#genuinely so fond of hobs

[chasedeys]

it was hobs who asked that question btw yes! thank god for this ultimate Ally, he's always helping us with our Narratives 🙏🙏 (for real though it is pretty clear he's ja'marr's favorite reporter. love that!)

oh of course he was 😭🫶 Geoff Butch Hobson No. 1 Joemarr Ally <3 abt to use that pic for any joemarr presser with insane quotes. no joke it's so funny how he's consistently the one to keep asking about These Two Being These Two you know? like. ship-wise relationship-wise soulmate-wise. why is that 😭

and it's sooooo cute how much they adoreeee him. several accounts of joemarr calling him by name and joking around with him no??

i've joked around with casey he's definitely invited to the hypothetical wedding lmaoooo and when (lol) ja'marr gets to his first presser post-wedding and gets asked about what feels different playing with joe pre-marriage and post-marriage (nothing btw. they're still the fucking same to everyone's befuddlement.) ja'marr just fucking outright lies saying 'wdym? i'm married to joe?' and everyone just laughs incredulously in disbelief bc boy?? your wedding was nationally scrutinized?? hobs has to show him the printed picture of him and the two taken in their wedding hugging and stuff that he keeps in his wallet and he goes 'oh you got that photoshoped that's cute send that to me' and it's really just. dumb as hell. and then the next presser joe has to just do damage control all 'yes everything is fine with my husband we're still married and in love please just humor him he's deranged.' good shit to think of <3

[cuubism]

I REALLLLLLLLLLLLLYYYY LOVE YOUR BELOVED PROFESSOR DREAM FIC!!!!!!!! PEOPLE TEND TO FORGET THAT!!! EVEN IN CANON!!!! HES FULL OF LOVE!!!! AND PASSION!!! AND HE CARES SO MUCH IT LITERALLY DOOMS HIM!!!!! AND IF ONLY HES BEING GIVEN A MUCH MORE KINDER CIRCUMSTANCES!! HE WOULD BEHAVES EXACTLY LIKE YOUR FIC!!! I FEEL SO CRAZT!!!! PLEASE NEVER DIE I LOVE YPUR WORKS SO MUCH!!!

I've grown quite fond of him myself 🥺 @five-and-dimes and I discussed him at length and created more lore for him. It was determined that Dream's earnest whimsy probably got him bullied a lot when he was younger. Not since he met Hob though.... it's probably a coincidence 🤷‍♀️ surely everyone just realized the error of their ways and decided to grow up and be kinder! Dream knew it would happen some day :)

-

Dream is still reeling as he reaches the cafe where he's meant to get afternoon coffee with Hob. He feels a bit shaky, but happy. Joyful. In disbelief.

When Cori had cornered him after class, Dream had been sure he was going to shove him up against a wall, or throw his books on the ground, or any of the other number of things he seemed to get satisfaction out of doing. He'd clutched his books tight, bracing himself.

Instead, Cori had, with halting, uncomfortable words, apologized to him. Actually apologized! Dream had been wary at first, sure it was just another way to hurt his feelings--he's been called gullible many times and he knows there's truth to it--but Cori hadn't taken it back, or suddenly turned on him again like he had every other time Dream had tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. He seemed genuine.

It was what Dream had always wanted, what he had always hoped for, so decided to take it and just pray that Cori wouldn't change his mind again in the future. Or trip him as he walked away.

He didn't, though. And as Dream left to walk to his next class, he couldn't help but feel victorious. He knew he would get through to him eventually! He'd always known that eventually people would grow out of their juvenile pranks and learn to treat others better. And finally it was starting to happen.

None of the other usual suspects bothered him that day, either. Nobody tried to trip him, or snickered when he said something overly sentimental in class. It was like overnight the world had woken up and decided to better itself. It was magical.

So he's still shaking a bit when he sits down across from Hob, who's already gotten him his mocha latte. When he doesn't say anything at first, just takes several long sips of his drink, Hob nudges his leg under the table.

"Everything alright?"

"Cori," Dream says, "apologized to me."

He must have milk foam on his lip, for Hob reaches across the table to wipe it away with his thumb, lingering on the corner of Dream's mouth. "Did he?"

Dream nods. "It- it did not seem to be a joke. Hob, I think he actually learned."

Hob smiles sweetly. "That's great, honey."

"Nobody tripped me today," Dream muses. "Or made fun of what I said in class. I cannot believe it. I knew that eventually people would grow up and learn how to treat others kindly, but it's startling to see it happen in real time."

"They must have learned from your example," Hob says. He takes Dream's hand on the table and starts playing idly with his fingers. Hob is very touchy-feely with him, always holding his hand, or playing with his fingers like they're a fidget toy, or petting his hair while they're lying in bed together. Dream found it strange at first. He was used to others he had attempted to date wanting to rough him up a little. When he questioned it, they would say, with a laugh, you're just too sheltered. Dream didn't think he was, particularly, he just didn't understand wanting to push someone around. At least not without finding out if they even liked it.

When Dream mentioned it, Hob had said, with a grimace, that Dream's kindness could be misinterpreted as innocence, and it made people want to 'corrupt him.' Dream didn't get it, but there were a lot of things he 'didn't get', at least according to other people. In any case, Hob didn't do that, because he knew Dream didn't like it, so Dream is content now. And he has Hob to at least attempt to interpret other people's odd behavior for him.

"I hope it sticks," he says, worriedly. "I would hate for Cori and the others to backslide now that they're finally making progress."

"Oh, don't worry," Hob says, bringing Dream's hand to his lips and kissing his knuckles. He looks at Dream over their joined hands, gaze absolutely sure, a look that never fails to make Dream shiver pleasantly when it's directed at him. "I think it'll stick."

[gabessquishytum]

Sliding into here with a concept that I'm not sure I'll get around to writing in detail. I know it's been talked of before but I gotta bring it back 'round!

We've got Dream and Hob and they've finally gotten to a point where they've started shaking things up in the bedroom. Hob was perfectly happy with the traditional Human Sex they've been having so far. More than happy. It's Dream. It's his Friend, his Stranger. How could he not be?

Then Dream opens his mind to all the possibilities one can have when lying with an Endless, him specifically. So they enjoy their exploration through the impossible. Hob discovers he quite likes feeling small against a massive eight foot Dream. He's also particularly fond of the seemingly endless (ha) rotation of non-standard genitalia Dream can conjur up.

For their second Christmas together - a holiday he only celebrates because Hob does - he wraps himself in soft silk woven of stardust and lies under the tree for Hob to "unwrap" once he wakes. And it's just as wonderful as every other time, especially as the stardust ribbons come to life and start stroking and coiling around Hob's very eager form and restrains him while Dream feasts upon his warm body.

Then things in Dream's work life take a turn for the worst. The Kindly Ones come, Daniel takes over, and Dream is no longer Dream. He's Morpheus, for the time, but even that name doesn't fit as it used to. Murphy, when Hob's been cheeky about it and his new found humanity. But he's still "Duck" and "Dove", "Sweetheart" and "Love" and every other name Hob has bestowed upon him.

So he moves in with Hob and learns to be human. It takes a while. Things are very different than they used to be. But he gets better. And finds he almost enjoys his new life. Until they make their way to the bedroom after many months.

He can't contort his human body like he could before. There's no more mystery or change or intrigue. It's just him and his human flesh and his mortal cock and he's honestly unsure of how to handle it.

Hob notices because of course he does. He notices how his darling is still hard and leaking but his gaze and mind are elsewhere. So they stop. And doesn't that just send Morpheus spiraling.

They talk. Eventually. It's still a bit like pulling teeth with Morpheus. Humanity didn't do anything to dampen his pride and ego. But eventually the truth comes out and Hob swears to do everything in his power to show the love of his life that the sex has been fantastic because it was with him. Not because of his powers - yes, he'll admit, it was a perk - but humans have come up with quite a few ingenious ways to spice things up in the bedroom.

And when his first Christmas as a human rolls around, he decides to do his best to embrace humanity as Hob would. He grabs the soft red rope he had bought from the sex store they had visited together many times before and does his best to tie himself up like a gift as he had back when he was still Dream.

He lies under the warm glow of their tree. He had woken early, knowing well he could not sleep under here the whole night, but he rests and waits on the plush tree skirt for his lover to emerge.

And when Hob sees him all wrapped up for him that morning, he doesn't hesitate to show his appreciation for such a fine and thoughtful gift.

Ohhhhhhhh Dream. My heart. I'm screaming at the idea of human, vulnerable, darling Dream waking up early and wrapping himself up - looking down at his frail human form and trying to see what Hob sees. Something beautiful and worthy of love. The red rope looks nice against his pale skin, and he implicitly knows that Hob will think that he's perfect.

And Hob’s face when he sees Dream lit up by the lights on the Christmas tree, wrapped up like the gift he is... he's crying a bit, and smiling, and he's also genuinely super horny about this whole situation, and mainly just so arse over tits in love with his darling, darling Dream. The man that he loves with all his heart, sex or no sex. The man he will undoubtedly spend the rest of his life with.

He sucks Dream’s cock right there by the tree. It's not magical or earthshattering, it's just really fucking nice and lovely. And when they both go back to bed afterwards with a cup of tea, Dream doesn't feel less than what he was before. He feels more. More loved than ever.

[somuchbetterthanthat]

Actually I'm obssessed with that idea that people were saying in the tag, that Rue was in love with being in love most of all, this is breaking my brain and turning over and over and over in my head and I sort of want a story where, a few years into their marriage, Rue realizes that they've sort of fallen into the same dynamics they used to have with Wuvvy, and they love Knicholas, they truly do, but they love him like they loved Wuvvy, and it SENDS THEM SPIRALLING-

Were they in love with Wuvvy? No! They loved Wuvvy, deeply, understood and appreciated her devotion enough to stood by her when Wuvvy challenged Hob, enough to understand the GRAVITY of commanding her to the point of crying over it, but they weren't in love with her, and so whenever Wuvvy said "You know I love you" they couldn't say it back, not until it was clear they were now on the same page, on the same equal foot, on the same understanding that when Rue told her "I love you" It didn't mean "I'm in love with you".

But they've been saying to Hob so easily, so passionately, so immediately that they loved him, because Hob felt different and new and like them, because he was the answer to something they'd yearned for for a millenia; and they have such deep fondness for so much of him, and I do thing they get along very well when it comes to passion, so to speak, and so for a bit Rue gets MUCH MORE PASSIONATE, which Hob is confused but pleased to go along with, for sure, wide eyed and devoted fully to them, just like Wuvvy used to be, and Rue is like something is not right-

And I think it gets even clearer whenever they go see BINX and Andhera. Because BINX and Andhera are in love, in genuine, simple, mundane love, the "passion" (yes this is all an euphemism.) barely there, if at all (a fact that at some point the Cousins have learnt, i'm sure, which led to One Hell of a Dramatic Scene, i'm SURE, until BINX got serious and Andhera all princely and the Cousins were like "let's chill, you're right, we were all built different" etc.) (at the same the scene had gave Rue an odd chill, a bit of a dry mouth, but they'd leant closer to Hob and said nothing, forgetting to even mediate gracefully).

Anyway, Rue panics, runs away, creates yet another scandal, leaves a bemused and heartbroken Hob behind who definitely believes for a while they were kidnapped or something, goes on a journey of Yet Another Self-Discovery, and it starts with people of the Court of Wonder, then to the Cousins (who are like, "rue, dear rue, of course passion is not love, do you know how exhausting our lives would have been, if passion was love?), then to BINX and Andhera (who, by this point, are very angry at her but are still going to help, of course, even though rue hurt Hob, because they're their friend too, and they love them, and Andhera and them discuss how he lacks passion and how they fear, they're terrified, that all along they lacked /love/ and he is like "but do you? The same way I do not feel passion but can still appreciate and deeply need touch, even if you do not feel romantic love, do you not feel deeply? Do you not need intimacy, is that not what you've built with Hob?" and then "Also please talk to your husband, Rue, that's what Marriage IS, we talk to each other when something is wrong!!!")

So Rue goes to Hob, and tells Hob they needsto figure something out, that they're so sorry but can he please, please be patient for them, just a moment more, and when they'll come back they'll talk, and Hob is like "What did I do wrong?" and Rue is all heartbroken eyes going "I fear maybe It's me who has kept being wrong, again and again- there is someone I need to see, but then, then, let's go home and talk." and Hob kisses their hand and Rue waits for the spark they assume SHOULD be here, but it's not, and they sob as they hug him goodbye and kiss his cheek in a half embrace.

And then, of course, they go to see Wuvvy, their oldest most faithful friend, a wound that was never quite close, and they talk and talk and talk and talk.

And I don't know how it goes afterwards, but let's just said that aromantic!Rue who craved romantic love since they were young is making me dizzy. I would like to believe they and Hob make it work though. For Reasons.

[tj-dragonblade]

oooh Star Trek AU and cruise verse part 3 for the wip game! xo @hardly-an-escape

Hello hello! Yes! The Star Trek 'AU' was more idea than WIP until this-here round of WIP-ask gaming. Now it's got a bunch of drily-expository introduction to the scene, which is progress I'm delighted to have made. The first bit can be found here; this snippet follows on directly from that:

They meet yearly at the least, now, every 7th of June by Earth calendar reckoning, and Dream often drops by once or twice in between as well. It's been a wonderful change the last four centuries from the six that came before; their friendship is genuine, solid, lasting. Hob makes the journey back to earth every year that ends in 89, always returns to the cradle of London and the New Inn, still standing all these centuries later, to mark the turning of another century in their relationship. But in between the centennial tradition, Dream will meet him where he happens to roam, and the age of space travel means he can roam farther than he'd ever imagined. Currently he's been crewing cargo freighters out in the wormhole sector, where new and exciting things have been happening for the last few years. He's been to the Gamma Quadrant a couple of times, the entire other side of the galaxy! Sometimes he still can't quite believe it but it's absolutely brilliant; he loves just mucking around out here, experiencing things that his peasant brain could never have fathomed in his natural mortal lifetime. Then the last freighter he'd signed onto had started smuggling for the Maquis, and when her captain inevitably went to Federation prison for it, he'd cut loose from the rest of the crew and drifted back to Deep Space 9. He'll find his next berth soon, he's in no hurry, and in the meantime. Dream is here for their annual visit. "My dear friend," he greets, standing as Dream reaches the table. "It is good to see you." He clasps Dream's hand, settles a firm grip to his shoulder with the other, the sorts of physical greeting he never would have dared a few centuries back. But Dream has grown, their friendship has grown, and pulling him into a light one-armed embrace is now not only allowable, but reciprocated. "Hello, Hob," Dream murmurs, as they draw apart, and the warmth in his crystal blue eyes is unmistakable.

Cruise-verse Part 3 is not officially committed to wip status, but the unavoidable reality is that I keep scribbling down bits of conversations they could have if I decide I'm going to go ahead and write the third installment. Of this series, I suppose I should specify. Here's a bit of one of those conversations, which you'll see is still in the almost-entirely-dialogue stage:

"Holy shit…you're Morpheus Ateleíotes, head of the Oneiros branch of InfinityCorp??" "I would much prefer you continue to call me Dream; indeed, to think of me as your 'just Dream' from the cruise." "Alright alright, I can wrap my head around that. Just Dream it is, between you and me. Just. Gimme a minute to process." "That you have fucked a high-society recluse?" "I mean you were in the priciest suite on that ship; obviously you were loaded but I never—oh, hold on a tick, didn't I just see something in the newsfeed about a divorce being finalized?" "Yes, that is one of the things I wished to talk about with you today." "So you were still married when we hooked up at sea?" "…Yes. Technically." "Oh my god, I'm an adulterer??" The glittering of his eyes seems more amused than affronted. Dream tilts an eyebrow. "You were not married, so strictly speaking—" "I am party to adultery, gorgeous, don't argue semantics." "I apologize for not being forthcoming about my marital status on the cruise." "Mmyeah, might've been nice to know?" The warmth of his smile keeps the words light, free of any real sting of recrimination. "Would it have made any difference?" Hob looks him up and down, gaze sweeping over him, appraisal with a backing of very fond heat. "Absolutely not. Still would've fucked you senseless for the asking. And I do get why you wouldn't want to haul your messy baggage into your fun tropical fling." "Truly, you are the most beautiful and understanding party to adultery I could have hoped to find."

I've also posted a bit of later (and more fleshed out) conversation on a last-line-tag-meme previously.

(@hardly-an-escape just in case your tag in the original ask doesn't ping you)

[malakaie]

random question that might of already been answered. do you have an all time fav HoB match? or just in general fav match :o

oooh i don't think i have answered that! ty for the ask :>

for a trios match, i'd say probably revolution 2023 versus the elite - it's got story, it's got fun attitude, and it's got a pack of really great wrestlers, so it's an all-time match for me for sure. (i'm also just deeply fond of it because it's when HoB won the belts, though - proving themselves as not just contenders but winners against a team as strong as the elite is wild, to me, and i hope we get to see that kind of calibre of match again soon.)

singles matches i don't think i could pick just one - anything brody vs darby is always great. buddy vs. copeland and malakai vs. copeland are stand-outs as well. for julia, i'd say probably abadon at world's end 2023.

honorary mention for brody and buddy vs. mxm collection because it was both a genuinely great match and also just super fun.

[milune-vox]

The Dawn of Redeeming Grace (chapter 1)

(Hello Dreamling shippers, I come with an offering) (Continuation of the Dreamling present time meeting) next chapter You can also read it here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43003029/chapters/108048981

Chapter 1:

  It was but another day on Earth, in the year of our Lord 2022. A human being was seated on a chair, relaxing after a long day teaching young minds at a university nearby. He was sipping on a beverage whose recipe had rippled across centuries, shifting through time but staying the same at its core, much like he himself had. As per his habit, stacks of homework crowded his table, and he was going through them at a rapid rate, red pencil scratching and underlying and crossing and leaving snarky comments in the margins.

He read, tapping the rhythm of an old, forgotten tune on the table: “Shakespeare was a man who knew how to use words to describe things well,” and snorted. Circling the sentence, he wrote: “a most eloquent description. Worthy of the man himself.” On another, with writing so dreadful it almost made his eyes bleed, he took the time to note: “Honest work, maybe do it with your glasses on next time, I know you think, I quote, that they “give you the look of a deceased ferret,” but one; however creative, it is not a fair analogy, give yourself more credit. Two; if you don’t start wearing them I’ll be the one in need of glasses soon, and three; seriously, it pains me to have to remove credit for this.”

Going through a peculiarly obscure work in which the student had obviously used Wikipedia blindly, he was frowning in disappointment when he suddenly felt eyes on him. He raised his own at the man in front of him, and it took him a moment to understand what he was seeing, and react accordingly.

Bloody hell, FINALLY, was the one resounding thought in his mind, blanking out any others. The blue eyes, the pouty lips, the modern look still dark and broody. His stranger, after all this time, here, now. An overwhelming joy grows steadily in his chest and the following words cross his lips, a playful, barely heated thing, like his eternal companion had just made him wait a few minutes at most:

“You’re late.”

This smile of his. He had never smiled this way before. Free, unbidden, genuine. A thing of ethereal beauty. Hob couldn't believe his eyes, the sight too good to be true.

“I apologise. I’ve always heard it is quite impolite to keep one’s friends waiting.”

He couldn't believe his ears either, turns out. If he had been less in control of his emotions, he would have been reduced to a sobbing mess right now.

His nameless stranger… No, his nameless friend sits across the table from him, and Hob is still trying to process the overwhelming relief and warmth he is flooded with as the mysterious man stands back in his chair, his posture relaxed, a warmth in his eyes that pushes him to once again question the reality of it all. It is not a dream, however, he can tell—this is too marvellously tangible and precise and it makes him feel as giddy as a child. In the golden hue of the light, his divine features glow, a relished, chiselled perfection. He had tried so often along the years to keep them from escaping memory through recollection, the occasional attempt at drawing and painting. Any such attempt feels foolish now. It was nothing like what he sees there, his imagination and memory paling significantly in face of the real thing. His friend seems… less pale, more human, in a way, in this century, in this light, with this fond expression warming his features… Hob can’t help but chuckle in disbelief, slightly shaking his head.

Oh, this moment is delicious, he absent-mindedly comments in his heart, tentatively leaning forward on the table, and resting his chin in his palm like a lovestruck fool.

In all his years, there have been a few moments of pure joy which he kept close to his heart, to hold on to in the grieviest hours. He can now add this moment to the list.

“I am glad you could make it this time, my friend.”, he says, beaming so wildly he feels his vision blurring with happy tears.

He should feel silly, and he does, to be letting himself feel so strongly after the deep hurt his friend's rebuke had imparted to him, but one hundred and thirty years is a long time to hold a grudge, and he is now more relieved, unquantifiably so, to see him than anything else. Yes. Maybe he will not have to face eternity as alone as he had thought he would be. Maybe they could share the tiniest bit of forever together, still.

“I hope you find this place to be a worthy replacement from our usual hang, I am afraid it got closed a little bit after, well, 1989…”

His mystical stranger’s expression dims slightly, and a melancholic cloud looms over his beautiful face. Hob’s smile dims in kind, a weed of worry crawling inside his chest, instinct whispering of hurt and doom. A group of young people enters the inn and he pays them no mind, their boisterous laughter does nothing to fill the silence between them. A few seconds pass before his friend carefully says in this low, velvety tone Hob has so dearly missed listening to:

“Believe that I would have made it to our appointment, had I not been…”

He stops there, at a loss for words, with a faraway look, and Hob furrows his eyebrows in concern. Definitely, a lot had changed since last they met, and clearly, there was something wrong about this whole thing. In a flash, his friend’s words make him recall the warning he’d heeded in the eighteenth century ‘You can still be hurt, or captured’.

“Something happened,” he guesses tentatively, afraid of setting the ire he knows him capable of since their last meeting.

Slowly, his friend nods. He does not look him in the eyes. Hob feels a heaviness grow and sit on his chest, weighing him down, turning his body to lead. He fears to know the truth of it, he fears to push too far. However, most importantly, he wishes nothing but to tend and care and this instinct wins out, for he manages to ask softly:

“Are you alright, my friend?”

“Dream. You can call me Dream.”

And that was… not the answer he expected. His immortal heart misses a bit. He stares in confusion. His friend has the gall to look amused, and after a beat in which he seems to delight in Hob’s dumbstruck expression, he adds mercifully:

“I go by many names. Some know me as Morpheus… My most truthful name would be Dream of the Endless.”

Morpheus… Like the Greek god of sleep? Was he talking to a god?... Dream. Dream… Dream, Dream, Dream. His excitement at finally knowing his friend’s name grows and surges in his chest with the overwhelming strength of a tsunami. Hob doesn’t have a clue what it all means, truly, but he nods, a puzzled, delighted expression probably showing on his face, torn between the sheer joy of finally having a name other than stranger, and now friend, for the one being who has been a constant in his immortal life, and the thorough concern he is feeling at the thought of… Dream coming to harm. Because this is all that it was, wasn’t it? An attempt at deflecting his question? And why else would he escape it so?

“Dream,” he tries, and it sounds so much like an endearment, and maybe it is, in his mouth. He watches the rapt attention his friend gives him at the call of his name, the sparkle in his blue eyes, uncanny, like the light isn’t reflected but instead is coming from within. It is terribly bare, vulnerable, to be but a human under this unfathomable gaze, he thinks. He feels holy reverence from centuries past trying to bring him down to his knees in a posture of worship. He isn’t sure this would fare very well with his friend, nor would it fare very well with who Hob’s grown to be. He settles back in his seat, breathes in, out, and continues:

“Dream… Thank you.”

His friend smiles at him, a small thing which warms his heart and brings him back to his original concern. He must know for sure, cannot take a cowardly path out of heavier topics. At least, not until he’s been well and truly rebuked. He has to make sure Dream knows he can speak to him. This is what friends are for. This is what Hob is for.

“Do you wish to talk of… what it is that kept you away?”

“No.”

Dream answers too quickly, his voice harsher and louder, removed from its usual whispery quality, but then instantly recoils, and seems ashamed of his outburst, looking down at the table, hands clenched together in a tight grip, an all too human gesture Hob has never seen in him before. He feels a lump in his throat at the sight. His centennial companion has this faraway, haunted look he has seen on many others before, especially during and after the horrors of the world wars. Something bad happened to his friend, this he knows to be true, and a part of him screams in anger and despair. He doesn’t show it though, and simply leans in very slowly, very gently, and places his hand on the table not too far from the pale hands, not daring to touch them but trying to convey a sense of comfort with their proximity anyway. Dream finally seems to notice, for his eyes focus back on him, and the lingering redness and shine slightly dissolves from his eyes.

“Not yet,” he says with more softness, and adds in a murmur, glancing towards the window, the afternoon light and the chirping birds: “Later, perhaps.”

An instant passes, contemplative, and then, his face relaxes again as he, in turn, leans forward and crowds the space separating them, saying with a small, damning smirk:

“I am here to hear about you, Hob Gadling. How did these last one hundred and thirty years treat you, my friend?”

Hob is feeling all sorts of things at the way Dream says his name, and calls him his friend, and looks at him with those starry eyes of his, of which he sees every individual eyelashes with their new found closeness, and the delight of it so pure and strong he feels dizzy with it.

With the aplomb only one with such a long life experience could muster in such a feet sweeping situation, he takes a shaky breath and asks the waiter over to bring them drinks.If his friend, Dream, wants to get his mind off things, he shall indulge him and regale him with tales. He draws nearer as he answers conspiratorially, with a sure smile and a bit of mischief glinting in his eyes:

“Well, my friend, be ready for the story of the century —and yes, this was an easy play on words, and really not good at all, but his friend’s mouth curls up every so slightly and he feels like he’s standing at the top of the world.

He goes through it all. The wonders, the horrors, the enterprising spirit of mankind in both its benevolent and malevolent endeavours, navigating a stormy sea filled with wonders and despair. Through it all, he speaks grandly, animated with gestures, silly anecdotes, a few wriggle of eyebrows and, at one time, a wink, which earns him a god to honest chuckle, and he decides here and there that he must find a way to make his friend laugh again, for this is the sweetest sound he has ever had the chance to hear. His friend interjects a few times, asking for clarifications or musing some mystical truth from his retailing, and Hob delights in his attention, in his viewpoint on the stories he tells. A few times, he even makes a few cynical comments, only the twinkle in his eyes revealing his jest, and Hob responds with a boisterous laughter, absolutely stricken by his friend’s strange, certainly dark and entirely damning sense of humour.

After what seems to have been minutes pass, which actually might have been hours as it is now dark and the influx of people coming to eat dinner spikes up, his great retelling is now reduced to a more mellow tone. He is sitting back with a fond smile, as he breaches the topic of his new job, and that of his students, how some of those young minds are a marvel to him, in how they allow themselves to be more freely with each generation, and how he learns more of the world and himself everyday through the lens of their bolstering youth. He stops, catching a depth of fondness in Dream’s eyes that simply steals away his words, and they simply look at each other for a time, simply relishing each other’s presence. It is a peaceful and content affair, so comfortable and pure, and Hob feels like his rightful place in the world can be found in this moment, like something just clicked into place, like a void he had forgotten was there has suddenly been filled to the brim with complete satisfaction, and— A glass falls to the ground, shatters, and Dream jumps on his chair, eyes wild.

“Dream!” comes his surprised gasp.

In reflex, he brought his hand on his friend’s forearm. The latter freezes, incredibly tensed, staring at the offending appenage with an unreadable expression, and quickly Hob takes it back, and circles the rim of his glass instead, to occupy his hand and pacify himself.

“... Are you… are you alright, my friend?”

This question again, he realises after it has crossed his lips. They have come full circle, it would seem. A long silence. He clenches his fingers nervously around his drink. He finds himself almost wishing for his friend not to answer, to go back to these joyful moments shared, to remain in blissful ignorance, or better, for his friend to admit that, yes, he had simply been brooding and trying to make his point clear, back then in 1989, and his absence was very much of his own fault, thank you very much. All quarrels pass in time, however, and he was just passing by and thought “What is becoming of this old cogger?” and simply went, which, ah, Hob can forgive, easily, selfishly, because in this anxious moment, he would have taken any reality other than the one in which the cruel truth takes form, inescapable, cemented in spoken words.

“... I was locked away in a cage for a hundred years,”

Dream admits with a voice so incredibly soft it breaks Hob’s heart in a million pieces. It is like angel tears, both beautiful and unfathomably sad, it is like a beautifully welded knife, searing through his flesh. Images of prisons in wartime flood his mind. He suddenly notices how much thinner his friend appears behind this coat of his, how emaciated his cheeks, how sunken his eyes, and at that, his blood slowly starts to boil.

“There was neither air nor sustenance in my captivity.”

Hob sees the memories choking his friend, pulling him under, and he reaches out on instinct, taking both of his hands in his, to try and anchor him. The blue eyes snap at him, and Hob starts pulling away again when his friend takes them back, keeping them both pinned on the table, jealously guarded by his own. As if to procure an explanation for this desperate hold, he adds, almost sheepish, with eyes filled with unshed tears:

“No kind company.”

His hands are soft, and cold, their press is strong and unyielding, and Hob fears the moment Dream will let go. Words do not come easily. Not when tears well up in his eyes, mirroring his friend’s. He wishes with all that he is to wipe away his pain, to hold him and protect him against the world. “You need not have come to my defence.” And yet…

“I'm sorry, my friend… had I known-”

“No. I would not have endangered you so.” Hob opens his mouth in protest but he’s quickly cut by the mellifluous yet intransigeant voice of his friend;

“One of my subjects, my faithful raven Jessamy…she tried to free me. She perished for her loyalty. I would not have you meet a similar fate. You may have survived, but you can sti-”

“Still be hurt, or captured.”

A shadow of a smile, a sad, small thing, as he nods in recognition. It is this inopportune moment Jen, the waitress, choses to interrupt, coming up to their table with an apologetic smile.

“Hey Robbie, sorry to interrupt your date-”

He tries to interject and reestablish the truth of the matter, which, in his head, would be something akin to “ah, I wish it were one, but it is not”, and stutters:

“Uh it’s, it’s not-”

His rebuke is rather weak and she plainly ignores him as she keeps saying her piece:

“-but are you guys going to order something? There are a lot of people here tonight, and I don’t want to have to turn down any customers.”

Dream retrieves his hands- and Hob feels terribly bereft-, then looks around him like he’s noticing for the first time how packed the place has become, and from the sour turn of his lips and increasing tension in his shoulders, Hob wagers he doesn’t like the chaotic, rambunctious crowd very much.

“It’s quite alright, Jen, we —do you want to come upstairs?”, he asks his friend, adding with a knowing smile “There’ll be less noise.”

A beat in consideration, then he answers with too much solemnity and intensity for such a casual offer:

“I shall follow where you lead.”

He turns his head to Jen in an attempt to avoid the intense look in his friend’s eyes, and sees as Jen slack jawed snaps out of her surprise and raises her eyebrows suggestively at him. Hob considers an instant the possibility of once again trying to dispel her assumptions. He ends up shrugging mentally. He’ll see about that later. The rumour mill will run crazily in the meantime, he knows, but, frankly, a part of him is preening at the idea people would think them a couple. A man can dream. Hopefully, his friend isn’t privy to those peculiar dreams. … As the, what, probable god of dreams, he very well might? Now that’s a distracting, life threatening thought if there ever was one, ha. He picks up his stack of half graded homeworks (he hasn’t made much of a dent in them, he knows he’ll come to suffer from it when he’ll have to sacrifice his sleep and his peace to get them done in time, but he can’t be bothered at all right now, his happiness full and impervious to regret). As he closes the locks of his briefcase Dream comments, watching him intently like he is resolving a puzzle:

“You know the staff quite well.” Ah, there it goes. He cannot quite escape this much longer, he guesses. Especially now Dream has agreed on his offer to come upstairs. Where he might have assumed the rest of the inn lies, but where his apartment lies also.

“Well, I do own this place, so, it comes with its perks.” He shrugs like it is no big deal, avoiding his friend’s eyes, and stands, coming at Dream’s sides to guide him through the crowd by the small of his back (not quite touching, simply gesturing). He brings them upstairs, feeling the heavy stares of his employees (and a few regulars). Rumour mill shall run, indeed. A silly anticipation rises in his gut, a buzz singing in his blood. He feels a little lightheaded. He rarely lets people come up to his apartment, but the sense memory of it mixes with his current circumstance anyway, and makes for a very combustible cocktail. He fumbles for his keys. It takes more time than usual to find the right one from the set.

“You live here.”

Dream's voice, much too close for peace of mind, vibrates through his body and leaves a trail of goosebumps in its wake.

“Well sussed.”, he laughs without looking back, feeling how his friend crowds his personal space, and not daring to verify the fact, else his heart explodes in his chest. Hob breathes out. Opens his door. Bends in a silly and outdated courteous gesture:

“Welcome to my humble abode, my friend.”

[dictatorose]

the districts taught the attitude of perception. one had to be wary of the black markets that stretched like vineyards through the back alleys, the hidden corners and cracks in the walls which had eyes. there was a web spun of rebel communications; that, he had discovered unwittingly through sejanus, and he loathed the knowledge of it. the hob itself was a mockery; people with not a dime to their name, living in makeshift houses, singing and dancing whilst the capitol still bore the harsh reminders of the war and the bombings. the districts taught entropy — they had their own wild laws here. he had not held much in the way of expectation but was still disappointed; mostly, he had been grieving the loss of his potential. it would be easier, he thought, to stomach the indignity had he not been an exceptional student of high class, with prospects and opportunities for a bright future.

fish monet said, i tend to be over-fond of risks.

his spiral of ruminations was ungraciously unwound by the sound of her voice. he had to bite back a sigh and a reprimand for whatever @imprvdente had undoubtedly gotten roped into this time. opting for jest, he scoffed out a laugh. ❝ as am i, apparently, seeing as i have covered for you twice this week. ❞ between her, lucy gray, and sejanus, he had developed sympathy for dog wranglers. despite himself, and any hope he had of one day returning to the capitol hinging on good behaviour, the grin that tugged at his features was somewhat genuine. that had been a recent revelation — the camaraderie born of the barracks was so unlike the cultivated alliances he had held at the academy. he didn't dislike it. if he would be wasting away here for the next two decades, he ought to make the most of it. there was a simple pleasure to being anonymous, not having to bear the weight of his name. here, the girl from district four was no lesser than he, a sister-in-arms. at least in station. ❝ wait until after breakfast before you go running off, fish. it's too early in the morning to break protocol, and earlier for me to join you. ❞

[bill-y]

𝐈𝐍𝐔𝐑𝐄

Peeta mellark x male reader

We all know who Katniss Everdeen is, but what if Primrose hadn’t been chosen but another boy from another unfortunate family? YOUR family.

Info: This is basically a reader insert and I’ve changed a few rules, not ground breaking though. The reader is a bit bland for now but I plan for his actions to be different. Because he has different moral grounds from Katniss and such. Would appreciate feedback! FEEL FREE TO POINT OUT TYPOS. GRAMMARLY SOMETIMES DOESN’T DO MY DYSLEXIC ASS JUSTICE

Part one: Over there, buddy

Part two:You’re here right now. :)

Part three: Click here, pepperoni salami.

Wattpad account: L0calxDumbass

I separated with Gale and Katniss for a while, telling them I needed air. I sighed, leaping from branch to branch in the thicket of trees. Bread, not just bread, baker's bread. If I'm lucky I could get just enough squirrels for the baker, he had a taste for it but his wife was much of a witch, so he only buys it when she's not around.

I remembered how she found me stealing some burnt bread from the trashcan. I looked at her with wide eyes, frozen, I thought I was going to die, stealing was punishable for death, after all. But she just let me go, screaming about her frustration of Seams picking through her trash.

I got bread that day either way.

I landed on a sturdy branch, spotting a squirrel on the tree adjacent to me; it was quite huge, I'm sure he'd love this. Let's just hope the witch isn't home by the time I give this to him.

I crouched down, still as a statue as I watched the squirrel run up and down the tree. I pulled out the thin, glistening dagger, unwrapping its course, leather bindings, which became a makeshift thin rope. I felt my eyes unconsciously widen,  watching the squirrel's movements.

My arm aimed, then with a simple flick, the dagger whistled through the air. The small creature was then pinned to the bark of the tree through its eyes. The dagger's blade was thin enough to not damage anything when aimed right.

I pulled on the rope, the blade coming back, dragging the animal carcass with it. A small smile tugged on my face, I can get bread.

Kunal was surely panicking, he was the type to worry about the smallest of things. He once stepped on a cat's tail, Buttercup, Primrose's cat and he bawled, nobody could calm him down. Until he was offered food, that is.

I chuckled at the memory, slowly pulling the blade off the head of the squirrel. I held it in my hands victoriously, a grin on my face. I whistled a small 3 tone song, the chirping mocking birds falling silent before they imitated the tone.

After meeting up, we went back home, passing by the Hob. It was sort of a black market, where coals are transported directly to trains. I disliked it here, the amount of coal dust always bothered me, so when I come here I tend to cover my nose.

We managed to trade six of the fish for good bread, the other two for some salt. The lady who sells soup, the one that always glares at me because I've insulted her soup on multiple occasions, Greasy Sae: took half the greens we gathered, along with the dead dog meat that she calls "beef".

That's why I hate her soups, though it's not like I have much of an option, we can't afford luxury here. Unlike those obnoxious, entitled, privileged people in the Capitol. My jaw clenched at the mere thought of those scums.

We finish our business on the market, so we went to the mayor's house, who was particularly fond of strawberries. We knocked on the back door, his daughter, Madge opening it for us.

She's in Katniss and I's year sits beside us at almost every event because we don't really have groups of friends. For being the mayor's daughter you'd expect her to be an entitled brat or maybe a snob, but she was alright, she kept to herself.

I like that, I hate noisy people, They'll scare away the game, that and I've never really liked loud noises. I still remember the explosions in the mines, it was traumatizing, even though my father didn't meet death there. I really wished he had.

Madge didn't wear her usual attire, instead, she wore an expensive white dress, her blonde hair up with a pink ribbon. Reaping clothes. I felt my face scrunch up, that day was supposed to be a form of celebration. It's more of a way for the capitol to show who's in control.

We were being punished for the crimes of the people who failed, disguised as some form of celebration. It's disgusting.

"Pretty dress," Gale complimented. Madge shoots him a look, trying to see if it's genuine or if he was just being ironic. It was a pretty dress, but it was a waste.

She smiled, "Well, if I'm going to the Capitol, I want to look nice, don't I?"

I clenched my jaw, "But you won't be going to the Capitol," I said coolly, my voice monotone. My eyes landed on a small, circular pin on her dress. Real gold. The testament to the fact that she probably won't be chosen. "You probably have five entries, compared to us, that's a blessing."

"That's not her fault," Katniss said. Madge looked slightly hurt, probably because I've never really spoken my thoughts to her, I try my best to be polite when she engages a conversation with me.

"I know," I responded plainly. Madge smiled towards me, though it was clear it wasn't exactly genuine. She then handed the money for the berries. She looked towards Katniss "Good luck, Katniss"

"You too," She responded.

We walked toward the Seam, I can't help but feel angry. Her? Going to the Capitol? What a joke. When you're twelve your name gets put in the pile once, thirteen twice then so on. Up until your eighteen, where your name is entered seven times.

But the thing is, the rich have an advantage. You can enter your name willingly in the pile when you're starving in exchange for some tesserae. I had been doing this since I was twelve, having entered my name 3 times, for my mother, brother and myself.  Every year following suite, it has always been like this.

Now at the age of 16, I've entered my name twenty times, same with Katniss. Gale was in even greater danger, with a number of forty-two.

And she'll be the tribute this year? It can happen but it's deadly slim. I knew Gale felt the same way, listening to him rant about tesserae in the woods with Katniss was enough confirmation, along with the fact that I join in on the rants. Always end it with a promise to destroy the Capitol, somehow.

But what good does that do us?

Gale, Katniss and I divide our spoils, though it wasn't really the evenest distribution.  Gale got more, understandably since he has more mouths to feed.

"See you guys in the square," Katniss said, Gale nodded, "Wear something pretty," he joked.

I decided to stop by the bakery, by then the witch should be home but I took my chances. There was Mr Mellark, sitting outside, watching the pigs. He saw me from the corner of his eye, he grinned. "Greyback!' he called.

"Mr Mellark, still up for some squirrel?" I ask, holding the fat one up. He nodded, "You're lucky my wife isn't here, yet. Hold on, I'll get the bread for Kunal," he said, rushing inside.

I walked to the backdoor of the bakery so that he wouldn't trouble himself that much. I waited awkwardly outside, looking at a small bird fluttering about. I whistled, holding my finger out.

The bird landed on my finger, making me smile. From the corner of my eye, I saw a boy, blonde, stocky. Could probably kill me, if I'm being honest. Even though I was fast, I wasn't strong.

Soon enough, the bird flew away with the arrival of the baker, with a loaf of sweet, savoury bread, hot from the oven. "Here you go, Greyback."

I nodded, handing him the squirrel. "Oh!" he hummed, "Have you met my son, Peeta?" he asked, a smile on his face, "You're in the same year, yes?"

I didn't know what to say. Sure, I know him but I don't know that well him that well. My eyes travelled to the boy, who simply waved and briskly walked away. "I don't think so," I answered.

"I better be going, Mr Mellark. Nal needs his favourite bread after all," I said, flashing a small smile before I left. A small pit of dread boiled in my stomach, something bad is going to happen.

But then again, it's Reaping day, nothing good ever happens.

Word count: 1.3k

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@nin3s

:)))

[gabessquishytum]

Arranged marriage au in which Prince Dream’s hand is given to King Hob in marriage to seal a peace treaty between their two kingdoms in order to prevent war. However, Dream is secretly meant to use this marriage as an opportunity to assassinate the king and take over the kingdom, all but giving it over to his parents. Dream is fine with this plan (he might keep the kingdom for himself though, he hasn’t decided yet), but then he actually meets King Hob, who ticks all of his boxes and also falls in love with Dream at first sight. Oh dear.

On their wedding night, Hob is willing to wait out of respect, but Dream pulls out all the stops to seduce him (all in the name of lowering his guard, and to further cement Dream’s position when he kills him in a few months and takes over), only to be turned into a babbling mess as Hob proceeds to completely take him apart, all with nonstop looks of adoration. It’s the most intense sex in his life, and it nearly weakens his resolve all on its own.

But then, Hob follows this up with day after day of giving Dream both constant attention and complete freedom. He is perfectly content to allow Dream to do absolutely nothing if he chooses, just sit there and look pretty, but the exact moment that Dream decides to speak up and contribute Hob will listen to every word and give it every due consideration. If Dream tries to distract him from his duties by whining and begging for attention, Hob will immediately see to his needs, but will somehow at the same time continue to see to his rule with a gentle and firm hand. Dream becomes more and more genuinely obsessed and loathed to give this up, and soon it stops being an act for him.

(Also, Dream didn’t know this, but Hob’s kingdom is rather hedonistic and very comfortable with public sex. They do their best to hide it from foreign dignitaries so as not to offend their delicate sensibilities, but the first time Dream seduces Hob in front of the court (in an attempt to weaken his position in front of his courtiers and also because he was itching for more sex) they were met with either 1. looks of fond indulgence normally reserved for acts of innocent flirtation, or 2. looks of outright desire and lust, some even taking this as permission to also hook up with their partners. Dream never knew this was something he was interested in, but now that he has it he’s utterly ruined for anything else)

Dream’s parents grow more and more impatient to hear word that their son-in-law is dead, so that they can go “comfort their son in his grief”, and finally are invited to come celebrate their first anniversary. When they get there, to their dismay they see an alive and well King Hob, looking with hearts in his eyes at Prince Consort Dream on his lap. Dream looks like the cat that got the cream, utterly content and satiated, but his parents can read the hidden message in his gaze; they’ve lost their top assassin and the prize kingdom, if they try to kill his husband he will come after them, family be damned.

-🪽anon

(There’s probably room in the middle there for some light drama, as Dream feels guilty over his former plans to kill Hob, maybe Hob knew already or maybe he didn’t, but I’m here to provide smut and fluff and let others do what they will with it 😁)

I love nothing better than a slutty assassin <3

Dream comes from this long and prestigious line of famous assassins/royalty. Super rich, super powerful, always looking for more. (Anime fans, think of the Zoldyck family from hxh. Dream already has the aesthetic!)

Dream is the most ruthless and the most beautiful, and he has quite a reputation... but Hob agrees to the betrothal anyway. He definitely looks at Dream and thinks "aww, I can fix him!!" And he's kind of right? But he also makes Dream immeasurably worse, because the two of them fall in love.

I love to think that Hob knows about Dream’s plan, but he doesn't care - he just gives Dream a pat on his head and tells him that he's such a silly boy, it doesn't matter! Hob has killed dozens of people, he'd be a hypocrit if he got mad at Dream for this. And he knows that the only way Dream will kill him now they're married is through orgasm related cardiac arrest <3

They're fucking so much its actually a bit concerning. Hob loves being railed by his consort, over his own throne is a particular favourite. Dream’s parents hold out a small hope that their son genuinely is trying to fuck his new husband to death, but nooo. He's just channeling his murderous rage into making sure that Hob can't walk properly. More than once Hob has seen to paperwork or matters of state with Dream’s cock pounding him at the other end. If he does extra good with his statecraft then he gets Dream’s cum inside him, and maybe a little break before the next round <3

[orionsangel86]

I think its a matter of interpretation in the comics of a few panels. I don't personally see it at all in the show, because Gwendoline Christie's Lucifer is much more antagonistic to Dream compared to the comic where they are on a more equal footing and as @writing-for-life says, they are very much narrative foils.

But you can interpret Lucifer calling Dream "sweet Morpheus" as flirtatious if you want to.

When Morpheus described Lucifer to Matthew, and calls him "beautiful", again, you can accept that it is just a fact about the angel Lucifer once was, or you can interpret some whistfulness on the part of Morpheus there if you want. It's the readers choice how they interpret the delivery of that line after all.

There are also moments like this which again, you can interpret as just a fact of how Lucifer was, or you can read into it if you want to:

I think maybe its the -- before "and passionate" that makes it so easy to read as a personal memory rather than a simple fact of Lucifer's character. Lucifer also mentions how much he thinks Dream has changed since the old days (meaning before he fell 10 billion years ago) so I just think its easier to wonder about what more might have gone on between them back then?

Also I got the impression that Lucifer was genuinely upset by Morpheus's death, not in an obvious way obviously, but its easy to view Lucifer's thoughts on the matter as wishing that Morpheus had taken their discussions to heart and followed in his footsteps and quit the job that was clearly killing him, just like Lucifer had done.

At the end of the day, Neil Gaiman has stated that the lovers of Morpheus that we know of are only very few compared to how many there have actually been. Just because only a few actually spoke at the Wake, doesn't mean there weren't plenty more who didn't want to speak, or couldn't for whatever reason. Also, if I was going to interpret Lucifer and Morpheus as former lovers, I would say any relationship happened before Lucifer fell, as in Morpheus actually had a relationship with the angel Samael. If thats the case, its likely that Lucifer can barely even remember the relationship, other than having some fond memories of Morpheus from that time, which, honestly does in my opinion fit in with the comic canon we have.

At the end of the day its all our own interpretation of these things. If you were to ask me if I genuinely believe the comics are meant to be interpreted in a way that means Lucifer and Morpheus were canonically lovers at some point, I'd say no. But I do think there is merit in that interpretation regardless.

As for Morpheus and Mazikeen, I think that is a result of Dream aka Tom Sturridge having chemistry with absolutely everyone in the show (other than Gwendoline Christie who seemed to be actively rebelling against any sexual chemistry and basically admitted as much to it in her PR interviews!)

Tom Sturridge's Dream just seems to have bedroom eyes for everyone, and I picked it up between him and Mazikeen just as much as I picked it up between him and Johanna Constantine, Lucienne, The Corinthian, Hob Gadling, Desire and Death (yes I know), and even Alex Burgess (Dream being Alex's sexual awakening in show canon is somewhat amusing to me).

So make of that what you want. I'm all for people shipping Dream with whoever they feel like shipping him with. I think there is a lot of leeway in both the show and comics to do so.

(I'm still hoping Pharamond will turn up in the show because I can't listen to that section of the audible podcast without blushing - WHAT HAPPENED IN BABYLON MORPHEUS? I WANT TO KNOW!)

Oh and to bring this back to OPs initial post, Lucienne and Mazikeen is actually such an interesting ship. Lucienne would be fully aware of the backstory there, having interactions with Eve and Cain and Abel (and I get the impression that Lucienne's role in the show may have absorbed Eve's role from the comic unless Eve turns up in season 2) and with Mazikeen being a daughter of Lilith there is room for some fun exploration there.

Both are after all the companion and second in command of a terrible, moody, all powerful, ancient entity. They'd probably have fantastic bitching sessions about their bosses.

Oh wait, I was JUST saying in my other post about Lucienne probably keeping quiet on her true thoughts about Morpheus's terrible love life for fear of it getting back to him, but were she able to go somewhere neutral to meet Mazikeen, that is one person who Lucienne could probably be free to voice her complaints to without fear of it reaching her boss. Okay I'm on board with this ship now. Lucienne x Mazikeen for the win! :P

i think that it would be SUPER fun if mazikeen and lucienne are exes the way lucifer and dream are implied to be

[ditttiii]

Brothers Conflict || 02.

Thrust into an already established family, you struggle to find your footing while dodging the advances of seven, incredibly good looking stepbrothers.

Your father marrying, and you suddenly having to live under the same roof with seven step brothers was a royal mess or so you had thought, Because them falling in love with you was so much worse. Or was it?

◈ Genre: Romance, Fluff, Humour, Smut and maybe a little angst. (PG-18) (step brother AU) (They are all adopted, I do NOT support incest, this work is inspired by the popular anime/manga Brothers Conflict)

◈ Pairings: OT7 x Reader (reverse harem)

◈ CHAPTER TWO

WC: 3124

Warnings: Curse Words (sfw)

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There needs to be a limit, you think. A threshold level to how bad a day can go before it ends, or maybe you faint and are left craning into nothingness. Just something to tell you that this is as bad as it can possibly get for you. 

You hear Seokjins' concerned voice get drowned by the much louder voice of your best friend, but you don't respond. You realise that you should get up, reassure everyone that you are okay, but you are starting to wonder if you can even salvage the day anymore. 

The limit to how embarrassed I can be has hit a new high today.

Groaning and cursing every single god up there, you finally raise your face from the floor, bringing your hand up to scratch your cheeks and rub your eyes, as you purposefully avoid all the gazes that you can feel trained on you. 

Wincing you scratch at the burn you feel on your chin from where your face had hit the carpet. The fall could have been a lot worse, but the rug had saved you from the worst of the burnt. 

Saved, everything but your dignity that is. 

"I am fine," You reassure everybody without looking at anybody; before you turn to Sunmi and squeeze her hand in silent reassurance. Her concerned eyes stay trained on your hunched figure, but at your small smile, she nods, sending a small worried smile back. 

Sunmi has been your best friend since middle school. Your friendship blossomed the day she punched another girl in the school washroom for you, the girl; a bully was making fun of you for being a late bloomer, when Sunmi, your schools' resident queen-bee, swooped in like a raging goddess in all her angry glory and gave the girl a black eye. 

You still think back to that day with fondness and a slight sense of wariness. Your petite, barbie doll of a best friend could pack quite the punch. It was a reassuring yet scary skill of hers. 

Snapped out of your thoughts at the feel of a hand on your shoulder, you look up to see Seokjins’ concerned eyes peering into yours, and exhale out a heavy breath. 

Okay, now it can't get any worse. 

Maybe you shouldn't feel as reassured as you do with that thought, but you do. The realisation that you have already hit rock bottom when it comes to first impressions is, funnily enough, liberating to you. 

At least now, I don't have to worry about if the pitch of my 'hello' is right or not. 

Evidently, such frivolous solicitude was no longer a concern of yours. You have risen to higher grounds, where your first impression bar now ranges from psycho to batshit crazy.

Yep, that sounds about right. 

A cough snaps you out of your thoughts, and you quickly rise to your feet, with a little help from Sunmi. In your peripheral vision, you see Seokjin’s hands hover uselessly in the air as he stops himself from reaching out to you. Clearly, your earlier responses to his touch had left an impression on him, one that was probably not all that great, you realise. 

Wincing at both your embarrassment and the slight sting you feel, you finally swivel your gaze away from the floor and to the six men ahead of you, Seokjin still hovering worriedly by your side, like a concerned mother hen. 

If you had any dignity left, you'd have laughed, but as it is—you are probably bordering on crazy, and you don't want to push it. 

Not today. 

"Umm," You start as your eyes lock with that of one of the brothers who is looking at you with concerned filled eyes and you quickly break your gaze away. Focusing at a point on the floor somewhere by his feet, you bow low and mumble out an "Annyeonghaseyo!"

The words feel foreign on your tongue, even though your best friend is Korean. While you don't live in Korea and aren't Korean, your new extended family is. You know that they know English and originally you had no plans of speaking Korean. But nerves shot, and performance pressure high, the slightly accented greeting tumbled out before you even fully realised what you were saying. 

An awkward silence stretches on for a second too long, before the man whose feet you are drilling holes into with your gaze, is bowing and introducing himself. 

"Ah, Annyeonghaseyo! I am Kim Namjoon, the fourth oldest brother or well the middle one," Here he flashes you a quick close-lipped smile, and your eyes automatically stray to his dimples. 

‘Pretty’

While your eyes are still locked onto his dimples, utterly fascinated by their definition, he continues, "We have been waiting for you, it's a pleasure, to finally meet you Y/N-ssi!" His smile widens as he finishes his greeting, and you want to reply, but your eyes are, again, focused onto his dimples.

'So pretty.' 

It's when Sunmi pinches your side subtly that you clear your thoughts, moving your gaze away as you smile back—a soft, genuine curl of your lips. 

"Um, sorry I'm late, there was some traffic," Here you wave your hand in the air aimlessly before you realise what you are doing and force it down, biting your lip. "This is my best friend Sunmi, and um it's really nice, to finally be able to meet you all too!" You finish lamely. Your introduction, a mess of stutters and random flailing limbs, leaves your face feeling hotter by the second. 

"Finally! We have been waiting to meet our cute little yeodongsaengie all day! I am Jung Hoseok, the third oldest and welcome to the family Y/n-ah!" Greets Hoseok, a bright megawatt smile overtaking his face, as he swoops in and gathers you in a hug. This time though you are ready and without a seconds delay, your hands wrap around Hoseok's back, as you awkwardly pat, unsure of his boundaries. 

Hoseok though has no such concern, as his strong, warm hands wrap affectionately around your shoulders, pulling you closer and giving you a proper bear hug. Somehow it doesn't come as a surprise to you that Hoseok would be affectionate, something about his bright smile and sunny disposition had you feeling more comforted and reassured than awkward. 

Surrounded by your now brother's warmth, you melt in his arms and for once enjoy the feeling of belonging in someone else's hold except Sunmis’. 

"Did you have any problems coming here? I knew one of us should have come to pick you up instead." Hoseok continues, his eyes soft and concerned as they rake over you, keeping you at arm's length, as he checks you for any injuries, and a laugh almost slips out of you at his over the top concern. 

"I am fine Hoseok ss—" You pause, hesitant to continue as you think of what you should address him as before you try again, "Hoseok-oppa?"

Your voice comes out soft, questioning and a little hesitant as you look up at Hoseok to see his reaction, but he's grinning. His smile somehow even brighter than it had been before, and then he's pulling you into another hug. 

His arms wrapping around your shoulders and softly rocking you from side to side as he coos, "Aish, call me Hobi-oppa, Y/n-ah! That's what all the dongsaengies call me!"

You giggle as your limited Korean knowledge kicks in and you realise he's talking about his younger brothers. A groan echoed from behind him and in response a laugh booms out of Hoseok, as he finally loosens his hold. 

Wrapping his arm around your shoulders, he turns to Sunmi, and again introduces himself, Sunmi doing the same. 

You watch the interaction with an unfamiliar almost, warm, feeling in your chest. Usually, it would be you introducing yourself to Sunmis' family at Christmas or family vacations for which you'd tag along; and your father was never really home enough to ever meet Sunmi. 

So, to finally have someone call you family in front of your best friend, was a simple but strangely comforting thing, and you grin, feeling rapidly more at ease in your brothers embrace. 

"Aish Hob-ah! Stop hogging our little yeodongsaeng, will you?" Jin jokingly reprimands, and you chuckle, your grip around Hoseok tightening as you lean into his side. 

"Well, it's only fitting; I am going to be her favourite oppa, after all!" He jokes as his head tilts to look at you and he winks. His soft black hair slips low over his forehead, as his shimmery dark eyes sparkle from in between the gaps of his strands. And you smile softly, shaking your head fondly at his antics before you extract yourself from his embrace and move to introduce yourself to the rest of your stepbrothers. 

"Min Yoongi, second oldest, Welcome to the family Y/n." You smile and nod, a small 'Thank you oppa,' slipping out as you shake Yoongi's hand. His palm is soft, and a little cold against yours, and your smile widens at the small grin he gives you, blonde locks messy and rumpled as he runs his hand through them. 

Turning to look at the other three men in the room, you smile and bow as you greet them too. Your eyes rise when one of them steps forward, bowing to you, his cotton candy pink hair catching the light of the room and shining bright. But what gets your attention is his smile. Full lips curled into quite possibly the sweetest smile you have ever seen in your life, as his eyes turn into two crescent moons. 

"Nice to finally meet you, little sister, I am Park Jimin the hyung of the maknaes'" He winks before continuing, "and the fifth oldest one. We have been waiting to meet you for a while now. Glad to have you be a part of our not so little family! It might be a bit overwhelming at times, but know that we are all delighted to have you here." He grins, and you let out a chuckle yourself, comforted and appreciative of his efforts at trying to make you feel more at ease. 

"Thank you for welcoming me!I..uh am not the best at first impressions, but I promise I am not always such a clutz." You quip back and watch surprised, as Jimin throws his head back, eyes crinkling into those crescent moons again, as a laugh tumbles out of him. His hands rest on his chest, as he hunches over laughing and you smile, your gaze travelling to his palms and a snort slipping out when you realise his hands much like the rest of him are exceptionally pretty and delicate. 

You aren't usually very self-conscious, but surrounded by so many ridiculously attractive people, the insecurity was starting to creep in.

Blessed men. 

Shifting your gaze to the last two brothers, you smile, bowing a little as you greet them, but when only silence greets you back, your raise your head, eyes furrowed as you look up to see the last two of your seven step brothers looking at you with disinterest and maybe the slightest bit disdain?

A little more hesitant now, you smile at them again, but receive back even more silence. 

An awkward silence stretches on for a while, as you take in their appearance. You already know the names of the youngest two, had painstakingly learned then a week ago when your father had informed you that you'd have to move in with your extended family. 

Kim Taehyung, the one with crystal-like cerulean eyes and platinum blonde hair, that was almost silver. Long, messy strands that reached low and covered almost his entire eyes. His face so perfectly chiselled, it was like the gods personally took their time sculpting it, not a single flaw or blemish on his pale, smooth skin. 

In any other situation, you'd have gaped and taken your time appreciating the fineness that was his face, but since those crystal blue eyes of his were glaring angry holes into your forehead, you decide not to. 

Next time. 

Snapping your eyes away from Taehyung; your gaze falls onto the last brother, Jeon Jungkook, the youngest in the family, at least before you came along. 

For someone who was only a year older than you, his build was impressively large. Even from under the oversized loose tee he was wearing; you could see his broad shoulders. The t-shirt hugged his pectoral muscles before it loosened over the abbs. Jungkooks, from what you could only assume, abdomen was coiled and defined under the loose shirt he was wearing. 

After a few more seconds of awkward silence during which you see Jimin hiss and glare at the duo from the side, you snap back to your senses. Clearing your throat, you twist onto your heels as you look back at Jimin, who stops mid hiss when your eyes catch his before he pushes his signature bright smile your way. 

The smile you give him is a little shaky, your awkwardness from before coming back in full force, in response to the two youngest giving you the cold shoulder. 

You aren't surprised though; you were expecting some sort of resistance. When your father had pretty much ordered you to move into your new 'mothers' house, you were pretty pissed too. You had then thrown a tantrum, screaming and crying about how unfair he was being. That even as your father, he had no right to uproot your life like that, but no matter what you said he didn't budge. 

His decision was final, and so cursing and screaming, a week later here you are, trying your best to be the ideal sister your father expects you to be, as you attempt to accept these seven strangers as your family.

'Life just doesn't give me a break, does it?' You think wryly, letting out a soft sigh when you feel the glares against the sides of your face darken. 

Okay then, act like a bunch of pouty little brats, see if I care. 

Rolling your eyes at the immaturity, your two older brothers were currently showcasing, you move back to Sunmi who was now talking to Namjoon. 

"Your boxes were delivered a few hours ago, we've moved them all up to your room, but we haven't unpacked any. Would you like help with the unpacking? I have to leave for court now, but a few of us are free today, and we'd be more than happy to help." Namjoon offers, his dimpled smile again on full display, and if you were any more juvenile, you'd have called it a personal attack. 

Pretty 2x.

Feeling the glares at your back not letting up, you just shake your head. You have a feeling Namjoon is talking about the two overgrown babies who are currently wishing death upon you, but you'd rather have the boxes fall and slowly suffocate you to your demise than have them help.

"It's fine; I can do it. Thank you for sending the boxes up to my room though!" You reply, and Namjoon just ruffles your hair in response. Squealing you try to move away from his reach and groan, fixing your now rats nest of hair. 

Chuckling at your apparently hilarious antics Namjoon nods and calls Jimin over, asking him to escort you and Sunmi to your room. You figure since it's still early on in the day, most of them have their jobs to attend to, and will probably take their time to socialise with you later. 

You don't mind, the more time you have to get your shit together, the better. 

Waving goodbye to Namjoon and everybody else, You, Sunmi and Jimin make your way to the stairs. Why you can't just use the elevator like before, you don't know, but considering it has been less than an hour since you have joined your new family, you don't bother complaining. 

Too soon. 

Much like downstairs, the interior of the floor above was simplistic. Metallic, with lots of glassed walls and plenty of potted plants. 

'Someone in this family is obsessed with plants.' You think amused as your gaze travels to all the different types of plants around you. Some of them, you think, look too green and fancy to be real. 

The marble staircase is wide and curved, and once you reach the end, you turn back to look down and raise a brow, impressed, at how high the floor was. 

Fancy indeed. 

"This floor is where most of the rooms are, only Namjoon-hyung and Yoongi-hyung live on the floor below," Jimin explains, as he leads you to where you assume your room is. 

Passing by different doors on your way, you wonder whose room is which. You'll figure it out later you know, but you just hope none of the younger brothers are near you. 

'Except Jimin, he's nice.' You decide as you follow his lean figure. 

Pink, a colour you think would look absurd or emo on anyone else, looks bright somehow fitting, on your brother's head, and you watch entranced as his soft silky strands bounce with every step he takes. 

'What is with these people and their genetics?'

It's that thought that leads you to an epiphany. You almost stop in your tracks but stumble forward when Sunmi nudges you from behind. 

Earlier you were too nervous and wired, terrified of somehow messing up and offending your entire new family and so you hadn't given it much thought. But thinking back, you realise there was something weird about how they all introduced themselves. 

Min, Jung, Jeon. 

Their last names were different. You don't understand how you hadn't noticed it before when you had learned all their names, but you blame your anger and stupidity for the oversight. 

'Kim Young-Soon', your step-mother, and the woman you currently hated with all of your being. 

However, what you hadn't realised before but now do was how only Seokjin, Namjoon, and Taehyung, had the same last name, 'Kim' as their mother. 

'What the heck is up with this family?' 

More confused than anything else by your realisation, you continue to follow Jimin blindly. His voice fading into the background, as your eyes track his movements, the way his full lips curl when he smiled, and your suspicion only grows. 

There was something your new family wasn’t telling you, and you were going to find out just what it was. 

At least now I have something to do besides stressing out over suddenly having seven brothers, two of whom would set me on fire if given a chance.

Nodding, you decide you are going to have to do some interrogation tonight. 

A/N: If you like my work, leave me your feedback, even if its just a single word, it leaves me feeling immensely happy. 

I updated in less than a week! Heh, clearly my stir craziness is achieving new heights. Oh well, more content for y’all so yeeehawww 🥴

[dvp95]

can’t breathe when you touch my sleeve - chapter 13 (now complete)

pairing: dan howell/phil lester

rating: e

warnings: none

tags: alternate universe, slow burn, fluff & humour, tiny bit of inner turmoil wrt sexuality but trust me it’s not that deep, deeper than anticipated but still not that deep y'all this is primarily silly, eventual smut, idiots in love

word count: 6,375 for this chapter (59,473 total) (damn, i was really hoping to hit 60k)

summary: Dan keeps making a fool of himself in interviews, to the point where it’s basically a meme. Now he’s got to sit down for the better part of an hour and sell his show to the YouTuber he’d had a massive crush on when he was a teenager.

read from the beginning on ao3 or on tumblr!

read this chapter on ao3 or here!

"Do you need to do some laundry before bed?" Phil asks, stirring vegetables with the kind of dubious intensity that Dan recognises from setting one too many meals on fire himself. "Or is all your stuff dry-clean only?"

"Very funny," says Dan. He's keeping an eye on the rice, but it requires much less effort. "Yeah, I could do a load tomorrow."

Phil looks up from his skillet for the first time since he turned the heat on. "Tomorrow? Dan, you leave tomorrow."

"Not til like two," Dan says with a little shrug.

The way Phil is looking at him makes him laugh. He's never seen the man's eyes so wide and anxious, so like a deer in headlights. Dan gently nudges him away from the hob by the hip and takes over vegetable watch.

"Dan," Phil says again, "that's not very much time. You don't want to pack tonight?"

"It sounds like you probably want me to pack tonight, Phil," says Dan. "I'm good at throwing things together last minute, though. I'm not worried about being late."

"I'm worried about you being late," says Phil. "Wouldn't it be easier to pack tonight and just hang out tomorrow?"

Dan smirks and tosses the rice in with the vegetables and sauce, just to get it all stirred together. One of Phil's hands is settled on the small of his back as he needles Dan about this, and it all feels so disgustingly domestic that Dan almost can't handle it.

"Uh huh," he says, trying not to let the fondness seep too much into his tone. "So, what you're saying is, you want me to do my laundry tonight so you can keep me in bed all morning?"

"Yes, but also, I've got time anxiety," Phil chuckles. He presses a kiss to the back of Dan's neck, which makes him shiver.

"You've got anxiety about the concept of time? Honestly, same."

"Stupid," says Phil. He isn't trying to hide the fondness the way Dan is, the affection coming off him in waves as he presses himself into Dan's side, drops a kiss to Dan's shoulder. "That too, I suppose, but I mean about being late. I always have my stuff packed like, two days in advance."

"Absolutely cannot relate," Dan says, biting his lip to try and hide a smile. "But yeah. I can do a load so you're not anxious about my unpacked suitcase all night."

That's not something he would normally offer, because Dan is almost never actually late and he's just fine with his current method of timekeeping, thanks, but he'd rather keep Phil in the best possible mood. And, okay, maybe it does sound kind of nice to just have a lie-in without running around to try and grab all the things he's somehow strewn across the flat in these short days.

It's strange, actually. Dan has spent a lot of his adult life on other people's couches and in hotel rooms, and he's good at keeping his stuff compartmentalized because of that. Something about how comfortable he feels here has him treating it like it's his own home. He's absolutely certain that Phil doesn't mind, if he even notices - it's not exactly obvious that Dan's chargers and straighteners and toothbrush haven't found their way back to his bags when Phil's junk is strewn across every possible surface.

Dan bumps his hip into Phil's and turns off the hob. "You ready to eat?"

"Literally always," says Phil. His hand leaves Dan's back, and Dan feels a bit bereft for it.

Still, he supposes, joining Phil on the sofa to watch some MasterChef while Thor acts like he isn't quietly begging for scraps isn't the worst way to spend an evening. In fact, if that's the only way Dan wants to spend all his dinners from here on out, nobody has to know.

--

Dan takes a shower while Phil goes on a walk with the dog, and he spends more time zoning out than he does actually washing himself. His phone is blaring a playlist he doesn't even remember making, and while it has some real bangers on it, he keeps getting distracted trying to track down the memory of it in his brain. Then, of course, his mind just drifts from there.

He thinks about his family, about the emails he still hasn't checked, about Adrian spouting bullshit profoundness down a phone line. He thinks about Heatwave, and his role in the whole mess of it, and what Amy will say when he tells her that he doesn't want to be a part of it going forward. He thinks about London, about the way the city has felt like an eventuality before but not quite like this, about how Phil is really what makes it feel like a place Dan can settle down and build a life for himself.

Most of all, Dan thinks about how much it is going to suck to be away from Phil for however long they have to be.

Long distance relationships aren't exactly Dan's forte. Which, okay, to be fair, relationships generally are not exactly Dan's forte, but he understands how this part works. He understands sex and cuddling and kissing, even if it all feels like the dial has been turned up to eleven with Phil, but he's not a hundred percent sure how to keep this sort of energy when they're an entire ocean apart. Dan is kind of a jealous person with a yo-yo of self esteem, and Phil is a very handsome and charming man who surely has far better prospects than talking to Dan on Skype until he falls asleep.

And that thought process isn't one Dan really needs to go down, is it.

He decides to try and trace back an inside joke to its inception while he washes his hair, because surely that's a better use of his time than heading down a rabbit hole of insecurity. He's still pondering that when there's a knock at the bathroom door and it opens.

"Hey, Dan?" Phil's voice comes, just loud enough to be heard over the shower and the music. Dan's eyes are closed so he doesn't get any fucking shampoo in them, and he has no idea if Phil is looking at him through the glass screen or not. He makes a noise to indicate he's heard Phil and tilts his head forward to start rinsing his hair. "You want me to throw your clothes in for you now? I can leave you something of mine to wear."

"I'd take something of yours anyway," Dan says, dry. He keeps his eyes closed. If he doesn't look, then he can live in a world where his boyfriend is checking him out just for the hell of it. Dan doesn't mind being watched by the right eyes.

"Of course you would. Anything that can't go in the wash?"

Dan grins and shrugs, even though Phil might not be looking at him. "I mean, read the fucking labels, mate. But yeah, none of my dress shirts."

"Got it." There's a beat of relative silence for so long that Dan starts to wonder if Phil has managed to leave the room without making noise - not Phil's strong suit at the best of times - but then he speaks again, low and amused. "If I were a murderer, Dan, you'd be so dead right now. Why are you facing the tap, you absolute freak?"

Water goes up Dan's nose when he laughs, and he's sure the sound of him cough-laughing isn't exactly attractive. He turns around and cracks an eye open to check if Phil is laughing at him or not.

Phil is resting against the bathroom counter with his arms crossed and a smirk playing around his pretty lips. If Dan were not acutely aware of the injuries it would cause, he'd whinge until Phil joined him under the spray.

"I'm just having a face the tap kind of day," he informs Phil, making sure his hair is completely devoid of any shampoo that might sneak-attack his eyes and make him look even more hilariously incompetent than he already does. "You just gonna stand there and look at me?"

"Tempting," says Phil. He leans over and picks up the pile of clothes that Dan had discarded beside the bath mat. "But one of us needs to get this done."

"Oi, I said I'd do it."

The grin Phil sends his way makes Dan's knees feel a bit wobbly, like he's a teenager all over again. "I know. I didn't believe you."

Honestly, that's fair. Dan is better at putting things off than he is getting off his ass to do it right away. He pretends to be offended, anyway, because it's more fun than conceding defeat. "Excuse me? I'm a man of my word, Philip."

"I believe you'd do it eventually," says Phil. "But if I do it now, then you can be naked in my bed once you're done wasting all my hot water. See? I think ahead."

"Go away," Dan laughs.

"I'm doing a nice thing!" Phil protests, but he's laughing too. He lets his gaze drift over Dan's body again, unapologetic about checking him out in a way that makes Dan's heart beat a bit faster, and then he's gone. The door closes behind him, and Dan covers his face with both hands to hide his blush from the empty bathroom and Frank Ocean's crooning.

God, he's so far gone for this guy. It's genuinely fucking ridiculous.

He doesn't spend too much more time in the shower, because his boyfriend is waiting for him. And, fuck, that still feels so goddamn weird to think. Boyfriend. Dan has a boyfriend. It's actually surreal.

Dan dries himself off and wraps the towel around his hips, because Phil hasn't come back to give him pyjamas. He turns off his mystery playlist and pushes wet curls off his forehead before he leaves the fogged-up bathroom.

"He emerges," Phil jokes, barely looking up from his phone. "Clothes are in the dresser if you want to put them on."

"If I want to?" Dan repeats with a big grin. He likes looking at Phil's long legs spread over his colourful bedsheets, glasses perched on his nose and his hair sticking up a bit at the back. He looks comfortable and soft, and Dan truly considers throwing on something soft and curling up for another nap. Or sleep, at this point, if Phil lets him sleep through the night. But he's leaving so soon, he wants more than that. "Yeah. I don't really want to."

The way Phil's lips twitch make Dan feel certain that Phil didn't really want him to, either. He puts his phone aside and raises his eyebrows at Dan. "C'mere, then."

As tempting as it is to just collapse into Phil's lap right away, Dan is getting the hang of this 'sharing a small space with a dog' thing. He has to use treats and toys to lure Thor out of the room this time, gamely ignoring Phil's snickers at his attempts. Thor is so dubious at this point, not particularly enjoying being put away, but he eventually does follow Dan into the bathroom and curl up with his rope and a reproachful look at Dan. It's very distracting, but Dan manages to remember to grab a couple of condoms. The lube is still on one of the nightstands, on the side Dan has been trying pretty hard not to think of as his own.

"You know," Dan says as he hangs his towel on a hook, closes the bathroom door behind him. "When I get a place in London, it's going to have more than two rooms. So even if you do bring Thor over, we can shut a door without him getting mad at me."

"I think he'd get mad anyway," says Phil. He sounds distracted, looking Dan over again, and Dan preens a bit under the attention.

It's not that Dan doesn't know what he looks like. He's not going to win any awards for his face or body or whatever, but he's not exactly a bridge troll. He's seen himself on screen and heard enough people talk about him in complimentary ways that he knows, more or less, the way people tend to react when they look at him, but.

Just like everything else, it feels like so much more with Phil. Normally, Dan feels anywhere from gratified to indifferent by people finding him attractive, but when Phil looks at him like that, he just feels... wanted. In a really, really good way.

"Probably," Dan says, putting a hand on his hip. His pulse jumps at the way Phil's eyes track the movement, how they linger on Dan's dick. So what if he's getting a bit hard just from being looked at? Dan doesn't mind being watched by the right eyes, and Phil's are definitely the right eyes. He can't find it in himself to be embarrassed about it, not when Phil doesn't seem to find it funny in the slightest.

"Come here," Phil says again, more firmly.

Dan does as he's told, straddling Phil's thighs and grinning at him. He takes Phil's glasses off his face, puts them and the condoms on the nightstand for safekeeping. Phil blinks a bunch and grins back at him.

"You're wearing a lot of clothes," Dan notes, toying with the collar of Phil's shirt. He hasn't changed all day, and as much as Dan likes looking at him in this tacky print, he'd much prefer to see the pale skin and downy hair and shock of metal beneath it. "That's gonna be a problem."

"Oh, is it?" Phil teases, running his cool hands over Dan's thighs, his flank, his ass. It's like he can't decide where to settle them, not that Dan is complaining about the exploration.

"Yeah, but don't worry, I can fix it." Dan flicks the buttons of Phil's shirt open, pressing his lips to Phil's collarbone as soon as the bright fabric is out of the way. He feels Phil exhale as one of his hands tangles loosely in Dan's hair.

The texture of Phil's jeans feels weird against Dan's bare inner thighs. He leans forward a bit so less of his skin is touching denim before doing something he hasn't done since he was a literal teenager. He bites down rather gently on Phil's pale collarbone and soothes it with his tongue, giving Phil plenty of opportunity to protest before he goes in properly to leave a mark.

Dan finishes unbuttoning Phil's shirt while he sucks and nips at Phil's clavicle, and he lets his large hands map out the rest of Phil's torso while he darkens the bruise to his satisfaction.

Little sighs keep escaping Phil's lips as he runs his fingers through Dan's damp hair, and Dan is sure that he would have been tugged away by now if this wasn't good for Phil, too. Dan brushes his fingertips over Phil's ribs and bites down harder, just to see where the line is.

Phil's breath hitches. Otherwise, he doesn't really react.

"You're like a vampire," he comments, his voice low and dry and very, very attractive to Dan. "Do you bite all the boys?"

"Nah," Dan murmurs, nosing at the small, blossoming bruises. He likes the way they look, hopes that Phil will send him photos later with them on display. "Just you. Want you to think about me while I'm gone."

"Trust me," says Phil. "That was never going to be a problem. D'you like getting them, too, or do you just like giving them?"

What a perfect set up to a shitty joke. Dan's favourite. He grins wide and winks up at Phil, tweaking Phil's nipple ring as he does. "Oh, I'm versatile."

Even with his shirt pushed open, his cheeks pinked, his eyes dark and intense despite not being able to see much of anything, Phil manages to roll his eyes. "Yeah, alright. D'you want a hickey or not?"

"Yes, please," Dan says cheerfully. "Nowhere I might accidentally flash to a camera."

Phil hums and looks Dan over, thoughtful. Dan feels his dick twitch at the attention and resists the ridiculous urge to cover himself.

"Okay," says Phil, patting Dan's thighs decisively. "Lie down."

"Sounds good to me, my dude," says Dan. He laughs as he rolls off of Phil and onto his back, suddenly remembering something he'd said to Phil on what he now knows was their first date. "Never sit when you can lie down, am I right?"

"You are right," Phil says dryly. He shrugs off his shirt and lets it fall to the floor. "You are also very annoying."

"Is this because I dude-zoned you?"

Phil's lips twitch, and he smacks at the general direction of Dan's thigh. He misses, hits the mattress instead, and Dan can't hold back a snort. Phil's depth perception is shot without his glasses, and Dan is so endeared by his confused blinking.

"Where are you?" Phil murmurs, mostly to himself, and stretches his hand out to connect with Dan's hip. "Aha. There you are. Got you."

"I literally was not moving." This time, the slap does connect with Dan's thigh. He doesn't really mind, but he makes a big show of sulking about it anyway. "Ow, rude."

"As if that hurt," Phil says dismissively. He trails his hand over Dan's hip and lower stomach before he moves to settle between Dan's legs, as if he's using his palm to map out where he needs to be.

Okay, yeah, Dan can work with this. He wiggles to get more comfortable and arches a bit into Phil's touch.

This always makes Dan feel so vulnerable. He knows that Phil can't see him clearly, but that doesn't seem to matter to that sense of shame that Dan still hasn't managed to eradicate. Phil presses his lips to Dan's thigh and Dan spreads his legs wider in response, blushing furiously and thanking his lucky stars that Phil probably won't notice it.

Dan knows what he wants, and normally he'd have no trouble asking for it, but he's nervous. It's hard to focus completely on the wet suction of Phil's mouth on his inner thigh when all Dan can think about is how terrifying this is to him. He can't figure out the source of the anxiety at first, mind drifting down various paths the way it had in the shower, but he's jolted back into the present when the sharp edge of Phil's teeth press against his skin.

Suddenly, it's obvious. Of course this is nerve-wracking. Everything that he's felt with Phil has been more intense than anything he's felt before, from such simple things as holding hands to the feeling of Phil's cock in his mouth, and Dan already knows how much he likes being fucked. He's nervous about, like, blacking out or doing something else stupidly embarrassing like that.

Phil pulls back to look at the mark he's left on Dan's inner thigh as best as he can without perfect vision, and Dan tries his best to ignore whatever notions of shame and fear still try to make him feel like less for enjoying something like this.

"Hey," he says, reaching for the bottle of lube before he can lose his nerve. "While you're down there, might as well make yourself useful."

It takes a bit of squinting, but Phil snorts a laugh when he figures out what Dan is holding out to him. "I thought I was already being useful," Phil says, "but sure, whatever you say."

"Don't act like it's a hardship," Dan huffs. He shifts down a bit, getting his hips in a more comfortable position. He can see a red flush all over his chest, and he bets his face looks even worse. He needs to keep fighting back that embarrassment, that shame. That fear of it being so good he won't know how to act. He doesn't want to tell Phil everything, but he wants to somewhat explain himself in case Phil can tell he's acting weird. "Though, like, guess you should know that it's been a while."

"How long we talking?" Phil hums as he brushes his thumb over Dan's dick, teasing.

"Uh," says Dan. "Like, uni."

That makes Phil sit up a bit and furrow his brow in the general direction of Dan's face. "Dan, that's almost -"

"I know," Dan groans, covering his red face with both hands. "I know it's been almost ten fucking years, Phil, but I'm not going to fucking - break, or freak out, or whatever. I do fuck myself, okay, it's just been since uni that another person's done it for me."

"Okay," Phil says, his voice soft and soothing. He squeezes Dan's thighs and leans in to press a chaste kiss to the pudge of Dan's tummy.

"Okay?" Dan repeats, his heart beating way too fast to match Phil's serenity.

"Yeah, okay," says Phil. He smiles. "You say you're okay, I believe you. Just keep talking to me, okay? And you can change your mind whenever."

Dan swallows around a sudden lump in his throat. Fuck, he shouldn't be getting so emotional just because someone about to fuck him is treating him gently, but he might have more issues around this than he'd thought he did. He reaches down to tangle his fingers with Phil's, squeezing both of his hands.

"Oh, so now you want me to talk?" he teases.

His voice doesn't come out nearly as conversational as he wants it to, but Phil is kind enough not to draw attention to it. Instead, he just asks, "You want me to suck you off? Give you something else to focus on?"

"Are you that coordinated?" Dan asks, trying his best to get the light atmosphere back. He can't deal with the weight of emotion right this second, not when he's leaving so fucking soon. He's got enough emotions to deal with about that, he doesn't need to add more onto his plate. He isn't exactly 'good' with 'emotion'.

Thankfully, Phil laughs. He pinches Dan's thigh, close to where he'd left a bruise but not quite on it. "Hey, fuck you."

"That's what I'm saying," Dan laughs too, wiggling his hips. "Fuck me."

Phil still isn't looking directly at Dan's face, but his reassuring little grin still hits Dan as hard as it would have if they were staring into each other's eyes. He settles back down between Dan's spread legs and taps at Dan's thigh.

"Lift," he instructs, and Dan knows he's blushing even deeper as he hooks a leg over Phil's bare shoulder, making things a bit easier on both of them. God, but the vulnerability is so much worse like this. Dan likes being looked at by the right eyes, but the feeling of being on display like this makes him squirmy somewhere in his gut. Phil hums against Dan's thigh, presses soft kisses over it until the muscle relaxes. "Be easier if you put the condom on for me, yeah?"

All too happy to have something to focus on that isn't the feeling of Phil's fingers brushing over his balls, Dan does as he's told.

It's easier like this, it really is. Phil is working by touch more than sight, and that becomes doubly true when Dan's dick is in his mouth and he's got his pretty, unfocused eyes closed. Dan fights back the panic threatening to overtake him, because this is just Phil.

It's just Phil. And more than anyone else he's ever met, Dan thinks that he probably trusts this man the most. He tangles his fingers in Phil's soft bedding, breathing deeply and doing his best to relax when Phil goes ahead and rubs his fingers over Dan, presses a tiny bit inside him, makes a questioning sort of noise around Dan's cock.

"Yeah," Dan breathes, letting his own eyes fall closed so he can just think about how good this feels. "It's good, you can keep going."

And it is. It's really, really good. Dan already knows he likes this, knows that a finger inside him while a hot mouth is wrapped around his cock is one of the better things for him in bed, but Phil sure does turn this up to eleven, too.

Phil isn't even trying to get him off right now, is the thing. He's sucking Dan lazily, keeping his cock warm more than actually blowing him, and his finger - fingers, after a minute, and that slight stretch makes Dan bite back a truly mortifying noise - aren't seeking out Dan's prostate, but none of that makes this any less good for Dan.

He doesn't treat Dan like he's made of glass, and Dan appreciates that almost as much as he appreciates the steady thrum of pleasure coursing through him as Phil gets him ready. He had been a bit wary that admitting the length of time would make Phil gentle and nervous, as if Dan were a bloody virgin or something, but he should really stop projecting so many of his own anxieties on a man who is clearly more well-adjusted than Dan.

The only thing Phil does is slow down when Dan has been quiet for too long, make some prompting noises, pull off him to remind Dan to breathe with him. It's considerate in a way that doesn't make Dan feel embarrassed and smothered, and Dan could fucking kiss him for that. In fact, he will, as soon as Phil comes back into kissing distance. Dan could never articulate any of this to Phil, of course, but he can kiss him until he gets the general idea.

Dan babbles. Of course he does, he's been given explicit permission to do so. It's all a jumble of affirmations and curses, not exactly sensical, but he doesn't think Phil expects him to be talking in proper sentences right this second.

Eventually, though, Dan groans and reaches for Phil's hair, pulling him off. "Okay, okay, fuck. I'm good, need you now."

He opens his eyes and has to swallow another noise at how good Phil looks right now, all reddened mouth and darkened eyes. He surely can't see the way Dan is gawping at him, but the way he smirks makes Dan think that maybe he can sense it. "What exactly do you need?" Phil asks, playing dumb. Dan would kick him if he was physically able to.

"I'm going to kick you," Dan informs him.

"Wow, abuse of the boyfriend," says Phil. He nips at Dan's stomach and sits up with a little roll of his neck, stretching it. "I'm just asking for some clarity, Daniel, you already have me."

"You're terrible," says Dan. "This is terrible. If you don't have your dick inside me in the next ten seconds, you're sleeping on the sofa."

Phil's fake-innocent mask breaks as he giggles, tongue poking out from between his teeth. "This is my bed!" he protests.

Honestly, Dan doesn't care whose bed it is. This is a ridiculous argument to be having when Phil's got three of his fingers in Dan's ass.

"Ten," Dan threatens like he would with a small child, and Phil laughs even harder at him. Dan can feel giggles threatening to bubble up from his own chest, and he tries to hold back a very unsexy snort. "Shut up, oh my god, you're the absolute worst."

"I'm not the one whining about not getting my way," Phil points out.

"Hi, have we met? I'm Dan."

Phil rolls his eyes to the ceiling and shakes his head. The loss of his fingers makes Dan whine involuntarily, and he whines even louder when Phil stands up.

Thankfully, Phil only stays off the bed long enough to shuck his jeans and pants off. Dan reaches for him, wraps a hand around Phil's cock and revels in the soft, surprised 'oh' of a noise that falls from Phil's lips. He's hard and heavy and Dan has to know if that Prince Albert will do anything for him when Phil is inside him. He gives Phil a couple strokes and tears open another condom. Maybe if Dan were a less lazy person, he'd take his own off now that it isn't needed, but - hey, it's already there, clean-up's going to be a lot easier. Whatever.

He doesn't think he can stay on his back. He isn't entirely convinced that he won't get teary if this feels at all like this 'making love' thing people keep talking about, first of all, but Dan also has far more practical excuses for rolling onto his front. His thighs are starting to cramp up, and the other people who live in this building would surely appreciate Dan's loud mouth being pressed into a pillow. Dan has so many things he could say to Phil if he asks about the change of position, but Phil doesn't ask.

A cool palm runs over Dan's lower back and rests on his hip, squeezing. Dan sighs and buries his nose further into the pillowcase. It smells like Phil's fruity shampoo, and that's comforting. This isn't as scary now that Dan remembers exactly how at ease Phil puts him, has been able to since they met.

Phil working mostly by touch gives Dan enough warning that he doesn't quite gasp when he feels the head of Phil's cock pressing against him, but he does groan into Phil's pillow.

He definitely forgot to warn Phil about his volume control issues. It would be fairly redundant to do it now, Dan thinks, because the barely-muffled sound he makes when Phil starts to sink into him is already the loudest one he's made in Phil's presence.

Phil pauses, squeezing Dan's hip again. "Hey. Good or bad?"

Dan turns his face just enough to laugh breathlessly, stretching his arms out to hold onto the pillow. "Uh, fucking incredible."

"Yeah," Phil agrees, voice so low that Dan can practically feel it vibrating down his spine. He rolls his hips carefully and makes a choked-off laugh of a noise when Dan outright moans, only able to hide the tail end of it in the pillow. "Christ. You weren't kidding, yeah? You really like this?"

Eyes closed, practically suffocating himself, Dan does his best to nod.

He does. He really likes this.

The thing is, he still isn't really sure that he's able to vocalize that, at least not right this second. Dan rocks his hips back instead of trying to articulate some kind of response, heat sparking through him at the motion. God, but it really has been a long time since Dan has gotten fucked. Phil lets his hips snap forward to meet Dan's little thrusts, and, yeah. Fuck.

Dan was right. This feels so much better than any other cock he's ever had, and it isn't because the ball of Phil's piercing keeps nudging against Dan's prostate just right or because he's thick enough to stretch Dan just the way he likes - or, okay, it isn't solely because of those things. They do help.

It's just because this is Phil rocking into him, pressing kisses over his shoulders, making little breathy noises whenever Dan clenches around him.

Honestly, Dan had no idea that liking someone so much and trusting them with his body would make sex this much better. Sure, yeah, it makes logical sense or whatever, but it isn't something he could have ever guessed he'd get to experience.

He’s still overthinking when a particularly hard thrust has him rushing to the edge faster than he has in a long time, making his entire mind short-circuit.

"Oh," he moans, curling his hands into fists in Phil’s pillow and nodding into the fabric. "Oh, fuck, s-sorry, close -"

Phil's laugh turns into a groan, and Dan thinks that's the hottest thing he's ever heard. "The fuck are you sorry for, Dan?" He slides one of his hands around to play with Dan's cock, tight enough that Dan doesn't even fucking care about the latex barrier keeping him from the texture of Phil's palm. Phil presses more of his weight onto Dan, kisses the side of his neck, murmurs directly into his ear. "I want you to come."

Yeah. Okay. Dan might be a bit suggestible. He bites down on Phil’s pillow as his orgasm hits, embarrassingly quickly. Maybe he does black out for a second, because he feels heat through his entire body one moment and absolutely boneless the next.

Phil is still kissing over his feverish skin when Dan comes back to himself, and the feeling of him grinding slow into Dan is hovering right on the knife edge of too-much.

"Fuck," Dan gasps, turning his head so he can breathe again. His tongue feels heavy in his mouth and he isn't sure that his arms will ever not be jelly again. He feels Phil stop moving, probably planning to pull out, and he whines a bit. "No, s'okay. You can finish, baby."

If Dan were more present, he might care that he's called someone baby unironically. As it is, he just wiggles back into Phil and revels in the moan he gets in response.

"You sure?" Phil checks, voice trembling the tiniest bit. It's like he's holding himself back. He doesn't have to do that, not with Dan.

"Very sure," says Dan. He closes his eyes, lets the too-much turn back into a low level thrum of pleasure. He's not nineteen anymore, he definitely can't go again tonight, but it still feels good to be making Phil feel good. He hums and reaches a hand back to hold onto Phil's, both of them pressed against Dan's hip. He feels loose-limbed, happy, and he doesn't second guess himself at all when he adds, "I like the way it feels. You can keep going."

"God," Phil breathes. He gives Dan a couple of slow, careful thrusts, testing the waters, but when Dan only makes a contented noise in response, Phil starts really fucking him again.

Dan holds tight to Phil's hand and lets Phil use him for his own end, murmuring absolute nonsense to help him along. Just, "Yeah, that's it, doesn't it feel good, you feel good", that sort of thing.

Still, Phil does get there before Dan stops enjoying the oversensitive feeling. His rhythm falters a couple of times and his blunt nails dig into Dan's skin, hopefully leaving more physical reminders of the best sex Dan's ever had, before he's groaning something that sounds like Dan's name and coming. Dan whimpers at the feeling of Phil losing control inside him.

They're both panting and sweaty and have gross condoms to dispose of, but when Phil pulls out of him and pulls him into a cuddle, Dan feels more at peace than he thinks he ever has in his goddamn life.

"I don't want to leave," Dan whispers into the quiet, because he isn't sure if he's told Phil as much.

"I don't want you to leave," Phil says, pressing a kiss to Dan's damp curls. His arms feel so steady around Dan, not at all jelly like Dan's are. "But you'll be back when you can, right? And I go to Florida every year with my family, I can totally road trip to you."

With any luck, that won't be necessary. Dan is too fucked-out and sleepy to turn this into a Conversation, though, so he just makes an affirmative sort of noise and nuzzles into Phil's chest.

They can clean up in a minute.

--

"Sorry, sorry, I know I was almost late, but I promise I have a good reason for it -"

"You can't be almost late," Phil says, rather patiently for the time of morning it is in London. He looks tired, glasses on and hair an absolute mess, but he'd woken up just because Dan had asked him to. Dan can see Thor's nose, resting on Phil's thigh, and everything inside him wants to crawl through the screen to join them both.

Dan settles in the hotel bed with his phone, grinning at how cute they both look even through shitty FaceTime quality. "Still, I'm sorry. I know it's early."

"Yeah," Phil says, unable to stop himself from yawning. He gives Dan a sheepish little smile. "But I wanted to see you. How's L.A. going? Has anyone tried to lick you yet?"

"For the last time, you're the only person who has multiple stories of strangers trying to lick you," says Dan. He winks. "Not that I blame them."

The grin Phil gives him makes his stomach swoop. Dan wonders if it's ever going to stop doing that.

"Shut up," Phil says, fond. He shifts around on his sofa, getting comfortable, and Thor gives him a disappointed sort of look for the temporary displacement. "Sorry, buddy. But I'm serious, Dan, what's up? You've been stupidly vague."

"Yeah, I guess I have," says Dan. He lifts a shoulder in a lazy sort of shrug and puts his hand in front of his mouth to try and hide the ridiculously happy grin on his face. "I've been talking to producers all day, and it's been a fucking nightmare. Just got back to the hotel, I really did think I'd be back earlier than this and I could try to be early for once, but."

Phil blinks at him. "I thought you were on vacation."

"Don't you think I'd go to your place if I were on vacation?" Dan laughs. "No, I - I didn't want to get your hopes up. But like, here's the thing. I've got news."

Even Thor seems to perk up. Dan grins at his screen, wishes he could watch Phil's eyes go from their carefully guarded neutrality into something that's softer, more hopeful. Just for Dan.

"You've got news," Phil repeats. He bites his lip. "What kind of news?"

Dan had this whole plan to drag it out, make it all dramatic, but now that he's faced with the cautious optimism in Phil's face, he can't bring himself to do it. He laughs, rolls onto his side to get more comfortable. "Well, you can tell your mum I'm coming round for Christmas, for one."

[qm-vox]

So You Want To Play A Beast

(Meme version of Queen Ramona Rabbit provided by cantankerousAquarius, character by me. Catch her in New Avalon.)

Here I am, back on my bullshit again. As I mentioned in So You Want To Run A Spring Court, a series of Seeming articles are starting up next. Unlike Courts, Seemings are not political or religious bodies, and are only loosely social identities; rather, one’s Seeming is part of who and what one is. Lost develop a Seeming because of the abuse they have survived, the labors they were forced to undergo, and what they did to survive both. It can be a complicated and hurtful subject for Changelings, but also a source of pride; the things you learned to become a Beast, a Darkling, an Ogre, are also the things that ultimately helped you to escape.

At this point you may be wondering why I started with the Courts when Seemings are more fundamental to an individual character, as well as less optional (you can have no Court, but it’s hard to have no Seeming). I’m gonna be real with you, it’s because there’s six of these damn things and each of them is about to be as complex, if not more, as the Court articles.

The following article draws primarily on Changeling: the Lost core and Winter Masques, with additional information drawn from Swords at Dawn (that last book has come up a lot because it deals with the Lost in change and conflict). Other books, where used, will be cited. And so, without further ado:

A Miserable Menagerie - Beast Overview

Beast is the first Seeming presented in Changeling: the Lost, and is well-represented in the published material and the fanbase alike, being one of the most popular and therefore most common. Stripped of their human reasons, Beasts had to remember how to think like human beings again before they could escape and seize their Homecoming. It’s never exactly a complete reversion. Aside from this common loss of reason, and a certain surprising sociability (more on both of these later), few experiences unite Beast to Beast, a reality that can make their fellow Lost mistakenly think that their Beast peers lack common strengths and common bonds. It’s true that many Beasts have strong similarities to Lost of other Seemings that share similar functions (a Truefriend kept as a loyal and loving hound has a lot in common with a Playmate forced to serve as an ornamental factotum and the Chateline condemned to maintain her Keeper’s house), but it’s also true that any Beast has more in common with their fellow Beasts than with the troubles of their non-Beast peers.

Release the Hounds - Homecoming as a Beast

Compared to Beasts, only the wretched Wizened have a higher disparity between those who are taken by the Fae and those who manage to return. Anyone at all might become a Beast; the process of transformation is a sort of corruption, one a mortal prisoner might catch from being forced to live among animals, from being treated as subhuman, by deliberate malice, alchemical transformation, or even deliberate pact - but not anyone who becomes a Beast can manage to achieve their Homecoming. The first and most difficult step is to find their reason again, some powerful trigger or memory that reminds the Beast that they were once human and that the Fairest of Lands (Arcadia) is not their home. Though not all Beasts degrade in intelligence in the same way or to the same degree (one might be seemingly wholly feral, condemned to live as a rabbit or a rat, while another has memories of being a hunter-gatherer among a pack of others, with axe and bow to hand and no thought but the kill and feast), no Beast can escape without remembering what it was like to be mortal. It’s more than just a matter of cunning or intelligence; indeed, the actual physical act of escape is often shockingly simple. It’s that without human intellect, human memory, the Beast cannot yearn to return home, and thus cannot escape the Fairest of Lands.

The second obstacle is having something to come back to, and believing that you deserve to have your Homecoming. This is easier, in some ways, than regaining your mind, but infinitely more insidious. All Lost need mortal memories to make their way home, of course, but for Beasts they need something to focus on that keeps their reason anchored while they’re still trapped in the lands of unreason. It can be all-too-easy to slide back into the animal’s mind, especially if your moment of clarity and your opportunity to escape don’t coincide. The hound knows how to survive the mad lands when the man might not.

Memories of loved ones to come back to help, but for many Beasts the light that guides them home are distinctly human places, places where they felt that they belonged and which in some way belonged to them. The library where a Beast spent her childhood, full of her fond memories and imagination, can help her cling to her human half long enough to get home, as might the memory of the funeral home where her father’s wake was held, or even the stadium where she was cheered on by adoring fans. These human places hold significance that can be understood on some level by the animal (safety and contentment, loss and sorrow, joy and thrill), but require human reason, human perspective, to be wholly understood. That reason, and the shining light of the mortal world, draws the Beast back home.

Beasts are among those Seemings least likely to escape with someone else’s help. It’s not that they’re asocial or incapable of cooperation, but rather that need to find human reason. Most of the time if someone is making their own Homecoming and stops to rescue their Keeper’s favorite catgirl, that catgirl’s mind isn’t her own. Maybe on the way home something shocks her memory back into place, but all too often that doesn’t happen and you end up with a hob or a catatonic victim rather than a free Lost. On the other hand, Beasts freed by their Keeper can make almost ideal Loyalists; their ability to produce great Composure on demand, and the general prejudice of other Lost against them, mean that a Beast still enslaved to her Keeper can often go years without being detected, if she ever is. For an example of such a Beast, check out Maya Sharptongue in Night Horrors: Grim Fears.

All Creatures Great And Small - Beast Kiths

The magical bonds that unite Beasts as a Seeming are subtle and often overlooked. All Beasts can spend Glamour to flare their Presence and Composure, a capability that makes them second only to the Fairest for sheer sociability even if the Beast in question shares the essence of a decidedly non-social animal. Additionally, all Beasts have an affinity for all animals (that 8-again with Animal Ken though) which, while seemingly limited in modern application, has a lot of impact on their day-to-day life. A Beast will rarely have, say, rats in her home unless she prefers those rats be present; her pets will be well-trained and well-behaved (and likely well-loved) and her ability to just walk up to and befriend any given animal is not to be underestimated.

Psychologically, Beasts regardless of Kith tend to be territorial, a fact many Lost don’t think about a lot despite it being somewhat odd on its face. After all, not all animals are particularly territorial, and yet a swan-like Windwing, a lupine Hunterheart, and a Swimmerskin mermaid all display a similar concern over their spaces, their places. This is the Beast’s human nature at work; just as the places of human connection draw them home from Arcadia, so too do they stake claims over such places in their new lives, creating spaces where they can feel safe and in control, and able to indulge in both their animal instincts and their human desires and sorrows. For those Beasts with an especial affinity for their physical environment, Contracts of the Den and Contracts of the Wild (the latter being shared with the Elemental Seeming) can go a long way to creating and safeguarding their personal places of power.

And then there’s the back end. Beasts genuinely struggle with their Intelligence; compared to a human whose Intelligence attribute is equal, a Beast will always achieve worse results, and can’t benefit from the flashes of inspiration and intuition that sometimes characterize human thought. They struggle more with unfamiliar intellectual processes, though putting in the time to learn can solve that problem. The end result is that Beasts, regardless of Kith, tend to be some of the smartest dumbasses their friends know, who provide better results when they have to think at speed or under pressure than they do outside of the moment. Still, this perception of stupidity haunts Beasts, and in all too many Freeholds they can find themselves gently shunted away from power or complex duties or responsibilities that others believe they’re incapable of handling.

When it comes to Kiths, Beasts present an odd combination of being greatly defined by their Kith (in much the same way that Elementals or Wizened are) and their Kiths having very little relation to the folkloric archetypes that inspire Beasts. The overwhelming majority of the options for your Beast character concern themselves solely with the physical properties of one or more animals, which is great for the fantasy of playing an animal-person and completely fucking useless for the fantasy of a fae animal-person. More than most other Seemings, a Beast character meant to invoke a figure from folklore might want to consider the Dual Kith merit, with an eye towards Fairest and Ogre Kiths to snag most of what you might want.

Some expanded thoughts on the individual Beast Kiths follow.

Hunterheart - Arguably the quintessential Beast, Hunterhearts are infused with a predatory nature expressed through deadly fangs and claws. They tend to be reshaped in the vein of mighty wolf-men, cunning cat-people, or as archetypes of Beasthood or the hunt - mighty Hunters with racks of stag’s antlers, or even near-Ogrish beings like the Beast of French legend, whose price for a stolen rose was a bride to soothe his burning heart. Almost any predator might lend its nature to a Hunterheart though; a tarantula, for instance, is more appropriate here than as a Venombite, and Summer’s smallest and most surprising berserker may well be a Hunterheart with the soul of a shrew and an unshakeable lust for blood. Hunterhearts tend to be very physical people, who have a lot in common with Darklings - including an inability to escalate violent confrontation in an appropriate manner. Among the more thematic of the Beast Kiths, Hunterhearts might benefit from a Dual Kith into Flowering or Whisperwisp if you’re looking to embody a predatory trickster figure.

Windwing - Perhaps the poster child for Kiths that deal solely with the physical attributes of an animal, Windwing is a prime candidate for the other half of a Dual Kith concept if you’re after a more folkloric concept rather than looking to explore a more straight mixture of human and animal. A graceful Swan Maiden might look towards Dancer or perhaps Artist, while a Mothman type might lean towards Shadowsoul (a wise owl, on the other hand, might be an Antiquarian on the back end). Most carrion birds will also be Roteaters, but especially corvids of all stripes. Regardless of their nature, a Windwing is an incredible asset for a Freehold, and can expect to be courted aggressively for their abilities as a messenger, guard, spy, and scout.

Skitterskulk - I have no god damn idea what the writers were thinking on this one. Skitterskulk is, in theory, supposed to represent hard-to-exterminate vermin such as mice, flies, cockroaches, or mosquitoes; things that move fast and bother people with their filth, thievery, and pestilence. Unfortunately not only does their blessing of Impossible Counterpoise have almost nothing to do with this (and almost nothing to do with the perception of Skitterskulks as spies presented in Winter Masques), it is shamefully fucking useless. If you find yourself looking at Skitterskulk for the animal natures it’s associated with, consider some combination of Roteater, Windwing, Truefriend, Venombite, and/or Runnerswift instead. Don’t use this Kith.

Roteater - Speaking of, meet what is probably my favorite Beast Kith. Roteaters embody those animals that scrape, scavenge, and feed on carrion or refuse. Crows and vultures are obvious candidates (and probably Dual Kith’d with Windwing), but Roteater is also great for Beasts in the vein of Rat Kings (fleeing from the gnawed halls of a Sugarplum Fairy), raccoons (whether sly thieves or powerful tricksters) and even for social insects such as ants when used in combination with Truefriend. Roteater strikes a very good balance of the physical properties of its animals and their folkloric qualities, with the power of the Beast Seeming itself filling in the back end. Given that Lost tend to struggle both with money and with legal access to certain goods, the propensity of a Roteater to scavenge, salvage, and scrape can be a godsend to their Freehold and especially their Motley, if they can put in at least a minimal effort to clean themselves up.

Truefriend - Truefriends have a lot in common with Fairest; as “beloved” pets, they had a lot of their Keepers’ personal attention, and their memories of Arcadia may be cut through with the bloody consequences of the kindness and discipline of the True Fae. Regardless of what kind of animal they are (and they can be most of them; Truefriend is rife for thematic Dual Kith opportunities inside of the Beast Seeming), they tend to be, well, friend-shaped; Truefriends are often well-groomed, sleek, colorful (or with an interesting color pattern in their fur or scales) and might even be cute or drawn from a twisted branch of pop culture as embodiments of more ‘modern’ takes on Beasthood such as catgirls or animal mascots. Like Fairest, Truefriends may take to manipulating others in order to feel in control of their own life, and given the lack of suspicion that attends to Beasts they may get away with it for a whole lot longer.

Broadbacks - In a Seeming marked by a tendency to be kinda dumb motherfuckers, Broadbacks are the guys that make dumb ideas work by outlasting their consequences. Their bonus to Stamina rolls is most famous for satyr-like partying, but it also means that they can guard a door for hours on end without so much as a bathroom break, run marathons long after even the Runnerswifts have keeled over to beg for the sweet release of death, and brave hazards or traps in the Hedge that might force back other Lost. Aside from the (again rather famously represented) satyrs and fauns, Broadbacks might also take after minotaurs, be infused with the essence of camels or llamas, or even Dual Kith into Swimmerskin (as mighty whales) or Windwing (with Contracts of Hearth or of Omen, embodying the albatross).

Swimmerskin - The lines between Beasts and Elementals blur with Swimmerskins, especially those who take after mermaids, selkies, and nixies; Elements (Water) is a popular enough buy that it can be hard to tell the difference. Mechanically, Swimmerskin is a case of a Kith that sorta has to be about the physical properties of its animal nature; it’d be a strange sort of mermaid who couldn’t swim. Consider investing in magical Merits such as Siren’s Voice, specific Contracts (Elements was already mentioned, but Omen for a powerful sea-witch or Wild for a storm-brewing sea dragon can be equally striking), or investing in the Dual Kith merit to bring out further specific animalistic or folkloric traits, such as Hunterheart for a sharp-toothed shark, Tunnelgrub for octopi and other escape artists, or Farwalker for an ambush predator or a Thing From The Deep, emerging to prey on the ignorant and innocent.

Steepscrambler - The opposite of Swimmerskin in some ways; Steepscramblers are all about the physical act of climbing, but they really did not have to be and as a result they’re a big whiff on the folkloric elements of the animals they embody, including and especially the specific ones spoken of Winter Masques. Still, in a lot of ways Steepscramblers have the same practical uses as Windwings, especially in highly urban environments, so for concepts that are looking to invoke those folkloric trickster elements, eat the Dual Kith into Whisperwisp, Drudge, Farwalker, or Flowering and live ya best life. If you’re more interested in direct physical animals but are looking into something like a spider, fly, or beetle, consider Dual Kithing inside the Beast seeming to pick up the other aspects of your animal.

Runnerswift - For when you absolutely, positively have to GO FAST, there exists the Runnerswift. Though most famously associated with prey animals such as rabbits and deer (which are also common fertility symbols, go fucking figure), consider Runnerswift for more predatory concepts as well; as hunting hounds, cheetahs, or man-eating horses straight out of Greek legend, Runnerswifts can make terrifying pursuers and hunters. Though it can be tempting to Dual Kith in the latter case, it pays to keep in mind that the human side of your Beast definitely remembers how guns and baseball bats work, and those are probably going to be a better option than fang and claw if you’re already in a situation where you feel comfortable running down your frightened prey. Like quite a few Beasts, Runnerswifts skew towards being tricksters in much the same way as Hunterhearts, though in this case the prey animal often comes out on top rather than being made out as the villain.

Venombite - A cool concept with a bad case of being a late bloomer; Venombite’s Blessing is nearly useless until you start punching up into high Wyrd, at which point you are a POWERFUL MAGICIAN who can also fang people to death if they get too close or you can catch them unawares. Still, Venombite can be quite attractive for many concepts, especially spiders, deadly nagas, and treacherous scorpions. Their tendency to be associated with small and easily overlooked animals make Venombites surprising brokers of information and dealers of death; it might be awhile before your own poison can kill the human, but the brown recluses that obey your commands can kill one now.

Cleareyes - What if you had Contracts of Fang and Talon 2 but all the time? Cleareyes is an odd Kith; mechanically they’re solid, but also redundant with one of the game’s more attractive Clauses in one of its most attractive Contracts. There’s a few ways to split this difference, though I tend to suggest either making that Clause and/or their Blessing free if they have both (similar to how Gravewights get a discount on Contracts of Shade and Spirit) or permitting Fang and Talon 2 to give them a different sense the animal is known for (a cat-eyed Cleareyes able to see in the dark might invoke her Clause to also gain cat-like balance or perhaps a cat’s sensitive hearing). Thematically, Cleareyes is great for a lot of concepts and can hold down a lot of the same niches as Roteater and Runnerswift in a different way. It Dual Kiths well with almost any other Beast Kith if you want to double down on animalistic aspects, but as a task-driven Kith it also goes surprisingly well with those outside of Beast; Draconic (feral drake guardsmen, or perhaps a ‘failed’ Fairest), Antiquarian (wise owls in a different vein from Windwing), Oracle (a churchyard grim, or a cat kept as the familiar of a terrible witch), and Farwalker (straight-up werewolves or, with Contracts of Mirror and a nasty disposition, vicious rakshasas) are just some of the potential combinations on the table.

Coldscales - Not the flashiest, but they get the job done; Coldscales (typically but not necessarily reptilian in nature) benefit from a further bonus to Composure that makes them unusually hard to manipulate, a boon not to be underestimated given just how much fae magic attacks people emotionally. Though this Kith is intended to represent cold-blooded reptiles, consider it as well for animals famous for their sloth and endurance; a sleepy Bear Prince who can’t be bothered might display the calm endurance of a Coldscales, as might a terrible wyrm that must be roused to wrath (perhaps Dual Kith’d with Fireheart or Draconic), or even a big cat, deadly only if hungry or disturbed and otherwise content to feed on the carrion left behind by those who flee before him.

Riddleseeker - The Kith, the myth, the legend; Riddleseeker is the closest you get to a Mental-focused Beast (for, ah, obvious reasons) and is introduced in Night Horrors: Grim Fears. Its sample character, the loyalist Maya Sharptongue, has a sphinx-like aspect to her but Riddleseeker is also a great choice for ravens and crows (perhaps clutching fragments of lore stolen from their Keepers that their human minds could understand when their beast ones could not), legends of oracular serpents, and tricksters like the fox who made Mighty Miko a king. Riddleseeker holds down thematics on its own, but if you’re looking for the physical aspects it doesn’t do on its own it Dual Kiths inside of Beast pretty easily.

The Animal Kingdoms - Beasts in the Courts

As alluded to earlier, Beasts are often the backbone of the Freehold. Wizened do the thankless jobs that everyone relies on, but often it’s Beasts that fill in the miscellaneous roles. Messages and packages need carried? You’re probably calling a Beast. Loyalist needs his shit kicked in? Beasts are ready. Need to connect with a lonely mortal and see if their dreams are poisoned? Whistle up a Beast. Obviously not every single job a Freehold wants or needs will be filled by a Beast even if in theory it could be, but given how diverse the Seeming is and their combination of on-demand sociability and poise, they’re attractive for many duties. After all, even the most standoffish Venombite or Coldscales can put on a charm face with the best of them if you can keep a steady supply of Glamour on the table.

Given their difficulties with abstract reasoning, Beasts tend to relate to the ideals of their Court on a practical level, which can make them either sorta-kinda bad at being Courtiers on a formal level or paragons of their Court’s ideals, without a whole lot of in-between. Both perspectives are valuable; there’s not a whole lot of point in constantly debating the ideals of, say, Fear, if no one is going to go out and spread fear. For those Beasts who place great faith in the ideals of their Court, their commitment can serve as an inspiration and example to others, and a living reminder that sometimes living up to high ideals means making choices that aren’t easy for you personally or politically.

Beasts are surprisingly common in leadership positions, especially in Summer (where their physical focus and access to talented officers can carry them far) and Spring (where their instant sociability and diverse spread of talents can help them catch the eye of the Court). Unlike Fairest (who have a steadier and stronger social focus), Beasts aren’t prone to losing their entire goddamn minds in singular, shattering moments, which can make them more stable officers, nobles, and Crowns than their more glorious peers. They can also make surprising spymasters and even money-makers. Depending on the Court, though, a Beast in a leadership position may require an assistant to help with the paperwork (or the math), or else be prepared to work a lot of overtime patiently making and decoding ciphers on her own.

Like Elementals, Beasts can be somewhat more sensitive to the physical temperament of the Seasons than other Lost, to the point where it may be surprising to find, say, a snake-like Beast bundled up in layers beneath her Winter Mantle (gently muttering ‘fuck snow’ under her breath every so often). Those who choose to endure such discomfort are often some of their Court’s most avid members, and known as such.

Spring - Insofar as any Lost are natural joiners of Spring (typically a Lost’s second or even third Court), Beasts make for natural Spring Courtiers. They’re sociable, hard to visibly ruffle even if they’re screaming internally, often physically striking, and talented at living in the moment. Unfortunately that same talent can feed into a Beast’s difficulties balancing their human and animal aspects and leave them stuck in the middle between healthy and toxic even worse than Spring generally gets stuck. Despite this, Beasts can go quite far in Spring and often end up as movers and shakers who influence opinions.

Summer - Most people think of predators as Summer’s Beasts, but herd animals are much more common. Sure, every now and again you get a canine Beast who goes far, or a would-be King of Cats that remembers the twisting alleys of his Durance and the silver nets of Arcadia’s animal control enforcement, but Summer’s brotherhood and focus on physical defense is much more appealing to Beasts whose natures are shaped by animals such as deer, oxen, and dolphins. Those Beasts whose Durance was defined by fear and flight also sometimes flock to Summer, seeking the strength the Iron Spear offers to ensure that they will never again be Arcadia’s prey.

Autumn - Where most of the predators actually end up; human nature turns an animal’s innocent hunger and instinct into cruelty and schadenfreude in places, giving rise to Beasts that take after vicious werewolves or treacherous serpents. Though they can have a hard time fitting into the scholarly aspects of Autumn, Beasts go quite far in the Leaden Mirror through practical applications of sorcery and being quick on the draw. They may not necessarily understand the nature of their power, but Beasts definitely know how to hammer it home.

Winter - The Coldest Court is as pragmatic about its Beasts as it is about everything else; Winter tends to recruit Beasts by openly asking them to serve in jobs the Court believes they’re suited for, and paying them for that work. Summer might be content to make, say, a Runnerswift into a mighty Knight, but Winter is going to ask them to run (and, at times, to hide). The ability Beasts have to crank their Composure on demand can make the talented and discreet candidates for Winter’s higher-level social positions, and as the keepers of important information or Tokens.

Until Proven Guilty - Beasts and Changeling’s Themes

Beast is in an awkward spot compared to the other Seemings. In a game that is very explicitly about abuse, trauma, and recovery, Beast lacks a clear connection to those themes. Core introduces the idea that Beasts are united by a sort of innocence, a refutation of corruption that protects them from Arcadia on some level, but literally none of the rest of the game did anything with that theme. Their other primary theme - the mix of literal or folkloric animal instincts with human ones - is engaging and interesting, but disconnected from that central aspect of the game in a way the other Seemings aren’t.

You don’t necessarily have to address this. If you aren’t looking to deep dive into the nature of your Seeming, or your Chronicle doesn’t have a strong emphasis on those themes of abuse you can probably just let it ride. If you are looking to focus on those themes, one idea that’s gotten me personally a lot of mileage is to look at how your Beast relates to Seemings that had similar functions and asking yourself why are are not that Seeming, exploring your Beast’s trauma through comparison and contrasts.

From life experience though, there might be something to that dropped ‘innocence’ theme. That idea of an innocent, damaged and transformed by circumstances beyond their control, trying to build a new life in a world they weren’t prepared to live in has some strong similarities to children raised in cults or by survivalists and conspiracy theorists. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve connected with someone only to watch their entire worldview fall apart as they realized the world they’d been raised to live in doesn’t exist, and that everything they know how to do only works in the context of that fictional world. Fairest can also be strong candidates for depicting this kind of abuse, but I’d still encourage you to consider Beast if you’re interested in engaging on this concept directly.

We Don’t Bite People, And Other Lies We Tell Children - Coping With Beasthood

To be a Beast is to be caught between worlds twice over (three times, for Swimmerskins and Windwings, which, y’know. Sucks to be you guys); like all Lost they are influenced by both fae and mortal nature, but Beasts are also caught between instinct and reason. The animal within is entirely comfortable in the now in a way humans just aren’t, but their human half treasures things the animal can never understand. In the heat of the moment, though, when it comes down to instinct or reason, instinct often wins - sometimes to the Beast’s benefit, and sometimes to their great sorrow.

This balancing act defines the Beast’s life, and generally starts at home. Beasts usually live alone if they can, even if they’re otherwise sociable, so that they have a space in which they can entirely be themselves and decide who is welcome, when. Rarely does this influence stop in the physical bounds of a Beast’s house, apartment, or sewer drain though; any place the Beast thinks of as their turf (the broader neighborhood or apartment building, their office in the Freehold’s Commons, even their job if they have enough pull to get away with it) is going to be shaped to let them express some part of both sides of themselves. How that comes out varies from Beast to Beast. An affable satyr might become the neighborhood darling, doing favors and bringing food to their neighbors in unspoken payment for letting odd behavior slide, while a spidery Venombite might be more likely to trade on passive intimidation or even adopt a performative identity (it’s strange if a pastor’s wife is creepy, but no one thinks twice about a goth gal that’s spooky). Having those safe and/or welcoming spaces available is vital for a Beast’s ongoing mental health, and without them a nervous breakdown is only a matter of time.

Outside of the matter of their home and places of power, Beasts have a tendency for straightforwardness that has little to do with their particular animal (though it might) and everything to do with the fact that as a Seeming, Presence is their strongest source of social prowess. Dealing openly, for good or ill, plays to their strengths and has the added advantage of keeping their social life relatively straightforward, even if it’ll never quite be simple.

Stability, ultimately, has to be the goal of a Beast looking to build a new life after their Durance. They need to find a way to live their life that acknowledges and nurtures all parts of their divided nature; even those Beasts dumb enough to favor one side over the other can’t do it for long without losing their entire god damn minds. Few Freeholds are without stories of would-be Cat Kings (Autumn Nightmares) or Riddleseekers who turned into crows one day and just never turned back. Having escaped Arcadia only by finding their minds again, Beasts tend to be among those Lost most cognizant of what their issues are, and most willing to face those issues on direct terms. They did it once already, after all; the hard part is showing up to do it again every day.

Sample Beast - The Toy Taker, Autumn Riddleseeker/Windwing

Margaret Bellman is called Maggie by her Freehold and the Toy Taker by an increasingly mystified local media. Her memories of Arcadia are more like a gap than the usual splintered and fractured recollections of the Lost; one minute she was a teenage girl staring in fascination at the twisting figure in a mirror, and the next she was a grown-ass woman with crow’s feathers for hair and tiny, somehow functional wings, staggering through that same mirror and bleeding all over the place.

It didn’t take long for Maggie to swear herself to Autumn, though she’s an odd bird for the Leaden Mirror. Though she adores and practices magic, Maggie’s primary profession and hobby is theft. She steals things the Freehold needs stolen and sometimes robs homes for money, crimes the media has yet to connect to her other persona.

For Maggie also steals toys.

It’s never often. When her life is at a low point and spiraling out of control, Maggie slips into a child’s bedroom and takes one of their toys. She rips the shiny bits from it to add to her collection at home (displayed this way and that in her room, in shadowboxes, on strings, glued to the walls, dangling from coat hangers), crucifies the remainder, and leaves it on the kid’s door. Though the Winter Court disapproves of her methods, her hobby sows Fear and Sorrow in equal measure and her dedication to it has earned her some small formal appreciation from the Coldest Court.

As with all of my articles, I welcome questions, comments, discussion, feedback, and criticisms. Please, feel free to reblog if you’re feelin’ it!

Next up: Wizened

[thereforall]

There's a box left for her, with a note indicating it was from Hob-- a gift, it seemed, wrapped neatly. But upon opening it, she would covered in glitter as it exploded from the box-- and a note from the true giver, Desire, would float gently down, reading 'Gotcha ;P

The sight of the box catches her by surprise. Not many have access to her little pocket realm just outside of the Sunless Lands, so she’s curious to see who’s managed to find their way in when she sees the note. 

Death smiles a genuinely happy smile the moment she sees Hob’s name scrawled out at the bottom of the note, and she brushes her fingers across it with a fondness reserved solely towards a select few (even less than those who have access to her place). She’s excited to see what’s in the box and opens it hastily, only to be coated from head to toe in sparkly, multicolored glitter that clings to every inch of her. 

She tosses her head back and laughs with more glee than she has in ages before twirling around to watch the glitter being flung from her body. And with a wicked grin, she doesn’t hesitate to go to where she knows Desire’s currently hanging out.

“How do I look, sibling?” she asks, a dramatic flourish of her arms sending glitter flying.

@desideriotuum

[softpeetabread]

I talked about a lot of these with @imakemywings and it was great fun.

There was a post for the rewatch of the Hunger Games that discussed whether Peeta crying was part of a strategy and I wrote a response to it that I’m sticking to: I think he was genuinely terrified. From the moment his name is called, he looks scared. He tries his best to hide it, but you can tell he can’t contain his terror at the fact he was picked to go die. However, the thought of Peeta being calculating (and manipulative for a good cause, mind you) really is shown in the books and I have reason to believe he was prepared and had a strategy ready or an idea of a strategy if he ever got reaped. I think he thought about the possibilities of what his reaction would be if he were reaped. Everything else came together and I feel the odds were ever in his favor.

Peeta probably didn’t talk to Katniss for eleven years was because of what his mother would say about Seam folk. It became a sort of forbidden love, and the slimmer his chances were of getting to be with Katniss, the harder he fell for her. If they hadn’t gone to the Games, he would have probably approached her when they were of age to marry. (BUT THEY DID GO TO THE GAMES AND LOOK WHAT WE GOT.)

Something that has been bothering me about The Hunger Games is why didn’t Katniss and Peeta form an alliance? I think Katniss never even thought about that because she didn’t want to watch Peeta die. She couldn’t have handled that. If anything, I think Peeta would have been the one to suggest it, but then there was this moment where Cato stared at them after the Tribute Parade and he had a strong sense that Cato would definitely go after Katniss, so Peeta needed to keep him away from her to protect her. This would also explain why he joined the Careers in the first place. (It is confirmed he joined them to keep Katniss from having to confront them and therefore keeping her safe, but I still wonder what it would have been like if the two had had an alliance. I don’t think they would have won the Games the way they did.)

Haymitch asked both Katniss and Peeta to wake him up on Tour Day in Catching Fire so they would come in at the same time and face each other.

I’m so fucking upset about Peeta in the beach scene when he tells Katniss nobody needs him. Like how fucking awful does his family life have to be to even say these words? I think Peeta’s mother, being the abusive cunt she was, told him before the Quarter Quell reaping, or maybe even before any of those events, that his family didn’t need him. I think this happened before the reaping of the QQ because during the victory tour, when Katniss tells Haymitch and Peeta about Snow’s visit, he tells her he has family to protect. So he was concerned for them then. But during the beach scene, he tells her nobody needs him. I think his mother made him believe this after the QQ announcement that he was basically going back into the arena and he would surely die this time. And he is so honest about it to Katniss that even she realizes his family wouldn’t miss him (he has two older brothers that could help out in the bakery after all) and only she would feel broken if he died.

After the war, Peeta, Katniss, and Haymitch have an open-door policy where they can come into each other’s homes without invitation.

After Peeta came home, Peeta and Katniss live together in her Victor house while he turns his own Victor house into a bakery. He would bake bread and other pastries and give them to returning families from District 12. Once he and Katniss started growing back together, she joined him in delivering these goods.

Peeta tried teaching Katniss how to bake, but she didn’t have that kind of patience for it. Instead, so they spend time together while Peeta bakes, he suggests that Katniss could gather the ingredients he needs. It would work as bonding time for them, which I think is sweet.

Katniss would watch Peeta bake and observe his concentration and how he holds and grasps the piping bag for the frosting and she’d realize “so that’s how he knows how much pressure to use” and it’d totally refer to something sexual because those two would fuck each other’s brains out all the time.

Katniss tried teaching Peeta how to hunt. He wasn’t that great at it at first because he makes noises involuntarily in the forest, but he eventually gets the hang of it. Katniss is still better at it because she’s had years of experience, but it’s another type of bonding time for the two to have.

After District 12 is rebuilt, there is a trading market similar to the Hob, but it’s not a black market. It’s open to anyone that wants to trade. Katniss brings meat and trades with people, often bringing some baked goods Peeta makes for her to take.

Buttercup lives with Katniss and Peeta and he likes Peeta instantly. Katniss grows fond of the cat because he belonged to Prim, even if she still thinks he’s stupid and the cat still hisses at her.

I’m starting to see Katniss as the type of person that needs to be kept busy so she doesn’t get uncomfortable or anxious. Especially while pregnant. (I read this wonderful fic about her pregnancy and Peeta would go hunting with her when she was like 8-9 months pregnant and he was waiting for her to admit it wasn’t a good idea.)

Haymitch, Peeta, and Katniss get together to eat, but when he isn’t able to, they drop off a plate of food and freshly baked bread they made so he can have something to eat. Katniss also hunts and brings him fresh meat.

I like to think Haymitch would write a book about what happened, like a memoir of some sort or something about his two charges and what really happened during the 74th and 75th Hunger Games and during the revolution. (I read a headcanon about that and now I can’t stop thinking about it.)

Haymitch loves Katniss and Peeta’s children. The kids would worm their way into his heart and he’d probably look after them when Katniss and Peeta are busy…or want some time alone. He’d let them play with his geese (if he has any left) or he plays with them. He’d be so damn happy for Peeta and Katniss because that’s ultimately what they all fought for so to see it actually happen and he’s living to witness it, sometimes that would make Haymitch sort of sentimental in a good way. Not enough to cry, but enough to toast to them for staying alive and for keeping them alive.

Haymitch does his best to stay sober to look after the kids. However, because of his heavy drinking he wouldn’t live to watch them grow up. It’s bittersweet because after having a life full of dread and loss and despair (Katniss even mentioned Haymitch chose solitary confinement to stay away from people), I think Haymitch wouldn’t be used to having a family and everlark and their kids would be the next best thing. It’s so funny how he doesn’t like Katniss, because they clash all the time, but he’d definitely walk her down the aisle and be there when she gives birth to the kids and steps in if Peeta has an episode. Katniss and Peeta are like his kids except he didn’t raise them. He just protects them (District 12 team is so wholesome wtf).