#feather edge panels

[oakviewfencinguk]

Oakview Fencing services offer feather edge fencing panels, designed to enhance the security and appearance of your property in Northampton, UK. Invest in premium fencing solutions for lasting protection. Discover our selection of high-quality fencing products today.

[greensgardenlandscape]

Feather Edge Panel Fencing and Panel Fencing in London: Enhance Your Outdoor Space with Quality Fencing Solutions

When it comes to securing your garden or outdoor space, choosing the right type of fencing is crucial. In London, where properties can range from traditional homes to modern townhouses, the need for a stylish, durable, and functional fence is more important than ever. Two popular options for homeowners are feather edge panel fencing and panel fencing, each offering unique benefits. Whether you want added privacy, a clean look, or protection for your property, understanding these two types of fencing can help you make the right choice.

Feather Edge Panel Fencing: A Classic Choice for Strength and Privacy

Feather edge panel fencing is a traditional and versatile option for homeowners looking for privacy, durability, and a natural look in their garden or backyard. Also known as close-board fencing, it is particularly popular for boundary fencing and creating a secure environment for homes.

Why Choose Feather Edge Panel Fencing?

Durability and Strength Feather edge panels are built to last. The overlapping wooden slats (feathers) are fixed vertically, creating a sturdy barrier that is strong enough to withstand wind, weather, and wear over time. This makes it ideal for areas with exposed conditions, such as gardens near parks or open spaces in London.

Privacy and Security One of the key reasons people opt for feather edge fencing is its ability to provide privacy and security. The overlapping slats form a solid, impenetrable barrier that prevents people from looking into your garden, offering a high level of seclusion and security for your property.

Customizable Heights and Styles Feather edge fencing offers a high degree of customization. You can choose the height of the fence depending on your privacy needs and local regulations. It also lends itself to decorative features, such as trellis tops, which can add a stylish flair to your garden while still providing privacy.

Traditional Appeal With its rustic, natural wood appearance, feather edge fencing blends seamlessly into a variety of garden styles. Whether your home is modern or traditional, the warm tones of wood and the craftsmanship of this type of fence add character and charm to your outdoor space.

Long-Lasting and Low Maintenance Feather edge fencing is made from high-quality timber, which can withstand the test of time when treated properly. With regular maintenance, such as cleaning and re-staining, these fences can remain functional and beautiful for years. It’s an investment that offers both value and longevity.

Panel Fencing in London: A Stylish and Versatile Option for Every Garden

Panel fencing is a popular choice among homeowners in London who want a clean, neat appearance and effective boundary solutions. These pre-made panels come in various designs and are easy to install, making them ideal for homeowners who want a straightforward fencing solution.

Why Choose Panel Fencing?

Simplicity and Ease of Installation Panel fencing is often considered a quicker, easier option compared to other fencing types. The panels are pre-constructed, making the installation process much faster. This is an appealing feature for homeowners who need a fencing solution that can be completed promptly.

Wide Range of Styles Panel fencing offers a variety of styles, from classic close-board panels to decorative panels with intricate designs. Whether you prefer a traditional look or something more modern, there are options to suit every aesthetic. You can also opt for slatted panels, which allow light to pass through and create a contemporary, open feel.

Affordable and Cost-Effective Panel fencing is often more budget-friendly compared to other fencing options, making it a great choice for homeowners looking for an affordable way to enclose their garden or backyard. With various materials available (wood, concrete, or composite), panel fencing offers flexible options for different budgets.

Privacy and Noise Reduction Like feather edge fencing, panel fencing can also provide a high degree of privacy. Solid panels prevent onlookers from peering into your garden and can help reduce noise from busy streets, making it a perfect choice for homes in urban areas like London.

Low Maintenance Panel fencing requires less maintenance than some other fencing options. While wood panel fences do need periodic treatment to prevent decay, they are relatively easy to maintain, particularly when compared to more intricate or high-maintenance fence types.

Key Differences Between Feather Edge Panel Fencing and Panel Fencing

While both feather edge and panel fencing offer privacy, security, and aesthetic appeal, there are key differences that might influence your choice:

Feature

Feather Edge Panel Fencing

Panel Fencing

Privacy

High level of privacy due to overlapping slats

High level of privacy, especially with solid panels

Durability

Extremely durable, especially in exposed areas

Durable but may require more frequent maintenance

Aesthetic

Rustic, traditional wooden look

Modern and neat, with a variety of styles available

Installation

May take longer to install due to custom fitting

Faster to install as panels come pre-built

Maintenance

Requires periodic maintenance to maintain longevity

Easier to maintain, but may need treatment for wooden panels

Cost

Generally more expensive due to custom work and materials

More affordable, especially for standard designs

Choosing the Right Fencing for Your Property in London

When selecting between feather edge panel fencing and panel fencing, consider the following factors:

Aesthetic Preference: Do you prefer a traditional look (feather edge) or a modern, clean appearance (panel fencing)?

Budget: Feather edge fencing tends to be more expensive due to its bespoke nature, while panel fencing offers a more cost-effective option.

Durability: If you’re looking for a fence that can withstand the elements and provide long-term value, feather edge may be the right choice.

Privacy Needs: Both fencing types provide a high level of privacy, but feather edge fencing is typically denser and may offer more seclusion.

Installation Time: Panel fencing may be quicker and easier to install, making it a great option if you’re working on a tight timeline.

Conclusion

Whether you opt for feather edge panel fencing for a traditional, rustic look or panel fencing for a sleek and contemporary design, both options provide excellent value, privacy, and functionality for your garden or outdoor space in London. Professional installation services ensure that your fence is secure, long-lasting, and perfectly suited to your property’s needs. Investing in quality fencing is a great way to enhance the beauty, security, and privacy of your home while increasing its overall value. So, consider your style preferences, budget, and maintenance requirements to choose the best fencing solution for your needs.

[bokettochild]

I cannot BELIEVE no one told me we had an update!!!!!

Anyways, here's my favorite bits as always, because I need to SCREAM about this one!

The rupee acquisition!

I love how JoJo included that traditional *item acquired* pose that all the Links do, and gave it a reason in the comic (Wind insisting he hold it up is just so fun)

Sky's comment though, "don't spend it all in one place". Isn't that a line you get in Skord when you acquire rupees? The cute little easter eggs here are so fun!

I also really love how Legend is taking an instructional role here, both with Wars and the champion!

While also letting his veteran show

and I love that the rest recognize that! Wild calling Legend "an expert" and actually listening to what he has to say, even if he doesn't agree with it.

I also super like the panels of Twilight's interaction with Legend here

Very eldest and middle sibling discussing the youngest child, and I love it. It reminds us that, even for all the cuteness we got between them in the last arc, Twilight still sees Legend as too rough around the edges, enough that it borders on bullying when it comes to some of the rest, and he's trying to curb that. And Legend is LISTENING, because (as I've said a thousand times) Legend respects Twilight and values his opinion. Twilight is his big brother too now and Legend, while still being himself, genuinely seems to care about his opinion.

Twilight's just tense in general, although why, I think is mostly because of Time's sharp scolding in the last update. Even though he's snapping back at the younger ones, he's not very happy to be snapped at right now, and he's eager to get out from under Time's watchful eye.

Time and Warriors

Because while he feels e has grounds to correct Legend for telling Wild what to do, Warriors straight up subtly scolding his protege is different. And the difference is that Legend and Wild and Twi had camaraderie (see Dawn p.3), they're brothers, but Wars is approaching this as a commander, a captain, and Twi doesn't appreciate that. Warriors isn't their leader though, but he's taking that role anyways. (Old habits die hard, I'm sure)

I mean, we all knew Wars was going to confront Wild sooner or later, but I'm glad he was so calm about it. Twilight's ruffled feathers (fur) is more from Time being overbearing, I believe, so it aggravates any slight annoyance Warriors might present.

Even despite some of our suspicions earlier, I like this bit here. Wild was a soldier once, and the captain is very much the image of what he would have worked with before. JoJo mentioned wanting to play with that dynamic, with them bothering having military background, and I think this is that training (hundred years ago though it was) kicking in and making the champion defer to the man who outranks him (as far as they know). Granted, they all call Wars "Captain" but this felt pointed.

I do love Four acting as the word of wisdom here, advising Time, just like he does Twilight, as to the best way to handle a team. it's a reminder that he's done this before, and he knows how teamwork can be, but also that sometimes you need space and working together means working in different areas.

Anyways, here's a couple bonus things that make me happy!

Bunny stance!

(shh, I know he's making a point by stepping on Wild's toes, let me have this)

Wars being so freaking pretty! Dear Hylia help me! (Is it wrong I understand Cia a bit now?)

Wind being the youngest sibling who is Done With Your Chatter

A competent boy being competent (and not as experienced as Ledge, but pretty darn close (if you've played both their games you know))

Showing off items! (I can hear the little ✨da nana na✨)

And of course, I love Time being a tired, overprotective parent (he looks like my mom here, good grief!)

[hoonigiris]

— bye bye my blue

y. jungwon x f!reader

wc: 2.3k genre: hurt/comfort, angst content: reader is older than jungwon (reader is called noona), insecurities, relationship growing pains and they're both horrible at communication. but they're growing!! and they're growing together :') misc. notes: title inspired by bye bye my blue by baek yerin :)part one of my jungwon noona anthology series, birds of a feather.

on a tuesday afternoon, jungwon finds you on the bathroom floor.

somehow, he knows something is wrong before he sees it, a weird feeling twisting in his gut the moment he opens the door to your apartment. the shades are still drawn, there’s a half-eaten bowl of food still sitting on the counter, and, most importantly, you’re not there. you’re not anywhere—not on the couch, not in your room, not in the kitchen. the door shuts behind him, a disturbance in the air.

it’s too quiet.

jungwon stops at the doorway, slipping off one shoe at a time. and then, carefully, he opens his mouth. “noona?”

it sits in the open air for a moment, waiting, and then he tries again, the feeling in his gut creeping up his throat. “noona, are you here?”

he steps further into your apartment, about to call your name one more time, until something rustles in the bathroom. jungwon stops, ears straining. a beat of silence. he steps forward, avoiding the single creaky wooden panel three feet from the door, socked feet practically sliding across the floor to avoid any unnecessary noise, until he hears it again.

a small sniffle, the ghost of a shaky breath echoing in the bathroom and trickling out from underneath the door. jungwon’s bag immediately drops from his shoulders. 

you’re hurt, his head starts blaring.

his right foot moves first. and then his left. and before he knows it, he’s stumbling through the hallway towards the bathroom on instinct alone. jungwon’s hip rams into the edge of the corner table placed at the beginning of the hallway, a loud bang as it slams in the wall behind it. he registers it distantly, the noise, the burst of pain that shoots into the bone, but it doesn’t matter. none of it does, not when you’re holed up in the bathroom, all alone.

his hand flies to the doorknob, heart in the pit of his stomach—and he stops.

the voice in his head is still screaming at him to hurry, you’rehurtyou’rehurtyou’rehurt—but the metal lies cool against the heat of his palm, and jungwon takes a deep, shaky breath. he forces his panic to dilute into something more palpable, more manageable, to where he can swallow it down from the back of his throat to his chest and think.

he can’t force his way in, not if you didn’t want him to. whatever hurt he feels at that thought, jungwon shoves aside in favor of leaning his forehead against the wood, one hand clutched at the doorknob, the other raising slowly in a closed fist.

jungwon knocks once, then twice. he calls your name tentatively again, fragile as his lips form around the word. he hopes it’s enough to pass through the door, the walls you’ve yet to let down, the ones you still haven’t let him walk through.

he can’t tell if the silence that follows after is contemplation or guilt or embarrassment, but even so, he knocks again anyway. “noona, are you there?” please. “can i come in?” please, just let me in.

and again, nothing. jungwon tries to discern the silence, pressing his ear flush to the door trying to pick up any sign that you were okay, but it’s hard to tell when all he can hear is the thumping in his own chest, the blood pounding in his ears.

there’s a sort of shame that ripples in jungwon, stifling in his chest.

the gap between you and him is something he rarely forgets, with the way you shower him in adoration and praise him until his cheeks flush cherub-like. stubbornly, he wants to be more, but all jungwon has done is wait. he makes himself patient and he waits for the moment where you will finally let him see anything deeper than the smile you give him every day, where you stop seeing him as the younger boyfriend and someone to take care of and instead see him as someone you can rely on instead, where you tell him your thoughts and worries and peel back your layers and trust that jungwon will handle your rawest form with care.

he’d thought that maybe if he proved that he was good enough, capable enough, then you’d eventually let him in. but jungwon had convinced himself of that months ago, and now it’s come to this. you, locked in your bathroom and crying alone, and him, outside and still waiting.

(maybe the problem really is him. maybe even after all this time, he still isn’t the man you need him to be. perhaps you don’t really need him at all.)

“noona,” jungwon tries again, quietly, slumped against the wood. “please.” even if you didn’t need him, he needs you, still. “just let me know if you’re okay.”

something shifts, at that. the rustling of clothes on the other side of the door, a shaky exhale. jungwon would have been satisfied with that, really, his hand slipping from the doorknob and the offer to just go back home ready to leave from his lips along with his heart placed bleeding at the doorway. but instead:

“you can come in.” it’s so quiet it’s almost a whisper, the echo of the bathroom muffled through the door, but it’s the clearest thing jungwon has heard all day.

a few seconds pass, and the door creaks open, light spilling out into the hallway. a lump immediately forms in jungwon’s throat.

sat in the middle of the bathroom floor, a crumpled white button-up shirt between your hands, you look like a mess. red-rimmed and puffy-eyed, you stare up at him with a distinct quiver in your lip, like the mere sight of him sent your hastily reconstructed sand castle walls crumbling again. but you gather yourself again quickly, patting down any loose pieces of sand into form and pulling your lips into a sheepish smile.

“hi, wonie,” you greet, embarrassment peeking through. your cheeks are still wet, shining in the light when you tilt your head up at him. “you’re back early.”

jungwon used to think the worst thing he’d have to overcome was never being able to see any version of you but the perfectly curated mask you try to show him, but he thinks this is worse. to finally see you like this, and to have you look back at him as if you’d been caught, like being vulnerable was akin to some wrongdoing, like you’d been spotted with your hand in the cookie jar and he was the uninvited witness.

“ahh…” you breathe out, laughing. “i guess there’s no point in hiding it now.” there’s a certain look of guilt in your smile when you look at him that makes jungwon’s gut twist. “sorry you had to see me like this.”

“that’s not—” jungwon tries, but whatever that was supposed to come out next lodges in his throat, somewhere between breath and speech. “don’t—don’t apologize.”

your smile falters a little, hands falling into your lap. another ‘sorry’ gets lost between the two of you, mute at his admonition.

it feels a bit like a scolding, with how you avert your eyes from him and stare at the ground, and jungwon feels even more at a loss. he looks at you and then the shirt and then back at you again, running over anything he could possibly say to soothe over the awkward silence. and then, finally, “what happened?”

jungwon barely hears himself say it, the whisper so faint he’s not sure he even voiced it at all. you blink, eyes wet. your lip catches between your teeth deliberating, before you exhale.

“it’s okay,” you shake your head. you smile at him again, half-hearted and consoling. “it was stupid, don’t worry about it.”

your smile falls the second you see the look in his eyes, the hurt he can’t control that displays clear on his face. jungwon reels it in quickly, but you try to mend the wound before it can fester further.

“i spilled my coffee on my shirt,” you confess, holding up the stain. “i, um… i couldn’t get it out.” you look down at it again, and then back up at him, sheepish. “see, i told you it was stupid.”

there’s more to it, jungwon knows there is. a stain on some shirt of yours wouldn’t warrant breaking down into tears and sobbing in the bathroom; there was something you weren’t telling him, something you were deliberately hiding from him.

the last thing he ever wants to do is pressure you into divulging what you’re not ready to reveal, but how could he let it go now? how could he see you like this with his own eyes and turn away like he saw nothing at all?

“what happened?” he repeats, gently.

the question presses into you further, and you shake your head softly. “i told you—”

“do you trust me?” he interrupts, still quiet. do you trust me enough to lay yourself bare? do you trust me enough to know that you could let yourself crumble and i would still be there to catch you? do you trust me enough to take care of you?

your eyes dart to him immediately, panic splayed on your face. it’s like you can sense something falling apart, you or him or both, together, but you immediately try to patch it together again. maybe it was just in your nature. “what? of course i—i love you. i love you so much, you know that.”

your bottom lip stiffens as soon as the confession sounds, the sudden, unfiltered vulnerability resulting in you hiding the way your lip wobbles as you avert your gaze away, blinking away glassy eyes. you’re holding back your tears, again. 

jungwon swallows hard.

(distantly, he wonders if this is all he is to you, someone you have to hold back for.

love and trust aren’t the same thing, and equating the two isn’t much of an assurance when something ugly and resentful has been curling in his chest ever since he stepped foot into your apartment; not at you, but at himself.

must you carry the weight of him along with everything else? is this all he is good for? to only see you in your good moments and be kept in the dark as you handle everything all by yourself in the bad?)

but you sniffle, an instinctive jerk of the body you can’t hide, and he pushes the ugly, resentful thing in his chest aside. jungwon steps forward, bit by bit. he can wallow in his failings another time—all that matters right now is you. 

“what can i do?” he asks, finally, open-eyed and pleading.

a part of him wonders if he can even do anything, if you even want him to do anything for you, or if he’ll be thrown back into his regular pattern of waiting. waiting for you to come to him, waiting to be let in again as you cast him out yet again to deal with everything on your own. 

he can’t demand anything of you, but right now, he wishes you would just lean on him, if only a little; he wishes you would ask him for something, anything. he wishes you would want to.

jungwon can’t do anything you don’t ask him too. it haunts him, this constant fear of being a burden to you, to be helpless even when he’s trying. his attempts are nothing but clumsy and stumbling, and it wouldn’t be anything but more trouble on your plate if he extends his hand and you don’t need it, you don’t want it. you'd both be left with something lingering in empty space with no one to claim it.

but perhaps his desperation to not be helpless gets to you too, because you take a shaky breath, clutching the shirt tighter between your fingers. and then, quietly: “can you just hold me? please?”

jungwon moves forward without a sound, kneeling down to the floor and taking you in his arms. the shirt falls down into your lap as you wrap your arms around him and hold yourself tight to his chest. neither of you say anything—perhaps you don’t know how to say it. or maybe, there’s nothing else that needs to be said, not at this moment.

you grab onto him like a lifeline, gasping out the beginning of sobs that threaten to rip out from your chest again, and jungwon sits there, letting you. he doesn’t need an apology, he doesn’t need an explanation. some would call it selfish, maybe, to have you taking what you please when you find it suitable, but the selfish you is what jungwon has been searching for this whole time.

jungwon wants you to be selfish of him. he wants you to want him for yourself, even if it’s just to be there with you. he'll let you take as much as you need from him, because it isn’t taking if he’s giving it to you.

later, after the tears have all dried, you will tell him the truth. at least, the parts of it you can properly articulate. how the coffee stain was the last straw of a shitty day in a shittier week, how you didn’t want to trouble him by complaining about something you hoped would soon pass, how you never dropped any mention of having a hard time to him because when you were together, everything else didn’t really matter that much anymore.

it wasn’t a matter of trust. just love.

but for now, on a tuesday afternoon on the bathroom floor, you hold him tight as you cry, and you let him hold you back.

[fanaticsnail]

You Kissed the Clown? Part 1

(S1:E2 OPLA timeline)

Upon waking, you found yourself in an unfamiliar environment. Stuffed into a small crate with your three travelling companions, your dark haired friend referred to as a “crew”, your senses were still groggy from the crimson powder exploded above your small rigging.

After your “Captain”, Luffy, disclosed to the group he had consumed the map to the grand line to “keep it in a safe place”, the crate opened to reveal a darkened space. Applause rang throughout the area and your eyes were drawn to a spotlight being placed on a man dressed as a white lion. Several circus-type performers littered the room and directed the large crowd to respond with prompts written on large white panels held by several members. You noticed the features of the crowd were bearing terrified expressions, crying streaks littering their cheeks and some crusted over wounds adorning their faces and bodies.

Through the small opening of the red and white tent, a displeased figure appeared out of the shadows. You were immediately mesmerised by the figure, brightly coloured facial paint adorning his cartoonish features, a large brim hat with blue tassels hung over the folded edge and a collection of mismatched stripes, spots, fur and feather upon his physique. He had a dangerous air around him, full of malice, ill-temperament and a small amount of desperation amongst his features.

The blue haired man immediately berated his companions, yelling at them for the wrong timing, the queue being off, the lighting contrasting over a lion-like man instead of his own features. You looked to your green-haired swordsman companion, making brief eye contact with him and quirking up your brow in question. He shook his head at you and nodded back to bring your attention to the scene playing before you.

You had no idea how you were among this ragtag trio of misfits, especially as piracy was never an occupation you fancied for yourself. You and those within your family line were skilled jewellers; antiquity restoration, appraisal and fine gold and silver smithery was your trade. You and your father were requested to appear before Captain Morgan and add a new gem encrusted embellishment to his recently acquired new head for his Axe-Hand.

You witnessed the fight that was brought out with Helmeppo and several other marines at the skilled hands of Roronoa Zoro. At that point, your father decided he was no longer going to be working with Captain Morgan; no payment was enough to continue working for a man that allowed his child to bully those lesser than him. You were given a choice then to find your own way in the world and bring attention to your own skilled crafts or to sail home with your father to return to work in the shop as a finery smith. Opting for the former of the two, you bid farewell to your father and found yourself upon the small rigging with three companions of whom you had grown fond of.

Bringing you away from your thoughts and tuning back into the conversation, your gaze fell to your orange-haired friend, Nami, as she attempted to bribe the blue-haired clown with a new crew member with untold abilities. Before you could stop her, she threw Luffy’s straw hat into the air and bolted for the opening of the large tent. Two members of the circus crew managed to drag her back to the group which she then berated the jester before you for destroying the town the tent was situated in. The conviction she held in her voice sounded quite intimidating, but the clown just laughed in response. He used a small knife to cut a piece of apple and place it into his mouth, while nonchalantly saying he didn’t destroy everything in the town – he allowed the townspeople to keep their hands to applaud his act.

You inhaled through your nose deeply and widened your eyes at his comment, breathing out slowly through your mouth while fixating your gaze onto his relaxed form. He continued to look over the four of you with a twinkling smile as he consumed his crisp apple before his gaze fell over you.

“You,” he began, pointing at you with the small knife in his hand, “you have been awfully quiet.” He gestured to the rest of the crew with the same knife, “that one threatened me,” he said pointing at Zoro, “that one attempted to bribe me,” he pointed the knife at Nami while sauntering over to the spot you were situated, next to Luffi and Zoro.

“Your Captain lays claim to what’s rightfully mine,” he continued while stalking your form. Your eyes leave his form to look to your companions.

“Don’t you look away from me!” he yelled suddenly at you, causing you to flinch in response. Your body began to tremble slightly at his demands, not used to threats of great violence being thrown at you at a whim. He almost danced over to your place on the ground, bringing his body within an uncomfortable proximity to your own. He made no effort to hide his gaze raking over your body from the hair on your head to the shoes adorning your feet.

Although he had a large nose that immediately drew your attention to it, you couldn’t help but to notice the hue of his irises hidden amongst white, red and blue paint. The intensity of his gaze was drawing you in like a moth to a flame. The hue was akin to several fine gemstones you worked with in your family’s smithery. Jade, sapphire, tourmaline and emerald being the first stones that sprung to your mind while gazing at the angry and menacing clown before you.

“And what would you do, hm?” he condescendingly smirked at you, “you’re no fighter, by the looks of you.”

You held his gaze, staring deeply into his mischievous teal eyes while searching your mind for a response to his pointed question. He placed the small knife into his breast-pocket within his long fur coat and stalked slowly over to you like an animal prowling over to their meal. You trailed your eyes over his form slowly, raking and sizing him up with a small amount of unbridled suggestion held behind your eyelids.

Unsure if what came over you was bravery, stupidity or something else entirely, you reached your right hand forward and swiftly grasped the mustard coloured cravat hanging tightly from his neck and pulled him into you with all of your strength and successfully closed the distance between your bodies.

He was right of course, you were no fighter. Your skills lay in appraising fine metals, gemstones and hand whittled crafts. You read books filled with fairytales, poetry and refrains whispered between lovers. With your occupation, an aura of charisma would often aid in sales; whether you were doing the buying or the selling. You were known far and wide in your homeland as someone with a small amount of flirtatious charm, which was why you were asked to aid your father in his journey to the “tight-pocket” Captain Morgan. You were to charm him as you did many others, swindling them out of their apprehensions and bringing more berry to the till of your family’s business.

A shocked whimper left the lips of the Genius Jester as you tenderly placed your own lips against his, bringing your left hand to his side and using it to bring his body flush against your own, cradling him into a tender embrace. Your eyes were closed as you deepened the kiss shared between you. You began using your lips to open his and caressing them slightly with your tongue.

You slowly felt him relax into your embrace as he placed one hand to the back of your head and the other hand wove itself around you, placing it to the small of your back. He almost gently laced his gloved hand into your hair and held you tightly against him. He released a stifled gasp into your mouth as the hand on your lower back squeezed slightly, pressing your bodies closer together. You released your right hand and moved it tenderly from his cravat to his jaw, feeling the slightly prickled skin beneath his painted face.

Not a word was uttered, silence engulfing the space. In this instance, nothing existed to either of you apart from the moment you were sharing with one another. The map? Gone from both of your minds as you held each other tenderly. You arched your back, pressing your chest further into him as you began lacing your fingers into the hair peaking out from the bottom of his broad hat. You snaked your left hand around his waist, beneath his fur coat and raked your fingertips over his skin, causing him to moan into your mouth and cradle you further into him.

You utilized your head to nudge his own head upward for you to deepen the kiss further. Trailing your hand from the hair under his hat down towards his neck and exploring his pectorals, you massaged down his body while holding him tightly and skillfully in this heated embrace. Your fingers began to explore the flesh of his back, lifting the material slightly to expose his flesh to your administrations.

He did not withhold any sounds from escaping his lips, as small groans released from his lips between kisses alerted you to how much he was truly enjoying your touch. You even allowed some gasps to escape your own lips as you continued to caress, massage and cradle him to yourself as he held you.

You were not foreign to the romantic touch of others by any means, but this kiss felt unlike anything you had experienced prior. You could almost feel his desire for affection as he hungrily held your body against him. Waves of loneliness escaped from his form and onto you as he began to be filled instead with your freely given affection, unlike the painted women he would pay berry for their time.

He groaned slightly and furrowed his brows together at the thought, releasing your lips from his own and holding you to him. His eyes bore into your own as your lips parted from one another, almost gazing into your very soul with the intensity he held.

Without warning, he pushed you from his body and swatted your hands from their position on his back. He turned to face away from you and brought his gaze to your captain before monologuing.

“Ok, here end the theatrics,” he began as the spot lights filter onto the four of you.

“I know one of you have my map, and I’m gonna get it back,” he said with malicious intent.

“What was it you said, rubber boy? That it was ‘in a safe place’?” he mocked with a small glint in his eye. Luffy looked to you in confusion.

“Oh, don’t look so surprised. I have eyes and ears everywhere,” he laughed. You trailed your eyes over his features, noticing the paint over his lips appeared more smudged than it had been moments prior. You then began to imagine how your face may appear after you shared the kiss with him moments prior.

“So,” he clapped his hands together and looked to his gang of circus members, “please make our guests uncomfortable in the green room.”

You felt hands clasp your wrists. You looked around to see a large man in a leotard grasping your form before you looked back to the clown. Your eyes met briefly once more, an unfamiliar emotion that could almost be described as a combination apprehension, longing and desire located in his eyes as your body was dragged to another location, this time without your captain amongst you.

You held little resistance as your body was escorted away. You looked to Luffy once more and attempted to reassure him with a nod as you walked briskly to be caged with your friends.

Nami was placed in a small cage suspended above the ground, whereas Zoro was bound to a large spinning wheel. As they were placed into these positions, their movements protesting and making it difficult for your captors to place them in these restricting positions; you held no such apprehension.

An aura of calm was coming from your form, confusing the large leotard-clad man. You placed your wrists together and held them out in front of you with a shrug and almost taunted him with how easy you were making this for him. His brows knit together in a puzzled fashion as he began to bind your hands in rope and tie you to a post away from your companions.

Once successfully restrained, the circus people left you with your thoughts as cries of laughter were echoing to the chamber that sounded like it was being pulled from the mouth of your captain.

“You kissed the clown?” uttered your green-haired, tri-sword wielding companion in a low accusatory tone, “why did you kiss the clown?”

You laughed slightly at the question, looking down at your bonds as you wiggled your hands against the tightly clasped rope, testing it for any sort of weakness amongst the restraint.

“I honestly can say I have no idea,” you smiled while pressing your knee against the post you were bound to with a small shove to assess its strength.

“It was incredibly stupid,” Nami commented from her enclosure, “if you were that touch-starved, I’m sure Zoro or Luffy wouldn’t have minded if you wanted to give them a little smooch.”

You turned your gaze over to Nami momentarily before rolling your eyes.

“Oh please,” you replied, “Zoro, I’m sure you are a wonderful kisser but unfortunately you don’t quite have what I’m looking for.”

He scoffed slightly at the comment while you moved your hands down to the hilt of your belt and began searching the folds of your skirts with your wrists.

“And if you don’t mind me asking, what does the dangerous clown-man have that Zoro doesn’t?” Nami asked with a teasing tone. Your wrists find the object within your belt and you smiled broadly, gripping it and bringing it to the light.

“Right now?” you said with a small twinkle in your eyes as you held the small object up to your new friends, "a knife."

For the first time in a while, the three of you shared a laugh before you all began to attempt an escape from the bonds of the green room.

Part 2

[chic-a-gigot]

Mode-palace : album mensuel des dernières créations parisiennes. No. 12, décembre 1905, Paris. Planche coloriée 983. Toilettes de cérémonie. Bibliothèque nationale de France

Première figurine. — Toilette pour dame d’un certain âge, en velours "prune de Monsieur". Jupe en forme, légèrement froncée à la taille et garnie d’un entre-deux de belle guipure ourlé de velours noir. Corsage drapé, garni de petites barrettes de velours arrêtées sous des boutons en stras et de grands revers en guipure, bordés d’un biais de velours noir. Guimpe en mousseline de soie ocrée, plissée. Manches drapées dans un bracelet froncé, avec tête, et volantées de fine dentelle. Chapeau en velours « prune», garni d’un oiseau coq de roche.

First figure. — Ensemble for a lady of a certain age, in "Monsieur's plum" velvet. Shaped skirt, slightly gathered at the waist and trimmed with a beautiful guipure insert hemmed with black velvet. Draped bodice, trimmed with small velvet barrettes stopped under rhinestone buttons and large guipure lapels, edged with a black velvet bias. Wimple in ochre silk muslin, pleated. Sleeves draped in a gathered bracelet, with head, and ruffled with fine lace. Hat in "plum" velvet, trimmed with a cock-of-the-rock bird.

Métrages: velours, 14 mètres; entre-deux, 4 mètres; velours noir, 0m50.

—

Seconde figurine. — Toilette de cérémonie. Jupe en tulle noir pailleté, découpée et incrustée sur un haut volant de chantilly blanc. Le tout monté sur fond de jupe en satin blanc. Corsage en tulle pailleté, découpé sur une blouse de chantilly blanc, faisant pans d’habit. Petit col-revers en velours noir. Gilet et ceinture en satin souple vert très pâle. Manches découpées sur un fond de chantilly blanc, avec nœud de velours. Chapeau en velours noir, garni dune belle plume amazone vert pâle.

Second figurine. — Ceremonial ensemble. Skirt in black sequined tulle, cut out and inlaid on a high flounce of white chantilly. The whole mounted on a white satin skirt background. Bodice in sequined tulle, cut out on a white chantilly blouse, forming panels of the dress. Small lapel collar in black velvet. Waistcoat and belt in very pale green soft satin. Sleeves cut out on a white chantilly background, with velvet bow. Hat in black velvet, trimmed with a beautiful pale green Amazon feather.

Métrages: tulle noir, 5 mètres; chantilly, 5 mètres; satin, 0m80.

[drunkenmantis]

minimalistic Good Omens art - Breakdown

A little design breakdown and why i did what i did on my minimalistic Good Omens art

Gold: the gold is the connection both Aziraphale and Crowley have to there angel side (crowley being a former angel) --> Aziraphale still being an Angel has his Halo still in one piece while Crowley being a fallen Angel has his broken and in pieces.

black: chosen from Crowleys main appearance with his clothing choice, also stands for him being a fallen angel

"aggressive" red: stands for Hell and references Crowleys hair

beige/almost white: pulled from Aziraphales main appearance with his clothing choice and him being an angel. I also went against a complete white to show that Aziraphale is not a typical "pure" angel

grey/blue: stands for heaven and is a reference to Aziraphales eye color.

Everything on Crowleys side is supposed to scream energy and a sense of "brokenness", that's why i depict him with sharper edges, pointy ears and nails, a broken Halo more animalistic snake eyes and the feather are thinner and pointier.

On Aziraphales side I wanted to bring out a more soft, angelic and friendly welcoming tone to equal out Crowley. I tried to give him a more "round" and soft feel, like a teddy you wanna pick up and cuddle. His wings are also rounder and "fluffier". His eyes are a bit smaller than Crowleys and of cause human like.

I always insert a details in the color of there counterpart to break up the overall composition and not make it overwhelmingly "one sided", also to symbolise how deeply they are connected to each other.

Another thing i reference with the composition is a dyptich. "As an art term a diptych is an artwork consisting of two pieces or panels, that together create a singular art piece these can be attached together or presented adjoining each other. In medieval times, panels were often hinged so that they could be closed and the artworks protected." -Wikipedia

Aziraphale is always depicted on the left because he is an Angel "and sits on Crowley right shoulder" Crowley is always depicted on the right because he is a Demon "and sits on Aziraphales left shoulder"

[separatist-apologist]

The Prophecy

Summary: No one has seen or heard from Elain Archeron in two months…until she turns up one day in the Spring Court with no memory of where she's been or what she's been doing.

Tamlin and Lucien will have to work together to untangle the mystery of Elain's missing memories.

My gift for @olenvasynyt- but other people can read, too?

@acotargiftexchange

Read on AO3 | Chapter 1 | Chapter 2

-

Elain had nearly untangled Tamlin’s chain of wards when they all just came crashing down. Lucien strode into the library, eyes blazing and for a second she was certain the whole thing was her fault. She’d pulled them too quickly and they were all aware it was her meddling. Lucien didn’t say a word, jaw set, as he reached for her wrist.

She didn’t have time to say a word—there was merely yanking, and then…somewhere new. Somewhere nice, if not a little dusty smelling. The floral paper on the walls wasn’t peeling or scratched, the paneling on the walls intact, the tile immaculate. 

“Where are we?”

“Yew Tree Manor,” Tamlin said, appearing out of nowhere. He was dressed well—his long, blonde hair was neatly styled in a ponytail and someone had trimmed the edges. His beard was gone, replaced with smooth, tanned skin that made him look ten years younger. Combined with his pine green tunic and well-fitted pants, he looked the part of a noble born son. Maybe not a High Lord, but close.

She could certainly see what Feyre had liked. Tamlin exuded strength and power and was handsome if you like that kind of thing. Elain wasn’t certain she did, and wasn’t willing to examine what she did like lest her eyes turn toward the man currently holding her wrist. 

“Why are we here?”

“So you can go outside,” Lucien informed her, as if that were a sentence that sounded normal. Even Tamlin winced a little, hearing the words spoken aloud. 

“We got you something,” Tamlin added, eyes bouncing from Elain and to Lucien. He beckoned for her to follow, and so she did, relieved she hadn’t been caught with the wards. Her secret was safe, at least for the moment. 

There was nothing but lush, rolling hills in every direction. No woods that led to the human lands—the steepled rooftops of a nearby village blurred in the distance, though Elain didn’t believe she’d be allowed off-leash to wander that far. Still, it was a goal—if she could get away from them, she could run to the village and ask for help. 

Elain momentarily forgot that when Tamlin presented the gift he and Lucien had apparently decided on it for her. She turned to look at Lucien, who had his hands jammed in his pockets, cheeks flushed with what seemed to be embarrassment.

“You got me a chicken?” she asked, looking at the brown hen cradled in Tamlin’s hands. 

“I told you to get the kitten,” Lucien hissed. Elain didn’t know what to make of the whole thing. They’d conspired? To get her a gift? She didn’t know a thing about raising animals, though it was one hen. How difficult could it be? No one had ever given her something half so strange, and yet thoughtful at the same time. 

“I thought you ah…” Lucien rubbed the back of his neck as Tamlin nodded his head with encouragement. What was happening? “I thought you could start a garden.” “We have vegetable seeds,” Tamlin added.

“I’ve never grown food,” Elain informed them flatly, walking toward Tamlin to take the bird. She didn’t know what she expected, and yet the feathers were soft and the little creature rubbed its face against her bare arm. Elain was in love despite herself—something about those watery, beady eyes made her hate Lucien and Tamlin just a little less than before. 

“Flowers?” Tamlin asked, a note of irritation creeping into his voice. Why did she enjoy that? He wasn’t talking to her like she was a stupid child, she realized. Neither of them were, but Lucien never had so there had never been any expectation that he would. Rhys, and Helion that one time he’d come to visit, always talked to her like a child.

Tamlin was visibly frustrated with her unwillingness to accept this kindness, even though it came with strings.

“I’m allowed outside?” she heard herself ask petulantly. Perhaps she was no better than a child—but he’d kidnapped her, effectively, and she didn’t think she had to be nice about it. 

“Yes,” Lucien said. Elain looked outward again, catching the iridescent shimmering of the wards that domed overhead, woven in a far more intricate fashion than they’d been in the manor. She glanced back at Lucien, whose aura had shifted from its usual sunny orange to a brighter shade of red. When Rhys was that color, it meant he was angry, though Lucien didn’t seem mad at all.

He was watching her, though, with an intensity that made her want to squirm where she stood. Did she suspect her? 

Be casual.

“The illusion of freedom, then,” she grumbled.

“You could tell us why Rhys sent you here—”

“He didn’t send me anywhere!” Elain exploded, stamping her foot on the ground. So much for not being treated like a child, she thought ruefully. Her temper had merely bested her. 

“I don’t believe you,” Tamlin informed her dismissively.

“You really believe Rhys entrusted me with anything?” she asked, turning pleading eyes to Lucien. “You honestly think that?”

Lucien winced. No, he didn’t. Not deep down. 

“I believe he’d use you if he thought you were the only one we wouldn’t suspect,” Tamlin informed her, cocking his head to the side. “And I think he’d send you if he wanted Lucien’s cooperation.”

She wanted to scream. A pawn—that’s all she’d ever been, and everyone, even Tamlin, seemed to realize it. Her anger was a vicious thing, clawing at her chest and burning the back of her throat. She tried to swallow it, but her pounding heart made it almost impossible. Elain was so, so tired of being small, of feeling afraid, of being pushed here and there and everywhere else regardless of what she wanted. 

“You believe that because you’re stupid,” she declared, stating the words as though they were simple facts. Tamlin bared his teeth, canines elongating as Lucien strode forward, one arm outstretched to keep Elain and Tamlin from shredding each other to ribbons. 

“When he finds me—”

“He’ll lock you right back up,” Tamlin interrupted, his own anger getting the better of him, too. “Just like you’ve been. Or is the illusion of freedom acceptable when it's your own sister doing it?”

“You have no right—”

“I think I do,” Tamlin interrupted a second time, chest rising and falling rapidly. “I think I do have the right to speak about it, given everything your sister did and every criticism she laid at my feet. You are not leaving my court until I’m assured you’re telling the truth—you can return to your gilded cage right after.”

“It’s not a cage,” Elain whispered, some of her anger flopping to her feet with a wet smack. Of all the people to be right, she thought angrily. Elain still held her chicken, which seemed content enough against her chest. 

“And when you leave…nobody follows you?” Tamlin asked, already knowing the answer.  

Lucien was listening intently. Elain looked down at her shoes, because yes, she was followed. Sometimes someone would just spontaneously offer to join her—Cassian, for example, always came with her if he was nearby, even if he just spent the whole time talking without making a purchase.

But more often than not, Azriel or one of his spies would tail her. She wouldn’t see them, but she could feel their presence. She’d tried slipping out unnoticed, telling no one her plan, making her way out back doors, or other little tricks that, in the end, didn’t matter. Elain was fairly certain she was watched everywhere she went, and Rhys likely got a report on how often she walked between the kitchen and her bedroom each day.

“I had a life, once,” she heard herself say. Why was she telling them this? 

Pity slithered over Lucien’s features. 

“You don’t have to go back,” Tamlin informed her, chewing on the words. “You could go anywhere else.”

“See the world,” Lucien added softly, with more emotion that she preferred. Elain drew within herself, unable to have this conversation. They were her abductors and she simply didn’t trust them. Elain nodded her head and then turned back for the sprawling estate they were going to live in. Rhys, and Feyre by extension, must not know about it if Tamlin and Lucien were willing to extend her leash. Or Rhys and Feyre were close to finding her, so she’d been moved. There was no way of knowing, and no one to ask—not without raising alarms for Tamlin and Lucien.

She paused in the doorway, her fae ears picking up the remnants of a conversation between Lucien and Tamlin.

“...don’t have to be so harsh—”

“Maybe people should stop lying and coddling her,” Tamlin snapped back. “She’s a grown woman, not a child.”

“...new…deserves kindness—” 

She didn’t finish listening beyond that. Her plan remained the same. Untangle the wards, make a run for it, and then…and then…

You don’t have to go back,

See the world.

The thought of doing so alone terrified her, but maybe…maybe she should. Elain tried to imagine explaining this to her sisters and their stone faces, how they’d gently urge her to come home and then she’d just…be home. Later, it was always later. There was always something more pressing, something that took precedence, and Elain…Elain was simply supposed to wait.

Well, maybe she was tired of that, too. Elain had begged Feyre and Nesta to travel with her back when they’d all been human—flush with what she now understood to be Tamlin’s money—and both of them had put her off.

Graysen had wanted that, though. When she’d told him about her dreams, he’d encouraged her. Agreed to go with her. Had been just as excited, planning out their honeymoon to the continent. Elain’s chest tightened at the memory—she tried to forget about Graysen just as thoroughly as he’d forgotten her, but it was an old wound that hadn’t scabbed over. She’d placed a bandage to stop the bleeding, but if she peeled it back, it would start gushing again.

She’d loved him. So much it had felt earth shattering at the time. Like it could change the fate of the very world itself. Feyre simply didn’t understand, had written him off  because he couldn’t see past the faerie thing which infuriated Elain more than maybe anything Feyre had ever said or done. They’d all been afraid, once—even Feyre, though she liked to pretend otherwise. Elain had been there when Tamlin had come for her sister.

Feyre had been scared, too. Had expected to die. Had been tortured at their hands simply for being human, even. The fae had enslaved them, and even still sometimes slipped across the borders and snatched children or women that were never seen again. The treaty drawn between them was unenforceable and the fae had all the power thanks to their superior numbers and strength. 

Elain had hoped, of course, that Graysen would make an exception for her but she knew what he saw. Her sisters, the winged men with swords, the endless demands on Graysen’s resources without any of the self-awareness to recognize why humans might be afraid of them, still. Just demands. So many demands. 

She’d written to him in the aftermath, had explained things. Graysen hadn’t responded and so Elain was left to pick up the pieces of her shattered heart. She’d thrown herself into learning to bake, to clean, to mend her own clothes after cleaning them. It was all quaint, cute little hobbies to everyone around them, but in the beginning she’d planned to leave them. She’d simply become complacent.

Elain was afraid. 

—

Lucien was grateful for the reprieve. Tamlin and Elain were at the other's throat—the latter angry with the circumstances and the former frustrated to be reminded of his lost love. Lucien might have found it amusing to be caught between an Archeron and the High Lord again had it not been his mate they were currently holding. He was trying to come to terms with the fact she’d never love him.

She’d never like him, either.

It wasn’t lost on Lucien that if he helped Elain slip the Night Court’s grasp, he’d likely never see her again, either. Was it better, or worse, if she never resolved the mating bond? Lucien didn’t know and hoped to never find out. He was a fool, holding out hope there was some magical path between them even in the face of her open loathing. 

Tamlin wanted him to make inroads with Summer, so Lucien was doing just that—and he was taking his sweet time, too. Let Elain and Tamlin rip each other to pieces. He spent that first day napping on the beach, which had resulted in a sunburn across his bare chest, though it was well worth it. 

Tarquin was waiting for him the next morning, shirtless save for the golden collar he wore around his neck and shoulders. “I never thought I’d see you back in Spring,” Tarquin commented casually, falling in step with Lucien.

“Old habits,” Lucien replied with an easy shrug. “Varian can likely do whatever I was on your behalf.”

“I never thought you did anything on my behalf, at least for the Night Court,” Tarquin replied and Lucien was certain he didn’t imagine the sharpness in Tarquin’s tone. “I assume you didn’t come all this way to enjoy my beaches?”

“That’s part of it,” Lucien replied honestly, “but I’ve also come to speak with the old Spring families.”

Tarquin’s blue eyes seemed to sharpen. “Poaching my noble families?”

“Only the ones you stole first,” Lucien agreed with what he prayed was a charming smile. “No hard feelings, just like when they left?”

Lucien hadn’t been around for most of it—a lot of the families that fled to Summer had done so when Tamlin ascended to High Lord. The ones who had fled after Feyre had destroyed Spring had gone to Autumn or Winter rather than admit to the lords of Summer that they’d been right.

Or, that’s what Lucien assumed anyway.

“I can’t fathom why Rhys would want that,” Tarquin quipped, casually clever just as he’d always been. “His spies fly over once a day…one might think they’re mapping something.”

“One might,” Lucien agreed noncommittally, though that was something he hadn’t considered until right that moment. Would Rhys invade Spring? Lucien had always assumed he’d merely attempt to install his own choice as High Lord—a risky maneuver given the magic could be temperamental. 

It still happened—Lucien knew there were nobles in Autumn that had quietly rallied around Eris, looking to depose Beron and install a High Lord they thought would be more favorable to their own goals. Tarquin was truly an upset for Summer just as Helion had been—neither had ever been expected to ascend, and never would had if not for the invasion of Hybern and Amarantha’s meddling 

“A High Lord gaining a foothold in Spring would have easy access to the rest of the island,” Tarquin continued, pulling Lucien from his musings. The air was already warm despite the early morning hour. His hair had begun to stick to the back of his neck, even after he’d braided it off his face. 

“A strong, Spring Court could prevent that,” Lucien agreed amicably. Let me do what I came here for.

Tarquin was quiet for a moment, the sun gleaming from his well-oiled skin. He’d forgone his crown, or anything that might mark him as High Lord save for the way he carried himself. Tarquin was younger than Lucien and yet stood in a way that betrayed centuries of wisdom and scholarly curiosity. He might have been Helions peer for how carefully he maneuvered in the harsh, political landscape of Prythian. And Tarquin’s position was precarious—if Spring fell, his own territory was in trouble.

The second war was proof enough of that. A strong Spring Court protected the other seasonal courts, alongside the humans who no longer had the wall as a buffer between them. Lucien nearly crumbled beneath the weight of the realization they needed more than just a return of the nobility—they needed new laws, new policies, new alliances. The Solar Courts, for example, had long held an alliance with each other when it came to trade and protection.

The Seasonal Courts needed one as well. 

“You’re always welcome in Summer, Lucien Vanserra,” Tarquin finally said as they came upon a fork in the hall. “In any capacity.”

“I appreciate that,” Lucien replied. If he failed in his goals in Spring, he supposed he could always hide in Summer. 

“Tamlin, too,” Tarquin finally added before walking off. They weren’t said so easily—there was anger cut just beneath. Tarquin had lost more than anyone during the second war, and Lucien supposed it was easy to blame Tamlin for it. Lucien wondered how much blame everyone else took on while Rhys somehow managed to get off scot free. 

It shouldn’t have bothered him the way he did, but by the end of the day, Lucien was seething, unable to move past it. Feyre could have just left. She could have been honest from the start, even if it made Tamlin miserable. Maybe she had to leave with Tamlin in order to get everyone out of Hybern, but did she need to destroy everyone's life in the process? Did she need to ruin his? She got to live happily ever after while Lucien had been the betrayer, had been beaten for his lack of loyalty, mocked at every turn, and treated like an outsider despite doing everything asked of him.

Why?

He stormed home that evening, slamming into the office Tamlin had overtaken. Tamlin looked up, staring blankly at a stack of documents that he clearly didn’t know what to do with.

“You’re a piece of shit,” Lucien said.

Tamlin cocked his head to the side. “Do you want to go outside and work this out?”

“I want you to tell me you’re sorry,” Lucien hissed as Tamlin rose to his feet, fists clenched at his side. “I want you to apologize for choosing Feyre over our friendship.”

He thought Tamlin would hit him. Lucien was prepared for it, bracing himself as Tamlin came closer.

“I’m sorry,” he said, the words strangled and stilted. “But I loved her. I still—”

Some of Lucien’s anger lessened. I still love her.

That was the crux of the matter, wasn’t it? They both loved her, in their way, and they were both coming to the slow realization that she didn’t love them. Maybe she had, once, in her small, fragile, human way. Certainly not anymore. They were both waiting for a life that no longer existed except in their memories. The ghosts of the three of them still lingered, watching him and Tamlin grieve with what must have been embarrassment. 

How did they move on? It had barely been anytime at all and yet Feyre had made such an impression, had brought light and life back into their miserable, cursed existence. And then she’d simply left with their shared enemy without a glance back. Did she ever think about it? Lucien did—all the time. It seemed as if everything had fallen apart so quickly, and in the aftermath everyone had been so focused on survival they hadn’t had a chance to think about rebuilding.

Even now, there truly wasn’t time for it. 

“I’m tired of being your enemy,” Lucien told Tamlin, his own half-assed apology. Pride wouldn’t let him say everything he needed to say. Tamlin must have known, nodding his head, jaw set. He wouldn’t ask.

“Then don’t be,” Tamlin said simply. “I could…I need a friend.”

Things could never go back to the way they were, but maybe that was for the best. Lucien considered that, perhaps, there was a new way forward for them. 

“How did it go in Summer?”

Tamlin made his way back to his desk, the window open to allow the bright sunlight to pour inside. Lucien hadn’t been here since…well. Since Jes had died. Tamlin had given him private use of it for a time, during which Lucien had wandered that halls crying at the top of his lungs with noone but the long forgotten gods as his witness.

He could almost hear himself, still. Almost.

The estate itself had belonged to Tamlin’s mother, inherited when they both died. Killed, if Lucien remembered correctly, by Rhysand’s father. Tamlin couldn’t stand the memories, or so he’d said when Lucien had asked why they never visited. Lucien supposed he understood why. Everything had been decorated to her tastes, from the cream and sage rug on the floor to the pink and purple flowers stenciled on the wall. The desk would have been brought in later by Tamlin’s father, who’d apparently worked from Yew Tree Estate during holidays with the family. 

Tamlin eased into the high backed, leather chair with all the comfort of a male that knew he hadn’t been born for this life. In all the centuries Tamlin had ruled, he’d never once grown comfortable with power.

Lucien supposed it was why they got along so well. Lucien was perfectly comfortable in proximity to power—though he was grateful he’d been born seventh, and never had the expectations of the crown. He thought he might crumble beneath the pressure.

Besides, it was far more fun to carouse than it was to be the head of the court. 

“It was disappointing, though illuminating,” Lucien admitted, sitting across from Tamlin. “People are comfortable and unsure—they need someone else to make the first move. Tarquin, though…Tarquin would ally with us. I think he’d loan us gold, too, for rebuilding if it meant we returned to patrolling the border.”

“We have enough gold to pay sentries,” Tamlin said, rubbing his eyes. “If I appoint common males—lesser fae—do I lose all the families we’re courting?”

“Probably,” Lucien acknowledged thoughtfully, “but maybe that’s not such a bad thing. You could elevate loyalists. Give them land, titles, wealth…create a new nobility.”

“That takes time,” Tamlin mused.

“So does begging these fucking blue blooded snobs to come home. We could simply…start over.”

The more Lucien thought about it, the more the idea appealed to him. “Either way it takes time. At least this way you know they’re loyal. You’ll never be able to trust nobility I had to poach from another High Lord.”

“I’ll consider it,” Tamlin murmured, which was a relief. Lucien could have wept at those words. How nice, he thought, to have his expertise listened to. 

“How is Elain?” he asked as he made his way to the door. He wanted to see her.

“Sulking,” Tamlin replied without glancing upward. Just like her sister, was the unspoken addition. 

Lucien almost suggested they return her. Simply weather the rage of Rhys and move on with their lives. He didn’t say it, choosing instead to follow the thread between them until he found her out in the ruined garden. If he gave her back, Lucien knew he’d never be allowed to see her again. For all he knew, Rhys and Feyre could dig around in her mind until she didn’t feel the bond at all, effectively freeing her of him, while torturing him for the rest of his life.

Inevitably, he’d have to let her go, but for now…

“Busy?” he questioned, noting how she’d sectioned off the garden into more manageable plots. Elain was slick with sweat, her sleeves rolled up to her shoulders with a sun hat protecting her from the waning daylight. She was somehow prettier than he was used to, which was not helping him with his coherence. 

“You’re back,” she said, wiping dirt from her hands, still on her knees. 

“Miss me?” he asked, too breathless to sound casual. She didn’t clock it, or at least didn’t acknowledge she’d noticed, which was for the best.

“No.”

Lucien sighed with exaggeration. “Can I help?”

Elain scoffed. “Help with what?”

“I’m pretty good with a hoe,” he told her. “Surely you wouldn’t mind someone else digging out all the weeds?”

“I like digging weeds,” she replied, examining her broken nails. 

“Suit yourself,” he replied, swallowing his disappointment. He’d made it all but three steps back to the house before she called out.

“Wait!”

Lucien’s heart picked up even as he turned slowly to look over his shoulder. 

“I…fine. You can help—on the other side of the garden.”

It was a victory, if nothing else. “I could do that,” he agreed, taking in her wary demeanor. Lucien would spend whatever time she allowed, in whatever capacity. Even if it meant being covered in dirt. “Tomorrow?”

She bit her bottom lip. “You’ll be here?”

He nodded, trying not to jump up and down. She cared, in her small, petulant way, and that’s all he needed. Just a small sliver of hope. 

“I will.”

“Fine. Tomorrow.”

Lucien grinned as if she’d agreed to let him take her out. “Tomorrow it is.”

[witchofthesouls]

Can you explain how preening works on bots? For someone who new to the idea of it.

Preening is a real-life bird grooming behavior that extends the life of their feathers as well as waterproof them using an oil secretion from a gland and a bonding activity, too. Transformers fandom likens the Seekers to birds, so I'm doing my duty and expanding on it lol

For Seekerkin, preening is a grooming behavior that satisfies multiple functions: a social activity for the trine and flock, a necessary and vital part of maintenance to check out the responsiveness and state of their flight systems, and trains the very young or very new on how to handle environmental influx, both passive and active. It's typically guided by the more experienced hand: mentor to student, parent/guardian to child or newbuild, elder to newcomer, trainer to trainee. A pair of hands skims and go over the expanse and edges before using their talons to pick out the slag in the fine seams as they test out various sites and sensor response.

It's an activity that actively builds social cohesion as it takes a lot of trust to allow someone else around appendages packed with a variety of sensors. It feels good as well. Not a sexual pleasure. It's more akin to good massage or very nice body scrub. A great source of stress relief under an at-home health check. Of course, that also fosters relationships between kin, trines, cohorts, and flocks.

Arcee and Bumblebee have their own sensory panels to care for, and it's a job for a second pair of hands. Ratchet has similarities with his own servos.

Miko is too much of a young menace to realize others don't have her own War-Forged physiology, so she's allowed to go ham on the heavier armored Autobots because she's mimicking the care she's receiving.

[dastardly-imbecile]

Thalassophilia

Used to be, you would put your chin on his shoulder and watch him work, whispering ideas in his ears when you wanted to be helpful, whispering other things when you were in the mood for distraction. Galatea carved in statuesque marble, naked and tangled in his sheets, coyly asking him if you were inspiring him.

Now, now you are Aphrodite wreathed in seafoam, beautiful in raw, brutal edges, nestled within the mouth of a clamshell.

---

Elliott loves you, dead at sea. Elliott loves you, somehow still alive. OR an elaborate excuse to make elliott a monsterfucker

---

Wordcount: ~6k

The ocean is poetry. Elliott’s always liked it, ever since he was young, hunched in his father’s wood-paneled office and flipping through old books. Running his fingers over those grainy images, trying to replicate the cool caress of those foam-capped waves, the frailty of life all bundled up in the crash of the surf. It’s why, when he finally set off in pursuit of this authorial lifestyle, he settled beside the sea. It’s worth the grains of sand constantly in his bamboo sheets, it’s worth the crabs that hide in his shoes, it’s worth the constant fight against lichen and mold and moss. 

There is no better feeling than to sit upon the dock as the sun crawls over the horizon, painting the sky in gauzy nectarines and pale creams, sea kissing the undersides of his bare feet. 

Well, it would be a better feeling to be able to share such nirvana with someone else, but as that’s not an option, solitude still has its own kind of beauty. 

Today, like every day, he makes his way down those rickety wooden slats, past Willy’s old shop, now quiet and dark and boarded-up, a great beast stripped down to its skeleton. He wonders if your farm looks the same way, all torn and unkempt, chipping away at the edges. He wouldn’t know. Hasn’t been back to check. 

Leah’s left a bottle of wine on his doorstep, propped up against a paper-wrapped baguette and a small coin of soft cheese. It’s her bohemian version of a mourning casserole, and he leaves them on his porch for now, continuing along in his trek down the beach. 

There, washed up upon the shore, is a plank of driftwood, and his eyes snag on the peculiarity. Most likely, it’s random, something blown into the sea by heavy winds and spat out later, but he can’t quash that niggling bit of curiosity. 

Boy’s a wanderlust, Father’d said, long ago when he was a gangly boy of sixteen and trying to write instead of participate in his class’s mandate of business and economics, no room for the artistry in such high echelons. He hadn’t meant it as a compliment, but Elliott’s taken it as one, repurposed it as one makes feathers into dreamcatchers and seaglass into necklaces, made it something entirely his own. It’s that curiosity that drives him to kneel, using a delicate hand to turn it over. 

The bottom half of the thing is encrusted with barnacles, pulsing softly, exposing their soft inner hearts to the air with each shellbeat. Above that, though, in algae-grown letters, faded gold, it reads Man O’ War. He drops the board like it’s burnt him. 

He remembers Willy on a Thursday night at the saloon, so many months ago, “an’ she fixed it right up! Just like that! My Man O’ War, in sailing shape once again!” 

So it was no coincidence after all. Figures. 

It never is. 

After a long, steadying breath, he picks the plank up again, tucking it under his arm, turns away from the croon of the ocean and towards town proper. 

Lewis is tending to his gardens when Elliot reaches him. He doesn’t announce his presence, simply stands there until the man cottons on—and then, there is a muffled yelp as Lewis stands to find him looming over him. 

“Oh! Elliott!” His eyes drop from his face down to the boat under his arm, and just like that, any pretense of cheer melts away, dripping from the last bristles of his mustache. 

“It washed up this morning,” he says in explanation, drawing it out from under his arm and presenting it to Lewis. It’s soaked his jacket, but he doesn’t particularly mind. These days, he’s not the most well-kept sort of man in any case. All those fancy suits that he’d pilfered from his father falling to tatters, hair tangled and matted in the underareas, dark circles below his eyes, salt crusted in the strangest places, like he himself is being slowly subsumed by the sea. 

Man O’ War, Lewis mouths, a stricken expression falling upon his face, so stark that it’s almost amusing. He stares at it for a long moment, before looking back up at Elliott, then down again. “What do you… ah, what should we do with it?”

“Willy would’ve liked,” he says after a long moment, “To be buried with it, I think. He loved that ship like a wife.”

There’s some thread of morbid humor to be found in that, in the irony, but Elliott can’t bear to find it. 

“Of course,” Lewis assures, “yes, he- I do believe he would have, yes. I’ll… I’ll handle it.”

“Can I come?” Elliott asks. He feels like a little boy, asking, he feels like he is back in Father’s manor, watching him bustle about and unsure how to recapture his attention, he feels like he is unmoored and drifting in that great blue eye they call the ocean. 

“Of course, of course,” Lewis assures, placing a warm, paternal hand upon his shoulder. 

—

It’s up in the mountains, past the railroad, where the dirt roads fade into tall grasses and thin, reedy trees. Far from the town’s own graveyard, down in the center of the plaza, which is a nice place all in its own right—all shaded by tall, graceful oaks, well-trimmed lawn tufting up around many polished stones—but you’d have liked it better here, both of you, he thinks. It’s here that they bury adventurers, that they bury those who died in the mines or the caverns, fighting monsters, defending the sanctity of Pelican Town. 

Though you’d died doing neither, when Lewis’d asked Marlon for permission, the old man nodded solemnly, of course, she was the bravest of us all. And Willy too, for good measure, because he’d shared drinks with the guildmembers at the saloon, and easy enough to spun a tale portraying him as the valiant captain in the midst of some goliath storm. Both of you heroes, both of you dead.  

Marlon’s there when they enter, standing over some ancient looking slab, sword pressed into the ground. He does not even open his eyes as they swish through the path. Best not to disturb his grief. 

Your grave is in a prime spot under the tallest of the trees, like some ancient king slumbering in his enchanted grove. Willy’s is further back, tucked into the crook of the mountain, where Lewis leads. Headstone carved to look somewhat like a mermaid’s figurehead—the combination of Robin and Leah’s best work; he remembers long nights watching the two of them slowly chip away at a massive block of stone—and now, he stands upon the earth, grass ticking his knees through the holes in his pants, wonders if the man dreams of krakens, down in his real grave, deep under the surface of the waves. 

“Burial is hard,” Lewis says after a moment, “but we can- we can erect it here, like a marker, see?” He maneuvers the plank of wood down onto the ground, pushes it slightly into the loamy earth, looks up at Elliott for approval. He nods blankly. “Good,” Lewis says, and then repeats, “good. This… he would’ve liked this.”

“Yes,” Elliott replies simply. Lewis cuts a glance at him from under the brim of his eyelids, shifty, gauging something. 

“The Dance of the Moonlight Jellies is coming up,” he says after a moment, “I hate to spring this on you, Elliott, but… if we should cancel it this year like we did the last, then it’s no imposition, really, I just should inform the-”

“No,” he cuts him off, “no, it’s quite alright. We can host the Dance.”

“Are you sure? I know it’s… it’s quite close to the anniversary, and if-”

“Mother Nature will happen either way,” Elliott replies, “there’s no use in staunching it. Perhaps it will help the mood.”

Lewis nods rapidly, swallowing. “Good idea, yes. I’ll… I’ll begin preparations immediately.”

“I cannot wait,” he replies, using the most emotion that he has at all thus far in this conversation, and truly, he means it. 

—

They’d canceled the Dance, yes, though that was before they’d known you were both gone. After departure to Ginger Island the day before, a kiss upon his cheek and the promise of a return, and then a storm, winds beating against the glass of his cottage, clouds burled overhead. The day of the festival itself, there was the search, setting out upon small sailboats, until chunks of wood began to wash back up upon Pelican Town shores. They’ve kept coming in the months since—half a steering wheel here, a few smoothened shards of glass there, and now, the nameplate. 

Soon, the Gem Sea will run out of pieces of ship to regurgitate onto the beach, and then it will have to start with pieces of body, and he dreads and anticipates that day in equal measure. Grotesque. Morbid. Seems that’s the only way his mind turns these days, though. 

It’s seeped into his writing. He cannot unravel sci-fi epics anymore, cannot slowly turn his way through delicate romances and sprawling fantasy worlds. All he churns out are tales of the macabre, of great monsters in the froth, of waves that stretch high as the heavens and low as the hells. They don’t sell. His editor doesn’t particularly like reading the fifth story that ends in, and then, the sea took them all. 

When he’d complained of this to Leah, she’d frowned, worrying over her bottom lip, and then tried to introduce him to wood carving—said maybe a different avenue of creativity could unclog whatever pipes were malfunctioning. He’d started to, on instinct, make a crude sort of kraken, and she’d taken the knife away from him. 

They’re not malfunctioning, is the truth. They are working exactly as intended: pumping out a thousand gallons of saline, churning the wheels of some great, rotating machine in the depths of his mind. 

Tonight, he hunches over his desk, and writes the only other thing that he can write: a letter. In a hurried script, leaving small, messy drips of ink all over the crumpled parchment. Doesn’t matter. The words have their substance and that is all he needs. 

I love you, he says, and then scratches that out, I still love you, marks it again, I will always love you, before moving onto the next. An exercise in revision, in making it perfect. He’s sent you dozens—twice a week—and this time, he mentions the boat’s nameplate, Lewis’s question about the jellies. It always was your favorite holiday. You’d told him, that day you left, that you hoped you’d make it back in time to watch. 

Carefully, he rolls it up, slots it delicately into a colored glass bottle. One of Leah’s old winebottles, in fact, from her weekly deliveries. He doesn’t drink them—instead, pours them straight into the ocean, another form of tribute. The letters are for you; the wine is for Willy. Always did love a good drink, that man. 

Then, he pads out into the surf, bare feet digging into the sand, and pushes the bottle into the waves. The sea takes it eagerly. Of course. Greedy, always greedy, always wanting. 

Though it’s spit out many other things, it’s never given back one of his bottles. He likes to imagine that’s because you’re keeping them. Tucked into the hollow of your ribcage, ensconced in bony arms, wherever you are. 

—

If he were a sappy man, he would call it love at first sight, and because he is a sappy man, that’s exactly the label that he slaps upon it. You, on your first foray into the beach, picking up a mussel and turning it about in his hands—and him, emerging from his cabin after a six-hour writing marathon. Eyes meeting, hearts sparking, falling into each other’s arms as naturally as the flower blooms. The real story is of course longer and not so much a fairytale, but at this point, his own version has become so naturalised that it is all he thinks of. 

He tries to write it down, sitting at his desk, with a ragged duck’s feather that you gave him many months ago. It starts strong, but sputters out by the time he reaches the final act. All there is left to say is that the ocean takes, and that is that. 

—-

One week until the Dance. Six days until the anniversary. He goes up to your farm for the first time since those early days in which you didn’t come back. Brings a small notepad and another quill, just in case it finally sparks some sort of inspiration, if the ghost of his muse rises from the dead. Used to be, you would put your chin on his shoulder and watch him work, whispering ideas in his ears when you wanted to be helpful, whispering other things when you were in the mood for distraction. Galatea carved in statuesque marble, naked and tangled in his sheets, coyly asking him if you were inspiring him. 

Now, now you are Aphrodite wreathed in seafoam, beautiful in raw, brutal edges, nestled within the mouth of a clamshell. 

The farm is abandoned, of course. Marnie took the animals, folded them back into her Ranch, Demetrius cleared out the cave, Lewis came by and uprooted each one of the crops once they began rotting in the earth. All a necessity, of course, but it felt a bit like many small parasitic beings consuming the remnants of some gargantuan corpse. Now, all that’s left is the overgrown grass amongst the old husks of barns and coops, the scarecrows crucified above brambly fields. 

Elliott tries to pick his way through the undergrowth, but the burrs begin to snag at his pants, and he can bear no more, so he retreats to the collapsing porch.

He’s never been quite the outdoorsy type of man, which only inspires more questions about why, exactly, he chose to live in possibly the most rudimentary part of the valley, but this is a different breed of unpleasant. Reminds him of when Leah tried to take him camping, and he could not bear his hair getting tangled in the branches, the hardness of the rocky ground beneath his back. You were so good, out here. It must be different in the sea. 

It’s the silence that chases him away, more than anything. No crashing waves. No breeze. Unsettling. 

On the way back into town, he sees the bustle of the saloon, many people slipping in and out, and thinks, why the hell not?

The first step inside, however, proves to be a mistake. He’s suddenly acutely aware of his appearance, of the fact that this has been his first time reappearing in town proper in a year—he has not attended a single one of the preceding festivals. Spent the most recent, the Luau, holed up in his cabin, blankets over his head, trying to block out the sound of forced laughter. 

“Elliot!” Gus exclaims, eyebrows making a valiant effort to reach his hairline, “it’s been a while. What do you want?”

He blinks. Can’t remember what he used to order, what his usual was. He still remembers yours—ocean sunrise, some obscenely fruity drink, bright gradient of yellow foam to deep indigo syrup pooling at the bottom of the glass, thick enough to coat the mouth and strong enough to linger. He used to tell you that things as brightly-colored as that are, by natural law, never meant to be consumed, and you’d asked, then why does it taste so good?

“Ocean sunrise,” he says. To his credit, Gus does not let even a tick of his facial expression belay any concern—instead, he turns straight to pouring and measuring out small quantities of bottled liquid. 

Elliott moves to Leah’s table, who’s been sitting there, watching him all this time. She has a nervous hand running down her braid, but that’s the only indication that she is not entirely relaxed. 

“Not a wine?” she asks. Right. That was his old poison of choice. 

“No,” he replies, “feeling… ah, nostalgic.”

She nods as if that was a profound statement. “You got my delivery?”

“Yes.” He manages to shoot her a shallow smile. “Thank you, by the way. I never do express my gratitude enough. You are… you are a good friend.”

“Anything,” she vows, moving the hand from her braid to her heart. Emily stops by their table with the violently colorful drink in hand, shoots him a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes, before whisking off to another table. He picks it up, takes a sip. 

The lighter, orange-yellow layers taste of pineapple and tropical fruits, Ginger Island. It deepens as the bottom begins to mix in; that thick, heady indigo syrup, and by the time he reaches the bottom, it is entirely bitter, thick and sharp and acidic. This is what storms must taste like, he thinks, lightning sparking on his tongue, bright ozone filling his lungs. This is what your final moments must have tasted like. A final lick of the salt around the rim, a gulp of seawater, and it’s an altogether full experience. 

He almost calls his compliments to Gus, good on distilling death at sea into a drink, but then it occurs to him that that probably wasn’t the man’s intention. 

“Written anything lately?” Leah asks, around a bite of her salad. He tilts his head, thinking. 

“Lots of horror. Not so much else.”

“Oh?” She perks up. “I like horror. It’s been too long since you’ve let me read one of your manuscripts.”

“They’re in the ocean,” he says, “but it’s hard, capturing what it feels like to die. When the ship begins to crack. I’ve never experienced it, obviously. If only I could ask…”

“Okay,” Leah says, voice dropping a few notes, “okay, Elliott, no more of that. Please.”

He flushes faintly. “My apologies. It is simply… inspiration is a fickle thing.”

“Really is,” she replies, but the tenuous sort of mood has snapped in half. He leaves not much later, passing his empty cup to Gus, taking the well-wishes of the others with a simple nod of his head. Back down to the beach, back to the waves that tear at the sand. 

Sometimes—and these are the thoughts that he voices to nobody—he wonders if you are truly dead, if you are not somehow alive. Not in the fanciful, swam your way back to dry land sort of way, but instead, it’s some amalgamation of mermaid stories, of life breathed into you, of becoming one with the sea. Harvey tells him that this is normal—I’m not technically a psychiatrist, but from what I know…—but he feels so certain, some days, that it threatens to burst through his chest. 

The only festival he’s attended this past year is the Night Market in winter. Not to peruse those exotic wares, even to take part in the free coffee. No—he made a straight beeline for the mermaid’s caravan, stepping into that thin wooden boat, shells hanging from the walls. 

He did not even wait for her, the frontwoman, skin bright and soft as white taffeta, shimmering with a faint iridescence, to begin her song. Instead, he asked, “in the sea, how do you… become a mermaid?”

She turned to her sisters or companions or whoever they were, behind her, and they all chittered for a moment in a curt language that he had no frame of reference for. Not even in all his childhood study of such languages, Ferngillian and Gotoron and all those different tongues, had he encountered something like that. 

Eventually, she turned back, said, “No, we are birthed.”

He saw that, after a moment. Eyes a touch too white, skin faintly translucent, many odd, small details that hinted at inhumanity. Only a pale imitation—or maybe humanity was a pale imitation of them—but there’s no alley of transformation there. Of course, then, he had to ask, “then, is there any way to… to evolve enough to survive the sea?”

Another round of chittering. This one sounded distinctly like laughter. 

“No,” she replied, when she finally turned back, “no, landfolk, no.”

All that to say that both alleyways of comprehension—that of Harvey’s scientific method, and the magick of the merfolk—have refuted his hypothesis, and he’s just a fool, a lovestruck idiot who has not yet moved past the first stage of grief. 

Your first kiss was upon a boat. Leah chewed him out, later, gave him a long lecture upon the implications of taking a single woman onto the water and kissing her but you’d been quite receptive at the time. Maybe that’s why it’s so hard to move on. 

When he remembers you, he remembers the seafleck salt upon your lips, remembers the damp hems of his pants and the brine in the air. You are the sea and the sea is you, undeniably intertwined, and all this was just both parts of you reconjoining at once. 

—

Willy’s birthday, 24th of Summer, comes, passes. He’s sitting on the docks, alternating between taking light sips from Leah’s most recent bottle and pouring shots out into the sea, when Linus suddenly sits himself down beside him. Next to Linus, Clint, and finally Marlon on the far side. 

“Are we interrupting?” Linus asks. Elliott shakes his head. Behind them, Willy’s shop looms, dark-windowed, beast with eyes hidden behind their lids. 

“He was a good man,” Marlon says after a moment, “took us across the sea more than once. Would’ve liked to die on the water, if you pardon me saying.”

Clint hums in agreement. “Told me to just… y’know, roll him into the surf when he keeled over. Uh, I always thought he was crazy, but…”

“And she,” Marlon adds, referring to you, “brave ‘un too. If a storm was somethin’ you could fight, she’d’ve come back no worse for wear.”

Dawn is upon them before they’re even done swapping stories, the bottle empty, all those many drops poured for Willy to drink, eventually, wherever he is. They stumble back to their respective homes, but Elliott remains on the dock. The air is charged not only from the weight of a thousand recollections, but something else, something bright and salty and there are only a few days left, now, only a few days left. 

—

A storm. Promised by the newfound height of the waves, grasping at the lip of the dock, by the pebbled clouds overhead. Elliott sits within his cabin, listening to the wind do its damn best to try and uproot the thing, and draws a monster upon the table. Today, tonight by technicality, is the anniversary, and there is none of that crushing weight he’d expected, no grief that bows his back down like a sapling. 

Leah makes it to his cabin by mid-day, when the winds are just beginning to pick up. “Hey,” she tells him, when he opens the door, “I think your house might blow down. Do you want to come back to my place?”

“No,” he replies, looking not at her but instead over her shoulders, at the ocean beyond. “No.”

“If you’re sure,” she says doubtfully. Gives him a hesitant pat on the shoulder, “just don’t blow away, ‘kay? I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll try my best.”

She leaves after only one more reproachful look over her shoulder, braid whipping about in the breeze. For lack of anything better to do, he sits himself down in front of a small mirror, and begins to work back through his hair. If he closes his eyes… well, if he closes his eyes, then it’s nowhere near the sensation of your fingers working through his hair, primarily because he needs to positively yank to untangle some of these knots, but it reminds him of that feeling, anyways. 

Often, it was the prelude to things. Him, sprawled out in bed, head upon your lap, while you worked your fingers through his scalp, scratching lightly enough to make his back arch in search of more. Then, of course, inevitably, it would turn to kissing, to the warmth of your tongue and the press of his body upon yours, hands still entangled in his hair. To him within you, suit discarded somewhere upon the floor, skin to skin in all the closest of ways. 

Outside, thunder cracks, and lightning flashes like the whip of some storm god overhead. He runs his fingers through his hair one final time, moving to the window. The waves are dark and obsidian, an infinite tar pit with many primeval beasts rotting within, mesozoic creatures under the coruscant sun, and there is something, there is a shape beneath the waves. 

He presses a palm to the window. Watches. 

It rises like a buried God, head breaking the surface, then body, torso and hips and legs until it is shedding the last of the sea, still walking steadily across the beach. 

It looks at him. 

You look at him, and he knows. 

Elliott rushes to the door and flings it open, allowing the wind to bunch and unfurl into the house, send his papers scattering, but none of that matters because it is you, you the same and different all at once. Hair plastered to your cheeks and your neck, naked, dripping. As you draw closer, more details make themselves clear, more strangeness. Your left eye is entirely gone, nothing but a gaping hole, and the skin of your right cheek has been superseded by the iridescence of scales—indeed, they run down your arms too, coil around your legs. Some of your skin is rocky, barnacled, made up of nothing but gray crag, but you are too close to turn back, and he would not turn back either way. 

Only when you are right before him do you pause. Part of your upper lip has been torn away by a predator in the depths, and the teeth it reveals are jagged, barbed. 

“You’re back,” he says. You fall forwards, into his arms, bracing yourself only once he has stumbled back under the brunt of your weight. A long moment is dedicated simply to holding you, to breathing in the briny scent of your skin, running his fingers down the slickness of the scales that line your skin. 

And then, you look up at him, singular remaining eye wide. He notices that there are small threads of gossamer substance entangled throughout your hair, and, when he looks closer, they have eyes too, many small pinpricks looking back at him. 

“Where have you been?” He asks. You tilt your head a fraction of a fraction, almost imperceptible, open your mouth to reveal those long, sharp teeth, and beyond them, a tongue that is black as coal, blending into the darkness that falls upon the back of your throat. Close it with a snap. He reaches out, uses a light finger to trace that ragged bit of flesh where your face was torn apart and you duck instinctively, shy. 

“No,” he says, “no, no,” reaching a hand beneath your chin to tilt your face back up, “you’re beautiful. Still. Did you get my letter? I’ll always love you.”

You do not blink. The pupil of that eye is slitted now, like a snake’s, a goat’s, and he could not care less. He runs his hands down your side, over the rocky bits that stick out from your waist, ducks his head so his forehead can settle against yours. 

“So much has changed,” he whispers, “I can’t write without you, you know. You’re my muse. I miss you terribly, every second, every day.”

Your hands, clawed, tighten around his side. He dips a bit lower, lips to yours, waits a fraction of a second to see if you’ll draw away—if you’re different now, if you are nothing but unfeeling sea—but no, your grip tightens once again, grabbing handfuls of his suit jacket, and you lean up. When your tongues meet, it is a bit of a shock, slippery with some bitter sort of mucous. Reminds him of Gus’s drink. Reminds him of death at sea. Reminds him that, no matter what, he still has you here and relatively whole before him, so none of that matters, and he takes it in stride, deepening the kiss. 

He cuts himself on your teeth, he’s pretty sure, because the taste of copper fills both your mouths, but that is of little matter and little consequence, simply another flavor to this kiss. Se maneuvers you slowly to the bed, wetting his sheets, tracking sand in, and has he not already established that none of this matters?

Slowly, you pull him down, dipping until your back lays flat upon the sheets, hand wandering to run up and down his back in an almost wondrous way. Maybe you are just as surprised to see him as he is for you. Maybe both of you have been lost in equal ways, land and sea, forever separated by that line in the sand. As the shock of initial embrace wears off, there comes the new realization that you are in fact naked, and you are pulling him towards you. He draws back for only a second to shuck off his suit and, with fumbling fingers, unbutton the seam of his pants, kicking them off. The area around your mouth is stained with red and black and still slick with seawater. It is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. 

Soon, he’s unclothed as well, and hardly a moment is wasted in pulling him back. Though you are not entirely flesh anymore, the parts he is interested in are all seemingly intact. Not that he’d mind if they weren’t. He’s determined enough to find a way. He starts with first a hand, but you make a quick movement, angling your chin towards him, and so he withdraws that and thrusts in fully instead, into the smoothness of your warmth. His hand, he moves back up to your chest, rubbing in slowly-expanding circles. When he reaches the patch of scales beneath your armpit, you huff out a quiet breath, and then, as he begins to scratch along their seams, you begin to writhe, so he lingers. 

“I’ve missed you,” he whispers, and he’s said this already, but you are not here to stay, he knows. Just a slip of seafoam in the breeze, the briefness of a late-summer storm, “it’s why I stay, so I can be-” you clench, and he loses track of his words for a brief moment—“-be here, with the sea, with you. I wade, sometimes, and pretend that it is an embrace.”

Overtly wordy confession of love when you are saying nothing at all, but the tail end of his words coincides with you tensing beneath him, so perhaps it had an effect after all. He tips over the edge in unison, both of you free-falling, and you bite into his neck with those sharp teeth, hard enough that blood immediately wells up and stains the sheet. Another dimension of pleasure, in such an adrenaline-hazed state, the spike of salt at the end of a long drink. 

Coming down is an exercise in drowsiness and the slow return of pain, both in his tongue and upon his neck, both lacerated by your teeth. His hair is matted in sweat and seawater and blood, spread out across the sheets, and you take to combing through it. When your newfound claws scratch against his scalp, it makes him shiver in something approaching rapture. Eventually, though, he cannot even stand that, too far from you, and instead turns to press his face into your chest. 

He is crying, he realizes belatedly. You run a single finger down from the crown of his head to the nape of his spine, and there it lingers. 

“How can I do it?” He murmurs into your chest, breath hot against your skin, “I cannot write without you, I cannot… cannot live. I wish to throw myself from the cliffs, some days. Would we be together, then?”

Your chin scrapes across his head in a negation. Whatever you did, whatever happened to allow you survival, he supposes it’s something he—boy born with an iridium spoon in his mouth, whose half-formed childhood idea of rebellion was to run off and become a hermit—would never be able to stand. 

“How, then?” He asks. You rest your head upon his with a heavy weight, a heavy finality, and he knows you have no good answer. He rises after a long moment, an idea striking him—leans over, skin unsticking from yours, to grab a quill and one of the many papers scattered across the room. “Can you-”

You cut him off with a shake of your head, a shrug. Whether that means that you physically cannot write, do not know how to write, or any number of possibilities between those, he’s unsure, but he deflates almost as quickly. Seeing his sudden disappointment, you hesitate, before pointing towards the letter, towards the sea. 

“I should continue sending?” He asks. You nod, a small, controlled motion. “I will,” he vows immediately, “Every day, a poem, a sonnet, for you, for the sea. My… my muse, my love, my glimmering waters,” and the last bits of that devolve into nonsense as he once again buries his head against you, laps the salt from your skin. 

Sleep comes with the swiftness of a storm. The last thing he recalls is saline, a sharp hand circling the top of his head. 

—

The bed is cold when he wakes. He reaches, instinctively, for you, but his hands hit nothing but damp blankets. 

When he finally pushes himself into a sitting position, he sees many wet puddle-footsteps leading to the open door, already soaking into the hardwood floor. 

Outside, there is no difference. The sea is placid. Unfeeling. 

He smiles anyways. 

Returns into his cabin and pens with a fervor—a poem, firstly, long enough that it stretches across the length of the paper, and then a letter on the other side, rolls it up and sends it into the sea. Finishes it with his signature, and then, under that, love you always. 

—

One last thing. 

The Dance of the Moonlight Jellies comes with the last bits of dusk. More muted than usual, of course, townsfolk picking their way through the detritus of the beach, and Elliott is already upon the docks. 

Lewis sends off the lantern without much ado, no ceremony or great speech, and the jellies appear as pinpricks upon the horizon that undulate, pulsing with their own internal rhythm. 

But in the water off to the side of the dock, he notices something. Believes it to be a jelly, at first, but no, it’s glassy and hard and, when he reaches down to grab it, he finds that it is a bottle. One of Leah’s old ones, filled with silted seawater and a scrap of paper. 

He opens it carefully, heart staccato in his chest. Out comes flooding the water over his hand, and along with it, the delicate scrap. He unfolds it as slowly as his eager hands are able, cautious not to rip it. 

It’s one of his own letters. Can’t remember when he wrote it, what it was about, but there is clearly a bit of text available, framed by the ragged edges. 

In familiar black script, it reads, until next year. 

He watches the jellyfish slowly approach below, lit by some internal glow, and thinks that it cannot come soon enough.

[missamyrisa2]

Wakey wakey~

You find yourself struggling on the curiously shaped padded white exam table which slopes downward from your head ~ the thick straps keep your arms forward your waist is similarly held snug, your legs are gently spread with enough wiggle room to kick nervously ~ particularly as the hum of machinery starts and viewing panels open from all sides high above. Shadowy figures seen glaring down at your plight are joined by the glowering red lights of observation equipment winking to life all around ~ your protests and squeaks echo around the sanitized room, the humming becomes a buzz as you sense the presence of something heavy and imposing approaching your legs~

You can kick all you like, the machinery can't be deterred as it deploys padded probes to the backs of your legs and begins stimulating with tickly tingly vibrations. Activity rises in the observation deck and the equipment feeds on your reactions, every noise and twitch and struggle is captured and analyzed ~ you can almost see the line of data pulsing through the equipment as every big reaction causes the machine to recalibrate and further massage on your most sensitive spots behind your knees and up the backs of your thighs ~ annnd up to your tush, humming and stimulating your booty to its satisfaction~

Your squeaks turn to giggles and gasps, the relentless machinery cataloging your body and coaxing it of all the sensitive secrets. You feel spent and worked over, probed and defeated ~ and yettt ~ the treatment is only starting. The machinery surges in energy, the probes attach to the backs of your thighs and tush cheeks in strategic locations. With a gentle push they hold you taut, hold your cheeks gently apart ~ as the machine spools up its routine and the sound of spinning orbital buffers fills the room. Their progress is temporarily delayed by a swarm of mechanical hands, clicking as they flex their fingers and work hurriedly to spray your rear quarters with a cleansing solution. Others follow behind with soft wipes, working away the imperfections. This attention, mechanical or not, puts you into a fury of blush and gasps ~ and it does not go unnoticed.

You glance back and see them approach. Your protests and pleads fall on nonexistent sound receptors. The machine cannot be bargained with. The observers above certainly hear your begs as the soft whirling surfaces are approaching your twitchy sensitive spots, and note each one. Soft motorized fluff invades the curves of your back legs, buffing in lines to maximize your stimulation. Two more join them, deployed at the curves under your buttcheeks. From your vantage point they are a blur of green but you absolutely feel every soft fiber as it is whipped over your skin, barely touching yet drawing out so much sensation ~ and giggles.

With a whine, another piece of equipment deploys. You shriek uselessly seeing the wheel approaching with a buzz. Each spoke sprouts a feather of soft stiffness, and the circle begins turning slowly as it is brought closer and closer between your legs. At first it's the tiniest breeze, teasing at your honey spot and royal area and edges of your tush cheeks. You think you can handle it, maybe even find it a good distraction from the buffers as they polish around your legs and behind your knees now. But then it grows closer. The breeze becomes a slowly growing itch, a little ember of want. Every feather slides down and caresses between your cheeks, over your hole and downward. That slow path quickly becomes worn in with gigglish sensation~

You get the slightest respite between feathers, but their time tickling at your line of ticklishness grows. The wheel is now slowing slightly each time a feather makes contact, then picks up speed after it passes your royal area. The adjustments are slight but they draw out your ticklish agony so much. The activity above rises. Eyes are stuck to glass, notes are taken rapidly. The equipment is burning hotly trying to consume all your data.

And then the wheel reverses~

You scream out in desperate wanting needing laughs. The feathers caress one after another after another, touching your royal area with the slightest slap before passing you to the next. The kiss at your honeyspot becomes an explosion of tickles. The wheel never stops turning. The buffers taunt and work to engage with skipping motions between each feather touch so that you are constantly passed back and forth from sensations. You want it so badly, you want that release. More buffers add to your desperation, their fluff invading under your toes and along your soles. Your muscles ache, your royal areas throb. Your whimpers only seem to encourage the operators, as you can start to recognize the motions above precipitating another surge of machine activity.

When your mewling overtakes your giggles, the wheel pulls back to give the taunting breeze so the buffers can work around your cheeks and small of your back and even sneak at your hips to make you buck and laugh. When your laughs become high pitched and silly, the orbital discs slow and the wheel engages at full contact to make you moan and giggle and yelp for more.

And more you get ~ as with a flurry of motion in the observation deck followed by what appeared to be a minor debate, the room trembles and through a complex set of mechanical squirms and shrieks, you find yourself flipped over, facing skyward under brightening observation lights. Strapped down tightly, legs gently spread, the wheel soon approaches once more surrounded on all sides by snaking orbital buffers ~ and a burst of newcomers, their intense blue-white lights igniting as they buzz furiously like a swarm of bees. Tiny spotlights illuminate under your arms, around your tummy, in your navel, along your neck, over your chest buttons, on your hip dips, and between your toes. The vibrating tools begin their humming inquisition as if questioning your hot spots with their tips right as the buffers make strides across your longer tickle zones - sides, ribs, arms, legs, and thighs. And that wheel, that wicked wicked wheel, extends its feathers once more and begins the endless caress over your royal area.

You want the ticklecum so bad~

and can only hope it's on the menu today~

[mangohgeckoh]

Chemical Reaction (Chapt. 11)

(Art credit: The amazing @dcartcorner ) A/N: Ages for Act 2: Ophelia: 45-46, Silco: 43-46, Roadie is 12, Jinx is 18-20, Vi is 24-25, Sevika: 40-42 (I don't give exact ages as to not commit to anything since none of the characters in the show have a solid age). Chemical Reaction Chapter 11 "Foes To Friends" Chapter Summary: Act 2 is here!!! Roadie and Jinx meet, Jinx freezes up during a job. - Song of the chapter: "Break The Rules" by Charli XCX "Never stop, it's how we ride, Comin' up until we die, I don't wanna go to school, I just wanna break the rules."

10 years later

Just as planned, a sleek black car pulled up in front of a very well lit bar. The same bar that Roadie was observing from the roof of a building directly across from it. With brilliant bright lights strobing throughout the main square of the Undercity, it was more of a club than a bar. The bronze telescope he held was light in his palms as he moved closer to the edge of the roof, preparing to get a better look at the passenger about to exit the car.

Its door opened, and a man’s head emerged from inside the vehicle. Roadie felt his breath catching in his throat as he watched the man's body extend to his full height. Finger clicking against a metal button, a thin glass panel slid over the lens of the telescope, causing it to zoom in on the back of the man’s head, anticipating him turning to get a view of his face. Just as the man started to turn, someone cleared their throat from behind Roadie.

“Whatcha doin’?”

Almost toppling over in panic, Roadie whipped around to where he heard the voice. His telescope clattered on the ground. A young woman, maybe 18 or 19, walked against the edge of the roof. Her arms were out as she playfully balanced herself between a 40 foot drop and the safety of the roof. “I-” Roadie stumbled on his words, not knowing what to say. He has heard of a girl who matched her traits. Long, braided blue hair and a twisted smile. Yet, now that he was looking at her in person, she didn’t have a smile. The girl was more disinterested.

The brown feathers that lined his ears swayed with the movement of his ear ticking at the sound of the car below having its door slammed. Quickly, he spared a glance over the edge to the street below. The man he had wanted a better look at had disappeared into the club. Roadie cursed, collapsing his handheld telescope. “What’s it to you?” He groaned, standing up.

The girl covered the distance between them fast. Between the time that he had blinked and her standing at the edge of the roof, she was now in front of him. “Y’know, you’re funny lookin’.” Her head was tilted as she plucked a chocolate brown feather from his ear. Roadie hissed, hand protectively clutching the now stinging area of his ear. “Only seen someone like you once.” She mumbled to herself as she examined the feather.

Just as he was about to argue, blue flashed past his eyes as the girl was now on the other side of him, observing a notebook. “Ooh! Secret diary, huh?” Roadie felt an emptiness in his hand, he looked down to see the book he had held was now gone. “H-hey! That is mine!” He started towards her, but she was taller than him. All she had to do was raise the notebook a few inches above his grasping hands so she could continue to read.

“Hmm, are you a stalker?” She asked, eyes still glued to the contents within the notebook. Roadie’s face heated with indignity. “No!” He defended, trying to now leap to snatch the book but she only raised it higher. “You sure? This is some stalker-type shit.” Her voice cracked, her focus now turning to the boy. “I am not a-” He groaned, tired of this conversation. “Just give it!” He lunged for it again but missed.

“Ah, ah, ah!” The girl tutted, dodging his attempts to catch the notebook. “What do you want with him?” Her voice was borderline accusatory as she pressed a paint stained finger on one of the pages. Roadie growled. “That is none of your concern. Now, give. It. back.” He warned, the feathers on his ears ruffled at his annoyance. The girl only belly-laughed, her blue braids bouncing around her. “Or what-” The second she had closed her eyes, Roadie took the opportunity to steal the notebook back and jump off the roof.

From behind him, he heard an offended “hey!” call from above but he continued to run as fast as he could back home.

-

“Where were you?”

‘Damn it.’ Roadie groaned, he should have known Kaz would be the one to open the front door. The sign to the orphanage creaked as it swung over the doorway. Kaz, who was a glorified assistant, held a toddler playing with a toy. Despite holding a young child, his glare was fierce on Roadie.

This wasn’t the first time he had run off.

Roadie only pushed past him. Displeased at his silence, Kaz called after him. “Your mom isn’t going to be happy.”

Roadie only rolled his eyes. “She never is.”

-

This space was only for him.

Well, space was an overstatement.

The tiny room that mirrored that of a closet was more like a nook. It was hidden away behind a loose wooden panel in the attic. Nevertheless, he didn’t mind when the ceiling leaked or when the floor creaked with each step. It was the only escape he was offered to have time away from his doting mother. Roadie loved her dearly, but she could certainly be overbearing. Whether it was twisting the valves that had been attached to the pipes now in his back.

Speaking of.

He reached over his shoulder to pull the back of his shirt up. Thanks to the doctor, his waist was adorned with the ugliest pipes cutting through his clothes. They were attached to a machine that was embedded into his spine. He grunted as he twisted a valve on the top of the machine. It hissed, but he felt relief wash over him as the diluted shimmer flowed into his veins.

Roadie dropped the notebook on the ground as he searched for something important. Just where he left it, was a photograph on a small crate he had pushed into the nook.

Stained brown from age, the photo’s edges were crumpled from the many years it had been stuffed in a box where he had found it. The box was small and made of tin, when he saw it in one of his mother’s desk drawers it immediately piqued his interest. There were many knickknacks inside it. Most were bottle caps, pieces belonging to broken jewelry, but one item in particular had stood out to him.

A photograph. Very old, almost antique. When Roadie had examined it further, he knew he had to take it up to his lair.

Now his knees were against his chest as he sat in his nook. It was quiet apart from the soft noise of shimmer cycling inside of him from within the tubes. He clutched the photo like it was the most valuable object he had ever possessed.

Because it was.

Roadie’s eyes danced around the photo, as if he was hoping the figures in it would move. Ophelia, his mom, looked to be in her early 20s. Her hair was significantly shorter than it was today and was buzzed on one side. Roadie always found it amusing when he would look at the photograph because she even had piercings lining her ears, which would be very uncharacteristic of her to have considering her personality today.

But it wasn’t Ophelia’s presence in the photo that made it special. His eyes followed her arms in the photo to where her hand laid. A young man, around her age, held a spray can as a threat. His tongue poked out in jest as his mom had her hand on his shoulder, holding his side against hers in an attempt to pose for the photo. Despite the photo being aged, there was still color. The man possessed features that matched Roadie’s. Seafoam green eyes, wispy dark brown hair, and a sharp nose.

Being that Roadie never knew his own father, when he found a photo of a man suspiciously carrying his traits embracing his mom, he had his suspicions. Roadie would come up to his nook almost every day so he would have the privacy to observe the photo, creativity getting the best of him. He would imagine what the man was like. Was he an artist? The man was holding a can of spray paint, perhaps he was in the middle of graffiti? There were traces of coal smeared on the man’s sharp features, maybe he was a miner too?

Either way, his mother never spared any stories of his dad no matter how hard he would plead. Careful not to crinkle the paper, Roadie hugged the photograph as if it would magically manifest into his dad.

“Wow, and I thought I was desperate.” Roadie had to fumble to catch the photo that he dropped from being spooked. There, on the other side of the nook, was that same girl. “Gotta hand it to ya, kiddo, you were hard to find!” She laughed as she drew her pistol.

“Who-” The girl climbed through the entrance of the nook and now stood before him. “Who are you?” Roadie croaked, eyes fixed on her weapon.

“Oh, little ole’ me?” Her pistol swirled in her palm as she gestured with it. “I just want answers.” The girl towered over him, mainly because she had to hunch over to fit against the low ceiling of the small room. Her blue eyes fell on the notebook. “What do you want with Silco?”

Roadie stood up, body trembling. Unlike the other trenchers, he didn’t know how to defend himself. His mom was always looming behind him, protecting him. However, as he watch the pistol swing in the girl’s hand, it dawned on him how completely vulnerable he was. “Silco?” He repeated, earning him a few dramatic nods from her.

“I…” Roadie trailed off as he picked up the notebook, flipping through its pages. Each page was filled with photographs of various men that matched the description of the young man in the photo. In the pages at the beginning of the book, red X’s had crossed the photos of men he had tracked to find that bore no resemblance to him. All that was left was Silco. Well, he didn’t know what the man looked like, so instead of a photo there was just a name scrawled on the paper.

“You gonna kill him?” The girl asked accusingly as she gestured the pistol. “‘Cause I hate to break it to you, you don’t seem like the assassin type.”

Roadie sighed. “I am looking for…” He closed the book, his hand laying upon the title he had carved into the cheap leather. His brown ears faltered. “My dad…” Despite not knowing this girl, Roadie felt embarrassed.

“Dad?” The girl furrowed her brows. “What, did Silco take him or somethin’?”

Roadie shook his head. “I never knew him, but- hey!” Fear replaced his solemn mood when the girl snatched the photo from his hands. “Careful with that!” He pleaded. The girl looked it over before pointing to Ophelia. “Who’s that?”

“My mom…give it back!” He clawed at her arms, but she shrugged him off easily. He was unusually skinny, short, and weak for his tender age of 12. Otherwise he would have been able to steal the photograph back. Her finger shifted to the man embracing his mom. “And who is this?”

Roadie paused. “I don't know, really...” The girl turned the photograph to look at it again. Just like that, Roadie found himself pressed against the dusty wall of the nook as the girl raised the photo next to his head. He froze as her eyes danced back and forth from him to the photo.

“Very interesting…” She said dramatically before tossing the photo back to him. Desperately he caught the photo and held it against his chest. A hand manifested itself in front of his face. “I am Jinx! At yer service!” Roadie gave her a confused look before tentatively shaking her hand. With the pistol now holstered, she began to explore the many knickknacks and random items in his nook. The ceiling was covered with various old fabrics that hung from nails. While cut outs of various maps were plastered onto the walls. “Some place you got, kid.” Jinx said as she marvelled at the extent of his lair.

“Ooh!” Roadie froze when she all but dashed over to a mirror. Below the glass were miscellaneous bottles and packets of makeup. Jinx took some lipstick and applied it to herself. “D-don’t touch that!” Roadie’s face was now as red as a tomato, his heart was racing as she went through his makeup. Making a face at how old, and mellow the makeup was, Jinx turned to him. “Where’d you get all this?”

At first he didn’t want to answer, but being that this girl was well known for shooting first and asking questions later, he relented. “...my mom…” He mumbled. Jinx heard it because she chuckled. “Why would your mom give you these boring shades?”

He blushed further, squeezing his arm. “She didn’t.”

Jinx’s features softened as she stood as much as she could under the low ceiling and walked past him, scooping up the notebook. Recklessly, she turned the pages until she found an empty one.

“I’ve got a job to do today. But! I think I have some shades that are more flattering to your skin tone.” Her voice was a little louder than he would have preferred as she scrawled an address and a time on the paper. “Find me here. Tonight.”

After scribbling on the paper she pushed it into his chest and passed towards the entrance.

“See ya!” And just like that, she had vanished out the loose plank and jumped out of the window in the basement.

- Clouds rolled through the railing that lined the airship. The humming of its engine murmured against Silco’s lackeys having small talk, waiting for the captain to announce their arrival. Ophelia leaned against the railing, watching the silhouette of buildings behind the clouds before the airship grow larger.

It was only on special, higher paying, occasions that Ophelia would help Silco with a job during the day. According to him, he was low on hands and required extra reinforcement to ensure his very expensive airship reached Piltover’s docks safely. Thankfully, Kaz was available to take her place at the orphanage today. With the funding Silco has been pumping into her establishment, she has been able to afford new hires who’d assist Kaz when needed. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have been able to take the reins of the orphanage so easily.

Familiar heavy footsteps grew louder behind her. “Piltover,” Sevika stood at Ophelia’s side, taking a deep inhale from her cigarette. “City of Progress my ass.” She growled, smoke escaping from her lips. Her fingers flicked the lit cigarette overboard as she turned to Ophelia. Sevika cleared her throat, ridding the last of the smoke from inside her before speaking out of annoyance. “Is the girl-”

“With the cargo, yes.” Ophelia interrupted, eyes fixed on the loading dock that protruded from the clouds. Sevika scanned Ophelia as she talked. “I just checked on her. She promised to stay out of your way, lieutenant.”

Sevika’s body was still, like a rock, as she surveyed Ophelia’s expression for any tells of a lie. Ophelia knew Sevika had a lot of grief caused by Jinx. So when Sevika caught wind of Silco’s daughter accompanying them on this job, she had approached Ophelia to ensure Jinx would stay out of her way.

The ring of a bell caught their attention, as it announced their arrival from the docks. Sevika pushed off the railing, barking orders at the goons to start preparing for offloading the ship. Once the airship was safely secured to the dock, large men carried equally as large canisters onboard. Ophelia’s talons clicked against the metal of the ship’s deck as she scanned the comings and goings of workers bringing stock on board. There were no rafters on an airship, so to her disadvantage Ophelia was burdened with being level with everyone else.

Her hands were clasped behind her back as she made her way to Sevika who was talking to the Piltover dockmaster.

The dockmaster, a weasley looking man, cleared his throat after observing the people at work on the airship. “Shipping manifest?” He croaked at Sevika who towered over him. Ophelia’s ear ticked slightly upwards at the hum of a strange sound.

‘Humming.’ ‘Above.’ ‘Echoing.’

It didn’t sound like any airship she had heard so she peeked her head overboard and looked up, all she could see was the ceiling of the dock that had been carved inside of a building. Appeased in finding nothing, she returned to Sevika’s side.

In the emptiness of a proper manifest, a bag of hexes plopped on the clipboard the dockmaster clutched. Sevika gave a fake smile as she loomed over the trembling man. “From your friend, downtown.” Ophelia blinked at the man, watching his reaction to the bribery. If he refused, she would need to get involved.

To her luck, he weighed the hexes in his hand before stamping the paper on his clipboard. Ophelia felt a weight flee from her chest as she watched him nod to the both of them and turn to leave. The humming sound grew louder above the airship.

She closed her eyes, listening to her senses.

‘Humming.’ ‘In the pipes.’

Her eyes shot open when she recognized the sound.

‘Firelight tech.’

“Get down!” One of her men shouted as several strings of glowing green zoomed around airship. Ophelia ducked as a Firelight on a hoverboard entered the ship, flying only a few inches above her, and smashed a bottle next to her. Familiar with their tricks, she rolled in an attempt to escape the crystals that could climb and subdue an enemy. Her wrists were weightless as they procured feathers from her wing and shot them at the turbines on the hoverboard. With military precision, the end of their hoverboard failed to float and they fell onto the deck of their airship.

A goon shouted once he recognized their attackers now infesting the ship. “Ah shit the Firelights!” They were fast, masked, and agile. They cut through the air with the help of their hoverboards, only pausing mid-air to crush bottles next to one of her men. Ophelia ducked again, finding cover behind a canister of shimmer as she watched one of Silco’s lackeys attempt to attack a Firelight, but just as he raised his machete he was engulfed in crystals that climbed and froze his body.

Sevika failed to react in time, bottles crashing against her body and crystals consumed her body, trapping her against a pile of crates behind her. Her angry grey eyes flashed to Ophelia who left the safety of her hiding spot and shot some feathers towards any enemy she could find. They were everywhere. Their leader jumped momentarily off his board to kick one of her men in the neck.

Growling, she chased after him. Her talons ready, she launched herself into the air. The tips of her claws made contact with the leader’s back, blood blooming from the new slashes through his coat. To her chagrin, he lost his balance and momentum for a second before readjusting his stance on the board and swirling around towards her. He was too fast, a bottle crashed against her arm, attaching her to a canister of shimmer before another smashed into her stomach, further trapping her within the crystals.

Circling around once more, the leader and the other firelights landed on the deck. All of the lackeys were either subdued under the crystals, knocked out or killed. Ophelia fought against the fresh crystals to no avail. “We have five minutes till they’re out of there.” The leader’s voice was contorted under his owl mask as he clicked a stopwatch. He passed Sevika, drawing his staff and using it to open one of the canisters of shimmer.

The purple liquid glowed in the air. “Have you ever seen this much shimmer before?” Another contorted voice asked the leader. “They’re expanding. Check for more below. Burn it all.” The leader growled, grabbing a large bottle of gasoline and uncorking it. Ophelia groaned, fighting harder against the crystals as she watched the firelights scatter the deck, opening the canisters and pouring gasoline.

It was when two firelights opened the deck’s hatch that led to the bilge of the airship that Ophelia fought the hardest.

Jinx.

Worry flooded over her. She knew Jinx could hold her own, but the thought of the child being trapped in a small space with two of those goons infuriated her. Her body was trapped, frozen, against the crystals in an awkward position that made her muscles burn.

The two firelights disappeared under the deck, but as soon as they did, the hatch immediately closed. Her eyebrows furrowed, Sevika only rolled her eyes. Ophelia’s ear ticked towards the screams coming from inside the bilge where the cargo, and Jinx were held. She listened keenly for any evidence of the girl getting hurt as she felt the crystal’s strength holding her weakening.

Suddenly, the ship groaned, smoke billowed out of the hatch that had opened during the intensity of what felt like an earthquake. The airship deviated slightly against the ropes securing it on the deck. Everyone on board, including the Firelight thugs coughed violently at the searing smoke forcing it’s way into their lungs.

Ophelia’s eyes burned at the contact of the smoke, the Firelights that had invaded the ship held onto anything they could find as they waited for the ship to stop trembling. After the quaking had passed, footsteps echoed from the direction of the opened hatch that had been surrounded by ashes and smoke.

Jinx emerged from the smoke, a confused look on her face. “Hi..?” Her moment of innocence passed as quickly as she threw the active grenades. They attached onto two of the firelights, the sudden force causing them to fall overboard. The leader, surprised, threw two large bottles of crystals, but Jinx was too fast. Her pistol smoked as she shot several rounds at the Firelight.

Ophelia’s ear picked up on the sound of rustling above the girl. “Jinx! Above!” She shouted and Jinx swirled around in a dodge and shot the firelight that had attempted to attack her from behind. While she was distracted, the leader and what was left of the firelights focused on pouring gasoline into the canisters.

One of them drew a flare and raised it, but before she was able to light the gasoline, Jinx’s hand grabbed the thug’s forearm. In an attempt to render the thug unconscious, the mask fell off the firelight and Ophelia watched as Jinx froze.

The blue-haired girl only just stared at the firelight with pink hair. This moment of weakness allowed her to drop the flare and cause flames to erupt around the two. Ophelia fought harder against the crystals. “Jinx!”

After fighting against Jinx’s grip, the thug finally escaped but as soon as she did, Jinx sent a bullet into her spine. “No!” The leader’s scream cut through the air as he was at the collapsed firelight’s side, shaking her limp body.

Ophelia’s ear ticked behind her as she heard the crystals breaking. Sevika tore an arm through one of the crystals, seeing this, Ophelia started to fight against her own. The leader drew his staff and roared at Jinx, but Jinx only drew her machine gun. The leader was pushed away by another firelight, both of them escaping on a hoverboard. Jinx’s line of fire cut across the ship, puncturing canisters of shimmer and even shooting Silco;s own men in an attempt to gun down the leader.

Bullets scattered as Jinx’s gun followed the firelights. Just as her line of fire almost tore through Ophelia, Sevika and her ducked after breaking through the crystals at the last moment. The two were on the ground, breathing labored but otherwise unharmed. Sevika glared at Ophelia. “I told you so.” She growled, her breath reaking of nicotine.

Jinx ran out of bullets once Sevika grabbed her shoulder and turned the girl to face her. “You were supposed to guard the cargo!” Sevika shouted, looming over the teen. Her teeth were barred as Jinx’s only apology was a smirk and a chuckle.

Ophelia was grasping at her shoulder, convinced that the crystals had dislocated it. “Sevika!” Ophelia called from behind the two once she realized Sevika had engaged the machine arm Silco had bestowed upon her. “We need to leave!”

-

Ophelia all but cursed when the medic pushed her shoulder back into its socket. She had made a beeline for The Last Drop after the mission had failed. Though Jinx made it hard to keep herself from straying, the Vastayan was able to escort her to her father’s office. Silco had stood from his desk, inspecting his daughter of any traces of scrapes before turning his attention to her face. Instead of facing him though, she disappeared in the rafters above them.

With a sigh, Silco returned to his desk. “Anything else?” The medic asked Ophelia but she waved him away, rubbing her shoulder in an attempt to soothe her pain. Once the medic left, her feathered ear ticked towards the closed door, hearing the familiar heavy footsteps of the lieutenant. “Sevika.” Ophelia mumbled, loud enough so Silco could know who to expect to enter his office.

As planned, Sevika bursted through the door. She entered the room with a large bottle of brandy from downstairs. The music downstairs made the room vibrate until Ophelia shut it behind the woman. “She fired on us.” Sevika said, plopping with a groan on his coffee table.

Silco, still facing away from them, examined a clipboard. “There are always mishaps in battle.” He lifted a paper up, signing something under it. ”The Firelights were her target and most are dead.” His voice was calm and cool, everything that Sevika didn’t have in that moment.

“It wasn’t a mishap. She froze up and lost her shit.” Her body trembled with anger, taking another swig of her drink.”I could have handled those brats. She’s a problem and we all know it.” Ophelia clenched her jaw. This was too far. “Easy.” Ophelia hissed a warning towards the woman hunched on the coffee table.

Sevika’s slight on his daughter made the tall chair behind the desk swivel. “We?”

He was now glaring at the lieutenant who stole another swig of her jug. ”Who's we?” Unable to defend herself, she looked away submissively.

Silco only huffed. ”I expected better from you than excuses.” Ophelia tensed up as she watched Sevika take the brunt of his disappointment. ”It was your job to make sure things went smoothly. You failed. Don’t disappoint me again.” Not wanting to try her chances, the woman stood up and stormed through the office door.

“And you,” Silco’s attention turned to Ophelia. His mismatched eyes fell onto her wounded shoulder. She knew he was about to direct his fury of their failed job towards her, but he lost his momentum when she rubbed her shoulder. Sighing, he turned in his swivel chair now out of her view. “You have my gratitude for ensuring Jinx’s safe return.” Her eyes watched as the back of his chair turned slightly.

“The world is growing smaller everyday, thanks to the Hexgates.” His thin fingers found the old contraption that he still used. ”And now we’re cut off.” Ophelia watched as he clicked the chamber and the base in place, ready for injection. ”The Topsiders are leaving us further and further behind.” Papers that were once stationary on his desk now tossed in the air as Jinx landed on his desk.

Wearily though softly, Silco called to Ophelia from his turned chair. “Leave us.” Sparing Jinx a worried glance, Ophelia left his office.

She heard his soft voice now address Jinx as she left.

“What happened?” -

Roadie had followed the directions that were scribbled out on the torn paper. “Hello?” He called out tentatively as he took cautious steps down a stairwell. The address he was given led him to a door leading to an old mine shaft. It got more cold and damp the further he descended the stairs, but there was a glow of light at the end of the staircase that kept him going. “Hello?” His voice echoed throughout the cavern he now stood before. A massive machine that resembled a turbine hung motionless in the air between the walls of the cavern. One of its massive blades had been tied by cables to touch the floor next to his talons, creating a bridge.

The turbine had many colorful scribbles and doodles covering it. There was no clock or way to tell the time but Roadie knew he was early. He took a trial step on the massive blade that led to the base of the turbine, but immediately retreated from his step in fear of falling down the cavern below.

After a few minutes of observing the turbine, he mustered the courage to walk along it. Once he realized it was stable, Roadie began to explore. Random objects were littered all over the turbine. From an old beach umbrella, to a large tent made of blankets and strobe lights, it looked strange.

He startled when his ear ticked at a growl followed by the sound of someone kicking a piece of metal off the blade of the turbine. His body felt weightless as he jumped a foot off the blade he stood on after there was an explosion that rocked the turbine.

“Oh.”

Roadie turned to see a dumbfounded Jinx. She was holding what looked to be a homemade grenade. That was very much live. “I forgot you’d be here.” Her voice lacked it’s whimsy from earlier today. She seemed upset, and her face was expressionless. Tossing the grenade over the side of the blade, she lazily made her way over to the boy. Roadie flinched as the turbine rocked again at the explosion beneath. Jinx was much taller than Roadie. But he was still surprised when her palms grabbed her knees so she could be eye level with him. Making a ‘hmm’ noise, she tilted her head, the blue fringe of hair moving with her head. “I think I have just the stuff for you.”

Despite the strange kindness she has offered him, he was still nervous. His green eyes followed her body as she passed him to the base of the turbine. There was a desk that circled in the middle of the out of commission machine, and junk was scattered all over it.

“So. You never knew your dad?” Jinx tossed a braid over her shoulder while she searched through the mess on her desk. Taken aback at her interest in his life, he took a moment to find the words to say. “Yeah.” He croaked, still anxious about the teen.

“Interesting~!” Jinx’s voice suddenly regained it’s bubbly energy from earlier. “And your mom, she’s that chick who runs the orphanage further in the Undercity, yeah?” A few items started to fly his way as she discarded them over her shoulder, unaware that Roadie was in their trajectory.

His face heated up as he dodged a plush thrown past his face again. “I guess?”

Jinx turned to face the preteen, a magnifying glass in front of her face, making one of her eyes look enormous. “How very intriguing.” Her voice was now a mock British accent, making Roadie giggle. For a moment she seemed to enjoy his laughter, before tossing the magnifying glass aside and returning to her search.

“I’ve met your mom. She’s fine. Much nicer than Sevika.” Jinx’s voice turned hoarse at the mention of Sevika’s name.

Roadie tipped his head to the side as he moved closer to Jinx. “Sevika?”

Jinx plucked a bug that had landed in her hair. “Oh, just some troll that works for my dad.” She examined it for a moment, getting distracted by it’s bright color, before hurling it off the turbine. This made Roadie gulp. “There you are!” Finally, Jinx turned once more, a box full of makeup in her arms. She plopped it on the desk and swiped a glove hand off a dusty chair, pulling it up to the desk. “Da, da, da, daaaa!” She announced playfully. “Your salon, good sir.” Jinx bowed playfully, gesturing him fourth.

Roadie chuckled. This girl was nothing like he had heard from the rumors. She wasn’t blood thirsty, vile, though, she was very unpredictable. The chair groaned under his weight as he stared at a cracked piece of glass that was propped at the end of the desk. With a tug of his shoulder, Jinx twirled him around to face her.

“What kinda look you been wantin’ to go for huh?” Her hands found her hips as she waited for the boy to answer. Heat radiated on his cheeks once more, feeling embarrassed. “I just…” He started, never telling anyone about this side of him. “Want to feel…pretty.” That last word Roadie uttered cautiously, unsure of Jinx’s reaction. Though, he was surprised when she made a “pshh!” noise before turning back to the box. “That will be easy!” Her hands fumbled throughout the box of makeup before she found a bottle of concealer that she thought fit.

“Now stay perfectly still.” The makeup felt chilly against his forehead while she applied the paste to his skin. Within the thirty minutes of Jinx doing his makeup, they had talked about music, guns, art and how to properly jump off roofs. After there was a lull in the conversation, the girl bent over him picked up the social ball. “You would not believe the day I’ve had.” She said with a scoff while applying mascara to his eyelashes. “Oh?” Roadie asked, trying not to blink.

Jinx pulled away with an exaggerated “ugh!”, making Roadie realign his posture in the uncomfortable chair. For the next ten minutes Roadie listened intently on how her dad had trusted her with a job but she seemed to have been frustrated with herself and him because she screwed it up. He offered her consolation, even going as far as assuring her that everyone freezes during a job at least once in their life.

There was a bittersweet pause between the two. Roadie took this opportunity to make her less tense. “ You know, you are lucky.” His voice was soft as he directed it at the girl who had a look of worry on her face. “Huh?” Worry turned to confusion as she looked borderline offended at what he had just said.

Roadie stretched in his chair, hearing his muscles crack in relief. “My mom never lets me do anything that could remotely be dangerous.”

Jinx plopped down on the floor before him like a child ready to hear a story. “Seriously?”

He nodded. “I’ve got,” Roadie’s eyes lowered to the pipes that hugged his waist. “Issues.” Jinx followed his gaze, furrowing her brows. “Wowa! What happened?” Confusion was quickly washed away by childish curiosity as she all but leaped to him, just now noticing the pipes. He wanted to feel uncomfortable, but for the first time in a long while he felt at ease with this girl’s presence.

Roadie shrugged. “According to my mom I was dying. The doctor I visit surgically attached these to my body so I can get a direct dosage of shimmer in my bloodstream to keep my strength.”

Jinx’s blue eyes sparkled. “That’s metal!” Roadie blushed again, but his moment of bashfulness was only present for a few seconds. Talking about his illness had him remembering how dependent he was on shimmer. How he was addicted to it. That he needed the dosage raised every year. The blue haired girl notice his solemn face, nudging his shoulder playfully. “Hey, I know what you need, kid.”

Roadie only looked at her with a quirked brow. “Now that you’re all dolled up,” She jumped onto one of the cables holding the turbine up. Her hands supported her weight as she twirled her body around the cable. “A refreshin’ night into town should lift your spirits!”

[heylittleriotact]

🎄 Merry Almost Christmas Have A Festive WIP 🎄

(It's not looking like I'll be able to finish this before the holiday chaos ensues and I won't have a moment to myself until at least the weekend, so Christmas came sort of early, Emmrook friends)

❄️ Yet Untitled First-Day Holiday Fluff Piece ❄️

She stares at the gold ring and twitches her finger slightly, capturing a beam of groggy winter sunshine in the impressive red jewel that adorns it. She raises and lowers the finger, mesmerized by the comforting silence of the wood paneled entryway, and the way the light catches so prettily on the stone, making it look like bright arterial blood: rich with oxygen and scarlet in colour. 

It’s no ruby though… not even relatively inexpensive garnet. It’s coloured glass, and the band isn’t gold: judging on the way it leaves a dull green shadow of itself on her skin by the end of each day, it’s brass or maybe copper. 

If one was to look at it closely - which she has numerous times over the past few months - they would see where the cheap metal has been repetitively worn down, buckled, been repaired, and worn down some more over decades. There’s an almost imperceptible chip in the stone near the upper left edge of the setting, and in the right light you can see where small spiderweb cracks have been painstakingly filled in with a strong, clear substance, sanded and polished to match the shine of the rest of the stone. 

She dare not ask how much coin Emmrich has spent over the years to keep this ring in good repair. 

He rather insistently offered to buy her a ‘proper’ ring to mark their betrothal the morning after they returned to Nevarra: his Father’s ring was only meant to be temporary given the timing of his proposal, and what she really needed was a ring befitting the enormity and depth of his love for her; a ring that would at least compare to her beauty, though no bauble existed that could ever equal it. There were a number of other poetic and deeply romantic sentiments that she patiently waited for him to list off, nodding politely as he worked himself into a veritable tizzy, snuggled up alongside her in the warmth of the plush feather bed in the master suite of his house in the city.

“If you wish to spoil me with a second engagement ring, I daresay I’ll be the talk of Nevarra, and I won’t utter a single complaint,” she grinned, rotating the priceless ring on her finger. “But I hope you realize I’m going to keep wearing this one. This is the real one: this one is you. And you could drop a small kingdom worth of gold on the finest ring from King Caspar’s personal collection for all I care, but it would still look like cheap junk next to this, so if this is all just a clever ruse to get me to give it back, you’re out of luck, love: it’s mine– just like your heart… but don’t fret: I’ll take good care of them both.” And she planted a kiss on the top of his head, burying her nose in tousled hair that smelled of ripe cherries.

He made her come three times in a row that morning. 

She smiles at the memory and tugs on a pair of lined leather gloves, looking around the inviting entryway of the house as she does this. It’s a level of status and comfort that she’s still very much getting used to. It’s not a palatial manor by any means, but rather a high-end rowhouse in a quadrant of the city where nobles, high-ranking Mortalitasi, and retired political advisors live. Rowhouse or no, it’s still got four bedrooms, three bathrooms, and the nicest kitchen Amina has ever seen. Emmrich worked hard for the comfort he enjoys, and Amina was no pauper before her break from the Watch, but getting used to having staff has proven… challenging. Blessedly with the holiday coming up, Emmrich has sent the housekeeper, footman, and butler home - with full pay of course, and some extra - to be with their families. The house is empty and quiet but for the two of them, and it’s been a boon to just feel able to fully relax without the ever-present awareness of someone perceiving her, even if it was done benevolently by the curious staff of Professor Volkarin.

She couldn’t blame them for their interest: their employer went on sabbatical months earlier and returned home, a lauded hero of Thedas, with a relatively young woman on his arm and rumours of an imminent marriage trailing the pair. 

She runs a gloved finger down the dark chestnut door frame (not a speck of dust) and shifts, feeling a bit warm standing inside wearing her thick, gray wool coat. It always takes Emmrich forever to get ready to go anywhere— they’re going skating, not attending high tea with the Empress of Orlais…

“Rook!”

She glances over her shoulder to see Manfred shuffling down the hallway towards her, a pair of ice skates held aloft in front of him as he races towards her. 

“Knives!” He declares, eyes flaring gleefully. “Knives!”

“Sort of,” she remarks wryly, her lip curling in an amused smile that she can’t help whenever the enthusiastic construct is around. “Best not let your Father see you running with those: you remember the incident with the scalpel, hm?”

“Pressure!” Manfred recites proudly, “Put! Pressure!” He grips Amina’s forearm with surprising strength to demonstrate.

“Very good.”

“Hurray!” He relinquishes his grip and hops from foot to foot, unable to contain his excitement.

It had been difficult to convince Emmrich to bring Manfred skating, what with her beloved citing the obvious incompatibility of brittle bone, hard ice, and gravity. 

“What if he falls?” Emmrich had queried, his brow knitting in consternation, his lips pouting, fingers laced over his heart - hell, his moustache might have drooped a little. 

Emmrich still turns brick red when Manfred calls him ‘Father’ and tries to correct him, but when he’s not within earshot, Amina tells Manfred not to listen: just this time - because he is Manfred’s father, and he’ll get used to it eventually, but denying it isn’t going to do either of them favours.

“He won’t fall,” she had promised Emmrich, tracing the shape of his shadowed jaw. “Not when he’s got both of us by his side.”

He made love to her twice that night: long, passionate encounters that left her muscles a bit achy and her brain a bit foggy come the morning.

She’s still been taking her weekly tincture to prevent pregnancy, but sooner or later she knows they’re going to have to talk about the future of that… and all that might come of stopping it. She could have broached the topic by now - could have said something, but he hasn’t said anything either, and even if she did float the idea of a child by him and he said no, that would be fine, but she hasn’t felt ready for the permanence of that conversation yet… the fact that once its had, it can’t really be taken back: she’s thirty-seven, and running short on time to act on such things…

“Emmrich is Father. Rook is Mother!” 

“Oh. Um… not… not just yet, Manfred… wait— who told you that?” She feels her face redden, feels even warmer in her coat and scarf than she already does: where the hell is Emmrich? “Your ability to speak is certainly coming along, isn’t it?” She pretends to take a nose he doesn’t have, sticking the tip of her gloved thumb out from between her index and middle finger. She shakes it tauntingly and bites back the laugh threatening to break loose at the sound of Manfred’s scandalized hiss. “Give you a few years and I bet you’ll be running entire lectures by yourself.” She ducks Manfred’s grab for the ‘nose’ in her hand, bobs under his skeletal arm and straightens: they’ve played this game before - it rapidly became one of his favourites once Amina made sure he was crystal clear in his understanding that it was a game and he was not to actually remove anyone’s nose. 

“Oh good, you’re both ready!” 

Emmrich traipses down the stairs, hauling his own dark green wool coat up over his shoulders, a man in his element with his hair impeccably coiffed, his charcoal trousers perfectly pressed even in the absence of his butler. His earthy, herbal aftershave follows in his wake as he squeezes past Amina, his hand trailing over her waist to tug a soft woolen scarf from one of the hooks lining the wall.

“The ice on the river might have started melting had we waited any longer.” She snags Manfred’s wrist and gently deposits the ‘nose’ in his hand. After he jams it back on his face, clacking madly the entire time, she turns to Emmrich and beams at him, watching him weave the brown scarf into a complex but distinguished knot, tucking the ends down the front of his coat before buttoning it and lifting the collar to frame his angular face.

He’s flustered - at odds. Is it because he hasn’t skated in years, or is he still preoccupied with worry over Manfred?

“I loathe feeling rushed,” he half mumbles into the scarf, verging on a proper strop. 

“No one’s rushing you.”

He’s taking this very seriously. Too seriously: the tension in his frame gives it away. So she catches his eyes with hers along with his hands, and rises on her tiptoes to press a long, soft kiss to his lips. He tastes like life and embalming fluid and strong black tea.

“You’re the one that wanted to take me skating anyway,” she purrs against his lips, half tempted to tell Manfred that skating has been cancelled so she can take Emmrich upstairs and put a properly fucked out smile on his face instead of the dour pout he’s currently wearing. “We’ll have a lovely time, and if it helps put your mind at ease, why don’t we bundle Manfred in your thickest down-filled coat?” 

His mouth turns up slightly at the corners after a moment of consideration. “What an excellent idea, darling.” He kisses her again, holding her chin with his thumb and forefinger, his fingers so wonderfully warm and real. For a moment she wonders if he’s having thoughts about calling off their excursion as well, but he turns from her to rifle through the closet. He leans further and further in, going further and further back through decades of fashions - some timeless, others dated and eccentric - she’s well familiar by now with the state of his sprawling closet upstairs: it’s little wonder he has this many coats too. 

Eventually she hears a muffled ‘a-ha!’ and Emmrich resurfaces gripping a massive down-filled jacket that’s a virulent shade of yellow plaidweave. It’s got about forty pockets, twenty-odd buckles, and a dozen black toggle style closures running down the front all shaped like skulls. The hood and cuffs are trimmed with…with some sort of fur? …Why is it bright green?

It’s hideous.

Actually, ‘hideous’ is a polite assessment: in fact, it’s so, so far beyond hideous that Amina is unsure if there actually exists a word to accurately describe the severe affront to all things fashionable that this jacket is. 

Unable to help herself, Amina bursts out laughing at the sight of the thing, mostly due to the immediate mental image of the man holding it, wearing it. 

“What?” He frowns.

“It’s so…” she gasps between giggles. “It’s just so… hah! Did you actually wear that?” She collapses in a fit of amused titters again as the love of her life holds the jacket at arms length and studies it. 

“Well… yes.” He states, sounding nonplussed. “Granted, I was in my very early twenties when this style was popular with the more… avant garde circles I ran with in those days…” 

“It looks cozy, I’ll give it that.” She gently tugs it out of his hands even though he’s still frowning at it, nostalgia evident on his face. “And we certainly won’t lose Manfred in a crowd with this colour combination.” 

[ruinparadox]

Full deamon husk x shy gn reader in a beauty and the beast like relationship

I'm actually so upset I hadn't thought of this idea before because its so good. Like, you can't just drop a banger idea like this and just not elaborate!

The Beast and his Beauty - Full demon form overlord Husk x Gn!Reader

It’s been a few months since that fateful day. A casino stands at the edge of the city, all but abandoned. The tables are barren, the cards are rotted, and the castle-like building has only one resident, and now one hostage. You swore up and down to your friend that they should not just throw themselves into the casino just to fish for gold and whatnot on the off chance that the overlord who purportedly lives there has somehow died off in the past few centuries of his life.

But no matter how you tried, no matter how you pleaded, they simply waved you off and made for the decrepit castle. One day turned into two. Two days turned into a week into a month, and you left for the castle as well. Other sinners called out to you, trying to warn you of the dangers, but you didn’t heed them. Your friend was in danger and you needed to help them, safety be damned.

Interestingly, the casino stands opposite of the Hazbin Hotel. Atop a hill, behind a tall gate, sequestered away from the big city. It's such a short distance, yet so far away. The metal creaks as you push the entrance open, rust coating the exterior. And just like that you’re scrambling up the hill towards that ornate but blemished door. You grab the handle and notice that it isn’t locked. The mechanism must have eroded away or the overlord is eager to hunt for prey within his walls. Either way, you gain free entry into the estate.

Bravely, or perhaps foolishly, you call into the depths of the halls, your friend’s name reverberating like a siren call. And like a moth to a flame, the overlord appears. He is a hulking beast, his stature so tall he takes up half the entrance hall of the casino floor. His tail is covered in scars and spines, his wings tattered and frail, the colors of the feathers dull and grey. Barely enough plumes for him to assume a brief bout of flight. 

A snarl rumbles in his throat, his face riddled with soot with his face taking the shape of a tiger who’s muzzle is scrunched and wrinkled in perpetual anger. His eyes are like gemstones, glowing in the dark, his slit pupils watching your every move. He’s a predator eyeing prey in his territory. The scythes for talons and claws on his giant paws scratch the floor as he stalks towards you, leaving deep wounds in the marble panels.

“Why are you here?” You could feel the castle shake with his distorted voice. He sounds so… tired.

Why else are you here? For your friend. You demand to know where they are, right now. You demand for their release. 

“Friend? You mean this little plaything?” His tail comes around from behind him, the tip hooked through the hoop of a cage and your friend dangling inside it. “I am merely defending my home from intruders. Intruders such as you, if that wasn’t clear. Why should I release them?”

Indeed, why should he? He has no reason to care about you, a strange person trespassing on the monument to his shame. He has no desires to cling to, no vices to drown in. What could you possibly have to offer the beast who wants nothing but to be left alone?

A question that leaves you stumped. No amount of money could lift him from this state. He’d just gamble it all away again on the vain hopes some windfall might come his way. You can’t offer him power, he has that in droves, not that it's done him much good. And redemption is far too flimsy a concept for him to take on faith.

No, there’s only one thing you could give him. Your soul.

Immediately, your friend is banging at the bars of their cage, crying out in protest, but your gaze is fixed firmly on the beast towering over you, its breath brushing through your fur. 

“You would gamble away your soul on something so small?” He’s almost surprised you’d even considered it, let alone actually offered. But nevertheless, as terrified as you are, even as your body shakes in anxiety and fear, your gaze does not drop. You will see this through. Though to what end? Even you yourself aren’t sure.

His eyes narrow down at you, but he accepts your proposal. You utter an apology to your friend as they cry and beg for you to take it back. They’re cast out after the beast places a spell on them to never speak or mention anything about what took place and can never return to the castle beyond the gate.

In the next second, the beast has returned, and your friend is barred from the estate, their figure barely visibly beyond the gates at the foot of the hill. A golden manacle manifests itself around your neck, a chain rattling as it extends to the beast. You expect him to yank you towards him, but surprisingly, he doesn’t. Instead, he looks down on it, and lets it fall to the floor, its brilliant yet ominous glow fading out of sight.

You don’t even get a word in before he’s stalking off to some unknown part of the castle, his voice quiet as he mumbles for you to “do whatever you want.”

It's been a few months since that day, and you two have grown close since then. The beast, whose name you now know as “Husk,” is trapped in his own casino, surrounded by nothing but forgotten bets and dried up alcohol. He can’t even drink the pain away anymore. He refuses to elaborate when asked about what is keeping him here.

At first, he’s distant and grumpy, barely acknowledging your presence with small grunts, let alone words. You attempt to talk to him, but whether he can hear you, or is just outright ignoring you is anyone’s guess. With conversation a moot front, you attempt to at least make a space for yourself to sleep and live in. If you are going to be staying in a decrepit castle, you might as well make it as comfortable as you can.

He sees you attempting to clear out a room as best you can, but the dust, dirt, and rot are endless. Begrudgingly, he tells you to stop and to just sleep in his room. There’s a lot less dirt and it has the only bed in the entire building that hasn’t crumbled to dust.

The bed in question is more than half the size of the room, a large circle mattress dressed in blemished silk sheets. You imagine it must have looked lavish in the casino’s heyday. You find yourself impressed when it's revealed that the room is capable of housing both you and Husk, the giant resting his head on the empty half of the bed next to you. 

His breathing is soft, but given the size difference it's a veritable gust of wind ruffling your clothes in your sleep. No matter, you’ll just have to use a few more blankets from now on. Assuming there are still any left.

In the next few days you do some exploring of the grounds. You’re not allowed outside, lest you bring more intruders to disturb his territory, but you’re free to go wherever you wish inside. It is then you happen across a closet filled with dresses and other clothes somehow untouched by the ravages of time. Husk is equally surprised but says you can have them. Normally they’d be gifts for his employees if they excelled at their jobs but… well, you get the idea by now, don’t you?

Happily, you put one of them on, looking at yourself twirling about in a cracked vanity mirror. In the reflection, you catch Husk staring at you with a look that’s less than grumpy as he usually is. He notices you looking at him and immediately turns around, his tail nearly knocking you over as he grumbles about taking a nap.

The weeks go by and you catch Husk looking at you more and more, a glint of something you can’t quite recognize in his eyes. It escalates from there. Purrs rumbling the castle, an unexpected nuzzle here or there, and his tail gently wrapping around you.

He refuses to say anything about it until you confront him directly. Reluctantly, he tells you of days long past, when dancers lined the stage, when bright lights and strong drinks bathed the walls, when money flowed through the establishment like water through a dam… when a horrible deal gone wrong took everything from him and one by one, the people disappeared. 

Soon there were no dancers, no booze, no lights, and no money. He’s been here all alone in his self imposed exile. It's not that he can’t leave, but he won’t. For what purpose would that serve? There’s nothing waiting for him out there. Nothing that could fill the hole in his heart. A hole he carved out himself.

At least, that’s what he thought until recently. Until he felt a spark go off within him when he saw you wear that dress, smiling like you were ready to go dancing. He feels something for you, but he can’t trust himself to not mess it up, to not ruin it like he did everything else. 

You give him a smile and he feels his fur go warm for a bit. You tell him that he won’t know if it will work if he doesn’t try. That seems to touch something inside him and for the first time in a while, he smiles. 

That night, you two make for a ballroom. Not sure why a casino needs one, but neither of you really care right now. You two dance and dance throughout the night. Well, more like you’re the one dancing and he’s gently guiding you with his talons. He’s far too big to move about in such a manner without causing some damage.

Still, it doesn’t matter, both of you have fun, and the next few weeks, it only gets better. You two are now having dinner together with what little food you can find or afford, you’re allowed to go outside and buy or steal anything you need, and you now sleep together on the bed, his body curled around yours to give you all the warmth you need.

You tell your friend that you’re okay and you don’t need rescuing. You pack your things from the hotel and move them into Husk’s castle, saying goodbye to your friends while promising to visit. Redemption is overrated. And whether your lives end from being redeemed, or from an exorcist's blade, or perhaps they never end at all, you’re just happy to spend your life next to a beautiful creature such as he.

It doesn’t matter that he can’t return to his normal form anymore. You love him just the way he is.

[rollup2theparty]

—⋆𐙚₊˚⊹ scarlet heart! sung hanbin

❦ when you find yourself in the heart of your favorite graphic novel, you didn't expect to fall for the crown prince knowing the slim chance of a happily ever after. (scarlet heart & extraordinary you inspired)

౨ৎ ONE SHOT (fem!reader x s.hanbin)

⟡ soulmates / star crossed lovers / historical

⚠︎ character death / minor angst / mentions of blood

notes!! im not the most confident in fantasy so this one is rlly short but i hope uu enjoy!! lmk if u have any feedback (not proofread)

all you ever wanted was to escape, escape the horrid reality of your austere 9-5, escape the mundane plethora of emails and meetings, escape the job you drag yourself to daily. its true that your greatest desire would be to flee the repetitive soul-assassination that is this routine life of yours but you sure didn't expect it to turn out like this.

you try to count your fingers, all five. this confirms it, it can't a lucid dream. so how could it be that the scene set in front of you looks identical to the opening panel of the final chapter to your favorite graphic novel? in a blink, you transport to a wooden palanquin dressed in your finest ensemble, hand carried by a parade of men.

your distress translates to shivers, you have no idea where you found yourself yet you know exactly where you are going, the crown prince's quarters for a royal wedding... your royal wedding.

the palace looks identical to the illustrations you were used to seeing, the mass from behind the dignified gates cheer as you proceed with the extravagance of a royal procession. while the stage before your eyes bears close resemblance to the masterful drawings of a human author, they gave the imperial heir to the crown no justice. no artist, painter or mastermind could possibly illustrate the way his eyes gleamed with a sentimental yearning, the way his nose fell perfectly between his cheekbones, the way his cupids bow rested delicately above the perfect balance between a plump smile and a knife-sharp jaw. he was angelic to the extent that it was almost bewitching.

familiar memories of moonlit evenings by the lake where the fish swam side by side with the star-filled sky accompanied by the soft embrace of his touch ran through your head like a prologue slideshow. the jittery feeling as he placed a refined jade pin adorned with golden feathers and a blush-pink rose in your palm materialized in your mind like the experience was truly yours. you watch the glimmer of the illusory night reflected on the water beneath your feet. your heart beat escalates, tickled by the warm paced breath on your neck. his hands gradually moved to your cheek, gracefully pushing back the strands of hair that fell on your face. whisker smile appearing on cue, his left hand right snaked pass the silk fabric of your robe and around your waist, he leaned in and your heart stopped.

"i'll love you in every life." he whispered-

and you snap back to the present as you make your bows, exchange wine and partake in a feast made for kings (literally). your groom excuses himself to change out of his ceremonial robe and you rise up to do the same, knowing that the two of you will reunite, veiled behind the tapestry. the retinue scramble to clear out the remnants of your dinner as the two of you step into the vicinity where you are man and wife. he tugs on your robe and pulls you in as he gently envelopes his fingers around yours, the awe that left your brain fogged failed to remind of you of a rather special ending, one with an agonizing pierce of a double edged sword.

the pain was so intense, so nauseating, it was nothing but all-consuming. the friction of cold metal through your skin and bones left you quivering as you fell to your knees in acute agony. you sink into the arms of your lover as you slowly succumb to the fatal pain, taking slower breaths, gradually reaching the end.

star crossed, ill-fated, and damned, the nature of your relationship was meant to be doomed. teardrops grazed your cheeks as his screams and yells turn into nothing but the sound of your defeated heartbeat and you are tugged back to the real world.

your eyes open to the harsh light of the office bullpen and you doubt the reality you experienced was anything more than a fever dream, until you spot the emerald emblem lodged in the corner of your desk. as you begin the question the line between fantasy and existence, your speculation is forced to a halt as your supervisor clears his throat to introduce a new member to the team. a dashing man in a white button up and tie with the same eyes, cheek dimples and fleshy lips. like you are bound to each other with an invisible thread, the two of you are destined to meet in every life, dimension and universe.

[ear-worthy]

Five Best Science Podcasts Of 2024

Science podcasts are a bright spot within the podcast industry, counteracting the growing number of conspiracy, extremist, and fact-free podcasts.

As I’ve mentioned before, Ear Worthy uses a panel of people from around the U.S., from Texas to California, New Jersey to Oregon, and Alabama to New Hampshire. Also, we do not choose the low-hanging fruit of podcasts with high visibility because of marketing by their podcast network. Just because a podcast has thousands of downloads does not make it a quality, ear-worthy show.

In no particular order, here are Ear Worthy’s Five Science Podcasts of 2024.

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Science Vs

And they do so tongue-in-cheek, but also with no fear of proclaiming “the data isn’t clear” or “we need more data for greater certainty.” Behind the wily wisecracks of Zukerman and the show’s refusal to take itself too seriously, Science Vs is deadly serious about facts, research, facts, and conclusions. But it never seems to get too far ahead of its skis, making claims it cannot substantiate.

The show’s success is evident from its consistent ranking as one of the most downloaded podcasts. This year’s episodes of note include microplastics, ask Wendy anything, and what’s at the edge of space.

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Scientists don’t really know what 95 percent of the universe is made up of. That fact is particularly shocking, considering we live in an age where humans seem to know it all. 

That’s why Vox’s science podcast — Unexplainable — is especially timely because it takes listeners on a journey into the unknown and then explores that feeling when “you think you understand something and there’s just so much more.” 

Produced by Vox — known for quality, thoughtful podcasts — Unexplainable host Hassenfeld explains that the podcast isn’t about the answers. “It’s about the questions,” he says. Alex Trebek would be proud of him.

Unexplainable launched its first episode in March 2021. Dutifully, that initial episode focused on the mystery of dark matter, which is composed of particles that do not absorb, reflect, or emit light. Therefore, dark matter can not be detected by electromagnetic radiation and can’t be seen directly. 

The format of Unexplainable is straightforward and is smartly designed to enhance understanding rather than grovel for listeners. In the show, host Noam Hassenfeld is joined by an array of experts and Vox reporters each week to look at fascinating unanswered questions in science and the mind-bending ways scientists are trying to answer them.

Episodes that are ear-worthy this year includes does your gut have feelings, how did Earth get its water, and what do dinosaurs sound like.

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Big Picture Science

The show’s co-hosts are Seth Shostak and Molly Bentley. Shostak and Bentley have been doing for years, so they are comfortable as hosts, interviewers, and with each other. The co-hosts can geek out on hard science and still laugh at science nerdiness, and they can get tough with junk science theories and claims. In essence, they make an enjoyable combo,

On the April 15, 2024, episode, “For The Birds” we hear about migratory birds that travel thousands of miles in a display of endurance that would make an Olympic athlete gasp. More importantly, we discover what can we do to save disappearing species? 

Plus, we learn how 19th century bird-lovers, appalled by feathered hats, started the modern conservation movement.

On the recent July 11, 2024, show — “Aliens Now” — the co-hosts talk to astrophysicist Adam Frank about the possibility of intelligent life on other planets.

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Taboo Science

Ashley Hamer is a writer, podcaster, and science communicator in Chicago. She is the creator of Taboo Science and the former host and content lead of the science podcast Curiosity Daily.

The podcast began in September 2020, and it didn’t pull any punches in its first several episodes. Topics included pornography, profanity, cannibalism, penises, and vaginas. I can just sense the uptight people who are organizing bans.

If you, as a listener, are into your science being serious stuff with people with PhDs speaking in solemn tones, Taboo Science is not for you.

But if enjoy a beaker full of fun with your science lesson, and don’t mind your poop being referred to you as “butt nuggets,” then Taboo Science is for you. 

The most taboo episodes this year include its miniseries about the weird and colorful world of kinks and fetishes. Be prepared to be shocked. Or not.

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Short Wave

Short Wave is a National Public Radio (NPR) podcast that gives us a sneak peek behind the science headlines — all in about 10 minutes, every weekday. It’s science for everyone, using a lot of creativity and a little humor. 

Emily Kwong is perfectly capable of presenting science from a different wavelength.

Short Wave can do a sub -10-minute deep dive because Sofia is so fluent in science and communicating key concepts. Recent episodes include a tale of swarming locusts in Africa and how scientists in Tempe, AZ are using a low-carb diet to minimize crop damage. 

Or a truly troubling episode about a condition called silicosis, and it’s been known about for decades. So why is it now emerging in new numbers among workers who cut kitchen counter tops? NPR science correspondent Nell Greenfieldboyce explains in such a way you’ll say a prayer that you kept your old Formica counter tops. 

 New discoveries, everyday mysteries, and the science behind the headlines — all in about 10 minutes, every weekday. It’s science for everyone, using a lot of creativity and a little humor.

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Honorable Mention Why This Universe — The biggest ideas in physics, broken down. Join University of Chicago theoretical physicist Dan Hooper and co-host Shalma Wegsman as they answer your questions about dark matter, black holes, quantum mechanics, and more.