#feel free to ignore this if you're not in the mood for politics I get it

[sheeple]

Heirs of Hogwarts | part 1

Genre(s): Nuisance to Lovers / Fake dating / Fluff / No Voldy au Fandom(s): Harry Potter Pairing(s): Mattheo Riddle x Hufflepuff!Reader Summary: After finding out your (now ex)boyfriend cheated on you with the girl he told you not to worry about, you decide to get into a fake relationship with the kid of another founder of Hogwarts. What could go wrong? Warning(s): Cheating boyfriend (Matt could never) / Matt is a cheeky shit A/n: Kinda tried something new with the notes. Lmk if you like/dislike it [Masterlist] [HoH masterlist]

There is a certain expectation that comes with having a well-known surname. People expect you to act in a way that befits a Malfoy, Abbott, Prewett or any other name on the Sacred Twenty-Eight list. And while there is no person left who carries the Gaunt name anymore, a Riddle is as good as a Gaunt in the eyes of the Pure-Blood community.

The one thing nobody realises that also carries on for the ones who are literally Wizarding World royalty. Like you. A Hufflepuff. No, not like the house. But your surname is literally Hufflepuff. Helga Hufflepuff is your great-grandmother many times over. And it sucks.

You're expected to be the embodiment of Hufflepuff House. Be kind, be ready to help everyone who asks, be patient, be humble, be just, be good at Herbology. You hate Herbology! The dirt under your nails. The smell of the classroom. The way magical plants are not really safe for children to be around. I mean... hello? Mandrakes? Yeah, didn't think so.

And it's not like you're not all those things. You are kind, you do help others when asked, you are humble, maybe not as patient as you should be, and just. Just not all the time. 

Like right now. Right now you are not patient with Hannah and Susan for hogging the bathroom. You've slept like shit and you are hungry. So, you've decided to go to breakfast without them and have them join you later. You can always brush your teeth after breakfast

As you walk across the common room, you greet your Great-Grandmother in passing. "Morning, Meemaw."

"Good morning my little Badger!", she calls after you cheerfully, earning a couple snickers from your housemates. You choose to ignore them and make your trek up the stairs in silence, giving every student who greets you a polite smile.

You don't even know half the people who call out your name when you pass them. They don't even use your name. Just a variation of Hufflepuff. Huff. Puff. Badger. Queen Badger — you really hate that one. You nearly punched a guy for calling you the Top Notch Yellow One. But to be fair, you were in an abysmal mood that day.

By now you've got a pro at tuning out the stares when you walk into the Great Hall. It's mostly the first years who stare at you with wide eyes and mouths agape once they learn who you are. 

You plop down at a free spot and start to plate up some food and pour in juice. Just as you're mid-sip, you feel someone loom over you.

"Good morning", gets whispered in your ear before your boyfriend takes a seat next to you.

You hum and slump against his shoulder. Malcolm pats your head as he knows that is the best attempt at getting a response from you before you've got a semblance of food in your stomach. 

Malcolm Preece and you have been dating for almost a year now. He's a year above you and on the Quidditch team. Your friends don't really like him — and if you are completely honest with yourself neither do you. He's too possessive. He always needs to know where you are and with whom. It also drives you absolutely up the walls.

It has always been expected of you to be in a respectable relationship by the sixth year. Even non-Slytherin families have that kind of pressure. Surprising hmm? You needed your parents off your back and Malcolm was there. Do you feel bad for the guy? Yeah, of course. And it's not like you don't care about him but it's more an obligation; the kissing and the touches and the handholding.

"Guess what", you grumble, whipping your mouth. Malcolm hums as he butters his bread. "My first class of the day is Herbology."

Malcolm laughs and shakes his head. He places a kiss on your hair before saying, "I know. You've been whining about it all last evening. Is there absolutely nothing you can find to enjoy about the subject. Or why don't you ask Sprout if you can drop the course?"

You give him a look. "You know I can't do that. Everybody in my family graduated top of their class and I am not about to be the first one of my siblings to royally piss off my parents. Amelia came close when she almost dropped Meemaw's cup." 

Your boyfriend laughs but doesn't say anything else. Because your hate for Herbology doesn't come from your general dislike of dirt. It comes from the first thing you see when you walk into the glasshouse.

You share many classes with other houses. You also share many classes with Slytherin. That also means you share many classes with Mattheo Riddle. He's a pompous prat who likes to make your days worse for absolutely no reason. 

Normally you sit on the other side of the classroom and ignore him and his friends. He's not above pulling your hair or bumping against you in the hallways. It's petty. And you have no idea why or how it started in the first place.

Herbology is the only class you actually have to interact with Mattheo. For the others you usually sit with Hannah or Susan. But Professor Sprout wanted to hustle up the usual groups and pair random students with each other. That's how you got stuck with Mattheo.

"What is it, princess? Scared a little mud will ruin your manicure?", he says with a shit-eating grin as you put on gardening gloves. You shoot him a glare but continue to tend to you Fluxweed.

"Looks like your Fluxweed can use a little manicure." You give a pointed look at the sad sprig that used to be a plant and continue to do your own thing. "That reminds me, we have to finish our report on Fluxweed. Do you have any time this week? I mean, between your busy schedule of pestering first years and tripping up Neville Longbottom."

You hear a snicker behind you. Hannah holds up her hand to her mouth to stifle her laughter and you wink at her while Mattheo sends her a scalding glare.

"Sure", sneers Mattheo, "if you have any room between tea parties and snogging that sad sack you call a boyfriend."

"I don't have-", you want to interject but you know it has no use. Only if Professor Sprout wouldn't be hoovering around you all the time you would have 'accidentally' stomped on his feet.

You turn your back towards him and walk towards the supply closet, searching for a pair of shears. But Professor Sprout keeps them on the top shelf. As you want to grab your wand, a hand suddenly tugs at the ribbon in your hair. 

With a gasp, you whip around and you are met with Mattheo's chest, his tie hanging loosely around his neck. He gives you a bored look before turning around and walking back towards his table. 

You shake your head and turn around. When you want to Accio the shears to you, you see that they've been placed on the shelve at eye height. Huh.

Once your classes before lunch are finally over you walk out of the classroom with a smile as you spot Malcolm waiting for you. But your smile soon falters at the person standing next to him. Gladys Prescott stands way too close to your boyfriend. She's twirling a lock of hair with her finger as she laughs obnoxiously at one of Malcolm's jokes. They're great, but not that funny.

When you first started dating Malcolm you voiced your questions about his and Gladys' relationship. You were under the impression that they were dating because of how close they were. You and your friends were surprised when he asked you out on a Hogsmeade date.

The worst thing is that Malcolm swears nothing's going on between the two. That they're just friends. But the way he looks at her and treats her makes you glower. It's not that you're jealous. Just... you don't want to get berated by your parents for choosing the wrong partner.

"Ready?", you plaster on a wide smile, clutching your books in your hands.

Gladys and Malcolm look like they are snapped out of their little world before Malcolm registers that it's you and he returns your smile. "You don't mind if Gly joins us, do you?"

You turn to the girl, who gives you a fake ass big smile. "Of course not. The more the merrier! Now, tell me about your morning."

The two of them speak more to each other and don't bother to include you. Resting your chin on your hand, you look around the Great Hall. Susan and Hannah are doing their Prefect duties so they are unable to join you for lunch. 

Tuning out Malcolm and Gladys, your eyes flicker to the other students who are enjoying their lunch. You suddenly make eye contact with Mattheo over at the Slytherin table. He raises his brows at you. You mimic his expression before continuing with your surveying. But when you look back he's still looking at you.

His expressionless eyes flicker towards your boyfriend and Gladys before back to you. He raises a single eyebrow at you, silently asking if you tolerate it. 

You send him a pinched look back before zoning back into the conversation. Malcolm and Gladys are laughing loudly and Gladys has a hand clasped over his. The hold on your fork tightens and you swear you feel it bend in your hold.

You stand up abruptly. Gladys and Malcolm pull their hands away like they're burned and look up at you. "I'm... I have to ask Professor Slughorn something before class begins." You think up the excuse on the spot.

"Oh... Do you want me to walk you..?" Malcolm looks at you with big eyes.

But you shake your head. "No. I wouldn't want to pull you away from your fascinating conversation." You give Gladys a sickly sweet smile, which she doesn't return.

Instead of making a left once you leave the Great Hall, you keep on walking until you're at the edge of the forest. You survey if nobody's following you. With a deep breath, you crouch down and feel your bones and skin snap and pull.

One thing that nobody seems to know about Helga Hufflepuff is that she is a born Animagus. And she has given the ability to transform into a badger at will to all her descendants. The Ministry knows about it and every Hufflepuff descendant gets tested at age ten. By then most children are already used to the transformation.

And you love it. It helps you clear your head and release frustration. As of late you've been doing it a lot more. 

Your little legs move easily over the forest floor towards your little burrow. You know, the Dark Forest isn't that scary when you're one of the animals. Mostly because you know which sides of the forest you need to dodge. Badgers are vicious but spiders are a paint in the butt. 

The afternoon is spent frolicking in flower fields, munching on berries and nuts, and reinforcing the little stick bridges you made for your fellow badgers and woodland creatures over the many rivers that pass through the forest.

By the time you return to the castle, it's already dark and you're tired. You want to curl up in your bed and hear about Susan and Hannah's day. 

But something stops you in your way when you pass a dorm. A whiney, feminine voice comes from Malcolm's room. Gladys. "For how long do you have to pretend to like that stuck-up brat?"

You inch closer to the door and peer between the crack. Malcolm and Gladys are on his bed, her between his legs and they're pecking each other's lips, naked. Your chest tightens at this display of intimacy Malcolm never wanted to show you. Too 'old-school'. Or so he claimed.

Malcolm hums. "I know, Pookie. But next year I'm graduated and I want a good job. If I manage to sit it out any longer Mr Hufflepuff might recommend me for a good position at the Ministry."

Anger bubbles from within you and you turn around, marching out of the common room. You ignore the calls of your name and keep on walking until you're outside and on one of the old defence walls of the school. Your thinking spot.

It doesn't hurt that he is cheating on you. You weren't blind. What hurts is that he is using you to get further in life. He's just like the others. 

Your shoulders tense up at the sound of someone making them up the stairs and the smell of cigarettes. Great. You really need him to bother you right now.

Mattheo halts once he spots you sitting between the battlements, your feet dangling off the edge. He blows out a puff of smoke before sitting next to you. Out of politeness, he offers his cigarette. He doesn't expect you to accept it and take a drag.

"I didn't know you smoked", muses Mattheo as he watches you blow out the smoke mesmerised.

You glance at him while giving the cigarette back. "I don't."

The two of you stay silent, neither of you wanting or knowing what to talk about. Until it's Mattheo who breaks the silence. "What has the pretty Princess so stressed?"

"I'm not stressed." You opt to ignore the princess part for your sanity.

"Sure. And I can't talk to snakes. You're destroying your nailbeds", he points out and you look down. Your fingers are picking at the skin around your thumbnails. You've managed to make it bleed.

Sticking your thumb in your mouth to suck the blood away, you stare defiantly at the darkness that envelops the forbidden forest. "Malcolm's been cheating on me", you say after some contemplating, eyeing the Slytherin boy next to you.

Mattheo raises one brow unimpressed. "What?", he asks when you give him a look, "do I have to act surprised?" He dramatically fake gasps. "Oh, my Merlin! He did not!" He impersonates an American Valley Girl while covering his mouth with his hand.

You roll your eyes annoyed. Of course, you shouldn't have brought up the subject to Mattheo fucking Riddle. "Forget it if you're going to be a dick about it." You push yourself up and dust off your hands.

But Mattheo's hand around your wrist stops you and he leans back, his eyes somewhat apologetic. "No, don't go. I'm sorry. How did you find out?"

This time you raise your eyebrows. Mattheo Riddle never apologises. What in the... 

Against your better judgment, you sit back, your hands folded in your lap. "I just came back and I heard him talk about it with Gladys. How he wants my dad to give him a good job when he graduates." You take a deep breath, the nicotine tickling your nose. "I had a hunch he was fooling around with her. But using me, that hurts, you know?" 

He nods as you glance at him. Mattheo knows. He, just like you, is used to people only talking to or befriending him because they want something from him. They think getting in his good graces gets them somewhere. Absolutely not.

"You knew?"

You hum. Your fingers start to attack your nailbeds again as you think back to the many times you've had to bite your tongue. To keep face in front of the others at school. "I needed someone to keep my parents off my back. My parents expect all of us to have a steady partner by our sixth year. My siblings did it, but only the oldest actually had a girlfriend. The twins just told me to find someone to play the part."

A groan escapes you as you bury your hands in your face. "And now someone will rat to their parents about my break-up, who in turn tell my parents and then I'll get a stern letter about my future. This whole break-up is more an irritation than a heartache."

The Slytherin boy next to you is deadly silent. Why would you be so stupid to air your grievance to him? It's not like he cares. Standing up for real this time, you give him a curt nod. "Thank you for listening, Riddle. Best not to mention our meet-up with anyone, alright? Goodnight." 

You make your way back towards your dorm and crash into your bed. Pressing your face against your pillow, you try your hardest to forget today.

But as suspected, sleep doesn't come easily. Or not at all. And you feel like a zombie walking towards breakfast, your friends giving you worried looks after you explained what happened last night — minus the Mattheo part. 

"I swear if one more busybody comes up to you to say they're sorry", grumbles Hannah as she gives the students around you glares. She balls up her fists and punches the air in front of her. You and Susan chuckle while students around you look at her weirdly.

It's the worst when you enter the Great Hall. The general breakfast noise quiets as your peers start to whisper when you pass them. You keep your eyes focused on a far-off point until you are at your usual breakfast spot.

The three of you eat mostly in silence. Hannah and Susan try to engage you in a conversation but you just play with your food. 

"Can we talk?"

You tense up and drop your fork. Slowly, you turn around and look up at Malcolm. He has a guilty look on his face and it angers you. "I don't know. Can we?" You cock your head condescendingly to the side.

You turn back around and start abusing the piece of toast on your plate. Malcolm lays a hand on your shoulder but it gets promptly ripped off by Hannah. "I strongly advise you to back off."

Malcolm scoffs, looking down at the girl who stands protective in front of you. "Or what? Can't I speak with my girlfriend?"

You slowly rise and turn around to face the prick. "Don't speak to her like that, you insufferable twat. You best believe my dad will make sure you won't get a job anywhere in the Ministry, not even as a wand polisher", you bare your teeth, your chest raising rapidly. The Great Hall has fallen silent, watching the exchange.

"You little bitch." Malcolm's jaw ticks and he balls a fist. But the voice of a teacher stops him.

"Mister Preece, I would strongly advise you to step away from Miss Hufflepuff if you don't want to lose your position on the Quidditch team." Professor McGonagall comes striding from the teacher's table, where they could have seen the interaction between the two of you clear as day.

Malcolm's eyes flicker from you towards the professor and back. "This isn't over", he grumbles before leaving the Great Hall.

"Thank you, Professor." You give the woman a small smile as you collect your schoolbag. She waves you away and you grab both Hannah and Susan's hands, dragging them out of the Great Hall, the stares the whole ordeal created starting to creep you out.

Hannah grumbles all the way towards Charms how's she going to 'beat his face in the next time he dares to look at you'. Susan and you share a look but you're glad you've got Hannah to look out for you.

It's again Hannah who sends glares around as the three of you take place at your usual spot — upper bench all the way at the end. That way the three of you can whisper among each other without bothering anyone.

The class goes as usual before a paper bird lands before you. You look surprised to the other side of the classroom. Mattheo Riddle is already looking at you and miming for you to unfold the bird.

You raise your brows at his note. He has such a chicken-scratch handwriting.

"What is it?", asks Susan in a whisper, leaning closer to you to read the note. A soft gasp escapes her and she looks over at Mattheo. Who's eyes are still trained on you, by the way. "Since when are you and Mattheo Riddle sending notes to each other?!"

"Since never!", you hiss, "what time are we done today?"

Hannah looks up from her book. "Three. Why?" She snatches the note out of Susan's hands and her eyes trail over the words. "He needs to fix his handwriting, my brother in Christ. Is 'Fluxweed report' some kind of secret code?"

You snort and swat her chest, earning a smug smile from the girl.

"I think it's rather romantic", says Susan, the hopeless romantic that she is.

A grimace forms on your face. "What is so romantic about finishing a Herbology essay?"

Susan sighs exorbitantly as she rolls her eyes. "You're officially single now! Free to go and explore and find someone who you really like! Mattheo obviously has seen his chance and took it!"

You and Hannah look at Susan as if she just swallowed a flobberworm. She gives the two of you an exasperated look. "What?! Isn't it like so romantic if the two descendants of Hogwarts founders end up dating? I bet ten galleons that he asks you out on a Hogsmeade date."

You huff out a breath. "Fine. But if he ends up humiliating me I'm going to enjoy those ten galleons with all my heart. Now, what do I write him back?"

"Oh! You should ask to meet at those tables at the back of the library where nobody really comes. That way you two could really cosy up."

You turn towards Hannah, feeling betrayed. "I thought you were with me on this?"

Hannah shrugs. "I'm always down for some drama. Besides, he has been staring at you and I always wondered when he would make his move."

"Since when has Mattheo Riddle been staring at me?", you ask genuinely shocked.

"Since like forever! He always manages to look away just in time. You were also too busy with him who we won't name. Bad joojoo."

You ignore Hannah's observation and pen an answer back.

You wait to send it towards him when Flitwick isn't looking before chucking the balled-up paper towards the other side of the classroom and hitting him in the face.

You clasp a hand over your mouth while you and your friends stifle your laugh. Mattheo unfolds the paper, his eyes following every letter you wrote before he shows a thumbs up. 

"Dibs on being you guys' child's Godparent", whispers Susan with a grin and you elbow her in the ribs.

You try to bring your focus back to Flitwick, but you keep on glancing back at the curly-haired boy across the room. Has he some sort of plan to ask you so publicly to study? What is his motive? It can't only be studying, right?

Throughout the day you've grown quite nervous about meeting Mattheo. If it wasn't for your stupid friends and their stupid words you wouldn't have thought about this afternoon like any different from any other Herbology class. 

For Merlin's sake! You just broke up with your boyfriend and your friends are already pushing you onto the next. You wanted to take it slow for a while and enjoy the rest of your year without the worry of having to please a guy!

You fix your hair and uniform behind a bookcase as you see Mattheo already sitting at the table. With a curt breath and nod to yourself, you walk up to the table and take place in front of him. "Hi. Sorry if you've been waiting for long." You send him a small smile as you grab your book and notebook out of your bag. "It takes more time than I imagined to get from Divignation to here."

Mattheo gives you a half-smile and waves away your apologies. "Don't worry. I just got here too actually. So... what needed to be in that essay again?"

The two of you work together surprisingly well. If Mattheo isn't throwing his snide remarks around anyway. You also don't feel the need to be as snappy as you usually are with him. It's actually... nice? For once. 

As you're writing the last part of the essay, you feel his eyes on you. You look back up and raise your brows, silently asking what his deal is.

"I was thinking", he begins.

You let out a chuckle. "That's dangerous."

Ignoring your quip, he continues, "you need your parents off your back, right? And I imagine that you would like to smite Preece after that embarrassing stunt he pulled this morning."

You lean back with your eyes narrowed. "I wouldn't quite call it that. But continue."

Mattheo licks his bottom lips as he instead leans close to you, his voice softening. "Go out with me. Just a couple of dates so that you're seen with me. You know it will drive him nuts seeing you move on so quick."

You contemplate it for a moment or two. He is right. Malcolm always was a bit too paranoid for your taste when you talked with a boy. 

He hums. "So you agree?"

"What do you out of it? This all is a bit too suspicious."

He laughs and he runs his tongue over his teeth. "You don't believe me that I'm just content with having a pretty girl by my side?" When you shake your head he grins. "Smart girl. Maybe by 'dating' you, it will pull Preece's attention away from Quidditch and they'll lose the cup."

"So I'm sabotaging my own house?", you muse, your eyes flickering between his own.

Something seems to falter inside Mattheo's eyes for a second before a teasing smile grows on his face. "Well, you can't have everything princess."

Huming, you fall back into your chair. "Sure. When and where will our first 'date' be?", you use air quotations when you say date.

"I've heard that Saturday is going to be a sunny day."

"Sure. Eleven okay? We could meet up in the Clocktower courtyard. That way a lot of people see us leave together."

And with that, quite casually, your totally not fake date with Mattheo Riddle is agreed.

Taglist (bold means I couldn't tag you): @mylosz0 @kermits-bitch

[yuri-is-online]

Plead the Fifth (Riddle, Floyd, Azul, Jack, Lilia, and Ace x Yuu)

Summer vacation is all fun and games until someone asks you to be honest with yourself. Unfortunately for Yuu, they got dragged to the beach by some "friends" and are getting a big old dose of heat stroke, just not from a source they want to confess to outside of a court.

notes: they/them pronouns used for Yuu, no spoilers for Lost in the Book with Stitch this is just about their summer outfits. Vague tsundere vibes from Yuu, Yuu is implied to be physically strong, Floyd knows he's hot and has a bone to pick from Portfest, also he's a red flag have I mentioned that before? Azul is only mildly possessive don't worry about it ♡. Mild suggestiveness all around, but I don't think it's too much. Feel free to check out my more serious work on my masterlist.

Riddle

"Seriously!" Riddle's cheeks are puffed in annoyance, and you have an uncomfortably close view. Not that you don't like looking at Riddle, quite the opposite, it's just hard to look at him... properly when he's fussing over your injured hand. "You would think that such a highly recommended resort would have better quality glasses." You don't know if you should be relieved or insulted Riddle believes it's cheap glass and not your raw strength responsible for the glass shards stuck in your hand. You flex it uncertainly, and he stares you into stillness. It's hard to focus with him so close, hard to breathe even. How Riddle hasn't noticed how beautiful he is normally is beyond you, but with how carefree he's been, staring out at the ocean and happily bringing you to see every unique shell he can identify, there is no way he can't at least sense how you look at him. It's just too much, and you find yourself pulling away worried he will find you disgusting.

But that's not what Riddle sees. He sees someone he cares for refusing to let him help. He certainly does not see someone who is nervously infatuated with him attempting to soothe their heart rate, otherwise he wouldn't have the nerve to continue being strict.

"Just where do you think you're going?" If he could collar you, he would, but instead he has to satisfy himself with yanking your shirt to keep you from struggling away. "Don't move, that's a direct order, prefect." You wheeze and Riddle decides to politely ignore your struggles, instead focusing on the weight of your hand in his with a smug sense of satisfaction. He is useful to you isn't he? So let him monopolize your attention for just a little longer.

Floyd

"Oooh Little Shrimpy~" You want to die. You probably are going to, Floyd has never been so close to your face without pinning your back to a wall, you would be stupid not to see it as a threat to squeeze. "You better not be thinkin' about callin' me adorable that'd really piss me off." You swallow. Or at least try to, you are horribly painfully aware that he has chosen to pick this fight just off the boardwalk meaning everyone can see your little spat and how little you have been looking at his eyes. Floyd can too, it's been sending a vaguely exciting shudder up and down his spine all day. He knows every dip and curve along his chest your eyes have followed, every lingering stare at his flexing shoulders, it's like you want to eat him for a change. He found that electrifying.

Or at least he had, but this little dance was starting to get boring.

What sort of predator never makes a move after setting the mood? He had tried telling himself he should be patient, shrimps aren't predators. Maybe Yuu needed extra time to set up their attack, he could work with that, maybe leave a few openings. But he was starting to run out of buttons to undo on his shirt and he really didn't want to ditch the sunglasses or beads just yet. He had been such a good patient eel, so why weren't you jumping on him already?

"I don't think-" You force yourself to look up at Floyd's eyes instead of his chest and your brain immediately fries. "I mean that isn't to say-" He glares at you and you try to wrack your brain for what compliment he could possibly want out of you. There is no way Floyd Leech is going to these lengths to try and get you to call him cool.

"Y'know, it's really rude to not answer your seniors shrimpy." Floyd draws himself up to his full height, with an oddly solemn look. "You're usually such a well-behaved little shrimp, is somethin wrong? You know if somethings wrong you had probably better tell me or Azul's gonna have to call the Headmage."

"It's because you're too hot ok! I cant focus on what you're saying because I keep looking at your fucking chest! Happ-" You can't get your compliment out before he's squeezed you into his chest and started shaking you around like a rag doll, squealing something about how hunting isn't that hard and he knew you could do it.

There's no way you were ever the one on the prowl here.

Azul

This isn't a date. Nothing about this is meant to be romantic, you are having a "purely platonic at best but lets be real this is probably for business" drink with Azul at the tacky (his words not yours) poolside bar. "I wouldn't have thought about putting a water park next to a beach." He murmers to himself, carefully photographing every angle of his float before sitting down to drink it. "It just sounds redundant." You shrug, idly stirring your own drink.

"You'd be surprised. Some humans really don't like swimming in the ocean." You're the one saying it, so he has no real choice to belive it but it's hard to wrap his head around.

"How is one of these parks safer? They aren't nearly as clean." He thinks that if he ran a place like this, that would be the biggest problem, humans are messy creatures already, but the level of mess he has just casually observed while sitting here with you really makes him wonder just what the actual appeal of this place is. Well, at least just what the appeal was to paying customers, he knew why he wanted to bring you here. Usually, when Azul turns to look at you, you immediately look away from him. But as long as you've been on this little vacation, no matter how many times he's looked your gaze has remained exactly where it should be. He's puffing with pride, looking you over wondering exactly what angle he can press to get you to say what it is you actually are thinking and not whatever cheap jab you have prepared to protect yourself.

You remain none the wiser, stuck staring at Azul and his shirt simultaneously drowning in how attractive you find him and how much it reminds you of a man in his mid fifties who relies on his bank account to make up for his miserable personality.

"See something you like, prefect?" Azul is unbelievably happy, you are tempted to say smug but then he sort of always does. It's the glasses you think as you bite on your straw and hope he doesn't notice how hard it is for you to maintain eye contact. But he does, oh he does, taking advantage of your flustered state to move closer to your side.

"You- you..." Azul is stupidly attractive he has to know that, but you also know he is desperately insecure and don't want to send him into a spiral with your stupid tongue. "You look like a middle-aged dad on his third divorce on vacation trying to doge the tax man." You mutter, trying really hard to sound threatening. It doesn't work, Azul just gives his best put upon sigh as he clucks his tongue in disappointment.

To your great surprise, he moves his hand to tilt your head to look him directly in his bright blue eyes, a similar smile to the one he has while trying to sell you on something directly kicking your heart rate up. He is trying to sell you on himself, you realize...

"How insulting, my dear. You should know better than anyone that no one gets out of a contract with me so easily they'd be able to do it three times." ... and he doesn't intend to take no for an answer. Not that it was the answer you intended to give him in the first place, and oh how happy he is to know that.

Jack

"Honestly! You would think you'd know to be more careful by now." You might as well be talking to a brick wall, Jack's certainly solid enough to pass for one. He still seems to be under the impression that he's fine despite how much of his weight you are supporting. You think he is trying to talk, but the heat has him only babbling nonsense. Reluctantly, he lets you guide him over to a shady patch of trees close to a water fountain before he is well and truly gone.

"This is nothing. I handled the Savana I can take a stupid beach." He mutters as if he his extremely visible chest isn't heaving or rolling with droplets of sweat that other, lesser people have been watching drip from his abs with extreme disrespect.

Not you, though! No, your eyes have been firmly on the spicket on the fountain, determined to soak one of the smaller towels you brought and gently press it to Jack's forehead. Despite his insistence that he's fine, he leans desperately into your cooling touch, tension leaving his shoulders in one deep breath.

Just as all strength leaves yours as he decides to collapse into your lap.

"J-Jack!" You don't know what you want to ask next. Your back is pinned to one of the trees, Jack's head is resting firmly in your lap, but the arm that had been around your shoulder has decided to move around your waist. He growls (growls!) when you gently try to push him off you to try and get him set up in a more comfortable position. "Bad dog." It's all you can think to say and he doesn't seem fazed, if anything you swear he starts holding you closer. There is no way this could get any more embarrassing.

"Mommy, what is that guy doing to his partner? It looks like he's trying to eat them." Never mind yes it could. You make awkward eye contact with a very young mother as you try to silently plead with her that "no, this isn't what it looks like, I swear" as you desperately try to revive Jack with the damp cloth. The young woman looks at you then to her child, clearly trying to hold back her laughter and not doing it very well. She manages to usher him off before he can ask any more pointed questions and you glare down at Jack.

"You're setting such a bad example." You mutter and he lets go of your waist only to cross his arms over his chest and start to snore. Oh he is going to be so embarrassed when he wakes up, assuming he believes half of what you'll have to say.

Lilia

Love and Lilia are old strangers. He knows he can feel it, no matter what ancient denials he might have made, but he finds no matter how long he lives he is no better at recognizing it, no better at knowing what to do with it. There's something ironic about how much of an outlier this chance meeting between you both that makes him feel something akin to apathy. He doesn't think that's quite the right word, but he struggles to better find an explanation for the little knots it ties itself in sometimes.

So Lilia may not know just what this emotion is no, but he knows he likes the way it looks on you.

"Well, prefect? It's rude to stare you know." He says that as if he is not trying to make you, winking just over his sunglasses and striking a pose Cater had shown him on magicam in just a silly enough way that he can pass it off as one of his usual jokes. Your usual denial flutters up on your face, but your heart seems to be beating your brain to your tongue today.

"You look very cute, Lilia." That strange pit is filling with nervous flutters again, but his brain beats his soul to his mouth.

"That's good! I was worried I'd have to spend this vacation in the shadows out of shame." He says, fully aware that you are both currently sat in the shade of a particularly large umbrella precisely because he can't be out in the sun for long, even if that's the purpose of a beach vacation. Speaking of which... "Why don't you go join the others out on the beach, prefect? You helped me with my little errand, you deserve to take a break." He says it much more gently than he'd intended, if it wasn't pointless, he'd keep you here and needle you for more cute reactions. Maybe he would ask you to try on his shirt and demand yours as payment. But that's not fair, that's not life, this connection is destined to be as fleeting as it is precious. The way disappointment and confusion mingle in your eyes tells him you know that too, on some level.

"Calling you cute isn't a chore, but sure, I guess." You tell him something about calling for you if he decides to go somewhere else, and he thinks he promises you only if you do the same, but he doesn't know. He's too focused on the way the sun takes you into it's embrace, taunting everyone but certainly him specifically with just how much you look like you belong out there in the daylight.

But the moon can still observe can't it? In a way that's all he knows how to do.

Ace

You really hate how low your standards are. Who the hell gets all jittery and flustered over a guy in a boater hat? You apparently, Ace has the worst dad on vacation fit you have ever seen, assuming you are politely ignoring Azul. Something that's unfortunately easy for you to do and has led to you paying just that much more attention to Ace.

Or at least that's what you've been trying to tell him while pointedly staring out at the shore. You wish he was too lazy to put things together, but as usual, when there is an inch to tease you over, Ace Trappola will take a mile.

"Admit it, you think I'm hot." He sounds so infuriatingly smug. It makes you want to kiss him but only to shut him up! Not because you like him!

"The only thing hot about you is how full you are of hot air! Seriously, what's up with that bunch of fruit on your shoulder? Why would I find that attractive?" You know it only sounds like you are asking yourself, begging more like, because you really do think he's attractive. It's written all over your face, you might as well scream it with just how flustered you become when finally you decide to look back at him.

"It's ok to admit. It might be self-centered to say, but I really am a catch. Really prefect how did you get so lucky?" Oh he is never going to let you live this down.

"Please, you look like a dead beat dad on his third divorce!" Your voice is unnaturally high, and Ace just laughs off your insult. "Who would be attracted to you!"

"You, duh." He takes your hand and pulls you back towards the beach. "Besides, if I convinced you to marry me twice, I can do it a third time." He winks at you over his shoulder and you stop dead in your tracks, so overwhelmed with annoyed affection and embarrassment it's all you can do to grasp for a come back.

"Was it Duece."

"What?" Ace is momentarily thrown, extremely confused by what he perceives as a change of subject.

"You said you could convince me to marry you a third time, but you're on your third divorce. So when did you leave me for Deuce ?"

"Wait I didn't- you know that's not what I meant!" And yes, technically, you do know that's not what he meant, but you refuse to be the only one embarrassed here. You hope he chokes.

[effy-writes]

hiii um. I see that u area takin requests but uh WARNING this one deals with autism symptoms and specifically poor eating habits so if thats triggering or anything plz feel free to disregard completely. i yam struggling with some severe autistic burnout rn and its causing some texture issues with eating (everything is disgusting and i want to cry when i try to eat anything that isnt a dry pack of ramen LOL) and i am distraught about it, i was wondering if u could write a blitzø x autistic reader (one shot, fem or gender neutral) who is . Struggling w that?? also no need for an established relationship i yam a sucker for pining and would love to see blitzø’s emotionally constipated ass all worried abt his crush and noticing them making weird faces while trying very hard to eat something and is like. “R u about to throw up. WHY ARE U CRYING” n e way like i said fele fre to ignore if this ur not comfy writin this ily mwah

Ofc!! I have autism as well and i also have shit eating habits. I can’t even stomach chicken on the bone bc of the fat, tendons and the BONE. i hope you liked this!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Blitzø x GN! Autistic! Reader: Eat Something

content warning: feeling overstimulated, burnt out, details about food textures, details about textures

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Autism is something that you have to live with your whole life. Ever since you were little you especially struggled with texture issues. Whether it's velvet, cotton balls, leather, but you specifically struggled with food textures.

However when it comes to food textures some days were better than others. The days where you weren't so burnt out you could handle a handful amount of specific food, but on days like this where you're so overstimulated and burned out you can barely even drink water because of the lack of texture in it.

When it comes to working for I.M.P, you can put on a good mask so the others won't think you're a burden (you're not, it's just you have insecurities about being autistic). However on days like this where you have poor eating habits because of the autism it can be very hard to mask it.

Everyone at I.M.P went out to get lunch together, but you couldn't even bare to eat at cheap ass restaurants or fast food. So, you made up an excuse to not go with them. Millie asked why but all you told her was that you weren't in the mood for going out in public. Moxxie asked if you wanted them to bring you something back but you politely declined.

Blitz stayed in the office to "organize" the clients target's information. And by organizing just reading them and then tossing it to the other side of the office.

You took your safe food out of your bookbag and sat it in front of you. Dry noodles. You didn't want to boil them because of the slime texture that'll soon be in your mouth. It even made you gagged by thinking about it.

You opened the package and tore off a small piece before finally placing the dry, hard noodle in your mouth.

Your face scrunched up in disgust, you wanted to spit it out but you barely ate anything in the past couple of days. You swollowed and a cold shiver went through your body.

You wanted to stop but your stomach was saying otherwise. You took another bite and gagged, spitting it out.

“Fuck!” You yelled out of frustration, grabbing Blitz’s attention.

He peaked outside of his office and saw you picking at the hard noodles before chewing and swollowing it. He saw your face scrunched up again as your fist hit the table.

“Are you about to throw up?” He said nonchalantly.

You looked at him and dry swollowed the not-so-safe-food anymore. Blitz got out of his office and stood in front of you on the other side of the table.

“Need a trashcan or something?”

You looked down at the noodles and mentally cursed yourself. This was supposed to be your safe food but now you can hardly stomach it. Out of tiredness and frustration you silently sobbed over the dry noodles.

“WHY ARE YOU CRYING?!” He frantically said, not really knowing how autism works.

“Because this was supposed to be my safe food and I can hardly eat it because I’m so fucking burned out.” You sobbed.

“Oh.” He quietly said before sitting down across from you. “Is there anything I can do?”

You shrugged, “Not really.”

Blitz thought for a moment, “How about I dim the lights and you listen to your favorite music? Or, or how about your favorite show?” He really wanted to help you out.

“I guess so, but i’m so fucking hungry.”

“I know, but if we make this place underestimulated then maybe it’ll help? To be honest I don’t know how acousticism works.”

“Autism.” You bluntly said.

“Shit, right autism.”

You rolled your eyes as a small smile crept on your face. “Yeah, let’s do that.”

Blitz smiled and dimmed the lights, “You got them fancy headphones or something?”

You shook your head.

“I have cheap ones but they’re better than nothing.” He went back to his office and grabbed headphones that has those horse shaped ears on the headband and handed them to you. “Do you want music?”

“Just silence.”

“Is there anything else?”

“No. Thank you, Blitz.”

“Let me know if you need anything else, I need to go back and organize the papers and shit.”

“Oh, yeah for sure, go for it.”

The next hour or so you helped Blitz organize the papers by the area of which targets live at. The silence, the dim lighting, and the organizing papers by location reset yourself. After telling Blitz this, he happily boiled the noodles for you to eat. You were grateful for him, and he was happy to help his crush out.

[hauntedestheart]

Ruining Valentine's Day (Male Bodyswap)

Belated Valentine's Day story I threw together- fair warning, this one features heterosexual couples and explicit straight sex!

"Hey babe, sorry I ruined Valentine's Day," Trent said to his girlfriend.

Vanessa pressed her lips together and said nothing, just barely managing to disguise her displeasure with her boyfriend. Ordinarily whenever she got into this mood he would just take her into his muscular arms and carry her to the bedroom for some incredible makeup sex, but at the moment he was physically incapable of doing that so she was just left to stew in her anger.

Trent had never been the brightest bulb in the drawer, but it wasn't like Vanessa was dating him for his brains- the only things she was interested in were his good looks, his rock hard abs, and his huge dick. Unfortunately those were all of the things that his latest blunder had taken away, and now he was stuck inside of the considerably less impressive body of his nerdy little roommate Chester.

And worse, now she was stuck spending Valentine's Day with him while he was like that.

"I don't know why you agreed to test that machine with your freaky roommate," she said derisively, referring to the botched science experiment that had switched the pair's bodies. She'd never liked Chester so she glared daggers at his mousy face- Trent was behind it at the moment, but she was mad at both of them so it didn't really matter. "Those things never cause anything but trouble."

"Hey!" Trent crossed his skinny arms in protest, marveling at the novelty of how it felt to do so without bulging biceps or ample pectorals getting in the way. "I told you babe, I was trying to earn a little bit of extra cash so I could take you out on a nice date!"

Actually Trent would have agreed to do it for free because they were buddies, but Chester insisted on always paying his test subjects and Trent wasn't one to say no to a little bit of extra cash. He made a decent living as a part-time model, but with the money he'd gotten from Chester he'd been able to book them a reservation at a swanky restaurant- not that it mattered in the end though, because Vanessa refused to go out and be seen with Trent while he looked like Chester.

"Well, thanks to your brilliant idea we can't go out at all," she grumbled, rubbing at her forehead as she fought an oncoming headache. "You're such an idiot sometimes!"

Trent tilted his head to the side, upset by the sight of his girlfriend getting so stressed out, and tried to resolve it the only way he knew how.

"Damn, I'm sorry babe! I know I fucked up, please don't be mad," Trent sauntered closer to Vanessa and reaching up to put his arms around her shoulders, leaning in to nuzzle his lips against her neck- though he had to stand up on his toes to do so. "I'm fine chilling just the two of us tonight... maybe instead of dinner we can just... skip to dessert?"

Vanessa looked down her nose at her boyfriend (because she was taller than him now) and turned an appraising eye to Chester's body- the guy was skinny, pale, and had way too much acne for someone his age -and she pursed her lips. It was an understatement to say that she wasn't attracted to him- the sight of the freak made her pussy actively want to close up shop.

"How sweet," she said through gritted teeth, batting Trent's arms away from her and ignoring the lost puppy dog eyes he was shooting her. "But you're probably feeling weird in your new body and want to be alone, right? After all, wouldn't it be weird for you if your girlfriend slept with another guy's body? We shouldn't do anything until you get your real body back."

"Oh, of course! You're totally right babe!" Realization broke through the dim expression on the man's face, and he took a polite step back. "Sex would be weird."

She sighed in relief.

"We can just have a quiet night in instead!" He exclaimed cheerfully, and she froze. He continued chattering as he sauntered his way over to the couch, pulling out his phone to sort through takeout options as he settled in for a long night. "Like, we don't have to fool around all the time, you know? It'll be nice for us to just talk and connect and stuff! It feels like we never get to do that."

"Oh joy..." Vanessa hissed out, fighting the urge to break something.

Meanwhile...

"My darling, I'm so sorry I ruined Valentine's Day," Chester said to his girlfriend.

"Huh?" Shelby, who was currently straddling his lap and grinding on top of his cock, pulled her mouth away from his neck and stared at him in confusion. "What are you talking about?"

He smiled down at her- his girlfriend was so sweet to pretend like nothing was wrong, but what he'd done was unforgiveable! He'd wanted to have his emotional transference device ready in time for Valentine's Day so he could use it to show her just how much he loved her, but in the process he'd cut corners on his usually vigorous process and tested it on his roommate before it was ready and in a shocking twist of events it had switched their bodies.

He supposed it was better that it had happened with Trent than with Shelby, but still, he found the situation less than ideal. His roommate's body was so different from his own- how was he going to explain things to his girlfriend when instead of the man she'd fallen in love with, he turned up looking like a heavily muscled model? He wouldn't blame her if she took one look at how tall he was, or how big his arms were, or the scratchy stubble adorning his square jaw, and ran for the hills.

Fortunately she'd taken the proceedings in stride and had insisted that they needn't cancel their plans just because of the accident- though he suspected she was more upset than she let on. She hadn't been able to stop staring at his body all evening and had rushed through dinner, and now she was trying to comfort him by letting him kiss her.

"I'm referring to the current state of my body of course," He sighed and stared down at the musclebound body he now possessed- such a stark contrast to his usual twig-like frame -and grimaced. "You've lectured me time and time again about being more careful with my experiments but I didn't heed your advice and look at me now! The victim of a freak accident on the most romantic day of the year, and you have to shoulder the burden."

"Chester, really, it's fine!" Shelby said- again. She was a little annoyed by how he kept interrupting their make out session after it had taken her hours to convince him that yes, really, she was okay if they did stuff together while he was in another man's body, and now she just wanted him to shut up so she could enjoy feeling up his gorgeous roommate's body.

"I appreciate you being so calm and collected about this," he smiled at her, strong jaw tightening as dimples appearing on either side of his pretty mouth, and she felt her heart flutter and her vagina tingle. "I know it must be strange for you to look at me and see an unfamiliar face."

Truth be told, the only reason Shelby had agreed to go out with Chester to begin with was because she'd grown tired of being the only single girl in her friend group and saying yes to the little nerd who worshipped the ground she walked on was better than being alone. Sure, she knew she was settling, but it wasn't like she was particularly a catch either so she'd just had to make her peace with that.

But for once, one of his idiotic blunders had worked out in her favor. A 10/10 guy like Trent was way out of her league, so she was going to milk this opportunity to be up close and personal with him for all it was worth! The longer Chester took to switch them back, the better.

"Oh yes, absolutely, it's so weird," Shelby lied, her eyes flicking down hungrily to his toned body again, and she ran her hand down his delicious torso. "But I don't want you to feel bad so let's just stop talking about it and try to enjoy the evening, okay?"

As if to illustrate her point, she slid her whole body down the brawny expanse of his body and reached for his underwear, stripping the tight garment off of his body and squealing with delight as she saw Trent's massive penis spring out. The lust inside of her reached a fever pitch as she stared at the long, thick tube of flesh that was hard as steel and already leaking pre-cum from its swollen head, and the thought of having it inside of her was almost dizzying.

"Oh my goodness, that's large!" Chester remarked, rather pointlessly as the size of his member was plainly obvious at a glance. He shuffled uncomfortably in place, making the turgid pillar sway around heavily. "Sweetheart, I appreciate how brave you're being about this but if this is uncomfortable for you we can stop here. I can't expect you to-"

"Shhhh," she whispered, placing a finger over his plump lips to silence him. He was not going to ruin this moment for her. "Let me have this."

Lifting her body up, she positioned herself over that glorious cock and slowly lowered herself down on top of it, moaning with delight as the incredible mass pushed against her walls. Chester's puny little thing never felt like this inside!

With his real body they only had sex in the dark so she could pretend he was someone else, but she had no need to pretend now. Her eyes drank in the gorgeous man before her, his beautiful face and powerful body a sight beyond even her wildest fantasies, and she began to bounce up and down as she tried to fit as much of him inside of her as she could.

"That feels so good!" She moaned, rolling her hips around as she rode him cowgirl style. She tightened herself and felt him buck beneath her, his hips moving of their own accord as he began to thrust up into her like an animal in heat, and it was so unlike him that it made it easier to pretend that it was the real Trent she was banging instead of her annoying boyfriend.

"This position is very interesting!" he agreed- their usual sex was fairly quiet missionary so he was glad for the opportunity to experience sex from a new perspective. He was glad his girlfriend seemed to be making the best of their unfortunate situation! "But don't worry, I promise you I'm working as fast as I can to find a solution to this predicament. I'll be able to make love to you in our normal fashion in no time!"

"Well don't-" She cut herself off with a grunt, barely managing to speak between panted breaths as her body was rocked by their lovemaking. The last thing she wanted to think about in that moment was boring sex with the real Chester. "Don't rush. No need to put so much pressure on yourself you can- fuck -you can take your time."

Another spike of pleasure hit her and she let out a curse as she lurched forwards, grabbing onto to the pronounced shelf of Chester's pecs for support (because her boyfriend had pecs right now!) and digging her fingers into the muscles for dear life. He reached out to steady her and the press of his strong hands into her sides did a lot for her.

"You're so big," she groaned, relishing the feeling of Trent's huge cock penetrating her deeper than Chester's ever could, and at that he paused in his motions. "Oh my god you're so fucking big."

"Oh dear, is that an issue?" He asked, a worried expression on his face. Glancing down, he saw that he'd bottomed out and the considerable length of his roommate's cock was now buried in his girlfriend. "I've noticed that's Trent's genitalia is rather unwieldly compared to my own, is that a problem for you? Do you need me to stop?"

"No no no no no," she hissed out, clenching herself around him so he wouldn't be tempted to try to pull out and rob her of the incredible sense of fullness she was experiencing. "It's fine just- just don't stop doing that thing! Keep going!"

He nodded and his hips jumped back into action, a steady rocking motion, toned ass flexing beneath him as he used his newfound muscles to thrust his cock with trained efficiency. But while Chester's body was currently a fucking machine, his mind hadn't quite caught up yet, and he continued cheerfully blathering on even as his hips slammed into his girlfriend.

"I must say, it's fascinating," he said blithely, his voice doing nothing to betray the pounding that he was delivering. "It appears that I've inherited his muscle memory! This must be the fashion in which Trent is accustomed to performing intercourse- his muscularity and the dimension of his penis allow for a degree of power and positioning unavailable to my own body." He casually observed the way that his muscles flexed as he pumped, a visual reminder of the new strength that allowed him to rock his girlfriend back and forth so vigorously. Trent's body certainly was impressive! "The scientific implications of this technology are incredible, don't you think so Shelby?" He paused and glanced at his girlfriend, who had a strange look on her face that he'd never seen before. "Shelby?"

Shelby didn't hear a word he said- she was beyond words at that point, completely lost in ecstasy as she felt that glorious cock drilling into her again and again. This was the type of sex she had always wanted, the type of man she had always wanted to be with, and she stared at clung to his boulder-like shoulders as she rode the crest of that excitement to a screaming orgasm.

Because his scientific mind was so detached from the proceedings Chester wound up lasting impossibly long, which allowed Shelby to milk out a record breaking five orgasms for herself before he finally spilled his seed into the condom he'd insisted on wearing- he still made that same ridiculous face he always did when he came, but his borrowed face was so handsome that for once it didn't completely kill Shelby's buzz.

His mighty erection now subsiding, Shelby pulled herself off of him and laid herself across his broad chest, rubbing her face into his pillowy pecs and trying to commit the feeling of his abs to memory. Having a boyfriend with muscles was something she could get used to, and she was going to miss it when Chester was returned to his real body. She'd never quite been satisfied by him before, and after getting a chance to fuck this powerful stallion of a man, she didn't think she could go back.

"Hey, Chester," she asked innocently, tracing a finger over his mountainous bicep. "Would you ever consider... I don't know... working out?"

"Working out?" His forehead scrunched up, unintentionally making his pecs pop a bit as he quirked his head to the side like a confused puppy. "Working out what? More math theorems? I'm already on that. Let me tell you about some of the research I've been doing into the square cube law that could..."

Shelby sighed and tuned out his prattle, instead brainstorming ways she could break the machine without getting caught.

[itstheghostofmypast]

MOOT GAME: " make up a trope for your moots and their biases. doesn’t need to be romantic. can be crackfic/funny/anything you want ^ㅇ(๑>◡<๑)ㅇ^ "

Okay- so, first of all, thank you so much Anon, for this ask and I'm sorry I responded to late, but I had to take my time with this one.😭💖.

So here it goes, (i know i said i'd do two biases, im sorry guys, i love yall too much and i get too invested the word count was killing me)

1) @edenesth

Park Seonghwa- Rivals to Lovers

Here me out, he owns an old book shop across the street, he's been there longer than you too. This was his turf, his town, his people, people who loved to read in his cozy library, with its olden print books, worn out pages, read through by generations of the same family.

All was great until one spring she shows up, with her whole pastel plus minimalistic vibes, all with the cutesy trinkets and plants, with warm lights- he noticed some books too, but they were only for show- in conclusion it was a horrid place.

A horrid place where most teens would go to after school now, no longer going to his bookshop, where they'd gossip, read novels or mangas, or even look at pretty pictured magazines (the safe kind, mind you he kept nothing nasty). What's worse was that the older folk began to go there, too! Especially because of how nice she was to them, so polite and so pretty and - ANNOYING.

He even went to 'inspect' the place, with a sour mood and an ill intention, though he was greeted with a burst of sweet aroma, one that had his stomach growling and his inner foodie, begging him to pick at least one of the many pastries or have a cup of steaming, delicious coffee. What came next was worst, her, with her gentle smile and angelic features.

"Hello! Welcome to Spring Avenue, how may we help you today?"

"You're taking my traffic."

"I'm sorry, I don't understand."

"Of course you don't."

With that he had walked out, starting a cold war, between the two. Ironically, she was a pacifist, never a fighter, but boy, did he piss her off, he knew all those buttons that would have her steaming like a hot latte.

The war had begun;

It all began when he put a " 10% off sign on Mangas, Fashion Magazines and Manhwas" that took a god chunk of her traffic.

In retaliation, she launched a "Friendship campaign, any customer that brings a friend gets a cake slice free."

Spend 2 hours reading here and leave with a borrowed book/novel of your choice."

"Buy a coffee and get a cookie free."

This continued throughout the season, so did their rivalry, to an extent that led their divided customers sense the tension. And like usual, highschoolers are escapists and this little feud of Seonghwa and her's was a problem they'd like to avoid, from her cafe they could see their beloved bookshop owner Seonghwa scowl at them, and if they were leaving the bookshop, the kids could feel the uneasiness in her smile that she give them once they'd pass her by.

"Congratulations, you're in loss." She sighed, closing the file, earning a scowl from the cafe owner, "Hey, I'm just here to check your bills, loss, and profit stuff, don't shoot the messenger."

"Alexia, come on." She whined, this was her dream, she'd put in her life's savings for this, "What should I do, Lexi?"

"Gosh, maybe not give out stupid discounts four times in a month?" Alexia sighed, rubbing her face, leaning back to stare at the bookshop across the street, "San said he knows the owner, maybe you guys could do a collab, instead of trying to each other's traffic."

"Who's San?" She asked her best friend, slash account manager and Public Relations officer- wait, was she dating!?

"Oh- uh- hey would you look at the time?" Alexia got up, grabbing her disposable coffee cup and bag, "Tell you what, you ask the bookshop owner dude about this? Okay? I'll get back with the details on Monday!" She called out as she walked towards the door, ignoring the cafe owner's questions about this San, "BYE LOVE YOU!"

That's how she found herself standing Infront of his bookshop that evening, still debating if she should go in or not? Was this idea even worth it, the guy was rude, annoying, stupid, incredibly handsome and sweet with kids and- the hell.

"Can I help you?" His deep voice came out of no where

She almost jumped out of her skin, only to turn around and spot the man she had been hating for the past ten months, standing there in all his angleic glory, with that ugly sweater and that overly comfortable scarf, not to mention his hair, his undercut had grown, quiet well too, perhaps he really was blessed with good genes.

"I uh..." she trailed off, pouting to herself, thinking of how he'd react, maybe he would make fun of her, or insult her or even go as far as to tell the town about her poor business management skills.

"Are you still open?" his question had caught her off guard, staring at him quietly wanting to see if this was a trick, only it wasn't, for when she nodded, he had looked around and then asked if he could...get a cup of coffee from there.

Of course she had said yes, why on earth would she say no to a customer, she needed the business. Unfortunately, that one cup of coffee, turned into two, then three, well- not as unfortunate as she would like it to be.

The two, mind you, who still didnt like each other, began to learn a lot about each other. He learnt how she was genuinely a sweet, caring and gentle person, her persona was indeed not fake but very real, this is who she was. She on the other hand, learned that he had inherited this business from his family, and he was an avid reader- sort a geek, a cute geek, a cute geek that could eat a whole chocolate cake with three mugs off coffee like it was nothing.

It wasn't until the third week of him visiting her cafe, that when he had stepped out to go there, he had bumped into her. She had almost fallen, but he was quick, gripping her wrist and pulling her into his chest, only to laugh when she mumbled an excuse, though he was glad she couldn't hear how his heart was hammering against his chest, wanting to stuff itself in the breast pocket of her coat.

That day she had asked him if she could check out his book shop, because she had been looking for old English bakery recipes and she couldn't find it anywhere, not any store around or online. Of course he had taken her to the right isle, in the right section in no time, this bookshop was his life and collecting and sifting through books was his passion, that day he had seen her passion, she had sat there, on the floor the entire night, reading book after book, mumbling to herself as she noted down recipes. He had sat next to her, helping her jot down notes, bringing her coffee- well not as good as hers, but good enough. At one point he had even ordered them a late night snack, well snacks, because he's a growing boy. He had closed the shop with the two inside, even pulled out a blanket and some cushions from the lounging area so she could comfortably work- she was a passionate girl and ironically he had realised something that night, only it turned into a full blown epiphany in the morning.

Next morning she had woken up right next to him, her head on his shoulder, his arm wrapped around her as the blanket was draped over the two, they had fallen asleep while reading- oh my, he really was pretty up close.

Though the two pretended nothing had happened, nothing had changed, however, everyone around them had noticed, the highschoolers would giggle when he'd come to her cafe for a cup of coffee, or how the older folk would pat him on the back when she'd step into the bookshop calling him out for help, with her little, "Hwa?"

Neither really knew how it happened, but one night while closing up he had waited outside for her, telling her he'd drop her home, even though she lived close by. Slowly this had become part of their routine, he'd often talk about the latest manga or an issue to the Star Wars comics or whatever on earth he'd talk about, but she'd always listen. Always smile and laugh at his jokes, while he'd readily accept any test recipes she'd try, telling her that his stomach was like a blackhole.

But when do the two get together? Simple, on New Years Eve, when he had to close his shop but she had decided to leave her cafe open, wanting to cater to all those who were celebrating the arrival of the new year with their loved ones, she knew Seonghwa had to go home anyway and she didn't want to spend the night alone since her family was out of town. What she did not expect was a few minutes before the strike of midnight, the cafe door chimed open as she turned to greet the customer, only to freeze at the sight before her- Seonghwa entering with a bouqet of origami flowers, smiling at her as he slowly walked to her;

"I- I know you don't like plucking flowers or bouqets, so I made you these."

"You...made these?"

"Ofcourse."

"W-why?"

"I...because I..." but before he could finish his sentence his ears picked up the count down, causing him to quickly place the flowers on the counter and as soon as the fireworks rang in her ears, it was as if she could feel the burning warmth in her body, taking a second to process how his lips were on hers, his hands cupping her face as her hands instinctively went up to grip his coat, pulling him even closer. Who knew that one day she'll end up opening a cafe that also served as a bookstore, who knew that one day, her little, evil, handsome rival bookseller, would be the New Year's kiss she never knew she needed, the man she never knew she needed, the lover that she was blessed to have.

2) @yessa-vie

Jeong Yunho- Neighbors to Lovers

No, she was not the new tenant, he was, and for some ungodly reason he was also extremely ill-prepared to live alone. Like any other weekend, she was leaving her apartment to go to the cafe to sit in peace and finish her novel, but God had other plans. She had opened the door to come face to face with a tall, good-looking man, though the smile he wore scared her- he was one of those extroverts.

No, he was not mean at all, nor was he the manipulative kind, Jeong Yunho really didn't know how the pre-installed dishwasher worked, that's why he had come to her that fateful weekend, about to knock on the door but she had beat him to it, opening the door before he could, earning a sheepish smile in return- who knew his neighbour would be so gorgeous, who knew purple could look so good on someone?

"Hey, I- I moved in across the hall, apartment 19, lol, I guess we're neighbours, huh?"

She had only nodded meekly at his question, pulling her satchel closer to her person, not because she didn't like him, no, but because she wasn't much of a talker anymore, not so confident either and also- because regardless of how good looking this stranger was, he was still a stranger.

"I'm Yunho- Sorry to bother you, I know you must be going somewhere, but I- I uh- I wanted to know if you know how to operate the dishwasher?"

That's how she found herself in his apartment, leaving the maindoor wide open, so she could escape if something were to happen, but to her surprise he was just a regular idiot, one who thought the dishwasher was a rack used to dry the dishes- men.

That night Yunho met an angel, one who seemingly had her life planned out, held together well, while he was still trying to build something out of his- data analyst or not, living alone was not the easiest thing to do, yet, she seemed so nonchalant about it.

Overtime however, she noticed how he would come over to ask her for help often, sometimes it was the 'fridge isn't working right' other times it was the 'how much water do you add to rice while boiling it?' Honestly, she would've told him to piss off if it were anyone else, but it was her polite neighbour, her sweet polite, new neighbour who would pass her by in the corridor every morning, smiling at her and wishing her a good morning- even if she wasn't a morning person.

Ironically, he continued to ensure they cross paths, only because he wanted to get to know her, to talk to her, he really needed a friend, and since moving here meant Mingi and him could no longer hang out 24/7, he really needed another person to talk to, someone who was not Hongjoong from the finance department.

Ironically, she did not protest or tell him to get lost, instead she's quietly help him whenever he'd approach her, giving him a shy smile then going back to her apartment. That purple door tempting him to go back and knock on the old wood, wanting to know what Narnia like secrets she hid behind.

She let it be, truthfully, she wanted fo befriended him, but during these little adventures, she realised she had begun to neglect her book, the same book she had a deadline for, the same book she had been working on day and night, and now this puppy pops up and takes all her attention?

So what does she do? Simple, she starts to create some form of distance, leave before he'd be awake, come back home later too, also even if he did come to knock on her purple door, she wouldn't be there to answer it, so technically she wouldn't feel guilty right?

Wrong, instead God had punished her with a severe writer's block, one so bad that she had missed two of her deadlines, and according to her publisher, she was on her last chance. That's how she found herself at the very cafe where she would find solace, now on the verge of tears, staring at the laptop in pure agony, maybe this was payback for leaving him unattended and ignoring him or maybe she was never meant to be a writer.

A fresh cup of coffee was placed next to her hand, causing her to quickly pull back and look at the stranger, only her panicked eyes met a softer, more timid gaze, a gentle smile gracing her presence.

"Hey... you looked like you needed the juice." He smiled, gesturing towards the chair, as if asking for permission to sit down next to her, to which she nodded.

"I uh..." she paused. Should she even be asking him how he's been? Does she have the right to do so, or are they just neighbours- well, at this point, two strangers living across each other.

"I read your books by the way," he began, giving her a gentle smile, as he felt the way she had tensed up, honestly, initially he thought she was like that because his presence made her uncomfortable, but he soon realised it wasn't him, but she usually was this tensed all the time, this nervous and unsure, which made no sense to him because she was one of the most well functioning person he had met in the city, and he was glad to have moved in next to her, "It's great, the plotline is amazing and the details- you really captured the essence, I particularly liked the world you created, honestly, when I moved here I thought everyone wore those 'blockers' too. To not...feel stuff you know," he turned to look at her, only to catch her staring at him, a small chuckle escaping him when she cleared her throat, averting her gaze, "You were the only one who was nice enough to help me, even for the stupidest of tasks...it means a lot."

She stared at him in awe and disbelief. She had been trying to avoid him for almost a month now, couldn't he tell? Or was he just playing dumb- I mean he totally could be dumb, he didn't know a toaster comes with settings, just thought the numbers were there for the appeal.

After that the two began to "spend time together", it was strictly casual mind you, nothing personal, though he would drop by more often than usual, sometimes after work, sometimes on the weekends- to have dinner with her, he'd bring dessert, or to watch a movie with her, he'd bring the snacks- no, nothing domestic at all.

Or so they thought, because a few months in, he had come over by swinging the door open, yes he had the keys and she had his keys, only to find her standing there all dressed up.

"Where are you off to? What about movie night?"

"Oh no..." she gasped, "Yuyu, I forgot to tell you I had a date tonight." A date? Why? With whom?

"Wait, why?"

"What do you mean why?"

"Why would you go on a date when we- I mean...isn't it weird? Shouldn't you be more focused on your book, instead of this temporary romance?"

"Temporary romance?!"

"W-wait, I didn't mean it like that. It came out wrong-"

"Out."

"W-what?"

"I said get out!"

That happened a week ago, she had been avoiding him for a whole week, she had been ignoring his calls, his texts, his knocks- no he didn't barge into her apartment, it took him a great amount of time to get her to open up to him and he idiotically clowned himself. So he decided to go to the next thing, go to the official reading of her book launch.

He waited there at the back, listening to her intently, taking in each word, who knew he would ever fall in love with, her neighbour, the same girl who had helped with the dishwasher, brought him dinner at night, spent time teaching him the usual ropes of living alone- who knew the very same girl had changed the plot of the book, basing it on her life, expressing how the shy, depressed protagonist, who thought dying her hair purple would make her feel better, realised that the only thing that would make her feel better would be a companion, a tall, handsome man, with a heart of gold- it was not that she needed a man, no, she just needed a friend, and she had finally found one, the inspiration to her writer's block, the Chandler to her Monica, the- HE DIES!? 

He gasped, appalled at the way she had ended the story, where at the end, on his deathbed the man tells his beloved how she never needed him, but he needed her to function, to live through each day- bloody hell.

He waited for them to leave when he finally approached her, somewhat upset-no, he was very upset, as she stopped cleaning up to look at him, raising a questioning brow, "What?"

"I can't believe you!"

"Funny, Jeong, I should be the one saying that."

"What!? You killed me!?"

"What?"

"I come here to declare my undying love- no I come here to tell you how much you mean to me and apologise for never asking you out but getting upset when someone actually asked you out and you KILL ME IN YOUR NOVE?"

"First of all, I accept your apology, secondly, the protagonist was DEFINITELY NOT YOU, I made him up WAY BEFORE I met you."

"Oh..." he stared at her then looked around the almost empty bookshop, maybe he should just leave-

"So...Will you ask me out properly now or...'l"

"Move in with me."

"Too fast."

"Was worth a shot." He smiled when she let out a small laugh shaking her head at his antics, "Take me to dinner, Yunho." She smiled watching him lean closer then pause, as if asking for her permission,  "Can I...?" His question was answered when she gripped him by the lapels of his coat, pulling him closer to crash her lips against his, smiling when he wrapped his arms around her, pulling back only to press his forehead against hers,

"We move into my apartment..."

"What? Mine's great-"

"Yunho, have you seen the window and the balcony on mine?"

"Your apartment it is boss."

3) @jaehunnyy

Choi San- Bestfriends to Lovers

Idiots, these two were complete idiots who were utterly in love with each other but were also too blind to realise that - why? Simple, because both feared that confessing to the other may ruin the long-held, deep bond.

A bond that had developed at the ripe age of childhood, middle school, to be more accurate. The day he had come to school, bored out of his mind, staring outside the window, wondering if he could jump on the closest tree to escape this prison. What he had not expected was an angel to come and sit beside him, well technically, the teacher had made her sit next to him, and he hadn't noticed her until she poked his shoulder lighter, causing him to jerk back and gasp, earning a few chuckles from the glass as the teacher just sighed in defeat.

"Wh-Hello."

"Do you need help with that?" She asked, pointing at the math equation in front of him. He looked at his notebook and remembered that's what they were supposed to me doing- damn that was a lot of daydreaming.

"Yeah, I guess...do you... know how to solve it?" He asked the new girl, too afraid to make eyecontact.

"Here, I'll show you." Turning to face him, she pulled his scribbled notebook closer.

"I'm San by the way."

That day onwards, a nice and quiet introvert at the back of the class finally began to crack open. From time to time, you'd hear him whispering to her, talking about some anime or a film. Often, he'd be telling her about his cat, Byeol, and how pretty she was. During break you wouldn't see San next to her for the first five minutes, no, he'd be sprinting across the campus,jumping down the stairs to go to the canteen to get her something to drink with her lunch, or a sweet snack, regardless of how many times she'd say 'it's fine.' During self study hours, she wouldn't be studying, no, she'd be busy tutoring her athletically gifted friend, he was...a little dumb, but that's okay, he was hardworking and she'd tell him she'd help him where he'd get stuck, explain and tutor where needed- especially in math.

As they grew older, he grew into his body, his self-esteem issues slowly subsiding, his feelings for her deepening, yet, never enough to tip the scale, at the bring of an edge but never enough to flow out he had to keep it all under control, because that's just how San was, patient and calm, he would never take a step if there was an ounce of the doubt when it came to how she felt about him. Though watching her spread her wings into the beauty she was, well, was somewhat problematic for him. Especially when she'd come to him, smiling like that, greeting him with the gentle voice of hers, asking him if he liked her haircut.

"What do you think?"

"It's...very nice."

"Just very nice?"

"You'd look pretty to me even if you were bald."

Conversations like these would have her heart hammering against her ribcage, and she'd pray to God that he couldn't hear it. She'd pray for it when he'd be walking home side by side, his shoulder bumping into hers, or his hand brushing against hers, when he'd take her bag from her, clicking his tongue at how heavy it would be,

"You trynna' build muscles like me?" He'd ask, though he was still very fragile, he'd only started going to the gym when he noticed how the 'basketball team captain', had decided to ask her to 'help tutor him too', though she had politely declined.

"Hmm? Of course not, Advanced Math books are just big like that..."

"Why do you do this to yourself, dove?" A nickname she had gained over the time, one used only by him.

"Because I wanna teach one day, I love teaching, I want to make sure people realise subjects aren't difficult or they aren't dumb, it's just that they're not taught properly."

Yup, he was smitten, on his knees, begging for her please ( he was also an idiot).

Ended up in college with her, though in a different major, like hell the now 'mountain of a man', no longer the kitten-like fragile boy, was going to major in math- business was a way better option.

This wasn't a bad situation, though they rarely had a few classes together, she'd still make time to see him, to text him as soon as class would end, but he'd already be standing at the exit, waiting for her with a coffee in hand and a dimpled smile, reserved just for her.

In no means was Choi San an extrovert, but somehow along the line he had met one, who later claimed that his MBTI had changed to an introvert too, though he doubted that notion- Jung Wooyoung.

Boistorous, noisy, obnoxious but a genuinely nice person at heart, Wooyoung was his companion in his major's classes, he was also the first person to know about San's little secret, since San trusted him enough to know, though Wooyoung assured him he had figured it out as soon as San introduced him to her as his "bestfriend".

"You're an idiot." Wooyoung snorted, taking off his shoes as he walked into the 4th years tiny apartment.

"What? Why?"

"You really think I didn't know?"

"How did you kno-'

"You can be bestfriends with a girl since childhood, unless a) one of you confessed to the other and got friendzoned but still chose friendship or b) neither of you confessed but are secretly crushing over the other."

"Wow, should've been a psychologist instead of a business major."

"What can I say, Sannie? I am a man of many talents."

Things progressed like this for a long time, Wooyoung watched from the sidelines how the two would basically act like a couple that was not a couple- almost everyone at campus thought they were a couple and Wooyoung was basically the third wheel. Not that he minded, and San appreciated him for that, he was glad Wooyoung's relationship with his dove was platonic- borderline sibling-like.

But Choi San was a fool, one that Choi San, at the fresh age of 25 wished that perhaps he'd be able to take the next steps, but something at the back of his mind held him back, were his personal desires as important as this friendship?

Which is why he stood there watching his best friend get ready for her date, her date with Wooyoung. After a conversation he did not like, but what could he say? He was too afraid to even confess, and well, Wooyoung wasn't a bad guy, and technically, he was his friend.

"I'm gonna ask her out, Sannie." The brunnet sighed, before taking a sip of his coffee, humming at the bitterness, perhaps this bitterness was sweeter than the bitter taste that had developed in San's mouth at the statement.

"W-why?" The bigger man with the fragile heart whispered.

"Because...I like her...I'm sorry but...I gave you time, so much of it and...I just wanted you to be the first one to know...if she says no, we'll all still be friends, but if she says yes...San, I won't hold back."

That had led to her first anniversary with Wooyoung, then the second and finally a day before their third anniversary San had texted the couple how he wouldn't be able to make it to their anniversary party because he had work that day and he wished them the best.

What he did not expect was someone knocking on his door at 2 am, opening the door to find a tear stained Wooyoung, only for him to punch the taller man in the face, watching him stumble backwards then wipe his eyes and sigh, "I swear- if you weren't such a great guy, I would've stabbed you."

"What the F*CK WOOYOUNG?"

That night was the first time he had seen Wooyoung cry, cry about how when she read the message she had become a mess, one that even Wooyoung couldn't fix, begging him for forgiveness how she made a mistake, how even though she was happy with Wooyoung, her heart belonged to someone else, someone who she thought she could move on from since he never confessed, since he never liked her back the way she did, and though the text was a confirmation of that, she couldn't bear lying to Wooyoung, to give him only half the love of what he deserved, knowing he deserved someone who would teach him the true meaning of love, because she was a teacher with only one student in mind, the idiot of a man- Choi San.

That night San couldn't sleep, not a wink, he processed the words over and over again, so did she like him? Should he confess to her? Now? Wouldn't that make it awkward? Or should he wait? Would that be a mistake?

Though his questions were answered in the morning when the doorbell rang at 7 am, making the sleepy man sigh as he stumbled to the door with blurry eyes, opening it still half asleep, only the slap he received woke sobered him up quickly,

"OW- WH- WHY ARE YOU JUST LIKE WOOYOUNG!?"

"SHUT UP! DONT TAKE HIS NAME! I HURT HIM BECAUSE OF YOU!" Never in the many years of knowing her, had she raised her voice like that.

"I-"

"NO! LISTEN TO ME!" She yelled before shoving him inside so she could continue yelling inside, "I like you- and you- you d*ck you could tell him you liked me but you couldn't tell me!? All those horrible dates you watched me go to, but you couldn't stop me?! You knew you liked me yet you let Woo ask me out!?"

"I- I didn't wanna ruin what we had..."

"San, I- what if I had married Woo? Huh? Then what? When you already had half my heart, I-"

She couldn't finish her sentence though, because the next thing she knew, he was smothering her with all that pent up love, his lips pressing against hers with a ferocity she had ever seen in her gentle Sannie, wanting to claim what he was too scared to touch before.

He only pulled back when she lightly pushed him back, gasping for air, looking up at him all flushed and pink, her swollen lips just enticing him even more,

"W-what was that?" She breathed out.

"Never say you're marrying anyone but me, I would've ruined the wedding even if it meant being thrown out."

"You're an idiot Sannie."

"No, I just had a teacher who could teach me math, but couldn't teach me how to love properly - guess she was learning too."

[cha-lii]

Ah for the Bad Things happen bingo apologies as I am always in a Sanji mood, but to maybe request Leave me Alone and/or Traumatic Touch Aversion for Sanji. Something that always gets me is when he needs comfort but pushes people who want to comfort him away and I would love to see your take. Or tortured for information? Sanji not selling out the Straw Hats or even Germa. If any of those tickle your fancy

And if you're not feeling those, perhpss Sanji cauterizing a wound on Zoro? Some good trusting nakama after bad stuff.

Thank you if you do and no worries if not!

(blue prompts are taken, yellow completed – the rest are free)

Hellooo @finalgale, my love I did not ignore you, I am just a Tragically Slow Writer – please enjoy this angsty word vomit that I mostly wrote tonight in a frenzy of inspiration that will likely not strike again for many moons!

ao3 link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/52234756/chapters/148709830#workskin

and over i go

Chapter 2

Dinner that night was tense. Sanji could tell that everyone wanted to talk about what had happened, but no one seemed to know what to say. Instead they sat in near silence at the galley table, watching Sanji bustle around the kitchen as he hastened to add the finishing touches to the myriad dishes he had prepared for them in the short time since they’d left that place behind them. The food he’d prepared for them was just as extravagant as always, and as he laid the dishes out on the table he made sure to present them with the same flourishes and smiles that he normally would, but any attempt at taking a conversation with him further than polite chatter was swiftly and smoothly shut down.

He doubted he would be able to carry a normal conversation anyway. Not with how his mind was still buzzing from his earlier meltdown. He kept getting flashes of hostile faces and scared shouts; spittle on his face and a hand on his arm, pulling him – and then, not far behind, chasing his every thought like a pack of hungry dogs, his brothers’ faces would come to mind. Twisted, mocking, cruel – Sanji shook his head sharply, and served his nakama dinner.

Most of them seemed willing to let the matter drop in favour of digging into the feast in front of them, but Sanji quickly noticed Luffy watching him closely in between bites. He knew that his captain didn’t believe any of his nonchalance for even a second; knew he could see the lingering redness around his eyes, and the tousled hair he’d forgotten to flatten after he’d pulled at it, and the way he just couldn’t seem to get his hands to stop shaking. When he caught glimpses of the others’ faces, he could tell that they weren’t buying into it either.

He kept trying anyway.

Bringing out the last dish, Sanji realised he now had no other option but to join the rest of the crew at the table. Idiot. He swallowed back a sigh, and sat in his chair with tired resignation. Luffy was following his movements, watching and waiting for any sign of upset, and Sanji had no choice but to fill his plate and eat the food, even though it was tasteless in his mouth and swallowing each bite took a ridiculous amount of effort.

Even though he could hear Yonji’s voice in his head telling him it was shit, he was shit, and everyone could tell, that’s why they were all staring at him and whispering about him and hating him–

Sanji ate, and hoped it would be enough to ward off his captain’s concern. But when all the food was eaten, one look at Luffy’s face told Sanji there was no avoiding the elephant in the room. Sure enough, the moment Luffy clocked that there was nothing left for him to gorge himself on, he sat back and fixed his gaze solidly on Sanji’s across the table.

“Sanji,” his voice wasn’t loud, not really, but it cut through the small conversations that had managed to find their footing around the table like a hot knife through butter. Sanji swallowed down the anxiety bubbling at the back of his throat, and tried to silence the voices in his head, and wished he could bring himself to look away from those warm, steely eyes. “I’m sorry.” He blinked.

“You’re – what?”

“I’m sorry,” his captain repeated, and Sanji began to understand that the hardness in Luffy’s gaze had nothing to do with rage or resentment or disappointment, but rather regret. He shook his head, but Luffy continued on, “I didn’t listen to you when you said you wanted to leave. And now you’re hurt. I’m sorry.”

“Luffy, no,” Sanji’s words were strained, and he could feel his panic rising again. See? It whispered to him in his brother’s voice, see what you do? “It wasn’t your fault – you know that. I told you that.”

“It wasn’t yours either,” Robin said, watching Sanji closely with a horrible sort of empathy in her deep eyes. “You understand that, don’t you, Sanji?” He tried to nod, wanted to nod, but he couldn’t. It felt like too much of a lie.

“It was just–” he tried, struggling through the tumult in his brain to find the words needed to end this conversation as quickly as possible. “It was just – unfortunate.” He cringed at the words even as he said them, and cringed again at the answering scoffs from Nami and Zoro. “I mean – it was just shitty timing, that’s all. Maybe if we’d gotten there a few weeks from now, or even months… maybe then it would have been easier for me to – to avoid it. For those people to… tolerate me.” Several of his friends bristled at his choice of words, and he quickly continued before any of them could voice their protestations. “But – I don’t know. It’s fine, though. I’m fine.” Nami scoffed again, her concern a thing with sharp edges.

“Yeah, sure,” she said, and from the way her voice seemed tight and just a little bit higher than was normal, he could tell she was barely holding back tears. “You’re ‘fine’. You spent, like, an hour having a panic attack before making us dinner, because a bunch of strangers took one look at you and wanted you dead. And you can barely even look any of us in the eyes – but yeah – ‘fine’.”

A few of the others shuffled uncomfortably in their seats, and none of them seemed quite so willing anymore to try staring him down. Sanji was aware of Luffy saying Nami’s name in that same quiet voice, but he couldn’t quite hear it over the blood rushing in his ears. Weakling. He clenched his hands under the table, wishing that he could steady them enough to start clearing away dishes, just to give himself something to do. Anything to get away from that table, and those eyes. Anything to distract himself from those voices whispering away in his head.

“I’m fine,” he said again, when he was sure his voice wasn’t going to betray him. “Maybe I was a bit upset before, but I’m fine now. You think what happened back there is enough to rattle me, Nami-san? I’ve heard far worse. So, yes. I am fine.” His voice was harder than he’d intended, and he’d perhaps said more than he’d meant to, but Nami didn’t say anything else, and he could only feel disgustingly relieved at her silence. Sanji cut a quick glance around the table, found everyone’s expressions suddenly unbearable, and stood to begin clearing away the dishes regardless of the fact he was still shaking.

He carried the tall stack of plates to the sink, and was glad when the rush of the tap drowned out the whispers behind him. He sighed, and ignored the familiar feeling of dread pooling in his stomach, and tried to breathe around the weight on his chest.

They regret saving you, Ichiji was telling him. They’re realising what a stain you are on their reputations, and they regret even meeting you in the first place.

“Sanji,” Luffy said, suddenly standing right behind him. He was still so quiet, like he was trying to soothe a cornered animal. “Talk to us.” He wants rid of you, idiot.

“I’ve already said my piece, Luffy.”

“You lied, though,” Sanji couldn’t help but flinch at the accusation, opening his mouth instinctively to argue back, but his captain wasn’t finished. “I know when you’re lying, Sanji. I could tell then, and I can tell now. Stop being stupid, you know better by now.” He’s wrong, it was Niji now, his voice carrying that same humiliating laughter that haunted Sanji’s entire childhood. You’re too stupid to know better – too much of a failure to learn from your mistakes. Same as ever– Sanji snorted, the anxiety inside him bubbling over.

“You are the absolute last person who has any right to call me ‘stupid’, Luffy,” he said tightly, hating himself more and more even as the words came tumbling out. He was suddenly desperate for a cigarette, but realised with a pang that his pack was in the pocket of his jacket, currently slung over his chair at the table. The table where everyone was still sitting, watching their interaction attentively. Listening to Sanji venting his frustrations on their captain.

Cigarettes weren’t an option, then. He settled for biting his lip, swallowing down any more biting remarks before he said something else he regretted.

“Stop deflecting, cook,” As though sensing his tenuous hold on his temper and wanting nothing more than to break it, Zoro spoke up. “We can all tell you’re not fine, you’re wound up even tighter than usual.”

“Fuck off, marimo,” Sanji bit out around his lip. He remembered the swordsman’s hand on his shoulder, his worried eyes, and the feeling of cloth against his face as Nami used his bandana to clean away the spit on his cheek. Even the mosshead pities you, Niji whispered gleefully. Even he can see it.

Sanji couldn’t catch his breath anymore, and he was shaking so much that the plate in his hand rattled as he put it in the drying rack. He was biting down so hard on his bottom lip he could taste blood, only that was all in his head because his skin was too hard for him to even bite through anymore, because he was a monster now  –  he was falling apart. He knew he was falling apart, and he knew that the others could see it clear as day, which only made him feel even more vulnerable and exposed.

He also knew that they were just trying to help. They always were. But they didn’t seem to understand – he just needed some room to fucking breathe.

“Sanji-kun,” and now Nami was starting again, her voice softer than before. Now she sounded cautious, like if she said the wrong thing he was going to lash out at her. Just like I did, right? Niji hissed at him. She’s scared that you’re going to hurt her, just like I hurt your little chef. Sanji bit down harder on his lip, and grabbed another plate from the stack. Nami didn’t even know about what happened to poor Cosette, he reminded himself. Nami was just concerned about him – she would never be scared of him – her face flashed before his eyes: tearful, screaming – terrified. Begging him to stopstopSTOP hitting their captain–

The water was too hot – he could tell because there was steam billowing into his face, and his skin was red – but he could barely even feel it. He tried to pretend it was because his anxiety was making the very tips of his fingers numb, and not because he was becoming so fucking inhuman that he couldn’t even feel pain anymore. Nami was still talking behind him, “– and you know we only want to help. We care about you – we love you. Just talk to us, please–”

“Sanji?” Sanji’s shoulders were heaving with every difficult breath he managed to take, and he had such a tight grip on the plate he was holding he was scared it might shatter, and Luffy’s voice behind him sounded confused now, even more worried than before–

Careful, Sanji, Ichiji whispered to him, you’re being pathetic again, they’ll see–

Ha, Sanji’s crying again, look at him–

Stupid, worthless–

There was a hand on the small of his back, and another on his shoulder, and something – something landed on his head, falling low, covering his eyes – and there was absolutely nothing that Sanji could do to stop himself from crying out, or to brace himself when he flinched so hard that the plate he still held went crashing to the floor.

Some vague part of his mind was aware of the sudden commotion behind him, and of the shell shocked look on his captain’s face – but the other part of his mind, the part that had been spewing poison all evening, that part was screaming at him to get it off. He tore at whatever had been secured around his head, but only managed to yank it forward a few scant inches before he met resistance at the back of his neck – it was stuck – and he could barely breathe already but now he really couldn’t breathe–

Another pair of hands – warm, calloused but soft, firm but gentle, and nothing at all like what his brain wanted him to expect – took hold of his and guided him until he managed to free himself from whatever the fuck was–

“Your hat,” he whispered hoarsely, blinking at Luffy. His captain, his friend, his saviour. Standing before him looking scared. “It’s – your hat.” Luffy searched his face, still holding Sanji’s shaking hands securely between his own. He nodded.

“Yeah, Sanji,” he said, his voice still carrying that faint tone of confusion, now undercut with something deeper, intenser. Something that Sanji has seen him topple governments over. “It’s just – it was just my hat. What else would it have been?” Sanji shook his head.

“S-Sanji,” and that was Chopper’s voice, timid and frightened and tearful. Sanji’s head jerked toward the sound, and he saw them all where they’d leapt up from their seats, confused and alarmed but ready for action, ready to fight whatever they needed to fight to stop their cook from looking like that.

Or maybe they wanted a better look at the crybaby, huh? Sanji flinched, and Luffy’s grip on his hands tightened in response.

“Sanji,” he said again, “what else would it have been?”

“I-I–” Sanji couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t breathe, and they were all watching him, waiting for an answer, for an explanation, for a reason, as if Sanji hadn’t been searching for that his entire fucking life–

“Sanji, breathe,” Usopp was rounding the galley island to stand by his side, hesitating only slightly before resting one hand on his shoulder and splaying the other flat on his chest. Luffy didn’t let go of his hands. “Just breathe. C’mon, we’ve – you’ve been through this with me before. Just breathe.” Sanji tried to meet Usopp’s gaze, then realised he was scared of what he’d find in it and decided to just close his eyes instead. “That’s fine – just breathe with me. It’s – you’re okay. It’s okay. It’s okay, right?”

“Of course it’s okay,” Luffy’s voice rang out, louder now than it had been. He was clearly affronted by this whole situation. “You’re with us. And you’re on Sunny – everything is okay, Sanji. Sanji!” He shook their joined hands until Sanji opened his eyes to look at him. “You’re – what else would it have been?” Usopp shushed him, but Luffy ignored it. He seemed genuinely confused. He looked guilty, and Sanji hated that he looked guilty. Hated that he’d made his captain feel guilty over something that Sanji had thought he’d gotten over, something that had nothing at all to do with his captain, with any of them–

Poor Sanji, still hung up on his helmet, Yonji was mocking him.

Poor Sanji, still nothing more than a worthless little crybaby, Niji was joining in.

Poor, useless Sanji – he’ll never really escape, Ichiji was hissing at him.

Poor, poor Sanji–

“Sanji–”

“Th-the helmet,” he gasped out, breathless and hoarse. “I th-thought it was the h-helmet.” Luffy blinked at him. He looked to Usopp, who shook his head, also at a loss. He looked to the rest of the crew, and didn’t find answers there either. Sanji closed his eyes again, trying to focus on the hands holding him together.

“What – Sanji, I don’t know what you mean,” Luffy said, and Sanji almost laughed, because of course Luffy didn’t. Even at his most exposed, Sanji had never told Luffy or Nami or any of them about the helmet. Or the cell. Or those endless, endless days when he’d been convinced that he was going to die down there, alone and unloved and unwanted. Or the endless, endless nights when he’d wanted to. He had planned on taking those secrets to the grave – but, of course, he was too weak to even manage that much. “Sanji,” Luffy shook him again, a sort of urgency bleeding into his tone, “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Was it–” Nami’s voice broke, and she took a breath before trying again. “Was it – Judge. Was it the V– was it them?” She sounded close to tears. She also sounded like she already knew the answer. From the way his captain’s grip became bruising – silly Sanji, monsters like us don’t bruise – Sanji could tell Luffy had come to the same realisation as his navigator.

“I-I–”

“Was it?” Luffy sounded angry now. “Was it them? Did they do something to you?” Sanji shook his head again, and tried to breathe. He finally managed to get some air back into his lungs, and if he tried hard enough he could focus on the feeling of Luffy’s hands holding his; of Usopp’s hand still pressed securely against his heaving chest; of the rough texture of his captain’s treasure still clutched in his own trembling grip. If he tried hard enough he could focus on all of these things, and pretend that they were enough to drown out his brothers.

“It was – a long time ago,” he managed, opening his eyes.

He looked at Luffy, at the way his jaw clenched and lip curled furiously. He looked at Usopp, at the hard line of his furrowed brow as he tried to make sense of what Sanji was saying. He looked at his nakama, still standing around the table. Nami’s face was red, a mixture of sorrow and anger. And Chopper was in Brook’s arms, and he and Franky were crying. Jinbei looked angry, and Robin and Zoro looked murderous. And Sanji didn’t know what he’d done to deserve them–

Nothing.

“What was a long time ago?”

You’ve done nothing to deserve them.

“Sanji.”

You don’t deserve them.

“Sanji! What was a long time ago?” Luffy was getting louder with every word. Sanji swallowed thickly, and licked his lips, and tried for the first time in his life to find words to describe the abuse that had scarred him worse than any words or beatings or starvation ever could.

“The – the helmet. He – they made me wear a – a helmet. He did – Judge did. He made me wear it. He made me. He–”

“Why?”

“Because I was dead,” Sanji whispered, the words cutting through the heavy silence in the room with the force of a bullet. “I was dead – and he didn’t want anyone to see me. I was dead. But he couldn’t – he couldn’t actually kill me. So he – he – he made me wear the – and he locked me down there. He–”

Sanji couldn’t breathe again, and Luffy’s grip was too tight, and he could feel Usopp shaking. He heard Chopper crying, and Nami’s wounded noise. He heard Zoro’s low, “And why exactly aren’t they fucking dead right now?” and he heard Robin and Brook’s noises of assent. He wanted to turn to them, to explain to them that it was behind him, had been behind him for years – but he couldn’t fucking breathe anymore, and his vision was going black around the edges.

His hands were released, and warm arms wrapped around his shoulders. His head was pushed into the crook of Luffy’s neck, and firmly held there. Usopp’s hand was still on his chest, crushed between them, but the sharpshooter made absolutely no move to free it, instead slinging his other arm around Sanji’s shoulders. A weight settled against his legs, and Sanji almost startled before he realised it was only Chopper. The little reindeer pressed himself against Sanji’s calves, rubbing his face against his slacks.

“They were wrong,” Luffy whispered to him, and Sanji shook his head, forehead rubbing against his shoulder.

“Please don’t, Luffy. Please don’t.”

“They were so wrong,” his captain continued, ignoring his pleas and whimpers. “They were wrong about you, Sanji. You’re better than them. You’re so good, Sanji. You’re so good.” The noises coming out of Sanji’s mouth were almost foreign to him; noises he hadn’t made since he was eight years old. Noises he hadn’t thought himself capable of anymore.

They were always in there, silly little Sanji.

“You’re so kind, Sanji.”

You’ve always been a scared little boy.

“You’re so much stronger than you realise. So much stronger than them.”

You’ll never be anything more than a scared little boy.

“You’re amazing, Sanji. Sanji.”

Sanji.

Luffy squeezed the back of his head, holding onto him tightly even though Sanji was getting tears and snot all over his t-shirt. Even though the precious straw-hat was pressed tightly between them. Even though he could see him for all that he was. “Sanji, you’re my nakama. I love you, okay? I love you so much, Sanji. Okay? Okay, Sanji?”

You’re worthless.

“Okay, Luffy,” he whispered, and wished his captain would never let him go.

[a-small-writer-in-a-big-world]

I have been reading your different readers with the 141 and I had a random thought. 7'4, Australian Special Forces officer that has enough sarcasm to make Ghost and Soap look like they're the most polite people on the earth. Feel free to ignore if you don't want to do this. Have fun and I love your writing.

Omg I can just imagine this. You would be a menace to everybody.

They can't keep up with you on the banter side of things because you're just so quick witted

Ghost and Soap are afraid to get into banter with you because they know how outmatched they are

Price has told you multiple times to tone it down in certain situations because people don't know if you're being serious or joking when you make vague threats towards them

Gaz steers clear of it any time you begin in

Though sometimes when someone's in a good mood you'll go in a volley with them and clog up the coms with your talking

Your size makes it harder for people to not be intimated or put off by your extreme sarcasm

[noaltbruh]

hi you should totally do what its like do what its like to live with the bucci gang in a house all together thxx

*Kicks the air, giggles, screams into a pillow, throws up, dies and comes back to life just to write this post*

No bro I don't think you understand, you've just awoken my most unhinged side ever, literally I think about what it would be like to live with this wonderful family 24/h. There is nothing else in my brain, just them doing shit.

So yeah! I hope you enjoy ^^"

Life with the Bucci gang! 🐞🤐🔫🍊🍓⏪🎙 (or rather, a survival guide about living with them)

Alright, the main rule in this house is: "Don't kill each other. If you absolutely need to, at least hide the body well before it starts smelling like Mista"

Any other rule is either ignored, purposely broken, straight up not acknowledged, or only followed because Bruno said so and you don't disobey him.

Congratulations, you just got yourself free entertainment for the rest of your life and at any time of the day. Who needs Tv when you can just watch these guys do literally anything?

What are you in the mood for today? Trish kicking Mista with a shoe because he accidentally ruined her dress? Narancia blowing up with Aerosmith that one spider Fugo is afraid to squash? Giorno turning everything he sees into frogs? Abbacchio trying not to look like a total simp every time Bruno breathes?

With that being said, I hope you're not an introvert, my friend. There's no freaking way in hell they aren't going to drag you on their shenanigans. No, you can't choose, you will take part in whatever the heck they're doing, they're forcefully gonna make you tag along if you were to ooppose.

Buddy say goodbye to your privacy, that stopped existing as soon as you walked through the front door. 99% of the times there will ALWAYS be someone with you. Whether they're actually talking to you or are just in the same room as you doesn't matter. Rest assured that being alone will become a rare occurrence, no matter how antisocial you may be.

Don't try to lock the door of your room, they'll gladly destroy it and then ask Bruno to replace it with a zipper. Alternatively, some of them might even climb up from a window if they're feeling goofy that day.

I advice locking any snacks you may want to keep to yourself in a drawer or another place you know of. If you don't, there's a very high chance that whatever you were trying to keep to yourself will get stolen by the pistols sooner or later.

Another advice I can give you is to write down all important dates related to them, or little things you know they like. It must not be easy to remember those sorts of things when you live with so many people.

Most days you're gonna find Trish practising her singing in either the music room (yes they have a music room) or her own. Don't be shy and ask her if you can listen to her, she'll always reply with a yes :)

They have a very big and well taken care of garden. If you feel like spending some time with Giorno, helping him water the plants is a great idea! Prepare for lots of fun facts about gardening, while you're at it.

I suggest laying there particularly during summer nights. There's always a nice breeze to send the excessive heat away, and the stars look very nice from there. Someone else will most likely join you as well, you can stargaze together!

If you feel like having a conversation that requires more than two brain cells, Fugo's always there for you. He's used to some of the others calling him boring and such, but a nice chat about Latin, Politics, Philosophy or anything alongside those lines is always welcomed. Even if you don't know anything about those subjects but are willing to listen, he'll be happy.

Prepare for Narancia bursting in your room with a new dance, a song to listen to, or cool trick he's come up using Aerosmith, and way too much excitement. The latter one is only allowed if you're in the garden, but try to stop him from shooting any plants while you're there.

Drunk conversations with Abbacchio at 3 am. are a MUST. He'll only ever share his alcohol if he's feeling dizzy already, so wait until he starts getting a bit off and you're good to go. Do you remember anything you talked about after that night? Nope. Maybe you discussed the meaning of life, maybe you just yelled at the Tv watching old races of formula one, or maybe you've found the cure for cancer...But you'll never know.

Bruno is a safe space in the house. If you want to catch a break and take it easy from the others' chaos, he's the most reliable one. You don't have to necessarily do anything together if you don't want to, but his presence alone guaranteed to make you relax.

Don't go into the basement, please. It used to be a nice and tidy place where Bruno kept old stuff he didn't need anymore, but it progressively became more and more messy once the gang came along. Now legends say that old artifacts and mystical objects, such as Mista's hair, ended up there and were never found again.

The house has a lot of very pretty balconies with a wonderful view of the city. A couple of times a day you should go out and take some fresh air admiring Napoli, it's very soothing.

The roof is also a perfect place to if you look for a great sight of the town. If you're brave enough, you can climb up from one of the balconies. If you're not, that's fine: there's a safer ladder that will bring you there in the backyard, and you always have the support of the others if you felt scared anyway :)

Speaking of which...Yes, they may come off as extremely annoying and overbearing sometimes, but remember that once you settled in, you're family to them and there's no changing that.

They will ALWAYS be there for you, no matter what the problem or your reaction to it might be. Rest assured that you won't have to face it nor suffer alone, they'll all there to lend a hand for you and help you through it. Even if you're just feeling sad for no reason, someone will undoubtedly try to cheer you up, and succeed in doing so.

Sure, maybe some of them are not the best at expressing that they care, but they truly do and will show it to you in one way or another, whether it's direct or subtle, they will let you know you can count on them.

Movie and game nights are...Something else for sure! Every time one or two people get to pick what you're gonna play or watch, and since they have very different tastes, you can be sure as you can be that you'll enjoy yourself and have fun.

For example, one week you're watching the most gut-wrenching disturbing, complex and traumatizing movie of all time, picked by Abbacchio just to scare you all for his own amusement. Narancia will be screaming, Trish is acting like she's fine but is actually holding on to someone, Giorno is getting shushed by everyone because he's got a third eye and is somehow predicting the whole plot. A loud "SHUT THE FUCK UP, GIORNO!" from our goth man is gonna be obligatory.

The other week, instead, Mista and Narancia decided you were going to play Smash, and you WILL be playing Smash. Poor Bruno is trying to find the pattern to the attacks and fails to realize that those two dorks just spam random buttons hoping to win. Needless to say, they end up losing anyway. Also, Fugo almost threw the controller and broke the Tv a couple of times, but shhh it's okay they're rich, they can buy a new one.

The sweetest part about these "events", however, is that at the end of the night, you're all super tired. You'll just end up falling asleep all together in the salon, cuddling up against each other to feel warm, without even realizing it. The Morning after, whoever wakes up first usually makes breakfast for the rest, so you all also eat together before actually starting your day ^^

Get this through your system: no matter the time of the day, someone will be up. There isn't a single moment during those 24 hours in which they are all asleep. You'll find Mista sleeping at 3 pm on the living room couch, just to see him stealing salami from the fridge at 2 am while you were just trying to get a glass of water. He won't even let you leave and just ramble about his latest theory about salami.

Yes, your sleep routine is gonna get fucked up too, cope. Also, very often you'll hear noises coming from other rooms, although it's probably just Bruno and Abbacchio banging like there's no tomorrow . When that happens, spend time with someone until you both fall asleep, or get yourself something to block out the noise. (I'd choose the first option, but you do you).

The house has a sort of balcony that acts as an entrance to the garden. On some nights, you may find someone (usually the quietest members) hanging around there. Stop to talk to them for a while, they're weirdly more open about their feelings at that time of the day.

Mista, Narancia and Trish are going to CONSTANTLY ask you to hang out, these guys enjoy the outdoors way too much. Before you know it, you're dressed up to go party in the hugest, loudest, most crowded disco you're ever seen.

Or maybe they're dragging you to a bar and gossip about people all night, OR they're planning to infiltrate in some rich guy's party they only found out about because Trish is famous and knows way too many people.

Don't worry if you get nervous though, they'll stick around by your side to make sure you feel comfortable, and they'll leave if they see you starting get overwhelmed. All of you need to have a good time or it's no fun.

Group reading with Fugo and Giorno. I repeat: group reading with Fugo and Giorno.

Okay, the stuff they recommend might not be the most exciting, but I can guarantee you that if you manage to actually read it, the discussions and conversations you're going to have about it will make up for it. You can basically see their eyes light up and soon as you begin talking and discussing its themes, you'll find yourself carried about by their excitement without even realizing it.

While it's something they usually do alone, sometimes Bruno and Abbacchio will take you fishing with them. It's a complete moment of chill away from the excitement of your everyday life, not to mention that Bucciarati is a great fisherman and dinner that night will be delicious.

If you think these guys are enough chaotic as they are, brace yourself for Holidays time.

Get ready to help decorate the whole house, which, considering its dimensions, is no easy job. The best thing you can do in this case is go with the flow and, most of all, follow Narancia's lead: the two of you will be setting up everything for even DAYS, if it's necessary.

Prepare for constant snowball fights, dudes blasting Christmas music ridiculously loud, alcohol disappearing at an even faster rate than usual, presents flying all over the salon aand lastly...An actual quiet Christmas night where you'll simply be watching a movie together and drinking hot cocoa in front of the fireplace.

Don't be tricked, the next day the extroverted trio is already asking you to go with on them on a Christmas themed party. Good luck.

You guys fight over the best spot under the air conditioner during Summer time, and the winner always turns out to be Trish. Alternately, if someone's able to compromise enough, you'll go get something fresh to change the mood a bit.

One last thing I'd like to mention is that, in the middle of the living room, there is a big frame with all eight of you smiling together. If things ever get rough, look up and remember that your family is always there for you :)

[apotodiplodocus]

YOU'RE MY IDOL!

Gyutaro X Reader

Chapter 3

This chapter is new and I'm posting it here first! I will be posting this to my AO3 (the same name) tomorrow with a note proving that this is my official account. This chapter is shorter than usual since I'm still on my phone :)

It took a while for the police to finish their barrage of questions and allow you to go. You had been co-operative up until they asked if you knew who had beat the man. At that point you feigned ignorance, claiming he didn't stick around for you to find out. They seemed to believe you and had moved on. You had been lucky and there weren't any cameras at that exit, you weren't sure if you were more pleased that there was nothing to capture your shame or that nothing could record your saviours face.

When Tengen finally managed to get his hands on you, he had checked you over as thoroughly as you'd let him, starting his own interrogation. You were more open with this one, telling him you knew who had helped and would probably be in contact with him soon. Tengen sighs heavily and massages his forehead with one hand.

"And you're sure you're OK? I'd like to get you in with a therapist at least just in case." He insists.

"If you're paying then I'll go but I feel OK, I swear." You laugh in response, trying to lighten the mood a little.

"Done!" He shakes your hand, a big smile returning to his face that you're sure would dazzle everyone but you. You smile back and nod.

"Now, please take me home Tengen. I'm exhausted." You wilt jokingly. Tengen starts packing up immediately, his girlfriends jumping in to help. The other girls in the group took their turn giving you comforting hugs and words of reassurance. You accept them all with a grateful smile and leave quietly when everyone is ready. When you're home you have to practically shake Tengen's girlfriend's off you, they had offered to stay with you (minus Tengen) for the night just to keep you company. You politely declined, as much as you appreciated their offer, you really just wanted to be alone. The plan was eat something straight from the fridge have a comforting shower and go straight to bed.

After waving Tengen and the girls off in their car, you practically scurried inside your home. The rest of the night passed peacefully, you did have a little bit of a cry when what happened finally sunk in but otherwise you were calm. What could have happened didn't, thanks to Gyutaro and you would continue to not think about it.

By the time you were out of the shower, you had gotten a few messages, some from Tengen, a couple from your agency and two from an unknown number. Assuming the unknown number was Gyutaro you jumped straight in.

22:37

Hey, this is Gyutaro and Ume, we met you earlier. Just sending this message now so you don't forget us.

22:39

Our IOU I mean.

You smile, it was exciting that he wasn't taking advantage of having your number. You'd had an issue in the past when you had handed out your number to a fan so they could call you with their ill friend. This must have been an attempt to get sympathy though because within an hour you had hundreds of unknown numbers calling and texting you constantly. You think for a moment before typing away.

23:04

Hi Gyutaro! Like I could forget you after tonight, thank you so much for your help. I don't want to think about what could have happened if you weren't there.

I'll save your number so feel free to text me whenever you guys think of something I could do to repay you!

You wonder if you'll talk to Gyutaro at all other than for whatever he chooses. You hadn't made any friends in a while and this was a good opportunity. You did want to get to know Gyutaro and Ume, they seemed interesting and of course Gyutaro had saved you earlier. You feel like you could get hot and bothered thinking about it, feeling your stomach flutter when you remembered how strong he looked. A sharp ping sound from your phone pulls you from your thoughts.

23:06

Yeah, no problem. We'll think about it.

For a moment you watch your phone, the little dots bouncing while he typed, and then they stopped. But then they started again and this continues for 5 minutes until eventually he sends something.

23:11

Goodnight.

You want to kick your feet like a teenager, who spends 5 minutes writing and rewriting "goodnight"? No-one he must have wanted to say something else! This excites you, the siblings were the first people you'd met in a while that treated you like a normal person. Not an idol, not a cash cow, just a usual person they could pass in the street and never remember. But you'd make sure they remembered you now, especially Gyutaro.

Little did you know Gyutaro had his head in his hands, sweating. How would he manage to not talk to you when you gave him your number so readily. He could practically still smell your perfume and that forsaken candle, the smell was enough to torture him.

"But fucking Hell..." Gyutaro thought "Sweet, sweet torture." He almost leaps out of his own skin when he hears his phone buzz, sinful thoughts dissipating immediately.

23:12

Goodnight, Gyutaro <3

Suddenly he feels like he can't breathe. Was the heart necessary? Then again Gyutaro would take the heart any day if it was from you. His sweet idol, the only idol he's ever been even remotely interested in. Gyutaro feels possessive, he wants, wants, wants but doesn't feel he deserves and he's slowly being driven mad. How dare you make him feel this way, so conflicted, but he knows he'd buckle and do anything to be able to talk to you face to face again if you even hinted at the possibility.

He groans and his head buries itself in his hands again. Ume bangs on the wall shrieking for him to quiet down. He doesn't reply shutting his eyes and trying to keep his thoughts clean after all the jumping you'd done. In doing so his thoughts drift to the drunken man and he feels his temper flare up again. What a disgusting freak. Gyutaro would never accept violence against a woman, he may be ugly but at least he wasn't a degenerate freak who would touch a woman against her will. His nails scratch down his face and neck as he tries to keep his cool, eyes clenching shut almost painfully tight as he imagines finishing the man off to call himself down.

When the fury subsides he settles in for the night, not bothering to change out of his clothes.

A week passes with you and Gyutaro occasionally trading greetings and Gyutaro has been racking his brains for what sort of reward he could take. He didn't want to creep you out by asking you for a date but there wasn't anything else he wanted from you, as much as he hated to admit it. He had thought about getting something signed but it would out him as a fan and just the thought made him feel like his bone marrow was being sucked out.

Eventually, he talks to Ume about it, she was more imaginative than he was so he hoped she might have an idea. Ume had long gotten it into her head that she wanted to set you up together so she leapt at the chance.

"What groundwork do you have?" She questions, not even looking up from painting her nails.

"Groundwork?" Gyutaro parrots back.

"Yeah, you know what have you guys spoken about?"

"Not that it's any of your business but nothing much, just some good morning and good night texts really." He shrugs as nonchalantly as he can, pretending like he doesn't feel flustered whenever you send a message first.

"Well, brother of mine, it became my business the second you asked me. Now she me the messages." She finally looks up and leans closer to him on the couch to look at his phone. He huffs and puffs but relents. Just as he is about to scroll up, Ume quickly taps the call button, careful of her drying nails.

If panic had an image it would be Gyutaro in that moment. He seems unsure of what to do and freezes, mind flickering between ending the call or dying spontaneously. The phone rings four times before you pick up and greet him cheerfully.

"Hey! Gyutaro, what's up?" Your bright voice is enough to send a chill down his spine but he just gulps. Ume rolls her eyes.

"Hi, Y/N! I'm here too! We're calling about the IOU." She chimes back.

"Ume, hi! Yeah, no problem have you guys figured something out?"

"Yes! We'd like to go to that new amusement Park." Ume replies as if they had discussed this. Gyutaro hates amusement park, too many happy families with better lives than him and Ume.

"Ooh, that sounds fun! Yeah, I can get tickets for you both." Gyutaro can picture your smile over the phone. He goes to interject that he doesn't want it, if you don't go then what's the point?

"We were actually thinking you could come and hang out with us? It would be so fun to talk to you again." Ume pleads and the puzzle pieces slot into place for Gyutaro, this had been her plan. While Ume wasn't the smartest at most things when it came to anything related to romance she seemed to have a natural knack for it.

"Oh! Yes! That would be so fun, I'm free on Saturday?" Hearing how eager you are Gyutaro suddenly doesn't mind the idea of the amusement park. He clears his throat.

"So are we, we'll see you there then." He responds before Ume can.

"Yes! I can't wait!" You exclaim and begin chattering away about some details, clearly already looking into the amusement park, suggesting a time and place to meet up.

With plans made the phone call ends and Gyutaro wraps Ume in a bear hug much to her chagrin, complaining about her hair and outfit being ruined. He doesn't even care that he seems almost giddy, figuring she'd already noticed his attraction to you. He slinks back to his room after teasing her some more and blasts some of his favourite music to celebrate.

[ophthalmotropy]

Hi Dae! Sent a similar ask to Vi but I thought you would also be a good person to ask. A friend has enlisted me to help her find good books and movies and we are now at the stage of searching for more general/meta advice on finding (high-quality) books/movies on particular themes that are too hard to concisely describe for a straightforward search to yield much. If the question is too specific, any general description of how you pick books/movies for your to-read/to-watch list would be great, and if that's also hard to do then top-of-your-head fantasy/sci-fi recs are also much appreciated. Feel free to ignore this if you're too busy or don't know how to answer of course!

Hi! I'm happy that you thought of me, but I don't have a lot of advice because there's a lot of serendipity involved for me. Taking the latest novels I've most enjoyed, for example, I discovered Solaris because I watched Tarkovsky's film adaptation—and I discovered the movie because my high school professor mentioned it in class in 2020. I similarly read Crash because I watched the movie first, and I started reading Arlt because of a scene written by him that I heard read aloud on the radio by pure chance. So I guess my first real piece of advice is to keep your eyes and ears open?

I can't really speak on finding books on specific themes because I feel that they find me most of the time, but sometimes looking at which artists are friends with each other helps (Cronenberg and Clive Barker were like that to me), or seeing which filmmakers adapt which books (Cronenberg led me to Ballard and Burroughs). Tumblr parallels compilation posts aren't bad either.

Tumblr is a source of book recs to me too. I got a good percentage of my current TBR just by following Vi lol, and when I see a quote I really like I normally add the source to my TBR too (same with gifsets and movies). I also like to browse through bookshops even if I don't have money atm, just in case something catches my eye. Those two sources plus what my professors mention make up the bulk of it, but since I started logging my reading on The Storygraph (kind of like Goodreads) I also look at what it recommends me from time to time. The algorithm can't quite nail your preferences, but I do find stuff I wouldn't have found otherwise. You can also search for recommendations filtered by genre and mood there.

For movies, aside from seeing gifsets, I sometimes discover them through the actors in them. Very rarely, I click on Letterboxd's "films like" feature out of curiosity and find some interesting films.

I don't know if that was helpful, but as for sci-fi book recommendations, I can give you off the top of my head Solaris by Stanisław Lem (a psychologist is sent to a station that orbits around a planet covered by a vast, possibly sapient ocean), Crash by J.G. Ballard (a group of car crash fetishists explore the relationship between the human body and technology), and The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin (political intrigue set on a planet populated by hermaphrodite aliens). In terms of fantasy, His Dark Materials is a series for children that I still find a lot of value in as an adult.

For movies, my first recommendation is Cronenberg's early body horror films (especially Videodrome, Crash, and The Fly) plus Crimes of the Future (2022). I also recommend Poor Things (2023) (describing it as a female Frankenstein's monster does neither character justice, but you get the gist), Primer (2004) (convoluted time travel movie), Pan's Labyrinth (2006) (dark fantasy set in post-war Spain), and of course Solaris (1972). I also rather liked the Alien prequels (as well as obviously the original films, but those are better known).

I hope this was somewhat helpful and good luck!

[blaqueswanzaghouliishiilikeda]

i understand if you don't feel like continuing this convo so feel free to ignore this if you're not in the mood but. i have to say i'm kind of floored by that one anon wondering why claudia didn't leave during those 6 years. because she wanted to be with louis! she didn't want to be alone, she was never planning on going alone, she was dreaming of taking that trip together with louis. going alone would be lonely and scary and difficult. louis wanted to live in nola so she stayed with him, hoping he would agree to go someday. then lestat came back into the picture. being around lestat is agitating for her, it's already a big sacrifice to have to live in the same house with him but she agrees to try. expecting her to act polite about it is kind of a big ask. and maybe she was just waiting for lestat to show his ass, is that so bad? she's literally proven right! lestat never had any intention of honoring the agreement they made, he lied about killing antoinette so it's logical to think his tragic backstory was a lie too. it's perfectly reasonable for claudia to hope that louis would eventually see the light and leave him. louis nagged her for not trying enough but when she proves lestat wasn't trying either he says he isn't even gonna confront him about it. i love louis and i know why he does what he does but this is all a goddamn nightmare for claudia. "he chose you over me." he chooses the person who treats them like shit over her. it's heartbreaking! she was willing to put off her travel dreams to be with him, she didn't want to be alone. she chose him for like 7 years but he doesn't choose her. louis is my favorite character but holy shit does claudia have good reason to grow resentful of him. even book claudia isn't as emotionless as people claim, she has mixed feelings about louis too, she doesn't start to resent him until she no longer has lestat to blame everything on, and i much prefer this complicated picture to the emotionless manipulator that people claim she is. she's not that in the books and she certainly isn't in the show. she is a complicated character who loves to kill and can be cold and calculating at times AND she desires companionship and gets her feelings hurt and her anger is born out of very real trauma. BABYGIRL

I don’t mind engaging here. and im gonna sound off on some things too while im here. please forgive me for veering for a moment before i get into what you're saying here. which i think is well said. me and anon don’t agree. i don’t feel like we have to either. i don't think every conversation has to lead to people being moved out of their stance all the time. Which is why there was a point where i said we simply have to just disagree. bc when it gets to a point where my stance is cut down bc im being perceived as only a “show watcher” bc im engaging with what is textually in the show…..well thats where the conversation started right? about the adapted character in the show so now you’re just deciding to say anything to get me to be wrong. and i am not going to engage with that. that’s not how i want to have discussions. im not saying i can’t be wrong. but im not gonna engage with something that goes beyond what im able to make sense of.

why show up to an amcverse discussion and demand the book take precedent? the show will adapt book claudia’s story arc to fit show claudia. all the parts we haven't got to yet will be adapted. so what is the sense in constantly cutting down show analysis with book analysis? they don't have to be identical. the different mediums are not identical. where they converge they converge and where they diverge they diverge. its not ignorance to speak of the show text as canon bc it is canon. in the show!

i’m able to do that with adapted movies/shows. i'm able to accept a multi-universe of truths in conversations so i just don’t know what to say to someone who refuses to, other than we disagree. where i don’t know, i go to book readers to ask. when there’s a conversation happening that is clearly book centric (wolfkiller fun debate/and jokes that i personally enjoyed, whatever angle was taken, for example) i am happy just to engage by rb and like and cackle while the ones who know bring the sauce. it was delicious and fun at first. sometimes i think we lose sight of the fact that people also just want to have a low stakes good time. but i digress

back to you love. thank you for your input. i agree. i can’t understand not acknowledging that claudia enjoyed being with Louis for a while there. She wanted to leave with him in a mirrored way to how Lestat also wanted to leave with Louis. I have seen many book readers discuss that there has been a shift in the dynamic that doesn’t lean into the romantic angle of their relationship in the book. Louis being made gay and not bisexual being one of those supporting factors. bc once again he is an adapted character and so is she. certain elements may be different. but you speak to there being love turned hate between them in the books as well and i'm inclined to believe you.

she’s heartbroken. she wanted louis to want her and choose her. she also wanted LESTAT to want and choose her. she’s heartbroken about his dismissal of her. his eventual boredom of her. his eventual resentment of her. of his abuse. i’ve even spoken to my understanding of what plays into why he feels resentful of her and how from his perspective in louis not immediately choosing him makes him also feel like louis is choosing claudia over him. that don’t mean he gets to just do whatever and be coddled and protected from the consequences of that…like? no i will not agree with that. and im comfortable with disagreeing on that. we on devices on an internet. our fingers make little tippy tappy sounds when we talk to each other. i don’t need this to be a be all/end all kind of thing. and im not moved by arguments of reverse abuse/manipulation. please miss me with that entirely. i dont agree. and i wont. i see him as a whole person too AND i am not gonna pretend she isnt justified in how she feels about him or reacts to him.

her tragic story is much fuller than just being physically small forever, and plotting something that failed. she’s more than a device to get the story to its next tragic beats to me. and i love what people i engage with bring to these analysis of all of these insane vampires. i love that others are as insane about them as i am. some people are so fucking smart. it’s a brain treat to read what they say man like how do you hold all that information in your mind and communicate it with such eloquence and hilarity and be so right??? keep talking, i am listening. some people got the book facts that fuck me up for the rest of the day thinking about it and what that author lady put into these stories like! others bring themselves with that too and that matters to me too. there is a beautiful variety of conversations happening on my dash. you’re galaxy brained and funny and i love it so much. thank you for your voices. i aint search for and lurk on the black/poc side of things for nothing. this my lil happy corner frfr. i think thats what makes this fun. its fun for me that way. and i am happy to be reminded if im going off course. and if im worried im being misunderstood i might clarify. but all this is to say its not a lot you can say to me to convince me claudia wasn’t 1000000% well within reason and justification to be whatever she needed to break free of that man’s tyranny over her. and if you aren’t moved in your stance. then we disagreee. simpo.

but back to you. thank you for your addition and giving me the opportunity to get this off my chest its heavy enough carrying around some tittys.

[frostise]

𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐍𝐎𝐓 𝐓𝐎 𝐃𝐎 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍 𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇 𝐌𝐘 𝐁𝐋𝐎𝐆

BASICS

name / alias: venus

pronouns: she/her/they/them

blog type: single muse. multi-muse. non selective. semi selective. selective. mutuals only. private. other (specify)

type of muse: canon. oc's. both. other (specify)

GENERALITIES

tiggers people MUST tag: eye horror. i recently found this out and it's the extremely detailed, slimy kind that looks as if it's going to fall out of the eye sockets. trypophobia as well thank you

interest tracker / checker: i have it and it's mandatory. i have it, it's not mandatory but i'm more likely to follow back / interact with the people who fill it. i have one and i prefer it if people fill it in. i have it but it's up to the people whether to fill it or not. i don't have one. other (specify)

reblog karma: i practise it. i practise it sometimes but i never expect you to send in a ask if you feel too pressured. i don't practise it. i always reblog memes from the source (as in, i will never reblog off your account because i fear it would bother you). indifferent.

rule passwords: i have one and it's mandatory. i have one and it's optional. i don't have one. i send passwords. i don't sent passwords because i have anxiety

ESSENTIAL RULES PEOPLE HAVE TO RESPECT

the basic rp etiquette

i'm a firm believer of keeping your dash a safe, stress free space. i don't mind if we never got the chance to interact and you soft blocked me because of that reason or if you got too overwelmed with reaching out first. believe me, i know the feeling lmfao

don't start drama out of nowhere because of miscommunication or if my muse offended you. they are a villain for a reason. mun does not equal muse. same goes for unnecessary vague posting or gaslighting. i hate that shit

i am a slow roleplayer. don't hound me every minute for replies. this is supposed to be a safe place for me outside of my personal life. i get distracted, i'm forgetful and i'm a human being with feelings

i value communication and politeness. i would appreciate if you're being honest to me without being a dickhead about it. especially if a thread is randomly dropped because you had no inspiration for it. i would understand why that happened and we can start plotting another thread. if i make you uncomfortable then say so, otherwise i would assume everything is fine between us. you're also free to drop me as a rp partner for whatever reason as long as it ends on a good note

i will never practice favoritism! i love writing with you mutuals equally

rp is a two way street. you and i are free to reject a ship or a concept plot. it's nothing personal. we are also here to support each other via liking/commenting headcanons, sending asks ect

IMPORTANT PET PEEVES TO KEEP IN MIND

elitist rpers that only follow because of fancy graphics/tags and have a large number of following as if they were superior to those without it

never assume i ignore you if i'm online. i will get back to you when i have the time for it. i'm mostly here because i have writing to finish or i'm sending in asks

i hate it when people guilt trip me. i won't stand for it

THINGS THAT WILL LEAD TO INSTANT SOFT OR HARD BLOCKING

only mutuals can like/reblog from my account but please don't spam me. it messes up my notifications. non-mutuals using me as a resource blog is annoying and would result in a hard block. i have a carrd for a reason

if you post too much occ negativity. it starts to effect my mood rapidly

i rarely hard block mutuals unless i find out you're a toxic person with heavy evidence against you

DNI personals (unless you're a personal with a side rp blog and we're mutuals then you're fine ^^) i don't want my posts to be reblogged or known outside of the rp community. a soft block will be my first warning, but if you try it again it's a instant hard block. no spamming here

THINGS THAT LEAD ME TO UNFOLLOW

vague posting. if you're not bothered to solve the issue like a adult then i will unfollow you

if you stalk, harrass, bully me or my rp partners

tagging: link is in the header. steal it ♡

[over-the-time-flow]

Pre-Chapter 6 Upgrades:

Neo Getter Robo:

HP: 5000 -> 5250 EN: 160 -> 176 Mobility: 70 -> 73 Armor: 1050 -> 1102 Weapons: 0 -> 1

Nadesico:

HP: 7800 -> 8190 EN: 240 -> 264 Armor: 900 -> 945

Aestivalis (Akito):

EN: 100 -> 120 Mobility: 100 -> 105

Gekiganger 3:

HP: 3300 -> 3580 EN: 100 -> 120 Armor: 900 -> 940

As it turns out, GEAR's HQ is situated below an amusement park, and a really fancy one too; if he didn't work here, Ginga definitely couldn't get in just with his allowance. Hokuto says he's exaggerating, but regardless, seeing a child worry about money makes Reika and Hikaru muse about all the children who can't afford to come to amusement parks. Kirakuni steps in to brighten the mood, saying that that's exactly the ideals this park was founded on; so that children would never forget to play and dream... though it doesnt sound very convincing when ginga was just complaining about it being prohibitely expensive

Mizuho, meanwhile, is taking in the sights. You see, she's never been to an amusement park; the colony she grew up on was rather... modest. Megumi stops to think about it, and in the first place, it's rather rare for colonies to have amusement parks at all. and we all know what happened to texas colony

Tonya wonders if that means the poor thing has never gone on an amusement park date, only to find out Mizuho has never gone on a date, period.

Beauty: "Huh!? I don't believe this. Aren't you 18? And you've never been on a date?" Mizuho: "N-no..."

Minato: "I'm appalled... RAUL!" Raul: "Y-yes!?" Minato: "You mean you haven't taken your girlfriend out even once!?" Raul: "What's going on here!? We're not even dating!" Beauty: "Dating or not, when you're hanging out with such a cutie, hitting on her is the polite thing to do!"

Strongarmed into feeling conscious of one another, the two can't help but feel awkward... until Kirakuni swoops in to save the day once more, gifting them a full day free couple's pass to the park! Still awkward, but even more unwilling to let a gift go to waste (even if they didn't ask for it), they reluctantly set out on the arranged date.

Witz is frustrated that it took all that work to get Raul to ask Mizuho out, as he feels a man ought to be able to do that on his own, but Tonya thinks all's well that ends well, especially when it comes to such inexperienced lovebirds.

Speaking of lovebirds, Captain Misumaru gets right to work on asking Kirakuni if there's any couple's passes remaining. It'd be a real waste to not get to spend this opportunity on a wonderful amusement park date with her beloved Akito! Regardless of his own wishes, of course!

Not too far away, yet very far-removed from all this heart-pounding romantic action, Raj is deep in thought, staring at a poster. Something about a "Mazinger Parade"? That's right, the Photonic Power Labs and the Science Fortress Lab are collaborating to have a little parade with their respective Mazinger teams. Most would be excited to see the Mazingers up close, or to meet celebrities like Koji or Tetsuya, but we all know Raj well enough by now to be able to tell that what he really wants is a peek at the functioning of Photonic Energy. Beauty wonders aloud why he thinks they'd show it off at an event aimed at the general public, but Raj either doesn't hear her or chooses to ignore her.

Go, meanwhile, is more befuddled by the concept of the parade in the first place. With the current state of affairs in... well, the entire Earth Sphere, is this really the time? But Kirakuni posits that it's exactly because of the state of affairs that this is important. Sure enough, at least the public seems to agree, as everything's sold out already... but Go just chalks that up to most people having more free time than common sense.

Speaking of more free time than common sense, Sho barges in; Go has been skipping training! He gets an earful and is promptly dragged away by his ear like he's Brock or something.

In the middle of all this... liveliness, Banjo has a sour expression. Hokuto asks him if anything's wrong, but he just asks Kirakuni for details on some of the people staffing the event. In particular, the master of ceremonies will be Edwin, a magician who works for the company that facilitated the parade in the first place.

Director Shibuya holds a video call with Kenzo Kabuto, the man in charge of the Science Fortress. It seems like this parade is also an excuse to transfer the Mazinger pilots into GEAR's forces, which is pretty smart; raise public morale and at the same time disguise your tactical maneuvers. Not bad!

Meanwhile, deep underground, at the heart of the Mycenae Empire, The Great General of Darkness (above) curses Tetsuya and the Great Mazinger, taking it as a personal insult that they'd dare hold a parade while in battle with his great empire. But his superior, the Emperor of Darkness, tells him to look at things more rationally. A parade is a great opportunity; with all the civilians around, the Great Mazinger is basically handing them chances to catch it with its guard down. Now properly motivated, the General sets off with his Mycenaean Combat Beasts and some refurbished Mechabeasts stolen from the late Dr. Hell, who once terrorized Japan until he was struck down by Koji Kabuto's Mazinger Z.

Boy: "Dad, is THE Great Mazinger really coming?" Girl: "I want to see the Venus A!"

In a completely trustworthy tone, the magician Edwin gets excited about making all these children's dreams come true... and his own.

Watching from afar, Banjo says that sure enough, it really is Edwin. Garrison muses that Banjo must be feeling nostalgic...

Backstage, Edwin talks to his true master; Koros, the Meganoid who is the de facto second in command. She commends him for his devilish plan; should all go correctly, he'll have many children to turn into meganoid soldiers, and maybe even get a chance at stealing a Mazinger for them to study. But he has to be careful; Banjo Haran, the Meganoids' greatest foe, is back on Earth. Edwin talks big about easily making short work of him, and wonders how they should execute him once he's caught, but Koros seems uninterested in the conversation; such things can be discussed when (and IF) Banjo's properly captured...

Back to the lovebirds' little impromptu date, they're looking out at an observatory, seeing the horizon line. Not being used to the Earth, this is actually Raul's first time seeing it. He thinks he's been to Earth before, but if he did, he was too young to remember much.

They bond a bit over not being used to the Earth, with Mizuho bringing up that when she was little, she visited once and the ocean made her feel sick just from the smell! Apparently it's a rather common occurrence due to how sanitized the air on the colonies is. Mizuho opens up that, for a long time, she felt a bit of prejudice against the Earthborn, but hanging out with so many of them since the time travelling incident, she's come to realize they're just like her. Raul can relate to this somewhat; he's been really taken aback by how steadfast everyone here is in their convictions. They all face down terrible odds, but they continue to strive to protect the world around them... This really inspires Mizuho, who gets all fired up all of a sudden; she wants to be able to tackle her future like that, too! Raul's a bit surprised to see her so motivated all on her own, but it seems he's happy for her, as they walk off to ride the ferris wheel next.

On their way back from the amusement park, they run into Yurika, alongside Akito's remains. She excitedly asks if the pair tried the Mach Coaster Twister 9, stressing how unmatched the feeling of reaching Mach speeds in the flesh is. Akito, with whatever strength remains in him, tries his best to express that... it wasn't as fun for him.

Akito: "People... weren't made... to reach mach speeds... urgh..."

Needless to say, Raul and Mizuho decide not to ride the Mach Coaster Twister 9.

Banjo: "..." Kirakuni: "Oh, Banjo. Everything good? Planning on giving someone that bouquet?" Banjo: "Sadly, the bouquet's recipient is... long dead. Kirakuni, cancel the parade right now." Kirakuni: "Wh-what are you saying? It only just began!"

Chapter 7 - The Mazinger Team, In Peril!!

[dotster001]

hello! congratulations for 1.5k followers! 🎉🎈❤️ it's amazing to see how far you've come, this is a huge milestone! you're a really wonderful writer and i thank you for all content you've wrote!! i hope the best for you and your blog, congrats once again! if it's alright though, may i ask for a type one, romantic matchup for Ensemble Stars? you're free though to ignore this if you want, no pressure whatsoever!

my pronouns are she/her and my sexuality is straight. (although i am currently questioning if i'm demisexual) also, my mbti is infj and zodiac sign is cancer. personality wise, i'm quite reserved and shy. i struggle with social situations, so i tend to mostly be quiet. but when i do interact with people, i'm usually polite and helpful. however, i'm really private, so it takes a while for me to open up. but once i do, i'm more playful, bubbly, snarky. i'll dote on my friends, but i'll also tease them when i'm in the mood.

my strengths are empathy, kindness, and diligence. my friends and family say it's easier for me to absorb emotions, which i use to give comfort and advice to others. they also say i'm hardworking, since i push myself to do my best in my work. but my weaknesses are overthinking, perfectionism, and a bit of a pushover. i have a bad habit of overanalyzing things, along with being a huge perfectionist. i also i find it hard to stand up for myself as i don't like conflict, so it sometimes ends up with me martyring.

my hobbies are reading, playing games, listening to music, and writing. and for my interests, it's musicals, visual novels, books, fandoms, and a little bit of psychology.

i'm really sorry if this was really long, please excuse me. but thank you and congratulations once again! take care and stay safe <3

Event Closed

(okay, since the event was so long ago, what I'm gonna do when I post a matchup is wait twenty four hours before I post anything else (including asks and theories) so that esp the anons see them hopefully. Again, thank you all for your patience, you have no idea how grateful I am 💙)

I match you with Adonis Otogari.

First off, I feel like your shyness would go well with his less communicative nature. In other words, he's not going to push you to open up with himself and others until you are really ready. He wants you to feel safe and secure. That's his highest priority! That said, when you do get comfortable, he really enjoys watching your bubbly, playful, expressive self.

Speaking of protecting you, he's big on making sure you don't become a pushover, especially in situations where he knows you won't be happy. He's always ready to protect others, but with you the drive is so much stronger!!! He'll speak up for you when you won't, and will also push you to take care of yourself! One time you forgot to eat, and he handed you a plate full of barbeque chicken.

You two have such a soft romance, cause he's a soft guy. Quietly sitting next to eachother doing your own things, but holding each other's hands, him resting standing behind you and resting his head on top of yours, making eachother lunches, and leaving each other notes in said lunches. Ah! So sweet!

You like musicals? He likes to perform for those he loves! He'll serenade you for hours with your favorite theatre love songs. All you have to do is ask, and his dulcit tones are all yours. He's nicknamed you his "angel of music"…swoon!

Adonis had been rehearsing for hours with the other members of Undead. Because of Rei's late night schedules, he was pretty sure everyone was asleep except for Undead. But he was getting thirsty and had run out of his water hours ago.

The door opened to the practice room, the white light of the hallway flooding into the room, and you entered, holding a water bottle.

"Hey love," you said, "I figured you'd be out of water by now. Also, I brought you a bagged dinner!"

You handed both of them to him, and he couldn't help the warm smile on his face. He gave you a soft, warm hug.

"You should be asleep, angel," he said.

"Couldn't sleep without you," you said with a pout.

"Well, if you promise to go to bed right after, you can stay."

You vigorously nodded, seating yourself in a corner.

It was another two hours before he finished, and when he looked over at you, you had fallen asleep. The other members of Undead grinned when he scooped you up and carried you off to bed.

He tucked you in, pressed a kiss to your temple, and snuggled in next to you. You were so good for him, angel. Then again, you were so good for eachother.

[itsjeonjk]

──── 𝒍𝒐𝒗𝒊𝒏𝒈𝒍𝒚 𝒑𝒆𝒏𝒏𝒆𝒅 𝒃𝒚 𝒍𝒊𝒂.

* important information below the cut, please read before interacting!!

— GUIDELINES —

THREADS ;

• selective!! no bts members outside of the affiliated group. NO member x member.

• third person pov

• semi literate to advanced literate depending on mood and mun motivation

• writes; idolverse, multiverse & aus

• can be descriptive and get carried away (sorry!)

• will try my best to mirror

• gif icon and/or pictures/gifs will not be used during a thread, but do feel free to format how you like !

• friendly! — Y/N's welcomed, OCs welcomed, fandomless characters welcomed, multiverse characters welcomed.

• platonic, romance & smut roleplay. romance and smut threads will only occur with Jungkook's shipping partner!!

— ask box opened | dms/ims pending

GENERAL ;

• no minors — minors, please, do not interact. the blog is occasionally NSFW, including but not limited to; reblogs, threads, suggestive imagery, ect. i'm extremely uncomfortable interacting with anyone below 18. that means don't like my posts, don't send me asks, don't try and thread with me. in the case that asks will be sent by a minor, they will be answered to be polite but anything past that will be ignored. if pushed to interact, i will hard block.

• good vibes only — any hate comments towards the idol i portray will be deleted and your account blocked. furthermore, do not interact if you're problematic in anyway; eg. any of the "ists and phobics" or just want to start drama.

• tags — all posts with trigger/content warnings are appropriately tagged to the content. nsfw has it's own tag and trigger/content warnings are under tw; and cw;.

EMOJI LIST (please check to see what ones are taken before sending an anon!) ;

🐱, 🐥, 🐨, 🐿️, 🐹, 🐯, 🐻, 🍡, 💜, 🌷, 🐈,

[imagitory]

*exhales heavily*

Okay...I don’t usually go off the deep end in political essays that often. If it’s a quick thing like “f**k Neo-Nazis,” then sure, fine, that’s easy. I don’t have to explain why Neo-Nazis -- especially the cowardly ones that try to label themselves as the “alt-right” in a vain attempt to seem more acceptable to modern society -- can go screw themselves. Everyone already knows they’re awful -- or at least, everyone should already know they’re awful. If you’re the sort of person that wants to try to “teach” me about how the alt-right are not Neo-Nazis, then this post isn’t for you, so kindly don’t interact and keep scrolling.

This post is instead for my Democratic followers, whether you support Bernie, Biden, Warren, whatever. Please feel free to skip over it, though, my dear followers -- I know this whole political season has been very draining, and I have a lot more positive posts on my blog that you can consult instead. If you do want to read my thoughts, though, here’s a cut.

Hi, guys. How’s it going? We really dodged a bullet with Bloomberg dropping out of the race, didn’t we? At least now no one should be able to say Democrats and Republicans are alike, right? The Democrats kicked their racist, sexist, obnoxious, out-of-touch billionaire accused of multiple sexual assaults to the curb, while the Republicans made theirs president.

On that note, though...we still have the Republican version of Michael Bloomberg -- the one and only Donald Trump -- in office. We all remember how he got there...Hillary won the popular vote, but thanks to the ridiculously outdated electoral college rules and Russian interference, the electoral votes went Trump’s way. We could conjure up multiple reasons for Hillary’s loss, but at least in my opinion, I would say we learned a few lessons from the 2016 election that I think we should keep in mind. (Alongside making sure Russians butt the hell out of our elections and fact-checking all the rampant misinformation from our media outlets.)

1) We Democrats have more things in common than we might think, sometimes.

Clinton was infinitely closer to Bernie, politics-wise, than Bernie was to Trump or Gary Johnson. Yet there were those who were so upset about Hillary’s nomination and the role Democratic Party officials had in coaxing  delegates to support her that they protest-voted against Hillary, even if that vote wasn’t in their best interest. We don’t have a system that lets us rank who we want for office from most to least, so sometimes we have to accept a bird in the hand rather than reach for two in the bush. You might feel good about voting your conscience in the short term, but you probably won’t when it results in your vote being a drop in the bucket that doesn’t prevent someone like Donald Trump from winning. We’ve already seen this happen not just in the Trump-Clinton election of 2016, but in the Bush-Gore election of 2000.

2) Despite that first point, if we want unity, our Democratic candidate must be aware of how diverse our party is.

Even if we do end up having to settle for a less liberal candidate in order to win an election, that candidate MUST acknowledge that we are not like the Republican Party. We will not march lock-step with people we don’t agree with just because they’re in our party or we agree with some things, and we will certainly not be satisfied with simple pacifism. The Republican Party has been tilting farther and farther to the right over the last three decades, to the point that their policies now involve mass internment of Mexican immigrants and family separation, directly paralleling plans carried out by the THIRD EFFIN’ REICH. We cannot keep begging for civility and peace and trying to reach a compromise -- you cannot compromise with this kind of extremism without sacrificing all of your principles, because those kinds of people do not make concessions.

I remain convinced even after four years that Hillary should’ve chosen Bernie to be her running mate -- if she had, the rift between the centrist and more liberal branches of the Democratic Party might have been healed enough that we could’ve looked at our ticket with excitement and hope, as we had for Obama and Biden back in 2008. Instead Hillary chose Tim Kaine, an inoffensive centrist Democrat who added absolutely nothing to her presidential bid. He couldn’t even help Hillary out by boosting the campaign with youthful energy or natural charm -- Bernie would’ve both boosted morale among younger and/or more liberal voters and lit a fire under those who were anxious about what a Trump presidency could lead to. The same could’ve been true if Bernie had been chosen to be president -- if he’d chosen Hillary, she could’ve better appealed to moderate voters intimidated by the thought of voting for a Democratic Socialist and run on her international experience as Secretary of State.

3) In order to make any difference at all, we must vote, and we must win.

I’m the first person to acknowledge that I hate voting against my convictions. If the Democrats had chosen Michael Bloomberg, I would’ve probably been ready for whole-scale revolution, right then and there. But let’s be frank here -- in 2016, we got complacent. We assumed that Trump would lose. We assumed that America wouldn’t choose racism, or Islamaphobia, or sexism, or Nazism. BUT WE DID. In the end, our country -- like many other countries before us were -- is more afraid of the promise of social change than we are of the threat of fascism. Yes, I called Trump’s vision of the country fascism, and I stand by it. Fascism is defined as far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism characterized by dictatorial authority, forcible suppression of opposition, and strong regimentation of society and the economy and often supplemented with government-sanctioned racism -- and yeah, given that Trump clearly wants to do whatever he wants whenever he wants without facing any consequences for his actions, persecute any so-called “enemies,” make money for himself while in office (even using his office and political power to achieve that end), and scapegoat minorities, I think my point is made. And so I will state it again -- America is more afraid of the future and the progress that could come with it than it is of the cruelty, bigotry, and tyranny of our past. It’s an absolute tragedy, but it’s true. Americans were absolutely terrified of Obamacare until it actually became law and people saw how cool it was, not to be booted off your care for preexisting conditions and stuff. Once that happened, Americans were ready to bite off the hand of any Republican who made any move toward repealing it. If it’s something we’ve never done before, it’s beaten back like the plague, but once it’s something we’ve become accustomed to, you can tear it from our cold, dead hands.

In the 1930′s, Germany had a choice between three political parties -- the Communists, the Democratic Socialists, and the Nazis -- and in the end, the reason the Nazis got power was because the Communists and the Socialists could not band together to stop that greater threat. The Nazis were able to paint a pretty picture to the German people of returning their country to its supposedly long lost, mythic greatness, and they won power, even if they were still not the majority when Hitler got into office. And as soon as the Nazis got power, they never let it go and went out of their way to destroy both Communists and Socialists, just like they did with Jewish people, the Romani, and the rest. We are at such a crossroads now. I am deathly afraid that the Republicans will try to find some way to keep power even if Trump were to lose, but we cannot let that happen. We must stand together, strong and united.

The more liberal of us must acknowledge that radical change cannot be put into place quickly. Our system is broken and falling apart thanks to the Republicans’ on-going sabotage, and we cannot hope to remodel our house until our foundation is secure. Even the Republicans were not able to destroy our country in so many ways these last four years without dismantling a lot of other things first -- corrupting our elections with money thanks to the Citizens United ruling -- sparking two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that drained us of money and added to the backlog of veterans that have yet to receive their deserved financial support -- intimidating political officials away from substantive gun control legislation -- chipping away at abortion rights nation-wide -- stacking the courts, both local and Supreme, with unqualified, strongly right-leaning candidates -- gerrymandering districts like crazy so as to split Democratic-leaning areas and puff up Republican-leaning ones -- even spreading misinformation through shows on their own private so-called “News” network. It will take time to repair all of the damage the Republicans have wrought, but we must first win if we are even to have the chance to try.

On the flip side, the more centrist of us must acknowledge that we cannot go back to the way we were because the way we were was WRONG. We might have nostalgic visions of it being more civil and peaceful, but the tremors of war were still rippling under our feet. The Neo-Nazi rats that elected Trump were gathering under us, and we let them. We let them gain enough confidence to come out into the light in large numbers and we stood by, assuming that they wouldn’t succeed in their goals. We ignored the rampant spread of anti-immigrant rhetoric and Islamaphobia -- we downplayed the racism, the homophobia, and the sexism. Sometimes it was due to arrogance, and sometimes it was due to flat-out indifference, because those things didn’t directly affect us. We should know by now that that rosy view of our past was not how things were -- just as many of our Founding Fathers were still slave owners, and America interned our own citizens in camps during World War II, and the supposedly great Ronald Reagan turned a blind eye while thousands of Americans died of AIDS, our country saw the signs of racism, xenophobia, and ultranationalism coming out in full again and didn’t fight back. And now that racist, xenophobic ultranationalism is in control of the Oval Office. If we have any chance of stopping them, we can’t simply go backwards -- we must charge ahead. We can’t simply pretend like everything can go back to normal -- we must accept responsibility for what we’ve done and pursue justice in making things right. We must fight back against these far-right, tyrannical policies and we must pay restitution to those our country has hurt. I do not want the Mexican families we have destroyed to be treated the way our Japanese American brethren were after they were released from the internment camps in the 40′s -- dismissed and forgotten, with our flag figuratively slapping them in the face every time some stupid guy crowed his head off about America being the greatest country on earth. I may have hated Trump’s immigration policy -- I might not have voted for him -- but he still represents my country, and therefore me, to the rest of the world, and even if he’ll never apologize for a single damn thing that he’s done, I want my country to make things right.

Maybe once a Democrat -- even if it’s a centrist like Biden -- is in the White House again, we’ll have the chance for real change -- good change. We certainly won’t get it as long as we’re stuck on the outside looking in.

Now of course, even when this whole presidential thing is done, we can’t rest on our laurels. We must get out in force for local elections too -- we must take back the Senate and keep control of the House. We must pressure our lawmakers to get the money out of politics, and fix gerrymandering, and restore environmental protections, and hold corporations accountable, and tax the rich, and abolish the Electoral College, and put term limits on Congresspeople, and impeach Brett Kavanaugh, and fund dismantling the backlog on VA benefits, and cancel student loan debt, and implement universal health care, and pass gun control legislation, and do all the other things we need done.

I really hope that whichever candidate we end up with -- whether it’s Biden (*sighs begrudgingly*), Bernie (*smiles*), or Warren (*wiggles in glee*) -- that candidate will strongly consider choosing a Vice President who is either more centrist (if they’re more liberal) or more liberal (if they’re more centrist) and filling their Cabinet with those other ex-presidential hopefuls who still have something to offer. Kamala Harris was Attorney General of California -- why not have her become Attorney General of the United States next? How about Tom Steyer as Head of the EPA, or Cory Booker as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development?

Here’s the thing about us being more diverse in thought than the Republicans -- it means we have a great swath of very different members with very different skill sets, as well as the ability to learn, critique, rationalize, change, and improve. And if we are to defeat an institution like Trump’s that demands lock-step, mindless obedience and praise, it seems to me that’s something we should use to our advantage.