#cw for self harm as metaphor

[misaerabl]

She Really Tore Me Apart

"Sayo lang ang puso ko, Kahit Kainin mo" (My heart is yours, even if you eat it whole) CW: Cannibalism (central theme; metaphorical and literal), Graphic depictions of blood and bodily harm, Psychological horror / emotional instability, Grief, trauma, guilt, and self-loathing, Implied past violence / disturbing imagery, Unstable relationship dynamics, Open-ended A/N: READ!!! may feel a bit ooc but this is supposed to feel unsettling and weird so... goal achieved i guess? (heavily inspired by "cannibal girlfriend - baby bugs" and "pag ibig ay kanibalismo II - fitterkarma, filipino band")

I. Red in the Marrow

You meet Ellie on the edge of winter, when the trees are all bones and the sky bruises early. The sun sets like it's afraid of what comes after, and you— you are already starving.

She's a stranger then. All sharp jawlines and wary glances, slouched against the rusted gate of a gas station long swallowed by ivy. Her fingers twitch near her rifle, but her eyes stay on you like she's weighing your teeth. You like that. Someone who doesn’t look at your face first. Someone who knows where the danger sits.

You're carrying a satchel that drips. Something wrapped in canvas, something that could be venison, rabbit, anything polite. You don’t offer her any. Not yet. You wait to see if she’ll ask.

She doesn’t.

Instead, she says: “You out here alone?”

You nod. Lie.

She nods too. Truth.

You both stand in the hush of a dying light, letting silence speak. When she finally speaks again, it’s not a question, it’s a dare: “Bet you bite.” You smile. Slow. Almost gentle. “Only if I’m hungry.” She doesn't flinch. Just smirks, low and crooked. You want to taste the curve of it.

---

You share a fire that night.

Ellie drops her pack beside yours and makes a bed from half a coat and dry moss. The wind sneaks between the trees like a thief, but neither of you shiver. Not yet. Hunger has always been warmer than snow.

You don’t sleep, though you pretend to.

Instead, you watch her through the red of the firelight. She curls inward when she dreams. Fists pressed against her chest, like she’s holding something in. Or holding something back.

You wonder if she ever ate someone just to survive. If she ever looked at a person and saw not a soul, but a solution. You wonder what she’d think if she knew about you.

The flesh you’ve turned into memory. The bones you’ve buried like secrets. The girl you used to be, gentle and soft-cheeked, before famine became a religion and you knelt at the altar of survival with blood on your tongue.

You didn’t choose it. Not really.

But you didn’t stop either.

Not after the first taste... Or the second. And well...

---

The next morning, you wake to Ellie stirring a pot of something over the embers. The scent is warm but thin. Roots, maybe. Dried meat. Survival food. “I had a dream,” she says, not looking at you. “You were licking something off your fingers.”

You pause. Swallow. “What was I licking?”

She shrugs. “Blood, maybe. Maybe peach juice.”

You laugh, though it’s tight.

She finally looks at you. "You don't seem like the peach type."

You lick your lips. Shrug. “Depends how ripe.”

You both smile like people who know too much.

Later, she finds your kill. The one wrapped in canvas, hidden near the rocks. She thinks it’s deer. She says, “Looks fresh.”

You say, “It is.”

She kneels beside it. Peels the cloth back with hands steadier than yours. There’s a long silence. She doesn’t say anything, but you see it in her eyes—recognition. An understanding you didn’t mean to give. Ellie doesn’t run. Instead, she ties the cloth again and says, “Next time, let me help skin it.” And just like that, she’s no longer a stranger.

She’s something else.

Something like witness. Something like want.

II. The Hunger That Knows Her Name

You travel together after that.

No questions. No confessions. Just boots against frostbitten dirt and shared cigarettes with cherry-red ends.

You walk like ghosts through dead towns, scavenging from forgotten shelves and the hollowed ribs of homes. You carry the heavier kills. She lights the fires. You don’t speak of the canvas bundle you both buried two miles east, under a tangle of pine.

You wonder if she dreams about it. You wonder if she dreams about you.

Somewhere between one town and the next, Ellie lets you braid her hair.

It happens in a church. Half of the stained glass is gone, the Virgin Mary haloed only by smoke and dust. She sits on the altar like something sacrilegious. You stand behind her, fingers weaving through the rough auburn strands, gentle despite the dried blood on your knuckles.

She doesn’t say a word. Not when your fingertips graze the shell of her ear. Not when your breath stirs the tiny hairs at her nape. The air between you trembles, electric and waiting. But it doesn’t break.

You tie off the braid with a strip from your shirt and step back. Your hands smell like rosemary and rust. She turns and looks at you for a long time. Not like she’s searching. Like she already knows.

“You’re quieter than I thought you'd be,” she says. You smile. “You talk enough for both of us.”

She smirks, but her gaze stays where your hands hang at your sides. That night, you bring her something. It's not human — not yet — just a rabbit caught in your snare. Its throat is cleanly slit, still warm when you drop it beside the fire.

But Ellie’s eyes flick to you, sharp. “You always so neat with your kills?”

You sit beside her, close enough to feel the heat of her body against your shoulder. You stretch your legs toward the fire, let your silence answer for you.

“You’re too good at this,” she mutters.

There’s no accusation in her voice. Only knowing.

The first time you taste her, it's not a bite. Not yet.

It’s in the way her fingers brush yours when you pass her a strip of dried meat. How her eyes flicker, not with fear, but something almost… aching.

It’s in how she doesn’t ask where the meat came from.

How she chews slow. Swallows slow. And then says, “I’ve had worse.”

---

Later, when the sky is bruised black and your campfire is a whisper, she comes to your bedroll.

Not to kiss you. Not to undress you. Not even to hold you. She just presses her palm to your chest and says, very softly, "Do you ever wish you could undo it?"

You don’t ask what she means. You take her hand, and you kiss her knuckles, one by one, slow and reverent. You taste salt, blood, pine sap. Her pulse like a prayer beneath your lips. “No,” you whisper. “Not if it meant never meeting you.”

Ellie breathes like she’s breaking.

---

You feed her again the next night. Something richer. Heavier.

You don’t say what it is. She doesn’t ask. But this time, she eats with her eyes on you the whole time. When she’s done, she licks the grease from her fingers. Slow. Deliberate.

Then she says, “You wanna try me next?” You blink. Your throat is dry, your mouth wet. And Ellie — Ellie doesn’t smile. She offers.

She holds out her wrist like a secret, like scripture, and tilts her head. “Just a taste.” You touch her skin. Warm. Soft. Living.

A deer, once, looked at you like this. Right before it let go. You don’t bite her.

You kiss the inside of her wrist. Tongue soft, breath shaky. And she shivers like you’ve set something inside her ablaze. The hunger roars in your chest. Not for flesh — not exactly.

For something holier. For the way she looks at you like you are ancient and feral and beautiful and hers.

You could devour her. You don’t.

Not yet.

III. Communion

There is a house in the woods.

You don’t remember who led who there.

The front door groans like a throat cleared after weeping. The floorboards are thin and singing with rot, but Ellie still walks through like she’s done it before in a dream.

You follow. You always follow.

The kitchen smells like rust and lavender, like it remembers something long dead. A dinner that never got served. A woman who never came home. You touch the counters. Dust blooms beneath your fingertips like spores.

Ellie finds an old tin of tea leaves. She opens it. Closes it. Opens it again.

Then she laughs—soft, bitter, unhinged. “They always leave everything behind,” she says.

You want to tell her it’s not true. But you’re here, aren’t you?

And you left yourself behind a long time ago.

---

That night, you cook for her again.

The meat simmers with rosemary and garlic, plucked from a forgotten garden buried under snow. The smell rises like a hymn. You plate it like you're offering your heart on fine china.

Ellie eats slow, the fork catching against her teeth. Her lips glisten. Her throat moves. She doesn’t say a word, and that silence is heavier than anything she could’ve spoken.

Then she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and says, “So, how do you choose them?”

Your spine tightens. You stir the pot though it doesn’t need stirring.

“I mean,” she continues, “do you wait until they’re already dying? Or do you—what? Pick them like fruit?”

You say nothing. She leans back in her chair, tilts her head. Her eyes are green glass. You can see yourself in them. Distorted. “You’re not a monster,” she says. Then: “But you’re not not one either, are you?”

---

Later, she finds your journal.

You’d buried it beneath a loose floorboard in the upstairs bedroom, next to the scattered bones of some small animal and a tin box full of teeth. She doesn’t ask permission.

She just reads.

All the names. All the prayers. All the guilt pressed between pages like dead moths.

She reads the entry from the orphan boy who begged you to save him from the cold.

She reads the one about the woman who offered her body for shelter, and the storm that didn't let up for five days.

She reads your favorite one, the shortest.

I didn’t want to eat her. But I loved her too much to bury her.

When she finds you on the porch, your arms are folded tight across your ribs like a shield. She stands beside you for a long time before speaking. “You don’t have to pretend around me,” she says. You laugh, raw and cold. “I’m not pretending.”

“No,” Ellie replies. “You’re just starving.”

---

That night, she lies beside you in bed. You don’t touch her. But your breath matches hers. Her voice in the dark: “Do you want me?”

You flinch. “Don’t ask that.”

“Why not?”

“Because you already know the answer.”

A pause. Then: “Are you afraid you’ll hurt me?”

“I’m afraid I won’t stop.”

She turns her head. Her lips find the hollow of your throat. Soft. Patient. Like an invitation. And still, you don’t bite. But eventually—inevitably—she bleeds. A scratch on her hand, from brambles maybe. Maybe a jagged nail. Maybe it was the house itself. She doesn’t flinch when she holds it out to you. Doesn’t blink when you bring her fingers to your mouth.

You lick it like a sacrament. Slow. Tongue to copper. The taste of her blood coats your tongue like honeyed rust. And Ellie breathes like she’s been waiting forever for this. When she pulls her hand away, your mouth stays parted. “I see it now,” she whispers.

“What?”

“You don’t eat to survive. You eat to feel.” She touches your cheek with her uninjured hand. “And you feel too much.”

Later, while she sleeps, you sit in the empty hallway. Your hands are shaking. There’s blood drying in the cracks of your lips and the echo of her breath in your mouth. It isn’t hunger anymore.

It’s worship. It’s horror. It’s love.

You press your head to the cold wall and weep silently into your hands. You remember what it felt like, before the world ended. Before you turned to marrow and ash and meat.

You remember churches. And prayers. And the way love used to feel like salvation.

But now—Now it tastes like her. And you are so, so full. And still, so empty.

IV. The Body Keeps the Score

The days blur in shades of winter and throat. Ellie doesn’t leave anymore. You don’t either. The house takes you both in like rot in the walls—quiet, stubborn, impossible to expel.

You wake in sheets damp with fever dreams, where your teeth fall out and grow back as knives. You dream of Ellie crawling into your mouth like a prayer and never coming out.

She wakes you with cold hands and tired eyes, the kind of eyes that say: I saw it too. I stayed anyway.

You eat less now. She watches you more.

Once, she takes your face in both hands and says, “There’s something about you that feels like confession.”

You want to laugh. You want to scream.

Instead, you kiss her.

It is not a kiss of hunger. It is a kiss of warning.

But she tastes it—your guilt. Your ache. The phantom of everyone you’ve ever loved too hard and swallowed too gently.

And still, she pulls you closer.

The silence starts to thicken.

She doesn’t ask what happened to the boy who lived here before. She doesn’t ask where you got the new meat in the freezer.

She just slices it thin. Cooks it rare. Feeds you in small pieces like communion.

You chew. You swallow. You don’t ask either.

One night, she leaves a note on the table:

You keep trying to protect me from you. But you don’t know what I’ve survived. You’re not the first person who’s wanted to devour me. You’re just the first to mean it like a vow.

You burn the note in the sink.

The ashes cling to the porcelain like guilt.

You taste one.

It tastes like her handwriting.

She brings you a gift days later. A rabbit, already dead. Its neck snapped clean. Its fur still warm.

“I wanted to see what you’d do,” she says.

You hesitate.

Then skin it slowly. Clean. Clinical. Your hands gentle. Surgical.

She watches you the entire time.

When you finish, she says, “I thought you’d eat it raw.”

You meet her gaze, bloody fingers trembling. “That’s not love.”

“No,” she says. “It’s instinct.”

The next day, she lets you touch the scar above her hip.

You ask where it came from. She tells you her full name instead.

You trace the letters in her skin like scripture. She lets you. Her eyes flutter shut like she’s praying you’ll forget your teeth, even now.

But you don’t bite.

Not yet.

You press your lips to her scar and whisper something in a language that hasn’t been spoken since the last time you buried someone warm.

She whispers back. “I’m not afraid of being devoured.”

You close your eyes. “But I am afraid of being forgotten.”

---

Later, you find yourself alone in the bathroom.

You stare at the reflection in the mirror, but it doesn’t look like you.

It’s her, somehow. Her hunger. Her grief. Her open throat of faith.

And you realize. You never turned into this because you were starving.

You turned because you couldn’t hold anything sacred without wanting to keep it inside you forever.

You turned because the world ended, and someone had to remember the taste of love. Even if it curdled in the gut. Even if it rotted there. Even if it grew teeth.

---

That night, Ellie climbs into bed beside you and says:

“Do it.”

You blink. “What?”

Her breath in your ear, steady. “I want you to remember me. The way you do with them. The way you’ve always wanted to.” Your chest knots. “Ellie—” She hushes you with her mouth.

“Just a piece,” she says, kissing your jaw. “Something small,” against your throat. “I won’t scream,” into your skin.

You tremble. Because you believe her. Because this is not survival. This is surrender.

You don’t do it that night. But your mouth never stops tasting her name.

V. The Last Supper

She hums in the kitchen, barefoot, bleeding.

A shallow cut from a slipped blade. Not an accident, not really. You can tell by the way she watches the crimson trail bead down her wrist. The way she licks it absently. Like she’s imagining your mouth there instead.

“I’ve been thinking,” she says, slicing the meat. Your meat. The rabbit? The boy? The one from two towns over?

You don’t remember anymore. Your body does, though. It clenches.

“You never let yourself have anything,” she says, voice syrup-slow. “Not really. Just enough to taste, never enough to need.”

You say nothing. Your teeth ache.

She places two plates on the table. One in front of you. One for herself. The meat glistens in the low light. There’s rosemary on it.

You stare. “Eat,” she says, and there’s no softness now. No tenderness.

Just offering. Just the edge of something jagged and raw. You do. Of course you do. Because this is what you’ve made her into.

---

Later, she traces your ribs with the tip of a knife. Not hard. Just enough pressure to know where you end. “Have you ever wondered,” she says, “what part of me you'd keep, if I asked you to?”

You laugh, too sharp, too sudden. “You’re not a lamb.”

“I’m not asking to be.” She looks up. “I just want to know if you'd stop at the skin.”

Silence.

She smiles, slow and mean, and god, how you love her. How it ruins you.

---

The storm comes on the fourth day. Outside, wind howls like a wounded thing. Inside, she says she wants to feel it. Not the storm. You.

All of you.

You try to walk away. She follows.

“I want you to do it,” she says again. “Like you did before. But this time with love. I want to know if it changes the taste.” You shake your head, fists clenched. “You don’t understand what you’re asking.”

“No,” she whispers, eyes glinting. “You don’t understand what you are.”

It happens all at once and not at all.

Your hands in her hair. Her nails in your back. The knife between you. The floor wet with something red. She says your name and it sounds like mercy. You say hers and it sounds like a curse. You don’t remember biting. You just remember the blood.

---

Later, the room is too quiet. The house has never been so still.

You sit at the table. Your mouth tastes of iron and rosemary and something holier than regret.

Her body—what’s left of it—is curled beside the hearth, a shrine of warm limbs and colder faith. You wrapped her in the sheet. You tucked her hair behind her ear.

You kissed her temple. You don’t cry. But your body remembers how.

Outside, the storm dies down. Inside, you set the table for two.

Just in case.

You don’t know what you’re waiting for.

Maybe penance. Maybe forgiveness. Maybe her shadow.

But the plate across from you stays full.

You pick up your fork.

You chew slowly.

And wait.

[END]

taglist - @fatbootymuncher

[transhitman]

@calpalsworld holding me at gunpoint and making me break my tumblr hiatus to post my thematic analysis of Look Outside. I know making horror about mental health is overplayed but hear me out for a sec, this one is good. CW for mention of sexual themes. And spoilers, obviously:

Look Outside is a sort of reverse Metamorphosis. At the start of the game, Sam has recently acquired some kind of invisible disability or mental illness, or one that he already had has progressed to an unmanageable point. This causes the world itself to metamorphose, becoming frightening, hostile, and deeply confusing. The specifics of his disability don’t really matter here, as Sam doesn’t understand it himself. The act of looking outside in this case represents confronting reality, and the people who have looked outside are those who have in some way or another come to grips with their tragedy. Jeane’s life is falling apart and she feels like she’s losing control. Mr. Henderson is dealing with severe PTSD. The tooth family is grieving the arbitrary death of their child (which I also realize is a trope, but sometimes the most obvious reading is simply correct lol). Stargazer projects its trauma onto the people it’s close to, attempting to control and “fix” them, and Spine subjects Sam to abuse in turn. Frederic ties his identity and self worth to his art, and he allows his negative emotions about his work to become all he is. Some of the cursed cope just fine, and while they may not appear the most stable, they are able to deal with reality without lashing out or destroying themselves. There are, of course, plenty of things that aren’t a one-to-one metaphor, but the general pattern is there. When Sam looks at the visitor at the beginning of the game, when he’s at his weakest and most isolated, he flat-out self-destructs because he’s unequipped to cope with his new reality.

The human companions, as well, have a pattern of being those who haven’t really looked inward. Ernest most obviously has some kind of psychosis going on with his paranoia and delusions about the paranormal, and has either chosen not to seek help, or hasn’t had it offered to him. Dan is a very clearly neurodivergent man who is completely oblivious to how he affects others, toxic and annoying not out of malice but because he is a deeply myopic person. Sophie is a child who either hasn’t been affected by tragedy, or doesn’t yet grasp the gravity of things that have happened to her. Papineau is sort of wrapped up in his very specific fixation, and while it’s not harmful, it’s definitely abnormal, and he doesn’t seem to realize it. And Xaria and Monty are countercultural weirdos, likely on the fringes of society, who use force to get what they want rather than constructively building community.

The specifics of Sam’s illness don’t really matter, but it’s difficult to ignore the erotic elements of the game. Putting aside the guro/tf overtones for now, Sam has three obsessive stalkers. While they vary in their level of harm, all of them in some way threaten his boundaries and sense of self. As said before, Spine seems to represent some kind of abusive cycle – a controlling and entitled partner. Lyle is mostly harmless, but is still a stalker at the end of the day. And though Sam can choose to engage with him, it’s framed as a generally awkward and transactional situation. Shadow doesn’t represent cut and dry abuse, but a chasm in communication. Sam is not ready for the sort of relationship Shadow represents, and when he runs into it too fast, it destroys him. Again, I don’t think the specifics of Sam’s illness matter too much in the end, but I can definitely see a reading where he’s dealing with emotional or sexual trauma that caused his mental health to nosedive. I mean, returning to the fetish overtones of the game, one could posit transformation as sexual liberation – entering a world that can be genuinely dangerous, but which can also empower those who reside there. I personally don’t think enough of the game’s characters fit this theme for it to be the intended reading, but I think it’s a fun angle to take. If anything, I think Sam has hang ups about intimacy in general. He’s just a very isolated person, perhaps because of his enigmatic illness, and that has taken a toll on his mental wellbeing. But I digress.

The ritual has Sam confronting reality at long last, finally staring down this inscrutable, nonsensical tragedy. This time, however, he has other people to lean on (if you aren’t doing a solo run), and has explored the lives and trauma of the other people in the apartment. He is able to see the visitor without instantly collapsing. He holds a mirror up to the visitor, showing it what it looks like, making it understand the harm it has caused, echoing the scenes of Sam berating himself in the more literal mirror. In the Denial ending, he confronts reality, sees what he needs to see, and moves on. He is changed, he understands himself. His life and the function of his body will never be normal, but he is happy and lives a fulfilled life surrounded by friends. In the Denial ending, Sam copes.

Truth, however, sees Sam fixating on his trauma to the point that it destroys him. He is consumed by tragedy, and it makes him a true monster, lashing out at the world around him and ultimately making it uninhabitable. Subscribed wholly to nihilism, he destroys his own life. Flawed ending Sam survives the encounter with the visitor and remains lucid (as far as we are shown), but he does not grasp the whole truth. He didn’t put the pieces together correctly. While he now understands that there is a problem, that he is in some way deviant, he can’t accept it as readily. Whether he copes with his change is left up in the air, but if he does it will take a long time, and he may never truly accept himself. Sam doesn’t confront the visitor at all in No Going Back, and is thus sentenced to a lifetime of general suckage. The world of No Going Back is the perpetual but lowkey misery that comes with having an undiagnosed or invisible disability. Sam does not change for the worse, but he stagnates. Even if he has friends, or has become stronger as a person, the root of the issue was never addressed, and the world will never truly be a place he can be happy in.

Tldr: Look Outside is a game about accepting a disability and mental illness as part of who you are, and learning to navigate a world that is actively hostile to you and people like you.

[tmntaucompetition]

CW for Captain X2: death

CW for Feral Casey: gore, blood, injury, death, child abuse, torture, self harm, themes of suicide, cannibalism, metaphor for genocide

LINKS:

Captain X2

Feral Casey

[lalalychee-x]

"1x1— I think I'm okay"

Angst! Rodrick Heffley x reader pt 1

"Hush your mouth, you talk too much..." romantic. + platonic

♡ Um! This whole series is SLIGHTLY a vent thing! But it's still an x reader! It's sfw unless labelled otherwise, but read the CW carefully!! I used the doawk fanfic "Dysfunctional Perspective" to help build around this story to give it some depth. Please check it out on r/loadeddiper on reddit! We have to establish some things first, though! So welcome to part 1 of "Think I'm okay!" CW: self harm (sh), weed/drug use, smoking, child-abuse, scars, healing scars, implied sexual assault (sa), obssessive disorders, classic crude teenage humour, skin-peeling metaphors?!, conflicted relationships, suicide attempts, suicide jokes, OCs or characters from Dysf. Perspective are included (even if they don't have the same plot-devices). masterlist of all parts: word count: 5223 song4this: 1x1" by Bring me the Horizon

This whole series is kinda to depict Rodrick closer to his cannon and less tiktok-ified version! It's also to convey two very different struggles of teenagers with similar coping mechanisms. Enjoy!!

♡ Rodrick and reader, School's fuck-up/Loser x School's Valedictorian/Popular Princess.

♡ Reader is depicted as popular, feminine, having a lot of friends.

♡ Rodrick is not depicted as popular but as well-known...but with few actual friends

♡ Reader is afab, female-dressing anyway, wearing skirts to fit a stereotype (it is a plot-relevant thing, I promise)

-------story starts here-------

It started as just another teacher’s errand.

You were used to them by now—the way your name always came up when someone needed a favour. Trusted. Organized. Sweet. Of course she’ll do it. She always does.

“Can you bring these up to Rodrick Heffley?” your teacher asked like it was nothing. Just a stack of notes and an excuse scribbled for his absence.

You paused. A little too long. “Sure,” you said, with that perfect little smile. The one you’d perfected to keep people from looking too closely. Too long.

You stared at the name on the top of the notes.

Rodrick Heffley.

The loser. The burnout. The guy who never showed up and when he did, never gave a shit. You didn’t run in the same circles—if anything, you existed in opposite galaxies. You were pink pens, honour roll, friends who planned everything two weeks in advance. He was torn denim, smelling like weed and rage, and scribbling band names on desks in black Sharpie. Everyone knew he was a mess.

And yet. You're sacrificing your hard-earned reputation, chipping away at it by rushing around and asking if anyone knew where the Heffley's even lived. Because fuck, what are other people going to think? You? Asking where his HOUSE is, running around like a neek with a stack of catch-up work in your hands. It was pissing you off.

Eventually, you did follow badly scribbled directions from a punk behind the school who knew his brother Greg, apparently from some disaster party that you didn't attend many months ago.

You sighed, walking up past the driveaway, up the pavement, knocking on the door. To your surprise, it creaked its way open under the force of your fist. It was open. You deadpan, cursing under your breath,

"Mrs, um, Mr. Heffley?" You think it's rude to intrude, god is this trespassing? Isn't it a crime—

You overthink for a bit longer when you realise it's been a bit too long... and there was no response. You peek in, the smell of Enigma Alexandra de Markoff perfume... do all white moms wear the same damn fragrance when they go out?

You scrunch your nose, then deduct that his parents were out. And you didn't know Rodrick very well but you were expecting some sort of sound from a noisy teenage boy... music or crude TV shows...

When passing him in the Music room in school, he was never quiet. He made his presence known, either by smashing drums like his life depended on it or yelling about some shit band no one else liked. But now? Silence. Eerie, suffocating silence.

You stood outside the cracked door, fingers curling tighter around the paper folder.

Then you heard it.

A noise—low, choked. Gurgled?

You spiralled up the stairs, pushing the front door to the Heffley house loosely shut and navigating across the upstairs hall.

And there he was.

Not sprawled on the couch with a smirk or blasting music so loud it’d rattle the drywall. Not throwing a dumb smirk at you like he always did when you passed him in the halls. No. He was slouched over the bathroom sink—in an unknown-band t-shirt, trembling, shoulders taut with some horrible tension. A single flickering bathroom light above him buzzed softly, and that was all you could hear for a moment, besides your own breath stuttering in her chest. The rest of the house had gone silent, like it, too, was holding its breath.

The sink was speckled red.

Bright, wet, and fresh.

His knuckles were clenched around the porcelain edge, his body swaying slightly like his legs weren’t even holding him up properly. Blood dripped from the underside of his arm, from angry, shallow cuts that hadn’t even stopped bleeding yet. His jeans hung loose on his hips, unbelted, and his hair was messy in a way that meant he hadn’t even tried to style it—it hung in his face, casting jagged shadows under his eyes.

He looked like a shadow. A ghost.

And when he blinked, slowly, blearily, then turned his head over his shoulder to look at you—you knew.

He wasn’t fully there. Was he high or something?

Eyes red-rimmed and distant. He looked at you like he couldn’t quite remember who you were. Like he’d forgotten how to process anything. A joint sat extinguished near the windowsill. The air was heavy with the stale tang of smoke and iron.

“Oh my god…” you whispered, and your voice cracked hard in the middle of it. It wasn’t pretty or elegant or composed like how you usually sounded at school—it was raw. It hurt to hear yourself sound like that. A way you knew all too well.

Rodrick blinked again. His brows furrowed, barely. He didn't even know you at first glance, only recognising you from your clothes, dolled out in glitter like a bad Regina George fashion trend.

“...What are you doing here?” His voice was gravel, slurred and slow, like he had to drag each syllable through his throat. Like his mouth couldn’t keep up with the rest of him. “You’re not supposed to—shit, go away.”

You didn't. Who would? Who could?

You chucked the manila folder of notes and handouts behind you, scattered across the carpet in the hall. Your heels clicked once—twice—as you stepped inside the bathroom and kicked them off so fast one hit the doorframe.

You would've whined usually, if anything happened to your precious shoes and outfit, but you couldn't care less. You were slipping on the tiled floor in your tights, hurriedly stepping in.

He was bleeding.

And you were the only one who gave a damn.

Your jacket soon followed, flung onto the counter before you even realized you were unzipping it. He looked alarmed, staggering back only to let more blood flow out of the cuts with the added pressure. Okay, maybe lunging at him out of panic wasn't the best approach, but what else could you expect a teenager to do?

“Rodrick,” you hissed, hands reaching for him, voice too high-pitched and breathless, “What the fuck—what the fuck are you doing?!”

“I’m fine,” he muttered, eyes rolling back as he tried to push her away with one limp hand, but his knees buckled, and you barely caught him before he hit the tiles. “Don’t touch me.”

“Shut up,” you snapped, something hot and ugly building in your throat; was it tears? Or rage or irritance? “Just—fuck—shut up!” Your hands trembled as they caught his bleeding forearm, flipping it gently over to see the damage. Your fingers hovered just above his skin, scared to touch him but even more terrified not to. “You’re not fine, you asshole—you’re fucking bleeding.”

Rodrick didn’t answer, with a slurred expression that said "No shit."

He didn’t need to say it.

Not when his body leaned heavily against the sink, head tilted down, breaths coming in shallow, embarrassed gasps like he was suddenly realizing how exposed he was. His skin felt cold—clammy—and you hated that you knew exactly how that felt. You'd been here before. Not in a bathroom with someone else, but in your own room, your own quiet hell that was ironic because your whole room was pink and covered in pop-band posters. It was so different to this, but it made the white lines on your legs throb.

Until now.

Now you were here, looking.

He turned slightly, just enough for the fluorescent light to catch the raw red slashes across his forearm. Still fresh. Still wet. His eyes were glassy, pupils blown too wide. Either high—or so out of it he still hasn't registered who you are and what you're doing.

And he looked so fucking tired.

“Come here,” you whispered, voice suddenly soft and shaking as you tried to guide him down to the closed toilet seat. You pulled paper towels from the holder with frantic, jerky movements, biting your tongue to keep it steady. “Let me—just let me help, okay? Please. Don’t be stubborn.”

His lips parted like he wanted to argue. But he didn’t.

And that scared you more than anything.

Rodrick Heffley, king of eye rolls and snide remarks, didn’t argue.

You swiped around the cuts, hands gentle and practised, the air too quiet now, too heavy with everything left unsaid. You pressed the clean cloths firmly against the bleeding gashes, and your eyes burned.

“God, you’re such an idiot,” You mumbled under her breath, voice breaking again.

"What'd I do—"

His voice sounded slow, hurt and it pissed you off. "Are you stupid?! Do you think I'm stupid, Rodrick?! What do you think you've done?"

It came off harsher than it should have and you realised after you'd said it; you had horrible communication skills.

Your voice cracked against the walls and in his ears, louder than you expected it to be. It echoed over the tense, suffocating silence between you, and for a moment, everything stood still—except for the blood running in slow trails down his forearm.

Rodrick flinched. Visibly. Like your words physically slapped him across the face.

His expression shifted instantly. From distant and dazed to bitter and defensive.

“Oh, of course, you’re not stupid,” he scoffed, attempting to pull away, his free hand clenching around itself in a tight fist... like it was the only thing keeping him upright. “Why would you be? You’re perfect. You’re everyone’s fucking favorite.”

You blinked, stunned by the venom in his tone, the way his voice twisted the word perfect like it burned his tongue to say it. Speechless. What do you even say to that?

He laughed under his breath, low and humourless, a sound that didn't belong on someone like him, a face like his... “Must be nice. Being the pretty little princess with straight A’s and clean wrists and people who actually give a shit.”

You look up at him from the floor, angry. So fucking angry but you can't speak.

"You—” he gestured vaguely at you with a slightly bloody finger, and it smeared against the underside of the sink with his clumsy motions—“don’t fucking get it. You’ve never had to lie about where you’ve been, why your hands are shaking, or why you can’t stop fucking up everything you touch!”

You stood up off the floor, finding the words but no less furious. “Don’t pull that edgy bullshit with me. What RIGHT did you have to say that? But I’m still alive. And so are you.”

His eyes widened, lips parting just slightly. Like maybe—for the first time—he wasn’t sure what to say. You both paused, looking at each other like some sort of stand-off. He wouldn't take you seriously, usually, especially in that outfit that looked like everything pink from Hillary Duff. But for some reason, whether it was the light or the fact he's had one too many blunts today, the pink dulled out and you looked furious.

He looked away, jaw clenched so tightly it trembled. His hands flexed at his sides. He was still bleeding.

And you couldn’t let him sit there and rot in it.

Not even as your knees hit the cold tile with a soft thud, your skirt bunching around your thighs and your palms stinging from the fall. You were right there, sitting on his bathroom floor, breath unsteady, heart in your throat.

The sink was still running, the water pink with diluted blood swirling down the drain. But it smelled stronger of bleach in that corner of the bathroom since you chucked whatever cleaning product you could find into it to get the blood off.

Rodrick just stared forward, jaw clenched like a vice, as you reached for his arm. You didn’t flinch, even though your hands were shaking. Even though your stomach flipped at the sight of the fresh gashes and the way his skin burned red around them.

“God,” you whispered, fumbling with the sleeve of your jacket to press against his arm. “You’re such a fucking idiot. Looks like someone ran a cheese grater across your arms.”

“I didn’t ask you to come here,” he snapped, voice rough and tight. But he did crack a slight smile at the comparison. But again—he didn’t move. Didn’t rip his arm away from your grip.

“You think I give a shit?” Your voice cracked, fingers pressing into the bandage as blood soaked through it. “You’re bleeding all over the place, Rodrick, and you’re still trying to act like none of this matters?”

He scoffed, looking down at you with tired, red eyes and an absolute shit-eating grin. “What, you think you’re saving me? Is that what this is? Poor little princess comes to fix the fuck-up? Do you think you'll get extra credit for this?”

“I’m not trying to save you, because I frankly don't fucking care,” you snapped, trembling as your hands worked, your breaths shaky and fast. “I’m trying to stop you from dying in a bathroom next to a blunt, in a stupid band tee because that's a stupid way to die!”

That shut him up.

For a second, the only sounds were the faucet still running, the wind rattling the windowpane as evening fell, and your ragged breathing.

You looked up at him, tears burning your waterline, fingers still pressing down on his arm as if keeping him here—on Earth—with you, even if the cuts weren't that bad. Your whole body was cold from the tiles, knees numb, lips chapped. But you didn’t care. Not when he looked like that. Pale and distant, like he’d already floated a few feet above his own body.

Rodrick’s mouth moved like he had something to say, but all that came out was a low, choked breath. Like the fight in him had cracked somewhere invisible, and all that anger was just a shield for the real thing underneath.

“No one can just ignore...that,” you whispered, referring to how you found him. “What was I meant to do?”

He let out a bitter laugh. He thought you were unusually nice. “You are annoying.”

You bit your lip to keep it from quivering. “I know.”

“I still hate you.”

“You’re allowed to.”

"Do you want me to?"

"I'd rather you did, actually."

The air did settle eventually with dry chuckles and crude insults—but barely.

It wasn’t calm, not really. Just a different kind of heavy. The kind that followed the storm of yelling and blood and shaking hands. The bathroom was still freezing. You could feel the tile digging into your knees, cold biting through the fabric of your skirt. Your jacket was ruined—streaked with red, crumpled on the floor beside you.

Rodrick joined you on the floor, sat against the side of the tub now, slouched low with his arm outstretched as you carefully swiped antiseptic over the cuts. It stung like hell, based on the way his jaw twitched, but he didn’t say anything. Just stared straight ahead, chest rising and falling like he was still coming down from something—rage, maybe. Or a high. Or both.

You kept your hand steady, even though your fingers were still trembling.

“I need to let this dry before I bandage it,” you muttered, voice quieter now. Worn out. “Otherwise it’ll trap the bacteria and—”

“I’m not a dumbass,” Rodrick cut in flatly.

You glanced at him, rolling your eyes and standing back up. “I never said you were.”

He looked at you then—really looked. His eyes were bloodshot like he hadn’t slept in two days, dark circles bruised beneath them. His hair was a mess, falling into his face. Blood stained his hoodie sleeve and the hem of his jeans. But even now, like this, he looked defiant. Angry.

Or maybe just ashamed.

You turned away, hastily busying yourself with scrubbing the sink to avoid looking too long. Well, that's when you really clocked that there was a joint on the window sill.

"Well, there goes any idea of letting some fresh air into here." You mumble, setting the rag down with a wet slap against the sink.

"Huh?" Rodrick perked up.

"It's suffocating in here. But as soon as I open that window, the smell of weed gets out, the neighbours know then we're busted." You cock one hip, staring at him.

Rodrick scoffed, furrowing his eyebrows and putting the implication of your words together, "Why the hell do you care if I get busted for some indo?"

"Because I'm in here too, dumbass." You pause, looking away like you were hiding something, "...I wouldn't tell. Then you know... everyone would find out about all this."

Rodrick doesn't reply, silently noting your consideration for him.

"Don't get funny ideas." You felt the need to clarify as your cheeks burned. Then, without turning to him, you asked, “Is that why your eyes are red though, or is that just the part where you almost passed out in front of me?”

He gave a small, bitter laugh. “Does it matter?”

You turned your head to look at him again, brows drawn tight. “Yeah. Kinda does.”

Rodrick rolled his head back against the bathtub, letting it thud lightly as he sighed. “It was just a hit,” he muttered. “Helps me stop thinking about… stuff.”

You sighed.

Rodrick glanced sideways, catching the expression you were trying not to show—disappointment maybe, or maybe just that hollow, too-familiar look. He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t give me that face. You don’t know what it’s like.”

Your lips twitched. Not into a smile—god, no. But something colder. Something tired. “You think I don’t know what it’s like?”

He blinked at that. Like he hadn’t expected you to sound like that.

You wipe your hands on your skirt, half-heartedly since your fingers were already pruning up.

"The fuck does that mean? You know I'm stupid." Rodrick scoffs, staring at you in disbelief, like he's challenging you.

You froze.

The bandage in your hand suddenly felt like it weighed ten pounds. Like every heartbeat thudded directly in your palms. You stared at it for a second. Then let out a sharp sigh, your whole body tensing as you shoved the gauze roll into the sink cabinet with a dull thump.

“Fuck’s sake,” you muttered, rubbing your face with both hands.

Rodrick blinked at the sudden shift. “What?”

You didn’t answer at first. You just took a step back from him. Toward the mirror, where you could see your own reflection—frazzled, stained, still looking too perfect in all the wrong ways.

"Never planned on telling anyone."

Then Rodrick snorted lightly, like he couldn’t help himself. “Why the hell are you telling me, then?”

You let out a short breath—half-laugh, half-pain. “Because you’re bleeding in your bathroom sink, and I’m scared you’re gonna die.”

That shut him up. Again.

You didn’t look at him when you reached down to unzip your skirt. You just did it, stripping down to the sheer black tights clinging to your legs. And then, carefully—slowly—you hooked your fingers under the waistband and began to peel them down.

Rodrick sat up a little straighter. His eyes flicked down, brows furrowing in immediate confusion.

Because there they were.

Scars. Thin, faded, some pink, some darker. A few recent, irritated. And burns��scattered, angry little circles on your thighs. Like tiny ghosts of every time you'd lost focus, lost control. Like years of “accidents” that were never really accidents.

You stood there in your underwear, half-shivering, arms crossed over your stomach—but it wasn’t about modesty. It was about baring something else entirely.

"Um, yeah, it was like... punishment for myself, rather than trying to feel something."

He was flushed.

His mouth was slightly open, like he wasn’t sure how to react—still sitting there against the tub, shirt stained with blood, but now watching you like you weren’t someone he knew at all. Like you’d just peeled back your skin and shown him something holy and fragile and fucked up all at once.

You just stood there, exposed, breathing in the antiseptic air and waiting for something—anything.

And then he finally spoke, voice hoarse:

“…You did that while studying and with your friends and stuff?”

You blinked, surprised. “Yeah.”

He scratched the back of his head awkwardly, eyes flicking back to your legs, then up to your face. “That’s like… really fucked up.”

You genuinely let out a loud laugh. “You think?”

You sat back down on the cold tiled floor with a sigh, pressing your skirt into your lap like it would make this any less awkward. It didn’t. The silence felt like a thick fog between you. Still wearing your blouse and nothing else on your legs, your thighs out and marked, your expression deadpan.

Rodrick shifted where he sat. His knee bumped yours. You didn’t move.

The antiseptic on his arms was drying now. The sharp, sterile scent was losing its sting.

“You ever think about just… ending it?” he asked suddenly. Voice low. Almost thoughtful. Like he was wondering what it’d sound like out loud.

You didn’t even flinch. “You mean like… before or after I force myself to study derivatives for three hours a night?”

Rodrick snorted. “Okay, damn.”

You looked down at the bandages. “But yeah. All the time.”

He blinked. Then muttered, “Cool, cool, that’s normal, right? Like, ‘Oh, I got a D-minus on a quiz, guess I’ll swan dive into traffic.’”

You coughed a laugh that was definitely more like a sob. “Or when you walk into your room and see a curling wand and just start thinking about not curling your hair.”

“Shit, that's out of the box...” he muttered under his breath, eyes widening slightly. “You win.”

“I’m not competing with you for most suicidal, dumbass,” you muttered, pressing your forehead to your knees for a second.

He nudged you lightly with his elbow. “Yeah, well. If I die first, you owe me a funeral playlist.”

You lifted your head. Stared at him, completely straight-faced, referring to his clothing style. “You want your funeral to sound like a Hot Topic in 2007?”

“Hell yeah.”

“…What the hell.”

Another silence passed. You fiddled with a loose string on your skirt.

He looked down at his arms again. The blood was dry now. Scabs already crusting where the antiseptic had done its job. But he still looked hollowed out, like the inside of him was somewhere a hundred miles from here.

Then he looked back at you. At your exposed thighs, marked and silent.

And finally, a question, quiet: “Why the legs?”

You shrugged, voice dry. “Because people don’t usually check there. My skirt covers it and no one really stares there... you know? My mom doesn’t do laundry.”

He nodded slowly, like that made awful, perfect sense. “Yeah. Yeah, I get that. Most people wouldn't risk getting called a pervert.”

A few more seconds of quiet.

You shifted, groaning as your back hit the tub with a thud, "Fuck, this floor is cold."

"Well, sorry, I don't really hold mental breakdowns in style." He retorts back, not even looking at you as you scowl.

This back and forth went on for a while. The silence is deafening in that too-bright bathroom—white tiles, beige towels, that fake marble countertop that looks like every white-family suburban house ever. You’re sitting on the edge of the tub now, arms wrapped around yourself because you’re still kind of in shock, Rodrick perched on the toilet lid with his head down, bandages hugging his forearms, still damp with antiseptic.

You glance over at him, unsure what the next move is, and your mouth twitches.

“This is so fucking weird,” you say, breathless with disbelief.

Rodrick looks up, eyes red—not from crying, but from the leftover high, lids half-lowered. “You think?”

“I was supposed to be doing chem homework,” you mutter, then laugh. Really laugh. Head tilting back, the kind of breathless laugh that borders on manic. “Now I’m half-naked in your bathroom and I’ve seen your blood and your scars and you’ve seen mine. Like. What the fuck.”

Rodrick snorts. “Kinda romantic.”

You throw a balled-up, bloody tissue at him.

There’s a pause again, but it’s not the tense kind anymore. It’s… weirdly peaceful. Intimate. Almost like after a storm, when the world’s gone still.

You glance at the tub, then at him. “Y’know what would wake you up faster than that blunt?”

“What?”

“A cold bath. Like chuck a few ice cubes from the freezer in there.”

His head whips toward you like you just said the most evil shit imaginable. “Are you outta your damn mind?”

You’re already standing up. “Maybe. But you’re the one who said it was romantic in here.”

“I take it back.”

“You’re such a baby,” you smirk, turning the blue faucet handle hard until the water blasts out, freezing cold. “C’mon. We’ll scream together.”

He watches, dumbfounded, then lets out a breathy chuckle that he tries to hide. But he doesn't protest, swinging the door open and making his way to nip downstairs. To the freezer.

And somehow—somehow—the night ends with both of you screaming out your frustration into the echoey walls of his bathroom as ice water pours over your heads, both shivering and alive and messy and laughing at god knows what, because for once… you’re not alone in the weird, horrible way your brain works. You swear at some point you tried to see how many ice cubes you could stack on Rodrick's usually-hidden forehead like a deck of cards.

Soaked through and shaking, your skirt on this time, tights tossed across the room like shed skin. Because skin was a running theme apparently, cutting off layers of shame in the same way you both cut layers of skin.

Eventually, you both down as you sit opposite each other in the tub. Dripping. Shivering. You’re in your bra and skirt, which is plastered to your thighs and basically translucent now. Rodrick’s shirt is half off his shoulder, hair dripping into his eyes, lips slightly blue. You’re pretty sure this is how people catch pneumonia.

And then—then—it hits you.

You slap the side of the tub. “Shit!”

Rodrick flinches, wide-eyed. “What?!”

“The maths notes.”

“What maths notes?”

“The reason I came here, dumbass!” You throw your hands up, looking around like the notes might still be floating somewhere in the air. “I was supposed to give you the equations for Thursday’s test! You think Mr. Beaumont’s gonna believe this as an excuse?!”

Rodrick blinks, then breaks into a cackle. “Oh my god. You still care about school right now?”

You glare. “Yes? Some of us have reputations to uphold?”

“You just showed me your scars and helped me bandage my arms, then dragged me into a cold bath in your bra,” he wheezes. “I think ‘reputation’ left the building twenty minutes ago.”

You slap your wet hand over your face. “I’m going to die.”

“You’re already in my bathroom. Half naked. In my tub. You’re basically already in hell.”

You throw one of the thicker ice cubes that didn't melt yet straight at him, and he yelps as it knocks him square between the eyes.

The two of you stare at each other for a second—then start laughing again. Breathless. Tired. Shaky. But real.

And when you two finally get out? The bathroom is quiet now—just the dripping of water from your clothes and the sharp sound of your own breathing filling the space. Cold tiles against bare feet. Clothes stuck to wet skin. Neither of you speak, not really knowing how to shift from whatever the fuck that just was into something resembling normalcy.

You keep your eyes glued to the wall tiles as you change, tracing the cracks in the grout like they matter, like they’re not just old and chipped but deliberate. You can hear him moving behind you—zipper, shuffle, that little groan he makes under his breath like putting on clothes is somehow a personal attack.

“I should ask when your parents are getting home,” you mutter, voice flat but testing the waters.

There's a pause. One that lasts too long.

Rodrick snorts. “Why? So you can rat me out like the perfect little fucking narc you are?”

You roll your eyes, still not turning around. “Jesus, I didn’t mean it like that. I just don’t wanna get caught soaked and half-naked in your bathroom, dumbass.”

He doesn’t laugh. Not really. Just lets out this low, bitter chuckle like it scraped its way out of his chest.

You pull your skirt over your thighs, still damp and clinging. It’s awkward, weird, way too intimate for two people who still hate each other.

“I mean... they won’t be back till late.” He sounds far away. “Probably.” Then quieter: “Hopefully.”

Something about the way he says it makes you freeze. You turn your head slightly, eyes catching his reflection in the mirror. He’s tugging his shirt over his head, jaw clenched, eyes low. That same tension from earlier. Like he’s bracing for something.

You chew the inside of your cheek. “They hit you?”

The silence that answers you is enough. Not a yes. Not a no. Just silence.

“Sorry,” you say quickly, the word tumbling out before you can stop it.

“For what?”

“For... I dunno. Asking. Assuming. Existing.”

He huffs, then finally turns to look at you. His hair’s still wet, dripping onto the stained collar of his shirt, and his eyeliner’s smudged—not like he meant to wear it, but like it’s just always kind of there, from two days ago or something. He probably doesn't have his own eyeliner, much less make-up remover.

“My dad thinks hitting me builds character,” he says finally. “Greg just—Greg doesn’t care. He’s got his own shit. And Mom... Mom just makes casseroles like every white American mom ever and tells us to stop yelling. Classic fucking sitcom family.”

You swallow. The air in the bathroom feels thick. You sit back down on the edge of the tub, wet and miserable and weirdly heartbroken.

He leans against the door, arms crossed. “What about you? Gotta be exhausting. Must suck when people find out you’re actually... kinda fucked up too.”

You glance up at him. “It’s not a competition.”

“No, but I’m winning,” he smirks, and for a second you wanna throw the empty antiseptic bottle at his face.

But instead, you laugh. Just a little. Just enough for your chest to shake and your throat to loosen.

Rodrick looks at you like he doesn’t understand why he likes that sound so much.

You both sit there for a second—just two messed up kids with blood on their hands, wet socks, and secrets sticking to their ribs.

“Okay,” you say, standing up. “We need to get out of this house before I start trauma bonding and make out with you or something.”

He blinks, surprised. “You wish.”

You grab the math notes still crumpled outside the bathroom. “No, you wish, you loser. I’m still delivering these. Like the good little girl I am.”

Rodrick watches you leave, eyes on your back, your calves, the little limp from your cold feet in wet shoes.

He doesn’t say it—but he’s already thinking about the next time he’ll see you, even if he knows it's going to go back to seeing your dolly-curly hair bobbing in the corridors from afar... and nothing else. But at least he’s not dreading that fact anymore.

click for part 1 click for part 2 click for part 3 click for part 4 click for part 5 click for part 6 click for part 7 click for part 8 click for part 9 click for part 10 click for part 11 click for part 12

♡ Please do not modify, steal, plagarise or post on other platforms without asking. Thank you! Please do leave requests!

[internetladyfables]

[Headcanons] Nikolai Gogol/Mykola Hohol: in a Romantic Relationship

cw: self-indulgent, possible OOC, fluff, female reader.

Requested by anon.

Simultaneously craves closeness and connections, and is afraid of emotional dependence and being shackled down by it. He constantly fights the urge to genuinely care for you because it contradicts with his ideas of total freedom. He teases you, then distances himself, and then comes back with dramatic displays of affection as if he hasn’t seen you for eternity.

Because of that your relationship with him is not ‘conventional’. He says he doesn’t care about attachment, yet he sticks around you a lot. Though, he twists the situation in such a way that it seems like you are the one who misses him that much and can’t live without him. “Ah, I know I’m that irresistible so that you can’t even live freely without my presence~”

Loves to call you various nicknames that can change daily: from simple ‘darling’, ‘sweetheart’ and ‘little dove’ to something chaotic like ‘lovely paradox’ (because to him you are), ‘my beautiful curse’ (a reminder that loving you is both a gift and a torment) and ‘fluffy menace’.

Is a gentleman… but in his own way, like he’s playing a role on a stage: he’ll bow dramatically, kiss your hand while spinning you in a circle, and say something like: “Allow me, my dearest, to escort you into the abyss of love~”

He may open doors for you with an exaggerated bow, kiss your hand while calling you ‘my liege’ or ‘my queen,’ offer his coat when you’re cold, or insist on walking on the outer side of the sidewalk — but expect these to come with dramatic comments like “Fear not, my dear, I shall shield you from the horrors of the dangerous side of the street!”

Teasing is his love language. He pushes buttons, plays mind games, and gives you odd little "tests" just to see how you'll react. But he's very attentive and remembers everything, even the things you thing he doesn’t notice. “You’re the most interesting thing I’ve ever wanted to keep in a cage — metaphorically, of course… unless?” No matter what your reaction will be (a side glance or non-harmful punch), he’ll only laugh loudly at your reaction.

Loves to drape himself over you, hang off your shoulders, tug on your sleeves, play with your hair — it’s his way of saying “I want to be near you.”

Though, he rarely asks for affection directly, but initiates strange games that result in closeness: “Oh no, it seems we’re stuck in this closet for now, I guess we have to hug.”

His ability is versatile — expect spontaneity with it at every turn — he’ll teleport in out of nowhere, hang upside-down to say “hello” or appear suddenly behind just to say something flirtatiously ominous: “You looked bored without me”, pull out little gifts for you, or use it to keep you safe without you knowing it. He won’t tell you he pulled you out of danger last second — he’ll just wink and say: “Lucky you to have someone who looks after you~”

Has his rare vulnerable moments where he lays his head on your lap and looks at you with something resembling awe, like, “How are you real in this horrible world?” — basically him saying ‘I love you” that way.

Despite his fear of any attachments, he remains committed to the relationship with you and his loyalty is unwavering — even if he doesn’t say it out loud, you can really say that Kolya really cares about you, but in his own odd way.

Speaking about his name. No one calls him Kolya, not anymore… only you. It feels intimate, familiar, dangerous and warm. And he hates how it makes his heart stutter. “So, you’re trying to domesticate the storm, hmm? Kolya is your pet name for me now?” Surely, you may try to call him pet names, but the shortening of his name hits differently.

[steviewashere]

The Belt Prong

Rating: Teen and Up CW: Past Suicidal Thoughts/Ideation, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Depression (Vague Though) Tags: Post-Canon, Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Slight Steve Harrington Character Study, Heavy Metaphors, Established Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson, Protective Steve Harrington, Protective Eddie Munson, Self-Sacrificing Steve Harrington, Vaguely Depressed Steve Harrington, Steve Harrington Has Self Esteem Issues, Steve Harrington Has Bad Parents, Steve Realizes He Matters, Eddie Munson is a Sweetheart, Good Person Steve Harrington, Everybody Loves Steve Harrington, Steve Harrington Needs a Hug (And Gets One), Eddie Munson Comforts Steve Harrington, Happy Ending I honestly don't know where this came from. But it felt important, so I wrote it.

🫂—————🫂 There’s a piece of Steve’s belt buckle that’s missing.

It broke off when he went to thread it through one of the holes, after he had cinched the leather tight. He had struggled for a couple minutes already to get that little piece through. And it frustrated him, sure. Frustrated him beyond belief that the one thing he needed was now missing. That it fell into the carpet, that it could’ve slid underneath his bed, that it could’ve slipped away from him to somewhere it’ll never return from.

Yet, somewhere in his frustration, the emotion morphed. Went away from the ire and the red and the burning. Turning southward, mouth set, marveling. It took just the one piece to fling away from him—and now he’s really noticing the way that he can’t get his pants to stay on. They keep slipping down his hips, revealing a little slip of his underwear, he has to keep tugging on the belt loops, and the belt won’t close. Just one thing. One thing and now everything’s amuck.

He doesn’t have a shirt on quite yet. Still standing in front of his bedroom mirror. Face pointed towards his hips, to his groin, to the waistband of his jeans. That leather belt gaping open and loose in its confines. Never to close again.

There are pink swatches of skin in the corners of his vision. And so he looks, eyes drawn to them already. Big, previously puckered, softened scarring. Shiny and pink and healed. He steps so that he can view his profile, noting the marring on his back; on the b-sides of his biceps. White lines on his knuckles, in his hairline, at the edge of his bottom lip. If he were to tug his pants down in this moment, there’d be more scarring there, too. Not from the Upside Down, but something just as heavy and drastic and dangerous. From a time before; lonely and young and confused; lonely and young and craving; lonely and young and…tired.

His fingers absentmindedly trace the outlines of the swatches on his stomach. Where it tickles. And it doesn’t hurt. Where nothing hurts and life is finally just…just.

At one point, he had considered.

Considered death, to put it bluntly. All the harm. All the overpasses and bridges and cliff edges. Thought of car crashes or drownings or his house burning down—the accidental ones. Of getting knocked a little too loose. Jumping into a line of action too overzealously. And he’s done that last one, knows he has; screaming at armed guards, nail bat twirling in hand, molotov cocktails, and strangulation.

A thousand possibilities, yet he’s never considered the thought of making it out alive.

With scars to show survival.

The hickeys on his neck to show the warmth he had been chasing.

And his eyes no longer wet or dim or petrified. Just two hazel eyes set in a face, awe in the irises, love in the pupils. Ones that dilate on their own accord, not from injuries. Eyes that see the world through eyeglass lenses, eyes that see the setting sun and the blue of dawn, eyes that see a handsome face laying next to him in bed; eyes that mourn, eyes that laugh, eyes that love.

He looks over his shoulder in the mirror to see Eddie in the doorway. To see him leaning into the doorjamb, arms crossed lax over his chest, a calm giddiness that’s resided and rooted.

“You know I love to look at you, baby, but we gotta get going. Don’t wanna miss that movie—though you gotta wear a shirt to get in,” Eddie lightly teases.

Steve’s fingers tense and flatten over the left bite mark scar. There are matching ones on Eddie’s torso. A million little ones littered all over him, ones that Steve applied pressure to and tourniquet with this same belt—a belt that won’t do that again because it’s missing that one little piece. He blows out a wet breath, something that could’ve been a chuckle if he weren’t so outside and so inside his own head—a simultaneous.

“Um,” he hums, voice all raspy and snotty. “I—I can’t close my belt.”

Eddie snorts, unbeknownst to what’s happening. “Don’t you have another one ‘round here?”

He shakes his head. “No,” Steve murmurs, “just the one.” His fingers now graze the cold, gold buckle. A buckle without a tongue, no way to speak, no way to chew. “Tried to close it and broke that little thin piece off. Guess I threaded it too hard?”

“Huh,” Eddie mutters, “could just do sweatpants. Or basketball shorts or…Or a”—his voice trails off. Mouth closing with a soft click. His eyes are bouncing, now, around Steve’s face in the mirror. “What’s wrong,” he asks, “is that a special belt or something?”

Something, he repeats inwardly. Something indeed.

“No…no I just—One small piece broke off and now the belt’s never going to close again,” he chokes out. Steve clears his throat, shuffles side to side, eyes darting over his scars. Dropping down to his thigh, too.

There were a lot of times where he felt he wasn’t needed. Wasn’t even wanted.

Times that he could get the hell out of dodge any moment and nobody would realize the absence he left. He’d be able to disappear without a trace, no friends to his left, no words to his name, no prospects for his future. At any point, he could’ve jumped into the driver’s side of his car.

Could’ve ran away from home—all the times when his parents were disappointed in him, where he embarrassed himself, those days and nights when standing up to his dad was the worst decision he could make; when he just made his parents’ life much, much worse. Could’ve stayed back with Tommy and Carol, never apologizing to anybody, saving face to protect a name. Could’ve drove into the sun and left Nancy and Jonathan to defend themselves against that demogorgon. Let Nancy drink herself to near death. Told Dustin ‘no.’ Kept those kids under Joyce and Hopper and Nancy’s watchful eyes. Turned Robin away. Never went after Eddie.

And yet…

Yet most of them are there because of his actions alone.

Had he not held that baseball bat, would Nancy and Jonathan have faced death? If he didn’t go with Dustin, would that twerp be left in his own mess, also possibly dead? And what about Lucas against Billy? The kids against the demodogs? He and Robin would’ve never become best friends; Robin would’ve never talked about her secret, never would’ve had a wingman, wouldn’t be dating Vickie right now. Eddie…Eddie wouldn’t even be looking at him.

Would’ve never resuscitated Eddie’s heart. Would’ve never helped apply pressure to his wounds. Or carry him out. Carry him to the hospital. Make a scene so he was taken care of. Got him cleared.

Would’ve never loved him.

And he wouldn’t be loved in return. Not the way he is. Deeply and unheard of.

Maybe his sacrifices were a lot stupid most of the time. Maybe they did initially come from a deep-seated want to just get away. Maybe he wasn’t just being protective, but also rather suicidal—though he doesn’t like to think like that, even if it’s the truth.

In the end, he did it anyway. And most of these people he’s met, they’re still in his life. Thanks in part to him, right? What would it have been otherwise? How much blood would’ve been spilled?

“Steve?”

Eddie’s beside him now. Hand on his right shoulder. Turning him away from the mirror so his concerned eyes can meet Steve’s crying ones. His thumb is pressing into the edge of Steve’s collarbone. And his eyebrows are furrowed. And his frown is lopsided from the scarring on his jaw. But he’s beautiful and he’s alive…god, he’s alive.

“I’m the piece,” Steve gets out, “the piece…the…that’s me.”

“I don’t—Sweetheart, I don’t think I under”—

“If I didn’t—If you”—he hiccups and gasps and sobs something on the edge of his next exhale. Steve brings both his hands up to Eddie’s face, cupping his cheeks gently, nails tracing where a dimple would indent, the silver edges of that scar. His jeans are slowly cascading down his legs, falling away too loose because his fucking belt is broken. “Had I not been there, you would’ve…would’ve died,” he breathes. He chuckles—a sound born from bewilderment. His fingers tighten, squishing Eddie’s very malleable, very warm, very in tact skin. “I was there. I was there to help save you.”

Concern and confusion is what Eddie shines with. It makes Steve laugh a little harder. At least it isn’t blankness. At least those eyes aren’t far away. “You were,” he says slowly, “what’s…where are you going with this?”

Steve bites his bottom lip and inhales, chest burbling and rasping, throat stinging and aching, eyebrows cinched. “I’ve been here from the beginning of that bullshit,” he rambles, “and…and because I was there, people didn’t die. Most people didn’t die. It wasn’t just me, I know that, but in part because of me. Had I just run away…had I gave up…had I—If I died! Imagine if I died? Where the hell would Dustin have gone? Who would be Robin’s best friend?

“Fuck…fuck. You’d be dead! I had to be there! What the fuck…I had to be there!” He pats his palms down Eddie’s face, down the sides of his neck. A pulse red hot and thrumming kisses his skin. A pulse he kept. A pulse he dreams about. “Just me. Just…just little me in the thick, bigness of it all. To think…to think.”

Eddie’s still confused. “To think?”

“To think that I actually matter,” Steve says in awe. “To think that I thought that I never mattered. That I was never needed. But now…now my belt won’t close because I lost one piece of it. Just one piece! Isn’t that fucking crazy?”

Eyebrows jump comically into Eddie’s hairline. His eyes are sweeping back and forth and back and forth. There’s horror there. Apprehension. Fear. Concern. “Of course you matter,” he softly exclaims, “Steve, you matter a whole fucking lot!”

“I know!” He responds at the same volume. Takes a deep breath, swipes his thumbs over Eddie’s pulse points. Exhales, “I know.” Steve sniffles back the last of his tears, the last of the snot burbled deep within him. “Jesus, I matter. I’m needed? What the hell.”

“Baby,” Eddie whispers, “you are always needed. No matter what.”

He swallows, eyes bouncing up from where they’ve drifted to Eddie’s collarbone. To his eyes. Those still concerned eyes. “Even if I’m an asshole sometimes?”

“Mhm.”

“When I…I feel like I can’t get out of bed?”

“Yup.”

He swallows again, this time around a lot of somethings, a lot of realizations too cosmically big for a mundane Wednesday afternoon. “Even as I am?”

“As you are,” Eddie breathes, “all of you. No matter what.” His hands land on Steve’s forearms, heavy and sure and squeezing. Comforting and warm. “You matter to a lot of people. And you are needed. And you are wanted. I want you, you understand that? People want you around, even when they don’t need a single damn thing from you.

“Even if you don’t function the way you normally do. Even if you can’t contain yourself. Even if you…you feel like you aren’t you. You will always matter. 

“We want you, Steve.

“We love you, Steve. We love you a lot.”

He proceeds that with silence. And gentle bewilderment. Fresh, crackling awe.

There is a pulse under his hands. And there is warmth in a body. There are pants ready to puddle to the floor. Here he is, here Eddie is—here the whole world is. And even if he’s one of billions, he still aided, he still put himself where he felt he could be. Where he ended up needed. Where he is now wanted.

Who would’a thought? Who would’a thought…

Steve presses himself closer into Eddie’s space. Hands gliding around his torso. Squeezing himself in tight, encompassing Eddie in all his warmth, and being embraced right back. He nestles his head on Eddie’s left shoulder, pulse loud in his ear. Tears beading in the corners of his eyes, to which he closes them. And he sinks into it.

To think it was a prong.

Just a silly little prong.

He’s finally got what he wants: a simple life—a boring, mundane life—with love, with care; to matter.

🫂—————🫂

[luveline]

Would you be willing to write a little blurb of Steve comforting reader who is in recovery from self harm? I know this is a very no no subject for some writers so I understand if this is a no!

fem!reader !! cw self harm (mention of the self injury, no active graphic imagery, but some details that could be evocative)

You’ve taken to curling up in whatever space he leaves. In bed, you sidle close to his side with your ear to his stomach. On the couch, you’re laying on his lap, every breath a press of ribs against his thighs. If Steve’s on a sun lounger in the backyard, you’re sitting on the ground next to him with an arm hooked over his leg and your cheek bitten by metal. ��

It’s sort of odd to see your arms without red cuts and welts. Curled again, you and Steve are sitting on the porch watching the sun dropping lazily to the horizon, the sky a funny shade of blue. You’re actually turned away from the sun and toward the house, Steve to the sun, like inverted commas interlinked. Your hand is on his leg, and your arm is bare and starkly uninjured. 

That’s too generous, maybe. Evidence of a bad habit long to kick tracks the length of you, white and purple and red scars criss-crossed through your skin. 

He’s seen them thick with dried blood and sore to the touch. Your skin aflame. Not because you’ve ever showed him of your own volition, you wouldn’t. You’ve always likened your self-injury to a contagion. “I don’t wanna put thoughts in your head,” you whispered. 

It was a nice concern for you to have, but Steve isn’t at any risk of hurting himself (purposefully, at least). He has no urges. He didn’t even know people did stuff like that until he met you. Maybe that’s why it breaks his heart so much. You hurt so much. You feel terrible and you take it out on yourself and Steve just doesn’t get it, ‘cos you’re aces. 

He never shied away from it, even if he didn’t like that you were doing it. He still remembers the first time he realised what you were doing, his confusion, the immediate internal recoil. How could you do that to yourself? Why would you? You’ve always been prone to that awful persisting sadness under the skin, but Steve knows a lot of sad people. He knows what it’s like to wish vehemently that you were a better version of yourself, or somebody else, or just gone. 

But you’re doing better now. He resists the urge to kiss your hands whenever he sees you and you act like you aren’t doing a brave thing. 

Steve’s stupid but he’s not stupid. (Or, at least he feels that way.) He knows you’re finding it hard to stop, like an addict. It’s a habit. A behaviour that takes conscious effort to break until it doesn’t. The worst bit is that you never even asked for help. 

Your hand twitches on his leg. 

Steve curls a hand behind your neck, kissing you softly, the silky press of your lips to his. You inhale and cut the quiet buzz of cicadas, your breath surprised but not tight. 

“Sorry,” he says, “was that okay? I was just thinking about you.” 

“It’s fine.” You laugh against his lips and take a kiss, evening the score. “It’s always okay. Kiss me whenever you want.” 

“You looked mopey,” he says. Foot in mouth disease forever. 

“I’m not mopey, just distracted.” 

“I know, it’s offensive. You come over here to hang out and spend the last hour in deep thought.” He makes it clear he’s joking through his light tone and his smile, your eyes met, his hand sliding down your shoulder and your arm. He’s especially careful as his fingers run down your forearm. You watch the path of his hand as it falls, twining your fingers weakly with his. “You can tell me anything.” 

“I do tell you anything.” 

“Well, just telling you again.” He kisses your cheek, then, less gentle, your lips. 

You have this aversion to saying the worst part out loud. There’s always a metaphor or an omission. You can’t say cut, it’s too much, but you’ve said hurt. You’ll admit to self injury but not the action. “It’s fine,” you say now. 

“I think you’re doing a good job.” 

You laugh softly through your nose. “Thank you.” 

“I’m not kidding.” He blows a breath up his face. “Look, can I just be honest with you?” 

Your smile turns uneasy at his bluntness. “Um. Are you breaking up with me?” 

Steve shakes his head. “Never,” he says, pushing your sleeve up your arm slowly, and then faster when you don’t resist. “I can’t remember the last time I saw you without them.” He doesn’t say cuts either, mostly for your sake. 

“Sorry.” 

He shakes his head again. “For what? I’m just saying. You’ve had them this whole time and I’ve never– they’ve never stopped me from wanting to kiss your face off.” He probably shouldn’t make jokes. He backtracks. “I mean, they don’t make a difference to me, I like you even if you can’t, uh… Even if the impulse is too much. But I’m thrilled you’re, you know, not doing it.” 

“I know,” you murmur. 

“I love you.” 

“I know.” Your voice is nearly inaudible, “That’s why it’s easier now.” 

His heart swells with pride and love and an unfightable want to hug you. He slides his arms around you from under your armpits, forcing you to hug his neck, stealing a kiss to the cheek as he squeezes you forward. “I just want you to know that I get it. Like, how hard you’re working to not do it.”

“Steve,” you admonish quietly. 

“Sorry, I’ll stop talking about it if you want.” 

“I mean… It's kinda nice to talk about it. It’s not in my head.” 

“It’s not in your head.” 

“But it feels weird ‘cos it’s like, something I should be doing anyways. It’s like getting praise for washing your hands.” 

Steve thinks there’s a pretty big difference between wanting to hurt yourself but resisting it and washing your hands, but he knows what you’re saying. Doesn’t agree, but doesn’t want to invalidate you either. However you need to think about it to get through it is up to you. “I can praise you for washing your hands. I want to.” 

Steve encourages you to turn into the sunshine. You lay your cheek against his shoulder. “Love you,” you say, your hand on his leg. 

He stares right at the sun and blinks hurriedly. “I love you too.” 

[guess-that-ship]

S14 Round 1

Dueling Inferiority Complexes

[This description was modified to remove author commentary and potentially identifying information.]

Character A is an accidental hero with the fate of all humanity riding on her shoulders. She lacks the talent expected of someone in her position, and is keenly aware of all of her failings and the fact that other people could do better, but circumstances left her the only one capable of taking on this role.

Character B was supposed to have the role that A currently has. He's of fairly low standing within his society, and this was going to be his chance to make a name for himself, but now all he can do is watch while some incompetent nobody screw it all up.

When A and B first met, they were enemies, and B verbally tore into A for all her failings and for taking the role that was meant to be his. Since then they've worked alongside each other more often than not, and B even ended up back on A's side permanently. He's teaching her some of the skills she lacks, and she's coaxing him out of his grumpy shell so she can properly befriend him.

2nd and 3rd

cw: discussions of self-harming tendencies, implied suicide

2nd and 3rd met during a very dark time in 3rd's life. In fact, it was 2nd reaching out--both literally and metaphorically, by being her friend--that saved 3rd's life, something that 3rd has never forgotten. Because of this, the two of them are extremely close, and 3rd can even get a bit obsessive over 2nd at times. She learned how to cook just because 2nd can't cook but loves to eat (3rd's cooking is now her favorite, of course), and 2nd's safety is her top priority. This has actually caused conflict between the two of them, particularly when 2nd's survivor's guilt-driven martyr complex was at its worst, as 2nd was destroying herself in an effort to save everyone and 3rd was doing everything in her power to stop her. Still, even when that drove the two of them apart for a while, they placed the utmost trust in each other and longed for the day they could be reunited.

[cryptidhoard]

CW : mentions of suicide and self-harm (in a positive, recovery-focused way); interact at your own accord.

--- Self-Harm & Suicide / Suicidal Recovery Pride

Two simple flags for anyone who is in recovery or has recovered from self-harm of any kind, and suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt/s, etc. respectively. It is also inclusive of those who are still struggling with either of these issues, either constantly, on and off, or even rarely or in specific circumstances. Any experiences are welcome with empathy and compassion. It is not neurodivergent-exclusive either.

They are meant to represent resilience, hope, and the strength that comes with living with these mental health related issues, and are meant to be used to highlight one's journey either of recovery or one's pride in one's motivation, determination or even spite to keep on going and living through such experiences, continuing despite the odds.

They are NOT meant to be used to romanticize, weaponize nor trivialize the topics at hand and it is not meant for those who """want""" to experience this. Please be respectful /srs.

Aside from that, anyone can interact with this post, and this flags are allowed to be archived with credit, as long as they are not manipulated in any way and neither are my words in this post. Thank you kindly. I'm proud of all of you for being here <3

tagging @radiomogai for archival-purposes. feel free to ignore ! /g

Color meanings, inspiration and icon's credits under the cut :

SH flag :

The oranges are taken from the SH awareness ribbon, which is usually colored orange. The reds going from darker to light represent the emotional release of SH but it also represents healing from it as a whole, physically and mentally. The white and yellow is meant to symbolize hope and a metaphorical light that moves one forward, whether it's on the outside (outer stripes) or on the inside (middle stripe). The butterflies were added since it is a common symbol of SH recovery and awareness, and they're used in a very known method of harm-reduction.

Sui flag :

The teal and violet are the most commonly associated colors for suicide awareness as a whole and its associated month. A ribbon with both colors was the most common suicide-related symbol I could find, so I decided to use them for the flag. The semicolon represents a sentences that could have ended but continued, and it's this poetic symbolism that made it become the most well-known straightforward sign of a suicide attempt recovery. It is a common tattoo on those who have gone through something as such, and I myself have one, so it means a lot to me.

Both icons are from Flaticon here and here.

[crayonverse]

details bout michael n eins dynamic. 2 me (cw physical/emotional abuse, cannibalism, suicide/suicidal idealizations, ableism, self-harm)

michael only refers to himself as eins father when he wants ein to do something, any other time hes just michael .

lets ein not refer to him as sir to make him feel more "special" .

after eins mom broke up w zack she sorta got a bit. out of it. she started neglecting ein and she became depressed. The First Step in ein distrusting others bc his mother stopped paying attention 2 him. michael used a small amount of his magic to control her and make her drown herself in the kitchen sink and then kidnapped ein, making it look like she had killed herself and ein had ran away. .

just as a small thing of me hcing ein as a transguy, michael named him ein bc the meaning of "ian" (which is what his name is just spelled weird) is "God is Gracious" as a constant reminder that michael "saved" ein. .

ein wasnt tested on w forever potions (in the early stages w the other kids) because michael absolutely could not let Zack know he had his other stupid kid. when ein found out about the testing he was extremely upset bc he wasnt "special enough" for it. picture ein 6 years old begging for medical malpractice to be used on him .

he was tested later but as a teen when michael got out, since he didnt have access to the other children. although he wasn't able to use the full potions since he didnt have access to emeralds at the moment, so he used diluted versions of the potions that weren't as powerful via syringes. ein gets a fear needles from it .

when michael n the other two idiots were locked in the pocket dimension ein went through a brief depressive period bc the One Guy he (thought) cared about him disappeared. when michael did get out he didnt tell ein immediately bc he . doesnt like ein but when he found out ein got arrested he told ein that he should stay in jail for a few months to "learn his lesson" .

slightly unrelated but when michael wanted him out of jail he also wanted ein to disappear off the radar so he faked eins death in jail. originally he wanted ein to die in like a riot but ein, sensing an opportunity, asked for it to say he killed himself instead. the opportunity being aphmau half way into her uni course looking up her old high school bullies to see what theyre up to and just finding out ein is Fucking Dead .

the potions michael uses on ein are mainly magic power related (like eins Green Laser) because he likes manipulating ein into doing things rather than using his magic because its "more fun" .

michael subconsciously views ein as his actual son (mcd travis) bc he feels like "this one is a better son" or whatever .

not a specific thing but mother knows best reprise from tangled is a Viewpoint on their dynamic 2 me .

ein is internally scared of michael but he never verbally says that and if anyone asks him if he is he denies it immediately bc he doesnt want pity. you can see it in his eyes though. elizabeth is really the only other person who mentions it but she mostly uses it to make fun of ein because she "doesnt think its that bad" (<- she is unaware) .

bc of michael ein absolutely hates unwarranted physical touch. he reacts violently if anyone grasps his shoulder from behind or touches his upper arms. the only touch he usually allows is people lightly touching his hair/head bc he still registers it as headpats (grabbing his hair usually results in him biting) .

michael usually physically threatens or abuses ein to reprimand him but sometimes he throws ein into the Metaphorical Torture Box for entertainment .

basically most of the things michael does to ein is for his own amusement .

he also heavily dehumanizes ein to convince him to do evil acts, rationalizing it to him as "you arent a person so is it really that bad??" ein does not view himself as an actual person at this point more so as a nameless soldier, a weapon, etc .

i used this for an old fic n stuff too but also michael makes ein commit cannibalism to forcibly dehumanize him more. he wants to make ein feel entirely disconnected from humanity (like michael feels for himself) so ein will basically be a "mini michael" .

ein also consciously copies michaels mannerisms/speech. only really elizabeth n zack notice it however and it just fucking freaks zack the hell out (elizabeth is also freaked out by it but mostly ignores it) .

theres just a general theme of a loss of control for ein in general. he gets a small allowance from michael and hes not allowed out overnight, all his communication is usually internally with the researchers or guardian forces. most of the time ein self isolates from them, viewing them as beneath him and michael. when they try to talk to him its a 50/50 whether he'll tell them to fuck off or he'll hiss at them .

another specific detail is pre s4 ein fucked up a potion and instead of his usual reprimand, michael used pliers to defang ein. in his head its the one thing ein can't rationalize about michaels actions (the one "seed of doubt" he has). he usually makes excuses for michael's actions towards him but being defanged is the only one he struggles with since he knows that michael knows how important his wolf side is to him .

pre s5 and just like at the end of s5 (when ein was seen on the bridge) he was going through another depressive episode bc he missed his ears and tail. he was mainly just going through the motions of his daily life but he was barely holding on. michael repeatedly discouraged ein from committing because the plan would be messed up because of it (michael said that directly to him) and he would imply that ein would be a traitor if he went through with it. .

michael actually flipped between discouraging and encouraging ein to commit to see what he would do. .

he's caught ein self-harming before, w ein attempting to either drown or smother himself. michael doesnt like doing this regularly but most of the time he lets ein hug him so he feels "comforted". other times michael just scolds him and tells him to not do it again. .

i also hc ein as a low empathy autistic (bc # me) and he used to stim very openly and loudly but michael disliked that part of him so he "trained" ein to not stim in public which just results in him being constantly overstimulated, a contributor to Ein being fucking mad all the time. hes like a hair trigger away from a meltdown at all times .

the only method of stimming ein can usually get away w is when he scratches his arms/scabs. unfortunately he doesn't trim his claws and it usually results in ein making himself bleed or reopening scars. michael has attempted to get him to stop doing this but its pretty much a compulsion for ein at this point.

[stchisaki]

hihii!! could you write bluebell for setsuno? <33

cw: Yandere, Delusional Behaviors / Thoughts, Gore, Organs, Allusions to Kidnapping, Brief Mention of Past Cheating, Brief Allusion to Religion, Suicide / Accidental Suicide, Quirk Used in a Metaphorical Sense (Not Accurate), Unhealthy Relationships, General Dark Content Not Suitable for Immature Audiences, Gender-Neutral Reader. Reader discretion is advised. 18+ Only!

author's note: Sorry this took so long! I've just been so swamped with work that I haven't had a chance to get around to it, especially with Kinktober here. Hopefully you like this! It was very fun to write. This was a prompt from "Yandere Prompts Flower Language" and can be found here . REQUESTS ARE OPEN—check pinned post. I do not condone unhealthy behavior in any sense! This is strictly fiction! Do not force yourself to read if you're uncomfortable.

PROMPT: Bluebell (Humility, Gratitude): "I'll be your humble servant, if only you'd let me."

word count: Approximately 2k words.

Touya doesn’t understand.

It’s not quite computing in his brain, or perhaps he doesn’t want it to.

You were the perfect person for him—truly. You were there after his fall, you’d been the one to extend a loving and tender hand to him after he’d been saved by Master Overhaul. Trash to everyone but honored by Master Overhaul, then cherished by you. There’s no way that anything else could be possible.

He’d frozen his heart, turned it to sheer stone and ice. Touya didn’t ever want to fall in love again. He couldn’t risk it. If he did, he’d find himself perched on a balcony ready to jump again, only to be ensnared by the hands of a faux hero that only wanted to save his sorry self for the glory. He was just a story to everyone. He was just a bad case of the flu, just something that was important to draw attention to before he disappeared within the millions of cases flocking across the world. Touya knew it all was a lie, knew that he could still see that cheating bitch’s face in his mind.

She was pretty at one point, but it melded into clay and maggots the longer he thought about it, but those disgusting things melted away after a while until you were all Touya could think about.

If Master Overhaul had been his second chance at life, then you were his protestant calling. You were brought here for a reason that you don’t like to tell Touya, but he doesn’t mind if you never want to say it because he already knows the truth: Master Overhaul knew he’d one day need a beautiful lover like you, that he needed another person to offer him what he’d lost, what he’d deserve.

So why—why are you standing before him, a terrified expression plastered across those gorgeous apples of your face?

“P-Please stop. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Touya takes a step forward, but you quickly shuffle backwards. Why are you doing that? Stop it. Touya’s just trying to get closer so he can pull you into an embrace, can squeeze the small of your back to reassure you that he doesn’t mean any harm.

“Yes, you do. I’ve noticed it a lot recently. You’re growing distant from me, and I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. Did I recently do something to upset you, sweetie?”

You blink rapidly, a dashing line dotting down your face until it reaches your suddenly agape mouth. There’s something unfamiliar flashing across your eyes, something that Touya’s never seen before. Or maybe he has. Is this what he saw looking in the mirror right before he tried to kill himself? Are you reflecting what he felt just so that he doesn’t have to feel isolated right now? Oh, surely you must. You’re so kind, and perfect, and dear, and just a little peach that he could rest in the palms of his hands and take a swift bite out of.

“I genuinely don’t understand what you’re saying. You haven’t done anything wrong, but I… I don’t think we’re on the same page. I don’t remember ever being close to you.”

Twitching. Are his eyes twitching? They can’t be. He could never be annoyed with you. No, of course not. He’s just annoyed at this set of circumstances. You’re trying to play it cool so that you don’t upset him. It’s because you’re just oh-so considerate of him. It makes Touya’s chest ache, makes him feel so special, so important, so remembered.

“I must have. You don’t have to lie to me. I won’t get angry. What kind of boyfriend would I be if I got angry at you for being upset?”

Touya doesn’t understand what’s staring back at him. Why are you suddenly looking at him in terror? Why is your bottom lip trembling? Why have you started wringing your hands and slowly backing away from him? Why do you look like you’re on the verge of tears? Why? Why why why why why why whyre why heyw ehwy whey wywhy e

“Please. Um, leave me alone. I don’t. I didn’t even want to be here in the first place. I was k—kidnapped, um. Master Overhaul didn’t tell me I was here to… He… He just said I had to take care of… I don’t know you.”

Squeaking engines scratch like records in the back of his mind, Touya’s teeth clench, his fists ball, and he breathes out gently and heavily. The air whistles between his teeth whenever he cinches his eyes shut and tilts his head away.

“Baby. I… You’re hurting me. You don’t want to leave me, do you? And after all of the tender moments we’ve shared… after every time I saw that stunning smile spread across your face whenever you looked at me? All of your coy glances… your shy attempts to remain casual. I know that you wanted to take our relationship slow, that’s why you never hold my hand or kiss me, right?”

A genuine sob bursts forth from your throat, something hearty and something monstrous, and Touya’s eyes snap open again to see you fumbling away, crying fat crocodile tears and stuttering like you didn’t know what to say to him.

“I—I’m going to tell Master Overhaul that you’re—you’re keeping me from doing what he asked. I’ll tell him you’re harassing me.”

Why would you need to lie like that!? WHY would you need to tell Master Overhaul something like THAT!? DON’T YOU LOVE HIM!?

Touya starts to awkwardly chuckle, swaying, dizzy. He feels drunk, he feels like he’s on the verge of passing out, as if he’s on the verge of losing his mind, exploding into tiny molecules that will fade back into sand and stardust, that’ll be chemicals beginning their half-lives for the rest of eternity.

“Heh… Heheh… You… Why are you saying these things, baby? Why are you… Master Overhaul didn’t… He didn’t kidnap you. He brought you here for me. Yes. That’s why you’re here. Just… Just please stop lying to me, okay? I love you.”

A tiny wail leaves you, and your feet dance until you collapse backwards, until your body collides with the wall and you’re sliding down it with aghast features, with skin taut and pulled back, with bleary red eyes and sleepiness, with tremors shuddering through your body.

“No… No! No, I wasn’t. I’m here just to… to—take care of some old man and little girl! Please, stop. Stop. I don’t know you. You’re not my boyfriend. I don’t love you!”

He growls. He doesn’t mean to, but he growls. He pounces forward a few steps until he’s only a meter away from you. It’s just enough space between the two of you so you stop panicking and lying, and it’s just enough space for him to brace against one of his knees and clutch his claws against his chest. Touya pleads, his voice cracks and he can feel tears start to tingle within his own eyes.

“I need you to stop speaking like that. I’m yours. And I’ll be yours forever. Just stop saying such hurtful things. Can’t you see? I’ll be your humble servant, if only you’d let me!!!”

Your hands grip the side of your face, and you’re hyperventilating. Nothing's making sense. Touya doesn’t want you to look at him like that, never wanted to see that expression on your face—especially not whenever he’s the one receiving it! That makes him feel like such a bad bad baaaaaaaaaaaaad boyfriend!! Why can he never do anything right!?

Visceral, primal, animalistic fear and rage bite him back.

“Leave me alone, you creep!”

Shredding machines and gears right through his body, wood chippers eating him alive, gore and guts splattering like piñatas pouring stale candy and frothy eyeballs across yellow grass. Touya shatters, and his side rings with agony whenever it slams onto the hardwood floor. Maybe he’s crying also, but he’s chewing his tongue and gagging against the way it rolls behind his front teeth. Touya’s long nails nearly slice his skin open whenever he winces against the heartbreak and the machetes slicing through the underbrush of his calloused trauma.

“Baby… Baby… Don’t say that… Don’t call me that… I love you… I love you, I love you so much. You’re killing me, you’re killing me, baby. What do I have to do?”

How can he prove his devotion to you? How can he show you just how much he genuinely and totally loves you? He’d do whatever you needed, he’d do anything for you, he’d do everything that will make you love him. He’d fling himself down before your feet, would lick the bottoms of your shoes, would prostrate himself to let you do all of your heart’s desires to him. You could crush his back, could rip his sinuses out, could fracture his kidneys, could slurp up his ligaments—do it!! Do it!! DO IT, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE

“I don’t want to be here! I just wanna go home! Stop reminding me that I—that I was—Please just shut up!”

“I’m always yours—always… from the moment I fell in love with you, I—”

Touya’s heart was thumping. It was beating against his sternum in ways that reminded him of wars, of airplanes humming and whirring their deadly fumes across the innocent plains, of the death rattle springing to life in its evil deeds, in throats, in limbic systems that don’t know just when to quit. It was so real, so painful, the pain. Touya could visualize it, could see it, could feel his own blood drumming within his fingertips, could tell that life was ending, could tell that you were yelling now, you were yelling for someone other than him and it was driving Touya insane. What could he do? Your heart’s a weapon to him, digging into him and twisting those fishy scales from his body, and Touya wanted to do the same to you, wanted to give you his heart, wanted to—

“Take it. Take my heart, let me show you how you’re hurting me—”

It was in his mind, so real, his heart is his only defense, his only backup, it was the only way to make you see just how much he absolutely adores you, he jerks forward, crawling, hands still over his lungs, breathing, seeing—

“Just. See, see how much I love you, I have to—to—”

It happens too fast. Something sharp and unbelievable, something that Touya never thought was possible. He blinked, and could feel the pressure against the pads of his fingers before he could even comprehend it. It tore right through his body, slicked through him like it was a wraith in the night, like it was metaphysical and wasn’t even truly a genuine organ. His eyes are vibrating whenever he slowly peels his hands away from his body, whenever everything starts eating away at the edges of his vision, flurries of gnats and fuzzy burnweeds, and Touya looks down.

There—there, his heart—his heart—

“I—”

Blood glurks from his mouth instead of words, but Touya doesn’t stop shambling closer. His hands fall, and he watches his heart hit the ground and bounce a few paces ahead of him. You’re shrieking, you’re staring at him with this abhorred expression, and he can hear Master Overhaul Master Overhaul Master Overhaul Master Overhaul over and over in his head. Jealousy begins to decorate his gasping breath, and begins to bleed onto his shirt. Why isn’t his name on your lips?

Touya focuses on his heart, everything is getting slurred into soupy rinds and he can’t help but beg that it works, that you’ll finally submit yourself to him in death, that you’ll see his love, that you’ll see that you ds ee waht it meens to jim if ouy wulde jusst

L o

V ee e

Me

[deepseasmetro]

Hi! Im not sure If this is a welcome ask but: what's ur analysis of the reasons for sayaka's transformation into a witch? It's been a while since I've watched the show but this scene had always sorta intrigued me because it always felt like there was something I wasn't getting. Also, happy belated birthday! I hope ur having a nice day :)

i'm assuming you mean the show and not her use of oktavia in rebellion (if u wanna hear my thoughts on that too let me know) - cw for suicide talk! putting this under a cut cus its long lol

i mean, i think ultimately, sayaka's witch transformation is metaphorically representative of suicide (i'll get back to why this specifically rather than just an Out of Magic moment in a sec). her gradual (well, not-so-gradual, but yk) descent into deep depression is portrayed pretty strongly as self harm - from her refusing grief seeds to cleanse her soul gem, to her intentionally numbing her body to physical injury to allow for elsa maria to harm her pretty grievously from what we can see.

sayaka feels like a walking corpse. she's come to terms with the fact she will never, ever ever get to live a normal life anymore. putting aside the lifetime duty to fight witches - the understanding that her body is literally a corpse being piloted and kept alive by her now-removed soul is sort of what seals the deal. and yeah, the stuff with hitomi/kyousuke does a lot to accelerate this, but i don't think it's what pushes her to where she is.

sayaka starts the show definitely believing in the good of the world, but we see her moody, more introspective self pretty early on when she and madoka are contemplating wishes together. sayaka comments on the fact that them being unable to think of a wish they'd trade their life for is indicative of privilege, and i think this sentiment echoes throughout the rest of her arc. i also think sayaka is readable as having some moral OCD, and i think this all culminates into a spiral she can't pull herself out of.

sayaka tells herself she's becoming a magical girl for selfless reasons (and she really arguably is, even if she does also want to get attention from kyousuke in return!) but this idea of her own privilege, her own wants and needs being self-centered and bad, push her further and further down this pit. she can't bring herself to approach kyousuke at school because of the complicated guilt she feels over making a wish on his behalf (and wanting his attention in return). she has a pretty normal emotional response to hitomi confessing and takes those inside thoughts as proof that she's bad, she's selfish, she's not acting for the good of the world, she's evil, she's unworthy of love, etc. she can't stop herself from ruminating on these thoughts. she doesn't even have a proper body anymore. so all she's good for, in her mind, is reaping what she sowed, as punishment for these thoughts she's having. fighting witches with no regard for her own safety or well-being until she dies.

except she doesn't die like mami does. she keeps beating witches. and then she overhears two men on the train talking misogynistically about their girlfriends. this world she was at least going to give her life to protect doesn't seem worth protecting anymore. girls and women like her are used and thrown away. society is built on the backs of her suffering, so why bother? why bother saving people like this from witches, if this is how they'll treat her someday? she snaps, and kills them (this is not shown but heavily implied and i think confirmed in some extra content). then you combine this act with sayaka's inability to forgive herself over even minor, internal thoughts - an act like this becomes unforgivable in her eyes, and it pushes her all the way over the edge.

her transformation taking place in a train station seals the deal on an act of suicide for me. obviously, train platforms are a very common place to commit suicide, especially in japan. she doesn't actually throw herself onto the platform, and she doesn't force herself into becoming a witch (nor does she understand that's what is about to happen), but thematically, this is the final moment she gives up on everything. "i was stupid, so stupid" is her statement that all the decisions she's made to get here were completely worthless. she threw away her privileged life for nothing. for nobody. she has no reason to live anymore (in her mind, at least), so she gives it up.

[daytaker]

Satan Headcanons

cw: some self-harming tendencies

Some of these are actually anti-canons. I don't know if that's a phrase I've heard before or one that I just invented but I'm going to call things that explicitly oppose the canon because I think they make more sense or fit better "anti-canons".

General Headcanons

Satan doesn't try new things if he doesn't think he'll be good at them from the very beginning. He hates appearing weak or ridiculous, so he tends to absorb as much information about something as he can before ever attempting it, and even then he only acts if having that information is practically useful. As a consequence, he has never played a Sport.

Satan is Lucifer's favorite brother.

He would unironically like Linkin Park.

He can't stop thinking about cats. He can't stop talking about cats. He needs cat rehab. He can't even stop going on about cats long enough to sing us a serious and emotional love song without mentioning cats. Cats are a problem.

He and Levi share cursed memes.

Satan writes poetry sometimes.

Asmo treats him as both a big brother and a little brother.

He can play the piano because Lucifer can play the piano, but he won't do it.

Baby Satan (By Which I Mean Newly Made Satan)

When Satan is very "new", his connection to Lucifer is stronger to the extent that he can more or less gauge what Lucifer is thinking at any given time. He just instinctively knows. This wears off as time goes on and he develops a more distinct sense of self, and there's more time separating him and his creation, but at first, he can track Lucifer's thoughts so well that Lucifer is extremely uncomfortable with it. He'll be sitting there at dinner while everyone else is talking about screaming tomatoes and how terrifying Devildom produce is in general, and Lucifer is trying to figure out what to do about Diavolo and his weird enthusiasm for that demon that just woke up in the middle of the new school, wondering why they're suddenly a founding member of RAD, and Satan turns to him and says, "Lord Diavolo seems to like collecting strange demons with questionable loyalties and making them into his personal entourage. Also, fuck you."

Sensory

He has a lot of sensory difficulties, and the next few headcanons below are offshoots of this one. But basically... have you ever been in a blind rage and felt something touch you gently? Maybe this is just me, but that somehow makes everything worse. Basically, I'm picturing boy fresh from the metaphorical womb, an uncontrollable ball of fury, and SOFT stuff GENTLY touches him? On his BODY? What the ACTUAL FUCK?

His antidote to this discomfort is to have something rough and painful touch the spot that was affected, and this leads to a lot of scabs and sores. They're worst on his back and shoulders. This was a source of stress and conflict for him and Lucifer early on.

He hates clothes. Especially loose-fitting clothes, because of how they sit on his body. He refused to wear clothes at all for the first couple weeks he existed. He'd just roll around and tear them up with his tail. He often finds clothes uncomfortable enough to be considered painful, though that's not exactly what's happening.

He hates to get wet. I know, I know. Very "cat". Pretty basic. But being wet is uncomfortable. And kind of humiliating. And if you so much as smile at him when he's wet, he will interpret that as mockery and absolutely go the fuck off.

So baths and showers are tricky. Why the actual fuck would he subject himself to something like that? Just so other people don't have to smell him? Do they have any idea how little he cares about their disgust? He's born of wrath and shame* and hate! He eats disgust for breakfast.

*As the Avatar of Pride, Lucifer can no longer experience Pride's antithesis (shame) so when Satan was made, he ended up taking his shame as a little present. That's one reason why he hates Lucifer: he knows why Lucifer hates himself, even though Lucifer doesn't anymore.

[iampastelry]

CW: mentions of mental disorders, fictional murderers, mention of self-harm

So I just watched American Psycho, and oh gosh why have I never watched this movie before. I have a love for psychology, as well as horror movies, and gosh was this movie an experience.

The main thing I wanna talk about is Patrick's monologue at the end of the movie, showing that the world is continuing on despite what he's experienced internally, and that his "confession" (that may or may not have actually happened), didn't change anything.

Patrick associates himself with the worst of the worst. And he's a bad guy, definitely, given what he wants to do to people and what he did to those hookers, but he's not as diabolical as he thinks he is. Patrick Bateman is not a serial killer. And yet, he experienced all those things, went through all that turmoil, eventually actually hurt people, and did all of it in response to a crime he didn't commit.

Patrick feels a constant pain, and he seems to see it as his own punishment. But he also feels that he's gaining nothing from his punishment, that he's putting himself through all this for nothing, and/or that the pain he's going through is just pain- with no grand payoff and no deeper meaning.

A common symptom of OCD is feeling the need to confess, even when you've done nothing wrong. A common reason for self-harming, is a form of self-punishment. I believe that what Patrick is experiencing through the movie may a metaphor for OCD, and that his decline into breaking his mask, even a little bit, is his own attempt at self-sabotage- even when that self-sabotage causes people (the hookers) to actually get hurt.

[salty-an-disco]

Okay okay okay, if I can ask for a second voice... I love all of your thoughts on Voice of the Cold so... songs for Cold pls? 🥺

*grins mischievously*

The first I already mentioned before, but they’re still accurate–

Oh No by Marina

Fairly Local by TØP (especially the progression of “I’m evil to the core” to “I’m not evil to the core” makes me think of Cold’s progression of thinking he’s someone inherently dangerous and unable to help himself, to realizing that that’s not inherent to him and he can always choose to do better for himself and for others [if he will though, is another story])

The Outside by TØP (the song literally starts off with “I’m already bored. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen this one before” if that’s not Cold-core, I don’t know what it is)

i’ll die anyway by girl in red (this song feels like Cold in a genuine depressive episode)

Sharpener by Cavetown (CW: this song is about self-harm, though it go about in a very metaphorical and non-explicit way; it makes me think about Cold’s relationship to pain, and the ending part, especially, tugs at my heart -> “You say ‘why am I like this.’ You mean ‘why am I stupid’.”)

[sellenite]

summaries below the cut <333

Tempest:

cw: dark content, mental health (depression, schizophrenia—curses are seen by non-sorcerers/doctors as schizophrenia symptoms), unhealthy relationship dynamics, power imbalance, emotional manipulation, age-gap relationships, dubious consent, substance abuse, death, geto is an entire warning on his own

You were born with the ability to see curses, a "gift" you shared with your mother. She could see them too—or at least she used to before she began self-medicating with cheap bottles of whiskey. But the two of you were isolated by your burden, your mother shamed by the community, and you, as her daughter, an accessory of that shame. It was like that for as long as you could remember—a lonely childhood in which you grew up in the shadow of your mother's self-destruction—until a sudden tragedy left you truly alone.

Refusing to follow in your mother's footsteps, you seek solace in the whispered miracles of a local monk, Suguru Geto. However, instead of finding salvation, he reveals to you a truth that shatters your entire reality as you know it: the monsters you thought only lived inside of your head are very real, and beyond that, you are blessed, as he says, with an untamed curse technique tied to the power of storms.

Taken under Geto's wing, you begin to serve as his dedicated pupil and explore your latent abilities. However, you begin to discover that his kindness harbors a dark edge. As your bond deepens into something tangled and dangerous, you must confront the fine line between devotion and manipulation and decide how much you are willing to sacrifice to belong to Geto's cult.

Echoes of Infinity:

cw: mental health (derealization, PTSD, schizophrenia), death, angst, suicidal ideation, homicial ideation, came back wrong trope

Death was not what Satoru Gojo had anticipated. Instead of cold, dark nothingness, he was bound in the limbo of his Infinity. For the immeasurable time he was suspended between life and death, Satoru bore witness to the unfiltered chaos of every alternate reality of his battle with Sukuna Ryomen—forced to watch his own demise and the loss of everyone and everything he held dear over and over again. But then he awoke from his nightmare, dragged from the brink of death itself, alive but forever changed.

As Satoru wades through his waking reality, he is tormented by the haunting visions and memories of what his Limitless technique revealed. The world around him is no more than a haze of delusions, his psyche caught somewhere between the past, the present, and the future, some of which he is uncertain are even his own. And he can't shake the unnerving feeling that buried beneath the rubble of his memories lurks something dark and vengeful, hungry for the promise of blood.

The only constant is you—the closest thing Satoru has to a friend and a former lover—and your stubborn refusal to let him retreat into the abyss of his fractured mind. However, as the delicate state of Satoru's inner world continues to deteriorate, you must face an impossible question: has the Satoru Gojo you once knew already died?

Of Magic and Destiny:

cw: suicidal ideation/intention (Gale), confrontations with death (literally and metaphorically), violence, nerdy DND + Baldur's Gate lore, this one is overall more light-hearted than the other two though <3

Elowynn, a wild magic sorceress, was blessed with untamed powers by the goddess Chauntea at birth—a gift her mother revered but one that often felt more like a curse. Without guidance or formal training, Elly's magic became a source of chaos, its raw, volatile nature spiraling out of her control and leaving unintended harm in its wake. As her powers intensified with age, Elly was forced to make the painful decision to leave her home, determined to find a place where she could safely study her craft. Yet her path to self-discovery was quickly interrupted when she was abducted by the Illithid ship, the Nautaloid, and placed at the center of a fight for the fate of all of Faerûn.

Among the wreckage of their shared abduction, Elly meets a group of unlikely companions—each with their own dark secrets and desires. However, she finds a kindred spirit in the charismatic wizard, Gale. As they face impossible challenges together, Gale becomes her confidant, mentor, and the anchor she never knew she needed. He helps Elly refine her magic, teaching her to harness its wild nature and channel its power more effectively.

But their blossoming romance is threatened by the shadow of Gale’s own secret: the Netherese orb he harbors, a dangerous piece of dark magic that may ultimately destroy them both. As Elly and Gale grow closer, she must face the heart-wrenching question of whether their love can survive the weight of the magic they wield, or if the forces that bind them will tear them apart.

This one is pure self-indulgence. It essentially would just be a canon retelling of Baldur’s Gate, just with my own details/scenes added in. I really just want an excuse to write about Gale and my favorite Tav, I'm sorry 😭