#even though it can just be platonic

[fandom-queen-13]

OK SO I JUST HAD THIS SANDERS SIDES FIC IDEA

So. Urban fantasy/superpower AU, and Virgil can see into the future. Not far, and not for very long, but it's there. One night, he sees himself at a party of Roman's for some reason, and despite everything, he feels like he needs to go. So, he's at the party, just standing around awkwardly, and nothing really happens. Maybe Roman gives him a look every now and then, but all in all, nothing happens. Virgil feels like something was supposed to happen, so he goes to the party. And the next, and the next, and the next. Nothing's really changed, he's there at the back of the party, just. Watching.

Until one night, Virgil decides to stop. Maybe he's not feeling great, or maybe he's decided that what he saw already happened and he was just there for no reason. Either way, he doesn't show up at the party and just stays home.

Cue someone (I thought of it as Roman but it can really be anyone, even all of them if you wish) showing up at Virgil's house because Virgil's shown up every time and without him "I don't really feel safe at the party."

(bonus points if they of them come back and see something bad's happened at the party, so in a way, Virgil did save them)

[feroluce]

I have finally finished 2.4 and oh my GOD watching Dan Heng be so protective of his friends nearly killed me, MY HEART.

And yes, the cutscene where he pushes the trailblazer out of the way and even cushions their fall with his own body, but I mean even before that! When he was already trying to protect them and March 7th from Feixiao and Lingsha!!

Because if you watch the dango trio throughout the main quest, you'll notice that they often position themselves in the same way, which is a detail that makes me super happy that Hoyo thought to include- when the three of them aren't evenly spaced, March 7th and the trailblazer tend to gravitate towards each other and stand very close together, frequently side-by-side. And by comparison, Dan Heng usually stands slightly away, and often even slightly behind them, where he can pull on their leashes to wrangle them keep an eye on them.

This is probably a habit learned through experience, since March 7th said during Belobog she is the "queen of unannounced disappearances" fjdksajfkldjsak

And of course at least a little bit of it is just done for like, aesthetic purposes. It's a video game. Things have to look nice for the player. The trailblazer and Dan Heng are the same height, March 7th is a bit shorter, and Yanqing is even smaller. It makes sense to have the trailblazer and Dan Heng stand on the ends, with March 7th and Yanqing in the middle, it just looks nicer and more balanced that way. But still! Even when they're accommodating for Yanqing in this quest, they still all arrange themselves the same way, almost every time!

But this changes after Dan Heng and Yanqing become suspicious of the visitors from the Yaoqing.

The dango trio still stand around relaxed and in their usual manner when they go to the artisanship delve and meet Skott,

but Dan Heng takes notice of Lingsha when she arrives, and he and Yanqing mentioned her specifically when discussing their worries.

Yanqing worrying so much about Jing Yuan got me right in the heart, he's such a good boy WEH

And when the four of them go out to the alchemy delve to meet Lingsha for tea, the pattern breaks. Suddenly Dan Heng is standing right up front, and even walks in and enters the scene before March 7th and the trailblazer to get to Lingsha before them. He stays a step in front of them the whole time, too.

And then when Dan Heng and the trailblazer have to go be interrogated by Feixiao! The same deal! Dan Heng walks in ahead of them and stays in front of them! Noticeably so! Enough that even Feixiao takes note and voices it!

Dan Heng is so so fiercely protective of his companions, and I love it, I adore hyper vigilance in the wake of trauma like this, I'm so excited to see what else he does in 2.5, I hope we either get to see him get fucked up or the trailblazer gets fucked up in his place, I wanna see them run through the meat grinder!!!

[knifearo]

i hate the concept of platonic and romantic as a binary i hate the concept of platonic and romantic as a sliding scale of "less" to "more" i hate the concept of platonic and romantic as the only two options i hate the concept of platonic and romantic as significantly different things i hate the concept of platonic and romantic as all encompassing i hate the concept of platonic and romantic as the two halves of a shallow concept of love that doesn't actually encompass anything at all i think we need to overhaul every popular conception about "types" of love so we can talk about things that are real and true for once

[stuckinapril]

I hate to be that one person who’s like when ur so busy ur not consumed by other people or being in a relationship blah blah blah …. But truly when u have ur hands full you could fucking care less and it’s so liberating

[sqtorux]

gojo 'i am a man too' satoru when you keep teasing him about how he's younger than you and makes it his life mission to prove it.

[fumifooms]

"Marchil? I guess I can see it on Chilchuck’s end, but what about Marcille’s? What makes you think she could develop feelings for him?" I’m glad you asked!

The first thing to note is that she does think highly of him

In the page on the right, literally defending his virtues and literally comparing him to Dalclan. And oh…

She does love a brooding mysterious guy who closes himself to love. But surely, Chilchuck isn’t her type at all, right? He’s not princely or knightly at all. In apperances certainly not, both looks wise and demeanor wise, but then that’s why she seeks to know him on a deeper level, to not only look shallowly.

And hmm. Chilchuck really is quite selfless isn’t he? Always looking out for others, and saving specifically her often, always making sure himself and, staying in or even running towards danger for her sometimes. Modesty is often considered heroic…

And can we talk about that drowning one… You can definitely frame the special attention as him knowing she tends to hesitate or be clumsy, and then his insistance on pulling her out of danger that she’s the healer aka the most important to keep alive, but. From the one who says that he just keeps his ass out of fights and won’t help this is a lot of risk to take, and he does die trying to pull her to safety in the dungeon rabbits chapter. And the drowning bit??? That’s when the dungeon collapses. The only reason they DON’T die of drowning here is that the water then gives way to outside. There was NO hope of pulling her to safety here and resurrections would likely not work either, he truly preferred to die with her than try to survive himself.

Sit your ass back DOWN you are in no state, self-sacrifical hero much damn

And Marcille definitely noticed this imo, after all she loves learning all she can about him, remembering things like how he hates waiting on people too. She pays attention to him and what he does and what he says. This to say that it’s notable, whatever reason for it you may think (though we know by this point at least she was already aware he was an adult though it wasn’t internalized), out of everyone it’s Chilchuck’s bed that she wants to sleep in during the Golden Kingdom stay. He’s safe and comforting to her: dependable, the defining trait in her view of him as is shown by the relationship chart in the Adventurer’s Bible.

^ Lending handkerchiefs is a romance trope btw and handkerchiefs have irl history of being used for courting. Especially in old English literature and plays like Shakespeare’s Othello, and personally I do see a lot of Shakespeare in Dalclan (nobility political drama with some romance). There’s how his cowl is a dearly beloved souvenir from his family too, there’s a lot of aesthetic tropes you can apply to him.

All this to say you can 100% romanticize Chilchuck into a princely noble guy if you try and that’s exactly what Marcille does with the wife roleplay. She doesn’t need much in the first place, she latches onto crumbs and makes aesthetic narratives out of details, give her an inch she’ll take a mile.

But what’s interesting about the shift throughout the arc of her and his relationship is that she starts out idealizing him into a little angel of a kid (shapeshifter), and she ends it idealizing him as a virtuous husband and family man instead.

And what’s doubly interesting is that in the former, she’s actively warping who he is personality and demeanor wise to fit the aesthetic, he doesn’t have that bitter pride of not asking for help and the edges have been smoothened. But what she does during the wife roleplay is something else, she acknowledges the flaws and just… Accepts them, rolls with them. She’s aware of his flaws and implements them into the narrative, but the reason why his wife left doesn’t capitalize on them even, rather Chil is chilblivious and his wife loves him very much still, she’s just testing him after having had a night of feeling out of place at his side.

And this is what separates the idealization vs romanticization, she’s not twisting him into someone else she’s just uplifting what he is and focusing on the good sides.

Marcille: "he has a shitty personality sometimes but if he was my husband I’d still cherish him" "If I were your wife I’d be overjoyed to go out with you and would get myself prettied up while you complain about me taking a long time, your friends would tell me that I’m nice and that’d make me happy, but I’d also be sad because you wouldn’t tell me that you love me enough"

He’s angry and his wife left him, he’s *flawed*, but he’s still worth hyping up, still worth having his own romance story, still has a shot of winning back his beloved. She sees him for what he is, human and real and not a carefully scripted character that fits an aesthetic, and she thinks it’s still worthy of love and admiration and fighting for

And what’s funny too is that you might expect her to cool down on him once she learns more about him but actually she only gets increasingly into his business. You tell her your age and next thing you know you promise to introduce her to your family. Give her an inch she takes a mile. And too the thing is, Senshi is equally mysterious but she doesn’t pester him like at all, asks him ONCE about his succubus and he doesn’t even answer and that’s like… It. With Chilchuck it starts off innocently enough with her wanting to know his age, hometown, the stuff she mentions having asked pre-canon. But it just keeps and keeps going and escalating. Think she’ll be satisfied now knowing you have a wife and kids, maybe she’s disillusioned now? Wrong! She wants to know their names and ages and occupations and hey how did you propose to your wife? Do you think she’ll stop after meeting them? What’s next? What will she want to know next????

She’s… Like it’s not a reach that Marcille is all over him. Like it doesn’t mean it’s romantic but she just is. She is not normal about him idk. Can you not ask him about what tongue technique he used when first kissing his wife, give the man breathing room

Marcille could literally go "if I was Chilchuck’s wife" having deeply pondered and thought out the hypothetical and people would still ask where anyone sees any romantic potential between them. Oh wait

There’s a platonic explanation for everything (almost?) in Dungeon Meshi don’t say I’m saying otherwise, but it’s definitely not like there’s nothing here to read into lol

Going off a bit more under read bc it’s my fave topic

Marcille has a whole theme with the charming prince trope with her idealization and storybook motif and Chil is kinda the "Well someone perfect like that isn’t very realistic and romance is usually more complex and that’s ok and good and flawed people can still be ✨virtuous✨" catalyst

Do you see do you see she starts canon thinking the most romantic thing is a prince charming but her arc in the end has her romanticizing an average, flawed, real and realistic family man, who’s on the poorer side and is on the verge of divorce. And that’s what he needed, too, seeing the positive of himself and the situation instead of focusing on the negative is explicitly what inspires him to hope that he might be able to reconcile with his wife, gives him the courage and self-esteem to shoot his shot.

He IS a prince figure instead that now it’s not about idealizing the grand and overt it’s about romanticizing the small things in real life!! About finding joy and beauty in things that seem normal or mundane and uplifting them to make the world feel kinder!!!!

He’s the devoted virtuous man that she wantsss not the storybook prince that’s unrealistic and could crumble like a script at any time. He’s the perfect example of a flawed realistic but virtuous & devoted & loving man. Far from a prince charming, but not fully detached from it either. Something worth fighting for despite the flawed cracks. Like literally, flawed romance being worth fighting for is literally the finale of Chilchuck and Marcille’s arc on the matter, where their separate arcs and issues intersect at the most crucial moment.

Marcille is important to Chil’s arc not only because of her optimism, but also because of her interest and knowledge in romance & matters of the heart, and that’s what he needs to both open his heart up to hope and to try to reconcile with his wife, like idk sounds gay

Their arc together is literally learning to 1) see each other for how they are and not undermining their qualities capacities etc etc while still not leaving flaws unchecked either and 2) opening up to people. Marcille LITERALLY makes Chil open his heart up to hope like idk man. What do you want from me. He’s literally the guy helping her through deconstructing novels and fantasy and rose tinted glasses and like. Deconstructing the prince charming figure into something more real but still romantically beautiful like KUI KUI STOOOOP STOP I’M ALREADY HOOKED I’M ALREADY-

 Ok fine that’s me reading into the tropes too much forgive me for being storybook brained but like. Speaking his heart out to a lone woman on a balcony, Romeo and Juliette shit, asking if she, too, doesn’t want to meet his family, madly blushing. And like she’s learned with Chilchuck it’s all in the little things, all the implications he cannot speak aloud. She does reciprocate, does blush madly back, and the first thing she does is shower him in flowers and jewelry and what in her heart is coded as romantic gifts

A lady, stashed away in a high tower by her lonesome, waiting for someone to call out to her from below… Romeo courting type shit with an offer, a heartfelt spiel, implicit confession from underneath her balcony. Offering him flowers because he succeeded in calling out to her heart…….. And they have to climb to her too…. Crazy

Doesn’t it sound like a proposal. One that’s both so storybook-like and not, contrastedly real and grounded, all about the implications rather than in your face grand gestures, "Don’t you want to meet my family?". They literally have an arc about the topic of romance and this is the climax/pinnacle of it like god?? This is @ the woman who said "Chilchuck is a shy/bashful man so I know he wouldn’t tell me he loves me, but…" btw

To quote a friend, truly the shiny secret unlockable dating sim capture target : THE DUNGEON LORD BIT WAS SO FUNNY BECAUSE HE KNEW SHE'D TAKE IT HOOK LINE AND SINKER HES THE ONE WHO GOT HER TO TURN AROUND COMPLETELY SHES LIKE. WIDE EYED FLAG RAISED???? FLAG RAISED WITH CHILCHUCK 👀👀👀‼️👀👀‼️👀

And the way that this is the culmination of their arc together… Like people are not ready for the ‘Chil calling out to dunlord Marcille on the balcony has Romeo and Juliette romance novels imagery’ take. Or the ‘their arc is about growing to see beauty even in the non-idealized, in the flawed and in the real’ take which makes it so so perfect if she were to lower her ideal from a charming elven prince to a virtuous halfling man (which she does end up romanticizing)

So there, you got to witness in real time what happens when I think about marchil for longer than 2 minutes, there are so many layers it’s a deranged rabbithole. I saw the necronomicon of subtext and it’s driving me to madness with forbidden knowledge that no one else sees

……. Like what if I told you she implicitly picked Chilchuck over a "unrealistic prince charming who’s actually disingenuous" much earlier in the story already. If she was given the choice to think through going with a guy that seems perfect and chivalrous like her succubus she’d pick Chilchuck over the other actually. If I sound insane rn tune in for my full analysis on them coming this month hopefully thank youu. Interwoven arcs of fantasy vs reality and idealization vs pessimism I love youuu

So now you know the general thesis of my planned analysis about the importance of the prince charming figure in Marcille and Chilchuck’s arc, where she romanticizes things to a sometimes worrying degree or idealize people into something easy and digestible and poetic (like Chil being a kid, and then him being a virtuous ✨✨✨husband), and how she needs to value aesthetics less and actual acts and facts more, be more grounded (like seeing people for what they are flaws and all, and accepting that people need money and not pulling through on principles of honor or unity shouldn’t get Namari shamed) and a part of that is accepting that Chilchuck is BOTH flawed and virtuous, a loving husband that still has shitty moods and fumbled his marriage so bad etc etc. So it’s like, her image of perfect prince charming that will whisk you away on an ethereal romance -> realistic flawed middle aged dad with personality issues and a failing marriage but he still is worthy of love and having his cute grand romance story and his happy ending. Ik I keep repeating the same point through this but I need it to be burned into everyone’s brains it has its grip on me I can’t do this. They are so special……

[catgirljaneway]

Tuvok and Kathryn and the time Kathryn destroyed the timeline get Tuvok back.

/I Swear Somewhere This Works - Trista Mateer/

[hnbka]

i think the reason i hate childhood best friends to lovers but not when theyre mlm/wlw is because when its a het ship, people expect them to date as children/teens, so most of the movie/show/book is denying romantic feelings, rather than expanding on the once thought to be only platonic feelings in mlm/wlw ships

[fossilizedhysterics]

a redraw of something from october, original under the cut!!

i like to think ive improved !

[acourtofquestions]

How is rowaelin already every romantic trope in one before they even have their first kiss?🫶😂👏

[yogacatdeskknit]

fanfic idea wherein the strawhats come across a very dangerous pirate with the devil fruit ability to steal voices, who makes a sick show of “collecting” peoples’ voices, especially if they’re the voices of famous (or infamous) people, and Luffy sacrifices his voice to save Zoro’s life. Mute!Luffy ensues but he literally doesn’t care that his voice is gone. He’s just happy Zoro is okay. ofc the strawhats fight and get Luffy’s voice back (and manage to free everyone else’s voices in the process), and when Luffy gets his voice back he has the BIGGEST and purest laugh of the century

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

when I want to write something self indulgent to give me all the angsty and cuddly hurt/comfort feels but I can't because I end up feeling guilty because I'm seeking after feels that I feel in an inappropriate place because my mom told me one time when I was 15 that I shouldn't search that out or it's probably sexual sin but it confuses me because ALL the feels happen that way for me even if it's entirely platonic and nonsexual and so I don't know if it's okay to want to write to that because apparently all pleasure of any sort, even over platonic stories, is sexual or comes with a possibly probably sexual feeling and I also am having a hard time figuring out what's genuine conviction from God and what's just my anxiety/OCD/perfectionism/fear of failure

[courtney-deserved-better]

telling myself i can't start another tdwt rewrite but dear god do i want to write one focusing on alejandro and courtney in this weird situationship thats a lot more nuanced than just alejandro manipulating courtney and her falling for it. like theyre best friends they dont trust each other theyre the same person they dont know anything about the other one theres a mutual attraction theyre pining for other people theyre codependent they dont care about each other theyre platonic soulmates like i just want to do a deep dive into how messy that relationship couldve been building off of their friendship that exists in my head except the line between romantic and platonic is so fucking blurred they have no idea what they are to the other person

[sanasanakun]

I need more people to discuss the fact that Gortash and The Dark Urge created an entire “super-duper secret BFFs 5ever” code/language just for their communications. And that Gortash later hid these letters at his fucking parent’s place, acting like an embarrassed kid covering up his old love poems about his first crush or something. They are so goofy for one another, bro.

[lunar-wandering]

Handcuffs

i was overcome to write shadowpeach being silly goofy

Summary: "This better not be one of your tricks Wukong." "Hah, do you really think so little of me?"

Wukong's smirk was the only warning Macaque got before a cold piece of metal was snapping shut around his wrist.

Word Count: 2k

Read on Ao3

“Oi, Macaque!!”

The sound of his name made Macaque lift his head from where he was reclining in the shade of one of the peach trees on Flower Fruit Mountain. Slowly pushing himself up into a sitting position, his tail twitched with barely contained irritation as soon as he realized who it was.

“What do you want, Wukong?” He asked, as the Monkey King skidded to a stop in front of him, kicking up the slightest amount of dirt, Macaque wincing as some of it landed on his clothes. Wukong panted for a moment, leaning over, before taking a deep breath in and standing upright.

“Give me your hand.” He said, holding out his own hand, and Macaque stared at him blankly. “C’mon, I don’t have all day, bud.”

…He was up to something. He was totally up to something. Macaque knew that look, he knew that look full-well. That was a look that he should not trust.

…Wukong was still holding his hand out.

“...Tch, this better not be one of your tricks.” Macaque sighed, placing his hand in Wukong’s and letting himself be pulled to his feet despite his better judgement. Wukong smirked at him.

“Hah! Do you really think so little of me?”

“Ye-” Macaque’s response was cut off by the sound of a click. Glancing down, Macaque was greeted by the sight of silver metal wrapped around his wrist. “...Wukong.”

“Hm?” Wukong’s tone was falsely innocent, as he snapped a matching piece of silver metal around his own wrist.

“What the fuck is this.” Macaque held up his wrist, Wukong’s own wrist being dragged up with the movement, the light of the afternoon sun reflecting off of the shiny pair of handcuffs wrapped around the both of them.

“Uh, handcuffs, obviously.” In his free hand, Wukong tossed a key up and down. Macaque eyed it for a moment, before focusing back on the offending piece of metal around his wrist.

Without a word, he turned himself to shadows, fully expecting the cuff to fall right off, rendering whatever it was Wukong was planning null.

Only… that didn’t happen.

The cuff stayed on, even as Macaque tugged at it, trying to slip his way out.

“Please, quit it, that isn’t going to work.” Wukong said, “These are magic handcuffs. Enchanted them myself.”

“You enchanted them? All the more reason to get them off, they’ll probably explode at any moment.”

“Psh, they won’t do that. …I think.”

“I heard that.” Macaque hissed, still tugging at the cuff, jerking Wukong’s arm around with his attempts to get it off.

“Of course you did.” Wukong sighed, before stopping Macaque’s movements all together by jerking his arm to the side, causing Macaque to stumble a little. “Stop struggling. It’s not going to work, the only thing that’s going to get you out of these is the key.”

“That so?” Not giving Wukong any chance to react, Macaque swung his leg out, striking the Monkey King in the shin as hard as he could. Wukong yelped, instinctively letting go of the key and dropping down to clutch at the injury- Macaque being dragged half-down with him. Unable to grab the key with his own hands, Macaque instead focused on summoning a shadow portal on the ground, the key falling down into the darkness.

With a triumphant smirk on his face, Macaque stood back up (as much as he could, what with Wukong still dragging half of him down), holding out his free hand and forming another small shadow portal above it, fully expecting the key to drop down into his awaiting palm.

…A few seconds passed.

“...Ah.” Macaque said, the shadow portal fading away as he closed his empty hand. Wukong, the sting of his injury fading, glanced up at him with confused anger in his eyes.

“Ah??? What do you mean, ah???” He stood back up, Macaque avoiding eye contact with him. Wukong narrowed his eyes. “Macaque.”

Macaque winced.

“...I might’ve just… lost the key.”

“You what?!”

“It must’ve fallen into my pocket dimension, instead of just getting transported between shadows…” Macaque muttered, ignoring as Wukong sputtered with indignant rage- the Monkey King only pausing, anger temporarily forgotten as he tilted his head to the side in confusion.

“You have a pocket dimension?” He asked, and Macaque gave him a Look, as though he’d just asked whether or not the sky was blue.

“Uh, yeah? Of course I do? What, how did you think I pulled objects out of my shadows?” Macaque summoned a shadow and pulled a candy bar out of it to demonstrate, before pushing it back in. Wukong blinked.

“...To be honest I kinda just thought you were opening portals directly to stores and taking from them.”

“I mean, heh, yeah, I do actually do that sometimes- but, most of the time, it’s just the pocket dimension.”

“Okay…” Wukong trailed off, then shook his head, his anger returning to him as he refocused on the subject at hand. “Well, hurry up and re-summon it from there then, I don’t wanna be stuck to you all day.”

“And you think I do? These handcuffs were your idea, Wukong.” Macaque huffed, “What was even the point of this anyways?”

“Uh,” Wukong suddenly looked nervous, a wobbly smile appearing on his face as he used his free hand to scratch at the back of his neck. “Um, it’s… Look, it’s not important, just, summon the key and we can just unlock these and forget this ever happened.”

“Yeah, see, that’s kind of a problem…” Macaque said, “...I kinda… can’t.”

“Can’t? What do you mean you can’t?” Wukong leaned closer, almost menacingly, and Macaque took an instinctive step back, stopping himself from taking another only due to feeling the slight tug on the handcuffs. Wukong’s eyes flickered red. “You pulled a candy bar out of there just a few seconds ago!”

“That’s because I knew where it was!! I can only summon something from there if I know where it is, the key fell in there by accident. I don’t know where it landed!” Macaque’s hands moved as he explained, and Wukong huffed in irritation as his arm was pulled into jerky movements because of it.

“Well, let's just go in there and search for it then, it can’t be that hard to find.” He said, not noticing Macaque’s slightly guilty expression as he silently opened a larger shadow portal for both himself and Wukong to step through. “After all, it’s not like you could have that much stuff in there.”

One brief moment in complete darkness later, and Wukong stood there, mouth agape, staring at the sight in front of him. Macaque leaned over, lifting his cuffed hand to close Wukong’s mouth- Wukong immediately reacted to the touch by jerking his arm down, dragging Macaque’s hand away.

“Do not touch me.” He hissed, glaring at him. Macaque tsked, using his free hand to rub at where the handcuff had dug slightly into his skin.

“Don’t just stand there gaping then-” He was cut off as Wukong loudly shushed him, silence descending over them for a brief moment- a moment soon broken by Wukong himself.

“This.” He said, lifting his arms and gesturing to their surroundings, uncaring as to how Macaque was dragged by the motion. “This. Is worse than my treasure room. I didn’t even know that was possible. What could you ever need this much stuff for?”

“Tch, what could you ever need everything in your treasure room for?” Macaque shot back, and Wukong flinched, dropping his arms.

“Eh… That’s fair, I guess.” He muttered, before starting to walk forwards, Macaque stumbling slightly with the sudden motion before quickly falling into stride beside him. “Let’s just hurry up and find this key… This is going to be like searching for a needle in a haystack.”

“Just my luck, I guess…” Macaque muttered under his breath, “...I never was all that good with keys…”

“What was that?”

“Ah- nothing. Just, use your golden vision and start searching already.” Macaque waved him off, turning to start glancing over piles on his own- Wukong was going to be the one doing most of the work here, really. There wasn’t much that Macaque could do to help while still attached to him, so really it was more of a waiting game until Wukong spotted what they were looking for.

“Jeez, how far back does this place go?” Wukong asked, squinting as his eyes flickered an even brighter gold.

“It’s a pocket dimension, Wukong. It goes back as far as I want it t-”

“Oh, hey, is that a poster of me?”

Macaque choked on his own breath, his fur standing on end, head whipping around to look in the same direction Wukong was, and yep, there it was-

Slightly panicked, Macaque rushed forwards, Wukong being knocked off balance by the motion as Macaque turned and slammed his back against the mountain of stuff, trying his best to cover the poster from view. Wukong lightly slammed into his shoulder a second later, quickly righting himself now that he was no longer being dragged along.

“Hey! We’re still chained together, remember?!” He yelled, before pausing, turning to look over Macaque’s shoulder at what was behind him. “...Also, I can still see the poster.”

Macaque cursed, stomping one foot on the ground, the pile of objects, as well as the poster sinking down through a shadow in the blink of an eye. He winced a moment later, hands shooting up to cover his ears as a loud crash resounded from elsewhere in the space. Wukong turned to stare off into the distance.

“...If the key was in one of the piles that all of that landed on, I will throw you into a lake once all this is done.” He threatened, before seemingly picking a random direction and starting to walk once more, Macaque quickly joining him.

-

Twenty minutes later found them still having had no luck, walking around piles of objects without any sign of the elusive key. After they turned another corner, with still no sign of it, Wukong suddenly stopped.

Only for Macaque to keep walking, and, of course, after a few steps, getting pulled back by the handcuffs, stumbling backwards-

His foot landed on a stray goblet, tilting him even further off balance than he was before. Wukong realized a second too late what was happening, shifting to try and catch Macaque, only to miss. Wukong’s motion, combined with the suddenness Macaque’s weight dragging the cuffs down, was enough to set Wukong off balance as well, and-

He ended up tripping over his own feet, falling on top of Macaque.

Neither of them processed what had just happened, for a moment, the both of them just focusing on trying to recover from getting the breath knocked out of them. Realization hit them both at the same time, as they both glanced up, realizing how close their faces were to each other. Wukong, instantly, tried to shoot into a sitting position, holding both of his hands up, only to drag Macaque up with him- their heads bonking together.

“Ow!”

After a few minutes of grumbled hissing and rubbing at their respective foreheads, Wukong suddenly let out a growl, making Macaque freeze.

“That’s it.” Wukong muttered, eyes fully red as he reached to the side, grabbing the first heavy object he could find. “I’ve had enough of this.”

“Ah, Wukong, wait- they could explo-” Macaque didn’t get his warning out in time, as Wukong shoved his hand down, dragging Macaque’s arm with his own, to place the chain of the handcuffs against the solid ground- quickly swinging his heavy object of choice down with as much force as possible. Macaque braced himself, closing his eyes, muscles tensing-

There was a loud clang that left Macaque’s ears ringing… and then the faint feeling of cold metal around his wrist vanished.

He opened his eyes and glanced down just in time to see the broken cuffs clink to the floor.

“There.” Wukong said, shaking out his wrist, and then patting his hands clean of debris. “No keys necessary.”

Macaque stared at his wrist, then down at the cuffs in disbelief.

“...You could have done that. This whole time?” He put his hands over his face, and took a deep breath in, collecting himself as best he could. Bringing his hands down, he made direct eye contact with the Monkey King. “Wukong. What was the point of this.”

Wukong’s expression changed from relief to a nervous smirk faster than Macaque could blink.

“Uh, y’see… about that…”

“Wukong.”

“...It was the kid’s idea, alright?” Wukong slumped, rubbing his arm nervously, before seemingly realizing that Macaque had yet to stand up. Avoiding eye contact, he held out his hand to him. “He told me it might… help us bond a little.”

…Oh.

“Heh. Right.” Macaque let out a breathy, barely there laugh, grabbing hold of Wukong’s hand and using it to pull himself into a standing position- quickly letting go soon afterwards lest Wukong pull any more connecting pieces of metal out of nowhere. “Well, next time you want to bond, you’d be better off trying to invite me to play video games.”

“You’d never actually come if I did that though…” Wukong muttered, “...Would you?”

“I don’t know, you haven’t asked me.”

“...Would you like to come to my house to play some video games, Macaque?”

“No.”

“Oh c’mon-”

“Kidding! I’m kidding!!” Macaque laughed, lightly whacking Wukong on the shoulder before the Monkey King could settle into a pout. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

Without another word, Macaque turned and, slightly dramatically, snapped, a large swirling shadow portal appearing in front of them, passing through it to the other side finding them inside of Wukong’s house, in his living room.

Wukong had just hopped down onto the carpet when the sound of a large explosion, as well as several things crashing together, resounded from behind him. Macaque’s hands shot up to cover his ears, and they both turned to look at the shadow portal as it shrunk and vanished.

Slowly, Macaque turned to glare at Wukong, the Monkey King letting out a nervous laugh.

“Haha, um, what are the chances that, uh, that was some other possibly magically unstable possibly explosive pair of handcuffs?”