#critical fail on head empty save

[t-hirstreview]

[alexlwrites]

𝑭𝒐𝒓𝒈𝒆𝒕 𝒎𝒆 𝒏𝒐𝒕

✿𝑷𝒂𝒊𝒓𝒊𝒏𝒈: Jungkook x Reader

✿ 𝑺𝒖𝒎𝒎𝒂𝒓𝒚:  The one where everytime you get dumped you pretend that you never met the guy before to mess with their heads. To the point that if you run into them somewhere you reintroduce yourself and act like you’ve never seen each other before.

Enters fuckboy Jungkook who disappears after your night together, not knowing how much he was about to regret that choice.

✿ 𝑻𝒂𝒈𝒔:  Romance, Humor, Fluff, Angst, College AU

✿ 𝑨/𝑵: I’m truly sorry for this sad excuse of an update.

(Fanfic masterlist)

(support me on my ko-fi)

°•. ✿ .•°

𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐭𝐰𝐨 - 𝐎𝐛𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧, 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐲, 𝐜𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐲 𝐩𝐞𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐬

(<<< part one)

“I can’t believe you’re doing this again” Jane’s voice rang through the phone as you walked down the streets towards your desired coffee spot.

You also couldn’t believe you were doing that again. You tried your best to live your life with no regrets, but men made it very hard.

“Have you seen him since he fled the crime scene?”

“Stop calling it a crime scene” you snapped.

“Well, have you?”

Your silence was enough of an answer. No, you had not seen or heard from Jungkook since he ran away from your bedroom in the dead of night, leaving behind only the smell of cologne and, funnily enough, a single sock. When you woke up that day to an empty bed, sheets crumbled and a mattress indented on the side where he had slept, all you could muster was a tired sigh of disappointment. 

And to be completely honest, you were disappointed with yourself, not Jungkook. You expected nothing less than a quick escape of him. But you should’ve known better than to hope for anything. Despite everything, you were still an idealist at heart and you thought that maybe just this once…

You shook your head obstinately. You had learned early on that no good would come from moping around for men who would never once feel any regret for their thoughtless actions and if your pain were to be always one sided, then it was better not to feel any at all. Not to dwell on it, move on, learn from it and be better. Or be worse, sometimes, as self-improvement was not always your goal.

Sometimes, you chose to listen to the tiny revengeful angel on your shoulder - who kind of sounded like Taylor Swift - that screamed for violence and vindication.

As your failed relationships started to pile up, you did reach a point where you had to wonder if you were the problem, as it was the canonical event of all 20 something women. But observation, therapy, critical thinking and hereditary pettiness brought you to the decision that it was not, in fact, your fault. At least not all of it. 

With that in mind, you left only the smallest of time slots in your booked and busy schedule to ponder and grieve over the fickle nature of boys’ interests. You had better, more important things to do, such as mindlessly scroll through Minecraft/AITA videos and save pilates routines that you were never gonna do. 

Still, in an experience intrinsically feminine, you allowed yourself a little treat to cope with the slight burn of despondency in the back of your mind. 

And so you directed yourself to the bougie coffee house near campus, hoping to drown your sorrows with an aggressively sweet and overly caffeinated drink. 

“You should slash his tires”

“Jane, please, we have talked about this.”

“You should totally slash his fucking tires!"

"Saying it louder is not gonna make me agree with you! Jane…"

Suddenly your eyes found Jungkook's across the room filled to the brim with depressed, financially irresponsible students, making you pause and hold back the urge to curl your lips in distaste. It bothered you that even with scared eyes as big as saucers and hunched shoulders to appear smaller, Jungkook still managed to look good. 

But you knew better than to let him know how much his presence and pretty face annoyed you. Boys like Jungkook only cared about having an impact on people’s life, very rarely caring if it was good or bad. He wanted a reaction out of you and you learned better than to give those away so carelessly.

So you frowned and looked away, the words practiced on your lips as you said “Some guy is staring at me.”

Jane laughed loudly on the phone “You’re a psycho, you know that?”

“I don’t know who it is, Jane, some dude” you stole a quick glance at him, finding vengeful glee at his shocked expression.

“Send me a pic of his reaction, I’m posting it on TikTok.”

You continued playing your part, ignoring your sister’s interruptions as you usually did “Of course I’m carrying a taser, Jane, I’m not an animal…”

“I’ll give you 5 bucks to tase him.”

“You know what, this coffee is not even worth the visual harassment, God I hate men…”

You walked out of the coffee house, hand empty but with a fulfilled sick sense of accomplishment as you stepped out into the street with a shit-eating grin.

“I hope you know what you’re doing” Jane said and you could hear the smile in her voice. Out of your two sisters, Jane was never the one to tell you to not do something, preferring to let you make your own mistakes.

And boy, did you. 

You left your big, beautiful, tattooed mistake behind you, ready to move on to something less prone to disappointment, such as fictional men and your Stardew Valley husband “Dont worry” you told your sister “I don’t.”.

—

“What are you doing?” Jungkook asked, left eye twitching slightly at your unbothered expression.

After your confusing exit from the coffee shop and a good amount of jabs from his friends, Jungkook had to hunt you down across campus, finding you sitting under a tree with a book in your hands, looking way too peaceful for someone who just had humiliated him.

You looked down at your book with an arched eyebrow “Kegels, clearly. Why?”

“No, I mean…” Jungkook’s frustration was rising by the second, the vein on his neck jumping out “Why are you acting like you don’t know me?”

You frowned.

 “Do I know you?” you asked, face doubtful.

“We have classes together?”

You blinked, impassive.

“We went on a date?”

A head shake.

“We slept together!”

“Nope, can’t say it rings any bells.”

That’s it. Jungkook was actually convinced you were clinically insane. 

“How can you not remember?”

“How can I remember something that never happened?”

“But it did! You’re crazy! I chased you for weeks!”

You smiled, a trap.

“So, you're, like, in love with me?” you ask, tone condescending. 

Jungkook scoffed and you weren’t sure if it was at the idea of love or loving you. “No, of course not.”

“So in this dream scenario of yours, we had sex but we weren’t together?”

“Trust me, this” he gestured between the two of you “is no dream scenario.”

“Well, aren’t you a charmer” you crossed your arms in front you, defensive “Let me get this straight. You, allegedly, chased me for weeks, but don’t really like me. Then, we had casual, out-of-relationship sex and then what? You banged my head against the headboard so hard I completely forgot about it? Your story is full of holes, my dude.”

You had to fight back the urge to smirk, energy spiking from feeding off of Jungkook’s stupefied confusion.

Nail in the coffin, you shrugged, turning your eyes back to your book “Maybe you weren’t that memorable and my mind deleted you like a childhood trauma.”

A slight left eye spasm was all the reaction you got at first, evolving to the pursing of pouty lips and the clenching of fists.

“You are insane” he said at last after seconds of turning clogs in his barely filled mind.

“Finally you said something true.”

Jungkook was equally bewildered and furious. He didn’t know what your deal was or what you were getting out of this, but your refusal to admit you had sex pissed him off deeply considering how much time and effort he put into getting you together.

“Also, I have to ask” you continued, clearly not done with your pursuit of driving him up the wall “what was your goal with this conversation? Chasing me for weeks to then sleep with me and then come here and tell me you’re not actually interested in me, but being upset when I don’t remember something that didn’t happen… What’s the point?”

Jungkook paused. Truly, he didn’t have much of an end goal in mind, actions fueled only by a bruised ego and a childish, borderline pathological need to prove himself.

When he didn’t answer, you stood up and gathered your things, keeping your head down to hide your poorly concealed satisfaction “I’ll let you ponder on that” you said “Don’t worry about reaching out with an answer, though.”

Finally, you looked up at him, face masked with faux awkwardness. “Anyway. Nice to meet you, I guess? No, actually, not really, this was weird as shit. You seem to have some things to figure out. Get help and take care, my dude.”

And so you left, leaving behind only a cloud of your bergamot perfume and a perplexed Jungkook blinking owlishly. 

There was a sudden influx of thoughts rushing through his usually much less busy mind, the general tone of confusion ringing amongst humiliation and frustration.

When Jungkook first set his greedy eyes on you, he had an inkling that you’d be a handful and in the beginning, you truly were. You took pleasure in making everything much more difficult for him, running from his presence like the plague and approaching the whole subject of him like one would the subject of warts - reluctantly and with caution.

And if he were honest, he wasn’t too sure on why he insisted, but one would be surprised at how far Jungkook would escalate things out of spite and resentment.

It was that same sick combination of flavors that drove him insane for weeks, moving him to pester you until you gave him a chance. And he took it, lord, did he take it.

That night, he made every possible effort to please you, cloaked in his best, non-ranch stained clothes and best non-arrogant behavior.

And when morning came and he opened up his eyes before you did, tired out from the epitome of his bestest behavior, there was a moment of quiet as he watched you eyelids flutter delicately, soft arm draped lightly over his waist.

The night before had been… Fun, he thought, even before you had reached your bedroom. You were weird and used a bunch of words he didn’t know, but you also made him laugh and listened to him babbling about his interest without once looking bored, even going as far as asking questions about his farfetched MCU theories.

And despite your many (too many to count, insurmountable really) differences, you had… Chemistry, one could call it. Thick chemistry, palpable tension, pushing you towards each other despite your previous attempts to go the other way.

But no amount of chemistry could break Jungkook’s routine as inertia pushed him out of your bed, practiced steps light as feathers as he escaped your apartment with one last look to your sleeping form and somehow one less sock on his feet.

And as he left, there was an undiagnosed pounding in his heart he tried to chalk off as the result of his Dorito and monster drink based diet, but his eyes kept flashing back to where you rested even when he was miles away.

He tried to make sense of your persistent presence in the back of his mind. You were cool, he’d give you that. Hot too. But it didn’t matter how your body fit his like they were manufactured together or how your passive aggressive way of flirting (or insulting, he had a hard time telling them apart with you) never failed to steal a snort from his lips. And yeah, it was kind of nice when you called him cute everytime he didn’t understand something you said. It brought a blush to his cheeks and wild butterflies to his stomach, because… Well, no one had ever called him cute after middle school. Hot? Yes. Sexy? Once a week. Biggest dick ever? Yes, both meanings.

But not cute. And deep down, under layers of aggressively oversized shirts and muscles… Jungkook kind of liked being cute.

Jungkook shook that thought away. Despite all that, you were a point he had to make.

And he did! Point proven and undisputed, up until you looked at him like he was a silly little kid throwing a tantrum (which he kind of was) and questioned him and his sanity,

But Jungkook was obstinate and, even more, the sorest of losers. He had proven himself once and would again! He was a man on a mission, he decided, watching you walk away from him while mouthing the words “I’ll pray for you!”. And the mission was to either send you into a psychiatric hospital or get you back into his bed.

And if the butterflies in his stomach fluttered excitedly at that second prospect, he didn’t allow himself to ponder on it for a single second.

°•. ✿ .•°

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[paroslineage]

Memoir

Oneshot

Featuring : Hwang In-ho x F!Reader.

Summary : A plot explaining how he became so ruthless and cunning after the devastating lose of you, his beloved wife.

The characters do not belong to me except the reader. This is an original plot idea do not steal or modify the scenario created down below.

Masterlist.

---

The hospital room was quiet except for the steady beeping of the monitors. You lay on the bed, your hand resting on your swollen belly, your pale face still managing a weak smile as In-ho sat beside you, holding your other hand tightly. His police uniform was rumpled, a sign of the long shifts he'd been pulling, but his eyes were solely focused on you.

"You need to rest, In-ho," you murmured, your voice weak but full of love. "The baby and I… we’re fine as long as you're here."

In-ho’s grip tightened slightly. His jaw clenched as he fought back tears. "I can't lose you, jagiya. I won't."

You knew the medical bills were piling up. The doctors had been clear—your condition was critical, and the liver transplant you needed was expensive. In-ho had already donated a kidney to his younger brother, Jun-ho, years ago. He had always been a man of sacrifice, but now, the burden was crushing him.

"In-ho, don’t do anything reckless," you warned softly, as if sensing the turmoil brewing inside him.

He didn’t respond, just kissed your hand and whispered, "I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you and our baby safe."

---

A week later, In-ho returned home late, his hands trembling as he placed a stack of cash on the table. The air between you both grew heavy as you stared at the money.

"Where did you get this?" you asked, your voice trembling.

"I borrowed it," he replied, avoiding your gaze. "From someone who could help us."

The truth was far darker. The money came from a criminal syndicate, and the interest was insurmountable. When the police discovered his actions, In-ho’s reputation, built on years of unwavering duty, was shattered. He was dismissed, humiliated, and left with nothing but his love for you and the debt hanging over his head.

---

Months later, your condition worsened. Despite In-ho’s best efforts, the treatment wasn’t enough. He sat by your bedside, tears streaming down his face as he held your hand.

"I’m sorry," he choked out. "I failed you."

You smiled faintly, brushing a hand against his cheek. "You gave me everything, In-ho. I love you… always."

You passed away that night, the baby you both had dreamed of never taking their first breath.

---

Devastated and desperate, In-ho received an invitation to the Squid Game. The prize money was enough to cover all his debts and give him a fresh start, though the cost was unthinkable. With nothing left to lose, he joined the deadly competition.

Player 132 fought with the ferocity of a man with nothing to live for. He survived each game, but with every life he took or saw taken, a piece of his soul withered away. By the end, when he stood as the winner with the prize in his hands, the victory was hollow. He had the money, but it was too late to save the family he had fought so hard for.

---

In-ho returned to an empty home, haunted by the echoes of your laughter and the dreams you once shared. It was then that he received an offer from Oh Il-nam to become the Front Man. Bitter, broken, and disillusioned with the world, In-ho accepted.

Every year, as he oversaw the games, he thought of you. He wore the mask not just to hide his identity but to shield himself from the unbearable pain of who he used to be. Behind the cold and calculating demeanor of the Front Man was a man who had lost everything—his love, his child, and his sense of justice—all for a price he could never truly pay.

[verysium]

PLEASE DO BLUE LOCK ICKS IM BEGGING🙏😭🌹

😏 coming right up anon. gonna channel my inner critic and not hold back on any of these.

RIN

brother complex. not much else to say except that he needs to get a life. not everything is about metaphorically crushing your older brother's dreams and brooding in the dark hate of retribution.

competitive but only because he is a desperate whore for external validation. ignores everyone but craves the attention of a sole person named sae itoshi. was defeated by isagi once and has never let go of it since. has a one-track mind that is impossible to derail. stubborn when he wants to be.

probably a virgin and will continue to be one until his late 30s.

has not known a single day of peace ever since sae ditched him for the popular girlies. as a result, he has developed a very concerning case of social awkwardness. his idea of a conversation involves a brick wall and thirty minutes of you staring at his resting bitch face. constantly looks like that one grumpy cat meme. judges you for your poor decisions but then gets aggressively defensive when you point out his own mistakes.

reeks of so much teen angst that even metallica can't save him. the problem is that he has nothing to back up his emo persona. his insults lack creativity and, unfortunately for him, phrases like "lukewarm" and "half-baked" and "hell" do not make his words carry more weight. uses the f-word but in the most embarrassing context that it makes you facepalm and internally cringe.

SAE

zero social awareness. this boy's head is empty. the lights are not on up there. there are no picture frames or furniture. the curtains are drawn, and there is not a sliver of clouds or sunshine. cannot read body language and does not know what a filter is.

the source of all of rin's stress. he is the original trauma projector, creator of generational cycles. not even subtle about it. "turns out i was wrong. i thought japan was incapable of ever giving birth to decent forwards." sir....with the way you worded that, you knew exactly what you were doing when you gave rin false hope.

swears but it's even worse than his brother. literally called his elders a "fatso and bob cut duo" and "insect turd." i mean....there is a line between what is considered a legitimate burn and what is a first grader making up insults in his coloring book.

has a horrible haircut and no fashion taste. i already talked about this previously, but it was so bad it deserved a second mention.

a freak but tries to justify it rationally. like what do you mean you can tell a person's athletic ability from their buttock size? just admit you have a kinky fetish already.

somewhat of a coward but i'm gonna give him some leniency due to his tragic child genius backstory. tbh he's just an eighteen-year-old boy who needs a goddamn break.

KAISER

alexa please play clown music. this man sets himself for failure and then wallows in self-pity when he actually fails. like what did you expect? you knew what was going to happen the moment you challenged isagi like that. it was most definitely your fault you got violently humbled.

has a borderline god complex (currently calls himself an emperor but has not evolved into a deity yet.) unfortunately, he does not stand on business. cue the dramatic meltdowns when he realizes there is an actual gap between his ability and his reputation. if you're going to lie, at least make it believable.

insecure and mentally unstable. he probably cuts and re-dyes his hair every single time shit happens. no wonder his locks get shorter every time.

lazy when it comes to anything that is not football and expects others to do it for him. demands princess treatment wherever he goes. unfortunately, not all of us have servants with no self-respect like ness.

"it is not enough that i should succeed, others should fail" type of person.

does not wear shoes and even if he does, it's sandals. put them grippers away.

NAGI

a literal sloth who has so much potential but uses none of it. has no intrinsic motivation of his own, so if he's going to do anything, it has to be you behind the wheel, making sure he gets put to work.

does not have a close relationship with his parents, and so he has no sense of community, holidays, or traditions. no fun at all if you want him to do things like christmas shopping or birthday celebrations.

rots in bed all day and then has to nerve to ask you to carry him around. your back better be strong because his 190 cm body is not going to be light.

not loyal (need i say more.)

REO

second male lead syndrome. also known as that one popular guy who's always picked last.

acts like a victim but then when you realistically tell him to how to change his situation he refuses to do so. you cannot ask for advice and then take none of it to heart. no wonder you're still not over your ex.

"i can fix him" mentality. no, you can't. you are a seventeen-year-old child, not a licensed therapist and nagi isn't even all that.

NESS

touch-starved to the point he will stay in a toxic and abusive relationship in order to gain some scrap of affection. just because you were the black sheep of your family does not mean you can lose all sense of personal dignity.

probably stalks all the people he hates. has a burn book like regina george from mean girls. cuts out and glues little pictures of kaiser all over his bedroom. doodles hearts all over it with glittery gel pen. isagi's face and name are scratched out of every team photo.

delusional and prone to mood swings. medicated but at this point, he is beyond saving.

ISAGI

a home wrecker. has ruined more relationships than he can count on ten fingers yet still manages to smile like he's some angelic saint.

solves jigsaw puzzles for a living (not very cool if you ask me.)

has some unresolved anger management issues. probably repressed all his negative feelings when he was younger, so it all comes out when he's on the field. unfortunately, his twilight-sparkle-friendship-is-magic agenda is not going to work if he keeps cussing out his teammates like that. but then again, he is the main character, so i guess his plot armor makes up for his pitfalls.

says that he's a good guy but then holds personal vendettas against rivals he doesn't like. boy was so ready to throw hands when #kaisagi was trending on the internet. but when you actually think about, he's similar to kaiser in more ways than he'd like to admit.

BAROU

has the worst case of high and mighty "holier-than-thou" attitude. isagi put his ego in check, but it still peeks out from time to time.

he was the ugliest baby when he was born. i am not going to hold back on the child barou slander because it is true. no, he was not a cute and lovable bundle of joy. he looked like a demonic gremlin.

he needs to take more risks in life and try cross-dressing. simply imagining him in a maid uniform will not suffice. it needs to be made into a reality.

with how nit-picky he is, i doubt people can realistically stay within a 1-meter radius around him. unless you are a clean freak yourself, his constant complaints will start to get annoying after a time. even if he does have good intentions, he needs to let people have a little breathing room sometimes. a messy room is not going to kill you.

BACHIRA

this boy's brain is smooth. no folds. no gray matter. no intelligence either. his pencil and eraser have been left untouched since day one. if he wasn't crazily good at football, he would be unemployed and homeless in the future. not even a mcdonald's wants him.

one of those people who will do the literal opposite of whatever you say. you want him to stop talking? well, now he's never going to shut up. you tell him not to step on a pile of dog shit? well, now he's going to walk right into it. you want him to quit running around and act normal? well, now it's his life's mission to make you as annoyed as possible. please pray for your hair follicles because at the end of the day, you're not going to have many left with how much he makes you want to tear your hair out.

has the cerebral capacity of a toddler. if he thinks monsters are real, he's going to think anything is real. super gullible when it comes to any form of scam, ploy, or trickery. the only way he would not be fooled is if he's also played the same prank before.

SHIDOU

a brazen pervert. says the most out-of-pocket things and refuses to apologize for them. sometimes it comes out a little too sleazy for your liking.

"to me a goal is fertilization! a shot is the seed and the goal is the egg!! and the birth of that joy i call an explosion!! my genes are gonna knock you up!" let us give ourselves a moment of silence to digest this quote. only shidou ryusei would come up with a sperm and egg metaphor to describe football. (i guess protection means nothing to him.)

has no empathy. if you dislike him or cannot keep up with him, you're a literal nobody in his books. no sportsmanship. no compassion. no self-awareness.

you cannot say "balls" to him in a serious tone without him misinterpreting it as something dirty. that alone should tell you enough. stay the hell away from him.

where do men get the audacity? right here. from this little bastard. he invented the term "shameless slut." boy was getting off during the u-20 arc and on live TV too. no wonder sae said he was disgusting.

and finally, he comes from a long line of cockroaches. he's even got the antennae to prove it.

i think this might have been a little excessive, but i have no regrets about it. you're welcome anon ♡

[fandomfluffandfuck]

Things that drive Bucky insane,

Steve's itty bitty waist, his plump lips that buck wants to bite like a strawberry, Steve's inability to shut up while watching TV

Oh, ho, ho, do not tempt Bucky to list the things about Steve that drive him insane sexually and generally because Steve's a little shit because you will be there for literal days if not years.

This is a nonehaustive list that you have begun, and we can add so many things:

Steve's itty bitty, teeny tiny waist that his fingers can't help but dig into while they're fucking doggy style, Bucky pulling Steve back onto his cock at the same time that he shoves as deep into him as possible. He wants Steve to wear a bruised-in corset of his handprints across his waist at all times, healing factor of the serum be damned.

Steve's plump lips that he wants to bite until they're puffy, hot, and glistening wet from the abuse.

Steve's inability to shut the fuck up during TV episodes and movies meaning that Bucky has to have subtitles on so he doesn't miss critical plot points. The only thing already supersized about Steve before the serum was his mouth--the fuckin' loudest mouth in Brooklyn. Bucky hates to love that mouth so much.

Steve's blush. Enough said.

Actually, no, not enough said about Steve's blush. There can never be enough said about that pretty, baby pink to dark, deep red color. Bucky gets unspeakably hot seeing the flushed, burning red shells of his ears when he's fucking Steve from behind. Bucky could watch the way his blush spreads in slow motion for hours, days, weeks--he could watch it on loop if Steve would let him video it. It starts high on his cheeks as blotches of color, spreads over the crooked bridge of his nose, floods his entire face from his hairline down to his cut jaw, leaks down his throat, finds its way to his chest, crests the hills of his tits, surrounding his perky, pink nipples, and fades down to the lower part of his flat, smooth stomach. If Bucky's lucky, he can get Steve to blush so hard, so feverishly hot with embarrassment, that the small of his back gets colored, too.

Steve's whole hobby of running off into alleys to get into fights. No longer getting into it with men three times his size, mostly because that's physically very hard to do these days, yet all the same in principle and ego.

Steve's golden hair fresh from a lay--sticking up in tufts from having Bucky pull at it, hands in his hair, directing Steve's empty-headed, glazed-over stare wherever he wants it or pulling his whole head onto his dick, fucking his fucked-out face. That look makes Bucky feral. The dumb look in his eyes and the dumber look of his gaped-open lips, all his muscles gone slack in his face save for the carved-in depression between his drawn-together eyebrows. Sprawling pleasure.

Not just after they fuck, though, Steve's golden hair when he wakes up in the morning. Ruffled like a baby chick. That look never fails to make Bucky crush him into a full-body hug, cuddle session because he's out of his mind with affection. There's something about all those achingly familiar cowlicks.

Steve's golden hair darkened after a shower, seeping rivers of water that eagerly streak down his squeaky-clean, hot-water-red skin, conforming to every curve and dip of his body. Bucky will never stop wanting to lick every drop of water off of him when he's fresh out of the shower or bath or pool or--you get it.

Steve's body.

Steve's tits. Bucky is a caveman, thinking about Steve's tits. They're ripe and so fucking grabbable, leaving Bucky with no words, just a low, hungry growl in the back of his throat, and if he keeps going on about them, if he keeps thinking about them, he's going to seek out his man like a predator stalking prey. Then, Steve won't be able to peel his teeth off of him for hours, being gnawed at like a bone to a wild dog.

Steve's whole goody-two-shoes, golden-boy act around people who don't know him but know Captain America. It always gets under his skin, frustrating him, making him huffy and wanting to start cracking jokes that would make army boys from back in the day do a dull spit take with how disgustingly dirty they are.

Steve's waist deserves a second mention.

And if his waist gets two mentions, then maybe his ass needs three. He looks ripe there, too, a work of art designed to leave everyone who admires it drooling, full of primal hunger. He's sculpted like a Roman statue. A young God.

Steve's stubbornness, a fucking donkey, an ass, gets a hundred mentions if his waist gets two and his ass has three. Bucky can't believe he volunteers to run after him on the regular.

Jesus wept, Steve's stomach. Bucky wants to kiss his stomach and feel the way it clenches and contracts under his mouth. Reacting so beautifully to the force of overwhelming pleasure, squirming until he's shaking, spasming on Bucky's cock shoved deep inside him.

Those miiiiiiiile long legs. Strong and smooth and carrying him with determination that's dragged them both outta hell.

Those legs drive Bucky insane for another reason, too, not just how shapely they are--that determination. If Steve would learn to walk away from a single fucking fight, Bucky would be saved another lifetimes worth of years in stress alone. Steve's legs always seem to propel him toward danger. Steve's legs, tender and vulnerable, with Steve's penchant for only using his shield to protect his upper half.

Steve's ability to, without fail, misplace his phone and then make them late out the door when they need to leave because he can't find it. He always has to resort to pouting until Bucky calls it, unveiling the fact that it's right where Bucky told him to look but he didn't. Obstinate fuck.

The fat, soft little pillow of his perineum, obscenely cute and pink and oh-so sensitive, between his legs, tucked behind his balls but before his hole. Hidden from prying eyes other than Bucky's. And pry Bucky does--

Steve's cheeks. Bucky has to pull his cheeks apart, spreading him until he squeaks with embarrassment, his cute, tight little hole clenching, winking at Bucky like a hidden treasure between his fat asscheeks. Bucky wants nothing more than to pry that sweet hole open. He wants to lick it, to finger it, to fuck it. He knows he owns it, and that drives him insane. He wants to own it again and again and again. He wants to overpower the serum that knits Steve back up tight after ever fuck and leave him ruined and gaping.

Steve's dick always gets him to that feral intensity, whether Bucky's just looking at it in all its objective beauty--its girthy thickness, its length with that slight curve, its dusky-pink color, its eagerness, twitching, leaking, swelling, its veins, its fat head, all of it--or whether Bucky is feeling it, tasting it, using it, whatever. Anything. Everything. Everything about that dick is insane. Bucky's insane for it.

Steve's balls. Bucky slurps at them and teases Steve when he goes without an orgasm for a day, two, three, or maybe even a whole week when the missions get nasty, for how swollen and full they must feel. He's a fucking spiller. He overflows with cum when he orgasms. It's the hottest shit.

Steve's feet, even. The handsome, high arches of his feet, the skin surprisingly soft like a baby's. Sweet and vulnerable. Bucky can't help but want to dig his thumb into the soles of his feet to make Steve moan with relaxation, reflexively kicking his leg out like he has since he was a kid. Foot rubs that turn into tickle fights are totally worth the accidental kicks to his chin that Bucky suffers.

Steve's never present survival instincts. Bucky will always be a little angry after he pulls a stunt where his self-sacrificial bullshit is on display. It doesn't matter if it's a grenade, a lacking parachute, or whatever else, it always drives Bucky up the fucking wall. Goddamnit, Rogers.

Steve's seeming need to crawl out of his own skin with an orgasm--arching his back, shaking from head to toe, screaming through his teeth or gasping in a silent, open-mouthed scream, clawing at Bucky or at anything within his reach, acting like it's bigger than him. Bigger and enough to give Bucky an ego, fueling his fire, making him want to do it again and again and again until there is no way Steve can keep going, so he collapses. Crumbled. Overwhelmed.

To cut this short, shorter than the hours, days, weeks, months, years long list Bucky has for each bit of Steve that makes him turn into a mad man: everything. It's everything about Steve. The man's too much.

I blacked out and wrote this. I was just moving some asks around, saving them as drafts, and, uh, got carried away, I guess, lol. I hope you enjoyed 😘

[regular-gnome]

Absolutely /adore/ your art and overall take on the Demon Realm world + it's history and the Archivists. Especially coming from someone who adores speculative biology and trying to find logic/science in magic (I'm not sure how to word it so it makes sense - basically almost everything you are doing here)

Curious if you have any ideas on how the titans managed to inhabit the planet, because Papa Titan's hand managed to reach the atmosphere just from lying down. There's no way that planet was big enough for a bunch of titans to walk around comfortably.

Idk much about planetary stuff, but is there some way the planet may have changed? Maybe the Archivists did something?

Sorry this ask got kinda long, hope you have a lovely day doing little gnome things :}

glad you like them!:D

So, one of the gnome things is overanalyzing things and avoiding doing math, but here we are, you actually made me read my biophysics notes from 4 years ago. There are a few things to really focus on and think about, but I gotta preface this by saying I am very much not an expert on speculative biology xD I just have the internet and some books I am basing my theories on

Titans:

First the titans themselves. A while ago, I made an approximation of how large the Boiling Isles titan is and got that it would be around 27 km in height post-mortem. Buuut if the titan was this height during its life is another question because it would run into some biophysics issues

Issues like the atmospheric pressure. At ground level, it is 101.3 kPa, but at 27 km, it falls is 1.6 hPa (titan bless wolframalpha for counting this as exp funtions are the death of me). That is 63 times higher pressure on their legs than on their head! Blood circulation would be shot to the moon. The blood is liquid that in general transports gasses so travelling fron upper body parts to lower ones where there is diffrent dissoving of oxygen would end up in gas bubbles, which are NOT GREAT. Additionally, their ability to stand up or lie down quickly would be pretty much non-existant as that would be super fast change of pressure and more bubbles. But okay, lets say they are like some kind of abyss fishes and keep constant internal pressure.. that would still mean their hearts would need to be either massive or they would have multiple pumping mechanisms to handle their size (maybe like the single-chamber hearts in fish??) And the thing is we saw their heart, it was big but not THAT big so unless it was just one of many, maybe the last beating heart there might be diffrent explanation. And Im not gonna even go into how temperature changes every 100m around 0,6C, lets say their fur makes them warm and cozy and blue blood avoids freezing problems like some arctic critters

bringing those graphs up again cause they show the altitude change nicely

All of this to say the titans during life were probably smaller. They would still have been massive, but maybe not three times the size of mt Everest massive. So next thing to consider is their magic. Their powers are closely tied to life, healing and creation and so, the demons on the Boiling Isles are said to have originated from it and their evolution waas likely sped up a lot thanks to it. Next we saw size-changing spells affecting King in the carnival episode, so it's not a stretch to believe that all titans could be affected by this kind of spells, with the strength depending on the particular titan's magic. So anyway as the titan was activly dying, its magic could have desperately attempted to save it by rapidly generating more cells to repair its failing systems, ending up in expansion of all tissues and their overall size. (Maybe thats why the vains were so big and empty in the mines, you cant create more energy so maybe the magic going with simmilar concept expanded everything around but not made more of blood?) However, despite these efforts, the magic would ultimately fail to save them. When it reached a critical point, maybe after using up most of its magical energy, the process would stop or change focus. There are some fun grusome possiblities on how that might have went down but this is already pretty long

So in short, I think the titans during life were big but only got island sized after death, otherwise theyd have some wild biological mechanisms battling physics and them becomming bigger would explain where did most of the blood go after death. Not to mention how much food they would need

Planet:

Next the size of the planet. While we don't have many clues to determine whether it's bigger or smaller than Earth, one clue is Luz's lack of reaction to changing gravity after passing through the door. If the planet were larger (or denser I know), she would feel change in g-force, so like the feeling of being on a lift going up in case of bigger planet or down in case of smaller. If the diffrence was significant she would develop issues with circulatory system and fatigue. But thats not the case and I do not have the energy to calculate min change xD

So let's say the planet is Earth-sized. This is still a lot. We don't know if there are any continents on the planet or their sizes, but even if there were same like earth, the scale is immense. If the Boiling Isles were the size of New York (based on titan's height) or even larger, say the size of Hawaii, compared to the world map, that's tiny. If Earh is 510 100 000 km², while NYC covers 1213,3 km² to cover the same area, we'd need 420423 titans lied up neatly next to each other. And thats if they are isles sized their whole life. There can also be landmasses where they can lay on, oceans deep enough to cover bodies, they can be stacked.... I don't think the planet necessarily needs to be much larger to accommodate creatures of this size

TOH as a show:

One thing to remember while analyzing shots from the show is that we we will run into contradictions because it's a show, one that is not focused on speculative biology. While most elements are well-constructed, some details may show inconsistencies. For example, determining the direction of north on a titan becomes challenging when one shot shows the sun setting in one direction and later another. Finding the titan's height poses difficulties when one shot shows their arm reaching the atmosphere while another barely shows them reaching it while standing. But its not due to carelessness, its more about serving purpose of the shot, conveying the atmosphere. They both show the titans are giant, the view from above is beautiful and if they were more focused on keeping them some arbitrery size it might have taken away from it

And Im pretty sure that I'm wrong around a lot of aspects here, how it wasnt supposed to be interpreted like that or its more convoluted than I realize. Thats just my take on this. World we live in can seem small as we can only see a tiny part of it but Earth is so amazingly vast. It's larger than we can comprehend, and yet, it's nothing compared to the vastness of the universe. So, yeah, some of my thoughts on titans and the demon realms planet xD peace

[cece-writes-fanfic]

the perfect cheesecake

You’re normally a pretty good baker, but today, you’re having trouble with a cheesecake. Good thing Matt is a fantastic taste-tester.

(fluff, 700 words)

**i don't bake lol i just thought this was a cute idea

request guidelines

~~~~~~

One of the fun little surprises that came with dating Daredevil was finding out that he had really sensitive taste buds. Like, beyond anything else you’d ever seen. He could list all the individual layers of flavors, single out spices, explain what should’ve been taken out or added in. If you were anyone else, you probably would’ve taken offense to someone being so critical of your baking, but you love it, especially since it's Matt. It gives you the chance to really perfect your recipes, and there have been multiple occasions where you’ve brought in Matt-approved cookies or muffins to work and had your coworkers praise your skills. 

Today, you’re working with a cheesecake. Not a particularly difficult recipe, but you’re trying to figure out how to modify the batter with fruit compotes and for some reason, the goddamn peaches are not doing what they’re supposed to. 

You slide your third failed attempt out of the oven and stare at the browned, crusted edges, a far-cry from the smooth finish that this recipe usually produces. The air smells like over-caramelized fruit and something badly burned. The crust, you know without even checking, is beyond saving. 

“What am I doing wrong?” you mutter to yourself, flipping through your notes. Baked it too long, probably, but you’ve been decreasing the time with every attempt and you’re still not getting it. “It’s just a cheesecake, for crying out loud—”

“What happened?” Matt asks, coming in from the bedroom, even though you know he can smell the disaster from a mile away. 

“Burned it,” you say, not even flinching as he comes up behind you and wraps his arms around your waist. “I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.”

Matt hums, resting his chin on your shoulder. “Got a fork?”

“It’s too hot!” you protest, even as he reaches around and pulls a fork out of the drawer. He releases you to scoop a small bite into his mouth. “You Catholics and your self-flagellation.”

“Too much sugar,” he says, swallowing. The corners of his eyes crinkle up in that adorable way of his, and you can’t help but smile, even if he’d stupidly eaten burning-hot cheesecake. “Other than that? I think it’s perfect.”

“You’re just being nice,” you mutter, accepting the kiss on the cheek. 

“Nope,” he says with a grin. As if to spite you, he takes another bite of the cheesecake. “Lower the sugar in the batter and the compote. Also, the compote needs a little acidity.”

“How’s the crust?” you ask. 

“Burnt.”

You swat his shoulder lightly. “I’m being serious.”

“Add a little salt.”

You smile and lean in to kiss him. His lips taste like cheesecake. “Thank you.”

“You’re going to nail it this time,” he says, squeezing your arm before heading to the living room. 

You make the modifications he suggested and, unsurprisingly, when you pull this one out of the oven, it comes out perfect, the orange swirl of peach compote standing out brightly against the creamy white batter. This time, Matt lets you have the first taste (after it’s been chilled for a couple hours), and you end up sharing a slice on the couch after dinner. 

“See? I told you,” Matt says. 

You nudge his thigh with your socked foot and steal the plate back from him. “Mr. Always Right. That’s what they should call you.”

“Nah,” he says, grinning. “I’m only right about a couple things.”

“Like what?”

“Like you,” he says. He reaches over and runs his fingers through your hair, before pulling you closer to kiss you. You smile against his lips. But when you lean back, you find your hands empty. You gasp in shock and watch him take the last bite before setting the plate on the coffee table. 

“Matthew!” 

“And this cheesecake,” he says, dodging the pillow you throw.

“You’re so annoying,” you grumble, pushing him back against the couch cushions and kissing him. 

“But you love me,” Matt says, and in the warm light of your shared apartment, his dark eyes glitter at you. He’s still smiling, his hands gripping your waist, and your heart aches with your affection for him. 

“Yeah,” you say, leaning in again. “You’re right about that, too.”

[red-water-dragon]

Raren demonstrating a suspicious spell in front of the royal court.

visual storytelling notes:

The bg was left blank until I started painting and the elements added to the bg were designed around the character. I didn't go into this with a little synopsis of what I wanted to convey. Only an abstract idea that Raren was going to be talking to someone, figure it out later. I decided he'd be presenting a new spell in front of a political chamber because he wears a crown and a blue crystal. So he has to be of some form of nobility and magical prowess. He also has blue eyes meaning he is an ice dragon and thus its a blue spell wow. The monarchs he's addressing are left dark and disapproving in the corner while Raren powers a statue beneath them. He could be demonstrating how the spell effects the world around them, maybe it freezes the stone? maybe it brings the statue to life? Either way its primed to eat Raren's opposition. Two of the bg guys are red one is blue maybe he's an arch nemesis who knows.

Art process and wips under the cut

I'm trying and failing to get better at visual story telling while keeping things simple. My long term goal is to have a frequent and consistent posting schedule. Most of the art would be stylized and simple like this and the rest could be fully rendered.

Art has been more of a "draw what's in you head and make it look pretty/ cool to hang up later" thing to me w/ the benefit of being a good source of self reflection as I create. Writing has more so been my go to for expressing that meditation. Writing I don't share because im unnecessarily cagy abt my emotions and my harshest critic lol. I want to tell stories with my art , convey tone, feeling, etc. and right now my paintings don't do that. I don't have the technical skill yet. This painting is the first of many to come that will hopefully change this.

The texture in this is chaotic and the line work is rough. Raren is the only part of this with a full sketch. All other line art was added to create the illusion of detail. There is less attention on rendering each section and more being put into the placement of characters and props. I had hoped this would make the painting go faster and...it has the potential to do so in the future. Sooo a piece that could have taken a couple hours took a whole day.

While im not overly thrilled with the final image im still happy about the process. Normally the dragon would be the only real focal point in my painting with the bg being a gradient, or a simple theme added last second. Conveying a message is more work but it gives more cool things for the eye to look at and the mind to ponder. So in theory even if the final result is aesthetically unappealing the theme can still salvage the work a bit.

what this taught me:

sketchy line work is passable in the final image

it can even add character to the art

plants are a great way of filling space without actually doing so

(hence the wip of the room looking empty af with out them)

the more clothing and eye candy you put on your character the more clutter you have to add to the bg to balance it out

the main oc was sketched the bg was painted on the fly

doing so saved time but harmed the natural flow of the piece

all of the storytelling is happening in quarters and it is almost abrasive to look at

what ill try in the next piece:

perspective guides

less shading and rendering

find a color palette to stick to

or work in greyscale first

write a little picture synopsis

or pick a theme

just find something that acts as a story guide

sketch out bg elements

toy around with the sketch more before moving to painting

[illuzijan]

Here she is. From start to now.

Transcript.

Age 10-15

Carla Radames was a child that was picked out of the United States foster care system by the Simmons Foundation for her abnormal aptitude in a variety of academic subjects. She was adopted as a ward of Marshall Simmons at age 6, as part of an accelerated academic study by the Simmons family. She could read fluently at age three, and supposedly speak in complete sentences. Mostly non-verbal, Carla also picked up American Sign Language as a means of communication. She began to speak at age 12.

As Marshall’s ward, she was placed into accelerated academic programs and in high workload environments very early, and at age 10 her guardianship was transferred to Derek C. Simmons and she was fast tracked into a university level education in biomedical sciences per Derek’s agreement to take her as his ward. 

Carla attended prestigious universities, graduating as a teenager with several scholarly articles attributed to her. She worked on several certifications and degrees during this time, not having a single moment where she wasn’t entrenched in academia.

During this time she achieved her PhD. in Virology, her expansive thesis being on HPV and potential vaccination paths to prevent certain types of cancers. 

After she graduated, Derek immediately put her into a position as Head Researcher in the Tall Oaks laboratory, seeing someone that he had unparalleled control over.

She began work on Project Ada immediately, the true purpose of the project obfuscated to her. 

-

Age 16-21

As Project Ada continued, failure after failure worsened the relationship between Derek and his ward. Carla spent days upon weeks attempting to use both the Golgotha and T-Veronica viruses as a basis to stimulate human viral parthenogenesis. 

She tested these beta Chrysalid proto viruses on more than 12,000 women, some alive and some dead, destroying all of them at Derek’s insistence when the cloning experiments failed. 

Surrounded by death and Derek’s consistent cruelty as her only actual social connection numbed her to the horror of what she was doing. Eventually the women were just numbers and failures, and Carla was just a very empty husk of a person. 

Carla developed a way to rapidly get results from her creations, splicing the virus through different species of animals rapidly before attempting another clone chrysalid. 

Eventually, the mounting failures drove her to put herself into the project once the bodies both alive and dead dwindled. She cycled Chrysilid through her own body in several controlled rounds and was able to make headway on the project. 

Ubivisto, Gnezdo, and several proto-Lepotitsa were created through this process. 

Derek was told by one of her lab associates that she had been using herself in the project, and was testing very highly on compatibility. 

Derek invited Carla to dinner to discuss the progress on the project, and then killed her later that evening in the Tall Oaks lab. 

He took a photograph of the both of them before she died as a memento.

-

Age 21-23

Carla was violently cloned into a perfect image of Ada Wong around the time she worked for Simmons. She was a perfect replica down to the damage in her shoulder from Annete Birkin’s bullet. 

Carla had no memory of who she was before the moment she hatched from the cocoon. She was told that she had gone critical as a result of a lab accident, and Derek injected her with the C-Virus to save her life. From this point on, her life was structured around the fact that her and Derek were lovers and engaged, and she was struggling with amnesia from the incident. It seemed plausible to her, despite her doubts.

However, no matter what kind of conditioning Derek attempted on her, and how much he tried to structure her life and control the inputs she experienced, Carla began to have violent psychotic breaks, and hear voices. She nightmared of a bygone life, and of being a different person entirely. 

Derek married Carla in 2008 in Lanshiang. He explained that her role in his life was like his second in command, and personal vanguard.

She returned to work on her Chrysalid project at the Vinci Medical Research center, and began to expand her social network through Derek and “Ada”. 

Derek insisted they have children, but due to the fact Carla was now an amalgam of beasts, she was unable to conceive and the cruel responses to failures returned.

-

Age 24-26

Carla found out what had happened to her through an exploration of Tall Oaks Lab that turned up the evidence of the “Happy Birthday Ada Wong” tape. She had already amassed a large network of connections to utilize at this point, and invested in a despair-induced series of plans that would eventually culminate in the ruin of Derek Simmons. 

She built herself an army through infecting anyone who was even slightly interested in trying “experimental” medicines, and contracted the building of two facilities based on old oil rigging construction off the coast of China. The Underwater Lab. and the Creature Factory were finished in a speedy two years. 

Carla field tested airborne Chrysalid virus in several places, one of which was the prestigious Marhawa Academy. She gave this knowledge to Derek under the prediction that he would use this creation to attempt his own pull on global politics.

She was responsible for the death of Merah Biji, the BSAA’s Far East Branch Ace in early 2012 in Marhawa.

All the while, Carla continued to act as if she was smitten with Derek, internally seething. She again developed a parthenogenetic clone to both appease him and hide her true intentions, presenting him with her own lab grown daughter in 2010.

He was deeply disappointed that the child wasn’t a male. 

She began work on Project HAOS in late 2010, once again using her own genetics to produce her biological son, an enormous monstrosity with the ability to infect all of the world’s oceans and reign as the Prince of Chaos.

-

Age 26

Carla began to execute the final piece of her network of plans with the kidnapping of Jake Muller and Sherry Birkin from Edonia  on December 24th, in 2012. 

She assisted mercenaries in the destabilization of the area, creating swarms upon swarms of J’avo to serve her purposes. When the BSAA arrived, she slaughtered Chris Redfield’s entire team, save Piers Nivans. 

In 2013, the Tall Oaks incident was the perfect trigger for her world of chaos.

Carla claimed responsibility for Derek’s attack in Tall Oaks under the group name “Neo Umbrella”, and began an assault on Lanshiang, China that completely annihilated the city as a distraction. 

Carla launched a missile in the center of Lanshiang, transforming everyone in Tatchi’s Quad Tower area into zombies. She orchestrated the infection of Derek Simmons, to condemn him to a life of chaos. 

Carla slaughtered Chris Redfield’s team a second time, taunting him while she led him to a demonstration of hopeless violence.

In a confrontation between Chris and Leon, Leon defended Carla, mistaking her for Ada Wong prime, and she was able to make it to her aircraft carrier before she was shot by members of “The Family”, Derek’s coalition of high profile individuals that had banded together to command aspects of politics. 

Carla fell off the balcony of the carrier, cracking to the ground where she was found by Ada Wong. Ada expressed sympathies for her, and Carla transformed into a roiling mass of horrific pale tar bodies and screaming faces. She had injected herself with “Enhanced C.” Carla developed a vaccine to the virus in this same project, though why she did was unknown.

Carla was rendered inert by Ada Wong, who vicariously took her torch and went after Derek Simmons.

Both Haos and her daughter were supposedly killed in Lanshiang.

-

Age 34-

Carla was inert for a long time afterwards, her body reforming in a Chrysalid that had been ingested by a sperm whale. Her body infected the whale while it reformed and healed over a period of seven years. 

The whale caused outbreaks of C-Virus as it migrated along the coast, never dying and never being identified as the source of these outbreaks.

A group known as “The Guild” was hired by Blue Umbrella in 2020 to neutralize an outbreak of C-Virus. Led by ex-USS agent HUNK, the group found the Chrysalid containing Carla inside this infected whale after a titanic battle. She hatched a second time after dreaming for seven years and was taken by The Guild. 

The Guild did not report finding her, and named her “Ahab” and the whale “Moby Dick.

She works for The Guild now, with other leftover Umbrella monsters in a coalition of monster hunters that never die. 

Her new objective and purpose? 

Kill any remaining members of “The Family” and collapse their institutions. 

And she will stop at nothing to get her revenge.

[siriuslysatorusimping]

Merry Christmas! And a lil update from Kiko

Hi. I just needed to get some things out and I’m honestly not sure if I’ll even post this after I finish typing it.

I hope everyone is doing well and having a restful holiday with their families. I’m grateful for everyone here in our lil corner, and wish you all a very Merry Christmas and am looking forward to what 2025(that’s insane to type) brings all of us! (Especially more Goinko 👀)

My update below the cut.

I finished moving today. Finished moving out of a house that, when I moved into it, I thought it would help improve my marriage that was already failing. I thought the things that were happening around us in our old apartment were the catalyst for our arguments and constant fighting, for his refusal to try marriage counseling. I thought that our apartment flooding and the black mold growing in the corners were what caused so much discontent and anger. I thought my boss constantly yelling at me was the reason I was exhausted and unable to handle my husband’s constant criticism and arguing when I got home. But those were only small factors that piled on top of larger issues that lay beneath two incompatible people, one of which was reaching her absolute limit with existing because she was constantly told that any version of who she really was was hard to love and impossible to like.

When we moved into that house, we were so excited. I was so excited for the new possibilities. Then we adopted Atlas and I really thought things could only go up. I was wrong.

I’ve been working on getting things moved over the past month, emptying out the three bedroom house and moving into a one bedroom apartment. I had to figure out how to try to pay rent on unemployment that was only a fraction of what the expenses were, and ended up having to deal with my ex-husband’s condescending accusations that my lack of savings and inability to pay the rent was due to my own shortcomings and not the lack of a job, or the fact that my entire life’s savings disappeared and never returned not long after we got married. I had to deal with him treating me like a stupid teenager who got in over their head when I didn’t get to up and leave all of my rental problems behind for him to fix. I had to fix the broken light switches and stained walls and carpets from his tantrums when he would throw and kick things in my direction but never directly at me so that he could still brag that he’d never hit me. He left within six days of me finally admitting I wanted a divorce, after he forced it out of me by threatening with it like he always did. He up and left, took Atlas without letting me say goodbye, and left everything he didn’t want for me to deal with and try to figure out how to get rid of or sell. Half-finished DIY projects and an electric lawn mower with no battery because he took that to be spiteful.

The past month has been a constant go-go-go while I worked part time, applied for jobs, and cleaned out the house as best I could while living with the constant dread of what I’m going to do once unemployment runs out. It may seem like nothing to some, but I’ve been at my limit all year and I’ve been running on empty for at least the past two years.

I felt a whirlwind of emotions today as I stood in the doorway and stared at the empty house, wiped clean of the evidence that I ever lived there. That the space once held all my hope that if I could just do better, my marriage would be fine, now empty and perfectly spotless thanks to the cleaners who did an incredible job. With the scent of cleaning products and carpet shampoo in the air, it all hit me at once that even though I’ve spent the past month cursing everything to do with that house and saying I wanted nothing more than to be done, I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to leave it behind because it was the last connection I had to the illusion of happiness I’d clung to for so long. A happiness that never truly existed in the first place. Instead of spending Christmas Eve with family, I was finishing up leaving behind a place I’d called home and genuinely loved so much when I moved in. I spent Christmas Eve alone, sobbing as I tried to come to terms with the fact that I felt so unbelievably sad for reasons I couldn’t begin to understand or explain. I don’t miss him. I don’t miss how he treated me or looked at me or spoke to me. I don’t want him back in my life in any way, so why did I feel so damn sad and reluctant to close that front door a final time?

There’s also the anger and bitterness that’s really begun to creep up lately. The rage that burns my chest at the fact that he gets to pretend he did nothing wrong and still treat me like it was all my fault. When he claims he couldn’t pay rent for a place he signed a contract for while he still has a full time job and a $6,000+ bonus coming in a week, while I scrape by on unemployment and still manage to make ends meet after being left with thousands in debt and no savings from the divorce.

Today was me closing out a chapter of my life that there was a time I never thought would come to an end. Officially leaving behind the last thing that truly tied me to my ex husband in any way. I won’t get my full deposit back because there was too much for me to do alone, and I didn’t have any type of energy left to keep working on it. But it’s done. I’ll have more time now to focus on something other than moving, which means I’ll be working and applying for jobs, but also trying to get back into writing more regularly again.

I’ll be around a bit for the holidays because I have a few days off. But like I said before, I hope everyone is resting and having a wonderful time with their families or whatever they’re spending their time doing!

This lil corner has been one of the few positive things in my life, something I never thought would come of my random Gojo brain worm almost two years ago. Thank you all again for the support and love you’ve given this year. I’m really excited for what next year will bring. (Like maybe a short tattoo au one shot)

- Kiko 💕

[fhw-unleashed]

Couldn't resist snapping one of the inspiring prompts from the cute BAWKtober 2024 list by @makenna-made-this Check out all this lovely chicken stuff. Nr. 5 Coffe & Donuts Carpooling

"Good morning, sleepyhead." Ryder greets David, who has been woken by a rumble of the car and is stretching out in the passenger seat. It's already dawn, but a glance at the clock tells David he hasn't missed much of the five-hour drive home.

Home. He looks nervously over at Ryder and puts a hand on his thigh, feeling his presence reassure him. It's the first time he's brought him home, and David desperately hopes his sister and her partner won't cause any trouble. Or worse, that they won't let him out of their sight out of intrusive curiosity.

"Sorry, I promised to keep you entertained during the ride, but I pretty much failed." David says, cuddling up to Ryder's shoulder, who takes advantage of a quiet moment to plant a kiss on the top of David's head.

"Go back to sleep, as long as you're sleeping you won't be fidgeting like a nervous chicken. Besides, your sweet snoring is quite entertaining." Ryder chuckles as the hand on his thigh pats him. "Let's stop over there, I need caffeine and something to eat, then I'll drive you to the end of the world if you want."

"I should shower with you more often, if you're always so calm and content afterwards." David remarks, licking his lips as Ryder looks at him.

In the nearly empty parking lot, Ryder quickly jumps out of the car and hurries to the other side to open the door for David. He gets out and lands right in his driver's arms, who kisses him tenderly. "If you don't stop seducing the driver, we'll never get to your house! Or is that your intention?"

"No, it's not. I'm just nervous, that's all. You know my sister, I love her, but she can be difficult." David explains, stroking the short hair on the back of Ryder's neck. "Oh look, they have coffee and fresh donuts, we're saved!"

David happily grabs Ryder's hand and pulls him behind him into the dimly lit diner.

Packed with bags and coffee cups, the two return to their car in high spirits. From a distance they can see that something is lying on the still warm hood and they both slowly approach it. "What is it? Doesn't look like a cat." Ryder asks suspiciously, grabbing David's hand as he tries to get closer.

The occupant of the car turns a small head toward them, but remains where it is. "It's not a predator, it's a chicken." David explains confusedly, and looks around the large parking lot for more chickens or a coop. "What's it doing here? It doesn't look like there are any chickens here."

"It will know where it belongs. Let's shoo it away from the car and move on." Ryder suggests.

"No way, it's dark. If it stays out here, it'll get eaten for sure. Go inside and ask where it belongs. I'll stay here and watch where it goes." David orders Ryder, who is about to reply, but then falls silent and kisses him on the forehead.

"Why am I still surprised that you would really save everyone in this world if you could? I'll be right back."

A little later, Ryder comes back with a critical look on his face at David, who is leaning against the car door and throwing something on the hood.

"Are you feeding that chicken my donut on my hood?" He asks skeptically.

"Her name's Clara, and she's hungry. Have you found out anything?"

"Nothing you'll like. There's no chicken coop here. Just some runaway chickens from a poultry truck that crashed a few days ago. According to the waitress, most of the ones that couldn't be caught were eaten or run over." Ryder says in a calm tone, squeezing David's cheek in his hand when he notices that his eyes are starting to glisten wet. "You can't save everyone, sweetheart."

"We can't leave her here." David says, a pleading undertone mixing with his emotionally charged voice.

"And how are you going to convince the chicken to get in the car? Not to mention what she'll do to the car during the four-hour drive." Ryder points out, seeing in David's eyes that his arguments are not falling on fertile ground. He sighs deeply. "Okay, do you know how to catch a chicken?"

Relieved, David wraps his arms around his neck and pulls him close. Clara is startled by the sudden movement and flutters to the ground, waddling across the dimly lit parking lot. The two look at the chicken in confusion, then set off to save Clara from certain death in the wilderness.

The coffee is long gone cold by the time the car rolls out of the parking lot two hours later. It has grown dark and a creeping chill runs through their limbs, although the heater is already doing its best to warm them up. David yawns and tries to find a comfortable position while Ryder drinks the cold coffee and steers the car through the darkness.

It doesn't take long until David, exhausted from the hunt, falls asleep again. Ryder caresses his still cold hand that rests on his thigh. "You couldn't have chosen a more loving guardian, Clara. I'm sure you won't miss anything." Ryder says, smiling as he hears a contented bawk bawk from the back seat, where Clara is picking donut crumbs from between the cushions.

[lady-wallace]

Whumptober Day 13: Team as Family

I've got a little La Squadra everyone lives fic for today's @whumptober prompt :')

Prompt: Team as family, multiple whumpees, 'death will do us part' Fandom: JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Part 5 Character: Risotto & La Squadra

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Read on Ao3

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In the After

Risotto wakes up after nearly dying on Sardinia and realizes his team has been reunited and given a second chance by the new don (everyone lives au)

~~~~~~

When Risotto woke after his fight against the Boss on Sardinia, he wondered at the fact he had woken at all.

And part of him wished he hadn’t.

He had never felt so tired in his entire life. The fact that he had failed weighed on him. Despite his drive for revenge, leaving what was left of his team in critical condition to follow Bucciarati’s team to Sardinia had been one of the hardest things he had ever done and to then fail…

He still didn’t know what state Passione was in. The fact he wasn’t dead made him suspect that Bucciarati and his team had come out on top of the fight against the Boss, but he still didn’t know what that meant for him.

He didn’t even know if he had anyone left in this world.

He had tried to ask after his team when a nurse came to check on him, but she hadn’t seemed to know who he was talking about. And truthfully, it was stupid to ask. He was probably in some hospital on Sardinia, wasn’t he? Even if the others were alive they wouldn’t be here.

But Risotto could barely stand to stay awake for more than a few minutes at a time. His entire body ached despite the copious amounts of morphine. He was riddled with bullet holes.

He shouldn’t be alive.

That was the only thing Risotto could think the entire time.

Why was he here?

That was the most perplexing thing, because who had found him in time to save his life and get him to a hospital? It was frustrating and he wasn’t sure that he had even wanted to be saved. He had gone after the Boss for revenge and he had failed in that. Failed his entire team. It was the last thing he’d had to give them, to make up for all the tragedy they had suffered and now all of that just seemed so empty.

Risotto drifted, never having felt so helpless in his life. He felt like he had been cut loose at sea, at the mercy of winds stronger than him. But then, nothing had really changed in that regard, had it?

He didn’t know how many days he had been there before the nurse came in to tell him he had a visitor.

Risotto felt a sudden panic at his helplessness. He didn’t truly have faith that it was one of his team, as much as he wished that to be the case, so the only other option was the Boss or one of his men come to finish him off.

It was neither though, to Risotto’s surprise. He watched the door cautiously, trying to figure out if he could summon Metallica with the morphine in his system as his visitor entered.

It was the blond teenager, Bucciarati’s new recruit. Giorno? Was that his name? He was dressed in a black and green suit, overcoat hung casually over his shoulders as he approached the bed with a neutral expression.

“Risotto Nero, we finally meet face to face.”

Risotto glowered up at him. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Giorno didn’t really look phased and Risotto kind of respected him for that. Not that he made a particularly threatening picture in his current state.

“I came to offer you a deal, Signore Nero. An opportunity to swear your loyalty to me and start afresh.”

Risotto blinked, genuinely confused before it dawned on him. “You actually killed the bastard, didn’t you.”

Giorno nodded. “Diavolo, the former Boss of Passione is dead, or, well, he won’t be coming back.” Risotto didn’t want to ask what that meant. “I have taken over the position now.”

Risotto’s head was whirling with all of this information.

“You want me to swear my loyalty to you?”

“If you wish to stay in Passione, yes,” Giorno replied with a firm nod. “But if you wish to leave and live a different life, it is your choice. If you chose to be my enemy, then just know that I will be rid of you in the same way I got rid of the Boss—There are worse things than death, Risotto Nero.”

There was a ripple of Stand aura around the teen and a figure briefly showed itself at his shoulder. Risotto felt an unbidden shudder run through him.

He let out a long breath. “If I am to swear loyalty to you, then I want to discuss terms first.”

Giorno smiled. “I would encourage it.” He pulled a chair over to the side of the bed and sat down. “Okay then, Signore Nero, let’s talk terms.”

***

The mansion was…huge. Risotto couldn’t help but stand there, looking at it in shock long after the cab had dropped him off at this place that was supposedly his new residence.

He still couldn’t quite believe it. He couldn’t quite believe how Giorno Giovanna had done this instead of executing him. But after a long discussion about what would and wouldn’t be allowed in the new Passione, they had come to an agreement and Risotto had kissed the new Don’s ring, swearing his fealty. Giorno had healed his wounds before leaving and gave him a plane ticket back to Napoli the next day where he had been greeted by a driver who had taken him here.

Risotto finally gathered himself and walked up to the door, opening it slowly.

He had never thought to live in a place so opulent, his old flat and team headquarters had been the best he’d ever had but he had always longed to provide a place for all of his team to stay. A place where they could be secure between paychecks, and now that he finally had that he was missing his team. He had asked Giorno before he’d left, but the teenage Don hadn’t known where his team members were. He did say he would look into it, but Risotto hadn’t heard anything from him yet, and considering the conditions he had left them in…

Risotto had always known life was cruel, but the blow that he would live, that he would be given this, while he had no idea about the whereabouts or conditions of his team…it seemed like one final cruelty. A second chance that hadn’t forgotten his past sins.

He dropped his bag, just standing there, suddenly so weary. His eyes slid shut and his head drooped down between his shoulders.

“Risotto?!”

His head snapped up at the sound of a footstep and his eyes widened as he saw Melone hurrying into the foyer.

“Melone…”

“Hey, you’re here!”

Risotto turned to see Formaggio and Ghiaccio entering from the other side of the room. They were both limping and had visible bandages but they were alive. Alive was all Risotto had ever asked for.

“You took your time getting here,” Ghiaccio said, but there was less of a bite than usual in his voice.

“Be nice, he just got out of the hospital,” Illuso said as he exited a mirror on one of the walls, his eyes shining with relief to see his boss. “It’s good to see you again.”

“Big bro, look! Risotto’s back!”

Risotto glanced over to see Pesci and Prosciutto entering the room too. Prosciutto was leaning on a cane, face dark, but there was obvious relief in his eyes.

Risotto couldn’t speak. He wasn’t even sure if any of this was real.

Melone stepped forward. “Riz? Are you all right—oof.”

Risotto simply reached out, grabbing Melone and Illuso who were the closest and yanking them in tight toward him. He then reached for Formaggio and Ghiaccio, pulling them close as well. Ghiaccio grunted in protest but didn’t try to pull away. Risotto then grabbed Prosciutto by the front of his shirt and yanked him and Pesci into the mix as well.

He sank slowly to the floor, attempting to hold his entire team at once. They were all a tangle of arms, clutching each other close. He let out a shuddering breath and finally realized there was wetness on his cheeks. He was actually crying. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d cried.

“Risotto, are you all right?” Pesci asked in concern.

Risotto only pulled him in tighter. “You’re all alive,” he croaked.

“Yeah, we’re alright,” Formaggio told him. “The new kid—er—Don Giovanna; he fixed us all up.”

Gratitude of a variety Risotto had never felt nor thought possible for another human being washed over him. He realized for the first time that he had done right by swearing his loyalty to Giorno. The fact that he had been gracious enough to heal the men who had tried to kill him and his teammates spoke volumes about the new Don.

He scrubbed at his face, and someone pressed a handkerchief into his hand. His team, his family stayed there holding each other for a long moment, all of them likely reveling in the fact that they were all alive.

He finally pulled himself together though and stood, everyone helping each other to their feet with their various injuries.

“I guess we’re back on the job then,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Yeah with these new fancy digs!” Formaggio said with a grin.

Prosciutto snorted. “Yes, well, that doesn’t give you an excuse to have wild parties. This house belongs to all of us and I expect you to respect that.”

“Sure, mom,” Formaggio said with a good-natured jab.

Risotto felt his mouth stretch in a smile. It was an unpracticed movement, but he had a feeling it was going to be more common now.

“This is a new start for all of us. I expect you to make the most of it.”

“Yes boss,” the others replied, smiling back.

And surrounded by his family, Risotto thought that this was the first moment he had ever felt anything close to peace.

[darkpoisonouslove]

Face to Face

Summary: Griffin finds herself facing her own clone that Valtor created to demonstrate a point about her leaving him. Set in the Fallen Love universe. I am eyeing my word count with disapproval. I may have also started something like a storyline here so I'm definitely glaring at my brain for that one too. Also, *insert clone-fucking meme joke here* AO3 | FFN

Falling backwards, Griffin didn't land on the mattress... entirely.

Looking up confirmed her suspicions that her head now rested in someone's lap.

Her own face, turned upside down, staring at her drove all the air out of her lungs. None was left to carry her startled scream.

The timid smile barely tugging at her mouth was different both from the critical gaze the mirror regarded her with and from the twisted grimaces her self wore in most of her nightmares.

A trace of magic lingered in the air around the other her like a haze of perfume. The scent was unmistakably Valtor's.

A moan erupted from her already opening mouth when Valtor thrust inside her. Her eyes fell closed to shut out everything else and let her savor the fullness of his hard cock sheathed inside her. It would be too much otherwise, her mind pulled between the delicious stretch of her body welcoming him and her own wide eyes watching her from the face above her.

As if on cue, fingers–her clone's fingers–sifted through her hair. Less so in a soothing caress but instead grasping at the strands, pulling them all but painfully as if trying to hold on and failing.

Her heart hammered in her throat. Opening her eyes was nigh impossible. Opening her mouth left her stifling whines for more when Valtor's hips rocked into her.

He cupped her cheek and leaned in as if to keep his words a secret between the two of them.

It only made her more aware of the grip on her hair, the lap she was lying on. That had always been his intention, his voice loud enough to carry through the whole room.

"Having you moan like that in someone's face and then do nothing to follow through should constitute attempted murder, dearest." He pressed a mockingly chaste, tame kiss on her lips – as if afraid a longer contact would make him burst into flames. "You should make it up to yourself, wouldn't you agree?"

The hands tangled in her tresses couldn't save her, keep her in her place.

Disorientation flooded her body along with his magic.

Up was down faster than she could take a breath.

Her face was shoved in the sheets, her hard nipples, her stuttering chest pushing into the mattress. Yet, Valtor's cock was still buried deep inside her as if she'd never moved, had imagined it all.

She lifted her head to find herself between her clone's legs. Her own confoundment was mirrored back as her clone blinked at her and shuffled to close her thighs, her knees poking at Griffin's upper arms.

"I've never taken you for the shy type, dearest," Valtor's smug remark sparked indignity in her and her clone alike.

Valtor killed her protests with a well-timed thrust that left her boneless with the quick succession of emptiness and flooding relief from the returning girth of his cock. His arm reaching under her to stroke her clit only prolonged the wave of liquid heat spreading through the whole of her.

Her clone seemed mesmerized by it as well, her gaze darting between Valtor's body pushing into Griffin and the blissed out expression taking over Griffin's face. Her own slickness was unmistakable – all over her folds and dripping onto the sheets already.

She opened her thighs instinctively upon Griffin's caress, a shared look between them enough for her to welcome Griffin's ministrations and the chance to shut Valtor up.

Griffin had to resist throwing him a challenging look over her shoulder.

He pushed into her again right as she closed her lips around her clone's clit, making her moan reverberate through the body beneath her and draw one in turn from the other her.

Hearing her own voice from afar as she lay between her own legs was as close as she'd get to being in Valtor's head, seeing herself through his eyes and feeling herself the way he would. Watching herself writhe, tasting her own desire and feeling her clit throb in her mouth was a mindfuck but one she could get addicted to. It would be easy to get used to her own thighs squeezing her closer, her clone grinding hungrily against her face and grabbing at her hair, would be easy to start craving it. She could get high on experiencing herself the way he did, becoming one with him in this new way he'd unlocked for her.

She could if not for the glaring discrepancy between the smooth, even rhythm of Valtor's thrusts inside her that had her panting for breath, her hips meeting his and her muscles tensing with coiling pleasure and the way her clone's pussy clenched under her mouth, empty and frustrated. Her hands were clutched in a death grip, one shoved into the mess of her own hair and her clone's and the other stroking the breast pushed into it. Her fingers were nothing more than a disappointing substitute for Valtor's longer, thicker cock, for his skill and mostly for his need.

Every time it got the best of him, his hips surged into Griffin and his own groans would accompany the whimpers and choked cries shedding from her mouth. It was only those that were building up her clone's orgasm when they resonated through her flesh, driving her that much closer to madness rather than relief.

She didn't even seem to want the orgasm – not from Griffin's lips. Only all the pent up desire that had her body trembling and her spine arching off the mattress kept her bucking into Griffin's mouth.

It was like reaching through the mirror to be hurled back into time. Back to those cold nights where her nerves had been wound up from spending all day five inches away from Marion and her Dragon Fire – so familiar and alien at the same time. Those nights nothing could soothe the ache in her chest or the throbbing in her cunt. It had been a waking nightmare that still came to her in her dreams sometimes.

The tickle to her spine startled her.

The ends of Valtor's hair announced his descent before his chest pressed into her back and his breath scorched the shell of her ear. "Have you finally come face to face with what you've done?"

His lips teased her cheek. It was hardly a kiss yet the force of it was brutal. It wrecked her more thoroughly than his cruelest spells, burned through her whole body with wretched, insatiable yearning for more.

"Are you ready to apologize yet?" His voice compelled her easier than magic.

She caught the eye of her clone, who was watching them intently, both intrigued and insulted. "I'm sorry."

The face in front of her–her own face–contorted so painfully when it couldn't fit so much confusion all at once.

"For... what?"

It came out mistrustful, spooked – the same way she'd accepted sympathy from her friends. She'd been too afraid of what their kind words would do to her, of how much dignity she'd lose to the sweeping revelations they would bring, of the truth.

"I'm sorry for starving you. For teasing you with a taste of something you can never have."

She cried out when Valtor fucked into her again, hitting spots that made her vision black out for a moment. Her pussy squeezed him jealously, hungering for the next stroke of his cock, for more irrefutable proof of his matching desire for her.

She held her clone's gaze – she owed her that much when she wasn't the one swallowing tears but pleasure instead. "I'm sorry for leaving you only with the memories of satisfaction that you cannot have."

They only shared a mind – so all the cold, dark corners in her head that were overflowing with the warmth of Valtor's skin on hers right now were still cold and dark in her clone's head. All she had to keep her from freezing were Griffin's memories of her nights with Valtor – fleeting things that weren't branded into her flesh like they were for Griffin, that wouldn't save her even if they'd been. That truth was branded deeper still into Griffin, into her very bones.

Something shuddered in the air between them.

It might have just been the heart in her chest, the flooding release crashing into her with Valtor's next thrust.

It swept over her again and again like waves splashing the shore. Each new one strangled her moans in her throat and every breath between them carried her voice just enough for a tortured "I'm sorry" interspersed with Valtor's name from time to time.

Valtor's arm was wrapped around her middle. She only noticed she was facing him again, chest flush against his own and his fingers sifting through her hair, when he pressed a kiss to her forehead. The aftertaste of magic was gone already or there was simply no room in her mouth for it through all the regret clogging it.

"Shh." Valtor kissed the crown of her head. "Who are you apologizing to?"

Griffin looked at him through tears. The heady rush of orgasm and the agony of his absence still fresh in her own flesh–not just her clone's–had frayed her nerves so badly that just looking at him hurt. The touch of their skin – even more so.

Her hoarse voice scratched in her throat like nails on a chalkboard, "Myself."

"She's gone." Valtor tucked her head under his chin, let her listen to the calm beating of his heart for a long while before adding, "I'll make sure of it."

She had to fight him. Had to claw at his chest until he let her go, push him back and keep her distance until talk of erasing parts of her didn't come to him so easily.

The ugly truth was that she wanted to forget.

Wanted him to heal the festering wound where she'd torn him out of her flesh so that seeing herself in the mirror or her nightmares, or even another living, breathing her, wouldn't have her pouring salty tears all over both of them.

[uwudonoodle]

This month for my book / movie club, we read The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton, and I have some thoughts. It was my first Crichton book, so I was looking forward to it (they did Jurassic Park before I joined). I didn't hate it, but I was underwhelmed. It was all plot and no character. The plot itself, the mystery of the virus was fairly interesting, but I think it was bogged down with too much scientific jargon. It's clear that the author did a lot of research, and the science itself is pretty accurate, which is admirable, but not all research serves a narrative. Not all sci-fi needs to be accurate to tell a good story.

It's not that I hated what the book was, but I think it could've been more. The characters were basically props to give exposition. They were all generic white male scientists with only a couple of unique traits to distinguish them. The most prominent female character in the book was the voice recording in the lab, whom the male characters liked because she sounded sultry.

There was essentially no character development. They could have had the scientists butt heads about procedure or hypothesis, and come to a better understanding and even become good friends by the end, but they didn't. They worked amicably most of the time and didn't develop anything more than the professional working relationship they started with. They're was a baby who was a survivor that was basically treated as any other piece of evidence. I kept waiting for someone's humanity to come out around the baby, but he was just treated as an object (they kept refusing to feed him because maybe having an empty stomach was why he survived, talk about neglect). It would have been interesting to have one of the scientists develop an attachment to the baby, and possibly seek to adopt him by the end, but no such luck. He was just another piece of the puzzle to serve the mystery. For a story about saving humanity, there was very little humanity to be had.

One other nitpick: It drove me nuts how often the scientists were trying to look at things critically and unbiased, and then they'd refer to humanity as "man" or "mankind". I get it, this was written in the 60's, and that's how people talked back then. But you're literally referring to your entire species by your own gender, my dude. I could let it roll off my shoulder a few times, but I lost count after about 40 times. It ended up rolling my eyes a lot at that specifically.

I thought I would enjoy the movie better, as I thought the actors would have to add more personality to the characters. We watched the film from 1971. Unfortunately for me, they followed the book very closely. I'll give them a point for a faithful adaption since so many movies fail at that, but I think a looser adaption would have made for a better film.

The improvements they did make was to add more female characters. They made one of the scientists a woman, and not a 25 year old super model either. She was a very average looking 40 something woman, which was very refreshing. They also added a female nurse to help take care of the baby (it was a relief to me to have someone to comfort the baby and advocate for his care). I also really liked the set design of the lab. Vintage 70's futurism is always a good vibe.

Unfortunately the script followed the book a little too religiously. The dialogue droned on with scientific jargon that was difficult to follow, and sometimes had me zoning out. They also had some disturbing scenes of putting lab rats and monkeys to sleep that probably wouldn't be allowed today. Besides the nice set design, it was visually very sterile. It felt claustrophobic and bland under all the florescent lights. Film is a visual art form. The very least you can do is make it appealing to look at.

The worst part was the music and sound effects. It had the most grating minor 70's "the aliens are coming" electronic score, which I guess served the plot, but was overall very unpleasant. The music coupled with all of the obnoxious sounds and alarms in the lab made for a true assault on the senses in some scenes. Even my partner in the other room came and asked what all that terrible noise was all about. I was relieved when the credits finally rolled if only to experience silence again.

I guess I get why it's a classic, since they did build some tension with the mystery, and the climax was exciting. For people who crave scientific accuracy, this is an excellent recommendation (my sister mentioned that this was required reading for the AP Biology class at my high school). As someone who wants emotional satisfaction and human connection in my stories, I'm probably not the target audience. It was an interesting experience, but I'm happy to move onto the next book.

[devilstaste]

open to: all (m will be platonic only). muse: emmett. android. a.aron t.aylor j.ohnson fc. plot: somewhat based on the psychological / horror vibes of a.lien and p.rometheus. your muse is part of a colonist crew heading to a new world, and while in cryosleep, the sleeping pods failed and many of the inhabitants died, leaving the surviving crew in disarray as there's still months / years left until they reach their destination and not much to do besides wait it out. connection: one out of a group of survivors. could even be that they're the only one of their gender left among the crew and thus creating more panic and paranoia for your muse. do not like this starter.

over a thousand days of solitary existence, the creaking of the ship and hum of machinery signifying that the journey was progressing as planned, until emmett's daily routine descended into chaos. a mass and critical failure in the cryopods led to the inhabitants inside never to wake, save for a dozen humans that he managed to save before a forever slumber claimed them too. since then, nearly every moment aboard the ship had been spent fulfilling his duty by catering to the survivors needs, providing support and treatment to them, managing resources and keeping atop of maintenance. life had certainly become busier for the android, but in comparison to the three years left to his own devices, he had very few complaints. ❝ your vitals have improved. ❞ turned to the crew member sat atop the bed, a smile intentionally pulling at his lips. here in the medbay, it was empty and quiet, a respite from the group's intense debates and erratic behaviour. ❝ physically, you're doing great. ❞ a beat passed as his faux blue eyes etched over them, his head angling in the comforting manner he had often observed in their kind. ❝ but how do you feel? ❞

[un---man]

Vulnerability

Last I checked you can buy a physical copy of the anarchist FAQ from AK Press but it’s separated into two volumes do to length. I appreciate the project, though it unintentionally demonstrated the seemingly sisyphean task we carry.

I think most friends and family probably know that I’m an anarchist even if I don’t exactly bring it up in regular conversation. Hints are dropped and word spreads fast. I both dread and look forward to the conversations where someone somewhat timidly brings up the topic of my absurd political position. I’ve won countless arguments in my head while pacing back and forth in my apartment but that never seems to stop me from being a nervous wreck when the topic actually comes up.

Where the state occupies an infinite space in it’s god like legitimacy anarchy is an empty space. Overwhelming in it’s negation, and uncomfortable in it’s nakedness.

“The state calls its own violence law, but that of the individual, crime.”

Perhaps the most basic statement of Stirner’s political philosophy. But what concern is hypocrisy to the nihilist? What recourse does Stirner have to condemn anyone? The Unique and Its Property is largely dedicated to defanging ethical concepts so what recourse does Stirner have when they don’t live up to his standards?

Stirner seems oblivious or indifferent to his own ethical subtext. His critics are quick to point out that Max seems to hold a strange position that we ought to be nihilists. The seeming glaring contradiction riddles his whole work.

For Stirner, philosophy has tended to fill a kind of backwards role. Reality, and in particular the self, are ultimately non-conceptual. Yet we seem to be obsessed with purity of concepts. We want them to fit like neat bathroom tiles. Stack them up like bricks and mortar. Stirner seems more inline with the Taoists, every concept, to the extent that we insist on its purity, its truth, is a kind of destruction. We sacrifice a non-conceptual reality for the sake of legibility.

Stirner isn’t satisfied with merely pointing out concepts will never live up to their own expectations, he seems to believe we shouldn’t hold them to that standard to begin with. That’s the whole trouble with Stirner’s work, he seems concerned about the ethical implications of ethics.

John Carrol in the amazingly under-read Escape From the Crystal Palace compares Dostoevsky’s Christianity, of all things, to Stirner’s hyper-nominalism and hints at its ethical implications through the story of The Grand Inquisitor. To quote at length:

”Stirner and Nietzsche imply that there is a type of freedom available to man in which ideology is not dominant, in which morality is adaptable to the needs of the individual; a state beyond good and evil. One counter-argument, which is stronger than they cater for, runs to the effect that this assumption is psychologically unfounded, that it is utopian in the repressive sense of serving to awaken unrealizable hopes. The case is put by the Grand Inquisitor in Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. He argues against Christ, who represents a position identical to that of Stirner, that men do not want this freedom, that they do not seek to determine their own values. He impeaches Christ for having too little compassion for man, for failing to respect his choice, which will be for happiness, given that happiness and freedom are incompatible. The Inquisitor himself chooses to take on the responsibility of making decisions and determine values; he provides the happier majority with bread to eat and miracles to save them from boredom. He would grant the truth of Stirner’s ‘You love man therefore you torture the individual man’. His defense is that the will of the majority urges that Christ be killed. The Christ's response, to kiss the Grand Inquisitor, is bafflingly and assertively anarchic, in the characteristic sense that little more can be said about it than that it expresses the individual. It is irrational in that it rejects the terms of the debate…”

-John Carrol Escape from the Crystal Palace

Effortlessly Carrol see’s Christianity and nihilism occupying the same space if only for a brief moment. In the moment of vulnerability. This world is full of values so deafening, abstract, and beyond our reach that, in practice, they resemble the supposed nihilism it desperately denies. Saviors are in cheap supply. So hyper-competitive they sit at a stand still. Meaning is over produced. The world is saturated in it. You’re beating a dead horse before you say anything at all.

Ironically, it is nihilism that posits us in what I would consider the most basic, though ultimately theoretical, ethical position, individuals without recourse. Persons left naked, forced to deal with one another without claim to higher ideals. Forced to be an individual, and without means to see anyone as anything else.To be beyond good and evil is to be stripped of the infrastructure of guilt, where influence doesn’t extend beyond our fingertips.

A nakedness that I think is worth our devotion. A vulnerability that’s difficult to create. Ethics builds itself up like a fortress, but it’s only in its cracks when it can honestly exist. From Christ, Nietzsche, Diogenes, Stirner, Laozi, we are confronted with the truth in contradiction again and again.