesnt want to show emotions so she makes herself a barrier by being mean is what i can gather from her conversation with kanaya. im pretty sure youre not supposed to understand her until its pointed out and rather see her as an “antagonist” at first, but yeah, her insults are more pitiful than anything and i also cant take her too seriously. i may not like her as a person but her character is interesting because you cant always have the goodie two shoes as the protags. it doesnt diversify the characterisation so i like vriska as someone who makes the plot work and it becomes more interesting since you have someone that makes it harder for the main crew to progress. a happy-go-lucky adventure with no trouble and no turnabouts would be boring in a way. so having a character like vriska, or like this new white text guy, it makes you stop for a second and realize oh shit okay, here’s where shit CAN go wrong and WHY. and i do especially like it when these bastards of characters somehow have more depth than being the “bastard characters”. kinda humanizes them in a way. doesnt mean you have to LIKE them continuously, but theyre humans (trolls whatever) in the end and every person has their own story whether its for better or for worse

for example, i like her being placed into the story, along with white text, by how its all leading to this “accident” and is slowly showing us hints on what happened, but in the end, it wont be until later that we know the full story. even if it was in the past, it apparently is very vital to the plot and shapes how the characters act in the future, so important aspects like that are to look out for. and usually they only occur when theres been some trouble within friend dynamics. so without these bastard of characters, plot wouldnt grow AS strong and i often keep that in mind when i explore a story.

anyways, I HAD A POINT TO THIS: so vriska and karkat are characters who are yes, mean, but it seems to be their personality, and the way they either show emotions and convey feelings (karkat) or make a barrier so they DONT show emotions to produce vulnerability (vriska), white text guy seems to mostly be out to be an asshole. he told vriska she was useless to sum it up but im not too sure if this is one of those “first dialogue” to mould out a bias opinion before we even get to the character themselves, but judging by how vriska and karkat played out, he surely means something bad and i dont know how to explain it. but i cannot base anything off from one piece of dialogue. i dont even know what else to call him other than white text guy so...... ill just leave that out for now, until we finally get his introduction

though, i do wish to mention, and will expand on, im not wrong when i say karkat and vriska are similar but in different context. sorry if youre favourite is karkat and you dont like vriska, or vice versa, but uhhhh their introductions are so similar its uncanny and the way they’re portrayed is the same except one is more on crack about the meddling, while the other is angry about the meddling. similar to how it was with karkat, we were introduced to vriska talking with someone we knew (tavros) whom she obviously didnt like, so obviously, from her point of view, she wanted to be menacing. like how karkat was menacing to jade because she wouldnt listen to his point... he got angry, so he lashed out. but us, the readers, didnt know that. we thought “oh god its this asshole” until we made it further in the story and started to warm up to karkat. it may not be the same with vriska, she may be a bully regardless, but you cannot tell me we moulded a bias towards her character as we did when we first read karkat. theyre both truly mean to other people, maybe both for different reasons, but i do want to point out the similarities and not leave that out. im pretty sure andrew basically gave us a conversation that formed our opinion of a character right off the bat rather than go into depth of WHY they did it, and how they are naturally without the conditions of the game. which, you can also see with vriska when she conversed with kanaya. andrew started off with a character who only appears to speak once, and makes you judge them from first appearance alone, without any explanation as to why they said what they said and how they are with other characters, let says. so you assume they were simply a rude character. now look how karkat turned out. so im guessing in homestuck, the first impression should never be the opinion you stick with until MAYBE 5 more conversations with that character (each one different)

OKAY done with the vriska introduction, now to slutquius

yes, hes kinda weird, i have stated that many times. i have no idea what to say about him other than he likes porn, he likes centaur dick which just so happens to be his lusus as well and if that isnt a red flag idk what is

he also likes his lusus milk, right from the udders of his guardian

fun times, fun times

my opinion of equius kinda.. differs. which i should really put in place the “dont judge by first impression” rule, because at first i thought he was rude with, then i thought he was hhh okay, because i understood why he was being so protective over nepeta and her team placement, since the people she was going to play with WERE dangerous. but if you think about it, both sides will probably put you in danger. it just depends on which ones you confide in more to protect your back rather than those which would cause trouble on purpose, in my HONEST opinion. so equius was a little overdramatic on that part, but i got what he meant. he was on the blue team and he didnt want to leave nepeta alone without him on the red. but then this session happened. and he went back to being weird again because of the whole porn thing, especially being so open about it like dude chill youre 13. but the thing is, then i felt bad for him because hes basically touch starved. to say that he could break anything he touches, i doubt people would go up to him for hugs. in fear they would be crushed to death by a simple hug. so im guessing hes rather lonely and doesnt really know how to interact because of this. so i felt sad that he had to live a life where he needs to be careful of everything he touches so it doesnt break randomly. see? poor dude. but then things got weird. and im pretty sure hes a masochist. so my opinion on equius is a fucking cosine graph

which brings us to the final point:

gamzee and equius’ conversation

i dont even know.....like.........gamzee was unaware that equius was using him for his own power play roleplay, right? gamzee knew it was a roleplay but it had had some.. idk.... obvious sexual implications? and i bet gamzee didnt really know that? he thought they were only venting out through a simple roleplay and trying to get closer because he originally thought equius hated him, considering equius flat out said “i hate you” and gamzee went “you tell me everyday and im okay with that” so.. gamzee probably wanted only to get closer to equius so he helped out his little problem which.. thats so sweet but i feel bad he was coerced into something he didnt get, especially since he was innocent enough to go along without knowing equius’ true gain

anyways, equius was getting off with the hierarchy thing. considering he’s “lower” than gamzee, and gamzee is surprisingly ...high on the spectrum??? so equius wanted gamzee to boss him around, because it felt only natural to him since he’s the “inferior one” and gamzee is The Big Man. like i get that, but it was written in a way that was so uncomfortable, that i wish i didnt. equius is just a weird character... hes not BAD per say, but hes... hes something alright

but im really liking gamzee. the two things which struck me in that one conversation, was the “i dont get why we should dictate people by the colour of their blood, i just see people as people” piece of dialogue and “i cant go around pleasing just everything so its alright if you hate me”

thats... so good, idk. i really liked that. i also really liked when kanaya said “youre dangerous but dangerous people are needed and are important because it shapes you” like <33 my fucking heart

god homestuck may be a tad on the weird side with some of its characters but it surely knows how to create great lines of dialogue

and that concludes the long 4 hour session i did, hope you all enjoyed it

with that, i rest

[rise-above-the-grave]

beware stained glass shards

for @dekusmynamecryingsmygame​. you said angst was fine, so uhhhh have some mf-ing erasermic angst I guess. please note that a) I am brand new to this fandom and am still figuring out headcanons and characterizations. hopefully I didn’t screw anything up too bad in that regard...but if I did, please at least be gentle in your critique :’)... b) I wrote this in...about 4 hours, all completely after midnight. it’s not gonna be my best work :/ but I did my best! and I wanted to get this up asap so you could see and read it sooner rather than later.

tw for: canon-typical injuries, hospitals (and everything that goes along with hospitals like doctors, nurses, surgeries, etc.), some implied (it’s only implied!! and it’s super duper uber vague) nsfw stuff, and an off-screen (debatable; maybe-it-was, maybe-it-wasn’t) suicide attempt. (was it a suicide attempt or a villain attack? I don’t even know myself! - at least not yet. read it however you wanna read it. I purposefully leave it open for interpretation.)

and if you don’t wanna read it because of that even potential suicide attempt, lemme know and I’ll write you something else, Peachy... alkdsjflkjdsf unfortunately I have a bad case of “I didn’t think this through” after midnight, and I didn’t even think of that possibility until I was basically done writing it. at that point I was like “It’s 5:30 and I need to sleep, I might as well post this on the off chance they do want to read it...” if you don’t wanna read it tho lemme know and again, I’ll write ya something else tomorrow <3

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

He falls.

There is lightning, there is thunder, there is rain—and for an instant (a second, a heartbeat, a breath), he is a swallow, a sparrow, a falcon. He flies with invisible wings, the air is caught beneath him and above him and before him, the world spreads out into infinity below the raindrops hanging suspended in the air. The lightning gilds his dark hair in quicksilver, the thunder that follows an instant later shakes his bones, and the rain that drives him to the earth soaks his clothes into a second skin.

He falls, the asphalt of the alley that runs beneath the comet of his body rising nearer and nearer in a rapid sequence that he thinks, distantly, should be alarming.

I should be afraid, he thinks.

This is going to hurt, he thinks.

Hizashi—

And then there is pain, and there is fear, and there is darkness gilt by lightning, silence shrouded by thunder, blood watered by rain.

---

Yamada Hizashi is 22, desperate, and dangerous.

He is older than he thought he would ever be. When he was young, he had imagined himself living to the infinite age of 50. He would look at himself in the mirror hanging in the bathroom, fingers combing through hair he imagined going silver, palms smearing smooth skin he imagined going wrinkled and weather worn. He would pluck at the band t-shirts he’d wear under too-hot, too-heavy jackets with fidgety hands, wondering what he’d wear then.

I’m gonna be a hero! he’d told his moms, and when they laughed and hugged him and told him, You’re going to be the best hero there is!, he believed himself immortal, invincible, inevitable.

And he was. He was immortal, invincible, inevitable. He could be hurt, he could be beaten, he could be knocked down. But no matter what—no matter the pain, the struggle, the difficulty—he healed, and he fought until he was victorious, and he stood back up. No one could keep him down. No one could diminish him. No one could threaten his impenetrable view of the future.

And then—and then Oboro. And it had all crashed down around him, like so many shards of shattered stained glass.

With Oboro goes his heart. His future. His eternity. He is taught, with the sharpness of stone, with the heaviness of rubble, with the choking taste of dust, that death lurks in the most innocent of shadows, that pain waits in the wings of the theater, that certainty is a lodestone chained around your neck.

Nothing is certain. Not everything can heal. No one is invincible.

He stops thinking he’ll live to 50.

He stops thinking he’ll live past 20.

“Fuck you,” he spat, and Shouta flinched as if he’d been struck, the Happy birthday that had been on his lips dying a silent, painful death. “Fuck everything.” Without warning—without even fully processing what he intended to do; he just hurt, and he needed something, someone, to hurt with him—Hizashi threw his tumbler against the wall behind the bar. The shelf the tumbler hit broke, and a cascade of bottles and liquor crashed to the floor in so many shard of glass and fragments of dreams and spreading rivers of blood.

There was a shout, and then Hizashi felt Tensei’s and Nemuri’s hands on his shoulders, heard Shouta’s voice sounding unusually placating and apologetic as he spoke to the bartender who had rushed over.

“Get him out of here,” Shouta snapped a few seconds later, turning and looking straight at him with death in his eyes. For an instant, Hizashi almost felt guilty. Then Tensei and Nemuri were dragging him away from the counter, away from the gathering crowd, away from the bar.

“Idiot,” Tensei muttered as Hizashi listed against him in the alley behind the bar, all at once too drunk and too sober to function.

“Idiot,” Nemuri sighed, guiding him into the cab, buckling the seatbelt across his chest and waist and then letting him collapse against her shoulder.

“Idiot,” Shouta hissed at him as he undressed him and shoved him unkindly into bed.

He stops thinking he’ll live—and so he stops caring. He drinks too much. Eats too little. Throws himself into his work with a single-minded mania.

His relationship with Shouta suffers. They grate, like two broken ends of a once-whole bone, the nerve that is Oboro’s death still laid bare between them. Shouta can’t sleep without Hizashi in his bed; Hizashi can’t sleep unless he’s alone. Hizashi drinks to drown his memories, his emotions, his pain; Shouta tries to starve his out. They argue about it, until Shouta erases Hizashi’s quirk and Hizashi throws a punch—about Shouta’s energy pouches, about Hizashi’s whiskey. About the lights Hizashi wants to leave on at night. About the socks on the floor inside the door. About the uncapped toothpaste left by the bathroom sink. About the half-eaten takeout sitting in the fridge. About the nights Shouta will disappear without warning, without a trace. About—

Hizashi wonders if it is his fault the day Shouta walks out, slamming the door behind him.

Shouta doesn’t come back.

Hizashi drinks more. Eats less. Works harder. Does anything, anything to distract himself from the event horizon opening inside his chest.

I’ve lost my best friend, he thinks, curled up alone and unable to sleep in a bed that had once held two.

For the first time in years, he wishes someone was sleeping beside him.

It is dangerous. He knows this—knows the risks, knows that the rewards are negligible compared to the ruin it could bring him. His career is on the line. His future hangs by a thread.

Hizashi doesn’t care.

He isn’t going to live past 21 anyway.

Only a few of his partners know who he is. Those that do keep silent. It is never wise to paint a target on your back, and Hizashi makes it clear that he doesn’t want a relationship, isn’t looking for a connection—that there is no reason for them to think there is anything between them but drunken carnality.

He learns fast how to duck cameras—and how to attract them. He learns how to avoid reporters, except when he wants to talk. He learns how to sidetrack paparazzi with glamour shots. He finds he is good at this game of chess, of Russian Roulette, of cards built into fragile palaces. He is good with people, good with crowds, good with playing the symphony’s strings.

I’d make a damn good villain, he thinks one night before he drifts off to sleep, a cute blond whose name he can’t remember already asleep beside him.

And then he thinks of Shouta—of Eraserhead—and the guilt he’d swallowed eight months before, when Shouta had walked out and left nothing but empty shadows where he’d been, threatens to choke him. He barely makes it to the bathroom before he vomits, bile tasting of too-much alcohol and too-little food, of regret and shame.

What am I doing? he thinks, leaning his forehead against cool porcelain.

“Are you okay?” the cute blond asks. He stands in the door to the bathroom and looks down at Hizashi with concern in his pale eyes.

“Get out,” Hizashi says, not looking up.

“But—”

“Just—just go.” And then, softly, voice breaking halfway through the only syllable that matters, “Please.”

The cute blond leaves, and Hizashi is left totally, utterly alone.

---

“You’re listed as his emergency contact.”

Hizashi stares at the window overlooking the city and sees nothing but smears of too-bright light against a stormy night. Sees nothing but the unknown caller ID flashing up on his phone screen after its ringing had woken him. Sees nothing but the memory of Shouta’s face just before he’d turned away and stalked out of the apartment, slamming the door behind him.

What had they even been fighting about? Hizashi can’t remember.

“I’ll be right there,” Hizashi says, unsticking his throat just long enough to remember what he’s supposed to say.

The line clicks dead, and Hizashi stumbles blindly out of bed and into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. He throws on a jacket, a pair of boots, a set of headphones. Ties his hair up in a bun to keep it out of his face and, hopefully, dry once he pulls the hood of his jacket over his head.

The trip to the hospital is spent in a haze of emotion, fear, and dread. He can’t parse any of it, though. Can’t understand it, give voice to it, give structure to it. All he knows is that he is feeling, and that he is afraid, and that he is certain that the scythe has finally fallen once again—only once again it hasn’t come to reap his life.

The hospital is bright against the rain-swept night, clean and sharp and stinging. Hizashi feels bad about the mud he tracks in, feels bad about the water he drips on the floor, feels bad about the lingering scent of gel and hairspray that seems to hang around him no matter what shampoo he uses.

He tells them who he is, who he is here to see. The nurse helping him looks at Hizashi with a curious expression that he is too strung out to try to interpret, and then leads him down a maze of white corridors that he knows he will never remember. They stop outside a door in the ICU, and the woman rests a hand on his forearm and says something Hizashi does not hear. Then she opens the door, and Hizashi steps into the room.

Shouta is unconscious on a bed, surrounded by machines. His chest rises and falls with intubated breath, and two IVs are hooked into the backs of his hands. His eyes are closed beneath the purple and black bruising shadowing his face, and Hizashi can just see more bruising peering out above the bandages swathing his chest.

“How—” He chokes, unable to form the words that he needs to say.

“We don’t know,” the nurse says. “He was found in an alley by a couple of drunk college students. We think he fell.”

“Fell?” Hizashi repeats dumbly. “But he never falls.”

The nurse is silent. Whatever she is thinking, she does not share with Hizashi.

For that, Hizashi is grateful.

“Is he going to make it?”

“We don’t know,” the nurse admits. “He has to stabilize before we can use any healing on him. If he survives the night, his prognosis will be good—but it’s a big “if”.” She hesitates, then says, “It’s a good thing you came.”

Hizashi moves to sit in the chair pulled up to Shouta’s bedside and sinks into it. He does not see the nurse watch him with concern—does not hear her pager go off a few minutes later. He does not even notice when she disappears through the door, or when the door clicks shut behind her.

For a long time, Hizashi is silent. There is too much to say—too much he needs to say, too much he wants to say, too much he can’t say. The words sit heavy on his tongue, in his throat, behind his teeth. They are stones in his stomach, glass in his lungs, thorns in his heart.

He opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again.

He laughs weakly.

“You always did have a way of leaving me speechless, Sho,” he says at last. His voice is a clap of thunder in the silence of the room.

Hizashi sighs and buries his face in his hands.

“Please wake up,” he whispers through his fingers. “There’s so much I have to tell you. So much you have to know. Like, you have to know that I—I’m sorry. For…for everything.”

He swallows. His throat constricts, and his breath comes in shaky gasps.

“I can’t lose you too,” he says to his palms, because looking at Shouta is too much. His voice is hoarse and barely audible and pleading. “Please, Sho…”

The machines beep. The vents rattle. Shouta’s false breath hisses.

And Shouta doesn’t wake, even when Hizashi begins to cry.

---

Hizashi is asleep when the doctor comes in, just after dawn. He startles awake at the sound of the door closing, blinking blearily and turning his head to stare at the tall, dark man. The doctor smiles at him, and goes to check on Shouta.

He had survived the night. That much, at least, is a relief.

“We still don’t know,” the doctor warns Hizashi. “But we can start to be hopeful.”

They take him away for another surgery. This time, they promise Hizashi, a healer will be involved.

Hizashi stands, stretches, and goes in search of food. He finds the cafeteria, and buys a meager breakfast that smells bad and tastes worse. When he looks at his phone, he sees that he has missed calls from both Tensei and Nemuri. He shuts it off and shoves his phone back into his pocket to deal with later.

He’s going to have to call his agency soon, too, but he has a few minutes until that call is critical.

He spends a quarter of an hour sitting at the hard, plastic table in the cafeteria, staring out of the window at the overcast morning and thinking. He thinks about what he is going to say if—when—Shouta wakes up. He thinks about what he is going to say to Nemuri and Tensei. He thinks about his choices, and about the certainty of death, and about the possibility of life.

He thinks about Oboro, and about Shouta, and about how he lost one and how he might lose the other.

Hizashi stands, shoving his chair back so hard it topples onto the floor with a bang. What few others are in the cafeteria stare at him with varying degrees of irritation and wariness, until he rights the chair and walks away with a casual wave of apology.

He calls Tensei.

Tenya is running around in the background, laughing maniacally, and Tensei is distracted during the call in spite of his concern. He promises to come by the hospital when he can, though, and tells Hizashi to call Nemuri. Hizashi promises he will, and hangs up.

Nemuri is unusually quiet as Hizashi tells her what he knows of what happened, and while he tells her that Shouta is back in surgery. When at last she speaks, she only says, “You were still his emergency contact.” It is not a question. It is barely an observation. More than anything, it is a revelation.

“I guess so,” Hizashi says, cradling the phone between his ear and his shoulder as he feeds a bill into one of the vending machines. His breakfast had been bland, and he wants sugar.

They talk for another few minutes about nothing in particular, and as Hizashi unwraps his candy bar and begins to eat, he is struck with the notion that Nemuri is just trying to distract him. He appreciates it. Before long, though, she hangs up with a quick goodbye, and a promise to come to the hospital after her last patrol.

Hizashi crumples the empty wrapper and tosses it into a trash bin, and wanders his way back toward Shouta’s room.

He calls his agency once he is seated by Shouta’s still-empty bed. He tells them there was a family emergency, and that he will not be able to patrol today. They are surprisingly accepting of his feeble excuses, and Hizashi wonders if someone else had already contacted them. Probably Tensei, he decides. That was always the kind of thing Tensei thought of.

His phone calls made, Hizashi settles uncomfortably into the hard, plastic chair to wait for Shouta to be brought back. He tries not to think. He mostly fails.

He thinks of Shouta. He thinks of Oboro. He thinks of invincibility, and of shattered stained glass, and of birthdays. He thinks of a broken shelf of liquor bottles. He thinks of screaming at Shouta in their apartment, so angry he’s lost control, and of Shouta silencing him with a red-eyed stare. He thinks of broken promises, and broken hopes, and broken dreams.

They bring Shouta back in sometime around noon. He is still unconscious, but he looks a little better than he had the night before. The bruising is lighter—more red and purple than black and purple—and he is breathing on his own. Some of his color has returned as well, though he was never anything but pale.

The nurses leave again, after telling Hizashi things he does not hear, his attention fixed on Shouta to the exclusion of all else. He wonders, vaguely, as he feels them leave the room, if they had figured that out, or if they had just finished telling him what they had to say.

The seconds drag into minutes as Hizashi waits, the minutes into hours. Hizashi sits, stiff and sore, in the chair by Shouta’s bedside, watching his chest move beneath the bandaging, watching his eyes flicker beneath his eyelids. He wonders what Shouta dreams of.

The doctor comes in again. Leaves again. Hizashi ignores him.

Nemuri comes, but does not stay long. She talks, and Hizashi listens with half an hear, saying nothing as she tells him about her day, about her night, about everything but her worry over Shouta. It’s there, though, lurking beneath every strained story, every forced laugh, every brittle word.

Nemuri is older than him and Shouta and Tensei—but, like Tensei, she had found them adrift in the wake of Oboro’s death, and like Tensei she had decided, “These are mine, now.” Hizashi is grateful for it most days.

It is only after Nemuri stands and presses a kiss to Hizashi’s cheek in farewell that he speaks.

“They think he fell,” Hizashi says, not looking anywhere but Shouta’s face. Nemuri freezes.

“But he never falls.”

“I know.”

“Do you think—”

“I don’t know what I think,” Hizashi says, short and sharp. “And neither do you.”

Nemuri hesitates. Then says simply, “Okay.” She leaves without another word.

---

Tensei visits for an hour, and when he leaves he promises to return later in the evening so that Hizashi can run home to shower and change clothes. Hizashi agrees without really knowing what he’s agreeing to.

Night has just well and truly fallen when Shouta’s eyes flicker, then open. He looks around, taking in the lights and the ceiling and walls—and then his eyes fall on Hizashi, and he freezes.

“Hey,” Hizashi says.

Shouta turns his eyes away and stares up at the ceiling.

“Uh,” Hizashi says, feeling suddenly awkward and tongue-tied. “Thanks for leaving me as your emergency contact.”

Shouta grunts. Hizashi wonders if he can even talk right now, or if it’s too painful.

“Look, Sho…” Hizashi grimaces. “Shouta,” he corrects.

Shouta looks at him again, eyes flicking over to his face. Hizashi rubs the back of his neck, and tries to figure out how to say what he wants to say.

“I know this is a bad time,” he says finally. “But I have to say this before the doctors come rushing in, and before you get up the strength to kick me out.” Shouta’s eyes narrow at him, but Hizashi isn’t looking at him anymore—is staring, instead, at the edge of the bed.

“I’m sorry,” he blurts out. “For…” He takes a deep breath. “For everything.”

Shouta looks back at the ceiling, and does not speak.

Hizashi calls the nurses. They come quickly, and Hizashi excuses himself from the room so that they can fuss over Shouta in peace. By the time they are done, Tensei is back, and Hizashi finds himself kicked out of the hospital until he has showered, changed, and eaten a full meal. He agrees to the terms grudgingly, but only because the memory of Shouta not even being willing to look at him is still fresh in his mind.

It haunts him as he showers, as he changes, as he walks to a small take-out restaurant a few blocks from his apartment and places his order. He wonders if he should even go back to the hospital, or if Shouta would prefer it to just be Tensei there.

He almost decides he would.

Tensei calls him just as he’s finishing his dinner, though.

“You on your way back?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Hizashi says, because he can’t quite bring himself to be selfless enough to say no.

---

Shouta is still awake when Hizashi walks into the room again. He looks at Hizashi when he opens the door and steps inside, then looks away again before he can close it. Tensei notices the silent exchange with a pensive look, but says nothing.

“Well,” he says, standing, “I have to go. I’m babysitting Tenya again tomorrow morning, and that little monster drains more out of me than twenty villains.” The soft smile on his lips belies the cutting words, though, and Hizashi knows that Tensei would give the world to his little brother if given the chance.

“Thanks,” Hizashi says, and claims the chair Tensei had just vacated.

Silence fills the room in the wake of Tensei’s departure, heavy and awkward and uncomfortable. Hizashi looks everywhere but at Shouta. Shouta stares at the ceiling.

“I…” Hizashi begins at last, entirely uncertain where he means to go with his next sentence but knowing he can’t bear the silence any longer.

A sigh cuts him off. Then, abruptly, in a ragged voice, Shouta says, “I’m sorry.”

Hizashi finally looks at him, startled. “For what?”

“For…everything,” Shouta says. “For walking out. For not being there for you. For ignoring you when you needed me.”

“Shouta, I…” Hizashi swallows hard. “I dug my own grave. I don’t expect you to dig me out. I never have.”

“Maybe that’s your problem,” Shouta whispers. “Our problem.”

Hizashi frowns. “What happened, Sho?” he asks suddenly. “How did you fall?”

“Someone pushed me,” Shouta says without hesitation. “I didn’t see them until it was too late.”

For the first time in seven years, Hizashi isn’t sure if Shouta is lying.

“Okay.” The word tastes like ash on Hizashi’s tongue, but there is nothing else he can say. Not now, anyway. Not yet.

Maybe not ever.

Shouta is silent again, but it is a different kind of silence. Hizashi waits, knowing he is preparing to say something. At last, after a few heavy moments of pregnant waiting, Shouta says, “Can we start over?”

Hizashi looks at him, surprised. “I’m not sure that’s going to be possible,” he tells Shouta.

“Maybe,” Shouta agrees. “But…try again, then.”

For the first time in over a day, Hizashi smiles. “Yeah,” he says. Then, again, “Yeah. I’d…like that. I’d like that a lot.”

Shouta nods, just a little, against the pillow behind his head. He closes his eyes.

“Will you be here?” he asks, voice already thick with sleep.

“Yeah,” Hizashi says, knowing what he’s asking. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

Shouta nods again, eyes still closed, and in seconds his breathing evens out into a soft, sleepy cadence.

Hizashi settles back into his uncomfortable chair, preparing for another long night of half-conscious sleep. It’ll be worth it, though, he thinks. Anything is worth having my best friend back.

And for the first time since the stained glass of his invincibility shattered, Hizashi thinks that maybe, just maybe—if Shouta is at his side—he’ll see his 25th birthday. Maybe even his 30th.

Maybe even his 50th.