#but we're a work in progress after that i think things go ok

[stormz369]

☕💖 Can I Get Your Number? ☕💖 Ch 16

Jason Todd x (f)Chubby!Reader

written with a female reader in mind, first person pov, no use of Y/N, will probably get NSFW later, let me know if there's anything else I should tag this with!

warnings/labels: suggestive content, little bit of angst, and fluff wc: 2.5k

A/N: sorry for the unprecidented delay in updates! Life got in the way and then I got sick and lost a whole day of writing. 😥

Chapter Selection

🦇BatFam Group Chat🦇

Dick: So Jaybird, how'd she take it?

11:02am

Jason: … I didn't tell her yet.

11:08am

Steph: WHAT??? 😰

11:09am

Tim: 😐 … Do you think a better moment is forthcoming?

11:11am

Jason: You really want to talk to me right now, replacement? After the shit you pulled?

11:12am

Steph: ???

11:13am

Jason: HE KNOWS WHAT HE DID!

11:14am

Dick: Ok, ok! Look, this doesn't have to be a big thing. Just tell her, it'll be fine!

11:15am

Damian: Do not lie, Grayson. It is a big thing, and Todd is not so stupid that he will think otherwise.

11:17am

Babs: You really should tell her soon, Jay.

11:20am

Jason: … Well when is Tim telling Bernard, huh?? They've been dating longer than we have, how is it not Gang Up On Tim Day??

11:22am

Tim: Yeah, I told Bernard. … And he already knew. 😬

11:23am

Dick: … We're gonna discuss that later. Right?

11:26am

Tim: Report's already in the Batcomputer.

11:27am

Babs: … Seriously, Tim??? O.O ????

11:32am

Tim: Hey, hey! Can we get back to Gang Up On Jason Day?

11:33am

Jason: No! I'm working on it, leave me be!

11:36am

Steph: … Given how she handled everything yesterday, what's the issue? Do you think she won't be able to take it?

11:40am

Jason: That's not it at all! … With her I get to be a normal guy. And the second I tell her, that goes away, for both of us

11:41am

Damian: … Granted, I have very little experience with women, but I do think that if she wanted normal, she would have bowed out the second she realized she was talking to a Wayne.

11:43am

Dick: Or when B showed up at the diner

11:45am

Babs: Or when Damian showed up at her apartment

11:46am

Cass: Or after sitting through a dinner with all of us.

11:47am

Jason: 😒 None of you are any help at all

11:50am

After the gala, Jason became determined that I should know how to defend myself. I was incredibly uncomfortable with going to the gym with him, but after a week of assurances he had me at least partially convinced me that no one would bat an eye at me there.

Once he had the green light, he jumped into action. He took me out to get some workout clothes, and we started going to the gym together once a week. I, like most every Gothamite, had taken self defense classes as a kid, so we started with some flexibility improving stretches, strength building, and making sure I still had a grasp on the basics. Every week we trained for a few hours, and Jason would take me out for dinner after.

I would never have expected it, but I actually started to look forward to our gym days. Jason was his most cuddly after training, especially when he was particularly excited about some progress I made. Every time I got a hit in, or blocked one of his, he would beam like the sun itself. The first time I caught him by surprise and kicked him to the ground he actually scooped me up in a bear hug, cheering for the whole gym to hear.

And what's more; his work was so sporadic that it was hard to predict if and when he'd be called away on the average day. He did his best to avoid it when we had plans, but sometimes he just had to go in. But he made arrangements with someone who worked for him so that our gym days were our days, so they very quickly became the day every week where I was guaranteed his undivided attention.

It was all so delightfully domestic. We would spend the night before together, just cuddling though he was slowly getting used to me touching him more. In the morning we made breakfast and ate together in bed. We'd go for a ride on his bike, see what was new at our favorite used book store, have lunch and a walk around the park, and head to the gym. After training we would take quick showers in the locker rooms and bring some take-out home. Sometimes we'd fall asleep in each other's arms, but if he had an early morning at work he would tuck me in with a kiss and head home to get some sleep.

Damian started coming over once in a while as well; as we had discussed, he would text me that he was on his way first. Somehow he never tried to come over when I was at work, and he avoided gym day too. But his visits didn't always correlate with Jason's. Sometimes it was just the two of us, and on those days he slowly started to open up. He would do homework at my kitchen table while I made dinner, we'd play video games or watch movies, and eventually the manor would send a car to take him home. He always grumbled that I didn't need to walk him out, but I wasn't about to let him out of my sight in my neighborhood, and he didn't protest past that.

Eventually he started leaving a set of casual clothes at my apartment. I took him to the cafe down the block, let him pick out snacks at the corner store, and one day we took the bus to the local craft store. He bought a dozen craft kits; crystal growing, shrinky dinks, window decals, little figurines to paint, even a candy making kit. They only made an appearance on days when Jason had to work, and Damian always looked so sweet and relaxed while we played with them, and every time he made me promise not to tell anyone. I wasn't sure what was so bad about his family knowing he played with age appropriate toys, but I always assured him that no one had to know if he didn't want them to. The crafts were always carefully packed away when we were done and tucked into a nondescript box in my hall closet.

Steph, Tim, and Dick all found me on Waynebook, and eventually Steph invited me to join girl's night. That Tuesday I found myself at Babs' apartment with her, Cass, and Steph, watching a movie, eating pizza and popcorn, and painting Steph's nails for her. Dick started sending me memes and safety reports from my neighborhood. I wouldn't even hazard a guess why he was so up to date on my area's crime reports, but I did appreciate the heads up. Tim didn't send me many messages, usually just letting me know when Bruce had been trying to get Jason to bring me by again, but he definitely stalked my profile since he liked a picture from my high school graduation. His stalking tendencies were starting to amuse me more than anything else, so I didn't mention it to Jay. Anything that strained their already turbulent relationship felt like unnecessary information.

Jason took me to see an outdoor showing of the 2005 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. He packed a picnic dinner for us, making sure all my favorite foods were available, and brought several blankets and pillows. He held me close and whispered in my ear, quoting along with Mr. Darcy when he confessed his love to Elizabeth; “you have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on...”

It was an unusually peaceful day in Gotham; the kind of day that makes the hard ones worth powering through. We drove back to my place with the windows down. I didn't notice when Jason's mood shifted, but I did notice his hands trembling as he unpacked the picnic basket, and him glancing at me next to him. I set a hand over his, frowning slightly; “... Honey?”

“Hm?” He swallowed hard. “Y- yeah?”

“Are you ok?”

“Course. … Course I’m ok, doll.” He smiled softly, kissing my forehead.

“Cause you’re squirming like something’s wrong…”

“No, no! Nothing’s wrong, baby, honest. … Sorry, I just … I wanted to …” He frowned, taking a deep breath. “... We’ve been together for a while, and I … was thinking we could try something tonight?”

I blinked a bit, nodding slowly; “Oh? What did you want to try?”

“...Um … can we … push the comfort zone a bit?” He refused to look me in the eye, blushing bright red. I bit back the urge to giggle at how cute he was being, squeezing his hand instead.

“That could be fun~ … but if anything pushes back-”

He nodded quickly. “We’ll take it slow. And I’ll tell you if I need to stop, promise.”

I nodded, cupping his cheek; “very good. Then, how would you like to proceed?”

“Um … well, … I really like kissing you … I was thinking … maybe we could kiss some more places?”

I nodded, crossing my wrists behind his neck. His hands rested on my hips, stroking in small circles. “That sounds nice. You want lights on or off?”

“... Off will help.” He nodded slowly. “Is that ok?”

I nodded; “of course. Changing one variable at a time is always best practice, right?”

“Oh god…” He chuckled, holding me close. “What is this, some kind of science experiment?”

“I mean, we are experimenting, and it’s not not science - it’s biology and chemistry and psychology, and probably a bit of neurology.” I giggled, leaning in more. “I think the only thing we’re missing is the part where you have to write stuff down for it to be science. … So unless there’s something you’d rather be doing, I guess we could start writing out some lab reports …”

“... You know what, you little dork?” He scooped me up, tossing me casually over his shoulder, and began walking toward the bedroom.

“Woah!” I gasped sharply, giggling; “what?! What’s going on?”

He kicked the door closed behind him and laid me on the bed, leaning over me a bit, his hands trapping me between them on the bed. “I’m going to show you what I’d rather be doing … i- if that’s ok?”

The demanding tone he'd used was making me tingle all over. I bit back a giggle at the cautious way he ended the sentence, nodding quickly. “Sounds good to me~”

I could see a bit of his face in the light from the window, enough to see his eager grin as he dipped down, capturing my lips with his. I cupped his cheek, kissing back hungrily. He moaned softly, pressing his knees to the mattress on either side of my hips. I ran my hands through his hair as he slowly pulled away from my lips, kissing along my jaw to nibble gently on my earlobe. I gasped sharply, shivering at the contact, and he moved on to kiss down the side of my neck.

His lips slowly trailed from my throat down to my collarbone, placing gentle kisses there. “Is this … still ok?”

I panted softly, whimpering, and nodded. “Yeah~ yeah, this is … ooooh Jay~ this is amazing~”

He grinned against my chest, kissing more. His hand slowly made its way to my side, and his fingertips slid under my shirt a bit. “And … this?” He slid his hand a little further.

I shivered hard and nodded. “ohh god, yes~”

His hand caressed my curves as he kissed and gently nipped at my collar. I quickly found myself squirming under him, whining a bit; “yes~ … j- just like that, Jay~”

I squirmed a bit as he explored my soft tummy, pressing his hands into my sides to hold me close. His lips slowly made their way a bit lower, and a bit lower, until they were at the neckline of my shirt. Jason looked up at me, stroking my sides gently.

“Can … um … can I …?” He slid my shirt up ever so slightly.

I nodded quickly, shifting to help him remove it. He tossed it aside and began kissing my cleavage again. His hands fondled and caressed more, making their way up to my breasts. He licked and nibbled there, squeezing gently.

“Ohh fuck~ Jay~”

He groaned softly, nuzzling against me. He nibbled more, holding me close. “Fuck, you're incredible, doll~”

He fondled me more, kissing all over. I panted softly, gently tugging his hair. He purred at that, nipping more. I gasped softly, tugging his hair a bit. “Ow... G- gently, Jay…”

He froze, slowly pulling back. “I … I'm sorry, … I … fuck!” He pushed off the bed, backing up until he was against the wall. He stared at me, wide eyed, as I sat up.

“Take a breath, Jay. It's ok, I'm not hurt. Your teeth are just sharp.”

He took a deep, shuddering breath, and slowly nodded. “... I … I'm sorry …”

“It's ok, baby.” I held a hand out to him. He slowly walked over to me, letting me pull him down to sit next to me. I stroked his back, kissing his shoulder. “Relax, it's ok~”

“It's not. … I hurt you…”

“Well, mostly you startled me. And when I said ‘ow’ you stopped.”

He sighed softly, burying his face in his hands. “... I … I hate this … I … I don't know how to do this…”

“What do you mean?”

“... I think ... After everything I’ve been through … everything I’ve done … this isn’t what my body is built for … I can cause pain, I can take pain … I don’t know what to do with … pleasure. I don’t know how to give you pleasure. And I don’t deserve to receive it…”

I frowned deeply; “... My love, … you are so incredibly strong, and it’s true that you can take an inordinate amount of pain. But you are not meant for pain. Someone as kind and gentle and caring as you deserves to experience joy, and love, and pleasure.”

“... I don’t know how.” he shuddered, staring into his lap. “... But I want to … I want us to get to be happy together … I want to be able to pleasure you …”

I nodded slowly, chewing on my lower lip a bit. “... Jay, … how did you get so good at fighting?”

“… Years of training?” 

A grin slowly spread across my face as I reached out for his hand. He let me take it, squeezing once. “Exactly. Someone who knew how to fight showed you how it was done. They had you practice punches and kicks, taught you how to shoot, right?” He nodded, slowly looking toward me. “... So why don’t we do this the same way?”

“... What do you mean?”

I cupped his cheek, purring; “you’re teaching me to defend myself. If you’ll let me, I will teach you about pleasure.”

A shuddering gasp ripped through him, and his lower lip trembled a bit as he slowly nodded, leaning into my hand more; “... Y- yes. … Yes, I want that. I … I want to learn. … Please, teach me.”

Next ->

Divider by: @saradika-graphics

Taglist (open): @jawdropforkpop @krys0210 @snowy-violet @superthoughts @wordsfromshona @mystic60 @iwannabealocalcryptid @morstuavitamea-a @frosty--giants @arisa191 @prized-jules @phoenix666stuff @dinonuggysandhuggus @anuttellaa @whore-of-many-hot-men

[rosepetalkitty]

more mechworld story after the break!

ok, so since y'all liked my last one so much here's a follow up on that mechworld story. to recap, here's the color coding, names are a work in progress rn:

the pilot, she/her

the handler, she/her

the lead training technician/supervisor, he/him?

fair warning that im having a bit of a rough time deciding on how to narrate this in a way that isn't boring as shit so im kinda winging it here. enjoy!

it's been... an hour i think? longer maybe? it's hard to tell. my head is spinning from her voice and the link, and her teasing smile is stamped on my brain. i barely process the technician walking into the room until he speaks.

"hey, you two ready for your sim? we have it all set up for you."

"oh of course, let's go pilot!"

"yeah, i'm ready!" yes ma'am wait. wait hey no fair! she's still in my head. she says she can't read my mind, that all she sees is a little window into what i'm feeling, but i don't know how much i believe her.

"alright, follow me."

we follow the technician down a brightly lit hallway lined with doors. one of them is open, and inside are a couple other technicians sitting around a table with a holoprojector in the center. off to the side is what looks like a metal seed, a few feet taller than me. its panels are open, revealing a seat angled such that it's more for leaning on than sitting in. the tech walking with us gestures to a chair, and my handler (miss oh shut up!) sits down.

"right. so, you're going to need to connect here"

he pulls a retracted cable out from a recess on the edge of the table. she takes it and pauses

"got it, do I just-"

"connect that cable to the port on your wrist and sit tight while we get your pilot prepped"

she's a little annoyed at being interrupted (how do i know that...?) but she doesn't show it.

"alright, easy enough"

he turns to me, already pointing to the giant seed thingy. as i turn away from my handler she gets... spiky? is she shaking? i can't tell what exactly i'm feeling but it's coming from her.

"great. pilot, come over here"

"am i going inside of that?" he's already walking, so i follow

"yep! don't worry it doesn't bite. it's just a sim pod."

"okay..." it's not as much that i'm scared as nervous. what if i screw something up...?

shhh, it's okay. you'll do fine. just relax.

i jump. i swear that was her voice, but it sounds... different.

hey, hey, calm down. sorry for startling you. we can communicate with the link, i assumed you knew that but i should have made sure before doing it.

what? wait, so i can just

talk to her?

there you are hun, isn't this nice?

so you can read my mind!

only when you let me~ and before you ask, i can feel that you're anxious. believe me, i am too, but we're gonna be fine.

so that's what that feeling was from before. anxiety. wait, is the technician talking to me? oh! gotta pay attention, right.

"...like a b-series cockpit without the rest of the mech, and the sensor data is faked by the simulation console. you'll get used to it, trust me."

"right, ok, so how do i-"

"arms on the arm rests, wrists in the rings, and sit on the seat. it's kinda awkward, it'll feel better once you close up the shell."

another pang of annoyance from my handler, this time with a protective streak to it. i lean onto the seat and slide my hands through the metal rings at the ends of the arm rests. i can feel something dangling behind my ear.

"i'm going to plug you in, look down for a second."

i do as he asks, and i can feel him plug the cable into the thumb-sized socket on my neck. as he does, the cockpit comes to life, and the rings tighten around my wrists. they feel like bracelets.

"great." he turns to one of the other techs "everything look good?"

the other tech nods and gives him a thumbs up. he turns back to me and smiles. "perfect. then you're ready! you can close the cockpit once you want to kick things off."

close the cockpit? how do i... wait. ok. i can feel... something. almost like a... handle? i'm not touching it and i can't see it but if i pull on it-

the cockpit doors slide up and slot into place in front of me. everything is black for several seconds, and then... woah...

"welcome to basic, pilot!" the voice is definitely the tech's, but it sounds... distorted. like it's coming over a radio. "before we do anything else, can you see?"

"i think so?" i can feel my handler nearby. she's happy, but tense. as i look around i start to register the space i'm in. i'm standing in the grass of a sunny meadow, with a tiny tree a couple dozen yards in front of me. or- wait... is it tiny or am i just... i look down. oh. that would explain it.

when i look down i don't see my body. well, i do, but it isn't the same body. or a real body at all. i'm currently a fifteen foot tall metal shell, shaped like a human but with wide legs and heavy arms.

i am inside of a mech. holy fucking shit i'm piloting a mech! a simulated one i guess, but still! my handler must feel my excitement because i can feel her voice over the link

there you go, took you a second huh? liking the new look?

oh my god yes are you kidding?

"yeah, i can see!"

"great. can you move your arms around? and try walking a few steps too. we need to make sure your connection is stable."

easy enough. i try to do some stretches but as my arms touch i feel what can only be described as the tactile version of nails on a chalk board.

note to self: mechs can't stretch.

i opt to just wave my arms at the tree instead. i walk towards it a few steps. it feels like i'm moving through honey, but i don't fall or stumble or otherwise struggle to balance.

"looking good. normally we would have engaged the neural stabilizer before passing through the sensors to your brain, but we wanted to give you a chance to process everything normally first. we do have to get that online now, though. fair warning, this will feel weird."

neural stabilizer? isn't that the implant that shuts off my..........

can you hear me pilot?

...yeah...

her voice is quieter. a bit spacey. hopefully that's normal and she isn't passing out. "should she sound so out of it?"

"yep, that's pretty common. she's fine. just don't ask her to do any math right now." the technician laughs. i don't. i'm genuinely worried about her... i know this is completely routine, but i needed to make sure she was safe. so long as she is, we're good.

alright hun, focus on my voice. stand up straight for me.

...okay...

i can see her mech straighten up over the holofeed. y'know what, she's kinda cute like this. i'm starting to get used to it, i think...

"paint the tree red and tell her to shoot it."

i wish the tech weren't so pushy. he seems bored. he needs to chill out. i reach out and drag a line from the red cube in front of me, floating just above the table, to the tree. it gets highlighted in bright red.

weapons free, pilot. shoot red targets.

this part feels natural. we covered the target painter in pre-basic, before i was assigned a pilot. she, presumably, was taught what the colors mean: red means kill it, yellow means it's not friendly but you can't kill it, blue means it's friendly, green means it's part of your unit. she hits the tree with a few plasma bolts while the technician watches, somewhat more interested than before.

"that's enough."

stand down pilot.

she stops shooting immediately. the tree sizzles and starts to fall before snapping back into place as one of the techs resets it.

we spend a couple of hours walking around, shooting trees and testing her reflexes. the techs spawn in a couple of tanks for her to shoot at, some soldiers for her to defend during a simulated evacuation, and a few different environments for her to walk through. we're mostly just helping her get used to the feeling of being in a mech. once things start shooting back at her, i can feel her getting scared, and i comfort her as she goes through the exercises.

calm down pilot. you're doing great. stay focused.

the techs seem impressed by the time they're done. she's stayed mostly calm, with my help, but i can't shake the feeling that we're only now getting to the most difficult part.

"alright, time for disco. tell her to stand by."

"right." i feel sick from the anxiety. they told us how awful pilots can feel after a disconnection, even if it's just a sim. i want her to be okay...

pilot, get ready to disconnect.

...oh...okay...

she has the same flat, dazed tone that she's had the entire time. i disconnect from the table and head over to the sim pod. the doors slide open, but she's still connected, not registering the real world around her. i step forward to catch her as the tech unplugs the cable from her neck.

...ready....oh god where's my handler where's-

she falls into my arms, breathing fast. i just hold her as she clings to me. i can feel how terrified she is. "hey, hey, you're safe, i've got you. you're okay."

"i'm okay..." i cling to her. when she says it like that i really do feel better. the ringing in my ears is quieting down and i can feel my breathing returning to normal, but i keep holding onto her.

do you want me to help you sit down, or would you prefer to just stand like this for now?

like this... please... ma'am...

alright, we can do that.

the tech gives me a pained half-smile of understanding.

"first disco is always rough. they'll get better. for you at least."

"not for her?" he just shrugs.

"here, i'll take you to the barracks, they've got a bed ready for you there. she should rest, or at least just lie down."

i'm going to start walking, just walk with me hun.

yeah...

she whimpers a bit out loud. hopefully her speech is coming back to her, but this works. i keep my arm around her waist as we walk to our bunk bed. there's a fold-out table attached to the lower bunk. i try to help her onto it and she lies down, tugging on my hand. i sit next to her and she rests her head in my lap.

"you did so so good hun. i'm so proud of you."

"th...thank you miss" i look up at her. she's smiling at me. she's still so pretty...

[feminist-space]

There is nothing wrong with a person who wears adult diapers. Those are an aid, a tool, to help that person be more mobile and preserve their dignity.

If someone has tremors in their hands and needs help picking up everyday objects, that doesn't take away from who they are as a person. There's no dishonor in muscular tremors.

If someone can't see or hear, or can only see or hear with aid of a tool, a piece of technology, that's fine! Here's a really simple one: so many of us wear glasses because our eyes can't do the thing on their own.

Having disabilities doesn't take away from who a person is. Mocking someone for needing aid to do things, however, is morally repugnant. And using ableism to put down or mock someone who themselves is morally reprehensible is still never ok.

It is important for all of us to re-examine how we, too, perform ableist acts in our daily lives. Here are some simple ones:

Stop using ableist words (check out this page: https://www.autistichoya.com/p/ableist-words-and-terms-to-avoid.html).

Stop calling disabled people "inspirational" and using them as a way to say "if they can do it then so can you" (see: paralympic commentaries from the same people who still support organizations like Autism Speaks -- https://www.themarysue.com/the-autism-speaks-controversy-explained/).

Stop mocking people for not being able to move the way you think they should move.

Stop calling bigots "crazy" (their bigotry isn't a mental illness).

Stop saying that "only disabled and immuno-compromised people are at risk from COVID-19" when what is unsaid after that is "so that's why I don't need to care about it or take any precautions."

Stop calling someone "blind" or "deaf" when they're being ignorant.

Stop making fun of someone for taking an elevator or using a motorized scooter at the store.

Eliminate the stigma of disabled people asking for accessibility by making things accessible in the first place.

When you're in a position to design things, physical or otherwise (buildings, software, apps), think about accessibility.

Actively learn from disability activists, what things are actually helpful and actually accessible. Incorporate those things into your design.

Hire and elevate to positions of leadership people with disabilities (and if your gut response is "but we hire by merit," I challenge you: are you telling me you don't think disabled folks can perform the duties of leaders in your organization? What are you saying, exactly?).

Change your organization to be supportive to disabled employees, and get rid of policies that marginalize them.

There's a whole LOT of ableism weaved in to literally everything. Even if we don't get it all in one go (and we won't), it's important to put in the work to do better.

--

Before someone comments with these:

"what's wrong with people?"

Ableism is EVERYWHERE, it is in EVERYTHING in this world and we have to actively work against it. Don't assume you're exempt. None of us are.

"who says these things?" "who does these things?"

A lot of people. A lot of people you might love. A lot of people that might include us (likely, actually). These mostly aren't monsters in alleyways saying and doing ableist things.

It's the nurse getting annoyed at the person using a wheelchair for having their wheelchair there. It's the dude at the gym who tells his friend that if those paralympians can do it, they definitely can do it. It's the person who keeps telling their friend with long covid to just do more yoga. It's the liberal angry at Trump who mocks him by saying he wears adult diapers. It's the person who builds a business branded and marketed on being kumbaya "we're so progressive" but they made their doors so heavy that they're hard for anyone to open and definitely impossible to open for a wheelchair user. It's the boomer telling a young person using a disabled parking spot that young people can't be disabled. It is literally everywhere. It's that guy telling disabled people they shouldn't be out past sunset ("we're disabled, Daniel, we're not werewolves."--Jen L Rossman).

--

Reading list, obviously not exhaustive:

https://thebodyisnotanapology.com/magazine/14-black-disabled-women-reminding-us-of-our-power/

https://thedailytexan.com/2018/03/23/stop-using-ableist-language-and-call-out-others-who-use-it

https://www.autistichoya.com/p/ableist-words-and-terms-to-avoid.html

https://www.tolerance.org/magazine/no-joking-matter-words-and-disability

https://diaryofadisabledperson.blog/

https://www.thegauntlet.news/p/disabled-peoples-exclusion-from-indoor

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/being-grabbed-pushed-touched-without-27376323

https://www.sociability.app/blog/the-medical-vs-social-model-of-disability

[sibylsleaves]

Ok since you talked about conflict: what do you think their arguments will look like!!! (The first one and then perhaps the ones after)

oh i do believe their first fight is messy af!!! Because I think the only time we really have seen conflict between them has been during the Lawsuit era, which was so long ago and relatively early in their relationship, and then like little hints of it in s5 (in 5x01 with the panic attack stuff, and kind of in 5x10 with Eddie basically shutting Buck down about coming back to the 118).

And I think fundamentally they would HATE arguing. Like they are ALWAYS on the same team and I think it would be excruciating for both of them to be at odds with one another, so I think even a relatively small disagreement about something could easily blow up into something way bigger because one, or most likely BOTH, of them try to bury it and ignore it and pretend everything's fine because how can they not be on the same side about something??? and then when they refuse to address it it just gets bigger and bigger and their first fight is like...this kind of catastrophic explosion.

(omg sorry putting the rest under a readmore because this got so long...)

Like not screaming at each other or anything like that, but like their argument gets out of hand and one or both of them have to remove themselves from the situation and a little part of them is like is this it? is this where it ends? what if we really weren't ever meant to get together what if we really were better as friends? We NEVER fought when we were just best friends maybe this is too much for us...and then they get some Wise Perspective from someone or they have a classic Call That Mirrors Our Current Conflict moment and they're like wait. we're being stupid. yeah maybe we're fighting right now but we also both want to fight FOR each other and FOR this relationship.

I do think one of their early if not their earliest fights might be something about Eddie keeping something from Buck--not something nefarious at all, but something where it's Eddie basically processing or refusing to process something and not letting Buck in on the processing/lack thereof and Buck finds out and gets upset because when Eddie keeps things from him BAD THINGS HAPPEN. And Buck LOVES to fix things and Eddie loves that he wants to (comes in handy when you've got a bunch of holes in your walls...) but also he doesn't want to admit that there's anything TO fix and also, maybe this isn't something that can just be FIXED.

Just spitballing but maybe it's that Eddie is avoiding telling his parents about Buck and it's not that Buck needs him to do that but that Eddie is HIDING the fact that he hasn't told his parents FROM Buck because he doesn't want to admit how scary it is to come out to them and also to possibly open up this relationship (that he feels SO sure of and SO happy in) to the judgement of his parents who, for all the progress they've made HAVE proven themselves to be judgmental in the past. And Eddie thinks Buck is going to be hurt and disappointed that he hasn't told his parents but Buck is just hurt and sad that Eddie hasn't shared his feelings about the situation with Buck. (This also fits into my desire to see the friction of like, here's something i would've shared with you without question before we got together but now we ARE together and you are the SUBJECT of the thing I would previously have been sharing with you as like a friend/third party to the situation). Cue the Diaz parents showing up unexpectedly for a surprise visit and it all goes to hell. and i for sure think their future arguments get messy not just for them but also for the entire firehouse. because you know who loves oversharing about their relationship problems at work??? BUCK. and you know who hates talking about his problems and wants to pretend they don't exit? EDDIE "I don't panic" DIAZ. So I do think their little tiffs tend to bleed out and affect everyone on the team (but important to note I don't think they let it affect them on calls, it's more just a general disruption of the Team Vibe like in the truck/at the station because they can't stop sniping at each other). Like I think we'd see something very similar to how pissy Buck was with Eddie in 5x01 and Eddie being like BUCK FOR GODS SAKE and Hen and Chim are like 🍿🍿🍿 and Ravi is like. traumatized because everytime Buck is upset with Eddie somehow HE gets punished for it. and maybe even Chim and Maddie end up in their own argument because they disagree about who is in the wrong in the Eddie/Buck conflict (who is siding with whom...now that's the real question...but for the record in my head Chim is on Buck's side and he is FLABBERGHASTED that Maddie wouldn't take her own brother's side!!! But Maddie and Eddie are so similar so she REALLY empathizes with him in this situation and also she's ALWAYS primed and ready to call Buck out for being a dumbass.) I could see this being played for laughs and/or also as part of a larger conflict about Buck and Eddie being allowed to work together on the same shift. Like maybe it's kind of played somewhat comedically at first and then they like, resolve their fight in some cute way but Bobby still sits them down and is like you have GOT to figure out how to fight as a couple without dragging us all into it. Or you can't work together anymore. I'm so serious.

And Buck and Eddie are like what are you talking about we're all good now!! we love each other everything's great! And Bobby is like *stares directly at the camera* oh so you're never going to have another conflict again for the rest of your lives?

And then Buck starts thinking about how HES GONNA SPEND THE REST OF HIS LIFE WITH EDDIE AND HOW AMAZING IS THAT--sorry I'm getting distracted.

But anyway. Yeah. I think it's a process and they have to actually sit down together and figure out how they're going to handle conflict going forward because as much as they love each other and as much as it KILLS THEM to fight, no relationship is perfect at all times, even theirs.

[cerastes]

Hey. It's been a while. I think it's right to update you on stuff so tl;dr I'm probably not going to be around for some time, and if I am, it'll be in a diminished capacity, but if you're interested, do check under the cut. I'll also immediately state that I am not in any dangerous situation, it's other stuff, but I'll immediately dispel that before the cut just in case you just wanted to know that in particular.

Let's talk for a bit.

Long story short, the economy here is in shambles. The idea was for me to already have a new job, but that's not gone according to plan. I've been eating into my savings for a while now, and the people that told me that I had a job lined up for me September or at the latest October, meaning, this month, have been ghosting me. It seems to not be an option anymore, and no explanation was ever given to me. A shame, because it came from a place of relative trust.

This has eaten away at my nerves somewhat, and though it is the month of my birthday, I can't help but notice that, between the economy being this bad here, how hard it's been to land another job, and the fact that I'm eating into my savings, well, it's got me more than a bit worried. I'm not in any immediate danger of losing the roof over my head, or starving, or anything like that, but after a few months of "well, my savings take yet another hit this month with no end in sight", it's been rather rough, you'll understand, and it's compounded a bit. For just a second, and not as a primary, secondary, or even tertiary plan, more like a twenty-eighth measure if anything, I did entertain the dark idea of maybe asking for a bit of help here, and the moment that thought came up, I realized, "Ok, this is truly and well affecting me, I never want to do that", because, again, it's not like I'm in any immediate danger of homelessness or anything that grave, but it's been weighting on me enough that, even as a distant glint in the horizon of an idea, I did consider it. I don't want to sound like I'm blowing my own horn here, but for over a decade that I've had this blog, and the community/following/whatever you want to call it that has grown around it, I've never once asked for something like monetary help, because I think that can be a slippery slope. I've seen people far bigger than me, and some smaller, too, get addicted to asking for donations or help, or simply start taking it for granted when they ask for such a thing. My friends will tell you I writhe in agony when I receive a gift such as a game or something over the mail. My logic is that I don't need it, not in a proud way, but rather, in a "I wish you would spend this money on yourself instead, or on someone that truly needed it". With this in mind, I realized that, for me to even slightly consider that as an option, for the first time in my life, it meant that it was biting away at me far, far more severely than I thought. It's translated to other parts of my life as of late; I've not been depressed or anything, but I've felt this itch, this remarkably implacable feeling of "my man, you don't deserve to be taking it easy right now, something has to change, progress needs to be made".

I went out to wander for a few days, then arrived at my cousin's farm. He and his wife live a humble, hard working life, he invited me to stay for a while, I accepted, it was real nice, we hanged out, went exploring creeks and mountainsides while knocking back a few beers, the whole shebang for two guys that grew up in the middle of nowhere. Anyhow, it's true that the whole exposition that was the previous paragraph is something at play, but I also just... Haven't really wanted to be online at all. I don't want to check anything, read anything, and I feel a deep sense of alienation that I've not really felt in a long time. I suppose this is one of those good ol' Bro Is Going Through It, if we're to summarize it in a few words. It's easy for me to dispel negative thoughts and bounce back normally, because I've done a great deal of personal building and homework on knowing myself inside out, but not even this black belt in Drimobrain has helped this time around, and well, it bothers me, obviously, bwahaha. It's the first time in a few years that I really sincerely do not understand what's up with me, and while it's not really something I would consider me being rock bottom or anywhere near those depths, I do think I'm still below surface level, which is something I don't admit to easily, but have no choice to. I would love to be able to give this malaise shape and firmness through written or spoken word, but right now, it's a work in progress.

What bothers me the most is the sense of alienation I spoke of before: It makes no sense for me to feel this way, I'm treated with love and kindness every day, no one's silencing me in any way, I don't deal with barbs or hostility. So why is it that that's how I feel? Or perhaps it's something that feels similar, but I've no clue what it is, so I'm compounding it with alienation?

Regardless, it's all compounded into me just... Not wanting to be online. In the words of a friend of mine, "Dreamer has a fetish for self-development and growth", and, well, yeah, she's got that right despite the wording, I like to feel as if I'm improving every day and becoming better every day, even if slightly, and right now I feel like I'm just degenerating. Is it because my mood has been sour overall? Maybe. It might as well just be the fact that I Just Don't Want To Be Online For A While, and capricious clown that I am, if I want to do something, I do it, and if I don't want to do something, I don't do it. I'm tied to nothing and no one except my desire and drive to do or not do things. I can't change that, nor do I want to change that. And in this case, my heart's said to me, "fuck going online, go out, do things, try to get a job".

I also almost got recruited into something fucking vile that I thankfully noticed in time to avoid, but that's a story for another time.

There you have it. Am I leaving the internet/blue website forever? No, of course not, I like it here. Are things hard right now? They are, to be honest. Are they the worst it could be? Not at all. Do I have complete clarity of what's up with this fog inside of my head? No, and that bother me quite a bit. Are things going to be alright? Yeah, I think they will be.

I do regret it's in October of all months that this is going on, because it's where my shitposting power is at its apex due to my birthday, but hey, things happen, not necessarily for a reason, but they can be handled in such a way that it gives them meaning. I'm a fervent believer in that. I'm sorry this isn't the update you may have been hoping for, full of Lucina cosplayer blowjobs and other such hijinks, but hey, they can't all be Rainbow Road, haha.

So in case we don't see each other for a while, I hope you're all doing fine and dandy. I'm alive, I'm trying to be well, and most importantly, most fundamentally, most quintessentially,

I stay silly.

[tyrantisterror]

At Sea Without a Map Pt. 14

"I don't know who I am," you tell Calibani. "A while ago I just woke up here, on this boat, surrounded by ocean everywhere I could see. I don't know how I got here, I don't know how long I've been here because I didn't both to keep track of how many days had passed and haven't seen a reason to start now, I don't know where I'm going or where I'm coming from." The words pour out of you more and more as you confess your situation in full. "I don't even know my real name! I had one, I know I had one, and that at one point I had a life, a family, friends probably, a job, an apartment or house or something... that I lived on land and in a town or a city with lots of other people and no monsters but now I'm here, just here, stranded with no idea of how I got here or how to get back to where I'm supposed to be or even what my goddamn name is!"

Only when you stop do you realize how worked up you've become - the rapid beating of your heart, the great heaving of your chest as your lungs hyperventilate to keep up with your passion. Actually stopping to think about your situation has been something you've avoided for a while now - you've kept your focus based on smaller decisions, limited to four options, nice and tidy and manageable, unlike the whole... entire... raw ass deal you're dealing with in the big picture of things. Sweat pours down your brow as you struggle to regain your composure.

But then...

You feel Calibani's hand reach out and hold yours before you see it, your eyes watching as her scaly talons curl in gently to give your palm a gentle squeeze. "It's ok," she says softly. "You've been through a lot, but it's ok."

She leans in close and gives you the most reassuring smile a sharp-toothed, snake-eyed sea monster can give a human being after admitting to having eaten humans in the past. "You're not alone in this. We can find more humans together, and they can help you get home. If there's one thing you've taught me, it's that humans are clever and resourceful, and if there's one thing I know how to do, it's how to hunt down humans. We'll find them together in no time!"

Her words lift a great weight off of your chest, and in that moment you're tempted to pull her into a hug, but you're not sure if you've reached the "hugs allowed" stage of this friendship, so you settle for giving her hand a friendly pat back. "I know one place we could start looking," Calibani tells you, only for her smile to waver a bit. "But it's dangerous, so we'll have to keep our wits about us when we go there, alright?"

It's an interesting proposition, but should you accept? You consult your compass.

[kafus]

why 100%ing the pokeathlon in HGSS is one of the longest challenges in all of pokemon

ok so the pokeathlon right. the fun minigame collection in HGSS that is sort of but not really a replacement for sinnoh contests. one of the achievements you have to get to upgrade the HGSS trainer card to 5 stars is beating all 10 preset records for each minigame in the pokeathlon, and this is probably what it's most known for outside of just being a fun minigame collection. i think most people beat all the records if they're going for completion and call it a day but despite how easy it is to get that trainer card level, it's actually barely scraping the surface of what this game expects out of you for 100% completion. i genuinely think it's one of the most insane pokemon challenges in terms of the amount of grinding and for WHAT??? WHAT WERE THEY THINKING AAAAA

okay deep breath hear me out. all of the images in this post are pictures of one of my own HGSS files that i have been slowly working on 100% completing the pokeathlon in. i am not done yet and you will soon see why

in the basement of the pokeathlon, there are four rooms that get progressively unlocked as you play. the first one ("solidarity room") is there at default, then you unlock the "trust room" by winning a medal in all five courses at least once, then you unlock the "potential room" by winning a medal for all five courses on the same pokemon (AKA what is called a "medalist pokemon"), and then lastly you unlock the "friendship room" by beating all the preset 1st records, which also gets you the aforementioned trainer card level. each of these rooms is there to display various pokeathlon achievements and holy shit there are a lot of them that just get more crazy as you go further back in the rooms so BUCKLE UP

this is the solidarity room, aka the first room. very easy stuff, the only records down here are in the glass case and they show your highest collective score in each of the five pokeathlon courses. for 100% completion of this room you need to get a score of at least 450 in each course and you can tell you've done this when there are two trophy icons filled in next to each on the right hand side. a couple examples:

the only one in particular that took me more than one or two attempts to get the score i needed was the jump course for some reason and i have no idea why honestly, i think i just suck at lamp jump. on the other hand the skill course is extremely easy entirely because snow throw can be cheesed (video of me doing this here)

next up is the trust room. mainly it features the glass case that shows off every pokemon you've ever received a medal on and also totals how many full medalist pokemon you have, as shown below (i don't currently have any pokemon who AREN'T medalists here, but medalist pokemon are given the red ribbon on the bottom screen, so any non-medalist pokemon won't have that icon):

yes i have 73 medalist pokemon at the time of writing this post. don't worry about the trophies right now, we're going to talk about it later

despite the glass case being the main thing here, the flag, jersey, and golden shoes on the back wall aren't actually there at first. they show up for accomplishing certain things. from left to right you have to switch 200 times in any minigame that requires swapping mons, join the pokeathlon (not necessarily win) 50 times, and dash in any minigame where you flick the stylus to dash 5000 times. these numbers might sound kind of high but it's potatoes compared to later and if you're trying to 100% the pokeathlon these will just naturally show up here eventually without you even thinking about it

amusingly after you get them and interact with them, it doesn't actually tell you what you did to get them there lol. it's just like wow! those are yours! crazy!

next up, the potential room: yet another glass case and a couple of tables on the back for more golden items that appear as you achieve stuff. the glass case this time contains all the records for each individual minigame, including those 1st records you have to beat as i've mentioned a few times.

here are some of my records that i am not so subtly taking the opportunity to show off here lol. i have played so much pokeathlon that all of the 1st records are completely gone from the list, i've overwritten the entire list from each event LOL. on the bottom screen, 1st records you've beaten get a little ribbon on the event icon... but hold on, there's trophies too!

yes there's actually two records to beat for each event, the one that gives you the little trophy is called the mastery record and some of them, unlike the 1st records, are actually pretty damn difficult to achieve. circle push requires 60 points for example, which requires you to get a score of at least 60 - and the theoretical highest score you can get, aka a perfect score, is 66!! that's only 6 points off from perfect!! and don't even get me started on pennant capture, imo it's by far the hardest mastery record, it requires you to pick up 50 entire flags in one game and for a variety of reasons this is very difficult and required me to soft reset over and over doing attempts for multiple hours lol. the mastery records are really where i'm like, damn as a kid with undeveloped motor skills this would make me fucking explode (and it did when i was a child. it almost did even as an adult. fuck pennant capture)

oh yeah btw that "Link" button in the top right is specifically for local wireless playing pokeathlon with friends and there are zero achievements related to it, there's no preset records and no local play is required for completion. figured i'd mention lol

anyway as for the two things in the back, the first with the golden pokegear is for 100 first place wins overall and the one i don't have on the right side is for winning each individual minigame/event in first place... 50 times. 50 times each. there's 10 individual minigames, and some of them don't repeat on any other course, so you can start imagining just how many pokeathlon playthroughs this takes. this is getting ridiculous considering the amount of time investment needed but it Gets Worse!

ah yes the last room. the friendship room. it's cute, it has a statue of you and the last three pokemon you won the pokeathlon with, so you can go in with a team of 3 pokemon you care about and take a photo of your screen surrounded by statues of your favorite guys. here the mons are just random though lol

however there's more to this room and this is where the true insanity of the pokeathlon reveals itself. if you interact with your statue, you get this screen:

as you can see, all of the trophies from the previous rooms are totaled here! the collective trophies are the ones from getting a good score on each course from the solidarity room, the trust trophies are from the amount of medalist pokemon you have shown off in the trust room, the potential trophies are from all the 1st records and mastery records you've beaten in the trust room, and the friendship trophies... well those are actually obtained from the big point score on the top screen, of which you need a minimum of 4500 to get the 10th and final friendship trophy. this total is made up of the sum of all five course high scores, the highest score from each individual minigame (after converting to athlete points, AKA the currency earned), and one point per each medal shown off in the trust room, so five points for each medalist pokemon.

and that's the issue. medalist pokemon. you may have noticed that despite me having a whopping 73 medalist pokemon at the moment as well as getting every other trophy in the pokeathlon, i only have 6 of the 10 trust trophies. do you know how many medalist pokemon you need to 100% the pokeathlon and get that last trust trophy? 200 OF THEM.

let me break down why this is fucking ridiculous. so first of all i've been waiting to mention this until now, but medalist pokemon aren't actually logged by individual pokemon, they're logged by species. this means if you go in with a cyndaquil, and then go in with a different cyndaquil, winning medals on both cyndaquils does not count as more medals after you've already gotten them on that first cyndaquil once. this means that to even attempt getting 200 medalist pokemon, you have to OWN 200 individual pokemon species - as of gen 4 there were 493 pokemon in the national dex including mythicals and stuff; that's a little under half the entire fucking pokedex!! think of it this way, there's 30 pokemon per PC box, and assuming no duplicates, you would need to fill 6 and 2/3 PC boxes with different pokemon species.

pokedex requirement aside, let's break down how many times you have to play the pokeathlon minigames MINIMUM assuming you win first place every single time and don't ever bring repeat species on accident. it's math time babey

you need 200 medalist pokemon but you join the pokeathlon with a team of 3 pokemon at a time, so let's divide that by three and round upwards. 200 / 3 = 67 full medalist runs. for each medalist, you have to beat all 5 courses, so let's multiply 67 by 5 to get 335 total pokeathlon wins. but wait, each course has three minigames! so the total amount of minigames you have to play MINIMUM to get 200 medalist pokemon is 1005. and again, that's at minimum assuming you don't fuck anything up!! these minigames aren't exactly short either, they last 1-2 minutes each and this doesn't count spamming A through dialogue and menus, picking your pokemon each time before each course, watching the cutscene of points getting totaled at the end... 1-2 minutes might sound short but even if we take out all that time menuing and assuming every course is JUST 1 minute for math's sake, that's 1005 minutes - that's 16 hours and 45 minutes of JUST pokeathlon gameplay, and that is absolutely an underestimate.

as you can imagine as a person with chronic pain these minigames are kind of painful after a while and so i'm definitely going slow with this grind but i intend to have every trust trophy eventually. i'm not the first to do it but i've seen very few people online who have even wanted to make the attempt and i want to be able to look at that friendship trophy screen and feel accomplished. (i'm also going to get that last achievement in the potential room but if i don't have it somehow at the end of getting all these medalists i'll worry about it then)

side note i think it's really funny how there's something called the Supreme Cup which is just pokeathlon but harder and the only thing worth doing it for is extra athlete points for winning (300 instead of 100), there's literally 0 achievements tied to it lol

oh, and an aside about how ridiculous the pokeathlon is - the data cards. despite all my rambling here about all these different rooms with various achievements, there's actually even more pokeathlon data that is accessible... for a price.

the lady behind the counter here will sell you data cards for athlete points which let you view more personal pokeathlon data on the computer screen right next to her. the issue is some of these are really expensive, most of them 1000 points or more, which is a minimum of two full pokeathlon courses probably won at first place each. and there's also one card that costs 9999 for some fucking reason, it's the one that shows your total pokeathlon playtime, which i think is really funny. you also can't buy it right away, you have to buy most of the prior ones first. they really said ok here's your reward for grinding enough AP to buy all those data cards including this 9999 one: checking how much time you've wasted on getting here! in total getting all the data cards costs 39499 AP. just to view all your data!! if you get an average of 500 AP per pokeathlon course, that's a minimum of like 79 pokeathlon wins!!

i assume most people have never bought a data card much less all of them, like most people are going to use all that AP for purchasing evolution stones and heart scales from the main shop on the right, but it's kind of nutty how much data the pokeathlon actually saves. very minute stuff. since i've bought all of them, here's my current stats at the time of writing this:

anyways don't do this unless you have a lot of time on your hands to tediously replay the same minigames hundreds of times, and if you do for the love of god rest your wrists btw. these minigames were not built for my bones and they probably weren't for you eitherSFDKSFD

[bullet-prooflove]

Headcannons for being in a poly!relationship with Joe Velasco, Mike Duarte & Terry Bruno

Tagging: @rosaliedepp You did this! It got too long for reblogs so I thought I would do everyone a favour and pop it behing a readmore.

Following on from this HC

I can literally imagine Mike sighing and watering these poor plants because Terry forget to all the time because of shifts. He would complain to the plants but then prune them when they are a bit wild. Terry is the one that repots them though when they get a little big.

Sleeping Arrangements:

Night time I imagine it's you and Joe in the middle, Mike on one side of you, face to face and Joe draped over your back. Terry always snuggles in with Joe because he's good at soothing him when he has nightmares or sleep paralysis.

Workplace:

So in work I think it's kinda an open secret. Everyone acts professional, they're cops they have to but there's always small gestures. I think Mike and you work in different divisions so you're not all in one place at one time unless a case crosses over. I think with Terry and Joe it's more noticeable, Terry will always reach out to Joe during a hard case, like a shoulder squeeze, or drops by his desk for a chat, even a quick hug in the locker room. Likewise Joe will make sure Terry eats as I think he gets hyper focus sometimes. If anyone is feels they haven't seen one of the others, they will drop by their desk to check in and make sure their ok and looking after themselves.

If there is an argument at home Terry is very good at being professional and will be cool and a little aloof. Joe will probably ignore Terry if the issue is with him unless he absolutely has to respond. Terry is very good at defusing situations so if Joe does get snappy he will give him space until he is ready.

I think Joe and Terry told Liv together, like we're in this relationship with Mike and reader. It doesn't effect or work but you have to know for HR.

With people making comments in a professional environment Mike would go for the throat. He would verbally eviscerate them, he is very protective of the three of the three of you and hates his business being blasted. Joe is more likely to get into a scuffle. Terry is more likely to ignore it. The only time he can’t ignore it is when you’re branded a slut for it. Then he’s getting in someone’s face. The one time Mike was called to deal with one of you in custody, he was very surprised to find Terry in the holding cell with an ice pack on his face because someone couldn’t keep their mouth shut. Mike had a word with the fella afterwards.

PDA:

I think PDA is very dependant on person so Mike’s not massive on PDA in general as he’s a very private person. He’s all about light touches, lingering in your proximity, buying drinks and giving you that smile. I think Mike genuinely relaxes when he’s round the three of you, even if you’re out. He laughs more, touches more. Terry’s sort of flipflops with PDA, he’s very intuitive so if he feels someone needs it he’ll willingly give it. If not, he’s happy to sit in his chair and laugh with the rest of you. Joe, I feel is hands on and it progresses the more he drinks. I think he uses touch as reassurance, (do you still want me, I’m here kind of thing) He’s hand on whoever’s at the bar’s lower back, kiss on the head as he drifts past one of you to go the bathroom, even playing pool he’s like let me show you how to line it up better. Terry and you enjoy that, Mike doesn’t need his pool game stepping up, he was hustling to make ends meet back in the day.

When it comes to anyone putting themselves in danger it plays out like this:

Mike will go through every possible eventuality with whichever one of you it is. He will try to deter at first but if they’re resolute, you bet his baby is gonna be as prepared as possible. He’s one running through UC identities with you, peppering with questions trying to catch you out. He’s also the one that makes sure the person has a weapon they can use on them at all times, he’s given every single one of you a push dagger just in case. When they are away on op he’s grumpy, short tempered and abrasive, constantly checking in with the superiors for updates.

Terry is the one that checks in on the emotional well being. He learns as much as he can about the op, the people who are watching your back and expresses how important the person is and what may happen of they get harmed. He usually uses Mike as the threat. When their away on op he busies himself as much as possible and tries his best to take care of the others as Mike will drink too much and Joe will spend a little too much time at the gym beating the shit out of people.

Joe will give whoever it is tips because he’s had the most UC experience up to date. He’ll have burner stowed away at a mutual location close to the target area in case shit does hit the fan. You have a code word that the others don’t know about in case things get a little dark. He will also be super clingy on the lead up. He suffers a lot when of the others goes away. He doesn’t sleep well, constantly asking Mike for updates. The other two in the relationship will take care of him, make sure he eats and pay him special attention.

This was fun feel free to send more!

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Like My Work? - Why Not Buy Me A Coffee

[hypersomniagame]

HYPERSOMNIA JANUARY DEV LOG : "LOG 1, WOOHOO!"

Hi! For all of you who follow HYPERSOMNIA, or are just stopping by, let me introduce you to this post to really set the tone.

For 2024, I am going to try to release a dev log about HYPERSOMNIA once a month, may come earlier, may come a little late, but I'm doing this to help give insight on to how the game is going, and to give me motivation to work on the game.

First things first, big news!

HYPERSOMNIA IS NOW AVAILABLE TO WISHLIST ON STEAM! (LINK)

After a while of back and forwarding with Valve, I've finally got a Steam page to call my own, and MAN is it bizarre seeing my weird little RPG in my Steam library. Like, that's my logo, and my key art, and screenshots of MY game, that's so weird. It doesn't feel real. BUT IT IS!

And, I would really really really really really appreciate it if you would consider wishlisting the game on Steam. It helps with the algorithm, and my happiness because I like seeing numbers go up, it feels good.

I even drew this as a announcement/commemoration for the page going live.

(P.S; if you couldn't tell, I really like Half-Life, it's one of my favorite game series.)

Secondly...

A new trailer is in the works! We were accepted for this year's MOTHER Direct (4th time baby, whoo!)

The trailer has been coming along well, I hope to show more battle oriented clips that I've missed the last few years, like special moves.

Can you believe I've never actually gotten to adding those in the game? I mean, they come set-up in default RPG Maker projects but I've never gotten around to revamping them until now, year 4 of engine work. Isn't that strange?

I also hope to improve on editing in the trailers. Whenever I finish a trailer I come back a few months later to notice minor points where I was kinda sloppy.

I'm not much of a video editor, (I only learned so I could edit trailers on my own) but I'd like to keep them at a good presentable quality. You gotta have standards with that kinda stuff, it's important!

OK, TIME FOR THE ACTUAL GAME STUFF. HERE WE GO.

Abilities are now implemented! And work! Wahoo!

In HYPERSOMNIA, players are able to switch abilities between party members. I find this a really interesting mechanic for how simple it seems, you get to choose who plays what role in your party. I think this is HUGE, and opens up a lot of unique scenarios for the game's encounters. I've had this planned for years, as far back as 2021 if I can recall, so it's super cool seeing it in game.

Mapping is being worked on!

I've also been working on mapping out more areas of the game! The forest part you hopefully saw in the last trailer is almost completely mapped. I've been working on the second part to it and am hoping to finish it sometime soon.

Mapping forests really suck. THOUGH, almost all the maps for the first chapter of the game are done! That's just another step closer to the demo. (Which, FYI, will be on Steam and Itch! ^^)

I've also been working on re-spriting older scenes!

This one's been really fun to do, I've been going back and redoing older stuff from the 2022 trailer, like this train! It's weird seeing it side by side, because you can definitely see where it's come from but at the same time, it looks so different.

(Also side note, these sprites are CRUSTY! EWWW!)

Lastly, Script and Music updates!

The script for HYPERSOMNIA's first act has been completed! with just 37 pages of just cutscene dialog alone! We're also currently working on wrapping up NPC dialog! Not much else to say.

And music is being worked on!

Music has been making some progress! I like to lay out demo's for areas I'm mapping out to help make both the music and scene come together. (Also, to help break up the eerie silence when playtesting...)

Speaking of music, FIREBALL, the games main battle theme, was recently delisted on our YouTube channel.

We did this because we decided we wanted to resample FIREBALL, and found that it's best to not have the song uploaded until a complete, final version is made. At least for the demo, it could possibly change before the final game but that's a bit too far in the future for me to think about fully.

Hey! Thanks for reading the whole dev log! Unless you just skipped to the end, you should probably go back up and read it. there's a steam page now. and some cool ross art at the top. you're missing out!

I hope this was like, readable to you all. I'm new to this whole dev log thing, so if you read it all the way through, let me know! It'd be cool!

I'd like to use this portion to pretty much just advertise Unique Indie RPG's.

Have you ever seen that strange purple square at the beginning of the 2nd and 3rd HYPERSOMNIA trailers?

Yeah, that! That's UNIQUE INDIE RPG's, which is a Discord community for you guessed it, Unique Indie RPG videogames developed by people like me! Or you! Or whoever! Who cares!

I help run it with some of my friends, and we all share cool stuff about our videogames! There's a ton of other SUPER cool RPG Maker games there like Astral Guard [LINK], or SOMEWHEN [LINK], or even MOMOinc [LINK]!

And of course, HYPERSOMNIA. It's a really laid back community, we're all super chill. Come swing by! We'd love to have ya, and SHOW US YOUR GAME!

[LINK TO DISCORD SERVER]

TWITTER

YOUTUBE

STEAM

UNIQUE INDIE RPG'S [SHOW US YOUR GAME!]

[PREV] [ABOUT HYPERSOMNIA] [NEXT]

[homunculus-argument]

I'm very glad to see that your new therapist is working out well for you so far! It makes me think that I probably should find a good one myself, however I don't really know how to go about that. Not locating one, I mean getting into the issues I need to deal with, especially if I don't really know where to begin beyond "I'm emotionally and mentally fucked up and would like to not be". As someone who's seen multiple therapists, even if the others didn't really click for you, do you have any advice about that?

To be honest, not really. It's the same annoying thing as what people say about dating - you just have to keep trying with new ones until you find one that clicks. But not knowing where to begin is a starting point, and that's still progress if you can find a therapist that seems to be helping with trying to start figuring out what the problem is. My first therapist was the best match I could find at the time, with my problem of "I don't know why I'm like this", and she helped me start unwrapping what I even mean by that.

After she helped me through getting diagnosed with ADHD, and the problems caused by being undiagnosed and unmedicated were resolved, I started to feel like she can't help with the ones that remained. I once told her that being in therapy felt like that joke of a man who goes to a therapist on all fours because he thinks he's a dog, and comes out walking upright - he still thinks he's a dog, but the therapist trained him to walk on his hind legs so it doesn't show. She laughed and agreed that this is essentially what therapy is, and that's when I figured that that isn't what I need from therapy.

The second one was the best match I could find at the time - now that I had been trained out of acting insane, it was easier to start untangling what was making me act in unhinged ways in the first place. Going into what I was feeling and what kind of experiences had trained me into having that kind of responses to that kind of situations. That was useful for a while, but after a time I started to feel like she was trying to make me complacent with how I am by reassuring me that there was nothing wrong with me - she tried to validate my feelings by telling me that I'm ok, and I felt invalidated by the way she was denying that there still was something wrong with me, and denying that I'm not ok.

In three years of therapy, I had gained enough clarity about what kind of a problem we're even talking about, that once my last session with my second therapist was done, I looked up a therapist that specialises in one specific problem that I hadn't even been aware of when I started with my first therapist, and which my second therapist reassured me would fix itself on its own once I'm better. Three years of therapy had made me aware enough of my own problems to be able to find a specialist and point a huge crack on the wall, point at it and go "look at that thing. That's not supposed to be there, right?"

And have her go "oh yeah, that's bad. Yikes."

[11queensupreme11]

Everybody fucking minds and always doing it the no sexy way 😞😔

Do love no war babygirls

If we're very decided we can solve all of this in bed! The sexy way

Or play UNO and whoever wins is the top

Sincerely, after watching the dress... Totally would think they're doing some kinky shit 🤣

Beelzebub: we can hold hands if you want 🥺 totally platonic no second intentions here

Percy: *didn't hear anything, cared no shit for what's happening, wants a hot dog with meat that probably is from a rat* what did you say?

Percy watching Sally being happier without her, her friends being happy with some girl... Queen, totally trauma, I'd cry and beg my mom to hold me even if that makes us miserable

Beelzebub, your yandere tendencies are showing. Giving her traumas and comforting her after. Get a man that can do both (please don't get you a man that can do that)

(Give us moooooore I'm starving)

(Waiting for what you're going to do with that, Percy progress- maybe fall is the correct word- is showing queen. Love it)

Anyway, can someone please draw them on their date? 😭 That's so cute, they're literally so perfect together, like that couple that is the black cat boyfriend with his golden retriever girlfriend and they're precious 💞

(Beelzebub worrying about her suicidal thoughts and he admitting he doesn't want to die so much... *Cheff kiss* we love an emo boy that is self aware)

Now, Loki?

Loki, my boy, your panic is beautiful to watch, horrific to endure.

I'm wondering how they are going to deal with being in the same harem? Fight to be the favorite concubine? Seduce their way to Percy's bed?

Percy: you're just a pathetic simp pretending to be an alpha man and you just go destroy mode whenever you're confronted with your own emotions. You love me so much that is making you look pathetic

Loki:

Him switching sides in the moment he accepts he loves her is gold.

He may be crazy, sadistic and a psychopath, but by the gods he's not going to fool himself.

He loves the girl, now he needs to kill all the other people that love the same girl.

Assassination! His favorite hobby! She's so much fun and they haven't even had sex yet! Wonderful wife indeed

And starting with Beelzebub is a wise move, you know? From all of them he's the one that she's the most comfortable with, he could play the slow game he's the one she'd fall at the end (you know, once she forgets about the other world, that he could make happen too).

Right now Beelzebub is that best friend that is the one for her (the other, even if I love them, aren't so close to her). He just needs to wait, fool her and she'd be his

(as if the other are going to let that happen, but is the scent, you know?)

Loki is right to be jealous of him, no one (with a dick) is close to her like him, she's herself with him and is the only one that likes him with his depressive tendencies.

He could say: Percy, for medical reasons, undress yourself and let me study your body. It may end in sexy medical porn, depending on my self control

And she wouldn't see no wrong.

Is Beelzebub! Her bestie! She can trust him with her security (poor navy girl, you can't never trust a man that much). Even if he has feelings for her she wouldn't worry about him doing anything to her, just worry about the uncomfortable situation.

Wondering if they're going to guilty trappe her to stay (You made us love you! We are learning to be open and to accept love and you want to leave us? Leave us in a world where we're fated to yearn for you for eternity and be alone again?), Percy would suffer whatever if she thinks she's saving people, such a naive and dumb girl, too good to this world.

This whole situation is pure chaos, they're planning so many things just to crash with each other. Would be funny to see them working together but also don't know how that situation would happen.

Anyway, thanks for the amazing chapter Queen! 👑

im sorry but this part cracked me up 😭

"for medical reasons we may need to fuck 😔"

"yeah sure ok"

😭😭😭

IM SO GLAD YOU ENJOYED THIS CHAPTER!!

i had a blast writing this chapter lmao, and im currently writing another chapter (not the next one) that's gonna be even better

maybe... idk. all i can say is that beel digs an even deeper grave in this one chapter and i just love watching him lose his shit

[raptorladylover6969]

ok so here's my oc's lore

so pretty much she originally was stuck on the island with the other six but wasn't part of Camp Cretatous (knows Kenji's dad and decided to take a self-guided tour) and after the events of Camp Cretatous biosyn reached out to a couple of the campers they refused (manta Corp flashbacks from Sammy and Ben was too busy with bumpy and idk why Darius said no but imma figure it out) so pretty much biosyn wanted a perspective on how dinosaurs interact in untouched nature for their "conservation project" and she obliged.

Every week was something new and exciting from seeing the resurrection process to feeding the smaller dinosaurs, distracting her from the scheming in the background. Eventually when they no longer needed her help she asked for one thing as a parting gift, an unfertilized utahraptor egg for her to do her own little studying. They saw no harm and let her have the egg (wu was not informed because it seemed fine at the time) and ahe was sent off on her merry way.

As she's leaving the facility she bumps into a familiar face, Dr. Ian Malcolm who had just been hired as their in-house philosopher, she gets his autograph and a picture and leaves, but something itches at the back of her brain about this place and she can't put her finger on it, but for now, it doesn't matter.

So the MC is pretty smart and has read pretty much every one of Malcolm and Grant's books and knows that in the right conditions that egg could hatch. (I'm not sure how that works so we're just gonna roll with it till I find a paper on it)

She raises the raptor and nurtures friendly traits in it. Using Owen grady's tactic with the clicker to communicate with it.

She learns about Brooklyn's death and finds the circumstances suspicious looking a bit too much into it she ends up where Mr. Kon is serving time, and instead of intervening in their conversation, she lingers back, watching. After a while, she witnesses the dinosaur attack and comes to the conclusion the atrociraptors think of her as their alpha so they listen.

She decides to follow raptor lady around, trying to not be seen, but is eventually confronted and after that I genuinely don't know how the fuck she gets out of that with bother and her dino alive 👍🏼

(I also have plans for her to put together some stuff about biosyn and the dpw and practically be on the run from everyone)

Also yes she is being targeted as she was on the island like the rest of the kids but she wasn't home when they got there and wasn't answering her phone so they just worriedly hoped she was OK while they went to go get Kenji

Its a work in progress and I still need to wrote out some kinks

Ooooooh I like this I like this a lot. Eating it up om nom nom nom

[icedmetaltea]

Just lettin ya'll know I'm ok

(random irl stuff to journal below, keep scrollin)

Wanted to wait to come back till

1. I wasn't dealing with mega gender dysphoria, my masc/neutral days are few and far between but by god it's been nonstop masc/neutral days lately and been a lot of just hating my body (and myself in general)

2. got the ebt stuff figured out, which I haven't yet, my doc put in a ref for a different place to sign a thing, waited 2 weeks for them to call, only to find out it was the wrong place and now I have to wait for the next place to call... which like yea I'm worrying about food but talking about it in therapy has helped somewhat. She reassured me even if that doesn't work we WILL find some place that'll sign the form I need to be eligible again

3. I wasn't dealing with as bad of depression/anxiety which like... idk. I've definitely been doing better anxiety-wise but idk if that's bc it hasn't been as hot lately or I've been feeding myself better. I know I must've been eating under 1200s calories the past few weeks bc the scale finally stopped going down and I know for a fact my anxiety gets bad when I'm hungry so I think for about a month I was unintentionally starving myself, SO making myself eat at least 2 nutritious meals a day now

At the same time I think perhaps my pmdd symptoms are... reversing time schedules??? Usually my anxiety/depression gets way worse before period but now it seems like it's fine before and terrible during/after????? Makes zero sense but who knows. Also it's a couple days late now so health anxiety is going off the shits about PCOS or something again UGH

Making SOME progress with therapy, am able to be outside for 5 mins without feeling that horrific sense of dread so that's something.

I've also been coming to the realization that I may have some form of DID?? Not the type where you lose time/blackout/completely have entirely different memories and starkly different personality switches but I've definitely been noticing now that I've been putting more attention to it how I go into different "modes" and sets of interests throughout the weeks and I mean... it's not secret I have imaginary friends I talk to on the daily. I've had an issue figuring out where "they" end and "myself" begins since childhood. Plus I already deal with derealization/dissociation/occasional age regression so it's not out of the realm of possibility. May bring it up next therapy apt. Kinda worried to bc I never want to get rid of them and I'm worried that would be one of the goals, like... just no. I can't think of anything more lonely.

But yea just random stuff I needed to get outta my system, sorry about all the suicidal stuff, it's just really hard. The future seems so bleak. And if one thing sets me back, like doctor stuff, food issues, etc my brain is like "DEATH WOULD BE EASIER LOL" BUT there's a chance trump/a republican candidate won't win, a chance climate change will be reversed/humanity will adapt somehow, a chance I'll be accepted for disability and live a halfway decent life, and if not... well, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. But for now there's food in the fridge, for now mom and dad are alive, for now we're ok.

[cyphyra]

So I think enough time has passed since release to say firmly that Tears of the Kingdom was an unfortunately just-good game. [TotK spoiler post, obvs]

Like, if we're talking about anything BUT the story, it's a 10/10 all around, the music's great, the environments are breathtaking, the combat and weapon fusing system feels familiar yet offers great changes. But a game isn't judged by excluding it's story, which in my eyes, feels like it's just OK if you do it in the intended order.

That's the main issue with the game as a whole; its open world actively hurts its largely linear storytelling. You NEED to do geoglyphs in order to get the memories and have them make sense from one to another, but the game barely ushers you to do the geoglyphs, and the intended order is in the forgotten temple, a place Impa hints at you to go but never tells you explicitly to. Depending on how you travel, you might just skip seeing Impa altogether and stumble into a random glyph on your own.

Memories worked in Breath of the Wild because they were largely disconnected. You already know what happened shortly after you start the game, the memories just provide context and characterization. They're entirely optional, whereas in TotK they're pretty much required to know what's going on. On top of this, if you do even like, half of the TotK memories the player should know for a fact that the present-day Zelda is a fake, yet Link can't tell anyone about this ahead of time, because that would probably then screw up the castle confrontation, and it all feels kind of jank in that regard. If they were going to make a story with intended progression they should've either made that progression feel real in the game or just made a linear game like the series staple.

tl;dr: the story of TotK suffers from being intended to be completed a certain way, which in a game that promotes doing things in whatever way you want really defeats the purpose of doing things the way you want.

[sagescented]

Husband had a dental appointment today to finish the other half of his deep clean. I had to step out halfway through to take my telehealth appointment with my GP since we had overlap between our appointments today.

My GP's really excited about my progress since she put me on the new diet. She's going to re-refer me to Cardiopulmonary Therapy, though, despite my cardiopulmonary workups coming back fine, that way I have medical supervision for my reconditioning, since it's been so long. But other than that, she's comfortable waiting until my usual / regular yearly labs are due in April, to see me back again. Which is great news!

Other than that, everything went well. Hubby has to go back in 6 weeks (ish) to make sure his cleaning took and everything's healing ok. And then I think I'm going to need to make an appointment for Whisper at the vet soon.

She's been acting strange since yesterday evening. Not lethargic, but more like she knows she did something wrong and is just ... Waiting to be punished for it or something? Doesn't want to come out of her kennel and has to be pulled out of it by force, is keeping her head down the whole time she's out, won't wag her tail and is keeping it tucked, didn't greet or play with my Husband yesterday when he came home from work like usual- and she only ate half her food last night (she is drinking like normal, though, so that's good). She's never like this, but we have no idea what's up.

As far as we know, there's nothing she could've gotten into. So I'm going to keep an eye on her for a couple days and see if she's just In A Mood™ because I took the bedding in her Kennel away yesterday (it's dirty and needs to be cleaned, and we'd had plans to give her a bath at the same time) ... Or if it's a more serious long term issue she needs a Vet appointment for.

Fingers crossed it's the former and not the latter- and if that's the case, it certainly wouldn't be the first time I've had to deal with someone being in A Mood because of some small change like that; I love my Pittie mixes to death and back- always will. But sometimes they can be so dramatic about things, ha.

ETA: @resolvedbrunette brought up a really good point about my Brother in Law potentially having done something to her. And I was going to say no at first, but then I remembered one of the last times he was down to visit and we had issues with Whisper not feeling well after he left.

We don't know if my Brother in Law dumped his Dog's food out in the yard before he left, or what. But we had this issue at one point where the day he left, Whisper suddenly started vomiting mountains of food out of nowhere. And we hadn't fed her yet that day (we evening feed all our animals, and this was during the day that it happened). It lasted about 3 hours, and then she was fine after that.

When we pulled the towel we gave her as temporary bedding (because she hates sleeping on the bare plastic bottom of her Kennel) out today, we found vomit in the bottom of the box. Not much, but enough that it seemed she threw up at some point while we were gone at the Dentist. I didn't think anything of it at the time. But now that Res has mentioned it ... I wonder if my BIL isn't feeding his Dog outside while he's here. And now I'm wondering if Whisper didn't potentially get into Buster's food while she was outside with him, unattended, yesterday while I was making the Peanut Butter Protein Balls for my Husband.

She used to have a habit of- even when she had food in her bowl- going and polishing off the food in the Cats' bowls the second we looked away. We had to start feeding them on top of the bookshelves as a result. And she still gets into the litter boxes and eats their poop, no matter what we do ... So I really wouldn't be surprised if, if my Brother in Law is feeding his Dog outside, she'd get into his food as well. And that's the only time we've left them together unattended since he moved back in with us. Now low and behold, we're having problems with her again?

If so, I'm going to be so mad about it. Because that man can never think anything through, or be considerate about anything or anyone and I hate it.

[nozunhinged]

my love sea rollercoaster

Okay so I was at the forefront of the love sea haters (don't ask me about mame I don't know anything about that discoure you can read why I didn't like it here if you want) but as weak as I am I kept watching and ep 2 still didn't do it for me but ep 3 turned the boat around so fast that I feel absolutely sea sick (literally!!) right now -- and because the discourse and perspectives on tumblr made me try to keep watching unbiased, I'd like to share my five cents as to why the story suddenly works for me after I've spent the first two eps rolling my eyes so hard I got a migraine.

I think it comes down to three major moments, with their conflict as the turning point

When rak started spitting the most degrading speech going at mut for dragging him out of the house, literally blowing so fucking low the blowjob mut was wishing for in the end was sky high terrain, I went "ok that's it, I'm turning this off" -- rak said word for word "no means no" but mut still kept pulling him I was close to angry tears what a fucked up situation that is, I thought.

But just as mut made rak snap out of it with his unimpressed reaction, so did I.

It was like the first half of the episode flashed right in front of me within the second rak was speechless. He was so on edge from the many calls he had in the first part and before that the diving incident -- he was streched out so thin that of course he would fall back to his default mode which is insulting anyone who dares to get within a 10ft radius of him. And then a guy who even dares to break down his pretentious walls? Better double down! (I'm still mad about raks tirade though, I would've dumped him in the sea right then and there)

But here's the thing, mut isn't fazed at all. Like, at all at all. And that's exactly what rak needs in this moment. Someone to vent his anger at so he can collect himself. We know now that mut had it a million times worse than this and his reaction isn't just because he has the hots for rak, it's literally his character. They both would react the exact same way if it was any other person. The difference? They develop an emotional bond over it and that's how they move forward. CHEFS KISS!

You might think but noz, of course its his character, thats the whole point? Yeah but not to me.

In the last two episodes, it felt like everything that happened between them was excruciatingly forced by the narrative (see my yaoi-post why I despise that) -- that everything between them is only brought out because they met. I know that thai bl (no, lets say the romance genre in general) has a big issue writing and introducing characters in a manner that makes their romance believable, but most of the time I can overlook that because we're not here for deep literary masterpieces, we're here for the smooches and the fumbles. I get it.

But when it feels so forced like it did the last two eps to me, even I just check out. So I already shelved that series in my mind and it's the first time I get so damn humbled that I have to write down a million paragraphs to defend myself lol. I think my longing for watching a believable lovestory reached so deep that it contributed to my current brainrot.

Don't get me wrong -- I attest this shift 100% to fortpeats insanely stellar acting. They make the characters believable and they make me understand why rakmut are prefect for each other although I HATE their dynamic. But that's the beauty of a good story my friends, I get now why their pulling and pushing works for them and I'll gladly watch them do that! Because until now, no aspect of the show managed to do that, neither the narrative progression, nor the editing, writing or pacing. Nothing. It was all just a jumbled, annoying mess.

So what's different now? The story lets fortpeat finally shine! (Accidentally maybe?)

Someone already said that the scenes are stale and slow (cant find the post anymore sorry) due to the fact that nothing is happening other than the two of them talking in the same position behind a different background and I 100000% agree. And the only way this poor choice is saved by is fortpeat. I was hanging on their lips for every single word. Their dynamic was suddenly so clear and palpable to me, I struggled to breathe properly. Rakmut are fucking made for each other and I'm losing my shit over it.

I can't believe they managed to make ALL the flaws of this show just POOF -- go away??? And it just keeps going like that. I could write 10 more pages about the little details of their dialogues that cemented my impression but I'll try wrap this up first.

The two other pivotal moments (to me) were muts reaction to rak telling him about his name. Yes, you read that right. Now that I finally understood how these two are ticking, I absolutely 100% understand where mut was going with this objectively BONKERS suggestion. Rak drops this bombshell of a trauma on him and he offers to do exactly that too??? Well, in muts head this is the only way to make rak understand that the outcome can be different. So of course, this idea would only work on him. Made for each other, I'm telling you. Two pieces of a fucked up puzzle.

Now, that scene.

First, doubling down on how much worse mut had it. (I'm not talking about his house thats a topic for another post) I think this one little story was enough to land the punch, the talk last ep was too long and clunky. I wouldve loved to have a scene where the guy who was fired tells the story to someone and rak overhears it, not understanding a thing and then putting the pieces together when mut starts talking I-- oh I think i wouldnt have survived that, I cried then and there already.

Well yeah I was in tears when they started fucking that was awkward but again raks reaction just made sense. They don't know each other that well and rak only knows one way how to make mut feel good which is riding him to the moon and back. And as a little cherry on top he completely let loose without any restraints.

There's already this amazing post by @hanhonymous which explains perfectly why the pillow talk after works so well as it does, so I'm not gonna say anything more. Just know that I was full on bawling at this point. When rak said "try it" it lost it. How he encourages his island boy who said "someone like me" a million times in the last ten minutes was perfect. Beautiful. Absolutely wonderful. Even his false lead felt perfect for this moment because only this way mut would understand that rak is absolutely serious.

I don't know how the bangkok arc will play out, my hopes are not very high but I will forever have this lovely little episode. And their lovely little pillow talk. And when they confess and love each other for real I will once again cry like a loser because fortpeat are amazing. Please someone get them a high quality production they deserve it so much.