#but why is it always them... they are so lovely and so well-written i just can't believe they get so much hate??

[wellofdean]

got these tags today from prev: #i think it's beautiful bc it didn't set out to be queer#life uh finds a way#it's not the best television ever#like not legit among the greats#but it had some incredible moments

And like... I have made a LOT of posts, at great length saying why I think Dean was always imagined as a queer character, and where the queerness was baked into the DNA of the show from episode one, and which I will not reprise here, but as much as I disagree that the queer glory of Supernatural is something it tripped and fell into by accident somehow, and without everyone involved knowing that queerness was part of what they were making, I do agree with something here: it's beautiful because it was a fucking journey.

Supernatural was not like today's prestige television with a tight 8-10 episodes and a fully planned narrative from day one, it was old-timey TV that arose out of things like Twin Peaks and The X-Files, falling somewhere between a weekly procedural and a serial. It had broad plot arcs sketched out, but the day-to-day grind of writing and making it was driven by characters that took on depth and meaning as it went along; network television long seasons with lots of filler that did nothing to further the serial plot, but let us get to know the characters, who became more and more lovable and real the more time we spent with them, in an organic way.

Maybe my Gen-X is showing here, but there's something beautiful about something that feels open-ended, isn't there? I mean, Supernatural STILL feels open-ended. Like, any moment now patient zero Jensen is going to suit up and tell us more of Dean's story, and we won't know where it's going and it will be fucking GREAT just to spend any time whatsoever with Dean? Television nowadays feels so PLANNED and yeah, there's some great stuff out there, but Supernatural had something special and fucking great that doesn't really exist anymore.

Like, what does it mean "one of the best" or "legit among the greats"? Supernatural was 15 years of storytelling, and for all the fucking kvetching on this, the Supernatural website, about its vagaries, it was pretty consistently well written. Jensen Ackles is a legit great actor who is seriously underrated for his sheer fucking craft, and as much as it is undeniable that Supernatural has some genuinely silly episodes, taken as a whole, when all of it is in your mind, the themes and threads in it are unironically epic in scope, and it has legitimately interesting things to say about those themes. AND it has incredible moments. AND the most devastaingly romantic love story I can think of.

Like, fellas, it's one of the best TO ME. It's legit among MY greats, and I would argue it deserves a place up there.

I got this one hobby horse, and god knows I'm gonna saddle up and ride it: Supernatural was a legitimately good show and it was queer as hell in its very bones.

[staybabblingbaby]

Soulmate Garden AU Ch.4 (Lewisia) a3d2

[Caution: These are not full fics, or even full parts of fics for some, these are part of my writing progress archive!]

Concept: Growing up, you knew Soulmates weren't all that they cracked up to be. So when, on your 18th birthday, your skin is painted with a garden of flower buds, you resolve to hide it from everyone. Who had ever heard of someone with 8 soulmates, anyway?

Or; Reader has 8 soulmates and no issue avoiding all of them. It's up to SKZ to show her that while every soulbond might not be made of fairy tales, theirs certainly could be.

Word Count: 10,680

Notes: Holy shit, it's been like 3 months?????? In my defense, holidays are awful, and this is a fuckin' beast of a chapter. Binnie would NAWT shut up T^T She almost matches the word count for the entire fic so far TT^TT Plus 10 images of texting. Y am i like this??? Huge shout outs to my lovely, patient, amazing betas who made this chapter at ALL possible, @lazyfacecowboy and @brbwritingfanfic. Seriously, this would not have been written without y'all, everyone say thank you! Also special mention for @chancloud8 for negotiating me through the last bit of the chapter LMAO. She kept feeding me fics, they were my reward for doing the writing UvU

Hope y'all enjoy! And I hope it was worth the wait <3

(p.s my ass did NOT do a real final readthrough. If the formatting is weird pls forgive me, I'm sick of looking @ her T^T)

Dividers by @saradika

Warnings: Allusions to past domestic violence, flashback of verbal abuse (very vague, but still there), panic attack, she/her reader

Leave me comments or questions or anything! Love hearing from folks <3

Masterlist <3 | Prev Part | Next Part (Coming Soon <3)

The next morning marks a return to routine.

You roll out of bed half awake, sleep-mused and ready for murder. Your mood isn’t improved by the way you’d gone to bed - still in your work clothes with day-after mascara gluing your eyelids together.

A quick stop by the restroom to strip and scrub your face is a necessity, otherwise you’re liable to just crawl back into bed and rot there. You honestly wish you could. Just rot away and let all this soulmate business pass you by as you slowly return to the earth.

Alas, capitalism waits for no man.

You examine your reflection when you’ve finished, doing your best to ignore the remaining traces of grey streaks down your cheeks where your eyeliner hadn’t been as waterproof as advertised.

You try to hold onto the flash of irritation the sight brings you, to cling to the normalcy of being irritated that your makeup is waterproof enough to be a pain to remove, but not to stay through your tears. Then you remember what you’d been crying over and the pit of fear and shame that’s been your companion the last few days comes rolling back.

You don’t even know why you’d cried. Don’t feel like you deserved to cry. After all, it’s not like you were the one rejected by your soulmate for no reason.

You do your best to shake off the incoming spiral, ambling your way into the kitchen. You just need to fall back on your routines and feel normal for a bit. You’re not entirely convinced that ignoring your problems won’t make them go away, despite the dark feelings trembling in your chest.

You press your lips together to stop the bottom one from trembling and open the fridge. There’s a plate of eggs, fruit, and toast inside.

Taylor, freak of nature that he is, has been up for hours already, you know. He’d probably been up and out the door before the sun had even thought about rising. Weirdo.

Your roommate is well aware of how non-functional you can be in the morning, so it’s not unusual of him to leave you leftovers when he makes breakfast. Especially when he knows you’re not feeling your best. The little note on top isn’t new either: usually a reminder, grocery list, or a little encouragement for your day. The whole thing makes you smile, usually, and you’re always touched by his consideration.

Today that little note makes your eyes prick with a new wave of tears.

‘Give yourself a chance. Bet’s still on <3’

The $20 you’d slapped onto the counter last night is taped to the back. It feels a bit like a stone hand is crushing your heart under the weight of something unknowable and precious when you carefully tuck both the money and the note into your wallet.

You very deliberately do NOT cry, though it’s a near thing. You’d done enough crying last night. But if you sniffle a bit into cold eggs, well...

That’s for you to know, isn’t it?

It’s a Tuesday, so after breakfast you drag yourself back to your room to throw on your largest, rattiest, t-shirt and a pair of leggings to head to the gym. You’ll drag yourself through your routine with leaded limbs if you have to, you’re going to have the most regular day you can manage and everything will be fine. It has to be.

You can’t help it when eyes catch on the newly-bloomed marks on your skin as you strip away your sleepwear. The sight makes you uneasy, almost uncomfortable. It takes you a moment to realize why looking at your mark, a daily ritual you’ve kept for years, feels so foreign to you today.

It’s almost alarming to acknowledge that you haven’t actually looked at your mark since you’d met your first soulmate. The concert feels like a lifetime ago, now, despite having been barely two days ago. You’re a bit ashamed to admit that you’d been avoiding looking at it since you’d felt the first flowers bloom.

It’s no wonder looking at it feels weird, you muse as you study it now. It might as well be a whole new mark, for all the changes that have happened since you last saw it.

You decide, in the name of returning to your routine for good, that you can’t skip even this tiny part of your daily rituals.

You shuffle over to your closet, swinging open the door to reveal the full-length mirror hanging on the other side. You don’t bother with your usual rounds of self-depreciation or daily affirmations. Instead, you find your eyes glued to droopy purple petals and blankets of white stars across your abdomen.

Something wilted and small within you mourns the loss of the buds that had brought you so much comfort since they’d appeared. The new blooms are beautiful, of course, vibrant and radiant and full of so much meaning. Still, the change wounds you.

Only time will tell if it’s the healing sort of hurt.

You find your eyes glued to the fresh flowers. Their names come to mind with ease as you trace gentle fingers over echoes of delicate petals. ‘Bellflowers’ You recite to yourself, drawing your finger up thin stalks and back down dipped heads, ‘for gratitude, affection, and endurance’. Your fingers dance a bit lower. ‘Edelweiss’ you muse, lightly tapping each fuzzy white star, ‘for devotion, nobility, and courage’.

The knowledge comes easily to you, not from any cosmic force, but because of course it does. Your sister hadn’t been wrong when she’d said that asking a person’s favorite flower had been basically an obsession of yours.

The habit had started well before you’d gotten your mark. Before you’d even properly known what soulmates were, really.

It started with lazy summer days you’d been almost too young to remember. A slim hand engulfing your tiny wrist, being made to sit next to your mother while she did something in the dirt, her shadow your only shelter from the blistering sun.

Gardening with your mother had started as a way for her to drag you out of the house to get some sun while keeping an easy eye on you. Before your sister was born you’d spent many hazy afternoons learning to work the soil beside your mother.

After the advent of your favorite gremlin, you’d spent those afternoons tending to the family garden alone.

You remember being grateful to the newborn back then. Those solitary afternoons were some of the most peaceful in your memory.

At some point the ‘family garden’ had become more ‘your garden’. Your mother wouldn’t even bother to plan it out with you by the time your sister had reached her toddler years. She’d drive you to the store, hand you a bit of cash, and leave it all in your tiny capable hands.

You’d spent hours researching the best ways to nurture your plants.

What flowers liked being planted together, which ones should be separated. You learned about soil types and the nutrients found in them. You learned about ph values, how to measure them, and why they mattered. Anything to have your garden thriving more brightly, more beautifully, for longer.

If you weren’t in the garden, you were in the library by your house, nose buried in a gardening book.

You vividly remember the day it all went wrong.

It hadn’t even been that dramatic, as you recall. At least, not in terms of your parent’s usual fights. It was heartbreak—despair— that had marked the day, instead of fear.

You’d been digging up weeds, clawing up deep roots with your gloved hands and a trowel, when your father had come storming outside.

You don’t remember what he’d said. It’d been nonsense, just vitriol for vitriols' sake. Something about you always taking your mother’s side because of your shared hobby, you think.

Never mind that the woman hadn’t put so much as a toenail to the dirt since your sister had been born.

He hadn’t let up for quite a while, if memory serves. Stood there yelling at you in your safe space for close to an hour. Maybe two, but your child-brain couldn’t be trusted with the time.

It may have just been minutes, now that you think about it.

Nonetheless, he’d yelled, and yelled, and yelled. He hadn’t trampled on or broken anything. He hadn’t even made sense.

And yet, when he’d finally left, everything was different.

The blooms you’d worked so hard to nurture were no longer beautiful, the soil you’d once called home no longer safe.

You hadn’t tended another garden after that season. You’d seen your plants to winter, and you’d let go. You’d turned away from the sun and soil and leaned into your books and silly questions to fill the hole left behind.

You’re sure you’d left claw marks in the dirt.

Something like a gentle humming emanates from your soulmark, and its warmth draws you back to the present. You look down at it, noticing how tightly you're clutching at the garden around your waist, your arms wrapped around you in a weak semblance of a hug. Each of your fingers had managed to directly touch a flower.

The awkward sprawl of your fingers feels natural, as if you’d never sought to comfort yourself any other way. As if seeking out your bond, your link to total strangers, for comfort was all you’d ever done.

It was natural, you muse. It was human nature to seek resonance in their bonded. It was the universe’s way of assuring you that you’re loved. Your soulmate’s way of assuring you that they’re still there.

You gingerly pry your hands away and blankly study the crescent moons you’ve left behind, soft skin indented where petals should have ripped.

You wonder if you’ll leave claw marks in this garden too. If they’ll leave claw marks in you.

You tear your eyes away from the mirror, ignoring the warm, gentle tingling up your side where your fingers had dug in. You know it means the people on the other end are pressing against their own marks. You know it shows their care, how that gentle sensation masks the stinging ache your fingers should have left behind.

For some reason, you miss the pain.

You quickly toss on a camisole, forgoing your usual privacy wraps, and your t-shirt over that.

There was nothing for emptying your mind quite like running yourself into the ground at the gym. With full awareness that you’re going to regret your gym session later, you flee your apartment, your mind pleading normal, normal, normal.

Maybe jogging all the way to the gym wasn’t such a great idea. It’d sounded fantastic at the time, a head start on your cardio and a way to remove yourself from your negative headspace before you tried to toss around weights you barely knew how to use.

It had sort of worked, but now you hadn’t even entered the building and you were already a sweaty, panting, mess.

You enter the building after guzzling down half of your water bottle, resignation in your heart. Cardio wasn’t even your focus today.

The automatic doors slide open with their usual swish and you’re greeted by the familiar stale smell all gyms seem to share, no matter how clean. It’s comforting, even if you do kind of wanna go home already.

There’s someone already at the receptionist’s desk when you approach, talking in slow and measured English. You try not to be annoyed with the tiny delay, but while you’d successfully outrun your demons (for now), your bad mood had stuck around.

Alas, you’ve ventured into the public and found the public there. A travesty. Knowing that you just have to deal with it, you cross your arms and bite back the irritation this complete stranger hadn’t done anything to earn.

Luckily enough, the low and measured cadence of the stranger’s voice is soothing enough to zone out to. Unfortunately, he’s also the only thing around to rest your eyes on, so you find yourself studying his form.

His back is broad and built, huge biceps on display in a tight fitting black t-shirt. You kinda wanna squish them. A vivid tattoo sleeve runs all the way down to his wrist, and you find your stare glued to it.

Large, boldly colored flowers take up the majority of the space, vague outlines of crashing waves and rolling mists filling in the rest with a luxurious combination of oriental art styles.

Beautiful as it is, you can’t help but think it doesn’t look finished.

Dragging your eyes away from such gorgeous ink is quite the task, but you don’t want your admiration to be mistaken for judgement. It gets easier when you start to notice just how fine the man himself is.

You really can’t help the way your eyes trace up and down his body, now that you’re no longer anchored to his tattoo. It should be impossible, you think, to somehow bulk up in only the right places, but by Jove this man has done it. You’re jealous, honestly.

Your eyes come to a rest on the stranger’s backside. Quite jealous, indeed.

You try to shake yourself from your admiration, reminding yourself that there were very many well-muscled men in this place and that you’d always endeavored to keep a polite line-of-sight, even when they didn't. It hadn’t even been a hard ask, until now.

You drag your gaze back up to the back of his head.

You’d be polite if it killed you. Even if neither the stranger or the scrawny receptionist had noticed your wandering gaze. Especially then.

While you were.... distracted... the man’s conversation with the receptionist seemed to have gone a whole lot of nowhere. From what you can gather, he’s looking for a short-term membership, and the receptionist is trying to tell him they don’t do that.

You know that’s true, the receptionist isn’t trying to scam the guy. Even the trial period for this place was an entire month. You’d specifically chosen this gym for that reason. If you hadn’t been able to stick it out for a month, you know you’d have never used the place enough to justify a membership.

You send your sympathies to this stranger, it seems he really just needs a little less than a week. You know there are some no-commitment type places not too far though, so you wonder why he’s stuck on this place.

Their back and forth goes a while longer, but it’s evident that the beautifully-built stranger can’t really argue his case properly. Whether because of the obvious language barrier he’s working with, or because he’s run out of arguments, you can’t be sure.

Eventually he steps to the side to make a call, and you’re able to approach the counter.

The receptionist (His name is Jake, you remind yourself by reading his name-tag. The owner’s nephew, if you recall) looks relieved to see you after whatever hassling the stranger had given him.

He lazily waves the clipboard and its sign-in sheet at you in greeting. You take the clipboard, trading him your membership card and driver’s license for it, and turn to prop your knee up on the counter to balance it while you write.

Incidentally, your choice of position keeps the stranger in your line of sight.

It also happens to give Jake a view of his own, but you magnanimously ignore his gaze wandering to your chest. If only because you’re still looking not-so-respectfully at the tattooed stranger a few feet away.

You weren’t close to the receptionist by any means, but Jake is easy to chat to, when you take the extra minute to do so. The type of acquaintance you’d never remember the name of if it weren’t pinned to his lapel, but you've seen pictures of every dog he’s ever had.

It makes it easy to pry him for gossip.

“So what was that all about?” You query as you hand back the clipboard. He shrugs at you, typing a second longer.

“Some big-shot who needs a security detail,” He answers, unimpressed, “Says this is the only gym in, like, five miles of his hotel that he doesn’t need an entourage to go to.”

You hum your understanding, now trying to place if the handsome stranger was someone you knew of.

Situations like that weren’t uncommon for this gym. Celebrities that actually lived in LA weren’t spotted here very often but, since it was settled very close to quite a few high-security luxury hotels, the building saw its fair share of famous faces.

Due to its occasionally high-profile clientele, security was kept quite tightly, and a certain code of conduct was expected amongst the gym’s members. It was another justification for the long trial period, wherein one could only access the front room with the basic weights and machines. All the fancy stuff (including a pool, rock wall, dance studio, and all sorts) was in the back.

Non-members weren’t allowed past reception at all.

It was also another reason you yourself were a patron here. The high security and strict standards made for a quiet and comfortable atmosphere.

At least, as long as you ignored the judgmental looks. Most people who utilized this space were much more fit and put together than you. You tried not to let it bother you.

“What’s the issue, then?” You question Jake, “Doesn’t the owner make exceptions for celebrities?” You phrase it as a question, but you know he does. The unfamiliar faces that pop up for a few days every now and then wouldn’t show up otherwise.

Jake just sighs like he’s had this conversation a thousand times. Considering the celebrity(?) waving his hands around as he spoke rapidly into his phone not far away, maybe he had.

“He does, but he’s out of town and no one else can adjust the contracts.” He eventually explains. He finally hands you your stuff back, and you hum consideringly as you put the cards back in your wallet.

Another glance at the furrowed brows on the stranger’s masked face has pity welling up your throat.

You turn your gaze to focus on Jake.

“Do I still have that visitor pass?” You ask him, knowing that he still has your details up. Jake glances at you with a raised eyebrow, but obligingly checks the computer.

“Yup,” He confirms, “You’ve been paying for it since you dragged your poor roommate in here that one time. Why?”

“Can he use it?” you nod your head to the frustrated stranger. From where you’re sat, still perched on the edge of the desk, it looks oddly like he’s begging whoever’s on the other line.

Your visitor pass wasn’t all-access, of course. It’d just get the poor guy into the main front room plus the locker rooms and showers, but you figured it’d be better than nothing. It wasn’t like Taylor would step foot in here after you’d run him ragged last time, not even for the moral support.

Jake levels you with his most deadpan stare. It’s quite a good one, completely unimpressed. You think it must be something about customer service that allows him to make that face. Or maybe it’s just you.

“You realize that your visitor pass is you vouching for your visitor’s character, right?” He reminds you, “If he does anything, breaks anything, pisses off the wrong lifeguard- it’ll be on your head.”

You just shrug. It’s not like you couldn’t find a new gym if you had to. You’d miss this one, with its quiet atmosphere and abundant amenities, but you didn’t require its security and discretion like some of the other members did.

“I’ve got a good feeling about it.” Is all you tell Jake. It’s not even a lie.

The poor boy just rolls his eyes at you. He still turns to rifle through the desk for the right form for you to fill out though, so you’ll take it.

“You a fan of his or something?” Jake asks, handing you a different clipboard. “There are easier ways to bag a celebrity.”

“Nope!” You answer cheerfully, fully ignoring the suggestion of your motives as you start to fill out the form, “No idea who he is.”

Jakes huffs an incredulous laugh, and turns a considering gaze on your new friend. And the stranger does have to be a friend now, because ‘some guy’ is not an option on your paperwork.

“I bet he’s a wrestler,” he finally says after a long moment, “Or a sportswear model.”

You gently bop him on the head with your clipboard, “I refuse to participate in your speculation.” You admonish, ignoring his whining.

“I’ll show you his picture when you leave,” He smirks back, “and whatever google says about him.” He shrugs when you send him a cutting glare, “What? It’s public information.”

“Respect your customer’s privacy, you weirdo.” You scold. He just laughs as you hand him the form, all filled out and just waiting for the stranger’s signature. You know full well that Jake will go through with his research, regardless of what you say, so you give up easily.

It’s not like he’ll be fired for doing it, as long as you don’t go blabbing about the poor celebrity outside of the gym. Privileges of nepotism.

You exchange farewells as you hop off the counter, and he begins to wave over Mr. Celebrity. You meet the eyes of your on-paper friend and offer him a quick nod before you scuttle off deeper into the building.

Hopefully he’d be too grateful for your offer to find you terribly strange.

You manage to make it all the way through your warm-ups before your good deed gets punished. You suppose you’ll be grateful to the universe for letting you find your zen on your yoga mat before it dropped the other shoe.

You notice the legs in the mirror before you realize someone is trying to speak to you. You accidentally ignore the newcomer for several long moments, assuming they were approaching to use a different part of the mirror. When you finally realize they’re waiting for you to acknowledge them, it’s been just shy of too long.

You ease out of your last stretch and stand up, automatically taking an earbud out as you turn to face them.

“Sorry, did you need me to move?” You question as you finally look up. You‘d had your most emo playlist blasting in your ears during your warm up, an attempt to process your feelings through movement or whatever that one instructor from forever ago had tried to teach you.

So of course it’s with perfect clarity that A. Jay Popoff sings “I am my own worst enemy” into the empty space between you and Seo motherfuckin’ Changbin.

Your mental plea for a normal, routine sort of day dies a horrible death when you make eye contact with the pop-star.

And you realize you really must be your worst enemy as you do, because you easily recognize the outfit he’s wearing and the vivid tattoos on his arm.

Of course your good deed for the day led you to one of your soulmates. Of. Fucking. Course.

You’re not sure what you’d done to Karma recently for her to be throwing all of this shit at you right now, but you’d appreciate it if she’d just let you apologize instead of whatever cruel punishment this is.

Changbin must realize you recognize him, because he shyly raises a hand to fiddle with his earrings as he replies.

“Ah, no, I uh...” The hand slides to the back of his neck and he clears his throat uncomfortably. You quickly school your expression back into a semblance of normality when he glances away. You feel like you might still be a bit wild around the eyes, though.

“I just wanted to say thank you.” He concludes. He looks like he wants to say more, but you figure he might not have the English words to do so easily. It’s okay, you don’t really have the Korean to describe how you’re feeling right now either.

Your first instinct is to offer to speak Korean for him, but the air between the two of you is already wildly uncomfortable. Vastly different causes for both of you, you’re sure, but it’s enough to make you second guess your every move.

“Oh, uh, no problem.” You assure.

You stare resolutely at his nose when you speak. If you look into his eyes again you’re sure you’ll spill your entire life story. And if not that extreme, you’ll at least spill the whole soulmate thing. Something about being directly confronted with your problems makes you chatty.

But also if you look away from his face, knowing that body is supposed to be compatible with yours... It leads to some very impolite thoughts. Cute as it is, his nose is the safest thing for you to look at right now.

You offer the idol a thin-lipped smile when you realize the interaction hasn’t ended. Dear god, why has it not ended?

“Anything else I can do for ya?” you offer, inwardly cursing your manners. You’ve lived here long enough that you know people outside your tiny country-side town take that as an invitation instead of a dismissal.

Sure enough, Changbin starts to speak again, his words slow and careful. You watch him wipe his palms on his shorts, idly wondering if he’s shitting himself internally as much as you are right now. And what he’s freaking out about if he is.

“You... Recognize me? Are you STAY?” He gestures a bit while he talks, like he’s trying to cast a spell on you to understand what he’s trying to say. You think it might work, because your mouth is running off without you before you quite process the words.

“Ahh.. hah, uh,” You chuckle awkwardly, your fingers rising to pinch your lips nervously, “My roommate is. We were at your concert the other day, actually,” And even as you say the words your eyes flick down to his arm. You refocus, hopefully before he could notice the quick glance, but you can’t stop your thoughts from spiraling.

After all, he didn’t have that kind of ink at the concert. You and Taylor were front row, right up on the barricade, you’d seen all eight Stray Kids up close and personal. You’d have remembered such a vivid tattoo. And there were only so many reasons to cover a sleeve like that so completely.

Something complicated settles in your stomach as you realize that Changbin is probably a ‘loud and proud’ kind of soulmate, if he’s showing off his mark like this outside of his work. Work you know prevents him from showing off his mark.

Your mouth keeps running without you while you have your little crisis.

“I didn’t recognize you at reception, I woulda had you sign something for him.” You can’t help the rush of embarrassment that sweeps through you, even as you laugh uncomfortably at your own joke.

Why on earth would you say something like that? This situation is already uncomfortable enough! On so many levels!

Somehow, this seems to have been the right thing to say, though, as Changbin’s eyes light up at your joke, the tension easing a bit.

“I can sign,” He suggests, “It would make me feel...” He starts gesturing again, looking for the word he wants, “Less bad?” He finishes like a question.

And suddenly you understand his awkwardness a lot better. It always sucks to feel indebted to someone.

You laugh a little more freely with your new understanding, “Oh, you really don’t have to,” You assure, “I was just joking.”

He shakes his head, “Think of it as.. trade.” He nods, satisfied with himself.

You bob your head to the side, pressing your lips together with a tiny, frustrated, whine, “I really didn’t want anything from you,” you insist, “I hold onto that pass for my roommate, but he never comes with me anyways. You’re doing me a favor using it, seriously.”

You try to speak slowly and clearly, taking a page from Changbin’s book and letting your hands roam while you speak. You hope your spell of understanding works as well as his did.

He takes a moment to respond, mouthing along to some of your words. It’s kind of fascinating to watch someone translate in real time, especially when the process is written all over their face. It’s a little surreal to be on the other side of it.

Eventually his face clears, and he makes a little ‘ah!’ noise that you really shouldn’t find as endearing as you do. You’re in the middle of rejecting your soulmates, you should not be finding one of them cute right now.

“If it is roommate’s pass, more reason to sign, yes?” He reasons, looking proud of his logic. You huff a tiny laugh at him, absolutely charmed.

“Sure, big guy,” You sigh with defeat, though you can’t seem to wipe the smile off your face, “Sounds like a fair trade. I’m sure he’ll be thrilled.”

The two of you stall for a moment, the atmosphere leagues lighter than before.

When the moment seems over, you make a show of looking down at your pocket-less outfit, and then at the ground around you.

“I don’t have a pen on me,” you trail off meaningfully. He looks surprised for a second, like the possibility had never occurred to him.

“Oh,” He looks around as well, lost for a moment, “I can see if front desk has one?” he asks, like he’s looking for instruction. Another thought seems to occur to him then.

“Do you have...” He starts to gesture again, but you cut him off with a nod, fairly certain you’re sure what he’s trying to ask.

“Yeah, I’m sure I can find something for you to sign,” You point in the direction of the locker room, “I’ll probably have to look in my bag though.” You glance between him, the door to the locker room, and the door that leads out to reception.

“Meet back here in 5?” you propose. He seems content with this plan and nods in agreement. “Oh!” You stop him before he can fully turn around.

“Ask for a sharpie,” you instruct, “I’m not sure I’ll be able to find regular paper.” In fact, you’re pretty sure you’ll be sacrificing the spare ball cap you keep in your bag for this. You hope Taylor likes tie-dye.

With that, the two of you go your separate ways. It takes you no time at all to locate the bright monstrosity of a hat, a souvenir you abhorred from one of your father’s many ‘business’ trips. It would be no loss to you, but you take time to see if you have any actual paper around. You need the processing time.

Stars above, what were you thinking? There was no way you were getting out of this without another soulmate bond, but here you were, casually chatting with the guy instead of getting the fuck out of dodge!

You really couldn’t help it though.

Even when he’d been no more than a stranger to you, you hadn’t been able to help the way you gravitated toward Changbin. Now that you knew he was your soulmate, your actions made a lot more sense to you.

You’d always been on the people pleasing side of helpful, but vouching for a complete stranger was new for you. Even now, you were obediently grabbing an item for him to deface with a signature you don’t even want (no matter how thoroughly Taylor would murder you if you’d passed it up) just because you could tell how uneasy Changbin was with just accepting the visitor pass.

It didn’t help that the man was endearing as hell. Every little thing he did seemed cute to you, and you’d barely known him for ten minutes!

You felt like this was a new low for you. Doing things you didn’t really want to, for a man. Taylor would be so disappointed in you.

Having stalled for maybe far too long, you settle on sacrificing the atrocious hat to Changbin’s pen and put your stuff away. Something heavy and squirmy settles in your chest as you make your way back out to retrieve your prize from the man of the hour.

Surprisingly, there’s no accidental meeting of hands when Changbin autographs your hat. He did give you a bit of a bemused look for the choice of item, but you’d just shrugged at him. It was all you were willing to sacrifice, and Taylor should be grateful for even this much, in your opinion.

Unsurprisingly, the lack of first contact does not ease your mind at all. In fact, it rockets up your anxiety another thousand notches. You can’t help checking over your shoulder at every opportunity, despite the fact that Changbin hadn’t left the weights area since he’d settled there and couldn't follow you through the door to the rest of the facility regardless.

Look, you know how the whole first contact thing worked, okay? Fate would put two soulmates in the same place for whatever stupid reason, and find an even stupider reason for them to make skin-to-skin contact. You’d experienced it twice now, and you couldn’t help but think going out of your way to avoid everything Changbin was wouldn’t help you very much.

Even still, you can’t stay paranoid and vigilant forever. When nothing happens while you finish your cardio, or when you work your way through both the pool and the sauna, you admittedly let down your guard a bit.

Maybe that’s why, after you’ve made your way back to the front room to try and finish your workout, when you’re mid-stretch and staring daggers at a weight machine you’re sure you’ll figure out how to use if you glare long enough, you jump about five miles out of your skin when you hear Changbin’s voice behind you.

Jumping from such a precarious position is never a good idea, and your sudden movement has set your head on a one-way collision course with the gym’s hardwood floors about it.

Hands fly around your middle, catching you awkwardly around your ribs. Unfortunately, all this noble attempt to catch you does is slow your descent, giving you just enough time to flinch violently enough to bring your arms up and prevent your head from meeting the ground and brace for impact.

The rest of you still hits the ground pretty hard, and Changbin’s knees and elbows meet a similar fate, his own head saved by headbutting your stomach, knocking the air out of you even harder than it already had been.

The two of you sit there a moment, groaning with the pain of your fall. At least you don’t have a concussion. You’ll take every small mercy with the way the universe has treated you lately.

Some part of you is cognizant enough to give the heavens a heartfelt thank you when you notice that none of your aches and pains are from your soulbond activating. Somehow, through that entire debacle, and even considering the amount of exposed skin between your t-shirt and his, you hadn’t managed to touch. You’re still safe.

As the shock starts to wear off, you start to become aware of the warmth of large hands still resting heavily against your sides, both soothing and wildly distracting. It’s like every fiber of your being is focused on where he’s touching you, warm and weighty. Changbin’s head still buried in your abdomen doesn’t help with the building fluster taking over your brain.

You swear one of his thumbs has landed squarely on one of the flower buds directly opposite Lee Know’s Bellflowers, and the tingly feeling of the bond weakly trying and failing to establish through the thin barrier of your shirt is not helping your mushy brain at all.

You tip your head back to stare at the ceiling, pulling your bottom lip between your teeth to prevent yourself from doing something stupid, like confessing all of your sins to Changbin right then and there.

Maybe you did have a concussion after all.

It’s probably been less than a minute since the two of you hit the floor, but it feels like ten hours have passed when Changbin finally lifts his head, wide eyes finding yours frantically.

“Oh my god, are you okay?” He asks, “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you, are you okay?” He uses his hold on you to gently lift you to a seated position, removing them in favor of hovering politely as he fusses. You don’t think he’s realized he’s reverted to his native Korean in his panic.

“I’m alright, I’m okay,” you assure him in the same language, “Just bruised a bit, I’m fine.”

He continues to fuss a bit more, running you through a quick series of concussion tests even after you tell him that you hadn’t hit your head at all. It’s only after he’s helping you to your feet, respectfully allowing you to use a clothed part of his arm to help yourself up, that he clocks the language the both of you are using.

“Are you sure you didn’t hit your head?” He teases, “You speak Korean all of the sudden.”

You can’t help the little laugh that escapes you, nor can you help how his smug little smile makes your heart flutter. “I’ve spoken Korean the whole time.” You inform him.

“And you didn’t tell me? You just let me struggle?” The fondness in his smile assures you that he’s just joking, so you respond in kind.

“You were just trying so hard...” You shrug sheepishly and delight in the full body laugh that tears out of him. You wait for him to calm before you ask, “What did you need, by the way? I didn’t catch what you said before, well..” You gesture helplessly at the floor.

It’s his turn to look sheepish now, shoulders hiking up and a nervous hand making its way to his neck, “Ah, that.” he shrugs, “I was just saying that you had a pretty soulmark.”

The sudden compliment catches you off guard, and you suddenly become aware that your camisole has come loose from where it had been tucked into your sweats. Your hand flies up to cover the now-covered skin of your stomach, feeling sick.

You can’t remember when it happened, and the thought of however many strangers seeing your soulmark, no matter how little of it, sends a sharp note of dread through your body. You suddenly feel eyes digging into your skin, despite being covered again as soon as you’d stood up. You feel a bit sick, your skin crawling with discomfort.

You’re aware that your camisole would have ridden up to your lower back, at most, but there’s no telling how much of your mark anyone might have seen. What Changbin might have seen, what he may have noticed.

Changbin must notice your sudden pallid complexion, and continues on, trying to reassure you, probably. You barely hear him over the heartbeat in your ears, your trembling hands trying to discreetly tuck the undershirt back in while he speaks.

“I just meant that it’s very colorful and vibrant,” He explains, smile fading from his face as concern starts to cloud it at your reaction, “Whoever your soulmate is, they’re very lucky.”

“Ah, I don’t know them yet,” You counter. It’s even the truth. You hadn’t spoken much to any of your soulmates so far. Well, until now, you guess.

“Oh, well, I stand by what I said.” He asserts, his easy grin betrayed by the pinch between his brows, “Whoever your soulmate is will be very lucky to have you.”

“I don’t know about all that,” You tilt your head with self-deprecating consideration.

Maybe it’s a lingering guilt for how you’ve been handling your soulmates so far that makes you continue the thought, instead of laughing it off like the joke it should be. Maybe you just want him- want them- to know why you’ve been acting this way, “I don’t even know if I want to meet them, so I’m not sure how lucky they could be to have me as a soulmate.”

Changbin levels you with an absolutely baffled look, as if you’ve just challenged the very foundation of his worldview.

“Why not?” He asks, “Doesn’t everyone want to meet their soulmate?”

You wrap yourself in a loose hug, one hand rubbing soothingly at your elbow, and shrug, “I just... I haven’t had great experiences with soulmates, is all.” You can’t keep your eyes from straying to his soulmark, vibrant and full.

It’s an image that would be hard to elbow your way into, and you can’t imagine a way that the addition of you could possibly enhance it. It still feels unfinished to you, but it doesn’t look that way. You feel both better and worse about yourself, knowing that they didn’t need you.

A glance at Changbin’s utterly lost face has you opening your mouth before you can think about it, shoulders beginning to climb up to your ears.

“Not all soulmates get along, you know?” You mutter sullenly, almost to yourself.

Changbin seems to consider this for a moment, head tilting cutely to the side as he takes in your claim.

“I mean, sure.” He draws his words out slowly, carefully, with a little furrow between his brows. “Everyone fights sometimes, but you get through it together, right? That’s what makes you soulmates. Choosing to stick together.”

You couldn’t hold in the scoff and eye-roll combo that rips out of you if you’d tried. “Yeah, maybe.”

You’d feel bad about the venom in your voice, or the way it causes Changbin to shift uncomfortably from foot to foot, but you can’t find it in yourself to care at the moment. Something sick and dark twists around your stomach, and the battle to keep a deep scowl from your face is the only one you’re willing to fight right now.

“I have a feeling that was the wrong thing to say,” Changbin smiles wanly at you, and you meet his eyes for barely a second before you find yourself melting beneath his earnest gaze. The thorns around your heart ease just enough to bleed, and you shrug at him again.

“When people stay together just because they’re soulmates it only makes things worse.” you tell him, “Nothing gets magically fixed just because you’re soulmates.”

Surprisingly, Changbin agrees easily, “Well, yeah, that’s not the kind of sticking together I’m talking about,” He explains, “I meant more, like,” He gestures as he tries to find his words, and your heart positively aches as you realize the habit transcends languages.

You find yourself softening more and relaxing out of your defensive curl out of sheer endearment. You’re sure you’d be making absolute heart-eyes at Changbin right now if the topic at hand wasn’t so deeply uncomfortable for you.

“Ok, let me try an example,” He eventually decides, his eyes following your gaze where it had once again returned to his soulmark without your permission. He flexes a bit, making the flowers on his skin bounce and dance with a small, fond, smile. “I’m soulmates with the other members, right?”

He says it easily, casually, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. You almost nod along, before you remember that the world at large definitely does not have that information, even if you do, and you meet his smug little smirk with wide-eyed shock.

You can’t help but gape at him for the casual confession, glancing around the empty gym like someone else might’ve heard Changbin’s brazen confession. He’s already waving you off before you can sputter out the questions stuck in your throat.

“It’s not a big deal, don’t worry about it. It’s not like we try very hard to hide it.” He does a weird little half-nod-half-shrug motion at his soulmark, “But yeah, we’re all soulmates, and we all pretty much knew before debut, even though Innie’s mark hadn’t shown up yet.”

You do nod this time. Slowly, though, as you try to figure out where he’s going with this. Changbin takes it as permission to continue, and so he does.

“Well, Jeongin’s our baby, and even though marks show up at 18, you’re not an adult in Korea until 19, so there’s a lot we had to leave him out on.” He grimaces a little, “Being an Idol is stressful as it is, throwing a new soul bond and puberty and all that on top wasn’t very helpful. We were all volatile and fragile. But Innie definitely took it the worst. He felt left behind and unfair and angry with it all.”

He chuckles and gives a little shrug, “We had our share of knock-down, drag-outs.” He admits sheepishly, “It wasn’t an easy time for us.” He rolls his head toward the ceiling and, despite Changbin’s efforts, you can easily spot the smitten look on his face along with his cherry-red ears.

“But we made it through,” He says softly, “We took the time to dig into all of his insecurities and find what we could do to help him. He made the choice to be vulnerable and honest with us. It took time to get here, but we made it through.”

Changbin meets your eyes again, “That’s what I mean when I say soulmates are about choosing to stick together. You work through the hard times and disagreements together, work toward something better. Soulmates are destiny, but love is choice.”

You let his words rattle around your brain as you get lost in his earnest gaze. Let the idea settle into you like something entirely new, like it wasn’t your understanding of healthy relationships beforehand. Of course that’s the ideal, you know that. No one is perfect and all that, everyone disagrees sometimes. It’s discussing it and finding solutions together that makes a partnership work long-term. You know that.

For the first time, you wonder if you’d just always considered soulmates an exception to the rule.

You’d automatically assigned soulmates as a concept a failing grade at working their problems through. Your parents certainly never worked out their issues, and every soulmate you’d ever seen in the media was an automatic happy-ending. As soon as that bond snaps into place, the story’s over. Happily ever after.

You’d always thought ‘ever after’ must be an awful short time.

‘Love is choice’ echoes through you like something divine.

You break Changbin’s gaze and offer him a half-hearted shrug. “I guess.” you concede, “My soulmates probably have a lot of work cut out for them with me, though. So I still don’t know if they’d want me.”

“I think it’d be worth the work,” Changbin smiles gently at you, “To be your soulmate, I mean.”

You feel heat rush up your neck and bless your genetics for keeping it from showing on your cheeks. You disguise your bashfulness by lightly slapping Changbin’s shoulder (and woah is he solid under your hand when you do) and loudly complain about him being a flirt.

He responds by doing his best to fluster you, clearly enjoying putting those fanservice skills to use. You complain with every flex and smoulder, especially when he starts unleashing the aegyo, and the two of you let the banter and laughter chase away the somber mood.

Eventually you settle, and Changbin nods at the very intimidating machine you’d been staring at what felt like a lifetime ago now.

“Did you need a spotter?” He offers. You hem and haw for a moment, before sheepishly admitting that you need a teacher more than a spotter. When he lights up and offers to be that, too, you can’t help the way your eyes travel up and down his body with open admiration.

He certainly looks plenty qualified, and really, you’re only a girl. If your once-over leaves him with red ears and a smug grin, well. You’ll consider it your revenge for now.

You very quickly realize your mistake in letting him coach you.

Changbin tours you quickly around various machines, explaining their functions and the proper ways to use them to avoid injury. All well and good, and you ask permission to record short videos of him doing so in case you find yourself forgetting his advice, which he graciously allows on the condition you don’t share them anywhere.

You agree after negotiating for viewing rights for Taylor, with the reasoning that the lure of the videos might actually get your roommate back into the gym with you. It makes Changbin laugh enough to indulge you.

And then he actually starts you on a machine, after getting a rundown on what you’d already done today, and you experience hell on earth.

The thing is, he’s unfairly good at coaching you through it. He keeps up a steady stream of warm encouragement and light jokes even as you curse him out for steadily increasing the weights on each machine you work through. He’s right there to help you through the sets the moment you start to get too tired and is almost preternaturally good at pushing you to only just above your limits.

And his hands are always right there. He’s almost always touching you somehow, throughout the whole thing. His touch is light, coaching and clinical, and unfailingly polite. Still, the warmth of his skin through your flimsy gym-wear feels heavy. Nearly threatening. Distracting, at the very least.

You’ll definitely need those videos later.

It’s a relief when it’s over. You’re sore and sweaty and you have to go sit at a desk for six or more hours when you leave, which you’re very much not looking forward to.

Changbin splits with you to hit the showers, but somehow you still come together again before you pass reception.

“Thanks for today,” you say as the two of you stall your goodbyes, “I had a lot of fun. You’ve more than earned that guest pass.” you tease, smile wide and mischievous.

He’s smiling too, even as he shoves your shoulder and complains about you extorting him.

When you run out of things to say, you shuffle lightly in place. It’s not like you expect him to give you his number, he is an Idol after all, but still you can’t quite make yourself leave. You find yourself casting around for something, anything, to say to make the moment last. To stay in his presence just a second longer.

You shake yourself out of it once you notice. You might not be running from them anymore, but you certainly weren’t trying to make friends with your soulmates. The longer you stayed in his presence, the more likely it was that you’d end up with another first contact.

At last, after a far-too-long moment of silence, you hold out your hand and offer a flat, closed-lip smile.

“It was really nice to meet you, Changbin.” You tell him sincerely, eyes locked on his. You swear looking your soulmates in the eye is some kind of hypnosis, the way you always get lost in them when you do. Something about it just makes you feel a tiny bit dumb, like your brain gets switched off.

“You too, y/n.” He agrees, reaching for your offered hand. You only realize what you’ve just done as your name leaves his lips, your eyes widening as they dart down to his hand and yours, but it’s far too late.

Your breath hitches a moment before his skin makes contact with yours, and you watch it happen in slow motion. He grasps your hand and pulls you in instead of settling for the more distant and formal farewell. All too quickly you’re settled into his grasp, completely enveloped in him and dizzy with more than just his warmth as soft prickles dance up your side.

You feel more than you hear him gasp, his hold on you so complete. Your head ends up on his shoulder as you stumble into him from his pull, and you get a front row seat to the top of his shoulder filling in with outlines and shadows from your place tucked against his neck, dull colors adding a definition to the images in his soulmark and settling like they’d always been there.

Distantly, you feel chest tighten with completion, with satisfaction and something smug and proud at the sight, even as your mind starts screaming.

Changbin is solid against you, comforting and almost stiflingly warm from both his workout and shower. You catch a whiff of his soap, the scent muting the alarm bells blaring in your brain even as you lay limp against him with the shock.

And then his hold on you tightens just a bit, only for a moment, but it’s all that it takes for you to break.

Your breath begins to hitch, visions of sweet touches turning sour and threatening violence causing you to flinch violently in Changbin’s comforting embrace. You feel your eyes begin to wet as you start to struggle, needing out, out, out.

It must have been less than a second, but Changbin pulls back, still holding you by your shoulders like he doesn’t know how to let go.

“Y/n?” He asks, voice small. You can only shake your head, breaths coming out in harsh gasps, limbs trembling violently. Changbin hurriedly lowers the two of you to the floor, much more prepared than you are for your limbs to give out halfway down.

He finally releases you as you settle and you curl tightly into yourself. The places where he’d held you feel frozen now, the cold viciously settling into your bones, even as Changbin does his best to get your attention and guide you through a breathing exercise.

You can’t focus on him though, the sensation of flowers blooming on your skin overwhelming, the memory of his touch both welcome and suffocating.

“S- ‘orry, I’m-” You hiccup, “I’m so- so s’rry-” If Changbin is at all put off by your sudden breakdown, he doesn’t show it. He just tilts his head and offers you hushed words of assurance.

“Nothing to be sorry for, y/n,” he assures, “It’s alright, just breathe, ok?”

He offers you a hand and you can’t help but take it, the warmth startling a breath into you that you hadn’t been aware you needed. Changbin guides your hand to his chest, instructing you to breathe with him, and you automatically focus on the heavy thump of his heartbeat under your palm.

He keeps talking to you, trying to keep your attention, but your mind spins wildly away from you even as you finally manage a deep inhale under Changbin’s attention.

You need to tell him that you’d known since he’d first spoken to you who he was. Who he was to you, even, but you can’t open your mouth to do more than gasp another apology. You’re sure he’ll hate you, leave you there on the floor of the gym to die like you deserve, especially after all you’d told him about how you feel about soulmates.

He’ll hate you for putting his soulmates through rejection, for refusing to speak to them or even look them in the eye. He’ll leave you here, humiliated on the gym’s floor, and you’ll deserve it because you’re a horrible person who wouldn’t even give them a breadth of a chance because you were too damn scared-

A hand grasps your spare one, the one not touching him, not keeping you just barely above the waves of hyperventilating, and you hadn’t even noticed it scrabbling at the stretched out neckline of your t-shirt until it’s gently pried away and guided to a wall of firm muscle.

Your fingers instinctively grasp what’s suddenly underneath them, and your vision stutters back in as a soft tingling rockets its way up your arm.

You distantly acknowledge that it was probably a bad thing that your vision had faded off with your eyes stuck wide open, staring blankly at legs you couldn’t feel. Right now, however, all you can experience is Changbin. His mark under your fingers, grip clawing and desperate. His heartbeat under your palm, faster than it should be, but steady and loud and feeling like it’s part of your own body.

Like he knows he has your attention again, Changbin ducks down to catch your eyes. You find nothing in them but concern and a soft emotion you couldn’t hope to pinpoint.

“Y/n,” He calls softly, “Y/n, do you mind if I touch you?” The gentleness he speaks to you with is devastating, like he’s trying to place your panicked mind on a cloud of care. You want so desperately to accept that care from him.

You nod, small jerky movements to indicate your agreement even as gasping sobs still stutter in your chest.

Changbin immediately moves, shuffling closer to you on his knees and releasing the wrist of your hand, the one still grasping at his mark like it’d disappear if you relaxed so much as a millimeter. He uncrosses his arms from the awkward reach he’d had to use to maneuver your hands where he wanted them, and reaches his now free hand to rest gently but firmly on your waist, right over his place within your own mark.

The resonance from his touch is weaker, the material of your shirt in his way, but with both sides active the feeling floods you in a way you could never describe.

You know, in the back of your mind, that you’ve read about resonance before. That you know all about the flood of endorphins and other feel-good hormones that it causes, that you’ve read first hand accounts from all sorts of people swearing up and down it feels better than any orgasm ever could. In the moment though, you feel like your brain has been reset completely. Back to factory settings, entirely blank.

You come back to yourself in slow blinks, resonance still echoing brightly between you and Changbin. Your one hand is still tightly clasped to his chest, and you’re sure you’re only breathing right now due to the steady rise and fall of Changbin’s chest. The two of you are still gripping each other’s marks.

You feel unsettled as awareness returns to your body. You feel floaty and not all there, even as you calm enough to feel the numbness of your legs and the pain in your knees from hitting the floor. An increasingly familiar tingling feeling is emanating from each of your active soulmarks, despite the fact that you know the other two should have no idea how you’re feeling right now.

Your bond wasn’t strong enough for that. You hadn’t given it the chance to be.

The thought that they might just be thinking of you gives you a soft and fluttery sort of feeling.

Finally, Changbin pulls back, removing his hand from your mark and sliding up your arm to gently pry yours from his bicep. You’d wince at the marks your nails had left on his skin if you didn’t still feel like your bones were vibrating on the astral plane from the intensity of a reciprocal resonance.

He gently holds both of your hands in his and settles them between you, catching your eye again.

“You back with me, bubs?” He asks, smile light and tone even. You’d think him unaffected if not for the redness of his ears and the slight haze in his eyes.

Right. Eight soulmates. He’s probably used to it.

He’s also trying to get you down from a panic attack, you remember as your hands begin to faintly tremble in his grip. You nod slightly at his question, apologizing again.

“Hey, no.” Changbin scolds softly, eyes locked on yours, “You’ve nothing to be sorry for, it’s okay. Do you want to tell me what happened?”

You shake your head in refusal of both ideas, opening your mouth once, twice, three times, before huffing irritatedly at the lack of words falling from your lips. Changbin squeezes your hands to keep your attention on him, expression open and accepting. His silence allows yours to end.

“I just- It’s just that I-” You breathe harshly through your nose, squeezing his hands back to ground yourself, “I knew from when I realized who you were that you were my soulmate.” you grind out in halting words, the trembling spreading from your hands up to your chest. You take in a shuddering breath, “That’s why I was apologizing. Because I knew and I still said those things to you.”

You can tell your confession takes Changbin off guard. The man blinks rapidly as he takes in the new information, slotting your earlier behavior against your reaction just now and having trouble connecting them.

“Soulmates terrify me,” you confess quietly, before he can ask, “You’re so nice, but you’re so fucking scary to me, I’m sorry.”

With that, you remove your hands from his, and Changbin just sort of helplessly lets you go, a lost expression taking over his face. You try to stumble to your feet, and he scrambles up to help you, caring even through his confusion.

You can feel the trembling travel to your legs, and you’re glad for his steady hold despite yourself. You feel like a stiff breeze might knock you over.

“I need- I- I’ve gotta- argh!” You clench your teeth with frustration, taking a deep, bracing, breath, before trying again. “I need to go home.” You’d like to say it came out strong and self-assured, but the words leave you in a breathless whimper that makes you feel small and pathetic.

Everything about this makes you feel small and pathetic.

Changbin catches your eyes again, brows creased in concern.

Except for him.

“Of course, whatever you need,” He assures, “Can I call a car for you? A friend? Your roommate?”

You shake your head, hopelessly endeared by his need to help you. You feel guilty for refusing him when he’d just pivoted from the bombshell you’d dropped on him to focus on your care but you- you needed to go home. You needed to leave, and it was taking every ounce of effort you could spare to keep from bolting.

“No, I can- I’ve got- I want- shit.” The curse spills from you unbidden, frustration with the vestiges of your panic refusing to leave you building sharply. If anything, Changbin’s concern only grows deeper as you struggle to express yourself.

“I need to move, I’ll walk.” Your mouth finally allows you to spit out, almost aggressively. Changbin almost seems to despair at your declaration.

Looking at your own condition, you can’t blame him. Trembling like a leaf and barely able to speak, you’d never let yourself leave if you’d been in his place. You can’t spare the energy to explain that if anyone tried anything at you in this condition you’d probably try to kill them first and ask questions later.

You don’t handle stress well.

Still, despite his obvious reluctance, Changbin lets you leave his embrace.

You’re more stable on your feet now, and a deep breath fills you with a facade of confidence that will see you home. Changbin’s hands still hover around you, as if waiting for you to shatter apart again.

“If you need anything, please call me, okay? Anything at all, please call me.” He pleads with you. You only manage to give him another tiny nod before you dip into a full bow and turn to flee.

Changbin watches you go with a face full of concern and confusion.

‘I think it’d be worth the work, to be your soulmate’ he’d said. You can’t help but wonder, as the gym disappears behind you, if he still thinks that.

Tag Garden: @brbwritingfanfic , @braveangel777 , @breathlessbookworm , @chancloud8 , @roseynoodles , @katsukis1wife , @alisonyus , @imnotsop , @pixie0627 , @velvetmoonlght , @upsidedownchaire , @unusuallyshy , @interstellar-equilibrium , @staytinyluv , @m00njinnie , @staaaa4 , @yourcrypticreaper , @beas-24 , @stars4jo , @scented-morker , @tirena1 , @min-doesnt-know , @glitterveins992 , @yumuramma , @shoganaiiii , @4ng3l-ch1ld , @linospetsitter

Perma Tags: @mbioooo0000 , @thatgirlangelb (<- you've been added without choice. suffer.)

[blueaprondelight]

rockstar!carmy thoughts (via that lovely video olive so graciously blessed my feed with - here) NSFW THOUGHTS WILL BE POSTED TO MY OTHER BLOG! THESE ARE SFW!

okay, so like hear me out on this one because i just needed to get my thoughts out about this man rockstar!carm. in some other life, he's a guy who plays guitar in a band he started with his friends. i don't know why, no one does. he's playing some show in some city he's too lazy to remember (he's just in the background anyhow, he doesn't consider it his job to know where the fuck they're playing). his same tattoos on his arm - maybe with a few other music based ones - with a fender six string over his muscley arms and he knows he has his fan girls. every member does but he has a few more than the other guys because.. he's carmen berzatto he-fucking-llo. and who can blame them for choosing him!?

but he's literally paying them NO mind. no eye contact with them, no flirtatious ways like the other guys. he has you at home waiting for him.

i can totally see him meeting you through a mutual friend or even - hear me out - you being the photographer for their tour. he'd make EXCUSES just to talk to you about any and everything just because he wants to hear your voice go on and on

it's giving "forever" by the beach boys but i digress

that man would call every chance he gets. on long bus nights, after shows, before they go on stage. he'd call just to hear your voice, to hear you talk like he was there, to ask how you were doing. because to him?? that was his like stage freight buster.

if he's caught by paparazzi, it's usually always with you. his arm slung around you, or standing with you behind the stage (he thought he was out of sight but somehow he never is), arms wrapped around you, holding you close to his chest as the opener plays and he has so many things that remind you of him! he has a photo of you in his wallet, he has a photo of you and him that was taken by some friend at some party hanging on his bunk or as his home screen that fans can see easily whenever his phone is on in his hands before or after the show he'd have your initials written somewhere on his guitar, he'd have a kiss mark from you 100% on it as well, i stand by that

[mythals-whore]

ASSIGNING THE MEMBERS OF THE VEILGUARD A TAYLOR SWIFT ALBUM BECAUSE I CAN!!!

Harding - Debut

Obviously she’s our Ferelden farm girl so this just makes sense, but let me elaborate anyway. Harding is VERY Tied Together with a Smile/ The Outside to me?? Not to mention i feel like she would love the angrier songs Picture to Burn/ should’ve said no. We know how she gets when she’s angry. And you can’t convince me she wouldn’t LOVE Our Song.

Neve - Midnights

Do i even need to explain this one?? Neve gives such Midnights vibes, vigilante shit/mastermind/midnight rain???? Also SO yoyok coded. i feel like her romance is very Labyrinth/Snow on the Beach. And the woman who pets all of docktown’s stray cats is very “karma is a cat” of her idc.

Bellara - Red (TV)

This one was hard! It was between Red and 1989 to me. I just think Bellara would love the high energy pop beats (22, WANEGBT, Starlight). But i think she would LOVE Treacherous/State of Grace as well. Will help with the fanfic writing 100%. I put TV here specifically bc Better Man & Forever Winter could very much remind her of Cyrian??? And you can’t convince me Bellara wouldn’t be obsessed with ATWTMVTV.

Lucanis - Speak Now

Purple vibes, obvious. But he’s like, very Enchanted to me. AKA loves reading romance novels and the concept of romance but doesn’t know much about it/has never experienced it but wants it badly. Which is also why Electric Touch/Sparks Fly apply here. Don’t think about Lucanis listening to Castles Crumbling when he gets back from the Ossuary to find that Caterina is gone (+ later if you don’t save Treviso). Also Innocent was written about him, Taylor told me.

Shout to passenger princess Spite which i feel Taylor embodied when she wrote Dear John (iykyk)

Davrin - Lover

First of all, he is SO The Archer. “Ive been the Archer, Ive been the prey” “i jump from the train and ride off alone i never grew up its getting so old” “i cut off my nose just to spite my face and hate my reflection for years and years” its so Davrin (also one of my favorite songs maybe ever so this is big news). Also as @pinayelf pointed out, Assan as the Arrow?? Dying. But also Davrin’s romance is so Its Nice to Have a Friend. I saw someone talk about this not that long ago, but he’s very much a friend first?? Like he gives the vibe that as your LI you just hang out and rib on each other. I just i feel like they laugh a lot. + Lover as an album is soft but very anxiously attached?? Which i feel is the whole inner life of “i am a Grey Warden and im not supposed to get to attached bc it can’t last.” Honorable mentions go to Daylight/I Think He Knows/Cruel Summer/ Cornelia Street

Could also be convinced he is Reputation bc Reputation seems hardcore but is secretly very soft.

Emmrich - Tortured Poets (The Anthology)

Emmrich would LOVE the flowery language in this. Would love analyzing the lyrics with his besties. He’d love The Albatross (which, coincidentally is one of my favs, guess he just has good taste) and The Manuscript. Also tbh i don’t know much about his romance but “you know how to ball, i know Aristotle” feels like Emmrich with a much younger Rook (shout out to But Daddy I Love Him as well). Idk i think he’d secretly love it. Also relating Robin to Manfred bc that is his son??? On the sad side i feel like Emmrich is very the Prophecy/Peter because he has that dialogue about how he ‘once thought he’d get married’ like he always wanted love but never found it.

Taash - evermore

This was very difficult but i think the general witchy vibes are very “I’m Rivaini, we’re cool with spirits”. Also Tolerate It feels like when their mom comes to visit and no matter what Taash does it’s not good enough. Laash specifically is Dorothea/Ivy to me. And then of course (endgame spoilers) Marjorie after their mom dies and RWYLM if Harding is also gone. As a fan of the ‘pots and pans’ of Closure, they also get this one assigned to them. Just feels right.

[synthetickitsune]

Dino (SVT) | Good Luck, Babe! angst | 0.7k | f!reader warnings: reader wants to leave chan at the altar for a woman A/N: i'm so late to be obsessed with this song but oh well lmao

“Hey, uh,” you speak so fast the words blur together, “Do you think we could run away together?”

During the second of silence you realize your words probably weren’t clear enough to be understood, but that doesn’t matter. You only need to say them. You only need for them to be heard. You don’t expect much at this point.

The answer comes from a robotic voice notifying you that the number you called cannot be reached.

That’s not a no - that’s all you can think. 

Since your calls go unanswered, there still is a possibility that the person feels the way you do, right? You’ve been friends since you can remember, surely there’s some chance that she wants happiness for you… right? That she will forgive you and save you from your own choices like she’s always done.

Although you’re sure that your husband-to-be could make you happy too, it doesn’t feel right. You know he could, though. You need to believe it. Chan’s a good man. A kind man. He’s just not… You don’t even know what he’s not. He’s everything that they say would make a good husband, but is that what you’re looking for? You don’t know. Probably not, seeing as you’re still trying to reach your best friend. Former best friend? There’s too many things you don’t know.

You hang up the unanswered call and let your hand drop. Staring at the lit up screen with the contact info pulled up, it feels like the universe is mocking you. Just then, there’s a knock at your door.

“Love?” It’s Chan.

You quickly try to collect yourself, but you don’t trust your voice not to betray you and your complicated feelings, so you just hum in response. 

“I just… I want you to know that I love you.” You close your eyes and let a wave of gratefulness wash over you. You truly don’t know what you’d do if Chan wasn’t so set on not seeing you in your wedding dress. The door separating you and him feels like the wall you built around yourself inside your own head, one that you never allowed him to break through.

“I know you must be nervous - I’m so nervous. My heart beats so fast it hurts,” he chuckles. All your friends and family always told you that his smile and laughter is infectious, so you used to laugh and smile along whenever he did. This time you don’t.

“But I can’t wait to spend the rest of our lives together,” the smile in his voice is so loud. You feel nauseous. You call the number again, your fingers trembling as they tap away on the screen. You can only pray that she’ll pick up now, at the worst moment possible. Would you still go through with it? You’d love to say you don’t know, but right now that’s the one thing you’re sure of.

“Just… deep breaths, yeah?” he laughs softly again and you can imagine him standing on the other side of the door, fidgeting with the piece of paper with his vows written on it, “I love you. See you soon.”

You want to cry. The call goes on and on, unanswered once again. At least the tears will be written off as nerves or happiness. Today you can cry as much as you want without judgement. Nobody will know because nobody will ever know you like she does.

She was right, you realize and it almost makes you laugh. She knew that you’ll change your mind when it’s too late. You have no idea why you didn’t listen. You can be oblivious, but you thought you’d be the one to know your heart the best. Apparently, that was another foolish assumption on your part. Just the same as thinking everything will click into place when the wedding day comes and you’ll be walking towards the altar.

It doesn’t matter that Chan’s looking at you like you’re his entire life or that his entire face lights up. It doesn’t matter that some of the guests tear up with genuine happiness for you two. You feel sick to your stomach, your knees almost give up as you meet Chan and he takes his hand in yours.

His vows are a white noise in your ears.

It takes everything in you not to change your vows to a simple apology to her.

[akookminsupporter]

There’s a photo—or, well, I guess it's a screenshot from this clip—that happens to be one of my absolute favourite pictures of Jimin and Jungkook. This clip itself is one of my favourites of the two of them for two reasons.

The first reason, and probably the most obvious one if you’re someone who pays attention to details, is how perfectly their outfits are coordinated. It’s like they’re matching but not in a way that’s too deliberate or forced. They’re both wearing the same colours, but the way those colours are used or styled is slightly different in each of their outfits. Jimin and Jungkook do this quite often—whether it’s a coincidence or intentional, who knows?

If you think about it, they’ve always had this knack for wearing the same colour palette. Over the last few years, they’ve even started leaning towards a similar overall style of clothing. The main difference is that Jungkook’s outfits tend to be noticeably more oversized, while Jimin’s clothes are oversized as well, just not to the same extreme. But in general, their styles are so alike that it’s hard not to notice. They both gravitate towards neutral tones—white, black, greys, and the occasional earthy tones. Jimin, however, is a bit more adventurous when it comes to colours. He’ll sometimes add a pop of something unexpected, but even then, he stays within a very sophisticated, monochromatic or neutral vibe.

This makes it pretty common to see them with outfits that feel unintentionally coordinated. Sure, other members also dress similarly from time to time—for example, Yoongi often wears neutral tones, too but you wouldn't immediately say he coordinated his outfit with Jimin or Jungkook or both.

Now, the second reason I love this clip has more to do with the phrase written on the back of Jungkook’s bomber jacket. If you take it from the perspective of what we believe their relationship might be, that phrase feels incredibly meaningful. It almost seems to capture how they have to navigate the world they’re in. For people like them—living under constant scrutiny, with so much pressure on their shoulders—it must be incredibly isolating at times. And yet, the phrase on his jacket seems to reflect the idea that, no matter how hard or lonely it gets, they’ve got each other.

Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but I’ve always thought that phrase encapsulates so much about who they are and how they seem to handle things together. From the way I see them, there’s this unspoken connection between them—a sense that they just get each other on a level that’s hard to explain.

This connection goes beyond clothes or coordinated outfits. Jimin and Jungkook seem to share so many things in terms of their personalities, tastes, and even their thought processes. Out of all the members, I feel like this is something almost unique to them. It’s not just fans who notice it, either. The other members have commented on it, sometimes confusing one for the other or saying that either one of them could’ve done or said something because they’re so similar. Even their laughter sounds alike, especially when they’re together. It’s one of those little things that feels so endearing and makes you wonder just how much time they’ve spent together to develop such similarities.

Can you imagine what they’ll be like once they’ve finished their military service? I can’t wait for all the behind-the-scenes content that’s bound to come out when the group starts promoting together again.

At the end of the day, their dynamic feels so special. Whether it’s through their coordinated outfits, shared laughter, or the way they just seem to click, there’s something about them that’s completely unique. It’s one of the reasons why moments like this clip—and even something as simple as a photo from it—stick with me. It’s not just about how they look together but about everything they represent.

[cwritesforfun]

Emperor Geta x Fem!Reader: Escape part three

Part One Link <~ read first Part Two Link <~ read this too

Y/N = Your First Name & L/N = Your Last Name

They will not follow the Roman style of speech - it will be written in modern language.

*I do not own the Gladiator 2 characters or plot* I do change some of the plot!!!

Masterlist

Y/N's POV

Geta rested for a while, and eventually, you realized he was here to stay. He had told you countless times that he wanted to stay, but it hit you that he really did want to.

You thought that him staying would be easy, but why should it be?

Geta disagreed with your leadership style to the point where he kept arguing with you in and out of court. You finally had it with his constant disapproval, and you made your guards escort him out of the room. The rest of the day at court was tense for you. Everyone seemed to be walking on ice around you.

You meet Geta in one of the sitting rooms in the palace and have tea delivered. You take a cautious sip and ask, "So, Geta, would you like to tell me about what was wrong today in court?" Geta glances at you and answers, "I just don't like the way you let everyone have a say in court proceedings. I also didn't believe some of those crimes should have been pardoned. They deserved to be executed." Your eyes widen, and you reply, "I see. Geta, I let everyone have a say in what happens at court because that is what happens in this country. I let everyone preach their case and why they think I should listen to them. It keeps people happy to know that their views have been heard. It also ensures that I know the full story going into the proceedings. I know Rome was different, but you are not in Rome now." He looks distraught, and you continue, "And as for the crimes being pardoned, I think you would benefit learning from my advisors about the rulings in my country. I'll talk to them tonight, and you can attend lessons during the next couple of weeks so you can better understand my decisions. I don't like how you reacted in court and think you can also learn how to better express your disagreements. I'll make sure that is included in your lessons." He asks, "Anything else?" You answer, "I think it might be best if you sleep in another room while you attend the lessons so you can try to remain unbiased. Knowing how I would think may influence your lessons.” He reaches out for my hand and replies, "I thought we weren't going to be parting ways again." You reply, "We're not exactly parting ways. I'll still be at the palace and join you for dinner. Besides, I believe some time apart will benefit us. We began this relationship quickly and with an intensity that no others can grasp." He nods and replies, "Fine, as you wish, your majesty."

Geta's POV

How can one sit through boring lessons all day and not be annoyed?

I keep telling myself that I'm doing this for Y/N, but really, her choices of people to lead my lessons are a drag. For the first week of my lessons, I sat in lessons with her old governess from when she was a child. This lady was cold and stubborn. She kept snapping at me, and she treated me like a child. The second week, I was with her foreign advisor, who was a persnickety old man who kept quizzing me on viewpoints of this country. I kept thinking of how I would react as Emperor of Rome, which was the wrong thing to do. Speaking of Rome, apparently, it thrives under Lucius' reign. Both of these lessons required extra reading too. They had Y/N's notes inside and she often included little jokes that made me smile. I love her. However, the third week of lessons was my favorite. I learned from her military advisor who was both kind and fierce. His team respected him and followed him. He was kind to me and it seemed he actually liked me.

If I thought that was bad, well, I have been attending lessons early in the morning until dinnertime, where I must sit with Y/N and other members of her court as they all chat about their lives. I don't always get to sit next to Y/N, and she rarely acknowledges me. I just want to hold her and kiss her, but her guards keep strict protection around her. Almost no one can even talk to her. Am I a threat? Why is she ignoring me? I need to talk to her. Does she love me?

I'm sitting in my room with a book after my last lesson when a guard informs me that Y/N wishes to speak to me before dinner. Finally.

I get dressed and follow the guard to the sitting room nearest the dining hall. I enter with a smile on my face and see my lovely Y/N sitting at the desk. She stands, walks toward me, and guides me to the couches. I notice her pour two glasses of alcohol from the bottle on the nearby table and I ask, "Love, what is wrong?" She hands me a glass and answers, "I pushed you away wrongly. There was a threat to my life, and I wanted to protect you. So I sent you away. I do believe those lessons were something that you should have done, but I shouldn't have ignored your presence the rest of the time. I'm sorry." I quickly grab her open hand and ask, "What about this threat? Is it neutralized?" She nods and answers, "We apprehended the team this morning after my tea was poisoned. They were trying to harm me because they heard I sheltered you here. They escaped Rome to live here, away from you and Calla's rule. They are being held in prison for the attempted assassination. And as for the tea, well, I noticed it looked weird and I had my doctor test it for anything out of the ordinary. They used a generic poison and we found it quickly." I reply, "Don't send me away again. I'm here for you, no matter what. I love you, my Y/N... does the threat because of me scare you? Will you send me away?" She shakes her head and answers, "No, love. I'm not sending you away. I tightened security, and we'll make sure my people know you are no longer a threat to their lives. This is not Rome, and I would not stand for mistreatment of my people." I ask, "How will you tell them this?" She answers, "It's an idea that I wanted to run past you. I think an engagement is in order." I jokingly answer, "I would like to be engaged to the governess." She tilts her head and asks, "What?" I answer, "I was kidding. I was trying to make you jealous." She replies, "Oh, I'm not threatened by her." I bite my lip, smirk, and reply, "Non-jealousy looks hot on you." She laughs and says, "I meant for us to be engaged, silly." My eyes widen and I say, "I accept your proposal, Queen. I would love to be your husband." She smiles and says, "I am happy to be your wife soon, too... We'll draft a speech for us to give to my people, so they may know the Geta that I love." . . . Taglist: @doodle-with-rhy @ziggeddie

[blitzwhore]

Hello! I'd like to ask if you've seen the post with the screenshots that says Stolas inflicts his own torment by going with Stella's whims despite having more power and prestige than her. There is a rebuttal, of course, but someone else also added that the reason people think as the screenshot says is because the writers didn't put enough emphasis and reason on the hold Stella has over Stolas and his fear of her, as well as the fact that her apparent uninvolvement with Octavia makes his reason to stick with her seems very weak. They do put an intriguing essay on how the fear of Stella for Stolas could have stand out more.

Personally I think that he's probably desensitised and numb to her after with Paimon as well and the image of a nuclear family is a must for both society and daughter. Perhaps we'll have more answers in s3. What do you think?

Drink water regularly, may a good week come to you.

Hi! I haven't seen that post, no.

When I see posts arguing about the quality of the show's writing I almost always ignore them, because I'm not interested in discourse and I want my blog to be a place that's fun for me and others to scroll through. I don't want fandom wank and 'criticism of the show' on my blog because I go into fandom spaces to have fun, not to get angry. So if I'd seen that post, I probably would've just sighed really hard and kept scrolling.

That being said, because this ask touches on a subject matter that is extremely personal to me, I'll bite and share my personal opinion, which is that the writing is perfectly executed exactly as it is. Helluva Boss is a show for a mature audience—it says so at the beginning of every episode. That doesn't just mean "hey, there's sex and drugs in these episodes". It also means, "hey, some heavy themes are going to be handled in this show, and we're not going to hold your hand and walk you through them. It's up to you to use your media literacy and critical thinking skills to pick up on the things we're going to show you".

And maybe it's because I'm an abuse survivor myself and I know exactly what it feels like to go through decades of abuse, and maybe other viewers' interpretation of Stolas' character is completely different, but... I personally had zero trouble picking up on Stolas' motivations, fears, and emotions, or on why he made each decision at each turn throughout the show.

I'll put the rest of my answer under a cut, because it's personal and rambly. But in short: yeah, I do agree with what you said at the end of your ask.

1. "He's more powerful and has a higher status than Stella, so he's inflicting his pain on himself by not standing up to her"

So there's this thing called learned helplessness, and, fun fact, it is heavily linked with PTSD and depression.

"(...) Learned helplessness occurs when someone repeatedly faces uncontrollable, stressful situations and does not exercise control when it becomes available. They have “learned” that they are helpless in that situation and no longer try to change it, even when change is possible." (source)

It's not about the power and capability to control the situation Stolas actually has. It's about the power and control he feels he has—which is none. Zero. He says this to us constantly. "Owl in a cage", "you have no choice", "my entire life's been written in stone, he taught me that I could choose".

He was told since he was a kid that his duties, his marriage, his life trajectory were non-negotiable. He never knew a life outside of his palace—his gilded jail. He doesn't know what we as the audience know—that there's a whole world out there where he can build a better life for himself with people who actually love him—because he's been raised to be a pawn in a game much bigger than himself, and he knows it. I don't need (and don't want) the show to spoonfeed me this fact. It's spelled all over his character if you know how to see it.

2. "Stella's hold of Stolas and his fear of her aren't emphasised enough in the show"

Stella literally tries to hit him at the end of The Circus and looks shocked and taken aback when he grabs her wrist to stop her. I don't need them to show me Stella hitting Stolas 15 times in order to know she's been doing it.

He hugs himself and makes himself small, walking away to remove himself from the situation as quickly and quietly as possible, when Blitz starts yelling at him in The Full Moon. I don't need them to show me Stella yelling at Stolas 20 times to know she's been yelling at him for years. We've seen her yelling at him in Loo Loo Land, in The Circus and in Seeing Stars. We know it happens. We know it always has.

I also don't need them to tell me that repeated physical and verbal abuse causes a victim to become extremely afraid of their abuser and causes them to be triggered by anything and anyone that makes them feel unsafe, because I've lived it in my skin. And I know plenty of people who watch the show who are not abuse survivors, and they're also able to see that Stolas is behaving like any abuse victim exactly with zero support would act.

In the moment, he freezes and flees. He makes himself smaller. He gets away from the situation in any way he can. He "keeps the peace" to keep the abuse to a minimum, doing anything and everything to please the people around him because that's the only way he can feel some semblance of control. ("Yes, if that's what Blitzy wants" / "Do you like it when I talk to you dirty?" / just him sheltering Octavia from his suffering to be the perfect parent for her, and give her everything she could ever want and need, going as far as making promises he couldn't keep).

In the long run, he becomes hopeless and drowns in guilt. He assumes he probably deserves what's happening to him, and thinks it's his own fault that he's so affected by the abuse for being too weak to stand up for himself. He blames himself for not being good enough for the people around him ("I'll believe him, and not the voice that says I'm not enough"), and mentally berates himself for being a coward and a failure, and for not knowing how to put an end to his suffering. He turns to passive (sometimes active) suicidality because that's genuinely the only way he can see of getting back control over his own body and life. ("When I'm gone you'll be okay" / "I'll give my life to clean your slate" / "I don't care what they fucking do, I'm seeing Octavia" / "do it, pussy").

3. Stella's uninvolvement with Octavia makes Stolas' reason to stay with Stella seem very weak

I... Look. I can't be the only one who grew up in a broken family, and surrounded by plenty other broken families. Kids, especially small kids, can't rationalise that family relationships don't always work out and sometimes divorce is the best option for everyone involved. Especially not in this society we live in, where divorce/separation are seen as a failure, and children are (at least passively) taught that divorce is their fault.

Stolas knows all this. He doesn't want Via to feel like she's growing up in a broken house, which is what separating from Stella would accomplish. We also don't know if Stolas would've kept custody of Octavia had he divorced Stella when Via was little. But it's very likely he didn't want to risk leaving Via alone with Stella, even just half the time. Especially not when Octavia has been having nightmares and crying over the mere thought of being abandoned by Stolas. Divorcing Stella would very likely result in Octavia feeling abandoned by him.

I don't know, man. I feel like I don't even have the right words to reply to this point. I still remember being 8 and sensing that something was very wrong with my parents and feeling like it was my responsibility to fix it, or else my world would end. Stolas tried his best to protect Octavia from feeling this way, from feeling responsible for anything that happened between her parents. He just wanted her to be happy. The only way he could do that was by playing 'happy family' in front of her so she could grow up carefree. He tried his best to give her enough love that she wouldn't feel the absence of her mother's love. I really don't know what else to say to this.

If you want media to spoon-feed you its themes and hold your hand as it shows you what each character is going through, then... I don't know, man. Stick to media that does that. There's media out there that genuinely does this really well. Heartstopper, for example. The Hunger Games, in a way. But maybe think twice before diving into adult media meant for mature audiences and criticising it for wanting you to be a mature viewer. Maybe it's just not for you.

Anyway. I'm gonna drink water now, please drink some water too if you're reading this (included, but not limited to, the asker). Hope you all have a nice day ❤️

[duchessonfire]

Savior Carl!AU re-read Part 2 Chapter 6

Follow-up of my re-read of Part 2 Chapter 5. If you're not interested and don't want to have your dashboard spammed, you can block the tags Duchess reads and Savior Carl AU reread.

Commentary for Part 2, Ch 6 below the cut (spoilers for part 2 ahead):

Work has officially started again and I'm swamped so I'm only getting back into this re-reading now. (Btw, I'm currently listening to "toxic till the end" by Rosé and my god it's so Savior!AU Cegan... Same for "number one girl" from her Rosie album)

So, chapter 6, the beginning of the heatwave. This is so funny because I still remember writing part 2 and being like, okay I have 2 more chapters and the Claimers plot is done, so what can I do to shake things up at Sanctuary? And at the time I was teaching a class on the short story "Roman Fever" by Edith Wharton and I was explaining to my students the whole stereotypes about southern Europe from the povs of characters from England or the north-eastern coast of America, how the warmer climate is associated with looser morals, promiscuity, how people used to cold climates start to act a bit erratically when it's too hot and they let go of some of their inhibitions. And as I was preparing for this class, I was like... wait a minute... *lightbulb moment*

Anyway, this is how the idea of the heatwave came about and it's crazy that it is still ongoing in part 3, but at the same time it feels very fitting. Right when Negan has decided he's going to be a good man and keep things platonic with Carl, I turned the oven on and blasted them with heat :)))) No regret.

This chapter is very much a pivotal moment in the story because a lot hinges on it. In the previous chapter, Negan showed Carl a surprisingly human and compassionate side of his personality, but everything that has been happening since the start of part 2 (the increasingly erotic tension between them, Negan's cruelty) is still there.

In the Savior!AU, it's very important to me that Negan never becomes too nice. I have nothing against fluff or nice!Negan (in fact, I'm currently writing the fluffiest, nicest Negan ever in my Strawberry Mama Cegan fic), but I started writing the Savior!AU back in 2021 because there was a lack of Cegan fics where Negan was still the sadistic, cruel leader from the canon. Back then, there was a plethora of fics where Carl was sexually abused by Shane, or assaulted by the Claimers, and Negan was the only one who understood/rescued Carl, as well as a lot of fics where Negan immediately became protective of Carl and put him above everyone else right after meeting him, basically 'love at first sight' fics. As much as I enjoyed those stories, I was chagrined at how few fics there were where Negan was still Negan, still cruel and sadistic and egotistical, even when he clearly favored Carl over everyone else (a great example of this, and to me still one of the best Cegan fics ever written, is Wildflowers by Gemjam).

So, to me, this what the Savior!AU is and should always be: a story where Carl and Negan fall in love, yes, but where Negan is still Negan, still monstrous and power-hungry just as much as he's loving and protective, and this is in fact is the main obstacle of their relationship: that Negan's cruelty and thirst for power will always get in the way for as long as he's the leader of the Saviors.

This is why it's so important to me to keep all those moments when Negan is canonically cruel and ruthless. And this chapter has a big one with Mark getting his face ironed off.

Carl is so absorbed by him, by his sheer presence, that it takes him a second to notice that Negan is inspecting him right back, unmoving from his spot by the stairway. His gaze trails along where Carl is slumped against the wall, from the top of his head to the tip of his toes, slowly, down and then up again, and there is nothing concealed about it, his appraisal plainly obvious. His lips are slightly parted, letting Carl glimpse at his pink tongue, the tip caught between his teeth. He can’t feel hotter than he already does, but the rolling knots in his stomach are both new and familiar. He’s reminded of that time in the parking lot, of Negan’s susurrating voice making him feel like he was on a rollercoaster. When their eyes meet, Negan’s hand tightens briefly around Lucille’s handle, before going lax again. He moves forward and Carl knows he should straighten up, knows he should kneel, but he does neither. Instead, he stays right where he is, never taking his eyes off of Negan as he gets inexorably closer, his footsteps an ominous toll that sends Carl’s heart careening inside his chest. Negan stops right in front of him, the tips of his boots grazing Carl’s own. His gelled hair is curling at the temples and his skin is shiny under his salt and pepper beard, a sheen of perspiration covering the bow of his upper lip and the slight curve at the top of his chin. Negan makes a low sound, between a laugh and a sigh, and Carl’s eye follows the movement of his lips with rapt fascination when he speaks. “Pheew,” he breathes out, sending an exhale of peppermint-sweet air in Carl’s face. “Even in here, it’s hotter than the devil’s asscrack.” Then, unexpectedly, he asks, “Wanna hold her for me?”

There is SO MUCH happening here. Carl and Negan looking at each other and lusting after each other openly (the first time in the fic that it's mutual and not just one-sided), Negan's flex of the hand that shows he's barely restraining himself from grabbing Carl, Carl knowing he should kneel but staying standing because he's becoming aware of the fact that the rules don't apply when it's just him and Negan away from everyone else, Negan asking Carl to hold Lucille (the symbol of his battered heart and erect cock intertwined and wrapped in barbed wire) while he goes to have sex with someone else, so basically asking Carl to hold his heart while he fucks one of the wives...

Negan smirks, teeth flashing, and Carl should know better than to think he can hide the effect Negan has on him. “Thanks. Things might get a lil’ loud in there. Just a heads-up,” he winks. Carl swallows, hard. He is pretty sure the sweat rolling down his face must be sizzling, puffs of steam coming out from his every pore. As if on cue, he feels a plump drop of perspiration trail from his temple, along his chin and down his Adam's apple, before pooling in the hollow of his collarbone. Negan’s gaze, previously light and playful, turns dark and riveted as he gives Carl’s face a long once-over, slowly going down from his sweaty brow to his flushed cheeks and lips before settling on his neck, just above the soaked collar of his t-shirt. His gray eyes stay there for long seconds, transfixed, before Negan suddenly blinks, gaze flicking to the ceiling as he mutters under a raspy breath, “Je-sus.” Carl doesn’t have time to fully grasp what just happened that Negan is already moving, disappearing inside the wives’ apartment with a sharp exhale and a shake of his head. His warm and spicy scent lingers in the air around Carl, thick and heady.

This is one of my favorite moments in this chapter because it's really difficult to write a longing/erotic scene where in fact nothing is happening, especially when I have to tread the line of Carl's pov, of him still being mostly innocent and unaware of what Negan wants to do to him, while at the same time knowing it (as shown in the dirty dream that Carl has right after this moment).

I'm not going to quote the dirty dream, but I did want to have Carl explore his sexual attraction to Negan on his own before any smut happened between them. It felt important to me that Carl had at least some time to accept that he's sexually attracted to Negan, that this anticipation builds, before anything happened. A boy doesn't go from being sexually repressed for four years to jumping into bed with a man 3x his age out of nowhere. (Btw, Carl masturbating while thinking of Negan was inspired by this awesome fic Secret Handshake by Gonfalonier) (I'm realizing now that these re-read posts could also be a great place to rec some Cegan fics. If you like them, do show them some love!)

Now, the beer scene. Not gonna lie, I still have no idea where the inspiration for this one came from but I am SO PROUD of it. It's just the most devious interrogation technique. Negan knows very well what he's doing, that Carl probably never had a drink in his entire life, that he will be affected by the alcohol, less able to think and lie, all of this without touching a single hair on Carl's head.

And of course at the end of the scene is this awesome moment that will haunt Carl again and again:

He keeps his tone casual, but Carl doesn’t miss the dangerous edge in his voice when he asks, “And since when do you take orders from pretty boy Mark?” He opens his mouth but before he can answer, Negan snaps, “Drink.” The bottle is more than half-empty, its taste milder than before, hints of sweetness coating his tongue underneath all the earthy tanginess. It takes Carl a second to remember the question he was asked. “I don’t. I just… I didn’t want anyone to get hurt.” The crow’s feet around Negan’s eyes mellow for a brief instant, his expression turning understanding. But it only lasts just that, an instant, before anger takes over once more. He leans forward, towering with all of his height over Carl. His lips brush against Carl’s ear, but there is nothing seductive about it. It’s a warning, plain and simple. “Don’t be soft, it doesn’t fuckin’ suit you,” Negan growls.

It's not just the lie that bothers Negan, but the fact that Carl lied to protect *Mark*, young and fit Mark, who's already charming the pants off Amber and now Carl too. This is the first time that Negan is jealous of another man that Carl interacted with since Shane. After Carl killed Shane, Negan thought all the competition had been eliminated, that he was finally the only man in Carl's orbit, but now he realizes that it's not necessarily true.

The line "don't be soft" especially will come back in part 3 because Carl will never be able to forget it. Negan sees that Carl's lie was not done out of love for Mark but compassion, that Carl has a good heart, and of course it's something that Negan appreciates and admires, but at the same time, it's also something that deeply frightens Negan. Negan associates softness with weakness and, as his talk with Gabriel in the "Big Scary U" episode highlights, he is intent on eradicating weakness: the weakness that made him afraid of killing walkers in the "Here's Negan" flashback episode, the weakness that made him forget to turn the generator back on because he was afraid it would attract walkers and which led to Lucille's medication be ruined, the weakness that let him be captured by the Valaks Vipers biker gang, the weakness that made Lucille kill herself rather than fight cancer... Like Shane, Negan is desperate to turn Carl into a hardened and ruthless killer because they both think it's the only way Carl can survive: by being as merciless and cold as they are, because Negan and Shane have seen too many good and soft people die horrible deaths and they'll be damned if they let this happen to Carl. Negan, like Shane, knows that the real danger is not the walkers or other people, but it's yourself, your own kindness and morals and empathy. Those are the things that get you killed. It's tragic that so much of Shane and Negan's abuse toward Carl is driven by fierce protectiveness and absolute terror at the thought of anything happening to Carl.

This post is far too long already so I'll wrap it up with two scenes: the conversation between Carl and Dwight after Negan left the room, and Negan ironing Mark's face off.

I can't remember if I've said this before but the relationship between Carl and Dwight was really unexpected. I never planned on them bonding but, as I wrote the story and re-watched the episodes about Dwight from canon, it just seemed natural considering all the similarities between them: the disfigured face, the fact that they started as Negan's enemies, that their blind loyalty and devotion to Negan is underpinned by seditious rebellion (Dwight because he let Sherry get away and Carl because he freed Rosita). Dwight often acts as a sort of moral bell tolling for Carl. He's the one reminding Carl of the harsh reality of Sanctuary, of who Negan is. And for all that Carl likes to forget, he has to acknowledge that Dwight is right about everything. There will never be peace at Sanctuary, not in the long term, because Negan's Sanctuary is the product of his grief and anger and desire for revenge after the death of Lucille. The very inception of the place stemmed from the worst parts of Negan, and no matter how much Negan rationalizes it, no matter how many rules he creates to justify Sanctuary's relevance, it will never be freed of the ghosts that haunt it, of the blood and bones it was built on.

I know I talk a lot about the significance of Lucille the bat (Negan's heart and dick wrapped in barbed wire, the most vulnerable symbol of his past turned into his most brutal weapon) but I think Sanctuary holds the same place as an embodiment of the best and worst parts of Negan: the name itself promises refuge, peace, shelter and security, but Negan has fostered an atmosphere of ruthless violence and competition inside it, has kept the workers subdued and turned the Saviors into a feral pack of dogs lashing out against everything and everyone. Like Lucille, Negan's Sanctuary is fenced and weaponized, its boundaries covered in walkers to keep everyone at bay. There's little humanity in Sanctuary, like there's little humanity left in Negan. It's there, but it's faint and it's kept fenced in, tucked away inside an impenetrable fortress. It never ceases to amaze me that with all the resources at his disposal, Negan could have made Sanctuary a place worthy of the name. It's clear he knows how to make a place attractive (his room is glorious in a bachelor pad kind of way, and so are the harem and the room meant for Daryl). But he doesn't. Instead he keeps the factory gloomy and frightening. Because the Sanctuary, like Lucille, was created out of grief and fury. Negan doesn't want to make it hospitable. He wants it to be a punishment on himself and everyone around him.

I'll finish with this glorious line, which encompasses Negan's jealousy, his pettiness, and his reflex to lash out at the people he cares about because he's still, deep down, a wounded animal snapping at everyone who tries to help him:

“Since you like cleaning up after Mark so much, get a mop. Your boy made a mess,” Negan sneers before brushing past him.

Conclusion; tldr: This fic is an oven and I'm turning the temp all the way up. Carl and Negan are terribly horny for each other, but it's all part of the cooking process. Negan is marinating Carl in beer. Carl is having a dreadful time remembering that the man he jerks off to is still a monster. Negan is the most tragic character ever and the Sanctuary is basically the haunted manor in a Gothic Victorian story. Only one chapter left for part 2.

[wyvchard]

My specific Phoenix (the stuff I write without a certain tag are written without descriptions and have vague memories on purpose. I tend to write more specific-to-my-Phoenix lore moments in my RP / ask blog with a certain tag.) takes several points from a (last I checked) collective culture.

My Phoenix grew up in a culture where they're 'encouraged' to give people "face" to "get along" in order to avoid "embarrassing" people (even if they're horrible) and staying silent, even when the situation is bad, is often a side effect of it. Another aspect of it it "showing respect", which is often misused to "justify" some bad things. They weren't really experimented on or hurt by a bad family life, they actually had good loving parents and siblings. However, their extended family wasn't as loving or nice.

Which is why their decision to save John Juniper's life is so emotionally complex for them and they're still navigating how to feel about that. It reminds them a bit of the past in a slightly bitter way.

There's also an emphasis in the wider culture to form connections and it's through this connections that Phoenix got in contact with the agency.

Phoenix sought the agency out after a certain incident involving Zoraxis operatives shooting at them as collateral damage. They weren't the target but they were with the target since they were close. They wanted answers and they went to get it. They took advantage of the fact they're well-connected to gain access to intel into the agency. (In fact, they'd been involved in the information network for far longer than their time in the agency.)

While they absolutely loathe Zoraxis, they're more merciful towards Zoraxis operatives. Not everyone has the strength or opportunity to walk away, after all.

Onto little things that I add onto them, partly related to / taken from / inspired by the culture I'm basing them on and stuff people do in real life:

Souvenirs. Born in a culture where you tend to buy things (usually food) when you go on a long trip. (Also contributed to the fact they carry candy and snacks around all the time.)

Favors and their weird relationship with them. They don't like feeling indebted because of the (largely unspoken) expectation of paying it back. When they help, they usually show when they don't expect to get it back.

Their complex attitudes towards authority figures. They love their handler as family by the end of the third game but they don't reveal everything to him. They trust the agency as mostly peaceful but they have a backdoor to escape. Always. (Brought on about their knowledge of history. It's pretty dark.)

Silence and the fact they don't reveal secrets. "You didn't ask" is their common go-to. They like to pretend they don't know certain things so they don't get involved in the drama.

They're a bit too eager to get everything in writing. Something about not getting framed and having proof just in case someone tried throwing them under the bus. (Which most likely happened prior to them working for the agency.)

There's more but I wanna write those ideas instead. Some parts of the backstory have been shown, as seen in this whumptober entry but I'm still hashing out the details.

Hispanic/latino/asian phoenix’s r lowkey so cool as someone with a Hispanic phoenix and a hispanic mom 💥💥💥

[priceofreedom]

why are Aerith, Tifa and Zack ALWAYS the target in this freaking fandom

[itsalwaysforyou]

just remembered a wip i had which was jay at uni meeting normal people and desperately trying to act cool and normal whilst internally screaming about being in a whole new place with all new people and not having his gang with him

[pwurrz]

being obsessed with yakumo is a job and baby i’ve never called in a sick day!!!!!

[acourtofquestions]

Chapter 89

I just finished Chapter 89

[gigantomachylesbian]

Guys. I did not know before now that writing could be painfully millennial in a full prose book but the pho*nix ke*per has proven me wrong and I have to complain about it in the tags

[softestepilogue]

y’all keep saying how y’all hope ed becomes redeemable and like who tf cares he did anything wrong lmao. pushing Lucius overboard? hilarious. stranding the crew? hysterical. chopping off iffy’s toes? comedic af. y’all always so worried about a character being redeemable or morally right and it’s exhausting. that’s why modern books are what they are now. boring and lame af. ed is morally gray. he’s always been morally gray. he don’t like killin but he likes maimin and he has anger issues. and he’s hilarious when he does all of it.