#by ‘close family member’ i mean my actual mother

[blackynsupremacy]

MISSING YOU

pairing: smallville!clark kent x black!fem!reader

fandom: smallville (2001-2011)

summary: your good friend, clark kent, is there for you after you experience a major loss.

contains: fluff, sensitive topics, heavy angst, mention of cancer, mention of death, coping mechanisms, based on true events, crying, self insert, grief, sadness, hugging, a kiss on the cheek, you can imagine this with any comfort character tbh.

a/n: hey, guys! i just want to say thank you all for the love, support, and condolences. it means a lot. this blurb does contain material that has happened to me irl and i’m writing as a way to cope with the recent loss of a family member that i was really close with, so please be kind. fun fact: my grandma actually used to play pac-man dowwwn and win. it was a memory that popped up while people were visiting after she died. if this is a sensitive topic for you, please DO NOT READ! requests are coming in slower than usual, so that’s why they’re closed. btw, fuck cancer.

taglist: @greengoblinswifey @hopefully-saturn @jkr820 @hoffmansgirl @austeenbootler @niteskysx @sabrinasopposite @thabiddie23 @hnch33rios @xoxoglittergossip @supaprettyg @motherismotheringggg @oscarisaackissmykitty @simply-lovley44 @elitesanjisimp @gxuxhdjdu @v3n1ce-bxtch @iamsebastiansstan @stargirl-mayaa @miguelspvssy @oliviaambs @artyandink @dulcescorderitas @ellethespaceunicorn

“thank you so much for coming, martha.” your mother commended with a sad smile as she took the dessert plate from martha kent’s hands who then brings her in for a warm, sympathetic embrace. clark and jonathan stood behind the women before their gaze shifted to the rest of your relatives and friends that were gathered at your grandmother’s house.

“i’m so sorry for your loss, dear.” martha whispered, her hand rubbing your mother’s back in a comforting caress. with a soft “thank you”, her and your mother pulled away from the hug before she’s greeted with hugs and condolences from the rest of the kent family. after she invites them all inside, she holds clark back by the front door.

“if you need to find y/n, she’s upstairs in my mama’s room—she’s been in there for a while. you’re her good friend, clark. perhaps, you can talk to her?” your mother’s pleading brown gaze matched his sincere baby blues. your mother was right after all, ever since you were kids, you and clark had been thick as thieves by hanging out in the loft, studying at the talon, solving the bizarre mysteries of smallville, and so much more, but things started to shift when your grandmother’s cancer had returned. her declining health condition rendered you distracted from your studies and friends as you made as much time as you could help take care of her while she was in hospice care. you spent time and took care of her as she did for you and others for most of your life. it all came crashing down when your aunt and cousin were watching her, assuming she was sleeping before she opened her eyes and took five shallow deep breaths until there was no more left to let go.

it was your responsibility to call the nurse, your hands and voice quivering as you informed her that your grandmother was unresponsive. your heart pounded in your chest, uncertain whether hers had stopped as well. thirty agonizing minutes had passed as your relatives, such as your brother, aunt, and uncle, came to assess the situation. the nurse had arrived, performed the standard procedure, and to your shattering disappointment, officially called the time of your grandmother’s death. it was a gut punch to say the least. all of the emotional and mental preparation couldn’t have really meant that you were ready to see her pass in real time. it couldn’t have meant that you were ready to live life without her. it certainly couldn’t have meant that she wouldn’t see you get married or have a family of your own like she did for your siblings and cousins. you walked out into the dark, windy night and you just screamed as the stream of hot tears ran down your face, your mother promptly came to console your doubled-over body. as you saw the funeral home take your grandmother away in a pristine hearse, that night made you sick to your stomach.

it all happened over the weekend, so you decided to take a few days off from school to process your loss. through small town word of mouth, clark and the rest of your friends heard of the news. lana, chloe, and pete each would send you emails or calls to offer their condolences as their schedules were too getting hectic to visit you in person. your mother, aunt, and uncle had arranged for one day where your other family and loved ones could gather to eat and converse of fond memories concerning your lost loved one at her home. you decided to wander off from the crowd and sneak off to your grandmother’s bedroom, a place of sanctuary that you’ve always known as a child.

clark was concerned for your well-being and he wanted to see you since you haven’t been at school. it hurt him to see you in any type of negative mood. it hurt him to see you so devastated. if clark was anything, he was a good friend— a good friend who wanted to be more, but was too cowardly to say anything. he brushed it off because this wasn’t the place nor the time, that could wait. right now, you needed a friend and he was going to be that. your mother pointed him in the direction of your location before he went on his way. he was a few feet away from the door until his heightened hearing picked up on a sound that resembled a quick, rhythmic "wakka wakka" noise with a somber, descending tone following shortly after.

clark deliberately stepped closer to follow the first sound he heard, pondering what you could possibly be doing in your grandmother’s room at an event like this. the door was cracked open, and he peered through to see that you were sitting on the edge of the bed, engrossed in a light blue cubed-shaped console with a silver joystick on top. your intense focus on the video game you were playing didn’t register his arrival. he glanced at the screen to see that you were playing none other than the iconic arcade classic, ms. pac-man. with a gentle touch, he tapped your shoulder, causing your hand to slip and mess up, resulting in your character to be defeated by the ghosts as you were on your last life.

“ugh, what!? look i just wanna be alo—“ your sentence was cut short when your brown eyes met with his blue ones that were full of the kindness and charm you always knew.

“clark? what—what are you doing here?” you asked, puzzled as you paused the game, not letting the console out of your grip. you didn’t mean to come off as brash as his presence did do you some relief. it’s just been a long week of bereavement for you. the farm boy stuffed his hands in his pockets, a sympathetic smile graced his lips.

“y’know i wouldn’t miss this for anything in the world.” your heart flutters at his words as he gestures towards the empty space next to you.

“may i?” he inquired. you nodded and scooted over to give him a good amount of space to sit next to you. before you knew it, he wrapped his arms around you in a amicable embrace.

“i’m so sorry for your loss.” he compassionately uttered into your ear. with one hand still on the console, your other arm reached to reciprocate the hug. the sound of his voice caused you to release a sigh and enough strength to verbally thank him before pulling away, a somber smile etched on your earth-toned face.

“lemme guess, my mom put you up to this, huh?” you quip, clark chuckled as he shook his head.

“partly, yes, but i’ve been wanting to see you and not just to bore you on all of the homework you’ve missed—it seems you’ve been preoccupied as it is.” clark comments, his eyes pointing towards the console in your hand. your eyes follow suit to the same item that you looked at with such sentiment.

“this was grandma’s. i remembered when she used to play this all the time and let me tell you— she was a badass!” at your words, you and clark laugh as you continued to explain how you went to her room to just think about her in solitude. that’s when the memories of her playing the game plagued your mind before you began to snoop through her closet. that’s when you found the familiar blue console of ms. pac-man. you crossed your fingers as you worked to hook it up to her old television. who knew that after a decade and some years, it worked as if it were brand new! from that point, you wanted to play and win the game as you never got to do so as a kid. you watched your grandmother play countless times and she let you give it a go, but you always ended up losing. it would discourage you because you really wanted to impress her, but she would always encourage you to keep going, reminding you that winning isn’t always everything in life.

“god, i wish i could just win this damn thing!” you exasperatedly sigh and sniffle, your thumb ghosting over the red button that would resume the game. clark’s eyes never pulled away from your profile, a few strands of your freshly braided hair fell in front of your face, he gingerly reached to push the braids back behind your ear only to see that your face was stained with tears. he called out your name.

“hey, hey—look at me. do you want to talk? y’know i’m always here to listen.” clark softly affirmed by placing his hand on your shoulder which relaxed under his touch. you turned your head towards him, sniffling as more tears rained down your now blushed cheeks.

“clark—it’s like i’ve seen this coming, but—“ you swallowed. “i can’t believe she’s not here. just six months ago, she was completely healthy. it’s just not fair!” the gut punch returned as her kind face flashed into your mind, the same face that would gaze at you with such content as she watched you grow from a baby to a young woman, even in her ailment. god, how you missed her so. you missed her style, her love, her kisses, her funny nicknames for you, her cooking, her laughter, but most of all, her presence. the reality of saying your final goodbye was biting at you. you sobbed, dropping the console to the floor as your arms found their place around clark’s torso.

not hesitating to wrap his arms around you, he rubbed circles on your back as you nuzzled your face within his signature flannel.

“i’ve got you. it’s going to be okay.” he reassured, cradling you in his embrace, his shirt getting so

he didn’t mind, he was going to be right here whenever you needed him and for that, you loved him immensely for it. in some situations, you always thought of clark as your hero, but even heroes have their limits, and in that moment, all you wanted was a piece of the past. you pulled away from him, wiping your tears with the back of your hand as you glanced at the console still in your hands. it was a relic from your grandmother's joy and your youth. although the game was paused, the bright colors of the ms. pac-man screen flickered like a beacon of nostalgia. you pursed your lips, cutting your puffy eyes to clark before clearing your throat to articulate the words.

“do you think—do you think I could still play, clark?” you questioned, your voice still trembling.

your best friend nodded, a gentle smile spreading across his handsome face.

“of course! she would’ve wanted you to play.” he reassured again, patting your shoulder. that was his own special signal of nudging to step into something that you would’ve seen as impossible.

with a deep breath, you picked up the console again, your fingers trembling as you pressed the start button to resume the game. the familiar sounds filled the room, and for a moment, you felt a flicker of your grandmother’s spirit and drive beside you as your hand began to move on the joystick. you were focused, determined to beat her high score, to feel that connection as you felt it all those years ago.

as the ghosts chased your ms. pac-man across the screen, you could almost hear your grandmother's infectious laughter encouraging you, urging you to keep going. you didn’t stop. with a furrowed gaze and a steady hand every single white dot was disappearing into your grasp as you effortlessly dodged the ghosts. each time you consumed a fruit power-up, clark kent was there as your personal cheerleader.

“c’mon, y/n! you can do it!” clark encouraged, his voice an enthusiastic tone as he leaned forward to watch you move the pac-man like clockwork on the television screen. with each dot you devoured, the weight on your heart began to lift, and you found yourself grinning despite the warm tears still lingering in your eyes. finally, with one last maneuver, you cleared the maze of the white dots with no lives lost, the screen flashing in celebration. you had done it! you won the game for the first time in your life. your grandmother had been there for recitals, birthdays, and graduations, but this had to be one of your biggest achievements yet and she wasn’t here to see it happen.

“i—i did it! i really did it!” you exclaimed, laughter bubbling up through your tears. an array of emotions spread through you like they never did before, you couldn’t even describe how it felt in that moment. clark beamed at you, pride shining in his ocean eyes.

“i knew you could. i know that she’s so proud of you.”

overwhelmed with emotion, you turned to him, gratitude swelling within you, so you did the unthinkable, but not the impossible. you leaned in, wrapped your arms around his shoulders, and landed a lingering, tender kiss on his cheek.

“oooh! thank you, thank you, thank you, clark! for everything. you’re the best person a girl could ever wish for.”

it was slow at first, but nonetheless he smiled. to your amusement, the once pale skin of his cheeks were now painted a faint crimson as his gaze was awestruck for a second until you called his name to return him back to earth.

“a-anytime. y’know i’m always here for you.” clark stammered, but you both could tell he was sincere.” his palm reached out as a warm invitation for you to take.

“i have no doubt about that and i’d do the same for you in a heartbeat, clark.” you return the sentiment by taking his hand, intertwining your fingers with his. a sudden warm tingle surged through you, which was strange as you’ve held clark’s hand on other occasions—platonically of course. what was this feeling? you were dealing with so much, it was difficult to even pinpoint it. his tenor voice broke you out of your daze.

“now, let’s go back to your family. i’m sure they need you just as much as you need them.” you nod at his statement. this was going to be hard, but you were grateful to have someone like clark kent in your corner. like the gentleman he was, he carefully tugged you up from your seat on your grandmother’s bed, careful that you wouldn’t stumble.

hand in hand, you walked back into the warmth of your family downstairs, carrying a piece of your grandmother with you, and the strength of your connection with clark lighting the way for the funeral, burial, and whatever dark days may be ahead.

[velvet-apricots]

A series of Codexs i wrote about my Rook. Taken from this post.

Note found in Rook’s pocket

A note of poetry with deep creases indicating its been folded and unfolded many times. The lettering is written in a neat, loopy cursive in emerald green ink

Eyes of spring beheld by my eyes of winter

Hair of autumn betwixt my weathered fingers

Lips like berries and all for me to devour

My clever bird, my darling Rook

May your hands forever more hold my heart

For as long as it remains beating

E.V

An entry from Rook’s journal

I dreamed about Weisshaupt the other night. All those Wardens we couldn’t help. Davrin said there were a thousand of them. Now there are only a quarter of that. Solas said it was a victory. I don’t know what to think.

Varric said it helps to say or write out what did go right so-

I got to punch the First Warden in the face

An Archdemon is dead. 

Davrin is alive. 

Ghilan’nain is mortal. 

That's four good things. I am particularly glad that Davrin is alright. 

Solas also said that I may have to sacrifice someone to win. I said that I was ready… But I am not. I refuse to let that happen. No one in my team will die. Call it childish, but I won’t be like him. I am already on the right track, given Davrin somehow got out not dead. No idea why, but Bellara says it probably has to do with Ghilan’nain being out of the fade and back in the real world. Something about the soul and stuff.

I don’t remember. I’m not smart like her.

Rook's Shopping List

A list written in a messy scrawl that drifts downward across the page.

Lucanis, please buy these for me. I have to go somewhere with Bellara. No time to get it myself. I left some money to pay for it.

Lipstick. Cherry red. (For me. Last pot was dropped into blighted water. Davrin said I should throw it away.)

Pistachios. Roasted and salted (for me to snack on)

Chocolate (also for me. I need it)

Honey (to make honey roasted almonds as we have way to many of them now)

Beans (for Emmrich. He can't just eat yams and fruit)

Several sacks of Flour (also for Emmrich. Needed for Seitan)

Jam, preferably cherry or apple (for Harding, wants me to try her ham and jam slams again with “proper jam”. Pray for me.)

Spicy Peppers (For Taash to add to their food)

A message between two companions about Rook

A series of messages written in Davrin and Neve’s handwriting.

Should we be worried about Rook? She keeps talking about Varric like he’s still around. - Davrin

What do you mean by “like he’s still around”? - Neve

I mean she’s saying stuff like “I am going to go talk to Varric” then she goes and talks at his stuff like he's actually there. But he's not. He’s dead. Doesn’t that bother you? - Davrin

I have seen people react to loss in similar ways in my work. They talk to the person they lost like there are there. To help them sort their thoughts. It’s a form of coping with grief. I am sure Emmrich would be able to explain it better than I can. - Neve

And watch him fuss over her like a mother hen at dinner? Not a chance. - Davrin

Letter from Rook to their love interest

Emmrich,

Amatus. That's all I want to call you. It's all I chant in my head (along with your name). I feel like a little girl gushing over a boy who shoved mud in her face (not that you ever would).

I can’t write poetry but I can tell you that I want to call you Amatus. Do you know what that means? It means beloved. That is what you are to me.

When we next meet in private. I want you to leave with my name chanting in your head too. Not Rook. But my real name. I think you will like my name. It’s a flower, and you like flowers. 

- The letter is signed with a lipstick mark.

A letter to Rook from a family member or close friend

A letter lost in the chaos of Elgar’nan’s attack on Minrathous. Stained with blood and blight, sealed with the wax seal of Legatus Charon Mercar

My Sweet Rabbit,

Never apologize. You did what you had to.

I will be waiting for you in Ventus. Do not die. You are not allowed to. Not until I see you again.

Love, 

Papa

A note/letter that Rook never sent

An unsent, unfinished letter. Crumpled up and left near the fireplace.

Dear Hawke,

I hope this letter finds you well. You do not know me, but I knew Varric, and you through him. I am Rook, and I traveled with him to stop Solas. I knew him for only six months, but I considered him a wonderful friend and a great mentor.

I send you this letter to tell you that 

I regret to inform you 

I am grieved to say 

Harding probably already told you that

He meant a lot to me

 I have his belongings still and 

The remainder of the letter carries on the same way until there is no more room to write.

[zhongster]

Guys I’ve been so productive on here tonight holy hell

I’ve had asks backed up so badly from when I was inactive but I think I’m finally starting to catch up a little bit 😭

[sigweiner]

⌁₊˚ Shiver ˚₊⌁ {P3}

Pairing: Jinx x Fem!/Gnc!/Reader

Word Count: 10.2k (oopsie)

Summary: You infiltrate a brothel with Jinx and Isha so the three of you can invade a home in Piltover to chill (and you + Jinx can do other hedonistic stuff).

Warnings!: fluff, smut, swearing, mild angst, t06!c relationship, substance use, mentions of dark ses and physical stuff.

a/n: This is the last part of this AU (I think) since I couldn't bother to split it in two, lol. Also English is not my first language, sorry for the mistakes, weird punctuation and sentences. Minors and creeps dni. Dividers by me.

{P1} {P2}

Jinx is spreaded out on her orange couch with her head resting on your lap while you play with her braids lazily. She’s telling you stories about her family members as the day stretches in an atypical manner, finding  both of you completely alone since Isha was staying over with Sevika so she could get some proper care as the mature woman actually had a place with functioning amenities, or as functional as it gets at Zaun. 

It came as a surprise to you when Sevika herself offered to take the kid in for a couple of days, mentioning the hideout was “no place for a child to live in”. And she wasn't exactly wrong but the three of you kind of developed some separation anxiety after you and Jinx had your altercation. Though on the bright side you now have a lot more opportunity to hang out with Jinx and, you know, get to know her better inside out (and in an assortment of different positions).

“So your sister has a girlfriend from Piltover…” You start to ask with a grimace.  “And you accidentally killed her mother, who was a councilwoman?” You finish raising an eyebrow.

“Yep, totally accidental.” She replies, playing with an unfinished gadget of hers. You know for a fact that wasn't the whole story but you understand her leaving out a few important details to protect her self image.

“I don't know if I could date a piltie, to be honest.” You say after a beat of self-reflection. “Especially if they were that high up the ranks.” You conclude.

“Yeeeah, Vi has always had a weird taste in women.” The blue haired girl says nonchalantly. “Though I have nothing to say for myself since I'm fooling around with Zaun’s royalty.” She snickers.

“You talking about me? I'm not part of this shithole’s ‘royalty’.” You protest with a scowl on your face.

“Um, yeah you are. Your mother is one of the richest people in this city, you were untouchable until she decided to throw you to the wolves and not to mention you're a total brat.” She lifts a finger with each argument as if stating the obvious. 

“Ugh, you're a brat.” You childishly talk back before flicking your fingers on her ear.

Jinx flips you over on the couch in a swift movement so she is pinning you underneath her, holding your wrists above your head on a tight grip to constrain you. “See what I mean? And so freaking annoying.” She whispers close to your mouth.

“But you like it.” You pout your lips and bat your lashes but when you try to lean in to kiss her she pulls her head back smiling wickedly.

“I don’t know, maybe I need to teach you how to behave…” She releases one of her hands to run her fingers through the side of your face and down your collarbone. You shiver at the feather-like sensation but still manage to put on your best defiant look.

“What are you gonna do? Punish me?” You laugh which seems to piss her off a bit. Jinx almost falls for your trap before her face softens and she brings your arms to wrap around her neck.

“I would never hurt you, toots.” She whispers then lowers herself to pepper your face with kisses. You chuckle but your eyes can’t help but flutter at the tenderness of the moment.

“What if I’m into it?” You ask quietly while closing your eyes to better feel her soft lips on your skin.

“Are you?” You hear her retort back and you have to think for a moment before answering.

“I guess not currently… but I can eventually… if you’re into it too.” You open your eyes to stare into her pink spinel ones. She brushes a piece of hair away from your face and kisses your lips gently.

“Let’s not rush then, yeah?” She replies after pulling back. You can only assent your consent in the face of her affability.

This turns into a 10 minute makeout session, where she has you pinned down underneath her while kissing you senseless. The blue haired girl’s new favourite pastime was getting up close and intimate with you, so you’ve noticed. She once even said that you were just too soft and warm not to touch which you find absolutely endearing. However, you are getting self conscious about where this will eventually lead since Jinx also really enjoys taking control of your bodily senses. 

After Sevika walked in on you two having make up sex, you have been sneaking away every night to get some action after Isha falls asleep but it has been in uncomfortable places and you haven’t really let her get past second base with you. But now here you are all alone with a very charming and handsy Jinx pulling all her moves on you, making your body react in the most savoury ways possible. You wish this nagging feeling in the back of your mind would go away so you can receive all the love she can give you.

“Wait!” The request slips past your burning lips. The unconscious fear tries to take over your mind so you have to ask her to stop.

“What's wrong, toots?” She lifts her head up from your neck and studies you with a concerned look on her face. Her hands are so balmy on your body you could tilt over.

“I- maybe we should… slow down?” The uncertainty in your voice shines a light on your insecurities.

“Why? You don't like it? Did I hurt you?” Jinx scans between you and her looking for evidence of wrongdoings.

“No, I… really liked what you were doing.” You smile shyly and her eyes soften.

“Then what's the matter?” She looks small and you start to regret saying anything in the first place.

“It's just that I don't think I'm ready… to go any further than this I mean.” A look of realisation emerges on her face, granted she was snuggled comfortably between your legs, her bare stomach lined up with your center. She sits up next to you to give you some space.

“Oh, okay. I wasn't really trying to do anything like that… I mean I wouldn't do anything you didn't want me to.” She tries to explain herself. Jinx hugs her middle, suddenly seeming uncharacteristically self conscious.

“I know, I know.” You tell her softly when you sit up too. “I just wanted to let you know that even though I really enjoy being this close to you, it still makes me anxious… being touched by someone else.” It's your turn to recoil onto yourself. You pull your legs to your chest and rest your cheek on one knee.

“You know you can talk to me about anything, right?” Her eyes sadden when she looks at you.

Although nothing really bad happened to you on your last escorting job, it could have if you hadn’t been able to defend yourself properly, but the other guy was the one left pretty gravely injured, shit you’re not even sure he actually survived. Not that you care if he did but the truth is you haven’t really been able to process what happened and it’s been eating at your unconscious. Also, you're not certain if you want Jinx to know about it since she'll probably try and go after the guy. But damn, you want to trust her so badly and last time you ran away from vulnerability you almost lost everything.

“I- don't want you to worry about my stuff too, y’know?” You start saying before taking a deep breath. “But since you're asking and being so nice about it… I can try to explain why I'm so… insecure about this.” You manage to finish saying before she reaches out to touch your hand.

“Your problems are my problems, toots, there's no turning back now.” She says half jokingly then interlaces her fingers with yours.

“Heh, lucky me.” You shake your head trying to hide a bashful smile. “Fine, but you have to promise me not to go do anything reckless because of what I tell you.” Your expression changes to a warning.

“Fiiiineh.” She rolls her eyes but gives you a sideway smirk.

“Okay, well I was a um - an escort at the Rapturewalk, y’know my mother’s layer of doom and um - one day I got a job to do just that with a really rich topside dude and eerrr - I had to use self defense to set some boundaries but I guess I got carried away slightly and he might not even be alive anymore.” You manage to stammer out your story.

“He tried to hurt you?” She asks with a serious expression on her face. You chuckle, shaking your head.

“He had no chance, princess. I didn't even give him an opening. But… he might have hurt other people…” You try to reassure her and lighten up the mood but you're very much aware of how serious this was.

“I should make sure he's dead for what he tried to do with you.” She has a manic look on her face which usually was not a good sign.

“Don't bother, he already got what he deserves. I made sure of  that.” You reach out to touch her arm and she relinquishes. “He'll never hurt anyone else ever again.” You say with a dark look on your face.

“Still… If I ever bump into him sometime, it's over for him. For good.” She takes your hand and kisses it tenderly and you stroke her cheek in turn.

“My hero.” You say somewhat jokingly but deep down you believe just that.

“Yeah, yeah… well if anyone other than me ever touches you ever again I won't hesitate to pow-pow them.” She mimics a gun with her fingers, aiming at an imaginary target.

“Okaaay… let's not get carried away by unnecessary vengeance attempts, yeah? And hey, if you're a really good girl for me and behave I might even let you in my pants, what do you say?” You whisper the last part close to her face, making her huff and pull you to straddle her lap, hands moving on your thighs instantly.

“I don't know, trinket, I've never been good at behaving.” She says raking her hands up till her fingers find your hips as you cradle her face in your hands and close the gap between you. Jinx moans when you capture her bottom lip between your teeth.

“Well then… you're just gonna have to imagine what it feels like to have me tightening around your fingers.” You whisper in her ear and the poor girl can't help but whimper as she tightens her grip on you.

“Fuck, you're so mean.” She pouts and you kiss it off her lips, twirling your tongues around each other, keeping up until you both need to catch a breath. The blue haired girl starts turning her attention to your neck and you cradle the back of her head, ranking the tip of your fingers on her scalp carefully so as not to mess up her braids. Jinx downright turns to mush, burying her face on the crook of your neck.

“Oh look, an off switch.” You chuckle and she lets out a protesting whine but doesn't move. You stay like this for a bit until you hear her voice again.

“Did you like it? Escorting I mean.” She asks quietly without looking at you.

“Mostly, to be honest. But there were days I just went through it. And even though it was expected of me to do so, I found a way to enjoy it.” You answer earnestly. “Why? You thinking of changing professions?” You ask jocosely. She snorts and finally lifts her head to look at you with a dopey grin on her lips.

“Only if you're my sole client.” She winks at you before capturing your lips between hers once again.

“Uuuuugh, I'm soooo booooored!” Jinx has just walked up to where you're cleaning your blades inside her dirty tub, to slide inside it and sit opposite you with her legs dangling over the edges.

“Wanna have sex?” You ask nonchalantly. It's only the second day you two have been away from Isha and the other girl is already running out of things to entertain herself.

“Sure.” She retorts in the same tone. “But I wanted to… I don't know, blow something up or go on an adventure, see the world a little bit.” She digresses. You hum, trying to think of anything interesting you could do.

“You know what I've been dying for? A really big comfortable bed and a stupidly hot shower.” You say as you skillfully flip a knife around your fingers. Jinx’s eyes grow wide as she seemingly has an epiphany.

“Holy shit, Trinket. I think the old biddy might know someone who may have what you want.” She blurts out. “I mean, it certainly isn't the same as blowing shit up but I think it will do.” She says seemingly making a decision.

“And how would Sevika know someone like that?” You ask unamused. She waves you off and stands up to go grab her cloak.

“Be back soon. Don't you dare go anywhere, toots.” She says pointing a finger at you but before you can ask where she's going she's already out the exit.

After a couple of hours had passed, Jinx returns with a very annoyed looking Sevika  who has the kid propped on one of her shoulders. You stand up to greet them and the little girl is put down so you can run towards each other and embrace tightly. Oh how you've missed her and you tell her so; sure being alone with Jinx was definitely fun, to say the least, but without Isha something always seemed to be missing. The older woman only greets you with a nod and an unintelligible grunt, looking like she'd rather be anywhere else but here.

“We've got a job for you, Trinket.” Jinx announces putting her hands on her hips. You let go of Isha to give her a confused look.

“What are you on about now?” You ask, entirely uninterested in any kind of work.

“There's a man from Piltover who frequents Babette’s place and he has real estate knowledge, like where completely furnished and recently renovated houses lay devoid of people.” Sevika explains in a monotone as Jinx’s grin grows wider and wider.

“Yeah, and since you've got experience in that line of work, y’know at ‘fun’ houses, you're gonna get this information for us.” Jinx adds to the conversation.

“Hell no! I'm not gonna go back to that just for a home invasion.” You protest.

“You're not gonna do anything really with the guy, you just have to chat him up until you get what we need and then you can bolt.” Jinx tries to convince you.

“Well then why don't you do it?” You ask her angrily. She rolls her eyes at you, losing her patience.

“Because someone would probably recognise me and I'd definitely end up shooting the guy!” She exclaims in an aggravated way then sighs. “Look, I'm not gonna let anything happen to you. I'll be behind the walls watching and if he tries something I'll take him down.” She makes a good case but you're still unsure about all of it.

“I've heard about your reputation, Shiv, from when you worked for your mother at her freak house and if any of it was true, then you are the best candidate for this job.” Sevika weighs in with a raised eyebrow.

“My reputation? What in the world - you know what? I don't even wanna know.” You start saying before shifting focus. “Ugh, fine but you owe me big time for this.” You point your finger at Jinx before crossing your arms on your chest.

“I can definitely make it up to you afterwards.” She says with a dirty grin on her face, making your cheeks burn.

“You two are disgusting and I'm leaving now.” Sevika says already turning around. “Jinx will fill you in on more details and kid, take care of these two idiots.” She addresses Isha over her shoulder before exiting.

The child pulls at your hand to get your attention and you crouch down to talk to her on her level. “Did you have fun with Sevika?” You ask her while stroking one of her small braids gently. She nods but diverts the subject by gesturing that she wants to help with your plan.

“No, listen kid. That place is no good for you to be anywhere near it. You've gotta sit this one down.” You tell her patiently but Isha insists she can handle it and that it won't be a problem for her. 

“Hmmm, I think we can put her to use.” Jinx says, ruffling the child’s hair and when you start to protest she interrupts you. “Don't worry, trinket I'll make sure to shield her from any evil.” She gives you a sideways smirk and turns to walk towards her workstation, leaving you frustrated.

It's the evening of the day of your little heist and you're getting ready inside Jinx’s tent to infiltrate Babette’s brothel in a couple of hours. You fix your face with make-up, even though most of it will be covered by a mask, and change from your all black attire to a pastel coloured lingerie set you had to steal from a local shop. You haven't looked like this in almost a year now and you think the person staring back in a thin broken mirror next to the couch couldn't look less like yourself. 

You find the underwear way too revealing around the bottom, since the tiny v-string scarcely cups your sex and the corset it came with barely covers your torso, making you realise you have definitely loosen touch with the trade. But overthinking this doesn’t help at all so you fix your thigh high socks, attaching them to a matching garter belt before you peek your head out the tent to call after Jinx.

“Hey, can you give me a hand?” You sort of whisper, trying not to bring Isha’s attention towards you. The kid seemed to be very distracted with a gadget at the workstation and the other girl was sitting on the edge of the same propeller you’re on.

“With wha-” Jinx chokes on her own saliva when she gets inside the tent with you. “Are you trying to fucking kill me?!” She exclaims before covering her agape mouth with one hand.

“Calm down, I need help with this corset.” You say trying to cover your chest and lower half with your hands. “Ugh, stop being a horny freak and tie it up for me.” You reprimand her but she's already running her hungry eyes all over your body, making you fluster.

“I'd rather help you take it off.” She replies cheesily, and tries to pull your hands away so she can take a better look at you but you swat them away.

“Stop it! We've got no time for this, princess. Later okay?” You try to distract her with an empty promise and she pouts dramatically. You lean in to give her a quick kiss and she chases after your mouth when you pull away.

“You're being really mean to me lately…” She whines but lays her hand on your waist to turn you around so she can start working.

“It's not on purpose, I promis- ah!” You gasp as she pulls at a loop suddenly.

“Too tight?” She pauses and kisses the back of your shoulder sweetly.

“No, that's good. Keep going.” You manage to say after you steady your breathing. She pulls back and starts working again.

“Y’know, I've gotta say… this color makes your ass look soooo edible.” She snickers and you can't help but chuckle at her silliness.

“The color huh? Bet my client will think the same.” You provoke her so she retaliates by snaking an arm around your stomach to pull your butt against her crotch while her other hand secures the unfinished laces of your corset.

“I'll kill him if he even thinks about touching you.” She rocks her hips forward and then nibbles at your shoulder lightly. Gods, your panties are going to get ruined before you even get there.

“C’mon, princess. I promise I'll make it up to you if you behave.” You try to appease her now. “And the kid’s gonna get suspicious of what we’re doing back here.” You really don’t want Isha to see you like this, it’s bad enough she’ll be tagging along.

“Ugh, you’re no fun.” She huffs but relinquishes and pulls back to resume working on your corset.

After what seems to be an eternity for you, the time comes to leave and start your operation but you realise your nerves are getting the better of you when your palms start to clam up. You make Jinx promise you she won’t let Isha see or hear anything that goes on in that place and that the child will come out unharmed and free of any trauma that relates to the situation. Although she rolled her eyes at you and gave you a dismissive shrug, you caught her having a talk with Isha where she handed the kid a pair of noise canceling ear plugs, which doesn't solve anything but it’s better than nothing.

The three of you head out to Babette’s and you have to activate your professional persona mode, otherwise you’re not going to get through this entirely sane. You kind of wish you had taken a shot of something just to take the edge off but you got rid of all the bottles of liquor in the hideout since they were becoming a bit of an issue and you once caught a curious Isha taking a sip out of a bottle of rum that was lying around. And even though Jinx believes the small girl can handle anything, you feel obligated to shield her from all the world’s evils. Is it possible to do so? Probably not, but you’re surely going to try.

The back of the establishment is located in a dirty alleyway and there’s a very burly security guard by the door that holds a sign which indicates this was an employee only entrance. Jinx and Isha  take a different path where there’s a loose piece of wood on the wall and they disappear inside as you wonder how the hell the older girl knows about this secret entrance. But now it’s your turn to put on a bunny mask before you approach the security guard. You hand him a paper that Sevika got you, containing a written referral from another brothel that supposedly had a good reputation, and he grunts before opening the door for you.

The air is thick with hookah smoke and a strong rose oil smell that makes your eyes water a bit but you push past the uncomfortable feeling to knock on Babette’s office door. She orders you to enter and the first thing you see is a mature yordle woman sitting behind a wooden desk, scribbling away on a large open book. She doesn’t acknowledge you at first, choosing to finish what she was doing before getting a good look at you and when she does it is only to size you up with a raised eyebrow. You step forward to hand her your recommendation letter and she takes it without saying a word.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you madam.” You greet her, altering your voice to sound sweeter. “It’ll be an honor to work for you if you’ll have me.” You sound alien to yourself but it’s part of the job.

“Let me take a look at the merch, darling.” She waves her slender fingers at you for you to come closer. You unlace the ribbon of your coat, slowly shrugging it off your shoulders and you can see her gaze lingering on the implants scattered all over your body. You bite at your lower lip trying not to demonstrate how being this exposed really makes you feel.

“What are those implants for?” She asks after a minute then gestures for you to turn around.

“I had a few health issues and these saved my life, long story short.” You tell her in the most honest way you can.

“Hmmm, that might be a turn off for some people but I believe you can make me some good money.” She says finally and goes back to her book. “Get to work, honey.” And with a wave of her hand you’re sent away.

Now that you've successfully infiltrated the place, you just need to find where ‘Real Estate Guy’ is and extract the information, quick and easy, no need for unnecessary touching and undressing, or so you hope. You walk through a long dimly lit corridor where there are several entrances to different themed rooms and sounds of people being pleasured fills your ears, bringing you back to a time you thought you never would have to come back to. You take a deep steadying breath and focus on the task ahead.

You find a room decorated with a pastel floral theme where some incense is burning an aphrodisiac flower scent and a sultry beat is playing in the background. You see a frail man dressed in a beige suit that very much looks like it was tailored at Piltover, sitting on the edge of a loveseat at the corner of the room. You make your entrance, taking off your coat and flipping on the ‘occupied’ sign. He looks up when he notices you and a frown appears between his eyebrows.

“Oh, good evening. Y-you’re not my regular.” He seems insecure, wiping a drop of sweat that runs down his temple.

“I'm so sorry sir but the usual girl has called in sick. Don't you worry though, I'm here to help you relax.” You tell him in your best seductive voice while you saunter over to where he's sitting.

“Oh that's a pity, I hope she's okay. But I'm sure you're great too.” He laughs awkwardly and wrings his hands on his lap, glancing over at you when you sit next to him but then looks away nervously as you cross your legs.

“You don't need to be nervous, pretty boy. I don't bite. Well, not unless you want me to.” You chuckle lightly and he mirrors you.

“That's okay, maybe when we get to know each other better…” He trails off and you thank the universe for giving you the easiest job ever. “Is that alright with you? If we get to know each other first, I mean.” He still doesn't look at you when he speaks and you take the opportunity to scan the room. 

There's a side table next to the loveseat with an assortment of dildos and butt plugs in different colors and shapes and a bar cart at another corner with a couple of glasses and three different types of alcohol. You think you might have to loosen him up a bit to make him talk but not enough for him to feel comfortable to make a pass at you. You get up suddenly to prepare a couple of drinks.

“Of course! Anything you want, handsome. My mouth is a bit dry though, I need a drink. Will you join me?” You ask, already pouring two glasses of whisky and adding some ice.

“Errr, yeah sure. Why not? I um… I'm not very good at first encounters.” He rubs the back of his neck before accepting the drink you hand him.

“You don't have to be good at anything, darling. Just be yourself. But just so you know, I'm already hooked.” You say to the most boring man you've ever met. You hear a giggle all of a sudden, coming from the back wall and you wonder if Jinx has been listening to your conversation.

“Oh, really? I usually don't get that… women rarely take an interest in me.” He says shyly and gee you wonder why, but again your opinion is kind of biased since you’re not very interested in men.

“Well that's absurd. You know, some people just don't know what's good for them, am I right?” You proceed to butter him up and soon enough he's talking about his very boring life as a real estate agent and how the market is doing in numbers and a bunch of tedious micro subjects you couldn't care less about.

After a while, you think you might’ve expressed your gratitude to the divine too soon. You haven't taken a sip of your drink yet and you don't plan to but he's just so monotonous you're afraid you'll fall asleep right in front of him. You try your best to seem invested in what he's saying but he's like a chamomile tea inducing your eyes to feel heavy and slip into dreamland. You look around the room trying to find something to get out of this situation which is taking too long already and your eyes land on his suitcase which has a set of keys hanging on it.

“You must know a lot of incredible houses in Piltover, don't you?” You ask when you find an opportunity in the conversation.

“Oh yeah, you have no idea! The last one I hosted an open house for was the best one in my opinion.” Then he proceeds to list all of its great features and then tells you the exact location of the property. 

“Wow, that sounds amazing. Can I ask you… have you ever taken anyone back there while, y’know, they're vacant?” You know this question is borderline suspicious but you're also sure this will go over his tiny brain.

“No… I-I couldn't. Besides, I don't have anyone to do anything like that with.” He stammers through his answer and you fake a sweet smile.

“Well I would go, if you’d invite me. I'm sure we could have a lot of fun together all around it.” You take a chance and slide your fingers on the lapels of his suit which makes him tense up a bit but he doesn't reject you.

“R-really? I um- don't know… we could get caught…” He starts sweating again and you giggle while rubbing one of your calves on the pantsuit of his leg.

“That's the fun part, silly.” You say as you get closer to him. He runs his eyes over your entire body, probably imagining all the ‘fun’ he could have with you in a luxurious house. “Do you have the keys to the place right now with you?” You bat your lashes at him and he seems hypnotised for a moment.

“I-I-I, yes I do. What are you thinking?” He lays one hand on your knee and glances at his suitcase.

“We should go there right now, what do you think?” You suggest as you put your fingers on his jaw to make him look at you. Behind you two, you see a piece of the wall move silently as a very sneaky Isha appears inside the room, shielding her view of you with her helmet.

“You're so beautiful… can't we have fun here?” He tells you with cheeks flushed. Damn, too comfortable but you need a distraction fast otherwise he's going to notice the little thief. You suddenly straddle his hips and grab the back of his head to bury it in your cleavage, making him gasp.

“Tell me what you want to do with me, naughty boy.” You tilt your head sideways to see if the kid already managed to swipe his keys and she is almost there. He lays his hands on your back as you wiggle your body on his lap comically.

“I want - I want to kiss your plump lips and make love to you until our bodies fuse into one!” Oh, what the fuck is wrong with this guy? You fake an obscene moan as you roll your eyes at his ridiculous fantasy.

“Please take me handsome and make sweet love to me.” You have to try hard not to laugh but you're a professional after all, or at least used to be. He then grabs your ass suddenly, which makes you feel a burning fire of anger inside you but before you can react you hear a loud thud and he goes limp.

Jinx is now standing next to you, resting her gun on one shoulder with an angry scowl on her face. You move the man away from yourself to lay his unconscious head on the back of the seat then you stand up and look back you realise Isha is still slowly moving towards the hole in the wall, seemingly unaware of what just happened. You sigh before turning to the girl standing right next to you who's still staring at the knocked out guy.

“Fucking freak. Thinking he can touch MY trinket.” She says between gritted teeth. You dare not to touch her since you believe it will trigger her further.

You still feel aggravated by what just happened but having her intervene in your favor spreads a white heat through your chest that you can't really define with words where it's coming from. Surely you don't need anyone to protect you since you can take care of yourself with minimum effort, and quite well at that, but there is something about being cared for so fiercely as your girl does for you that turns a key inside you. You wish you could kiss her right now because who would've thought, she's your hero after all.

“I'm sorry, princess. Things got out of control.” You say quietly, biting at your lower lip.

“You're in big trouble, toots but I'll deal with you later. Now let's get out of here before I shoot him in the head.” She turns to leave without looking at you but the pet name gives you hope and you take a second to grab your coat as well as a couple of souvenirs before following after her.

Making your way towards the mansion was not the easiest task, to say the least, as you had to find a way to cross the bridge between the two cities undetected. You had no choice but to explore the dark underground air tunnels that connect both provinces to reach the sumptuous structure which stretched through an entire block. And after a couple of minutes of trying out all the keys Isha had stolen, you're finally able to unlock a side door that leads into an immense luxurious kitchen.

It's past midnight when you're all able to find rooms you'd like to spend the night in, the small girl having picked a children’s bedroom that looked more like a themed park with the amount of toys, slides and candy colored furniture it held. Now Jinx and you find a bedroom that overlooks the garden at the back of the house, strategically trying not to alert neighbours of a possible invasion. There's a four post king size bed with a canopy on one side of the bedroom that brings a happy shine to your eyes upon seeing it.

You throw yourself on it and stretch your arms above your head, making an excited squee sound from how satisfying it feels. Jinx is looking out the floor to ceiling windows that lead to a medium size balcony, but you've no idea what she's peeping at since everything there is to see is hidden by the darkness of the night. You wonder if she's still mad at you for letting that man lay his hands on you since she’s barely spoken at all on the entire way here.

“Hey, are you still upset with me?” You ask as you lay on your stomach to get a better look at her. She gives you a side glance over her shoulder but doesn't turn towards you when she speaks.

“You cheated, trinket. You weren't supposed to touch but you practically threw yourself at him…” Her voice is hoarse and almost sad, which lets you know she might actually feel hurt about what happened.

“I didn't see any other options, Jinx. The guy was so boring and it was taking so long for him to get comfortable enough to trust me with the information, I had to improvise.” You try to explain to her before taking a deep breath and getting up to go stand by her side. “I didn't mean to hurt you, I swear. Fuck I'm not even attracted to him, that dude was a total loser and he's not you, y’know?” You take a chance to slide the back of your fingers up her forearm and it's with relief that you notice she doesn't flinch.

“But he had his hands all over you… and - and you seemed to be enjoying it. That hurt loads, toots.” She whines like a child would and you just want to hold her even though she's the one that put you in this situation in the first place.

“I was definitely not enjoying it, he could've been a door for all I care. Besides, this kind of work requires a lot of acting and I’ll have you know, I was pretending really hard back there ‘cause he almost made me slip into another dimension with his dull ass chit chat.” You say with exasperation before you catch her trying to hold back a laugh.

“He was a real fun sponge, wasn't he?” She chuckles, turning to face you. “I think I might've fallen asleep a couple of times.” She snickers and reaches out to hold one of your hands.

“I know right? He had literally negative amounts of game, it was honestly disturbing, man. I don't think I've ever seen anything like it.” You start ranting with eyes wide and Jinx lets out a genuine laugh.

“I mean, guy had you sitting next to him wearing almost nothing and still couldn't do anything about it.” She rolls her eyes with a sunny grin on her lips and you're not quite ready for the implied compliment but it hits you in all the right places.

“Though he never really had a chance, I wouldn't let anyone other than you have me like that, ever again.” You stroke her jaw gently and her expression darkens instantly with lust. “Which reminds me, I swiped a few goodies for us earlier.” You slip your hand inside the pocket of your coat to grab a bright pink plastic dildo of medium size, a large textured purple one, a heart shaped butt plug and a bottle of lube to show her. Her eyes widen with surprise then she starts having a fit of giggles.

“Naughty trinket! You were thinking about snatching these the minute you saw it, weren’t you?” She puts her hands on your waist and you shrug but the sideway smirk on your lips answers her question. “I knew it! Then are you gonna let me use this on you or what?” She gets closer to you and you use your free hand to tuck a stray hair behind her ear.

“Hmmm, I don’t know… have you been a good girl for me, princess?” You lower your tone and Jinx’s eyes flutter as she looks at your lips for a second.

“I’ve been very good, toots. Didn’t even blow up any heads today.” She smiles at you innocently and you respond by kissing her deeply with the knowledge she’s anything but. It doesn’t take long for her deft fingers to start roaming, first feeling up your ass then massaging your chest before using one hand to hold you in place by your throat. Hmm, she’s been definitely picking up some moves from you.

“Hold on, Jinxie. These need to be cleaned up first.” You bring her attention back to the shiny toys and she sighs before snagging them from you.

“Ugh, fineee! You better not run from me though.” She narrows her eyes before stomping towards a door on the opposite wall that you assume leads to a bathroom.

“That could be fun, don’t you think?” You shrug off your coat when she’s out of view then move to cozy up in the middle of the bed, resting your back on the several fluffy pillows propped on the headboard.

“Nuh uh! No dice, trinket. Stop playing around.” She sounds exasperated as you hear the sound of water running and you just laugh at her response.

“Alright, alright then… will you help me with my corset again?” You’re anxiously waiting for her to come out and ravish you already, just thinking about all the things she’ll do to you is making you squirm.

“Yeah, yeah… I’m coming too-” She appears on the doorframe and freezes when she sees you sitting on the bed like a birthday present with one leg stretched and the other bent on the knee.

“Are you gonna stay there the entire night?” You ask in your best seductive voice, making her snap out of it and start making her way towards you. When you decide she’s close enough you start to move your bent leg sideways to give her a peek of your heated center. You let out a boastful laugh when she starts walking faster midway through.

“Thank fuck I’m no real estate man.” She jokes before taking off her boots and sliding into bed to kiss you desperately.

You throw your arms around her neck as she moves to kneel between your legs, spreading them apart with a light push of her hands and you take the opportunity to snake your lower limbs around her hips, trying to pull her as close as possible to you. Jinx rakes reverent hands through your torso as if trying to memorise every sensation her fingers elicit; the slight trembles, the sighs, the moans and the shivers. So you let her feel the smooth skin of your hips and thighs before teasing her digits on the hem of your tiny v-string.

You buck your hips upwards involuntarily, which makes you wonder, when was the last time you felt this much want? You honestly can't think of a moment being intimate with someone else felt this good and exciting. Fuck, you absolutely need her to possess you, and this is Jinx we're talking about so she certainly will. The blue haired girl sits on her heels as she pulls your hips onto her lap to rub the curved tip of the pink dildo against your center and through the fabric of your underwear, making you whine at the barely there sensation.

“This one okay tootsie toots?” She smirks at you and her eyes glow pink in the penumbra of the canopy. You swallow hard before you desperately try to grind on the toy she has lightly pressed against you.

“Fuck, sure but it would be better if it was inside me.” You tell her off impatiently. She giggles then puts the dildo aside to stand with a knee on each side of your hips.

“Turn over, I want to see what's underneath this corset of yours.” She demands and you hesitate for a second, debating with yourself if you want to provoke her or if you want to be coming hard in the next few minutes, before deciding on the latter and doing as she says. “Hmm so well behaved… maybe if you keep this up I'll give you what you want quickly…” She whispers the last part into your ear and kisses a path down to the back of your shoulder.

Jinx peppers your back with soft kisses as she plays with the string of your panties until she reaches your exposed ass and decides now is a good time to mark your skin with her mouth and teeth. You cry out in a mix of pain and pleasure and she licks her artwork tenderly before telling you this was just to remind you she has been here before. You chuckle incredulously because how the hell were you ever supposed to forget about her when you feel like she's the only one who can quench your thirst? And might as well be the first one to do so.

She works with deft fingers on the laces of your corset before turning you over again so you are laying on your back. Her eyes are soft now as she pulls down the shoulder straps down your arms before removing the piece of clothing entirely and throwing it lazily on the floor. You try to fight the urge to cover your chest with your arms but then she's telling you how perfect you are, so you dare not move. She leans down to kiss your lips languidly as her hands fondle your chest, pinching your nipples lightly in turns which makes you rub your thighs together in search of some friction.

After she's done marking your breasts with her affection, she manoeuvres to lay sideways next to you and you cradle her face between your hands when she snakes an arm under your thigh to pull it up towards your chest so she can rub her lithe fingers on your core, making you moan into her mouth. Your completely ruined panties are pulled to the side and you can feel her digits make light circles on your sensitive bud as you call her name feverishly, no longer being able to tell if you're upside down or inside out. You feel her guiding your hand to hold aside the tiny piece of cloth before she grabs the plastic toy to line up with your entrance.

You try to beg but words are out of your coherence capacity at the moment as she rubs the fake cock on your dripping pussy with intention. In an attempt to speed things up though you bend both of your legs upwards towards your torso before pushing her hand down, making the dildo slide in and fill you up effortlessly. You let out a long moan as you feel the object hit all the sensitive parts of your walls, the curved tip almost reaching your spot. When she starts to slowly pump the length of it in and out, your free hand flies to your clit to also give it attention.

“Tell me what you need.” She asks against the side of your face and you need to find a way to tell her you've been close ever since she started touching you. She moves some hair away from your flustered face and looks at you intensely before brushing her lips against yours. “I wanna know how to make you feel good.” Her teeth grazes the skin of the pulse point on your neck and your legs already start trembling.

“You… I need… you.” You manage to say amidst breathy moans which makes her slow down her movements between your legs and return her attention to your face. She looks at you in awe, the irises of her widened eyes almost entirely swallowed by her blown pupils. “What?” You think maybe you’ve said the wrong thing because your hazy mind doesn’t understand why she would almost halt to a stop now.

“Only me?” She whispers softly and you nod before pushing the hand she's holding the toy with so it reaches your tender spot. Not that she needs much guidance but you show her how your back arches off the bed when the tip of the dildo rubs against your back wall as you massage your sensitive bud.

Gods, the way she kisses you ardently now almost makes you break and then she’s running her mouth down your neck, leaving a trail of saliva one the way until she reaches your already hardened nipple to suck on it and you actually get hit by a wave of intense euphoria. Your entire body writhes uncontrollably with pleasure as Jinx helps you ride your high by keeping a steady pump of the dildo inside you. Your legs end up closing by themselves as you become overstimulated after a few beats so you pull her hand away to remove the toy from inside you.

She kisses all over your face as your body still spasms with the remaining electric jolts of your bliss. Then she brings the toy towards her mouth and starts wiping it clean, moaning at the taste of you, and as if this wasn't enough she lines it up with your lips so you can join her, your tongues brush against one another slightly as you sloppily flick them over the length of the shaft. You catch a sideways smirk on her face before realising she's observing the way you're lapping at it, and she must know how much that damn attractive grin affects you because in an instant you're pushing her to lay on her back as you straddle her hips.

“Proud of your handiwork, are you?” You start pulling her pants off and getting rid of all unnecessary accessories like her holster and gloves since you need to feel her skin on yours.

“Not gonna lie, getting in your pants is one of my greatest life achievements.” Her words are laced with sarcasm so you roll your eyes at her before pulling her top off.

“So you're no longer interested since you already got what you wanted?” You try to get a reaction out of her because the fire still burning inside you needs this to be rougher and more desperate.

“Ha! You're not getting rid of me that easy, trinket.” She laughs and crosses her arms behind her head to admire the view. You also take the opportunity to do the same since having her entirely naked underneath you doesn't happen too often.

“Good thing we're on the same page. Now…” You rip what's left of your underwear and throw it somewhere behind you before you move between her legs to line up your center with hers. “My princess, I want to return the favor since you were so good to me.” You lift one of her legs to secure it against your front as you lower yourself to sit on her.

When you rock your hips forward, feeling how deliciously wet she is and her already hardened engorged clit rubs against yours, you both moan in unison so you pick up the pace spurred by your intense lust. Jinx watches the sway of your lower body against hers, seemingly stunned speechless as she grabs the sheets beside her with force. You kiss her calf before biting at the firm skin there and she whines, turning her attention back towards your face. Leaning forward, you massage one of her boobs before pinching her pierced nipple lightly.

“Fuck, you're definitely trying to kill me.” She manages to say finally and you slow down the pace a bit to laugh at her reaction.

“What? We've never tried this position before?” Of course you know you haven't but you love riling her up so much, you can't help it. She narrows her eyes at you and grabs your hips with force.

“You're confusing me with someone else, trinket. Maybe your other girlfriends?” She pulls you closer and incites you to move faster and harder against her.

“No one… has ever compared… to you… princess.” You lean down to give her a sloppy kiss before straightening up again and adjusting your position to resume your tribbing. 

The bed squeaks with every thrust of your hips as her fire licks your core with burning desire, fuck she feels so damn good and you tell her so as she stretches an arm to grope one of your tits. She says she’s close and lucky for you with a couple more pushes you’re both shaking in tandem with the glorious strength of your mutual orgasm. You have to brace yourself with one hand on the mattress as your second climax of the night bites you hard and even though you’re still high with the blissful feeling, you’re not done with her yet. She’s still heaving when you lift yourself from her and grab at her legs to turn her over, exposing her incredibly irresistible peachy cheeks to you. 

Jinx gasps when you slap her ass playfully and when you lift her hips up towards your crotch, making her kneel between your legs as her upper body still lays on the bed, she hides her face seemingly embarrassed by the new position. “No need to be shy, princess. You’re literally perfect.” You lean forward to kiss her back while still holding her up with one arm. “Do you want me to stop?” You whisper and she shakes her head negatively. “What was that? You need to speak up otherwise I’ll take that as a yes.” You snicker and she grunts, frustrated with your teasing.

“Don’t you fucking dare stop, trinket.” She turns her head sideways to give you an annoyed look and you chuckle before straightening up again and cupping her sex with one hand.

“Hmm, good girl. Hope you’re ready for a couple more little deaths, your highness.” You tell her and she opens her mouth to reply but then you’re stroking your fingers through her damp folds to gather as much wetness as you can before nudging a finger in her entrance, and the words die out in her throat. 

Instead, a moan escapes her lips when you push inside her and you’re always taken aback by how tight she is, even after quite a few ‘stretching sessions’ where you’ve managed to fit in three of your fingers within her core. It does take a bit of clit play before she’s loosening up and swallowing your digits with fervor, but you surely worship the ways in which her body responds to your passion. She bites her fingers when you introduce a second one and you use the angle to massage her bare asshole, making her rock her hips backwards lewdly. 

Then you’re picking up the pace and burying deep and hard inside her sensitive pussy, the wet sounds of your movements filling up the room along with her loud whines of pleasure. She reaches an arm back to try to touch your thigh but you divert it's path by interlacing your fingers and bending her arm securely on the small of her back to hold her in place as you pump inside her relentlessly. Her back arches a couple of times with the impending arrival of her second climax and her legs tremble so hard, you believe the only thing holding her up is the tight grip you have on her.

Jinx lets out a short loud cry into the sheets as she cums all over your fingers, the brunt of it making her hips piston once onto the bed as the grip of her pussy pulls you forward with her. She spasms frantically underneath you but you're not done with her yet so you manage to let go of her bent arm to turn her over once more so you can sprawl on your stomach with your face buried in her center. You remove your fingers from inside her to coat her protruding bud with her slickness before you start sucking it. She gasps and tries to close her legs from how sensitive she is but you pin one of them down with your free hand so you can continue to eat her out.

Honestly, you don't know what's taken over you to go from being insecure and overzealous with her to needing the ferocious fire that burns inside you to consume you both. Maybe it's the realization that she can handle anything you give her, or perhaps it's knowing that deep inside you can trust her with your wild needs and unhinged desire for devotion. Well, whatever it is makes you rock your hips onto the bed to seek friction as you let out guttural moans, tasting her sweet nectar on your frantic tongue. She manages to lift herself on her elbows to watch your eyes flutter and roll backwards while you circle her clit with your tongue.

“Fuck, you're so good at this.” She manages to say in one breath as she's still trying to recover from her last undoing, and reaches out to wipe some sweat from your forehead before placing her hand gently on the side of your head. “But I wanna taste you too.” And there it is, the matching scorch that will deliver you both from evil.

“Yeah?” You give her a dopey grin and she nods with cheeks flushed then pulls you towards her lips to roll your tongues together, before you turn around to line up your center with her mouth.

She wraps her arms around your thighs to tug your hips down towards her face before lapping at the length of your pussy with intention, making you brace yourself on your hands as your body bends forward. You try to recover so you can rub circles on her sex, but then she’s flicking her tongue on your clit and you lose track of what you were doing, the rush of blood between your legs proving to be a sensational distraction. You rock down on her mouth and she stiffens her exposed tongue so you can rub your needy cunt against it wildly. You’re getting close again and as if realising this she tightens her grip on you to halt your movements.

“Mmm taste so fucking delicious.” She parts your folds to lick a path along your slit before capturing your sensitive clit between her lips to suck it lightly. You let out an obscene moan but force yourself to return your attention to her bare pussy. “Wanna do this all n-” She starts saying but then you’re swiftly eating her out with so much want she doesn't get to finish her sentence.

An unconventional race begins with you two competing to reach the finish line, although you wish there would be no end to this with how wonderful it feels. However, your ambition gets the better of you as you double down your efforts without mercy between her legs by sucking her clit with intention, your head bobbing up and down with your movements. Jinx’s warm breath caresses your dripping center as she lets out breathy moans before going back in to somewhat mirror your actions which you feel like it’s cheating but there are no real complaints to be made here. With a couple more suctions of your mouth she's cumming on your tongue and your orgasm follows soon after.

You help each other ride your highs by wiping one another clean until she asks you to stop and you're both completely limp on the now dampened bedding. You kiss her inner thigh before resting your cheek there as you try to catch your breath, you swear you can see stars on the peripherals of your vision when you close your eyes. You're both pretty much spent after this, the only thing to do now is to bask in the afterglow of your rapture. After everything you've been through today, your limbs finally start to feel heavy so you gather your last strength to manoeuvre your body so you can snuggle beside her, resting your head on one of her shoulders as you tangle your legs with hers.

“You’re not gonna fall asleep on me are you?” You feel her voice reverberate through her and a shiver crawls up your spine.

“Is that not allowed?” You ask lazily, making her chuckle for some reason.

“We’re not done yet. There are so many things I wanna do with you…” She rubs the back of her fingers on your forearm and you smile heartily at her enthusiasm.

“Really? Like what?” Your curiosity gets the better of you even though your eyes are already starting to close on their own.

“Like… having you against the window and… trying butt stuff… and um using the toy again on you and um on me too i guess…” She lists her fantasies as if trying to remember what she needs to buy a the grocery store. “And then there’s a really big tub in that bathroom that would be great to use too… but you know what would be insane?” There’s a sudden lilt of excitement on her voice.

“What?” You turn your head up to look at her through half lidded eyes and she smirks at you mischievously.

“If I could turn that toy you swiped into a fully functional dong with sensations and everything!” Her eyes shine in the darkness of the room and you’ve seen that look before which means she just had an eureka moment.

“Whoa, that would be really cool.” You kiss her collarbone sweetly before snuggling closer to her. “We can try all of that in a bit, princess… just need to rest my eyes for a second…” You’re sure you can reignite your fire in only a few moments from now but you’re already starting to doze off. She goes quiet for a few seconds before speaking up again.

“I love you, Y/N.” She whispers on the top of your head, and brings one of your arms to lay across her stomach.

“Love you forever, Jinxie.” You slur out your love declaration before slipping away into unconsciousness.

[cheeseceli]

Your nephew is jealous of him

Pairing: ot7 BTS × Gn! reader (individually)

Genre: fluff, reactions, a bit of crack

Request: when they try to get close to the reader, their toddler niece/nephew won't let them. The baby is really possessive of y/n and doesn't like anyone touching them.

Warnings: some of them are almost fighting with the kids lmao; that's it.

A/n: this was actually so fun lmao | daily click

Jin

‌oh so this is his first trial to prove himself as boyfriend material, he sees

‌he's ready

‌will try to befriend your niece

‌is actually trying to enchant her and be like "hey I'm nice too :D"

‌and honestly it's working?

‌of course it is, bro is doing everything the little girl asks of him 😭

‌but his goal is not to steal you from your niece

‌is to steal your niece from you

‌being liked by the family ✔️

having a chance of being invited on next hangouts ✔️

impressing you by showing he's good with kids ✔️

‌he's so winning

Suga

‌he's honestly a bit confused

‌because why can't he be even three meters near you??

‌at first he thought the kid wanted to play with you or just missed you

‌but then he noticed the problem was him 💀

‌your nephew just low-key hates him

‌and actually, Yoongi ain't doing anything to change his mind

‌he's just chilling as far from you as possible

‌just so the kid doesn't make a scene

‌and when you laugh at him and try to get closer saying "it's okay"

‌he's like "please don't come any closer your nephew will attack me-"

‌kid 1, suga 0

J-hope

‌he thought it was funny

‌cute even

‌it was good to know kids liked you

‌that could only mean you were a very good person right?

‌well, now Hobi is the one who's almost becoming a bad person 💀

‌he can't handle your niece trying to take him away from you every. single. time

‌like hey, I like them too??

‌he's trying to either bribe her or just straight up calling her mother to take her away

‌"that's not mature" he doesn't care that much atp

‌he just wants a second with you without a kid screaming at him

Namjoon

‌he truly is trying to be the bigger person

‌he knows he is the adult and your nephew is just a little kid

‌but he is about to start beef with this child

‌he tried his best, but now he's just stressing😭

‌he really thought he could use this opportunity to get closer to your family but that's just too much

‌tries to leave you and the kid for a while and then he tries small talk with the rest of your family members

‌but if he comes back after a hour or two and your nephew is still being possessive

‌he's about to cling to you so the kid either makes a scene and is taken by his parents or just notice that he can't win

‌namjoon 1, kid 0

Jimin

‌he gives up

‌the kid can have whatever he wants, Jimin is not fighting him😭

‌in the beginning he tried to like talk with your nephew

‌negotiate even

‌but then the kid just starts screaming and kicking him when he tries to get close to you and he's like "yeah, no"

‌he can endure being away from you for a while

‌kid 1, jimin 0

Taehyung

‌i'm honestly surprised this kid likes you more than him because damn

‌he truly has his charms when it comes to kids

‌and I think your nephew would like him quite a lot honestly

‌that is until he decides to come close to you

‌and at first taehyung is just a little confused

‌but then he's offended

‌like "I thought we were friends?!"

‌is honestly more upset with the fact the child suddenly doesn't care about him when you're near than the fact he can't be around you

Jungkook

‌oh now this is a competition

‌"no, my niece is only three years old"

‌he doesn't care.

‌if she didn't wanna compete then she shouldn't have started it

‌he is trying to distract her like "oh look, an airplane"

‌and then he's running to you the moment she is busy with something else

‌and actually gets like 🤨😦😔 when he sees he lost for a child

‌actually relieved when the evening is over and you guys are going back home

‌ but if there's a next time, bro will make a whole war strategy and will be prepared

Masterlist | you'll probably like: you have a lot of plushies

Reminder that this is all fiction, this does not represent the members in real life!

Taglist (open!): @yuyubeans @butnotmontana @lelewright1234

Dividers by @peachesboard | images 1 , 2 and 3

[kuroananosanji]

One aspect of ZoSan that Westerners may not get the full nuance of is the concept of “うちの”, literally “of our/my household”. There’s a reason why the EA fandom (mainly Chinese from my POV) disproportionally ship ZS over other ships, to the point where even dudebros hop the joke.

So there’s this Chinese saying that means “be strict to yourself but lenient towards others” which is seen as model behaviour for respected individuals. I don’t know if there’s an equivalent idiom in Japanese but both Koreans and Japanese hold similar attitudes towards treatment of self vs treatment of others in society. Here’s the fun part: thanks to collectivist culture, one’s “self” extends to your immediate family too. Since you’re seen in conjunction with your family, if you’re head of the house and your “inferiors” misbehave in public, it reflects badly on you as a person. That’s why strict parenting is more normalised in EA culture, because controlling how your kids behave is more or less the same as controlling how you yourself behave. This is also related to how tough love is a more common form of affection in EA families, there’s a sentiment of “being able to be mean to you means we’re close, being too nice means I see you as a stranger.”

You might now see how this relates to the Strawhats in general (see: Nami beating up members for acting out of line). Sanji is a funny one coz he was sort of a maternal figure secondary to Nami early on in the series. Women aside, there’s a difference in how he treats men on his crew and “outsiders” (e.g. Ace). He’s actually not rude towards men, it’s just that we predominantly see his interactions with the crew! Since his crew is his family, he can be strict with them like how he’s strict with himself.

How does this relate to ZS in particular? Well, it’s because Zoro is closest to him on the self—others sphere. Luffy is his captain so despite the usual bickering he has to obey him to some degree. Usopp and Chopper are younger and weaker, so Sanji has a responsibility to take care of them and show generosity as an “elder”. Franky, Brook and Jinbe are way older than him so there has to be some degree of respect when interacting with them. Nami and Robin are Women. This only leaves Zoro, who is his equal in both age, power and hierarchical position on the crew. Essentially, Sanji has every right to hold Zoro to the exact same standard as he would himself. And given that Sanji is extremely harsh to himself, he’s harsh to Zoro too.

This is why there was virtually no discourse over the “Sanji calls Zoro a liability” moment in the EA fandom. The unspoken context was that Sanji was apologising to Jinbe for Zoro, who wasn’t performing his best. And since Jinbe is relatively new to the crew and also much older than Sanji, it feels like a mother/wife apologising for her son/husband?? It’s giving “I’m sorry my Zoro embarrassed us”?? It’s giving “Zoro is my responsibility”?? On the flip side Zoro absolutely does this to Sanji too. I can’t name a specific anime moment but in one of the mobile game collabs he said something like “sorry our cook caused trouble for you”. The specific wording was うちのコック. (They both think they’re managing the other lmao I hate them)

Tldr: Zoro and Sanji see themselves as one household unit 😭 hence the bickering and bluntness and lack of pretences in general.

[martian-astro10]

Lord of a house aspecting that house

Okay, so just so clear things up, this is a very tiny thing and cannot do anything alone. It has to be supported by other factors as well. For ex: if your 2nd lord is aspecting the 2nd house, but the 2nd lord itself is in 6,8,12 houses, is afflicted, debilitated or in it's marana karaka, then it won't do much since the MAIN thing is in a bad position. It's like (I'm so bad at analogies but...bear with it), your gums and teeth are healthy so flossing your teeth just maintains the already good state, it removes small food particles stuck here and there. but if the gums and teeth are rotten then what will flossing do? Nothing. (The analogy is so bad i can't 😭😭)

1st lord aspecting the 1st house makes a person have a strong personality. They know what they want and how to get it. Have a good head on their shoulders (I know a person with this who also has ketu in 1st and he acts like a headless person anyways, so....). They can gain a lot of money through family business.

2nd lord aspecting the 2nd house makes the person gain through their family. Can get a LARGE inheritance. They can be very persuasive as well. Most of the times, have quite a large Appetite and this can make them fat.

3rd lord aspecting the 3rd house makes the person courageous and intelligent. Many actors and talk show hosts that are known for their wittiness have this. Can be very close with their siblings and school friends. They are creative and have a talent for constantly coming up with unique ideas.

4th lord aspecting the 4th house makes the person feel extremely close to their mother. She may have a huge influence in what decisions they make about their life. They can gain a lot of money through real estate. They will always support their family members no matter how they are.

5th lord aspecting the 5th house can make someone a successful actor, from what I noticed. You'll see this everywhere, but these people indeed have good children. I know two people with this and they have both treated their kids so badly but the kids still love them and I feel so sad, cuz bro, abandon them, who cares. Can have succesful short term romantic relationships, even if you breakup with someone it won't be that bad. Have the ability to convert their hobbies into a professional career. Can have a great relationship with their kids, I mean, my mom has this, and me and my sister couldn't have asked for someone better.

6th lord aspecting the 6th house is perfect for surviving in this era of capitalism. They will never be in debt and are good at financial management. A good immune system, don't easily get sick. They never remain unemployed for a long period of time. All your enemies will disappear from your life, like, if someone bullies you, they will have to pay their karma.

7th lord aspecting the 7th house is good for marriage and business partnerships. Can have good interpersonal skills. The spouse can resemble their "ideal type" very closely. Have a good public image. Good for settling abroad as well. People who openly oppose you will also get defeated.

8th lord aspecting the 8th house can make someone a great psychologist. Gives a heightened intuition. Sex life can be good. Can make them the best in their career. Can get a large inheritance from in laws. This also makes a person interested in magic and other things that are considered to be taboo, so they'll be interested in exploring it and may have a talent in it as well.

9th lord aspecting the 9th house is one of the best aspects that one can have, since 9th house is literally the house of luck. Can make a person lucky in general, even if they end up in a bad situation they get out of it very easily. Can have a great relationship with their father. Are usually very very intelligent and have the ability to read between the lines. I know a few people with this and the way they're able to grasp things is so fascinating, they actually use their brain. This also indicates abroad settlement. A lot of spiritual gurus have this.

10th lord aspecting the 10th house makes a person well liked by other people. Their bosses love them and that helps in career. They will always get recognised for their work. Can achieve a high social status. This also gives a good relationship with mother in law and not just "good" but good in the sense that she may be a business woman who will help them in their career goals.

11th lord aspecting the 11th house is another lucky position. Can give enormous amount of wealth. They have friends who help them climb the social ladder. This can give a large inheritance as well. Can give the same results as 10th house, except mother in law.

12th lord aspecting the 12th house also indicates abroad settlement. Can have psychic abilities (I would really recommend you guys to work on them). They can have a good sex life as well. Can be good healers. Can be good artists and writers as well.

Also, i forgot to add, it's a vedic system, so use sidereal and whole signs and aspects work differently in vedic, it's not according to sextiles, trines, squares. Most of the planets only aspect the house opposite from it. Saturn aspects 3,7,10 from it. Jupiter aspects 5,7,9 from it. Mars aspects 4,7,8 from it. All the others only aspect the 7th from it.

© martian-astro All rights reserved, 2025

[kangmoon27]

Control You | Jungkook FF

Pairing: Supreme leader/cult yandere possessive Jungkook x force wife Yn.

Summary: Growing up it was never in his wanting to be the leader of a cult but if it means he could have you and control you then he's up with it.

Growing up, he really hates the fact that he's next in line. He hates the fact that he has to stay here in this kind of society. He wanted to leave but sadly he couldn't, soon the whole society will be controlled by him, everyone will follow him and it's because he's born to be the leader of this cult.

Jungkook never wanted to be part of this but he doesn't have a choice, he had to, he's born to be like this, he's born to be like this.

Of course he tried to leave his birth place but always failed. It's either someone caught him nor his mother will beg him not to leave this place while kneeling on the ground crying.

But something made him stoped from leaving this society and even convinced him to stay. It's not something, it's actually someone.

Choi Yn who's a daughter of one of the cult member. She's born brave and talented who's absolutely gorgeous but everything seems to be wasted if she will just stay here in this toxic society where everyone admires their leader who all did was to brainwashed his people but not Yn.

She's smart enough to understand the wrong doing inside this cult she belong to. She promised herself that one day she will leave this place and have a better life far away from here but it was ruined. Her dream was ruined.

Jungkook became crazy for her. He keeps on following her around like a lost puppy, begging her to accept his proposal to make her as his wife but lady Yn never agree.

Jungkook will surly do everything for her so he made a deal with his father. He said he will stop trying to leave this cult of only Yn will be his bride and without thinking twice his father agreed.

Yn has no other choice but to actually marry him. For the sake of her family she had to do what he says. As simple as that, he's in control while she's under control.

"A beautiful shade of light pink will surly look good on you my lady" he whispered while kissing your neck. He stared at you through the mirror while smirking. He pulled the zipper of your dress up and turned you around.

"See, I told you, it will look good on you. But it would be much better without it." Your husband said while biting his lips. You surely did turned him on, just the way you look so helpless with those pity eyes. The way you never argue and just always do what he says. Being an obedient wife like how he wanted surely keeps on turning him on.

His thumb brushes your lips. He smile at you before pulling you by your waist and k'ssed you. You gave yourself freely knowing what the consequences would be if you didn't.

After some moment he finally pulled away and took a deeper breath after the breathless k'ss you both just did. The smile on his face never vanished knowing he won his battle, he won you.

"Just stay like that and everyone will be safe under my control baby." He chuckles before grabbing your hand and pulled you out of the room.

Everyone is complementing how good looking you were and how lucky you are that their supreme leader chooses to marry you. But that's what they just thought cause if only you could speak up right now all you wanted to do is to shout and course them for talking bullsh't.

You've never got this so much attention before, no one even thinks of taking your side when you tried to asked them to leave this cult. Not even your own parents but now they all complementing you just because you're the wife if the leader. Position really speaks loud and if you don't have it they your voice is useless cause no one will believe you.

"I told you. We loon good together, everyone literally said that my love and it's time for you to believe it." Jungkook whispered and kisses you. His hand travel down your waist and pulled you closer to him completely closing the gap between the two of you after seeing someone approaching you both.

"Long time no see Yn. It's been awhile. I missed you." Junghyun said trying to hide his pain. Your eyes meet his and it begin to filled with tears. You missed him so much. The memories of both of you flashes back and begin playing in your brain. You wanted to tell him how much you missed him and love him but it's too late. Both of you just looked at each in sorrow. The untold and discontinue story between the two of you hunted in regret.

"It's appropriate to talk to someone's wife like that mostly to your supreme leader Junghyun." Your husband said while gripping his hold on your waist. Junghyun bow at him as respect while you're left being shameless and scared. You knew exactly what will happen as soon as you get home.

"I'm sorry supremo. My apology if you think that was ruined." He glance at you while you just looked away not wanting to have another commotion that will burn your husband in anger.

"Please excuse me. I'll take my leave now. Have a great day." With that Junghyun left leaving Jungkook offended and mad.

He feels insecure after facing your ex lover. Knowing you used to love him fully and naturally not by force like what he did just to get you.

"Fck I hate him. Fck it, we're going home." Whisperings those and pulled you away with him.

"Tell me how good daddy is, huh?" His hands circle around your n'ck as he pushed his full l'ngth inside slamming his hips back then forward to make you whimpers and cries

He loved the wet and creamy texture of your c'nt. "So good!" You whimpered again grabbing his biceps to dig your nails inside them.

"The way you fill me up makes me wanna get fcked every single day, hour, minute and second" You looked into his eyes as he did the same.

He attacked your neck while his h'ps kept moving.

You started crying while hugging him, feeling him deep buried inside you made you feel disgusted. You can feel how every inch of his organ touches and feels you. Soon he c'm and thinking it was done Jungkook bang the wall and keeps on going.

He flipped you, facing the pillow as he pushed himself back in your c'nt while his fingers played with your f'lds. His t'ngue l'cked your back and started s'cking on it leaving marks that you unwanted.

"You're mine okay, just mine." He said shot himself inside you. "Sh't knee down and take me like you own me. Be obedient."

A knocked on the door woke you up only to find yourself alone in your bedroom. You tried searching for your husband but he's no where to be found and once again the door knocked. As soon as you opened it your eyes light up but your smile came crushing down realizing how bad thing would be if your seen to be together.

It's you against the whole community. "What are you doing here?" You asked but Junghyun just smiled at you and pulled you into a deep k'ss.

"You send me a letter that you wanted us to run away right then let's go. It's our time now we should leave already before everyone wakes up." Junghyun started pulling you hand and walked out of the house using the back door.

The whole tribe wa quite, it's middle of the night and people are already sleeping. This is exactly what you wanted. Escape from this cult and be with him but something isn't right.

You never sent a message nor letter to him mostly about running away knowing how Jungkook gripped on your n'ck is. You pulled away from Junghyun making him look at you in confused.

"T-this is wrong, I have to go back and you should too! It's his plan Junghyun." The confusion is written on his face. He clearly didn't know what's happening until every one revealed themselves one by one from their hiding place, soon your husband also came out looking so sad and betrayed.

"Was I not enough for you my love? I gave you all even my whole life but you still choose to be with him and continue cheating on me?." Jungkook cried infront of his people trying to get the sympathy of each and everyone of his cult.

"How could you both betrayed our supremo!! You both deserve the worst punishment!!." A woman from the crowd whom you called your mother speak up breaking your heart even more. He's really good at manipulating everyone that's he's already been the victim that even turned the table and make your parents turn on his side.

"N-no no no please mother I love your daughter very much I would be more in pain if I'll lose her. It's all his fault if he'll be gone then me and my wife will never have a problem again. It's all his fault." Jungkook said crying to convince everyone that it's Junghyun's fault.

You run towards Jungkook and started slapping him while he just let you do it to him as everyone started drugging Junghyun away shouting the word "burn him Alive, burn him Alive" repeatedly.

"W-what? No no no no no I love him!! I want him it's my fault." Your mother came to you and slapper you, your body landed on the ground and looked at her in disbelief.

"How could you do such a thing Yn!! All supremo wanted was to give you the best and love that you need. You're lucky enough that he choose you to be his wife and this is what you will do in return?!." She picked you up and pushed you to Jungkook as he immediately locked you in his embrace.

"She's all yours supremo, don't worry we will take care of him." Your mother said before turning her head on you. Soon you and your husband was the only one left.

A hard slap landed on your cheek. Falling on the ground while caressing your cheek you saw him going on his knees and grabbed your chin so hard.

"I'll break you tonight. I'll break you into pieces and mould you again, I'll mould you like how a perfect obedient wife would be cause I'm in control and I controlled you."

[merakiui]

I was reading through animals facts and found something interesting...

"Octopus lay up between 20,000 to 80,000 eggs at a time"

Σ(°ロ°) Azul!?

I mean, I doubt merfolk would lay that many (since Azul is an only child), but imagine if they did lay even close to that amount.

Like Azul deciding to babytrap Darling, and she's expecting one maybe two babies. Only to pop out like 10 tiny little babies. The shock and horror.

Or a scenerio involving alien or eldritch monster Azul, who wants darling to help him repopulate his species. Unaware that he's gonna knock her up with hundreds of babies at a time due to his biology.

I hope this isn't too weird. This fact just got my breeding kink going for some reason.

>:) back on the egg agenda with tako!!!!

I like to imagine mers can produce a lot of eggs (maybe not nearly as much as 20k and maybe some more than other species) but enough knowing that many of those eggs won't survive. Very few fry return from hatching if it's the open ocean,,, although maybe if he keeps you in captivity and you lay the eggs in a safe space where he can watch over both you and the young.... perhaps more will survive. <3

Alien Azul....... waaaa captured and forced to be the broodmother for such a large clutch. orz so heavily knocked up you can't even escape. Not that you ever could before. Maybe he's the creature who invaded your ship and killed all of your fellow crew members,, something something his home planet is no longer habitable, so he's been searching for a place that will be safe to repopulate and live,, or he was the thing kept locked up in a lab and you just happened to be the unfortunate scientist or janitor or security guard who caught his attention. World is cold and cruel, but human womb is warm and soft and perfect temperature for holding and incubating young. >w< if you're so scared, he supposes he can take on a human form, though he's not sure why that would be of any comfort when humans are so fragile and weak and easy to snap in half. :3c his true form is much better suited to protecting you and the babies.

And with so many tentacles at his disposal he can multitask!! Pleasuring you while cleaning up around the little nest/nook he keeps you in,,, feeding you delicious foods he managed to find and gather while filling you up with more slick to keep the eggs properly comfortable inside you. Restraining your arms and spreading your legs if you try to close them or resist in any way. Stuffing one down your throat to keep you docile and quiet whenever you protest. The babies don't need to hear their mother being a brat and pitching a fit. Tsk tsk. Wiping your tears away when you get so overstimulated from all of the attention and appendages stuffed in your holes.

You may think he's inherently cruel, but he's really a gentle creature at heart(s). :( he just wants to start a family and keep his species extant and maybe you'll come to love and appreciate him one day... he likes you a lot,,, if he didn't, he would've torn you apart by now and the walls would've been spattered with blood and gore. He's trying to make this as easy and painless as possible for you, feeding you aphrodisiac fluid so the process isn't uncomfortable, and he's even going out of his way to prepare you! He just wants his mate to be happy and relaxed. >_<

Maybe your mind just can't keep up with all of this,, the body horror and the actual tentacled horror fawning over you. The absurd amount of eggs crammed in your womb and all of these new sensations you've never felt before. Emotions and hormones are all over the place. You can't believe you actually panicked when you woke up one morning and saw he wasn't curled at your side. You actually want him to touch you, to wrap you up and hold you close, to speak to you in his native tongue and then translate in your language in the best way he can... orz you must be losing your mind to find comfort in the very creature who has made you feel so uncomfortable.

[despazito]

could u elaborate on "parrots make bad pets"? not disagreeing (far from it) just interested to see your take! looking to learn more about this

(i've gotten this ask before so please don't mind i'm just gonna paste a writeup i did a while ago)

There’s a blog run by an animal behaviourist who specializes in parrots that i really enjoy reading, she has a very good writeup on the state of companion parrots as an industry: The Inconvenient Truth About Cockatoos

so basically the average person usually cannot meet the needs of a parrot, especially medium and ESPECIALLY large species. they are long lived, extremely social and intelligent animals who are very demanding if you are their only companion. in my mind the most 'ethical' pet parrot setup is having some pairs of budgies in a dedicated bird room filled with foraging enrichment and doing some basic command training as a bird-human bonding activity instead of cuddles.

most pet parrots are hand reared or even hatched in incubators by breeders and are never given a chance to be raised by their parents, and virtually none stay with their parents until a natural weaning age before getting sold. which is wild considering it is fucking ILLEGAL to do that to puppies or kittens.

A parrot isn't really born wired for human companionship in the same way that a dog or cat is. they imprint on their parents which sets the blueprint of their kin, and they generally want to only form extremely close bonds with others of their kin. To get a very people-oriented parrot, it has to think it’s people.

This is different from the socializing practiced in raising cats and dogs or acclimating ferals to people. socializing means exposure to things so that the animal doesn't grow up to see the target as a threat, and ultimately that the target is something that can be very rewarding to spend time around. A dog raised with its mother and socialized to people still understands that it's a dog, it can get along with other dogs, but can also form strong bonds to people. They actually read both dog and human body language and legitimately have an awareness that we are different species.

The companion parrot is raised to think it’s people, and as a result many lose the ability to form bonds with their own kind. in fact the reason many breeders remove eggs or chicks from the nest is arguing that the parent birds don’t really know how to raise their chicks- because they themselves were hand reared and never learned how to parent from their parents! it seems that, like us, parenting isn't perfectly hardwired in parrots and they need to learn the skill from their families, oftentimes even staying to help their parents raise younger siblings!

That's why it's not at all uncommon for pair bonded breeding birds to be sold as a completely separate product from companion birds in many aviary operations. there's so many ads for people selling breeding parrots that fucking hate humans or are semi tame specifically listed for sale as breeders not as pets:

then their babies are bred for the pet market so they are taken either before or right after hatching to get hand reared and imprinted onto humans, because a parrot-bonded parrot just won't be as interested in forming those close human companionships you see in viral videos. this isn't the case for all aviaries, i want to acknowledge there are smaller scale breeders who have tamer breeding birds, but big producers can have borderline feral pairs and the point i'm trying to make is when you socialize a parrot to either the human world or parrot world, it's often at the expense of the other.

most trouble starts once the parrot begins reaching the age of sexual maturity. they stop being openly cuddly to most people, and will try to pair bond with their primary caretaker. It's not uncommon for this to lead to aggression towards other family members because parrots don't share partners, they can even do this to babies they are jealous of!

But a human can't become a suitable mate substitute for a parrot, and some of their mating behaviours such as regurgitating on you can seem straight up gross so the human then shuns the parrot and shuts down their advances. this can make your bird become very sexually frustrated that can lead to more unwanted behaviours and even health emergencies such as prolapse. we lead them on by stroking their chest and backs (only something bonded pairs do, you are essentially jerking off your parrot when you do this..) then reject them with no other outlet for their natural urges, and spaying/neutering isn't an option either! so they're stuck in a psychological purgatory of being unable to fulfill their instincts. and if they're in an understimulating environment and left alone for most of the day in addition to all that, frankly i think that's just an awful life to give to an animal we allegedly love!

we essentially alienate them, and when they don’t have people around to meet their extremely high social needs because you work a 9-5, even if there are other birds around, the lonely or frustrated human-bonded parrot can become depressed and self mutilate.

parrots that were left with their parents, are raised as parrots, and weaned at their own natural pace overwhelmingly do not exhibit these destructive behaviours.

 a productive relationship with a pet parrot is one that fosters independence, not dependence, on the human companion. the most responsible parrot owners should strive to act more as a zookeeper to their parrot instead of cuddling it and creating a ‘velcro’ bird glued to the hip, and socialize with them via training sessions instead of letting their birds indulge in pair bonding behaviours like petting and preening which leads to sexual frustration and aggression or self mutilation.

Ultimately I believe any parrot hand reared and imprinted onto humans is some degree of psychologically damaged and suffers from the parrot equivalent of a developmental trauma, they have been robbed of a normal parrot life and it cannot be undone.

SO many parrot rescues are completely flooded with unwanted pets, many with tough behavioural challenges (for example it's not uncommon for parrots to be reactive to an entire gender, so that cuts the adopter pool immediately in half). and these patterns can be difficult to break especially without the aid of a behaviourist. and the thing still has another 40 years of life left in it but nobody wants to adopt because it's another "crazy bitey bird that hates everyone", has reached sexual maturity so it's no longer as friendly, and it's much easier to start from scratch so folks choose to just buy another baby and keep the cycle going.

And none of that even touches on the rampant poaching that keeps supplying the trade in many parts of the world. and that's why everyone should have domestic chickens or pigeons.

[hyunnie04]

crown prince! bang chan x reader, fluff, royal au | m.list

wc: 1.1k words

a/n: dipping my toes into writing something a little out of my comfort zone! this is also lightly (heavily lmao) inspired by one of my fave games fe3h and it's support conversations.. 👉👈

you had no idea what chan might’ve wanted from you when he had invited you out for a cup of tea on the courtyard. it was unlike him to host such frivolous activities like tea parties out of the blue since he was quite busy these days, dealing with his royal duties and what not.

you haven't really crossed paths with him since your academy days and even now, you only ever caught glimpses of him here and there because of your parents' business involving relation matters, so the sudden invitation came as a surprise.

the said academy was for royals and nobles alike, shaping them up to be the future leaders for the next generation. it was how you both came to know each other. chan is the crown prince of the kingdom up in the frigid north, revered to be one of the strongest knights the kingdom has ever seen. polite, charming, not to mention extremely good looking as well.

you however, is just the eldest child of your family. house l/n had strong ties with the kingdom, your parents being close with several affluent families and being valuable members of the kingdom’s council.

"here we are." felix, his right hand man and closest friend, had stopped in front of the cobbled steps, leading down to the beautiful courtyard before sending you a grin. you thank him earnestly, giving him a smile back.

from a distance, you could see chan sitting quietly in the meadows, the lush grass and flowers crowding at his feet, cupping his chin in thought as the wind lightly blows through his hair.

he looks serene compared to the stressed look he adorns whenever you see him hunched over the castle’s conference room, going over his army’s battle tactics.

you bowed upon reaching his presence, the sunlight illuminating his handsome face. “thank you for inviting me, your highness.” chan stands right up, a slight shock on his face before swiftly recovering.

"i told you before, y/n. there's no need for formalities, just chan is fine." he sends you a warm smile and pulls out a chair for you.

the spread before you was amazing. tons of decadent pastries and cookies were laid in a dessert tier, making your mouth water in anticipation. 

“please, help yourself to some tea.” he takes the beautifully painted porcelain pot, pouring some of the aromatic tea in your cup. the steam from it flows up to the air, filling the table in it's light and refreshing scent. the atmosphere starts to dwindle into quietness, the breeze and wildlife surrounding you filling in it's silence.

"...was there something you'd like to talk about?" you cock your head to the side. he looks a little flustered, but ultimately nods. 

"-yes, actually." chan sighs out while he traces the rim of his tea cup, evading your curious eyes.

"did...your parents ever bother you about marriages?" he slowly manages to get out, stumbling through the sentence.

the tea cup you held in your hand freezes in place. now that he had mentioned it, your father and mother always brought up the idea of marrying. they were always pestering you, wondering when their only child was going to settle down. they stopped one day however, just like that. you wondered if your years of rejecting the idea itself had worked or they simply got tired. but you wondered what brought this on? were his parents arranging him with someone?   

"forgive me, i do not mean to be so straight forward." chan coughs into his hand, noticing the lack of reply and turned his head away in slight embarrassment.

"it's alright." you place your cup down on its saucer, secretly admiring how the tips of his ears redden so quickly. "but now that you've brought it up, yes i have."

"i see," the tea was abandoned now, left to cool in the summer shade. “i’ve heard my father speak about an arranged engagement for me a few years ago.”

you politely nod, urging him to continue. now you’re curiosity is piqued. although, you’re not entirely sure why he had come to talk to you about this, plenty of your shared friends and acquaintances had gotten proposals and arrangements.

“that was back then, however. my father got tired of me refusing to settle down and dropped it all together." you rest your chin on your palm, his words strikingly familiar.

“he never told me the specifics but i’m pretty sure he was talking about you.”

something between a choke and a sputter left your lips, “what?”

“it’s true.” he says it as if it wasn’t earth shattering news for you. "father wanted me to marry the heir to house l/n."

you could only gape at him akin to a fish, not knowing how to digest the information given to you. 

"truthfully, i didn't know you well back then, that's why i declined." chan shifts in his seat, unfolding his legs and turning fully to you. so that was why they had stopped. "but i would have been happy to accept it now, if i had known it was you.” 

an intense heat started to creep up your neck upon his confession, a rosy hue dusting your cheeks and tinting your ears impossibly red.

“you mean-” chan nods at your conclusion and smiles, his eyes crinkling in amusement. he would have accepted?

“i don’t think we would have been close if we were married.” you say whilst scooping up a spoonful of cake, distracting yourself from the violent wave of emotions you felt. it was contradictory, but chan seemed to hum in agreement.

“i think you’re right. i’m glad we met this way though.”he sucks in a breath- a cute habit of his that you have observed even back then. 

chan then asks you in a soft voice, staring deep into your eyes. “we can start over if you’d like.”

“i’d like to get to know you.”

you lean your elbows on the table, the wind flowing gracefully through your hair as you muster out a grin. "i would like that."

the rest of the afternoon was spent comfortably in each other’s presence, finally eating the sweets laid before you two while catching up.

“t’was such a pleasure.” chan offered his hand for you to hold when it was time to retire back inside, placing a chaste kiss on the ridge of your knuckles. 

“my, my. you flatter me.” you chuckle, covering your mouth.

from the corner of your vision, you could faintly make out felix in the grassy meadow, sitting down in what seems to be his own table and sipping his own tea. he sends a cheery thumbs up upon seeing you and chan glance at him. chan’s face reddens, hiding sheepishly in his hands as you laugh.

[honeybeedrabble]

Casanova (Cheating!Sasuke x AFAB!Reader pt. ii)

CW: Sasuke being a horrible husband/father/baby daddy (like actually he’s horrendous 😭). Throwing up (it’s a little gross, sorry), hand job, lip biting, dry humping, unprotected piv (please don’t be stupid), creampie (PLEASE DONT BE STUPID), breeder!sasuke, shoulder biting, degradation and slight praise, spitting, breast play, lmk what i missed !! (SPOILER WARNING!!!: pregnancy sex)

18+ MDNI

Sasuke went home that night a wreck. His feelings were entirely conflicted. Did he do the right thing? No- of course he did?! You were in need of help and only he could deliver. If anyone else were in his position they would’ve done the same thing. For crying out loud- you practically straddled him and barely left room for denial. Then again… Sasuke didn’t deny you the opportunity… But you were begging for it- needing it-

“Sasuke… is everything alright?” The sweet voice of his wife brought him out of his daze. He cleared his throat before taking a sip of water.

“Y-Yeah… long day…” He said softly, setting the glass back down on the table before picking up his fork and digging into the home cooked meal. The home cooked meal his wife made him. His wife Sakura.

“Do you want to talk about it-“

“No!” He raise his voice nervously. Sarada looked up from her own meal with wide eyes. She glanced from between her mother and her father, a brow raised in confusion.

“Um… Dad?” She asked.

“Y-Yes?”

“Is everything okay?” His daughter asked. He looked at her with a broken heart, the product of he and his wife’s love encapsulated in a single child, practically berating him for what he had done to their family. She knows… she has to…

“I um… Yeah… I’m fine. I’m sorry it’s just one of those days, you know? I think I’m just tired.” Sasuke shook his head, then abruptly stood up from the table.

“Going to bed already?” Sakura asked, getting out of her chair to collect his plate and bring it to the sink.

“Yeah, I think so. I’ve had a long day and tomorrow I write my mission report. Dinner was great, Sakura. Goodnight you two.” He said, walking over to the bedroom he and Sakura shared.

Upon returning home he promptly took a shower, scrubbing his whole body of the adultery he committed off, trying to erase the sin from his skin. To no avail- he still felt awful. He felt even worse staring at the bed he would share with his wife, how they slept next to eachother every night they were both home.

Sasuke wanted nothing more than to sleep on the couch- he would even sleep outside after doing what he did. But he knew it would raise suspicions, so he did what he usually would do and got into his pajamas, slipping into the soft bedding and closing his eyes to sleep.

Sasuke woke up to soft hands under his shirt, he recognized them.

“What are you doing?” he grumbled sleepily.

“Sorry, sometimes I do this to our pillows when you’re not home. Bad habit, I forgot you came back tonight.” Sakura smiled, nestling her neck into the crook of his neck.

“Don’t be sorry, we’re married.” Sasuke almost laughed.

“You’re right,” Sakura giggled, her hands trailing down his abdomen slowly. Sasuke inhaled deeply, feeling her hands break past his waistband and land at his crotch.

“What are you up to?”

“Well you said it yourself we’re married. It’s got me thinking about how intimate we used to be. How intimate we should be again.” Sakura said, her hand wrapping around his shaft. Sasukes breath hitched, his hand coming up to caress the arm Sakura had draped around him.

Sakura gently gripped Sasukes shaft, moving up and down his member, a finger tracing along the head of his cock. She bit her lip, her finger pressing into his tip to try to gather any precum he had. Sasuke felt his face grow hot, still guilty about the affair from earlier that day.

“Um… is everything okay?” Sakura asked, her hand stilling around his dick.

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“I mean… you’re still… y’know….”

“Still…?”

“Soft.”

Sasukes heart sunk. He didn’t even realize it until now. He shifted under the blankets, backing up into Sakura further.

“Here, try now.”

“Okay,” Sakura hummed, gently kissing his neck. The kisses helped, precum starting to flow out from his cock and he was about half mast a few minutes into the handjob.

But Sasuke couldn’t help it, even though he was comfortable in bed, had his wife next to him and everything he would need to get off, he couldn’t. Not when all he was thinking about was how you mounted and rode him for what felt like hours that afternoon.

“Enjoying yourself?” Sakura purred, licking a stripe up his neck.

“Yeah…” Sasuke lied. After a few more pumps he couldn’t take it anymore and with the hand he had on her arm, he gently pushed Sakuras hand off of him.

“Sasuke…?”

“It’s fine, really. I’m just tired. Let’s save this for tomorrow, please?” He asked, still not turning around to face her.

“Oh, yeah sure. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you up.” Sakura said softly.

“It’s fine. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight…”

____________________________________________

Sasuke woke up early that morning, he needed to get out of the house desperately. The only way he could get his mind off of you was with work. But said work was writing the mission report on the genjutsu user from just outside the village. The same genjutsu user who held you prisoner to your own urges, eventually holding Sasuke a prisoner of his own as well.

He put his pen down, unable to shake you from his brain. He left the office and took of to your house, not caring how early it was to wake you- he just needed to see you that desperately.

When Sasuke knocked at your door you opened it wiping your eyes. Your skin seemed paler than usual, your body fatigued. He felt bad, assuming he had done a number on you.

“May I come in?” Sasuke asked, looking around nervously.

“What are you? Some kind of vampire?” You asked with folded arms. “Yes you can come inside.” You shut the door behind him as he walked inside.

“Sorry to come by unannounced like this, especially this early…” Sasuke apologized. You shrugged.

“It’s fine, besides… I’ve been up for a few hours already…” You murmured softly, shifting nervously.

“Oh, well I guess it’s good timing then.”

“Maybe for you…” you said.

“Listen I need to talk to you.”

“Yeah, well so do I.” You seemed distant, slightly uncomfortable around Sasuke. He picked up on it quite quickly.

“It’s a good thing we’re on the same page then. About the mission report-“

“I’m pregnant.”

Sasuke paused. He felt adrenaline pumping through him, tensing up every muscle in his body. He could hear your words echo through his mind, over and over again. He couldn’t move.

“I…I’m sorry?” He asked, face as white a ghost, his eyes desperately searching yours to see if you were lying.

“I’m pregnant.” You said again, voice shaking.

Sasuke felt his legs give out, he fell to the ground, his ass hitting your wooden floor heavily as his stomach churned. He dry heaved, already sweating bullets. He ran to your bathroom and vomited profusely into the ceramic pot, his vision dizzy.

“That’s how I found out.” You said, leaning in the doorway. Sasuke flushed, turning on your sink and washed his mouth out, splashing his face with the cold water.

“But you haven’t taken a test yet?”

“No, but it seems pretty obvious to me that I am.”

“How can you be so sure?” He asked defensively, anxiety making him shudder.

“Don’t make such a big deal out of it. I can just go and get the procedure to get rid of it.”

“Get rid of it? Of an Uchiha baby?” Sasuke asked, heart racing.

“Calm down. If you wanted another Uchiha baby maybe you should’ve asked your wife to give you another one.” You snapped, walking away from him.

“You don’t get it, my clan is dead. It needs to be restored!”

“Sasuke for the love of everything, why don’t you fuck off? If your wife finds out about this she’ll kill me. Like… actually kill me. I don’t even know what she’ll do to you.”

Sasuke took a deep breath then let it out, holding your wrist and bringing you to your couch so you could both sit down.

“What happened between us was for the worst. It shouldn’t have happened and we both know that. But what if we just say that the baby isn’t mine? There’s no guarantee they’ll unlock their sharingan.”

“Sounds great! As a matter of fact, I’m confident I can raise your child as a single parent while you run off to your own little family and forget the two of us exist!” You sarcastically exclaimed, eyes burning into sasukes.

“Well what do you want?” He asked, standing up abruptly, raising his voice.

“No Sasuke, what the fuck do you want?!” You yelled, matching his volume and standing up with him.

“I want to pick you up and fuck you right on your kitchen table.” He growled, towering over you. Your eyes widened, the fists you didn’t even know you were clenching suddenly became less tense as you two stared deeply into each others eyes.

You narrowed your eyes at him, then quickly wrapped your arms around his neck and dove in for a kiss. You both were winded on impact, but met each other half way and soon enough tongues were being reintroduced to each other. He tasted like black coffee, and for some reason it turned you on. Knowing that as soon as he woke up and had his morning coffee he was on his way to see you. It was so fucked up, but you couldn’t deny the way it made you feel.

“You’re such a piece of shit…” You murmured against his hungry lips. He let out a soft “mmm” in agreement, unable to break the spell he was in.

His arm grabbed under your knee and pulled it up onto his hip. You wrapped your leg around him and as soon as your sexes met there was an audible sigh shared between the both of you.

“On my kitchen table you say?” You whispered, lips softly pressing against his.

“I’ll fuck you on your porch if you’d let me,” Sasuke moaned, your cunt gently humping against the growing erection in his pants. His hand left your knee and instead attacked your ass cheek with a rough smack. You let out a playful yelp, smiling at him before biting his lower lip, then licking it softly. You let it go and watched as it snapped back.

“I don’t doubt that for a second, Casanova.” You went down to kiss his neck, running your tongue along his adams apple while your hands went down to undo his black cape.

It fell to the ground with a plop, Sasuke had no interjections. Next, you unbuttoned his shirt, sliding it off his shoulders and arm. You touched his warm skin, feeling how toned his chest was. You licked his clavicle and he gently sighed, patting your ass so you could wrap your legs around his hips, you quickly obeyed.

He lifted you up and moved you to your kitchen table, practically tearing your soft pajama tank top off and revealing your soft tits underneath. His mouth watered as his eyes locked onto your hardened nipple, he quickly moved to suck one into his mouth, rolling his tongue around it.

You let out a moan that sounded like it had been ripped from your throat, your hands tangling in his jet black locks. He stuck his hand down your pajama shorts and yanked them off along with your panties. You kicked them off when they had reached your ankles and thrusted your hips up against the hard member that was just behind his pants.

You mewled, begging him to release himself from his pants, your leg wrapping around him again and licked along his jaw.

“Fuck… you want it bad, don’t you?” He asked low in your ear. You nodded, biting your lower lip and looking up at him through your lashes. He sighed then roughly grabbed your jaw in his one hand, squeezing your cheeks until your mouth became a small pout.

“Say it. Say you want me to fuck you.” He ordered, slowly unbuttoning his pants as he held eye contact with your pathetic face.

“I want you to fuck me Sasuke! Please fuck me! I need you so bad, needed you ever since I got to have you yesterday.” You pleaded. He smirked, letting his pants and boxers fall to his ankles before stepping out of them. He retracted his hand from your face and began to stroke at his cock.

“Good girl.” He praised, ramming his cock into you roughly, bottoming out before you could warm up to his size.

You let out a loud moan, legs wrapping around him tightly, the heel of your foot digging into his ass cheek, pushing his hips further into you. You clenched down tightly on his shaft, almost choking on your own spit as you whimpered underneath him. Sasuke grunted, grinding into your walls as his public bone chafed against your clit. You cupped his cheeks and pulled him in for a deep kiss, desperate for more of him. He quickly kissed you back, his mouth opening and demanding your tongue inside his mouth again.

He retracted his cock before slamming it back inside of you, too impatient to let you adjust to his size. You didn’t care, the pleasure mixed the pain that came with burning stretch of his girthy member, parting you from the inside and brushing up against your g spot had you begging for more. The feeling of his cock jack hammering inside you had you moaning so loud and so often you couldn’t kiss him back, throwing your head back in ecstasy to moan freely in your kitchen.

Sasuke couldn’t let you tear away any kisses from him and as he pounded away inside of you, rearranging your wet cunt, he tried kissing you again- landing on the corner of your mouth before licking your cheek sloppily. You ran your nails up his back, leaving behind long, thin red line along his muscular back. He grunted loud and painfully, ducking his head down to harshly bite down on your shoulder. You whimpered, clenching down on him and holding his head at your neck.

“Fucking whore…” He grunted, kissing your clavicle.

“M-Me? Y-You’re the one w-who came to my house f-for sex…” you managed to get out. Sasuke slapped the side of your ass and you let out another yelp, clenching around him yet again and dripping down your thighs.

“Don’t talk back to me.” He snapped, grabbing your face harshly, squishing your cheeks again to keep you silent. You whimpered loudly as his pace became even more unapologetically rough, loud squelching filling the room along with a sigh from him with each snap of his hips.

A tear rolled down both your cheek and your leg, Sasukes manhandling become too much for you to bear.

“If you’re not pregnant already you will be by the time i’m done with you.” He huffed, his muscular chest heaving up and down with each heavy breath he took. Your eyes widened, pussy getting even wetter at his words. Sasuke smirked, eyes narrowing.

“You want that? You want me to fuck a baby into you? Ngh- as if I haven’t already…” Your eyes rolled back, nodding your head vigorously as your orgasm quickly approached.

“Say it then. Beg me to get you pregnant, beg me to let you carry my child.” He grabbed one of your bouncing tits and spat on your nipple, rolling it between his fingers.

“P-Please Sasuke… Please let me carry your child… please cum inside me again…” You cried, legs shaking around the man’s waist.

“So fucking wet…” Sasuke moaned, his pace becoming sloppier and more desperate. He kissed you roughly and soon enough your insides were twisting in the most euphoric way possible, your toes curling as your core tightened and legs shook violently against him.

“Mph- Saaa…Sas- Mmm- Sasuke…” You moaned between kisses, your wet pussy squirting on his chiseled abs, your tight walls clamping down on his girth and strangling him for his cum. He moaned against your own moaning lips, shooting his seed deep inside your silky walls, painting you white from the inside.

You two breathed against eachother, still heavy in climax, your mind racing as you cursed yourself for letting him cum inside you again. Maybe if you’re lucky you could still take the morning after pill??

Sasuke stood up, slowly pulling out of your soaked walls.

“haah… aaahhhh…” he lightly moaned, fully retracting as he watching his hot cum pour out of you, too tired to finger fuck it back inside you.

“W-We’re so fucked…” you sighed, legs still twitching. Sasuke let out a loud sigh, bending down to slip back into his pants, pulling them up.

“I know.” He ran his hand through his hair, looking at you as you lay helpless on the table. “Listen, we’ll think of something together, okay?”

“I really hate you,” you murmured, feeling his hand run up and down your thigh reassuringly.

“I know.”

AN: please under no circumstances think i am anti sakura or a sakura hate account 😭😭 this is just a fic and more importantly it is an AU. that is all, enjoy <3

Tag List: @just-your-sensei

[whenmemorydies]

You love taking care of people: Fine Dining in the Time of Late Stage Capitalism

CW: this post discusses toxic and abusive workplaces and makes brief mention of institutional child abuse and intergenerational trauma. I might also talk about global systems collapse, for shits and giggles. Also this is another long one. You know the drill. Lets have a cuppa. Also this is my last minute submission to Sydcarmy Week 2024 and the theme of “you love taking care of people”. Enjoy!

I have a confession to make to The Bear fandom:

The food is my least favourite part of this show.

Its not that its not interesting. It definitely is. I'm a home cook and for the most part, I enjoy cooking (when I can do it at my leisure and not like most mothers, while balancing the mental load). I just find all the other aspects of the show much more fascinating.

In fact, I think this show about a bunch of cooks in commercial kitchens is so popular not so much because of its take up of cooking but its unflinching and loving interrogation of grief and trauma, including the kinds that get passed down through families.

The truth is, I've also never been overly excited about the world of "fine dining." I grew up in a large, Tamil family and so our meals were big, shared and not necessarily conducive to the minimalist plating preferred in exclusive, "gourmet" spaces:

Photograph is mine, delicious Jaffna Tamil spread is the handiwork of my great aunt (Kunchi Ammamma or “little maternal grandmother”), arguably the best cook in our sprawling, extended family.

As tumultous as family life could get, I often experienced meals (that, lets be real, were almost always prepared by the women in my family) with my loved ones as a happy experience. I mean we also had our share of blow ups at the kitchen table but what was always consistent was the love and care that went into the food that we were given to eat. It was woven into the rich and complex flavours that made up the curries, varais, and sambals we had on our plates (and that even now, make me salivate just thinking about). It was spread throughout the warm, coconut-y rotis and steaming rice and puttu we ate with our hands and used to mop up all that spicy, flavourful goodness.

And if there's one question I heard more than any other from older family members growing up, it was "ni sappittiya?" ("have you eaten?"). More than "how are you?" and definitely more than "I love you." As with many Global South cultures, for Tamil folks, food is used for nourishment but also as a primary means of conveying deep care. Obviously Tamil people don't have the monopoly on using food to show their affection (or even the monopoly on using food to replace actually saying the words "I love you" lmao). Food has been found to increase interpersonal closeness and can also contribute to emotional regulation. Feeding a child is one of the first means of bonding between parents and children. Food also plays a big role in the course of romantic love: as a basis for first dates and future time spent with a partner, and of course also as an aphrodisiac.

As Cesar Chavez, Mexican-American civil rights activist, labor organiser and co-founder of the National Farm Workers Association (which later became the United Farm Workers union) said,

The people who give you their food, give you their heart.

You love taking care of people

Conveying care and love through food is a theme that comes up repeatedly in The Bear. Recall 1x02 Hands and the phone conversation with Nat and Carmy:

Natalie: Chefs always say a big part of the job is taking care of people, right?

Carmen: Yeah, yeah. No I guess.

Also recall an almost identical bit of dialogue between Carmy and Sydney, under the world's most famous table that had absolutely nothing wrong with it in 2x09 Omelette:

Carmen: You love taking care of people.

Sydney: Yeah I guess.

Here's some further mirroring between Sydney and Carmy about giving people joy through food. Recall again the phone call between Carmy and Nat in 1x02 Hands:

Natalie: When did the breathing problem start?

Carmen: I think maybe sometime in New York. I was throwing up every day before work.

[...] Chef was a piece of shit.

Natalie: Then why'd you stay there?

Carmen: People loved the food. It felt good.

Also recall the conversation between Sydney and Marcus in 1x08 Braciole:

Sydney: I want to cook for people and make them happy, and give them the best bacon on Earth.

Be gentle with each other, so that you can fight stronger together: seasons 1-2 of The Bear

As rough and tumble as The Beef was, the clear throughline in season 1 (when The Beef was in operation) was the importance of the relationships and care between the show's characters. This was also the case in season 2 where the majority of the season was spent in the context of renovations and training prior to the opening of The Bear (in that season's last episode).

In season 1, we had Carmy leading the crew at The Beef by being patient, clearly explaining technique and positively reinforcing his staff's work.

Above left: Carmy walking the BOH crew through making Donna Berzatto's Lemon Chicken Piccata in 1x05 Sheridan. Above right: Carmy encouraging the crew to keep up their current pace in 1x06 Ceres.

We saw him working with Sydney, supportively encouraging the team to go further, to push themselves. We even saw Carmy at ease enough to talk about Mikey and his mother while at work. We had a Carmy showing us how integrated he can be.

Above: Carmy and Tina in 1x05 Sheridan

Heck, we even had a Carmy who wanted to get a compost installed at The Beef for processing food so that it didn't go to waste. Recall this golden bit of dialogue between him and Sweeps in 1x01 System:

Carmen: Eh yo Gary, you set up a compost for me today, Chef?

Sweeps: After I do my thing in the place.

Carmen: That's very clear. Thank you.

We had a Carmy who had time. Recall the below scene in 1x02 Hands before Sydney gives Carmy her draft business plan for The Beef (that she drafted on her own initiative and time to support his family's struggling business. If this man doesn't hurry up and fight for her in s4 istg...):

Sydney: Hey you got time?

Carmen: Always. What's up?

Similarly, we had Carmen in the first episode of season 2 making time to talk to a clearly distraught Richie:

Richie: Yo you ever think about purpose?

Carmen: I love you, but I do not have time for this, alright? *starts to walk up the stairs out of the basement*

Richie: *Nods, looks dejected, sniffs*

Carmen: I have time for this. *comes back down the stairs and sits with Richie*

Most pointedly in season 1 we had the conversation between Sydney and Carmy in 1x03 Brigade which lays the blueprint for their joint vision for the restaurant and which should have acted as a touchstone for both of them in season 3:

Sydney: You know, I think this place could be so different from all the other places we've been at. But in order for that to be true, we need to run things different.

When I said I didn't think that the brigade was a good idea, you didn't listen. And its not that you told me that I had to. [...] But you just didn't really listen and if this is going to work the way that I think we both want it to work [...] I think we should probably try to listen to each other.

Carmen: Yeah. You're right.

Sydney: The reason I'm here and not working somewhere else, or for someone else, is 'cause I think I can stand out here. I can make a difference here. We could share ideas. I could implement things that make this place better. And I don't wanna be wasting my time, working on another line or tweezing herbs on a dish that I don't care about, or running brunch, God forbid.

Carmen: *nods vigorously*

In season 2 while The Beef undergoes its facelift into The Bear, some of the show's most beautiful moments were when characters displayed their faith and trust in one another. Recall 2x01 Beef where Sydney asks Tina to be her sous chef, or 2x02 Pasta where Sydney and Carmy send Tina and Ebra to culinary school (and Tina's unwavering belief in and support for a nervous Ebra once they get there), and 2x03 Sundae and 2x04 Honeydew where we see Carmy and Sydney send Marcus to Copenhagen to stage with Chef Luca and build up his skills as a pâtissier.

So what happened at The Bear?

Season 3 of the show has been the most divisive of the series, with its preceding two seasons being almost unanimously adored by fans and critics alike. There's been a lot of debate on here and elsewhere as to why this is the case. What appears to be a dominant line of reasoning in this regard is the shift in Carmy and his approach to running The Bear as a fine dining institution.

At The Bear, we have Carmy as an Executive Chef who's berating, hostile, and blaming everyone else for his emotional state ("You guys are fucking killing me"). We have a Carmy who has taken "every second counts" to a point so minute that he has given up smoking because of the time away from the kitchen that it will cost him. We have a Carmy who has no patience for his team, almost all of whom have no experience working in fine dining before the opening night of The Bear. We see how out of sync Carmy and Sydney are ("Been off"). We have a Carmy who is reverting to patterns of behaviour that have been modelled for him by two of his abusers: his mother, Donna Berzatto and his previous boss, Chef David Fields, Executive Chef at Empire.

Perhaps second only to Donna and her stand in Claire, Chef David Fields' toxic legacy haunts season 3 of The Bear.

This is nowhere more clear than in the sheer wasting of food and money in season 3 epitomised by Carmy's insistence on changing the The Bear's menu every day (to quote Tina: "Every day, Joffrey Ballet?!") and his repeated throwing out of dishes he deemed "not perfect."

The waste did not go unnoticed by other characters on the show. Recall Natalie telling Carmy off in 3x03 Doors:

Natalie: The menu cost is out of control.

Carmen: Nat, figure it out.

Natalie: Oh. Oh. Figure it out? Wow.

Carmen: Figure it out.

Natalie: Why don't you fucking figure it out?

Carmen: I'm trying to use less shit.

Natalie: Okay, well, whatever you're doing, the R&D [research & development] of that, its fucking us.

Carmen: Well, we're using the best shit.

Natalie: Duh. Duh. Well, duh.

Carmen: Duh? Don't duh. No duh. [lmao this dialogue]

Natalie: Don't buy fucking crazy shit and then use it once, Carm. It's so wasteful. Duh! Duh, duh. Fucking duh, bro.

In episode 3x05 Children, Uncle Jimmy commissions The Computer to come in and run analytics on The Bear in an effort to get its costs under control (LOL at his assessment below, scrawled on the back of the dodgiest looking pie chart I've ever seen):

Computer: This sample is based on the month and a half we've been operating and does not take into account any funds spent previously on build, friends and family budget, other assorted fuckery.

Carmen: I mean, there hasn't been that much fuckery.

Cicero: Oh neph. You specialise in the fucking fuckery, bro.

Uncle Jimmy had plenty to say about Carmy's use of the former's funds (which Jimmy has duly invested in The Bear to support his nephew) including Carmy's decision to spend $11,268.00 on Orwellian butter (aka Dystopian Butter from the Fucking Rare Transylvanian Five-Titted Goat, lmao).

Even Carmy was under no delusions about how wasteful he was being this season. Recall his discussion with Sydney in 3x05 Children:

Sydney: You know what we should be doing?

Carmen: Produce vendor. You don't have to say it.

Sydney: Okay, I didn't say it then. I didn't say anything. Do you want me to say something?

Carmen: That I'm jamming us up 'cause we have a new menu every day and the economics aren't great?

Sydney: Well, I'm an accomplice, so...

Note: the language in this small bit of dialogue struck me as being off. Why does Sydney needs Carmy's permission to say anything? Its like she knows that he knows the constantly changing menu and exorbitant expenses are an issue but doesn't want to say anything until Carmy brings it up first. @yannaryartside has a great break down drawing the analogy between Sydney's "accomplice" confession here with Molly Ringwald's (sorry I dunno what her character's name was) confession about facilitating her partner's substance abuse, during an Al-Anon meeting in 1x03 Brigade.

We have Carmy repeating harmful patterns of behaviour at work that he has picked up from his personal life (for example, from his mother) but also from his professional experience.

The world of fine dining that both Carmy and Sydney came to The Beef from was marked, by their own admission, with "complete and utter psychopaths" who screamed, pushed and yelled at their staff (recall Sydney's disclosure to Carmy at the end of 1x05 Sheridan) or "fucking assholes" (in the case of Chef David Fields), who made their staff "very, probably mentally ill." Sadly, this aspect of The Bear is not fiction. @moodyeucalyptus pointed out in this post that both Carmy and David Fields appear to have elements of their characters based off of real life fine dining wunderkind Chef Charlie Trotter: a Chicago-based chef known to be brilliant but who mistreated his staff so badly that he had two class actions brought against him (one by FOH staff, and another by BOH staff led by James Beard Award winner Beverly Kim).

There are other stories about the grinding nature of the fine dining industry which we'll get into below. We'll also look at a few stories of chefs who are leading a renaissance away from the "toxic, hierarchical shit show" that has historically plagued fine dining and who Joanna Calo and Chris Storer may have front of mind as they take us through Carmy and Sydney's journey together in season 4 (because as tempting as Shapiro's offer is, we know Sydney isn’t leaving Carmy). But first, we need to go further back in time to look at how the fine dining industry itself has created the conditions for a chef like season 3 Carmy to exist in the first place. Lets look at the system, baby (to quote Tina in 1x01).

The Bear's culinary ancestry: Chef David Fields and the Fine Dining Industry

I should say that I did not want to go too far into history with this post. After Carmen, Natalie, and the Berzattos, I was committed to trying to write shorter meta (/snort). But I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about the origins of fine dining, and before that, the rise of Europe as the base of "haute cuisine" (which itself is directly tied to its history of colonialism and...Empire *badumbum* @freedelusionshere has made the point that The Bear writers have given Chef David's restaurant the name Empire purposefully and they're not wrong). All of this informs the current state of fine dining today.

Though France is often credited as the place where restaurants began (in the 1700s), its been established that folks were eating in communal restaurant settings all over the world, including in China about 700-600 years earlier. The origins of western fine dining (the tradition that Carmy and Sydney have trained within) however, are synonymous with French cuisine and the efforts of Georges Escoffier (who Carmy name drops in 1x03 Brigade).

The French Brigade

Escoffier was responsible for developing the French Brigade system of organising kitchen staff which is still used today in many restaurants worldwide, including at The Bear. The French Brigade was based on Escoffier's own military experience in the Franco Prussian War and was set up to identify roles in the kitchen and increase efficiency and consistency so that restaurants could scale their work to serve larger numbers of customers.

The thing with anything based on structures found in the military is that its going to replicate hierarchy (a chain of command is central to the running of military operations). In fact, much of 1x03 Brigade is spent with Sydney resisting what she identifies as the imposition of a "toxic hierarchical shitshow".

Mariya Moore-Russell, the first Black woman in the world to get a Michelin star (who also happens to be from Chicago) talks at length here about the benefits of the French Brigade for systematising commercial kitchens but also how easily it can get corrupted if the wrong people are in the kitchen. She says in those circumstances, the Brigade can quickly perpetuate, racism, sexism, perfectionism and "all of the isms." My fav quote from the video? When Russell talks about the French standardisation of cooking adopted by most kitchens in fine dining industry (at 23:39):

They were like okay, how do we take what Grandma does, what Mama does and make it you know efficient and consistent but also just extremely stressful for everybody involved? (lmao)

Note: Moore-Russell has a series of videos on YouTube about her experiences in fine dining which are very illuminating. She's also such an engaging storyteller. For example, watch "My path through the restaurant industry".

Service à la française to service à la russe

In addition to the French Brigade, another development in the history of western fine dining was the shift in styles of food service from service à la française to service à la russe. Service à la française ('service in the French style') involved serving all the dishes for a meal at once, allowing patrons to serve themselves. Think something akin to buffet style. See below for table layout using service in the French style from 1775:

Source: Wikipedia.

To me, service in the French style looks kind of similar to how my Tamil family lays out our meals (as can be seen in the first picture of this meta, minus the pheasant, moonshine and roasted woodcocks...lol). This style of service also looks a whole lot like "family style" dining which can be described as: "when food is brought to the table on large platters or serving dishes rather than being individually plated. Guests then serve themselves from the dishes which are passed around the table." In fact, service in the French style or family style dining is how many cultures serve and eat their food, both in the home and in restaurant settings (whether they use these terms to describe that layout is another matter).

I also seem to recall a couple of soulmates Jeffreys deciding to open a family-style restaurant in 1x08 Braciole (which @bootlegramdomneess has also pointed out in her post here).

In the 19th century, service in the French style became replaced in European restaurants by service à la russe ('service in the Russian style'). This style of service is what Western fine dining and haute cuisine restaurants utilise to this day. It involves bringing courses to the dining table in sequence, one after the other. Courses are portioned and plated before being brought to the diner by service staff.

In the case of Western fine dining, Escoffier shaped haute cuisine ('high cooking') through the use of his French Brigade system and the implementation of service in the Russian style. Haute cuisine has undergone shifts and changes since the 19th century including with the nouvelle cuisine movement in the 1960s which was marked by a focus on fresh produce, paired-back menus and a focus on invention. Haute cuisine of today has been described as a fusion: employing elements of nouvelle cuisine and more elaborate techniques and processes from Escoffier's system.

To my mind, service à la russe involves a lot more people (definitely more wait staff) to have it deployed effectively. When you have more people, you have more room for error (like all those dropped dishes in season 3). Family style service or service à la française allows people to serve themselves. It encourages sharing. Personally, I prefer the latter. Also can we talk about how small the portion sizes are in haute cuisine? lmao. I get it, its art. You need a gigantic plate for a small piece of hamachi because thats the canvas. Some (read: me, lmao) might also say its big ol' waste to wash a plate that size for food that takes up maybe a 1/5 of its surface area. Can we also talk about the concept of "chargers" (which the Computer rightfully rips into Carm and Sydney for in 3x05 Children) - why do you need a table setting that no one's gonna use? I'm sure there's other aspects to haute cuisine that make no fucking sense but honestly this meta is gigantic enough as it is so I'll stop there lol.

Anyway, notably it is service à la russe and food that would be described as haute cuisine that we see at The Bear. Family style is nowhere to be seen in season 3.

Colonialism, Empire and the rise of Western food cultures

A fact that is often left out of discussions about why the French and other European countries developed such globally renowned food cultures as well as their staggering wealth and status as "first world countries" (particularly in the period between the 1600s to the 19th century) was that at around the same time, these nation states were expanding their own empires by colonising other parts of the world with the express purpose of acquiring ingredients (and other resources) that they did not have access to in Europe. A brief and non-exhaustive list of examples below:

Europe's demand for flavour was so great in the 1600s that the Dutch traded Manhattan to the British in order to secure the Indonesian island of Banda Run which, at the time, was the world's only source of nutmeg. When they first arrived in the Banda Islands, the Dutch killed and enslaved much of the Bandanese population, taking control of the island's local nutmeg plantations. This violence would come to be known locally as The Banda Massacres.

It was the hunt for a direct trade route with India for black pepper that Christopher Columbus used to pitch his voyage to the King and Queen of Spain and which ultimately led him to the Americas. Columbus' arrival precipitated the colonisation of the Americas, which resulted in enslavement, disease and outright genocide, decimating First Nations populations throughout North and South America.

The colonisation of the Americas would also lead to the exporting of various foods that have come to be staples in European cooking. For example, the tomato - the key ingredient in many Italian (and Italian American) dishes - orginated in South and Central America and was brought to Europe via Spanish colonists.

The British set up their infamously brutal East India Company (EIC) to control the Indian subcontinent and the trade of various resources including precious metals, opium, textiles (silks and cotton), spices (such as cinnamon, black pepper, nutmeg, cloves, mace) and other food items (like salt, sugar, coffee and tea). The EIC would later be supplanted by the British Raj in Britain's stranglehold on India and after almost 200 years of imperialism and economic fraud, it has been estimated that the British drained India of nearly $45 trillion. I can't even begin to fathom an amount of money that large but the British could, and that theft powered much of the empire during its height.

The influence of Indian ingredients and cuisine spread throughout the British empire, including back to Britain itself. In fact, through colonisation and empire, Indian influences appear in various global cuisines (including other European cuisines as well as in the Caribbean).

Indeed the British's impact on food globally included its colonisation of Australia and New Zealand. These two colonial outposts essentially became gigantic cattle and sheep runs for the British who facilitated the wholesale theft of land - and in the case of Australia, did so without even bothering to enter into treaties with First Nations people - in order to run livestock that was then exported to feed Britain.

In order to satisfy its sweet tooth, France operated huge sugar plantations on the backs of the labour of enslaved Africans, particularly in Haiti (known at the time as Saint-Domingue). In the late 1700s, Haiti was responsible for exporting 40% of all the sugar consumed in Europe. The human cost of this was high and brutally violent. Eventually in 1803, after many armed revolts, enslaved African-descent people kicked the French out of the country after over a hundred years of heinous exploitation (thereby creating the first Black republic in the world). The French were so economically dependent on the colony for its production of coffee and sugar that when Haiti got its independence, France decided to punish the new republic for the loss of future income on Haitian exports, demanding 150 million francs in gold as compensation. The French sent warships to enforce this cruel debt. All in all, Haiti spent approximately $21 billion paying off France for the freedom that its people had already lost their lives and shed their own blood for. The debt (which involved the fledgling republic taking out exorbitant loans and fundraising amongst its citizens) was not paid off until 1947: 122 years after it was initially enforced. The French even charged Haiti interest.

Were it not for its vicious history of slavery and its century-long extortion of its former colony, I'm pretty sure France wouldn't have had the quantities of a certain key ingredient necessary to develop its worldwide reputation for pastries and desserts. I mean, you try making a crème brûlée, an eclair, a tarte tatin, a sweet galette, a mille-feuille, a madeleine, a crepe...without sugar.

This history deeply informs fine dining today. For centuries, Europe underdeveloped much of the world (borrowing Walter Rodney's turn of phrase) through colonialism and imperialist extraction. It then used those spoils and excess wealth to, among other things, develop its own food cultures and then self-proclaim itself as the cutting edge of the culinary world. To be clear, you can only faff about in a kitchen and create fancy sugar palaces and 10-course meals if you have the means and resources to do so. Haute cuisine is a product of wealth and resources, accumulated over time. Europe's colonial history also dictates which cuisines are recognised via awards like the Michelin star system. Hell, it dictates why you have the French (Michelin is a French tire company) dictating what constitutes "good" food in the first place. If you want to read more about this topic, this essay on Medium provides a good overview of the sad, racist state of affairs over at the Michelin Guide.

Where Europeans colonised and settled, this same lens was applied. This is why you have the undervaluing of Indigenous cuisine and ingredients in Australia, a situation which has only recently begun to shift. The colonisation of Australia actively involved the lying about Aboriginal foodways in Britain's attempt to falsely claim that Aboriginal peoples were nomadic hunter gatherers who did not use their land. Its why the history of how enslaved Africans brought their food cultures with them through the Door of No Return and transformed American cuisine, is not more widely known. Its why so few chefs of colour have been recognised for Michelin stars globally.

Empire and The Bear

Season 3 of The Bear pays clear homage to the impact of European empire on the world of fine dining in a few ways. The most obvious is the fact that Chef David's restaurant is literally called "Empire" lol. Another example and one of the most visually striking to me occurs in 3x01 Tomorrow. First, recall Chef David Fields' outright theft of Carmy's dish (I think we've established that you can't get more empire than the theft of food, yes?). Can we talk about how not only did Fields steal Carmy's dish but also, turned it into the most beige meal we've seen on The Bear to date, bar that single sprig of dill fighting for its life?

Carmy's penultimate plate (the final version being The Best Meal That Sydney Ever Had™):

Chef David Fields' dick measuring exercise version:

Carm was not a fan:

Can we talk about how the original plate featured the colours of the Italian flag (green, white and red) - emblematic of Carmy's cultural heritage and what is certainly one of the single biggest influences in his culinary journey (the dish also features fish, just like the main course in La Vigilia, the Feast of the Seven Fishes) - but after Fields was done with it, that shit was practically three shades of mayonnaise?

Can we talk about how Carmy's version of the dish almost certainly had a varied and dynamic flavour profile while Fields' looks just how I imagine it tasted like: whatever flavour meh is. The dish literally has no acid from what I can see (ingredients: paupiette of hamachi, fennel soubise, potato chip and dill). And I *know* a balanced dish has salt, fat, acid and heat (cos Chef Samin Nusrat told me).

Can we also talk about how Fields hates the most commonly traded of spices? The one that Columbus was looking for when he landed at what is now the Bahamas. The one that was an integral part of the East India Company's business plan rort to fuck India and South East Asia more generally?

Carmen: He hates black pepper for some reason I'll never understand. (from 3x10 Forever)

White folks in Europe were so hungry for spices to liven up their food that they invaded large swathes of the rest of the world to get the stuff. And yet, here we have Chef Fields, disliking Europe's gateway spice: the one that the Romans (Carmy's ancestors) had been trading with the East for centuries prior to Europe’s imperial frenzy, and which now makes up 20% of the world's spice trade.

Is the man so dedicated to meh that he couldn’t even bring himself to embrace pepper? Used to be one of the best chefs in the world, is right Chef Luca.

On top of dubious taste (I'm not a food critic but no one can tell me that hamachi and fennel soubise dish tasted anything other than fucked lmao. idc idc), Chef Fields is also one of the clear antagonists in The Bear. Along with Donna Berzatto, he is one of Carmy's two primary abusers. His impact on Carmy was never as clear on the show as it was in season 3. Lets take a closer look at that impact below:

Culinary ancestry and intergenerational trauma

Both Donna and David are ancestors of a kind to Carmy. Donna is clearly a biological ancestor in that she's Carmy's birth mother. I've argued here that David Fields is a culinary ancestor to Carmy. For ease of reference, I'll include my explanation of what I mean when I say "culinary ancestry", from that earlier meta, here:

Most folks understand ancestry to refer to our family or genetic lineage. When I was in university, I learned about intellectual ancestors or genealogy: where one can trace your intellectual lineage - the thinkers and creators that have shaped your understanding of the world and/or your chosen profession. I think its useful to take this concept and apply it to The Bear to help understand what the show is saying about legacy. I wouldn't limit the concept to "intellectual" ancestry though. It might be more helpful to talk about culinary ancestors in this context because the process of creating food - crafting dishes - isn't solely an intellectual exercise. It engages our intellect yes, but also each of our senses, our memories (recall that chocolate banana from 2x10 The Bear), and the need to nurture and be nurtured. Culinary Ancestors Carmy's culinary ancestors are varied given his work history. We know he's cooked under some of the best chefs in the culinary world of The Bear, including: Daniel Boulud (of Daniel), René Redzepi (of NOMA), Thomas Keller (of The French Laundry), David Field (a sociopathic Joel McHale, of Eleven Madison Park Empire), and Andrea Terry (a sublime Olivia Colman, of Ever). I'd also include here Mikey, Donna and Natalie Berzatto. I'd include cousins Richie Jeremovich and Michelle Berzatto as well. These are the home and line cooks Carm grew up with, watched in his mother's kitchen and at The Beef. He took his lessons - the good and the bad, learnt voluntarily and involuntarily - from all of these people, incorporated them into his working self and transmuted them into his food.

NOTE: In "Ancestors and The Bear" and in other meta I've written, I've incorrectly noted that Chef David Fields was the EC at Eleven Madison Park (instead of Empire). This was due to the fact that up until 3x10 Forever, we are not told the name of the restaurant that Fields and Carmy worked at together. In the draft script for the pilot, the restaurant is identified as EMP (Eleven Madison Park) by Sugar (see p 23 of that script), however this appears to have changed to "Empire" during the course of the show's development.

Through the lens of culinary ancestry, there is a clear connection between Carmy's wasteful R&D and menu choices in season 3 with the "lessons" he received under the tutelage of Chef David at Empire. For example, and as discussed above, the refusal to serve any dish that isn't viewed as "perfect" led to extreme amounts of waste at both The Bear and at Empire.

Additionally, Chef David focused on "subtraction" (recall his writing "SUBTRACT" on green tape and sticking it to the expo of Empire in 3x01 Tomorrow) and never repeating ingredients in the dishes that came out of Empire. Instinctually, these two strategies appear to me to be techniques to create needless scarcity. They're attempts at repression in and of themselves. Carmy adopts these philosophies and tries to implement them at The Bear as well. They manifest in his unilaterally overhauling the original menu at The Bear (without Syd's input) as well as his insistence that the menu change every day.

Minimalistic subtraction of elements was also a characteristic of Escoffier's approach to cooking which would be taken even further with the nouvelle cuisine movement in France. That movement focused on minimalistic dishes with fewer seasonings and sauces. Chef David Fields is clearly rooted in the French school of fine dining in this approach.

Subtraction also shows up in the show in a more dire way: in the cutting off of relationships and the whittling away of self.

I recently come across a promo still for The Bear. It features Carmy as the CDC of Empire, plating a dish. I've seen the image before but I never noticed the writing on the wall next to Carmy before. It reads:

"Its only after we've lost everything we're free to do anything"

This quote also appears in the 1999 David Fincher film, Fight Club (which itself is based on the book by the same name by Chuck Palahniuk):

Left: Carmen Berzatto, CDC at Empire in The Bear; right: Tyler Durden, general nihilistic fuckwit in Fight Club, also preaching the gospel of David [Fields].

This ethos, written on the wall and haunting the kitchen at Empire is emblematic of how Chef David operates. It reads like a fucked Psalm, giving a poetic shimmer to Field's abuse. Chef David tears down his staff, verbally degrading them to the point that he has the gall to whisper "you should be dead" to them. (OK. Can we...for a minute...imagine being a manager and that being your management style? Telling your best performing staff that they should be dead? Excuse me, mon cheri? A literal devil).

Chef David literally strips his staff of their dignity and their connections to the outside world. He makes them lose their sense of self and claims its all to make them better chefs. He tells Carmen in 3x10 Forever:

Chef David: So you got rid of all the bullshit, and you concentrated, and you got focused, and you got great. You got excellent.

The parallels between Carmy's experience at Empire - and even in the Berzatto household - and the critique of performative violent masculinity that Fight Club was trying to get across are worth pointing out. In Fight Club, white men beat each other up to try and assert control over a perceived loss of power. At Empire, Chef Fields consistently berates and degrades Carmy, clearly threatened by his CDC's talent. Similarly we have Richie complaining about having to take orders from "toddler" Carmy, saying "I was a baby too once, Syd. Nobody gave a fuck" in 1x02 (which could have been the origin story of any one of the men who joined Brad Pitt/Edward Norton to carry out "Project Mayhem" lmao. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of the dudes on Reddit fawning over Richie circa seasons 1-2 also watch Fight Club as if it was some sort of aspirational manifesto and not the satire that Fincher intended it to be).

Chef Fields is meant to be representative of a toxicity found in the restaurant industry globally. There have been numerous reports of the physical and psychological violence meted out against kitchen staff by those higher up in the brigade.

Additionally the structure of the French Brigade system is such that those at the bottom - stages - are often expected to work for free. While unpaid internships are common in various lines of work, those industries start to run into trouble when large amounts of their products and services depend on unpaid labour. In fact, darling of The Bear, René Redzepi of Noma faced criticism of his restaurant's unpaid internship program. The internship program was rife with stories of ridiculous working conditions. Redzepi finally began paying interns in 2022 but then announced that Noma would shut down regular service at the end of 2024 due to being unable to afford its staff (at one point, unpaid stages made up almost half of Noma's staff).

The fact that entry into the world of fine dining means people need to work for free as a stage automatically eliminates this as an option for folks who cannot afford to volunteer in order to gain work experience. This would disproportionately impact on certain communities, particularly communities of colour whose members may not have access to sufficient wealth that would allow them to work for free. This is clearly illustrated in The Bear where we see that Carmy has the safety nets and access in place that allow him to stage at various fine dining institutions and gain much sought after experience (e.g. his family's ownership of The Beef and his ability to work there, his cousin Michelle's restaurants in NYC and his access to those spaces). Sydney, Tina, Marcus and even Richie have very different entries into the world of restaurants and fine dining.

The issue of sexual abuse and harassment in the restaurant industry is also very subtly broached in The Bear (though it is more heavily implied in the draft script for 1x01), particularly in 1x07 The Review with Richie accusing Sydney of giving a food critic head in order to get a positive review for her risotto (season 1 Richie was genuinely the worst). But the issue is huge, with more sexual harassment claims filed in the US in the restaurant industry than any other field of work.

Even scrubbing floors by hand and cleaning with a toothbrush, while ensuring sparkling kitchens, have also historically been used as a means of punishment, particularly in institutional settings. During Australia's Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, there were numerous reports of children in care homes being forced to scrub floors with toothbrushes as a means of physical punishment and control. (CW: the above link discusses accounts of institutional child sexual abuse).

Given the above, its clear to see that the industry - the system - facilitates a whole lot of shit that its workers are subjected to. So when Chef Adam Shapiro catches Sydney as she leaves the train station in 2x04 Violet and asks her how she's doing, her response is telling:

Sydney: It's been a long month [at The Bear].

Chef Adam: Ah. That bad?

Sydney: No, just-- Restaurants.

Chef Adam: Yeah. Right? Why do we do this to ourselves?

Sydney: 'Cause we're crazy.

Chef Adam: Yeah. What was this month's crazy?

Sydney: Um. The kind that's inherited.

Chef Adam: *Nods emphatically* Understood.

This Financial Times article on the dark side of restaurant culture in Copenhagen, sums things up perfectly:

“We always had this joke, an explanation for why things are so horrible: shit falls down,” [Chef Levi] Luna told [the author Imogen West-Knights], with a cold laugh. In the kitchen, the head chef gets mad at the sous-chef, who gets mad at the person below him, a chef-de-partie, who then takes it out on a stagiaire. Then one day, the sous-chef is the head chef, and he has learnt how a head chef behaves: badly. It should give a sense of the strength of feeling I encountered about how damaging this system is that several people independently described it as being like children who are abused going on to commit abuse as adults. This is the dark flipside of the restaurant-as-family metaphor.

Challenging the status quo @ The Bear

By the end of season 3, Carmy appears to recognise that subtraction in his life is not going to bring him happiness. In fact, in 1x08 Braciole, he identified subtraction - specifically, the cutting out of people from his life - as the reason his life got quiet as he grew more isolated. In 3x10 Forever, when he finally confronts Chef David, Carmy laments the psychic and physical impact of Fields' abuse as well as the isolation it engendered. Fields, psychopath that he is, remained unfazed:

Carmen: You gave me ulcers, and panic attacks, and-and nightmares. You--You know that, right? Do you-- Do you understand that?

Chef David: Yeah, I gave you confidence, and leadership, and ability. It fucking worked.

Carmen: My life stopped.

Chef David: That's the point, right?

Additionally, its worth pointing out that despite all the focus on precision, minimalism and (quite frankly) rage being put into the impeccably plated dishes of The Bear, it's the messy, juicy, multi-ingredient filled Italian beef sandwiches that remain the site's best seller. Indeed, in 3x05 Children, Nat tells Carmy that the sandwich window is the only thing at The Bear making any money. So much for subtraction.

We also see Carmy resisting a total acquiescence to Chef David's approach to running a kitchen early on in season 3. His non-negotiables read in the hindsight of the entirety of the series like his attempt at integrating the lessons he’s learned from various kitchens. It’s why the list says “no repeat ingredients” AND “vibrant collaboration”. We know that vibrant collaboration had to come from someone else’s kitchen cos Fields certainly wasn’t collaborating with anyone. That asshole was out there dictating like a fascist.

Additionally, while Carmy has realised the dangers of the fine dining industry by the end of season 3 (and not for the first time - recall in 2x01 The Beef when he called the Michelin star system "a trap"), and while Sydney grapples with her role as an "accomplice" to Carmy's season 3 bullshit, their protégés Tina and Marcus continue to keep the flame of genuine care, collaboration and inspiration alive. This is most clearly seen during the conversation Tina and Marcus have in 3x09 Apologies where they discuss Marcus' mother and his memories of her as well as brainstorm ideas for Tina's cauliflower, brussel sprouts and horseradish dish (please for the love of gad, give us more Tina, Marcus and Ebra next season).

Challenging the status quo in the real world

There are also actual chefs in the real world who appear to be doing something different with their work: embracing their own food cultures that have historically been locked out of the world of fine dining and also trying to run their kitchens in more egalitarian ways.

Above clockwise from top left: Chefs Tim Flores and Genie Kwon of Kasama, Chef Adejoké Bakare of Chishuru, Chef Asma Khan of Darjeeling Express and Chef Mariya Moore-Russell formerly of Kumiko and Kikkō.

The first, most obvious example of this for The Bear fans is Kasama, (shout out to @currymanganese and @thoughtfulchaos773 for introducing me to the above linked, short doco) the Filipino American restaurant founded and run by Chefs Tim Flores and Genie Kwon (who also happen to be married) in Chicago. Kasama is also where Carmy and Syd were meant to have their palate cleansing "reset" in 2x03 Sundae and where Sydney may have also been hit on by fellow Coach K fan, Kasama bae (shout out to @sydcarmyfan for verbalising what I squee-ed about on first watch of this episode lmao).

Both Flores and Kwon come from fine dining backgrounds but appear to challenge some of that industry's basic tenets, including the messianic role of the EC as top of Escoffier's brigade food chain. Flores openly states that his cooking is an ode to his Filipino mother who regularly taste tests his food. In the Nick Cavalier doco linked above, Flores states "if [his mother Lolly Flores] eats [the food] and there's no reference to her dish at all, I'm not doing the right thing." Flores and Kwon also operate Kasama using a hybrid model (that I think would send regimental Escoffier into a tailspin) where they offer fast and casual service featuring Kwon's baked goods during the day and offer a Filipino tasting menu led by Flores for dinner service only. Kasama was awarded a Michelin star in 2023, the first Filipino restaurant in the world to achieve that title. It also took home a James Beard Award that same year.

Note: if you haven't already, have a read of this interview of Tim Flores and Genie Kwon conducted by the Michelin Guide. ISTG Storer and Calo have read this and lifted whole paragraphs for The Bear's script. An excerpt that stood out to me, in particular:

The two first met at Bib Gourmand restaurant GT Fish & Oyster, also in Chicago. "He was leaving as I was starting. So we didn't overlap for very long. But I actually went to eat at the restaurant that he was working at afterwards, and I had one of the best experiences of my life at a tasting menu. And after that we started talking and hanging out, and eventually started dating," recalls Kwon about how she and Flores first met.

Sounds a lot like a couple of Jeffs we know, yes?

Also check out Chef Adejoké Bakare, who in 2024, became only the second Black woman to get a Michelin star in the world (the first being Chicagoan Mariya Moore-Russell who announced in 2020 that she was taking a break from her career for her mental and physical wellbeing and who also...is married to a chef lol). Bakare's restaurant, Chishuru in London, specialises in West African cuisine rooted in Bakare's Yoruba, Igbo and Hausa cultures. Bakare, like Genie Kwon, has a background in biological sciences. She also began her career as a home cook, then ran a fish and chip cart while studying at university in Nigeria. Once she moved to the UK, she ran a supper club and later won the opportunity to run a short term pop up restaurant. During the ceremony where she got her Michelin star, Bakare noted "[i]t did feel rather odd at last night's ceremony that 90% of the room was white middle-aged men. But the passion I see among young women in the industry is such that I'm confident things will change."

Take also Chef Asma Khan, who got her start in the industry as a home cook and then began running supper clubs out of her house in the UK. She then opened up the Darjeeling Express with a group of South Asian women she had met when they were all fairly recent arrivals in the UK, none of whom had formal culinary training. To this day, her kitchen remains fully staffed and run by women.

In this TEDx Talk about her work, Khan says:

"I wanted to cook but I actually wanted to feed people. This gave me the greatest pleasure. I felt at my most powerful when I was able to serve someone something I had cooked. In some ways it was my way of showing affection and love, and being able to give them something that took them home."

Sounds familiar yes? Like a couple of Jeffreys in season 1 of a certain show?

About the systemic sexism in the industry, Khan says:

"But at that time, in England, anywhere in the West, everywhere you looked it was male chefs you saw that was on television [...] in the media. It was always about men who were cooking kitchens. The greatest irony of it all is that [...] in every South Asian home you go to, you will invariably find a woman [cooking] but in every South Asian restaurant you go to, not just in India but in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, almost everywhere in the world, you will usually find a man cooking in the kitchen. And it was a desire for me that I wanted to cook but there was no road or route in front of me."

Khan elaborates further on the skewed and gendered manner in which elite fine dining operates, in this article:

“There is no public hanging [in her restaurant]. Male chefs have made cooking into a combat sport. I think it’s a reaction to the idea that cooking is feminine: I’m not the dinner lady! I’m not your grandmother! Sorry, but if you’re constantly screaming at staff it means you’ve trained them badly.”

Khan is describing the hyper-competitive nature of fine dining (and her suspicion that in a highly gendered industry that is populated by majority men, that there is a need to perform a hypermasculinity in order to put distance between themselves and the historically feminine-gendered roots of the act of cooking) and how Khan wanted no part of it, for herself, her staff or her patrons. In this Guardian article, Khan points her attention directly at the toxic work cultures of many fine dining institutions:

Khan sees herself as a vital heckler on the sidelines of the industry, rather than part of its elite club of star chefs. She is especially scathing of a macho restaurant culture that has allowed workplace bullying and abuse to become normalised – and of those who enable it.

“My deep concern during the pandemic is seeing very prominent people with considerable wealth remove the entire workforce without a safety net.” A surge of restaurant and pub workers were reported to be sleeping rough in central London in April, a fact Khan can’t shake. “It is so shameful, my heart bleeds for the industry, it is immoral. I don’t want restaurants to be ranked by Michelin stars for the fluff and edible herbs they put on a plate. I want to know how they treat their people, they should be ranked on that. Where there is bullying and racism, where there is sexual harassment, where staff don’t feel safe, people should boycott those restaurants. I don’t want to see them prosper.”

Honestly, after reading some of the horror stories about work place practices in the restaurant industry, I'm with Khan. I'm also with Flores, Kwon, Bakare and Moore-Russell. I reckon Storer and Calo are also with these folks too and that we're going to see a shift in season 4 of The Bear that reflects the larger industrial change in the world of fine dining that chefs like these are heralding.

The death of fine dining

Above: Carmy's phone in 3x05 Children

Like @freedelusionshere says here, I don't think its a suprise that season 3 ended with Ever's funeral. The fine dining of Empire and even Ever is dead. How can it not be given the way its been largely running to date, as discussed above? How can it not be when we are living in a time of severe food insecurity precipitated by runaway consumerism and the twin existential threats of global climate and extinction crises. How can anyone in good conscience justify charging exorbitant amounts of money on a plate that is not going to fill patron's bellies while there are communities worldwide who do not have enough food to feed their children? When some communities, even in so-called "first world" countries like America and Australia cannot access clean drinking water?

Truly, the argument for fine dining posited by Will Guidara in 3x10 Forever made me (and I'm sure many others) actually cringe.

There's nobility in this. [...] We can give them the grace, if only for a few hours, to forget about their most difficult moments. Like, we can make the world a nicer place. All of us in this room. We have this opportunity, perhaps even a responsibility, to create our own little magical worlds in a world that is increasingly in need of a little more magic.

There *is* nobility in nurturing people, in feeding them. But in a time of the multiple and rolling, global existential crises, where particular communities are being targeted not just for marginalisation but whole scale eradication, this is not a time for more "magic"; particularly when those "little magical worlds" are reserved for the select few who can afford them. We don't need more holes to bury our heads in. We need real spaces of care that are accessible, kind (read: not nice, but kind. there is a big difference) and nurturing. And those spaces need to be those things not just for the patrons who visit them but also for the staff who work there.

There is also literally no time for escapism, at least not of the kind that late stage capitalism promotes and as described by Guidara in 3x10. We are living at a time where food systems are said to make up one third of all greenhouse gas emissions, pushing the climate crisis further to the point of no return. What's the point of making magic worlds to escape an actual world on the brink? And while your magic-making contributes to the brink getting closer? Its like putting lipstick on a pig.

Indeed some have posited that it was the British Empire's remaking of the world to feed Britain (which we've looked at briefly above) that has been the single biggest contributor to the current environmental crises facing our planet. The Bear acknowledges the issue as well. Recall 2x04 Violet when Tina visits Jerry at the farmers' market and his explanation for why he has so little produce to sell:

Jerry: There's fewer and fewer moths to grow vegetables now, and 'cause of that, there's fewer and fewer farms. Used to be you could come down here, buy everything you needed for a full menu. All in one spot. Whatever grows together, goes together.

The reason there are fewer months to grow vegetables is because of climate change which has impacted on everything to season length, groundwater and rainfall levels (as the two main sources for global farming irrigation) and increased periods of drought and heatwave.

So whats next for The Bear?

Season 3 put us through the ringer with Carmy replicating toxic practices in his restaurant that are rife in the industry at large. Yes, Carmy also has mental health issues and is a survivor of multiple sources of trauma. We know this. I've talked about this at length here and here. But he's also a guy who's running his own business with folks who are dependent on their place of work for their livelihoods. As such, he, Nat and Uncle Jimmy (as co-owners of The Bear) have responsibilities to their staff.

As EC at The Bear who is directly responsible for managing BOH, Carmy has a choice to make about whether he "blows his trauma through" (shout out to Dr Resmaa Menakem and his book My Grandmother's Hands) the bodies of those closest to him, including the crew at The Bear. Just as parents have to work on themselves so that they don't replicate harmful patterns of behaviour in raising their children, so too do we all in our daily relationships, including where many of us adults spend most of our waking lives: at work.

Like Richie observed, Carmy is not integrated in season 3 but neither is the industry in which he's working. A menu that constantly changes, wasteful food practices, a food production and agricultural industry that contributes to a third of global greenhouse gas emissions leading to increased global warming. These things are absolutely not integrated. In many ways, Carmy's mental state in season 3 - anxious, agitated, exhausted, is a reflection of the times. Given all of the above, Carmy's "I'm so fucking sick of this" in 3x09 Apologies hits me harder in the chest. Yes Carmy, you should be. Now go do something about it.

Having looked at the career trajectories of a few talented, conscientious chefs in the course of writing this meta, I think its pretty clear that the old way of running restaurants a la Chef David Fields is over. As we sit at the precipice of climate disaster, watching multiple genocides unfolding at once, during a time of massive food insecurity, who the hell has time to be suffering in the way Chef David made his employees feel in the course of making food that is meant to nourish people? What fucking cognitive dissonance is required to continue on THAT kind of a path?

Come season 4, I reckon we are going to see a massive shift in the trajectory of The Bear. This will be precipitated by multiple things (like the review Carmy got at the end of 3x10 and whatever the fuck Uncle Jimmy is up to with that box and those golf clubs lol) but most significantly, by a realisation on Carmy's part that his version of Michelin mode IS NOT IT.

I reckon Carmy and Sydney are going to continue to work together but they'll go back to the original plan they made with one another in 1x08 Braciole. They're going to go back to family style. They're going to treat their staff better (after Carmy apologises lol). They're going to shift from wasteful, haute cuisine to sustainable food practices that support producers and the planet more broadly. They're going to leave Chef David Fields' scare tactic of subtraction behind and lean into using more pepper.

Above: Sydney's notebook as she workshops a recipe at home in 1x08 Braciole.

Tagging: @moodyeucalyptus @currymanganese @hwere @freedelusionshere @thoughtfulchaos773 @ambeauty @brokenwinebox @devisrina @espumado @fresaton @kdbleu @vacationship @birdiebats @bootlegramdomneess @mitocamdria @tvfantic87 @angelica4equity @anxietycroissant @turbulenthandholding @yannaryartside @afrofairysblog @ciaomarie

cos you may be interested but as always, I'd love to chat to whoever wants to about this stuff!

[mcuamerica]

Welcome Home | Azriel x Fem!Reader

Featuring: Cassian x Reader (platonic)

Summary: After seeing how fun you have with Cassian, Azriel decides to test out a form of punishment... Requested by anon here.

Warnings: 18+ only, mean/possessive Azriel (because of a potion), scared by mate (?), alludes to SA, (I honestly don't know what to warn here, read the original request for context), not proofread

Disclaimer: I do not own SJM’s characters, only the ones I create for the purpose of this story. This is a work of fiction. I do not give permission to repost my work on any other platform or medium. Please be respectful.

While Azriel was on a mission, you decided to spend time with your best friend and the other deadly warrior of the Inner Circle, Cassian.

You were having a fun time with him, running around with some odd game he had created. Cassian, seemingly, kept changing the rules. You popped up behind a shrub of the garden, jumping on his back. "Mr. Illyrian Warrior, sir, you cannot keep changing the rules to make yourself win." You giggled.

"Foul! No jumping on the backs of winged faeries!" He called out, trying to shake you off. You giggled even more, dropping down onto the floor.

"Cass, seriously," you scorned, crossing your arms. "Tell me the actual rules of the game so we can properly play!"

You felt like a child pouting next to her older brother, but sometimes it was all you needed to let go a little bit. Forget the wars and politics that plagued the Inner Circle of the Night Court for just half an hour and play a stupid game, which involved you chasing Cassian around the garden. To what end? He still hadn't told you.

Cassian was the first one you met from the IC. He found you in the outskirts of Velaris, shivering at the end of a very small stream. In the middle of winter. You had been thrown out of your home by your father. You were trying to make it to Velaris when you encountered an incredibly vicious male who only wanted one thing from you.

Luckily, you fought him off and ran away, but not without falling down a rocky hill and cracking your ribs. That was when Cassian found you, patrolling the forest for a few run away soldiers. You were scared by him at first, not letting him anywhere near you.

But when he lowered and tucked in his wings, crouched down to be even lower than you, you knew he wasn't going to hurt you. The kindness in his eyes spoke enough.

So you let him take you in his arms and fly you into the city, settling with Madja to take care of you. For a week he sat by your side, wanting nothing other than to make sure you were okay, after he found the male that had hurt you... and sent Rhys to deal with your family.

After that, you showed your knowledge of spell cleaving, your mother a strong female from the Day Court, and became a quick member of the Inner Circle. After years of working and getting to know each member, you quickly fell in love and mated with Azriel. Your official acceptance of the bond was just about a year ago, meaning you were still learning a lot of new and exciting ways to make your lives even richer in love.

"Cassian!" You yelled as he picked you up and set you on top of a bench, peering down at him.

"You stay there for five seconds, eyes closed, and you have to catch me somewhere in the garden." He said.

"And what do I win if I do?" You asked, eyebrows raised.

"Extra dessert?" He teased and you narrowed your eyes.

"Deal." You said, closing your eyes and counting to five.

You opened your eyes and instead found your mate, peering up at you. With a look of lust and desire on his face, but something else tugged at the bond. Was that jealousy? You couldn't tell nor did you have time to decipher it because the next thing you knew, Azriel was carrying you up to your bedroom. He didn't even take the stairs, instead winnowing up to the room. Before you were even orientated, he was setting you on the bed and immediately pinning you down.

You quickly became overwhelmed by not only the change of scenery so quickly, but the scent that leaked from your mate. And the anger in his eyes. Did you do something wrong?

You let out a squeak when Azriel trailed his hand up your loose fitting shirt, grabbing hold before tearing it in half. "Azriel! What are you doing?" You managed to say, trying to scoot back from his grasp, your breath quickening. Azriel must have been so devoured by lust, or whatever it was, that he didn't hear you. Or.. didn't care?

"You are mine, understand? No one else's." He growled. Not a sensual one that drove you crazy most of a time, but more crazed. More desperate. "And I'm going to show you exactly how much you belong to me."

Your past, with the cruel male in the forest, flashed through your mind. You begged down the bond for him to stop. You shook your head again, eyes widened when he leaned back.

You took the opportunity and scrambled away, almost tripping over your feet as you ran from the bedroom. You ran down the stairs, hearing Azriel call your name. You whimpered, looking back to see him slowly stalking towards you. You made your way back to the garden, only to run into a hard wall. No, not a hard wall, Cassian.

"(Y/N)? What's wrong?" He asked, noticing your missing shirt, the silver lining your eyes, and your quick breathing.

"He- I don't know. Cass please make him stop." You said and wrapped your arms around his waist. He quickly looked up, noticing the stalking male now seething at the sight of his mate and his brother embracing.

Cassian soothed you, pulling you behind him. "Azriel... you need to stop." He said firmly, going into the protective warrior mode. Why was Azriel acting like this?

"Get away from my mate." He growled. There it was again. That crazed tone.

Then it his him. Cassian smelled the potion on him as he closed the gap between them, meaning to knock Cassian to the ground. "Azriel, this isn't you." He said, gripping his shoulders. Azriel's eyes darkened, moving to hit Cassian again. Cassian was faster, knocking him unconscious with a quick knock to the head. He stood for a moment, making sure that Azriel was indeed not waking up before he called for Rhys to get Madja here as soon as possible. Then he turned to you.

You were still shaking, arms wrapped around yourself as you cowered against the wall. You were never like this anymore. You were strong and independent and didn't need help from any of the warriors you called your family. Not after you learned to defend yourself.

But everyone was so overwhelming, you forgot all that training. You felt like the fragile female on that river bank again.

Cassian slowly approached you, again tucking in his eyes and bowing below your eye level. "Hey," his voice was barely above a whisper, "can I take you to your room?" He asked and you quickly shook your head, not wanting to go where Azriel had taken you. "My room?" He offered and you nodded, wrapping your arms around Cassian's neck as he picked you up carefully and took you to his room. He made sure you settled down, bringing you tea and your favorite comfort snack. Once you had eaten and stopped shaking, he lulled you to sleep with some very off key humming. Nothing like Azriel normally did when nightmares awoke you. Either way, by night fall, you were tucked into what was Cassian and Nesta's bed, sound asleep. No stutter of breath or shift in movement.

Cassian walked out of the room and crossed his arms when he found Madja and Azriel in the living room.

"I didn't even know it until I drank it... it smelled normal." Azriel finished saying, his eyes clear.

Cassian stalked over to him and grabbed him by the collar. "What in the Cauldron did you do to her?" He growled.

"Cassian! Get off of him." Madja said and swatted at his arm. Cassian quickly let go of his brother, but that didn't mean he wasn't pissed. "He had a jealousy potion in his system. One that, from the sounds of it, makes mates even more possessive of their partners. And will drive them to the brink of madness if anyone even looks at their mate."

"He hurt her." Cassian seethed.

Azriel's eyes flashed with hurt. He looked like he had been through hell. Good, Cassian thought, let him rot there a little longer.

"Cass, you know I would never hurt her intentionally." He said, frowning.

"You better talk to her in the morning.. but leave her alone tonight." Cassian demanded, not even wanting to talk with his brother right now. Rhys, who had been standing in the corner this whole time, decided not to chip in. While he was close to you, he wasn't nearly as must of a friend to you as Cassian was. He knew Cass would defend you no matter what, he saw you as a little sister. And if Cassian deemed that you needed space from Azriel, your mate, right now, he was probably right.

"I will..."

You were groggy when you woke up the next morning, not recognizing the scent of your mate or the feeling of the sheets. The events from the past day came back to you and you frowned.

It was then that you realized Azriel sat next to the bed, sleeping in a chair tucked in the corner.

You tentatively sat up, knowing there had to be an explanation of what he did. He had never acted like that with you before. Even when you were trying new things in the bedroom, he was always slow and considerate.

"Azriel..." You whispered, your timid voice betraying the courage you worked up in your mind. You reached for the glass of water next to the bed, slowly drinking as Azriel shot up in the chair.

"(Y/N)... sweetheart, I am so sorry." He said, getting up to sit on the edge of the bed. You pulled back from his touch, tucking in the glass of water against your chest. "It's not an excuse, but I was under the influence of a potion. If I had known the effects, I would have gone as far away from you as possible. But it didn't kick in until I saw you with Cassian and I was so jealous of the two of you all of the sudden and-"

"Az. You're ranting." You said, a small smile coming to your lips. As soon as he mentioned the potion, you remembered the strange smell that coated his scent. It wasn't like anything you had scented on him before, and you were glad it was just a potion and you wouldn't again.

"I'm so sorry." He said again, eyes pleading you to understand him. You slowly set the glass down on the nightstand, resting your hand over one of his.

"Promise you will never do that again?" You asked quietly.

He let out a sigh of relief, his whole body relaxing. "Yes, I swear on my life I will never do what I did to you yesterday. Never again." He said and shook his head.

You brought your other hand up to cup his cheek. "Well then..." you trailed off, leaning forward. "Welcome home." You sealed the statement with a soft, sweet kiss.

A/N: Okay, hope you enjoyed! I had a hard time thinking of any reason that Azriel would intentionally harm/force himself on his mate, so hopefully this makes sense!

Main Masterlist

[ellestrade]

What do you think makes a good Damian Wayne fanfic ? Like what are your standards and red flags when you're reading one

Usually, I would first look at the 'Damian Wayne-centric' tags on ao3 and go from there. I don't think I hold any fics up to a certain standard, though being able to read any is important to me— that means proper paragraphing, grammar, etc.

I know that most, if not all writers on ao3 are amateur writers, novice at best and, if I'm lucky, have been writing since the dawn of Wattpad, so it's not fair for me to expect top-tier writing/characterisation. Everyone always has some kind of trope to fall back into, myself included. It's just a matter if said trope is annoying or not to consume.

"Good Damian Wayne fanfics" are, itself, subjective— because good fanfics, for me, means that there are no attempts at butchering his character, along with his loved ones, and that includes Talia, Ra's, Maya and Mara, etc. If I open a fic and it's all just a grandiose of people putting down Talia (making her a bad/abusive mother) just to have Bruce hugs his son, then I'm closing the tab.

That being said, here are my red flags/pet peeves when it comes to reading a fanfic:

Any, and I mean any variant consisting of bashing the al-Ghuls.

"Talia al-Ghul is a bad mother"

"Talia al-Ghul is a rapist"

"Ra's al-Ghul is a creep"

"Damian is a bad sibling"

Usually, any fics that consist of these types of fics often came out as xenophobic or straight up racist— taking Grant Morrison's run (primarily Talia's character assassination) as gospel, or never reading canon material as a whole.

Of course, credits where it's due, there are some, and I mean a very small some, fics that don't transpire that image— using the tag that to simply convey Damian's time in the League, or phrasing it in a way that Talia/Ra's were an abuser once victim. However, making them bad in comparison is just a no-go for me.

Also, making Talia a rapist is a one way ticket for me to block you— because not only that it is wrong, but it also shows that you don't care enough to do thorough research and just take it as it is; Talia, pre-Morrison, was depicted as this kind and loving woman. She was studying medicine when she met Bruce. They genuinely have Chemistry together. She was also a victim of abuse herself, and she would rather die than inflict harm upon others on purpose. She loves her son, she loves her husband, she loves her family and she also loves herself.

Also, the al-Ghuls are also some of the most affectionate family there are— at least, of course, prior to the whole character assassination for the sake of making Bruce seem like the better parent in comparison. They aren't afraid to show genuine affection to one another, becoming physical and shows their devotion beyond what words could measure— which, is , unfortunate, since they're presented in Western media, and God knows how bad someone would interpret a relationship if 'I love you's aren't being exchanged regularly like therapy talks.

Dare I say, they might actually be better than the BatFam 🤷🤷 but then I might get hunted down for sports so I'll keep that opinion to myself, for now.

I'm also going to redirect you to this one lovely account, @rasalghul777 and read their take(s) on Brutalia. Here's a starting post and this one if you'd like to start. This person makes wonderful posts regarding Brutalia and the al-Ghuls as a whole than what I could ever conspire and I applaud them for it.

White savior complex

"Damian got his love for animals from [insert any BatFamily members here]"

"Damian learned to love through being with BatFam"

Again, this could also be read along with my first point, but can also be seen separately— I genuinely cannot stand when Damian was written in a way that he was a 'feral, stabby boi' prior his transgression into the BatFamily since it conveys distasteful perception of the Arabic people as a whole; them being uncultured or even uncivilized.

It's gross, I hate it, get it away from me.

Also, Damian inheriting his love for animals from anyone else other than the al-Ghuls is just pure fanon bullshit— because that means you have no perception of what the League of Assassins really are and just takes everything the fandom writes at face value; the League (including Talia and Ra's) aren't some 2-dimensional villains who kills. Reducing a villain to a mere trope just to prop up your white boy isn't going to make me like them. It just takes away the fun of it.

People just love to forget the 'eco' in 'eco-terrorist', which Ra's is.

If anything, Damian would inherit his genuine and deep love for animals and nature from him.

It's worth mentioning that the League of Assassins doesn't kill people just for the sake of violence— there's a reason why they're being categorized as eco-terrorists, and not the other category people love to associate Arabs with; they kill with reason. Similar to Poison Ivy, they specifically target any organisation that brings ruins to Earth and nature as a whole.

On another note, writing Damian as 'uncivilized' or 'feral' is just plain wrong. While it certainly can be cute, in a sort of gremlin-esque, little brother way (Lord knows how much I love my little brother, but simultaneously wanted to (subliminally) throw a chair at him) but depicting him as this one child that goes around stabbing everyone unprompted rubs me the wrong way.

This goes along with my first note, but Damian was raised as a prince when he was in the League; there were some instances where soldiers who came to pick him up refer to him as "Young prince". He has manners. He knows what to say and what to do when being confronted by the media. If anything, Damian would adapt 'Gotham's Darling Boy' facade faster than BatFam girlies mischaracterise the next POC character.

Damian does love his mother and grandfather and his family back in the League very, very much. Just because he doesn't convey it in a conventional, traditional way, doesn't mean he doesn't know how. He has his own ways of saying 'I love you's of his own.

People that clearly consume more fanon media in comparison to canon.

Tim Drake stans. Like, as a whole.

Let me begin by saying I actually do not care on how you plan to enjoy your nice little character trope, but believe me when I say that there are some weights to what's famously transpired in the fandom spaces.

It's the "fandom affects canon space" phenomenon all over again.

It should go without saying that what goes in the fandom stays in the fandom, and vice versa. Like I said before, people tend to fall back to their favourite trope— writing characters in a certain way, conveying certain messages, etc. However, in the midst of your 'creative freedom', it's easy to forget that these characters are not yours.

Fandom is derived from the canon substance, that's why it's so flexible and allows creative freedom in the first place. The consumer can decide what's canon in the fandom space (rejecting what's real), though it's important to remember that canon is still the blueprint and shouldn't be thoroughly ignored in favour of your dumb little incorrect quotes. Rejecting everything just means that you're creating an Oc, which, atp is what you should be doing instead of DTI a canon character.

It's why we got gems like these:

(I have reached tumblr maximum capacity for images, but know that there's more)

Again, do what you want, I don't care! But remember that when you're depicting certain character dynamics like these, it also affects other potential fans' views and first impressions of said character.

I don't want to go off tangent longer than necessary— but I actively avoid any variants of, "Hurt Tim Drake" tags on ao3. Mostly because mischaracterisation awaits me. The rest are because his fans are genuinely obnoxious and (more often than not) have little to no comprehension to actual canon substance.

I think that's all that I could muster up. Sorry this post is long, lol, but I got carried away.

[certifiedsexed]

I have this problem where I am hyper aware of the smell of specifically my mom’s sweat/discharge. It isn’t like this for anyone else, but to me I can always smell it whenever I am around my mom or if she has been sitting somewhere for a while and it really reeks to me, like to an unbearable level. Nobody else in the house has complained about this and I’m made out to be this hateful spiteful bully for always telling her she smells and that she leaves smells wherever she sits. Idk what to do anymore, help??? Why am I the only one who can seemingly smell it? Why is it only hers that I smell??

So, this is really far out of my wheelhouse and has nothing to do with my field of study but I still feel compelled to answer this.

My first thought here is that constantly telling someone that you think they stink, especially in front of other people, is very rude and hurtful. Even if it's true.

I think the way you're going about this, "always" telling her you think she stinks and around other people is actually very unkind and that's probably why people think you're trying to be a bully. That can be very humiliating and awful to constantly hear.

Even if someone stinks, that's often not something to comment on. It can be okay if you're with a family member, or someone you're close to, and you think they'd want to know, so you pull them aside and tell them maybe they need some deodorant.

Even sometimes, especially during puberty, a sibling might not smell the greatest. That doesn't mean you can tell them that all the time. Sometimes it means you give them some hygiene tips but often it means you wait it out, maybe spray some cleaning stuff sometimes. Sometimes people stink.

But the way you're going about it isn't like that in the least and you're describing how awful this is for you and how you're being blamed for saying these things but what you're describing is also happening to your mother. You don't mention once how she's reacted, how she feels about this, what she's said in response, etc, at all.

It sounds like this situation might be far worse for her to be experiencing, Anon.

It might not even be sweat you're smelling. It could be a soap or perfume she wears that smells bad to you.

Regardless of what it is, the way you're going about it sounds hurtful and it also sounds like you're not being very thoughtful about how this might be affecting her.

I think this could be solved much better if you try to figure out when this issue started, figure out if this is a hygiene issue or just a perfume type issue-

If it's hygiene, it's possible it's a health issue, which is not necessarily something that can be helped beyond you not shaming her constantly for it. If it might be perfume, ask if you can check out what soaps and possible perfume or whatever she uses.

That doesn't necessarily mean you'll be able to "fix" it, given she's allowed to wear what she wants, even if you don't like the smell, but it would clear up the mystery.

But if you can't figure it out respectfully and while being kind, then its an issue where you just need to mind your own business. Either way, it sounds like you really need to apologize to your mom.

I can't tell you exactly what's going on here but that's my thoughts. Not sure how helpful they are tbh, like I said, this is not my wheelhouse.