#guess i really cant call it a ficlet

[somethingsteff]

Political prompt!!

President Obi-Wan and political reporter Anakin get in a heated discussion in the press conference room that leads to some heated sex😏

Almost 2k words later and I bring you this little morsel! I had a ton of fun with this and really leaned into the West Wing vibes for it (I maintain that Charlie would make a great bodyman for President Kenobi). I hope you like it, friend!

Obi-Wan felt his nails dig painfully into his palms, but he was unable to release the tight fists. It was bad enough that someone had gone after a school - a school, children! - but for one of the press corps to accuse the administration of not investigating to their fullest potential. It was unfathomable. They had just received confirmation from a local health department that the recent string of illnesses at a Mandalore school district was from someone maliciously tampering with their water supply that morning. The federal government only just got asked to intervene. 

What more could Obi-Wan have done? He had immediately quarantined the buildings and dispatched a third party investigatory team to the site. He contacted the CDC and WHO for support in quick and effective treatment for all those who have been affected. Hell, he even asked his bodyman to compile a list of names and contact information so he could make calls to all the families, personally. 

All he could think about as he got each update was how easily it could have been Korkie, poisoned and in the hospital, if Satine hadn't brought him with her to Coruscant so she could be her best friend's Press Secretary. And now she was fending off accusations left and right by one man in particular. 

Anakin Skywalker.

Though he was a relatively new member of the press corps, he was well on the way toward making a name for himself. Obi-Wan had been curious about the curly-haired reporter himself. Now he was only gritting his teeth and wishing the boy would just shut up. 

“Does this administration have any excuses for why it's not taking action toward any of the suspected perpetrators?” Anakin's angry voice rang out through Obi-Wan's screen as he watched Satine deftly handle the angry man. Again. 

He couldn't handle it any longer.

Quickly navigating the hallways in the West Wing, Obi-Wan didn't notice the wave of people standing as he approached and sitting after he moved past them. He made it to the reporters’ bullpen at the back of the Press Room in record time, and instructed an aide to hold Skywalker off after the reporters were dismissed. He wanted to answer some of his questions personally.

A guard kept the reporters from streaming past Obi-Wan, instead guiding them toward another door and out of the room, but allowed Satine to approach him.

“Don't do anything you'll regret, Obi. He's just an angry kid, he doesn't mean anything by it.”

He couldn't bring himself to answer her, but did squeeze her hand as she walked away, taking comfort in her corresponding embrace.

“Mr. Skywalker,” Obi-Wan walked into the mostly empty Press Room and gestured for the remaining staff to leave them. “I hear you have some questions about the incident in Mandalore. Rather than letting you continue harassing my staff, I thought I'd give you the opportunity to ask me your questions directly. Off the record.”

Anakin's face didn't change when he saw Obi-Wan walk in, he hadn't expected it to, but at the mention of the school poisoning anger flared up in his eyes once more.

“Gee, thanks, Kenobi-”

“President Kenobi.”

“-I do have a few questions for you. But it really all boils down to one; why are you sitting on your ass instead of doing something about the attack?”

Obi-Wan had to fight not to outwardly bristle at the accusation that he hadn't done anything. “I assure you, we are doing everything within our power to get to the bottom of this situation.”

“‘Doing everything in your power’?” Anakin mocked. “Please! You're all twiddling your thumbs until you can get an optics report so you don't lose face in the election cycle.”

A muscle in Obi-Wan's jaw twitched, but he let Anakin keep going.

“I really expected better from you Kenobi, this shitshow-”

“Enough.” Obi-Wan didn't raise his voice, but he let all the ice he'd been feeling in his veins since this whole situation started seep into his tone. “I am the President, and regardless of what you think of my actions you will address me as such and with the respect that position deserves. You will cease calling me ‘Kenobi’, you will call me ‘Mr. President,’ ‘President Kenobi,’ or ‘Sir.’”

It appeared that Anakin wanted to interrupt, so he held out a hand.

“Now. I don't give a damn about optics, especially regarding an attack on children. What I do care about is completing this investigation and prosecution quickly, thoroughly, and with as little impact on the victims as possible. I will not let this become a media storm, and I will not stand for you accosting my staff.” He looked at Skywalker for a moment before coming to a decision. “Were you aware that Press Secretary Kryze is from Mandalore? No? Well, prior to moving out here after my confirmation her son went to that school. She knows many of the children and parents, and in all likelihood she and her son would have been directly impacted were she not out here.”

Anakin finally had the audacity to look ashamed, quickly gazing down at the floor and scuffing the toe of his dress show against the carpet. His cheeks were beginning to turn pink, and Obi-Wan realized his own face felt warm and his breathing had become heavy. Throughout his lecture he had become more and more riled up, letting his famed control slip just a fraction, and it seemed to cause the boy in front of him to squirm.

Good.

While he took the time to catch his breath, Obi-Wan looked more closely at the reporter. He was fidgeting with the hem of his dress shirt - he vaguely recalled that it frequently became untucked as Skywalker used the edge to clean the lenses on his black-rimmed glasses - tugging it down lower and- oh.

Oh.

He was hard.

The thin slacks that fit snugly along thick thighs did little to hide the bulge that was now pressing along his inseam. Try as he might, there was nothing he could do to hide it from his President.

The silence finally stretched to its breaking point and Anakin looked up. His eyes were blown, pupils swallowing what Obi-Wan knew was a lovely shade of blue. “I'm sorry, sir,” he said in a small voice. “It won't happen again.”

Obi-Wan considered the stress he had been under for the past few days - really since he was sworn into office, but the additional stress of late hadn't been any help. With a deep exhale, he decided to test his luck and see if he couldn't partake in some stress relief while simultaneously ensuring this reporter really did learn his lesson.

He stepped closer to the young man, coming toe to toe and letting his breath fan across his face. “You're correct. It won't ever happen again. And we're going to make sure of that.”

Telegraphing his moves clearly so that Anakin could stop him at any time, Obi-Wan reached his hand out and cupped the nape of his neck, pulling their mouths together into a kiss that started chaste and quickly devolved from there.

Anakin let the older man's tongue slip into his mouth, submitting so beautifully, and followed his lead as Obi-Wan, President Kenobi, led him over to the podium at the head of the room. As quickly as the kiss had begun, it was over. Obi-Wan spun Anakin around and bent him at the waist, forcing him to brace himself against the podium with his forearms. 

“Now, darling, let us see if we can really drive this lesson home.”

Obi-Wan reached around and unbuckled the reporter's belt before opening his fly and pulling his trousers and briefs down to mid-thigh. 

He trailed one hand up the prone body before him and traced the plush lips. “Suck,” he said directly into Anakin's ear and felt the responding shiver as the younger man eagerly pulled the digits into his mouth. “That's a good lad.”

Thoroughly coated in saliva, Obi-Wan pulled his fingers back and let them fall to trace along the rim hidden between the perfect globes of Anakin's ass.

“Now relax,” he breathed as he slid one finger in to the knuckle.

Anakin's body quickly adjusted, and soon the single digit was joined by one, two, three more until Anakin was a panting, quivering mess. 

“Please, Mr. President. I'm ready, I'm, uhn, ready.”

“Very good, darling.”

Despite his blood supply diverting to his aching cock, Obi-Wan quickly undid his own slacks and pulled himself out of the ever-tightening confines. He spit in his hand and slicked up his own length before pressing the head against Anakin's loosened hole.

“Are you sure you want to do this, dear one?”

“Yes, Mr. President. I want you. Please.”

Obi-Wan slowly pushed in and immediately felt a glorious heat surround him. It was addicting, and he found himself hoping he could have this again and again. Once he was fully seated he paused, waiting for Anakin to adjust to his formidable size. Only when he felt Anakin's hips push backward, trying to fuck himself on the cock filling him, did he start thrusting.

Soon the only sounds in the room were the obscene slap of their hips and Anakin's constant gasps and moans.

“President Kenobi, I'm gonna-” Anakin's sentence cut off with a moan.

“That's it, darling. Can you come like this?”

Anakin nodded and Obi-Wan increased his pace, frantically slamming into the body beneath his hands. As he looked down to watch his cock disappear into the reporter - his reporter? - he shifted his grip on those glorious hips so that he could dig his thumbs in and pull those plush cheeks apart. The slight jostling must have changed their positions just enough because Anakin let out a long and wordless groan, his arms giving out beneath him. 

Obi-Wan continued to punish the younger man's prostate, chasing his own orgasm as much as he was his partners, when he felt muscles tense beneath his hands and around his length, Anakin letting out another cry as he spilled across the podium.

It only took one, two, three more frantic pumps before Obi-Wan felt his own release crash over him, hips stuttering as they worked to push his seed deep into his partner's willing body. When he finally felt the last dregs of his orgasm fade he let gravity pull his body on top of Anakin's on the podium, taking a moment to catch his breath before even contemplating slipping out of him.

“Thank you, Mr. President.” Though Anakin's voice was still a little shaky it sounded content and drowsy.

“I'm glad you've learned your lesson, Mr. Skywalker.”

He was forced out of Anakin as the younger man stood straighter and turned around. “I don't know, Mr. President. I'm a pretty slow learner. I might need another lecture.”

Obi-Wan rolled his eyes, but straightened them both up nonetheless and led the infuriating reporter over to the Residence. He had a feeling it would take more than one more lecture and he found he was very amicable to the idea.

[victimsofyaoipoll]

alright time to write an essay detailing whatever yaoi has done to my girl nancy wheeler. so like, even when it comes to yaoi shippers nancy has had stonathan, harringrove, AND steddie over four seasons with steddie already having massive popularity + the other shippers, wheras thankfully eleven only has to deal with byler shippers when it comes to the victimization. but not to diminish eleven any more because she has def gone through it in fandom, im going to get into nancy's stuff: you will notice all three ships she supposedly gets in the way of (ignoring jargyle because the shippers are chill in my experience) involve steve harrington, AKA the most popular character if i had to guess and the white boy of the month. see, they were dating at one point in s1 and s2. the breakup was messy. like he kinda was complicit in her slutshaming at one point and didnt let her grieve her dead best friend properly and she ambiguously (as in nobody can fucking decide when the break up was) cheated on him so yeah. messy. mutually. if not more on steve's side given he was a bit of an asshole in s1-2 but gets better. yadda yadda fast forward to harringrove in particular, AKA steve x the guy who attacked a black child and abused his younger sibling (and im not attacking anyone thats just. what happened). basically 90% of them try to convince people nancy is abusive for the two arguments that occurred and is a slut and privileged (never mind steve being probably the most well off member of the main cast + hes a white guy in the 80s) blah blah blah. also ironic they call her abusive OFTEN when billy (one half of harringrove) kinda like threatens his sister max and breaks her things and otherwise abuses her Often. but yeah. they hate her for breaking his heart. they hate her for getting in the wya of their ship possibly. they hate her in general. add that to the general fandom misogyny and suddenly a large number of people are writing essays about how much they hate her and how she's a piece of shit, actually. fast forward to s4 and steddie and a new problem arises: steddie shippers keep flooding her character and ship tags with primarily steddie. so now your options regarding her are mlm ships and mlm shippers shitting on her. also keep in mind there is now more content for half of that ship, a guy who shows up for an hour and dies in the same season, than nancy, a mc. and if you like nancy ships like jancy or ronance, too bad those tags are flooded as well. as in someone did analytics in august for ronance i think and at one point the majority of main pairings in the ronance ao3 tags itself was steddie. either way both ships usually end up as side ships or bait into a steddie centric fic or tumblr post. or nancy ends up third wheeling and getting them together. as a nice bonus (not really) recently steddie shippers have decided that they too hate nancy and have entire posts and common plots (i have seen tumblr ficlets/hc's and people discussing this as a common trope for steddie fics on ao3) about how nancy was a horrible person who damaged steve's self esteem and ability to be in a relationship or something from a break up, as if the relationship wasnt mutually harmful and compounded by nancy's whole dead best and possibly only friend thing. and whoops for ships like ronance that isnt allowed either because steve's friend isn't allowed to interact with his ex despite the fact that said friend literally said he was an ass in the s1-2 timeline. all of this making it impossible to find any positive content without it being interrupted for a character who, if i remember correctly, has almost as much screentime as eleven (and eleven at least has popular fan content and other ships that dont somehow loop around to byler/mike). and whats worse is that while canon doesnt have yaoi victimization it does have heteronormative bullshit in which she is forced into a love triangle with the same guys TWO TIMES. she literally cant win so let her win a poll maybe also sorry this is super fucking long <3

Whoooo Nancy

[cypherscript]

This kinda blew up... I will say I like @britcision reblog addition of swapping every three questions so gonna add that in as it actually happened in this continuation of this little ficlet. Gods know I can’t motivate myself to finish any of my other fics... Enjoy.

_____________________________________

Several minutes after the switching continues, Zatanna and Constantine are nauseous and Batman is barely holding. Batman pulls a couple of vomit bags from his pouch and hands it to the two of them and Constantine instantly uses it, “Bloody hell, this is worse than that time I got smashed with Lucifer.”

Phantom looks them over, idly rubbing his neck, “Sorry about that, it’s been a while so I forget normal humans can’t handle spatial warping continuously. Let me just-,” Phantom lands for the first time, reaches down and with a wipe of his hand the floor is cleaned of the spell before they cast it. “That should help with any mana drain so you can use that to restore yourself.”

“Aesuan ruo laeh,” Zatanna casts her spell over the Justice League. Looking from the floor to Phantom, “You could have done that at any time? Why let us believe you were trapped?”

“First because you didn’t ask and second,” Phantom taps his cheek, “I dunno, I kind of liked playing question for a question. Still I should probably get back to my town, people will probably start noticing I’m gone soon.”

Batman steps forward, “I did still have a couple of questions for you if you can answer them before you leave.”

“Ehh... Sure, I can answer a couple more questions. What are they Batman?”

“You had mentioned a person by the name of Clocky before when you said you two were the most dangerous of your kind and being Space and Time, what did you mean by that and who is he?”

“Ah, that’s a tough one. Is it alright if I tell them? They seem alright to me,” Phantom stands there before nodding, “Well to make an Incredibly long story short; The ghosts or the beings you’re asking about consist of the Dead, Undead and Neverborn, sometimes the living end up there too but that’s not relevant, throughout all of time and space. Clocky is what I call Clockwork who is the Ancient of Time. He stands watch over the timestreams, nudging existence away from total and complete annihilation. He is what is considered a Neverborn, he is timeless and has existed and always will in a temporal loop sense. Always called something else by other religions but yeah, he’s Clockwork.”

“And space, I’m assuming that’s you? You’re a neverborn ancient as well? You don’t look more than fifteen.”

“Hahahaha,” Phantom wipes away a fake tear, “I’m not really sure what I am anymore but yes Clockwork says I’m the Ancient of Space so I’m inclined to believe him but I know I was human at one point. As for why I'm the most dangerous I can only guess it's due to how my powers work, I can adapt my ecto-energies to mimic powers I see other ghosts do. Anyways, I hope that answered your questions.”

Batman gets this look in his eyes as he comes to the realization that this boy had died around this age and reaches into another pouch to pull out a JL communicator, “If you will, please take this before your go in case you need to contact us or us to you.”

“Uh... sure I guess, just cant promise I’ll answer all the time. Electronics don’t really like the Zone,” Phantom takes the comms from Batman and phases it into his side. "Take care and remember to leave the ghosts to me. I've got it handled." With that Phantom blicks from sight.

Superman looks around the room, using his xray vision and superhearing, "He's gone. Nice kid considering..."

"Nice my arse, nothing that powerful just fucks off without some kind of ulterior motive," Constantine rants and raves as Zatanna tries to call him down.

"Enough, what's done is done. I need to do some research on this Amity Park. If what he said is in anyway true then we should have been receiving distress calls for at least a year but I've never heard of this town before these anomalies started popping up."

"Right, the only reason you let that little hellion leave is you've got a bleedin' heart for brats! This can only come back to bite us and I'm not going to stand around with my arse hanging out for the fish to bite it." Constantine shakes off Zatanna as he lights a cigarette before teleporting away. Batman grunts at this and heads for the Zeta tubes.

[02 Batman leaving.]

J'onn shakes his head, "I enjoyed our exchange with the young man regardless. His mind was quite interesting to read, nothing coherent; static mostly."

Zatanna whirled on J'onn, "You read his mind?! What if he sensed it and became aggressive?"

"Nothing intrusive, surface thoughts at most." J'onn denied.

"Anyways. I should see if Hal can get any information from the Lantern Corp about this other dimension, maybe get in touch with Wonder Woman and see if the Amazon's know anything about this Clockwork." Superman pats J'onn on the shoulder as he leaves through the Zeta tube

____________________________________________

Danny blinks back into being in a idyllic city, "Alright, halfway back to Amity Park. Just a quick pitstop..."

"You'll never defeat mein, Captain Thunder, I und ze pennacle of human perfection!" A german accented voice screams out nearby, danny barely catching sight of a red blur flying through the air and through several buildings. He flies off after him at high speed, finding a figure in a red suit with a lightning bolt embossed on its front with white cape. "Shit dude, that look like it hurt. Need some help?"

"Man I wish. I hate dealing with Captain Nazi this early in the morning." Shazam says as he drops his head back onto the ground with a thud.

"Well, wishes aren't really my forte but I can help. Just point him out-" Captain Nazi bursts through a nearby wall laughing maniacally, "Nevermind, I should have figured." Danny charges blue energy into his hands, "Hey, chill out. These are peoples businesses." Firing off the beam he freezes Captain Nazi in a block of ice.

"Ha, nice pun," Shazam looks at Danny in his suit, listening to the gods in his head talk to him, "Phantom?"

"Yeah? Do I know you?"

"Kind of? Solomon says you helped him out once or twice a long time ago."

"Solomon... Solomon... Sorry but it's not really ringing a bell." Danny's stomach growls and he chuckles sheepishly. You wouldn't happen to know of any good burger places around here would you? You can join me if you want, my treat."

"Sure, I could eat."

"Cool," Danny transforms back to his human form with a flash of his signature white rings. "Lead the way MacDuff."

"Should we leave Captain Nazi like that? Will it not melt?"

"Nah, I've never seen it melt before. Once he's in custody it'll wear off. Man I hope this place makes burgers as good as the Nasty Burger. I haven't eaten all day."

Shazam looks at him confused as he leads him to a burger queen. The two order an insane amount of burgers, fries and milkshakes, making jokes about the weird german man and random memes. The time comes to pay and Danny begins phasing various denominations of money from his body, "Alright I've got twenty-five thousand yen, a Spanish doubloon and... aha, I knew I had some US money. You can keep the doubloon," He pulls out a couple of twenties and pays the cashier who doesn't seem to bat an eye at the strangeness of pulling money from his body.

He gives a question look at the cashier who sighs, "Look sir, so long as it doesn't come from a bra-strap or sock I don't care. Thank you for choosing Burger Queen. Have a Royal Day."

The Ole Switcheroo.

The Justice League and the Justice League Dark are in need of some questions answered about the alarming numbers of tears in reality coming from this small nowhere town in Illinois and don’t seem to be stopping any time soon. So using every bit of summoning and containment magic the JLD have and the most prominent source of energy they could find in the city they decide to summon the owner of the energy. *** “And you’re sure this containment spell will hold whatever comes through,” Superman asks as he observes Zatanna and Constantine marking out the circle.

“Should, most beings from that dimension have very specific powersets but all of them include basic flight, invisibility and intangibility. Hence why the civilians of the city refer to them as ghosts.” Zatanna says as she finished her marking with a flourish. 

Batman grunts in response as he’s looking over data, J'onn focuses on Zatanna after she lists the powers, “I assume that is why I am here? Those powers are remarkably similar to Martian abilities.”

“Yes, should the being somehow escape we will need you to retrieve them if they become intangible.”

“Understood.”

“Ready John?”

“Let’s get this shiteshow started, luv.” John Constantine picks up a book and begins speaking in a voice of white noise and screams, the circle lights up an eerie green and wisping into the air before a flashing light reveals a white haired teen in a a jumpsuit floating in the air.

“What? How did I- Where am I?”

Batman steps forward, “That’s not important right, we just want to ask you a couple of questions about Amity Park.”

“Then I can leave?”

Several of the League Members share some looks before Batman answers, “If you aren’t a threat to this dimension.”

“Awesome, I can leave then.”

“That remains to be seen.” Zatanna cuts in, “First lets start with your name, can we have your name?”

“No, sorry but you can call me Phantom.” the teen chuckles at a joke he only knows.

“You can call me Zatanna then, the others are Superman, Batman, Constantine, and Martian Manhunter.”

Phantom perks up at the last name, “Wait, like a real Martian? I thought they died out a long time ago.”

“You know of us,” J’onn asks, perplexed.

“Yeah, there’s a few of you guys floating around the Zone,” Phantom shrugs before resuming looking at the circle, “Is this like a question circle? I couldn’t stop myself from saying that.”

“It shouldn’t be, it is merely a summoning and containment spell. Constantine?”

“Mighta slip some truth spellwork into it, had to be sure it was telling the truth. Pan dimensional beings aren’t really know for being trustworthy, Zatanna.”

“Constantine,” Zatanna shouts at the man in outrage.

“First of all,” Phantom interrupts, “Not an it, I’m a he and second I don’t exactly have a problem with the spell. Just be aware that it’s reduced your any number of questions down to three and then I get a turn asking the questions. Deal?”

“Deal,” Batman says before the two magic users can speak. “I’ve already thought of the most prominent question we needed answers for.”

“Alright, shoot.”

“We have been noticing an alarming number of dimensional tears in a small town on our planet and your energy reading is almost always in that town. Why?”

Phantom tilts his head stroking an imaginary beard, “Hmm, I’ll allow that as a single question I suppose. The dimensional tearing is a combination of a couple of reasons; the city is in a thin spot between your world and the Ghost Zone or the Infinite Realms as some of the older ghosts call it. The other reason is because there are a couple of human scientists who have punched a permanent hole into the Zone, usually natural portals appear and disappear at random and usually only for a few seconds at most. Honestly I surprised you’re worried about the portals now when the Bermuda Triangle has existed forever.”

“What does the- No, nevermind.” Phantom smirks at the Batman’s almost slip of a question. “You still haven’t answered my question; why is your energy signature always in that town?”

“Because it’s m̷̢̨̛̰͍̮̝̪̞͉̩̬͕̣̮̱̻̎͋̉͘ͅį̵͍̫̭̱̝̮̯̞̝̺̤̺̦̝͖̜̅̉̂̊́̑̿̆̈́̕͝n̴̫͎̼͇̭̾ẽ̵̱̭̗̥̱͕̒̋͛͂͆̑͝͠ͅ, I protect it by sending the other ghosts back to the Zone.”

“Who are the most dangerous beings from that dimension and are they a threat to this world?”

“That depends on who you- Me and Clocky. Wait really? Huh, I mean I guess I could see it; Space and Time. I guess this circle means like, the Truth and not what I believe to be true. That’s good to know. Anyways that’s your second question, best make the last one count.”

Batman thinks for a moment, looking over Phantom with a new eye at the revelation that he was the most dangerous, him and this Clocky being at any rate, “If there is an Incursion of beings from this Ghost Zone, how do we protect the earth.”

“You don’t. I do. That’s three questions,” Phantom snaps his fingers and the world blurs as it spins, coming back into focus as Phantom is now outside of the circle and the League is in it. Phantom takes on a sharp tooth grin as he pulls a notebook from inside his body, “Now my first question is for Martian Manhunter; what was Mars like when the Martians were alive?”

[turtle-steverogers]

i was thinking but do you know the unsent project? it is this website where you can write a message to your first love that you never sent to them. now imagine steve writing one (or multiple) to bucky after he came out of the ice after nat told him about it... yeah

hello hi anon this broke me and it was too perfect not to turn into a ficlet klafjldskjfalskf thank you

-

Unsent Letters

To:

Steve’s fingers freeze over the keyboard, the cursor blinking at him. It feels like it’s taunting him-- teasing him with the burden of choking out a name. What should he even say? The sender is anonymous, but how many people are named Bucky out there? Would anyone even care?

To: Bu

Steve huffs and backspaces, his hands trembling as he curls them into fists. He isn’t sure what provoked Natasha to tell him about this website. It’s a cruel tease to everything he wishes he could say-- wished he could say before Bucky slipped through his fingers. And now his only option is yelling into an abyss. The text box is black and daunting. He turns it yellow. No, too happy. Green. Yes, that’s fine. Bucky’s favorite color was always green.

His gaze wanders away from the screen of his hefty Dell laptop and out the window of his apartment. DC’s low rising buildings span out in front of him. His gut aches; he misses New York already. But he knows being there would only mangle his soul further, seeing his already alien home torn to shreds by literal space whales. He huffs, thinking of Bucky’s comics. His stories came to life after all. Bucky would have probably vibrated out of his skin if he knew there was other life out there.

To: My astronaut

How’s space treating you? It’s treating me pretty badly, if I’m being honest. If only you could see what it’s done to Brooklyn. I think you’d be pretty mad at it if you knew…

Steve hesitates, reading back over what he’s typed. It’s stupid as hell, and he cringes, but he doesn’t backspace. His fingers find the keys again.

I miss you something awful. I don’t think that even encompasses how much I’m hurting without you. I feel so lost right now-- space is much bigger and scarier than you’d think. I know you’d love it. I wish you could see bits of it, but god, I just want to go home. I want you to come home.

Steve freezes again and finds the screen blurry where tears have welled in his eyes. His jaw clenches as he pictures the way Bucky would laugh at him-- teasing him for his dramatics and ruffling his hair. He wishes he could be there now, rolling his eyes and nudging Steve’s shoulder.

“What’re you upsetting yourself for?” He’d say, gently closing the laptop and coaxing Steve into his arms. “I’m right here, pal.”

And if Steve closes his eyes, he can almost feel Bucky’s warmth enveloping him. But he’s not there. He’s dead, and Steve’s a goddamn ghost, drifting through a future that doesn’t know him.

He opens his eyes and stares at the text box, then clicks submit.

The screen loads, and his message is gone, his pain forever documented in the abyss.

-

For someone who fought aliens two weeks after waking up from his impromptu seventy year sleep, Steve’s life is pretty monotonous. He contemplates this unfortunate fact as he stands in front of his toaster, hair sticking up on the back of his head as he nurses a mug of coffee and waits for his toast to pop.

It’s 5:45 in the morning and he tries to remember a time when he didn’t rise this early. Before the war, perhaps. Though, he’s always been a bit of an early bird. His home life was sporadic to put it lightly and he’d learned from an early age that the sooner he was awake, the better it was for everyone. Vigilance is not a new concept for Steve.

He hasn’t always stayed up late, though. That’s certainly new, and he feels this fact viscerally as he catches sight of his reflection in the microwave. There are bags under his eyes that will be gone by mid-morning thanks to the serum. Dermatologists hate him, Natasha says. Steve thinks he’s pretty lucky that the serum more or less equipped him with a built-in anti-aging agent. His father had started balding by thirty.

His toast pops and he starts a little, blinking blearily at the slightly burnt bread as he pulls it out of the toaster with his thumb and forefinger. He spreads on the same raspberry jam and butter that he uses every morning and tries not to think of how bland it tastes in his mouth as he eats it standing at the counter. Another routine.

He tries not to look at last night’s dishes in the sink as he stacks his plate and silverware on top and doesn’t bother sorting out his hair before pulling on his sneakers and slipping out of his apartment. The sun hasn’t quite risen yet, only the beginning tendrils of light sneaking over the low tops of the DC buildings, and Steve vaguely regrets not grabbing a sweatshirt before he left. It’s not quite Summer yet and the mornings could still get pretty cool.

He’s about to take off down the street when he freezes. Natasha is sitting on the steps of his complex, wearing a pair of pink tinted sunglasses and tossing up and down the keys to her car. Steve blinks, rubs his eyes, then blinks again. Nope. She’s still there.

“Nat?”

Natasha looks up at him and smiles. “Hello.”

Steve shifts, uncomfortable. “Hi. You need something? Is there a mission?”

“No,” Natasha says lightly, standing. “You’re not running this morning, though. Come on, I’m taking you to Starbucks.”

“What?”

“Starbucks. You’re going to try it.”

“I don’t want--”

“Steve, you do the same thing every day. Step out of your comfort zone a little.”

Steve frowns, but Natasha’s right-- he really doesn’t ever stray from his routine.

“Fine,” he says, and twenty minutes later, they’re strolling into the nearest Starbucks.

He’s only been in one before, and that was to use the restroom while on a run. He’d bought a water bottle in an attempt to not be rude and use their facilities without giving them any business, but he hadn’t even considered the expansive menu. All the fancy names were too daunting.

They’re just as daunting now as he stares up at the board, heart hammering out of his chest as he’s faced with indecision. Natasha takes one look at his face, and reaches out to squeeze his arm.

“I’ll order something for you,” she says. “What kind of coffee do you like?”

Steve gives her a pained look. “Um… just coffee?”

Natasha quirks a smile and orders him something called a caramel macchiato. He’ll take it, he guesses.

The drink is too damn sweet and sugary and he almost gags. Still, he was always told to finish what he was given, so he drinks the whole thing.

-

To: Mr. Sweet Tooth

You’d fucking love it here. Everything is packed with sugar and sweetness-- enough to make even my teeth rot. I had something called a caramel macchiato today and it tasted like someone took your ma’s caramels and condensed them into a cup. I couldn’t stand it, but I know if you were here, you’d want at least twelve. I hope you’re enjoying all the sweets you can up in space.

Love, Mr. Boring

-

Steve’s fingers are stiff and frozen as he works at the straps of his stealth suit. The tangy taste of saltwater still sits heavy on his tongue, and he clenches his jaw to keep his teeth from chattering too harshly as he finally peels off his suit. It’s not much better, being naked, but at least the wet fabric isn’t clinging to him anymore.

The mission had been pretty straightforward until some alien tech managed to blast the quinjet to kingdom come, and they all free-fell straight into the freezing Atlantic.

Steve had managed to keep it together as they took down the goddamn mad scientist that fucked them over, but now that he’s home and alone, he can feel the adrenaline crashing.

He’s shaking from more than just the cold as he draws himself a warm bath, and he pulls his knees up to his chest, trying to breathe through the panic that wants to engulf his entire being.

He loses time for a bit, and comes back to himself lying in his bed, burrowed under several thick layers. He feels so cold, down to his very soul-- a chill that he can never seem to truly shake, even when he’s warm.

Not for the first time, he wishes Bucky were there to hold him. He slips off to sleep thinking old, comforting thoughts of Bucky rubbing his hands between his own, coaxing his head under his chin to engulf him in that natural warmth of his. He always was a fucking furnace.

But when Steve wakes an hour later, shaking hard enough to move the bed with the force of the nightmare he’d dropped into, Bucky is not there to soothe away the ice.

-

To: JB

im so cold and i cant breathe ever and nothing feels right. I dont know what to do, u were always the problem solver between us and i cant think straight right now and i just want you here please. I cant do this anymore, im so tired please come back. I need you please

-

The Winter Soldier file sits in front of Steve-- a horrifying nightmare wrapped up in a neat brown folder. Residual nausea swirls around in his gut as he comes down from the horrible high of reading through the contents. His hands shake where they grasp the thick paper. His heart clenches hard in his chest.

Bucky is alive. Bucky is alive, and he’s been unmade.

Steve doesn’t know where he is-- if he’s escaped, or if Hydra found him again. It’s been three weeks now since the helicarriers, and he’s only just gotten the courage to sit down and wade through the shit that is Bucky’s reality.

He just hopes he’s safe. God, he hopes.

Sam says he’ll help him look, and Steve needs to know he’s at least out of danger, but he barely knows where to start.

And he’s sorry. He’s so fucking sorry.

Blinking out of his reverie, Steve looks at his laptop. He feels strange and detached as he reaches for it and logs in.

To: Bucky

And yes, that feels right. He should use his name, since he suspects no one has for a long, long time.

I’m so sorry for what happened to you. I’m sorry that you’ve been hurting so quietly for so long. I understand if you’re not ready to come home-- I understand if you never are. I just hope that you know that there will always be a place with me that is safe. I love you so much and I’m here, forever and always.

Love, Steve.

He’s not naive. He knows it would be dangerous to submit that particular message, so he doesn’t. But that’s okay. That one’s just for him-- for them.

-

“Steve? What is the… Unsent Project?”

Steve frowns and pokes his head out of the kitchen. Bucky is sitting on the couch in the living room, using his laptop, because his own is having storage issues.

Bucky looks at him. “It’s one of your saved tabs. What is it?”

And oh, fuck. Steve had forgotten to remove that from his homepage-- it really wasn’t needed anymore. He blushes all the way to his ears.

“Oh, it’s-- nothing. Not anything important--”

But Bucky has already clicked on the tab.

“The Unsent Project,” he reads aloud. “A collection of unsent text messages to… first… loves…”

He trails off as he processes what he’s looking at, and Steve can’t quite read his expression when he looks at him again. His eyebrows are furrowed, and he’s looking at Steve like he’s some sort of kicked puppy. Steve shifts, uncomfortable.

“Were you sending me… messages? While I was dead?”

Steve swallows. “Um…” and now that Bucky says it out loud, it really does sound quite sad. He shrugs. “It’s Natasha’s fault?”

Bucky shakes his head, clicking on the search bar. He starts to type his name, but Steve shakes his head.

“I didn’t use your name.”

“Oh,” Bucky says, then frowns at him again. “What did you use?”

Steve blushes harder, sitting next to Bucky and taking the laptop from him.

“Um…” he hesitates, then types what he was sure he used as his first alias.

My astronaut

The screen buffers and loads, then fifty or so messages pop up. Steve scrolls down-- it doesn’t take long to find his.

They’re both quiet as they read, and Steve cringes. Jeez, he really had been pretty dramatic. Next to him, Bucky makes a hurt noise.

“Oh, honey,” he murmurs, taking the laptop back from Steve. He reads the message again, then once more, and reaches out for Steve. “Aw, I’m here now.”

Steve huffs, embarrassed. “I know,” he says. “That was way back, like, three weeks after I woke up.”

Bucky stills. “You fought aliens three weeks after you woke up?”

“... More like two.”

Bucky hums. “Are there others?”

“Yeah,” Steve says, reaching out to type on Bucky’s lap, because Bucky is holding him now and he’s quite reluctant to move. He thinks for a moment, then types in the next one he remembers.

Mr. Sweet Tooth

Bucky laughs, and Steve finds himself smiling.

“I find this funny,” Bucky says. “Because caramel macchiatos are definitely one of my favorites now.”

Steve laughs, too, and butts his head against Bucky’s shoulder.

“If only I could tell that to myself back then-- he’d be thrilled.”

“I’m sure,” Bucky says. “Any more?”

Steve hesitates, thinking of the one he’d sent after that nightmare-- when he was low and hurting. Incoherent. He isn’t sure he wants Bucky to see that particular side of his soul, but Bucky has been more than generous in letting him in on his pains nowaday, and it’s not like Bucky hasn’t witnessed Steve’s own current nightmares.

He bites his lip and types in JB. That seems to yield a lot more results, and it takes a while for Steve to find the message.

He hides his face in Bucky’s neck as he reads. Bucky’s arms gradually tighten around him, and a moment later, he feels him kiss the top of his head.

“Honey, I hate that you were hurting so bad,” Bucky mutters against his hair.

Steve shrugs. “We both were,” he says, and it’s true. There’s something to be said about the guilt they both feel for not being able to save the other person at their lowest, but life hasn’t been kind to them. The vitriol, Steve thinks, should be directed at the goddamn universe for keeping them apart, not themselves for fucking dying. They’re working on it.

Bucky’s quiet for a long time. “Yeah, I guess you’re right,” he says. “Is that it?”

Steve shakes his head. “But I never sent the last one.”

“Why not?”

“I wrote it after DC.”

He feels Bucky squeeze him again, and he squeezes back.

“Oh.”

“I just-- I wanted you to know that you didn’t have to come home. That I just wanted you to be safe; needed to know you were safe, but it was up to you. I just needed you to know I was here, if you needed me.”

Bucky pulls back then and cups his face, kissing him soundly. Steve’s surprised for only a moment before he’s kissing back.

“I did know that,” Bucky says against his lips. “I needed time-- I was lost-- but the first thing I knew when I remembered who you were was that you were a safe person, because you’d never force me anywhere.”

Steve kisses him again, then pulls him into a hug. “I’m glad you knew that.” It’s warm, where their chests meet, and Bucky is solid beneath him. Real. He isn’t speaking into an abyss anymore.

-

There’s a sticky note on Bucky’s pillow next to his head when he wakes up the next morning. Steve’s side of the bed is already vacant, and he can’t hear him downstairs. He must have already left for a run.

Propping himself on an elbow, Bucky plucks up the sticky note.

To: My Bucky

Thank you for choosing me to be your home, and thank you forever, for being mine.

I love you with everything I have.

Love, your Steve

Bucky smiles, heart light as he folds the notes. He’ll keep that one with him, he thinks. A little bit of home to bring wherever he goes.

-

anyway yeah fslkjflaskjfls i-- ouch. anything to do with letters w these two hurts me immensely

[cdroloisms]

Hello, idk if you’ll see this, nor do you have to take this request. But I’ve been thinking, and thought up: Dream joined the egg, but not because it offered him world domination or a happy family or any of that; no it offered to treat him kindly, to be affectionate, to be a friend, basically offering him human decency. (With an add on of everyone believing it was for some big reason, but the actual reason gets revealed somehow) if that made any sense. (Idk if this counts as an au or not)

[ask: if dream showed up to the red banquet, that would be very sexy of the writers to make him join the eggpire instead of the pro-omlette]

hehe egg!dream has so much potential ,, this is a ficlet i’ve been working on for a while (writer’s block my detested) but i finally finished it up !! it’s a bit unpolished but oh well - they cant all be winners lmao 

tw: body horror, blood, injuries, implied torture/abuse, starvation, possession, dark/disturbing imagery, dark content, pandora’s vault/prison arc 

Dream gets corrupted by the Egg, because of course he does.

Sapnap trudges through the vine-filled hallway, his face bundled firmly with a holy-water soaked bandana to keep out the worst of the spores. It’s a shoddy defense, but he doesn’t plan to stay long; he’s only been sent on reconnaissance, to see what public enemy number one is planning and get out as quickly as he can. As much as the entire server wants Dream dead, trying to defeat the man the first time was enough of a feat, never mind with the power of a giant demon egg on his side - to try and fight him now would be practically impossible.

The floor squishes underneath his boots, and his lips curl in disgust; the vines are thick and moist and feel ugly and rotten to the core. He can’t imagine anyone being anything but repulsed by the things, but he guesses it makes sense for Dream to be drawn here - corruption attracts corruption, it seems. It only figures that Dream would be desperate enough for power to let himself get possessed by the living - if you could really call it living - embodiment of decay and deterioration itself. The feeling of the floor giving way underneath his footsteps has another wave of revulsion crawling up his throat, though he’s not sure if it’s directed towards the Egg or his former friend or both.

He reaches the end of the hallway, an itching, pulsing feeling of wrong filling the air in the room just beyond the haphazard archway carved into the stone. With careful hands, Sapnap draws the bandana further up his face, making sure that it is tied securely behind his head - just beyond this wall lies the belly of the beast, the heart of the rot slowly but surely spreading its influence over the entire server. Something hums in the air; whispering, otherworldly sounds pierce through his armor and settle beneath his skin; he pushes on. He knows better than to listen, to try and make sense of the words within the noise - from what he’s heard, by the time you understand what it is saying, it’s too late.

He steps inside; the room feels, for the lack of a better word, red. He’s better suited for the place than most, being a Netherborn and therefore more used to the oppressive heat and heaviness of the air, but there’s something undeniably wrong about how this place feels, something entirely Other having made its home in the room. Every inch of the place feels hostile, angry, hungry, recognizing him as someone foreign and wanting nothing more than his destruction. Unlike the Red Forests, which teemed with life - piglins and hoglins and giant fungus - this room is little more than a twisted mimicry, sucking the air dry, leaving little more than husks behind.

His hand immediately goes to his sword, drawing it with a dull, metallic scrape. The room is eerily silent save for the Egg’s hissing whispers, and he frowns; he’d expected an attack, but the room is still, quiet; a mockery of peace that only makes the uneasy feeling in his gut grow further. He trudges forward, watching against the puddles of lava and smoking magma scattered over the floor, but nothing stirs.

There’s a growing pressure against his skull with each step into the room, and his hand tightens on his communicator; they’d set up a stasis chamber, just in case things went south, his way out of this place only a few button presses away. Still, nothing moves; no Bad or Ant popping out of nowhere, weapons in hand, no Dream driving an axe between his shoulder blades as he’s done so many times before in their spars. There’s only the sound of his footsteps against the rotting growths on the floor and his own heartbeat thudding in his ears and the Egg’s warbling voice, beneath it all - beckoning, almost kind.

He swallows, throat dry, and moves forward.

His feet carry him to the back corner of the room, to the rotting, pulsing core of the wrongness plaguing the entire server. Even through his bandana, the air feels foreign, nearly choking him, and he strains his eyes against the glare of the lava to look up at the vines’ rancid heart, the Egg. Up close, it’s almost underwhelming, only about three times his height, hardly coming halfway up to the ceiling of the room. What it doesn’t have in size, however, it makes up in sheer presence; the hissing whispers in his head grow louder, crawling under his skin and between his bones, and he curses under his breath as he prepares to call for his way back. Dream isn’t here; the mission is a bust.

“Sapnap?”

He freezes.

It takes a moment to realize that the voice wasn’t in his head, as raspy and unsettling as it was, and his eyes traced the edges of the Egg to a dull colored shape at its side, completely overlooked in his initial sweep of the room. He watches, a dull horror rising in his chest, as the shape moves, twists around on itself in an entirely unnatural way like a marionette pulled by its strings. A pale dot rises from where it had been hidden against the bright red of the Egg; it’s a face, Dream’s face, covered in clawing vines, stark against the bone-white of his sun-starved skin, vomit racing up his throat at the sight of the vines having made their homes in jagged wounds all over his face and neck and disappearing into the torn scraps of his prison uniform, each one spilling crimson in the form of writhing vines and thorns instead of blood.

“Sapnap,” Dream says again, his mouth moving with the words but something entirely other having made its home in the air of his lungs, a shivering rasp to his voice that lifts and falls with the same desperate hunger that saturates every tainted inch of the room. His neck tips to the side, shifted over by a twisting vine tangled within his hair and wrapping a crown of blood-red thorns over his forehead, tendrils drooping over his face and framing the gaunt edges. “You came.”

“Dream-” the anger comes back, familiar, at the other’s words - the same red-hot rage that had boiled within him in that first and only prison visit (you took so long) but it dissipates as fast as it comes. Dream - if this remnant, this shade, this corrupted, mangled half that seems more corruption than human can even be called the name of one he had once considered his best friend, his brother - stumbles closer, held up by the vines that twist over his shaking legs, one having the pale, ragged edge of a bone clearly having ripped through skin - and Sapnap does throw up, this time, dragging the bandana from his face and heaving bile all over the floor.

“What happened-” he cries, flames licking up his arms in defense when his friend-turned-monster-turned-this steps closer on a wreck of a leg that should not be able to bear weight, stumbles back to a roaring in his ears-

He is mine he came broken came shattered and I gave him everything I gave him his heart’s desire I am his savior his grace he asked for warmth and he asked for comfort and he asked for nothing but for someone to take his pain and he is mine he is mine he is mine

He freezes, hand tightening over his communicator; Dream stares at him with the one dull-green eye not covered by the vines splayed over his too-pale face, mouth moving but no sound coming out. The roaring, angry sound in Sapnap’s ears grows louder, follows the shape of Dream’s lips come join your friend come with me I will give him to you you have failed him once but not again not again he is mine but you can be mine also and you will be together together together

“-pnap! Sapnap!” Puffy’s words crackle over the communicator, harsh and loud and snapping him out of his thoughts, “Pull the switch, Sam! No, he’s not responding- pull the switch-”

The world dips, and he heaves in a shattered breath, lungs finally full as he breathes in clear air for the first time in what feels like an eternity, hacking coughs pulled from his throat as he tears the bandana off in one sputtering gasp for breath.

“Sap- Sapnap,” Sam pitches his voice low, comforting, a hand rubbing up and down his back, but all Sapnap can see is the skeleton of a man held together by red thread, the life leached from his skin and leaving nothing left, he asked for nothing but for someone to take the pain and he is mine he is mine he is mine-

“Sapnap,” Puffy’s voice is tinny with concern, “What happened? You stopped responding and the time passed so we pulled the switch on the stasis chamber- are you alright? Did he attack you?”

“I-” -you have failed him once but not again not again you will be together- “I need a moment.”

He scrambles away, feet carrying him away from Church Prime, away from the Holy Land, away away away until he’s standing on the Community House roof, staring at his hands at this home, destroyed, this home, rebuilt, this home, empty and wrong and a shadow of house for a shadow of a man, a shadow of a friend found, a friend lost- and sobs.

What had he done?

[babysizedfics]

hey! i just wanted to pop by and say that i love your blog loads 🥺🥺 also, i have a question! does roman ever give vee tickles? when they’re big OR small? 💗

aaawW thank u so much for saying so !!

heads up i accidentally made this a ficlet halfway through lol

warning for tickling and teasing

and YES roman tickles vee a lot hsjshdhs you see it on the ic blog quite a lot - if they're hanging out they are actually pretty touchy feely. even when big vee usually ends up in romans lap and he will purposefully be cheeky because he knows roman ends up tickling him as revenge jdhds

just yesterday roman was holding the video game controller out of reach of virgil and fondly teasing him abt being too short to reach it, so vee twisted his septum piercing with his tongue to freak roman out. roman is very grossed out by things easily and dropped the controller to get vee to stop

vee started playing the video game, still sitting in romans lap with a smug smile on his little face... but he was kinda disappointed roman didn't put up more of a (tickle) fight.

so he licked romans cheek

roman freaked out, went to scrub his cheek withm soap, compained on the blog about vee being gross and 'baby snot on his face', then vee just denied it all (purposefully being cheeky to try to get roman to retaliate) until roman started chasing him for revenge

they ended up in virgils room with roman pinning him to the floor. virgil THOUGHT roman was going to lick his cheeks back, but instead roman asked him to admit he did it. virgil denied it and roman started wiggling a finger under his ear

vee squeaked and a giggle escaped

"admit it!" roman demanded

of cours vee knew what would happen if he didnt. so: "no, im innocent!"

then romans other hand circled a finger around the side of his ribs. virgil gasped and started giggling constantly and wriggling under roman

"Last chance, vee-vee!" roman warns with eyebrows raised and a big smile

virgils gigges are squeaky and breathless already, he really is too sensitive for a lot of tickling. but he meets romans eyes for a brief second before they fall shut with another gasp when romans finger brushes a particularly bad tickle spot. "n-no-ho" virgil protests... then he licks his deptum piercing again just to add fuel to the fire

roman cries out in disgust then immediately starts scribbling both his hands quickly over the sides of virgils.

virgil screams and bucks and gasps and blushes so hard

at this point logan appears in the doorway to check what is happening

"h-help, lo-ho" virgil pleads, eyes watering and cheeks aching from laughing so much

"no, don't help Lo!" roman argues, chuckling at vee and kindly slowing his fingers enough to give vee room to breathe between giggles "this is justice for a heinous act!"

logan sniffs in amusement, "well i am not one to stand in the way of justice"

virgils eyes fly open and land on logan "no! pl-hee-he-ease, M-ha-Mama!"

hearing vee call logan mama immediately makes roman stop his fingers, because if vee is starting to regress theres no way he would enjoy such intense tickling

logan steps closer and leans down to better speak to vee. "are you alright, little one?" he asks in a very babytalk voice, then roman stops pinning him and pinches his cheek a little

"hi vee-vee, do you feel tiny?"

and virgil goess BRIGHT RED because he isnt regressing at all, he just used the Mama card to try to get logan to feel sorry for him. he covers his face with his hands and shakes his head and mumbles through his fingers "not little, sorry... just wanted.."

the other two frown. "wanted what, virgil" logan asks.

"do you want me to stop?" roman asks sincerely

virgil wriggles on the floor a little and pulls his hand down from his face enough to chew his thumbnail and reveal one eye and one very pink cheek "no.. just wanted, um... attention" he admits quietly

roman immediately lights up "Ohhhhhh-"

vee whines and covers his face again. roman takes his hands and pulls them away. "let me get this right... did you want more teases?"

vee's silence speaks loudly

"oh my god youre insatiable" roman laughs, but before virgil has time to feel insecure about it roman's fingers start teasing at his ribs again

"i think you have this under control," logan chuckles, then leaves.

"so teasing how tiny you are earier wasn't enough?" roman muses, his fingernails tracing lightly over each individual rib. virgil holds his lips tight to contain a squeal, but it just comes out as a highpitched whimper. "its not enough to just tease how your little arms can't reach when i hold a controller above my head?"

virgil cant respond because one of romans fingers is back under his ear and tickling right under his earlobe and making him titter and squirm

"and i dont think its enough to tease what an itty bitty widdle baby you are, either," roman says in a babytalk voice, laughing when vee whines and tries to hide his red cheeks but then roman pokes his tummy teasingly and vee immediately drops his hands to his tummy protectively. "because we all know what a tiny little cutie you are, with your baby bottles and pacis and your diapers"

"ro-ah!" virgil tried to protest but romans fingers went for the sides of his tummy and all he can do is gasp and wriggle and giggle and hope his cheeks dont catch fire with how much theyre burning

"so i think we'll just stick with teasing you... for how much you love being teased" roman says confidently

"nooo" virgil whines between breathless laughter

"yes, vee-vee" roman laughs. he's drawing little spirals over vee's sides now and it's making vee writhe and squeal

"you love the teases sooo much, how adorable is that, huh?" romans fingers slow down and atart tiptoeing over vee's ribs one by one like theyre stepping stones

vee gasps in a deep breath and lets himself calm down, all while squeaking and smiling so hard

"you pretend to not like it when we tease you for being the shortest, but everytime you get the biggest smile!" romans fingers go up so one wriggles under his ear again and one scribbles at his cheek. vee squeals and shakes his head

"no?!" roman gasps dramatically, "aw, but it's true vee! youre tiny and you love it! and you cant hide it anymore with those cute dimples popping out and your squeaky laughter whenever i hold something out of reach..."

virgils far gone from talking now. he's a flustered giggly mess

"hm and what about how much you love tickles? thats pretty adorable too you know" romans fingers go back to his ribs to circle around slowly and vee instantly curls up, legs bent up to his chest and accidentally trapping romans fingers there

"see!" roman laughs "you love being tickle tickle tickled so much you wont let me take my hands away!" he scribbles his fingers quickly now and vee squeals and rocks on the floor and gasps but his legs still hold romans hands there.

"n-n-no d-doh-ho--"

"no you don't?" roman guesses and virgil nods, eyes squint shut tight with laughter. "yes you do~" roman teases with a sing song babytalk voice. it makes virgils chest feel melty. "you love the tickles vee! Little vee is a little tickly cutie, aren't you?~"

virgil squeaks and gasps. romans fingers slow down and vee breathes through his giggles for a few moments. he's getting to his limit now

"cmon, vee~" roman sings and wiggles his hand sout from between virgils chest and knees. virgil squeals even tho roman wasnt trying to tickle him. roman laughs "if you admit you love teases and tickles then i'll stop"

it takes a couple of minutes for vee to be ready - both because he is so breathless and he keeps getting interrupted by giggle fits even though roman isnt touching him anymore, which just makes roman laugh too - but eventually virgil opens his eyes, squinting past tears of laughter and not bothering to hide his hot cheeks anymore and admits under his breath "i- i um i like being... teased and - and tickled"

"yeah you do" roman agrees with a big smug smile, then he gets up and helps pull vee up from the floor - vee's knees are wobbly and he collapses a little into roman when he is standing and they both laugh and roman keeps an arm around vee's shoulders when they go back to his room to carry on with the video game.

"that wasnt too much, was it?" roman asks a bit meekly after several minute of gameplay.

virgil looks iver to him and sees he refuses to take his eyes off the screen. romans fingers are fidgeting a bit with the controller even though its a cutscene on the screen.

"no," vee whispers, then lets himself wiggle back into romans lap like they'd been before. he looks at the screen as well and breathes deeply when romans arms circle around him. he feels secure and safe in his big brothers lap. "it was perfect" he admits quietly, stroking his fingers over romans arms

[wizisbored]

💖🖊️🌝

💖 What do you like most about your own writing?

the Vibes. vage answer, i know, but i cant really put my finger on it. i guess my ability to create atmosphere? just, whatever Bliss and the start of smoke and feathers and enjoying the show and chapter 10 of wildfire are. prose poetry, i think, though i wouldnt necesarily call all of those examples prose poetry. just. Vibes.

🖊 Post a snippet from a current WIP

started a lil centaurworld thing so heres that:

It starts somewhere near what used to be a grassland village. Used to, being the key factor there. Wammawink is barely a few weeks past her first spell when she reaches the area, and a few days past reaching it when she meets a small centaur of a species she can’t quite identify - some sort of pink and brown deertaur with a long neck. Well, perhaps meet is the wrong word. It would be more accurate to say she caught the little thing trying to sneak food out of her bindle.

🌝 Who is one character you haven’t yet written for that you would like to?

technically i already have written him in a ficlet once, but im looking forward to writing the homeless man in ragdoll. and tinky himself, thats going to be interesting

[kireihan]

[Ficlet] bastard flirting

ship: solomon x horizon

word count: 911

summary: What happened before Han Solo became a thing 

-------------

THEY WERE at eachother’s throats lowkey ngl

Hori was like “hello dude you’re good looking at all but you’re hella shady i don’t like you”

“Bitch”

I ACTUALLY DONT KNOW MUCH ABOUT SOLOMON SO might be ooc but whatever

Teachers shipped them so they kept being assigned together for projects and pe class

And solomon is a really annoying flirt. Bastard flirt.

Aka he would “fall” on top of her and be like “aha oops” and get up and hori knows full well it was on purpose but the bitch won’t admit it

RIVALS TO LOVERS OKAY

Who fell in love first?

Solomon

I almost wrote colon someone help

Now one may ask, “yo if the dynamic was like a little wonk how did they spark that romance?”

Thats a dumb question have you not seen the sexual tension mY GOD

But i do have an answer for you, the answer was classic fantasy novels!!

Despite “hating” each other, they were still pulled together by ancient magical blood

ANOTHER TROPE I LOVE OK

This is also like Dom x Dom so this will be interesting gjhfjdkl

Hori has really nice pencils so Solomon would do annoying things like steal them during class or write dumb things + notes in pen on her paper

Solomon once held one of her books hostage above her head (satan is that you) and was like “ahahaha a feisty girl i like it” back at it again with the bastard flirting

“Feisty eh?” bam solomon isn’t sure if he can have children anymore but Horizon is marching away with her homework book looking quite pleased with herself and that’s when Solomon’s heart did a flip

Are you a masochist too damn smh

ANYWAYS

This dynamic continues and it’s like really aggravating for everyone because first we have mammorons with their tooth rotting ness and now this new ship that has enough sexual tension and pheromones for asmodeus to go apeshit

It’s cold and Horizon would steal Solomon’s hat and wear it and Solomon would be like “damn bitch give it back” and she’d be like “lmao fuck off”

Honestly despite looking like they hate each other’s guts, THEY’RE NEVER FUCKING APART

It’s almost as if,, they’re going out of their way to go see/annoy the other person hiNtHiNt

Hori is usually really lax with her uniform while Solomon is lowkey more stuck up about following it

“Why do you wear your uniform like that?”

“Do you have a problem?”

“Loosen up a bit”

So she reaches over the table and fucking undoes Solomon’s tie thing and the top few buttons “see just loosen up it wont kill you to air out sometimes”

We all know you just wanna see some wizard collarbone

But still hot and Hori was like “oh no what is this feeling” after seeing slightly disheveled looking solomon bc he fought back

WHATS WITH THE TENSION STOP IT

Now im sure yall have been waiting for this

How and When did they get together???

Well actually it was this:

Horizon was being teased by a demon, doing the same thing he did before with the book holding except this demon was an incubus which is already spelling not good

“Aww what’s the matter? I thought you usually liked this kind of treatment”

Needless to say Horizon is not pleased and is ready to fight a bitch because we aren’t going weak damsel in distress here

Solomon was going to just go by since he was like “whatever im supposed to hate her” but news flash you don't you’re just deceiving yourself

Anyways Horizon decides to bastard flirt back(hmm i see you learned from someone) and the incubus is quite intrigued/happy so he thinks she’s interested so he starts leaning down

Hori fucking knees him in the gut once he’s low enough and grabs her book back

Get fucked sexual harasser smh

With a hmph, she kicks him again for good measure before walking away

But guess what, demon is mad and when he recovers he starts to go after hori but in bloodlust not lust lust

Horizon looks around to see demon about to attack her and that’s when Solomon steps in. since Solomon is a powerful sorcerer, and the demon was rather lowly so it’s an easy take out

And horizon was like “what the heck i had it all under control” and Solomon was like “yeah i know, i saw” but they both know that he just happened to have the upper hand with knowing magic

“So it’s only good if I do it?” and Horizon is like “bitch your audacity-”  and he’s like, “I think I’d prefer it if only I do it too.” and horizon is like “hello?? What??”

Oops accidental confession and Solomon is like fuck it we’ll just say it since asmodeus already called me out on it earlier

And horizon is like,, “ffffffffffhgfkdhslh fine whatever i like you too eventhough you’re an annoying dick” and he’s like “as long as I can keep mine”

Just kidding

Not really

So now they’re like kinda together

AND SOLOMON DECIDES TO TEACH HER MAGIC AND SWORDSMANSHIP SO SHE CAN DEFEND HERSELF SINCE HE CANT BE AROUND ALL THE TIME LIKE SOME ANIME PROTAG AND HE STANS A STRONG WOMAN THAT DOESN’T ALWAYS NEED A MAN NEXT TO HER

Does the quarreling get any better?

No it doesn’t it’s the same and the tension is through the roofs

[catsafarithewriter]

"I met them in an alley one and since then I cant seem to get rid of them" with the lovely lost ladies? If that inspires you

A/N: You know, I fully expected this prompt to be applied to Muta, but this direction was a really fun surprise. One lovely lost ladies ficlet coming up!

[I’m still open to prompts! Send me any from these three prompt lists.]

It was easy, sometimes, to forget that Louise was only mostly cat.

In some things it didn’t matter. She still purred when when pleased, her fur rose when angry, and Persephone had been explicitly banned from ever wielding a laser pointer again. 

Still, there were occasions when the reality slapped Persephone like a dead fish to the face and she had to remind herself that Louise wasn’t just not mortal, but not entirely cat either. 

Like today. 

Persephone inhaled slowly through her nose, her paws clasped against her chin in a fashion she had originally adopted when dealing with short-sighted advisors. It wasn’t a manner she often had to indulge in around her wife. 

“What,” she asked eventually, when the flight or fight response had been forcibly subdued, “is that?”

Louise glanced to the creature at her side and, if she had any inkling as to the situation, her brain hadn’t seen fit to inform her face yet. “I’m not actually sure,” she admitted. “I’ve named him George.”

Persephone exhaled, and this time the breath whistled through her paws. “You’ve named a ten-foot snake-monster George.”

“I’m open to suggestions.”

“Why–” Persephone inhaled sharply again as the feline instinct to scram reared its ugly head, and she was forced to take several shaky steps back in order to preserve her dignity. “What is it doing here?”

“Following me, it seems. I met him in an alley and I can’t seem to get rid of him.”

“We’re in the middle of volcanic wastelands!” Persephone cried, the absurdity of the situation finally getting to her. “Where did you find an alley in the five minutes I turned my back on you?”

Louise’s eyes lit up - not the reaction Persephone had been expecting - and she grabbed her wife’s paw. “You have to see this.” She dragged Persephone through the maze of towering rock formations while the sound of the snake-monster slithering behind them followed. They came to a halt where the canyon abruptly opened out. 

“Voila!” Louise released Persephone to gesture dramatically to the stone archway dominating the entrance, and the stone buildings that lay beyond it. “Queen Persephone of the Cat Kingdom, I present to you the Lost City of Igneus!” She bowed to an invisible audience. “Thank you, thank you, oh you’re too kind…”

Persephone drifted past Louise, too accustomed to her wife’s dramatics to spare much more than a congratulatory pat. “It’s real,” she breathed. “It’s really real.”

“Did you ever doubt me?”

“Well, there was a moment with the fissure vent…”

“We escaped unharmed, didn’t we?”

“Say that to my coat,” Persephone reminded her, but offhandedly. She laid a paw against the stone foundations of the archway, eyes exploring the engravings etched along its surface, and an encompassing calmness filled her and settled into her lungs, a deep-rooted contentedness that this was the life she had chosen. 

Louise stepped up beside her, and for a moment Persephone thought she might be having the same wanderlust, but then she drew her wide-brimmed hat across her face and said, “It’s quiet.” Head and hat tilted to one side. “Too quiet.”

Persephone snorted and the previous grandeur was eclipsed by humour. “Come on, I didn’t venture into this oven of a world just so I could stand at the gateway of a lost city.” But as she stepped through and onto the dusty street, she had to admit there was an uncomfortably heavy silence that blanketed the city. 

“Are you getting adventure vibes?” Louise asked. “I’m getting adventure vibes.”

“The only vibes I’m getting is creep vibes from the monster you’ve decided to adopt.”

Her wife gave a mock gasp. “Don’t go calling George a monster!” 

“Louise, he’s a ten-foot snake-thing with glowing red eyes.”

“Nobody’s perfect.” 

“Pretty sure he still has blood on his teeth.”

“It might be strawberry jam.”

“In the middle of a volcanic wasteland?”

“Which makes it unlikely, but not impossible.” A warm breeze wafted through the deserted city, and Louise lifted her head to inhale its heat haze scent. “I am right though. This place is abandoned.”

Persephone stopped by the empty doorway of a grand domed building, a space where a door had once been gaping before her. She slipped inside. The arches of the dome remained, but patches of sunlight filtered down through the gaps worn by years of neglect and shimmered in natural spotlights. Only the stone remained now. 

Persephone’s pawsteps echoed across the expansive room. “The scale and space of this building probably means it was used to house large numbers of people,” she murmured, more to herself than Louise. “A public place, most likely. The location implies it was important, centring the settlement like this. A town hall, maybe? Hard to tell with only the walls left, and it’s not as if we’re familiar with the culture of this world, so...” She trailed off, sensing Louise’s gaze on her. “What?”

“Oh, nothing. Just admiring my wife being clever.”

“Were your flirting attempts always this obvious?” Still, Persephone didn’t protest as Louise’s arms circled her, instead leaning back into the embrace. “Lou, Louise, I’m trying to work something out here.” 

“I can’t help it. I’m attracted to smart pretty ladies. It overrides my common sense.” 

“What common sense?” Persephone muttered, but she still leant further back and planted a kiss on her wife’s cheek. Her eyes lingered on her love, and then drifted to the snake monster that continued to linger in the doorway. “This would be so much more romantic if your pet monster wasn’t watching right now,” she whispered. 

“His name is George,” Louise mumbled. 

Persephone’s gaze moved uneasily past the creature, and she abruptly straightened, shrugging out of the embrace. “There’s writing on the walls.” She kissed Louise as apology for the sudden mood shift, and beelined for the nearest section of wall. 

Louise rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “This is what I get for marrying a queen who actually paid attention in class.”

“There’s markings all across the room,” Persephone said excitedly, bringing out a notebook and flicking through the pages. “They’re pretty worn away, but the alphabet combined with the vowel to consonant distribution implies it has roots in dragonese, with a grammar that I’ve seen in some variations of dwarvian languages...”

“Can you read it?”

“I can possibly guess at a few words that overlap from other languages, but that’s no guarantee they’ll actually mean the same thing.” Persephone trailed a paw up along the faded lines of writing. “For instance, this could either be a law concerning landowner boundaries, or...” She trailed off, her nose wrinkling. “Oh.” 

“What does it say?”

“Landowner boundaries. Definitely.”

“Sephie, you can’t just say that and not tell me.”

“Oh, look. This section is about how to settle inheritance disputes,” Persephone said quickly. “This whole room must have originally been covered with the laws of the land. Maybe this was a courtroom?”

Louise narrowed her eyes but didn’t argue too much as Persephone moved to another section of wall, already attempting to roughly translate another line. She drifted across the room, listening as Persephone called out some of the odder quirks of translation. 

“Apparently it was illegal to own more than two goats,” Persephone called. “Wait, that can’t be right...”

“Maybe they had really scary goats.”

“That might be two horns. Horns? No, that’s not right either...”

Louise came to the far end of the hall, absent-mindedly patting George on the head as he slithered up to her, and stopped. Here there were the same faint markings, but a set that were far newer were engraved across the centre. “Hey, honey...?”

“I think I’ve got it! This whole section is about the military and weapons - it must be referring to a kind of weapon, perhaps one made out of a horn?”

“Persephone!”

“Okay, I’m coming!” She hurried over, her eyes bright and her arms full trying to keep her note-taking in some semblance of order, and halted as she reached the same wall. “Oh, Bast.” 

“My adventure senses are tingling.”

Persephone approached the writing, not giving Louise any response except in giving the snake monster a wide berth. “That’s... that’s something.”

“I knew it.”

“It’s... It’s mostly in the same language, the grammar has mostly survived, but the spelling has changed.”

“Which means...?”

“Which means we’re looking at writing made much later than the laws, maybe a hundred years later. Maybe more. A bit like comparing Old Cat against Modern Cat hieroglyphics. Same language, same people... but to have defaced a building that was clearly a cultural centre of the city... I think we may be looking at one of the last things the people of the Lost City of Igneus left.” 

“Are you sure?”

“Well, there’s all that, and then there’s the fact the first word is translated from every dragonese dialect as ‘danger’.” Persephone glanced back. “You’re loving this, aren’t you?”

“Ancient lost city mysterious abandoned? This is what I was made for.”

“You would have thought your artisan would have made you out of sturdier stuff than wood then,” Persephone muttered, but she went back to the engraving. “Warning,” she roughly translated. “Beware the red... oh...”

“Oh?” Louise echoed. “This better not be a thinly-veiled euphemism again.”

“I never said the landowner laws were,” Persephone protested. 

“You didn’t need to. So, what’s the verdict? Where do we go looking for adventure and danger?”

“We don’t need to. We’ve already found it. Or, rather, you have.” Persephone tilted her head back to Louise. “It says ‘beware the red-eyed serpent.’”

They both turned to look at George. 

George smiled and smoke began pouring out of his mouth. 

“Oh,” Louise said. “Oops.”

[m-i-y-o-k-i]

2017 was utter shit and lemmie tell ya why bois

tw // drugs, abuse, sexual abuse, general bad stuff

first, my mom’s addiction gor worse, to the point she stole money and was arrested several times, even kidnapping my sister and i when we wanted to stay with my dad. driving us down some highway and swerving everywhere. she didnt care. she never has.

her high makes her more…well, not violent but bad towards me. hitting me or taking swings at me. emotionally abusing me by saying im an embarrassment to her – how she wishes i was never born, how she hates the way i am. that took a toll on me to hear every fuckin’ week.

second, dad lost his job. we havent had money to pay for shit. who knows how many times our electricity was shut off. who knows how many days we’ve gone without food, who knows how many times we’ve gone without basic stuff.

and he still wont help himself or get a job because hes a lazy fuck. he just sits and eats what little we have. all to himself and brags “oh lol my gf is gonna give ME money”.

he’s emotionally abusive. comstantly puts me down – “youre a failure” “guess whos a college drop out?” “get a job you fat fuck” “are you a d*ke? why dont you hang out with boys?” “fucking f*ga is all you watch, you must be one – gross”

combined, my parents stole from me. im native, when i turn 18 i get some money to help with school or whatever i want. i got this money long after i turned 18, in feb. my parents guilt tripped me to hell and back, “its for bills” “its for food” – and used it on their own needs. clothes, shoes, shows, casinos, drugs.

that fucked me up and just…wow, how can a parent do that?

third, there was a senior trip we took in may. about two weeks before graduation. during it, we had to room together in a motel. my class is full of rowdy and rough kids who give no fucks about anyone or anything.

my roomate for the trip threw a party in our room when i asked her not to. she didnt listen, half of our class drinking, smoking weed, making out.

while i was asleep they thought it’d be funny to pull up my shirt and fuck with my body. phones out and recording, they got as far as unhooking my bra before i woke up. one of the guys pinning my arms down as i trashed about and yelled at them to stop. the yelling got the attention of a chaprone who made everyone go back to their rooms.

they told me to keep quiet about the incident because “the schools already in hot water, we’ll keep them away from you. besides, you graduate in two weeks.”

fourth, i didnt get to go to college bc i had no way to pay. the money i got from the tribe was going to go towards that. but alas, druggie mommy and adulterous daddy said no and used it all.

i had to cancel everything and stay at home, with two abusive ass people who wont let me forget the fact “hahaha you were so close to leaving, better luck next year.”

fifth, my depersonalization and depression are rearing their ugly heads really hard. i try to be happy for everyone – but i even exploded at one of my best friends when they have it bad. i was selfish to do that. i’ve had multiple break downs on almost every blog i run, all my so called friends abandoned me after high school. so why would they start up again after so long and under the circumstances im in??

all anyway cares about me is i write and draw stuff that either gets them off or makes them laugh. who cares about bri as a person huh?! who cares if shes suicidal and depressed?! write more for the owly blog!! draw more for the owly blog!! write another ficlet for the ego blog!! draw more for ego blog!!

draw even though your art is horrible in your eyes and you wanna chop your hands off when you do!!

write even though you know its bad and wants to make you claw your eyes out when you do!!

who cares if youre having a breakdown?? give us your money, we’re your parents and its right no matter what!!

who cares if you wanna die everyday and wish you could magically go to sleep and never wake up? go get a job!! stress is good!!

who cares if youre fucking poor and cant barely get a meal every other day? go to school!! it’ll make you poorer but at least youre fitting in with kids your age!!

who

fucking

cares.

[cloversdreams]

So I'm not a BakuShin shipper but I'm open minded and wondering what reasons people ship them??

Because theyre great XD

Seriously though, I fell into this ship after reading a single ficlet about the pair. It simply resonated with me I guess. Cant speak for everyone else but I just love their dynamic. Quiet sleepy boy and his pain in the ass loudmouth bf is so good.

Theyre both strong willed and stubborn as heck. Neither of them is afraid of challenging a total stranger and theyd more likely than not accept a challenge from one too.

I can always see one calling the other out on his shit. Whether that be because he finds it ridiculous or amusing depends on the situation, but yeah. I could see them keeping one another grounded when they have to. Bonding over enjoying outdoor activities too. Not to mention study sessions that lead to Baku yelling because Hitoshi fell asleep again (he cant help it though! studying is boring and the blonds presence is comforting… terrible combo).

Did I mention the high levels of SASS between the pair? Fav. I love it when or both of them give each other lip (theres always a witty come back around the corner and I live for it).

Honestly theyre just a good fit the way I see em and I guess its really as simple as that in the end for me personally X3

If anyone that can actually explain these things eloquently (or if you simply have things to add) would like to weigh in on this please do… I feel like this was just a bunch of random nonsense *sweats*

[urloth]

Ñólinoss Part 1/2

What started as a ficlet request from @edgeoflight (who it wont let me tag?) who wanted Fëanor or Celebrimbor (or both of them hanging out together.)

I tried. That’s why it is in two parts. It grew. A lot.

 Part 1 of 2 (I think)

Warnings for schmoop, Opinions, and world building I guess? OCs if that offends. It’s set solidly in Amber verse which I neglect all the time.

I think the best summary of this is: Celebrimbor’s family. A case study.

There was a lady giving birth to twins. Usually this was something Tyelperinquar would have found out about after the fact, when his mother came back from the healing rooms at the back of their house and mentioned it over which ever meal it was. Today it was more important because the lady was very unwell even before giving birth, it was not a day when Tyelperinquar went to dame school or had a tutor visit, and it was the middle of the examination season at the University.

The last fact that meant his father could not look after him for the day because his father had a student who was finally defending her dissertation at the final level before being uplifted to a Lambengolmo. So Curufinwë had to be there. And usually this was alright, maybe better than alright, because Uncle Tyelkormo would turn up and take him away for the day and there was nothing Tyelperinquar enjoyed more.

Except that Uncle Tyelkormo was defending a dissertation himself.

“How?” his father asked, looking like his eyes were going to pop out of his head, “you do nothing except hunt and play representative for the butcher’s guild. We’d have noticed if you’d been putting in the hours to write a dissertation.”

“Laugh out the other side of your face Curvinkë,” Uncle Tyelkormo had looked cross but he frequently looked cross. It was alright. Tyelkormo was often cross but never actually angry. People made that mistake all the time and never stuck around long enough to see that Uncle Tyelkormo would stop being cross very quickly after he became cross, “it’s a combined study of the spiders that dwell in Lady Nessa’s region; broken down by species and their uses as either material manufacture and an alternative meat source or both.”

Tyelperinquar’s father had leaned very far back and his skin had gone very yellow and he had just said “that’s disgusting Tyelko,” before grabbing Tyelperinquar and hustling away from Uncle Tyelkormo’s house to his other uncles.

Uncle Kanafinwë couldn’t look after him.  They had gone to his house next despite Tyelperinquar telling his father he’d rather just read a book in an office somewhere in the university. Uncle Kanafinwë was always busy and he wasn’t comfortable to be around. He was very… very something, and it made Tyelperinquar uncomfortable. Also he didn’t really have time for children, when he looked after Tyelperinquar the day was often spent reading a book and staying out of his way anyway.

Riding to Uncle Kanafinwë’s house was all for no good anyway. He didn’t just have one student, he had three, taking important exams where he had to attend. He said this looking down his nose at Father. Father had turned red and marched off without another word.

Uncle Carnistir also couldn’t do it. He had not one but two dissertations to defend this day and the next.

“Why?” Father asked, sounding almost like Tyelperinquar did when he wanted to cry, “you already have six.”

“I like arguing,” Uncle Carnistir ruffled Tyelperinquar’s hair and asked after his lessons and they stayed a while drinking the honey tea that Uncle Carnistir always served and then he and father left again, Father looking towards the clock tower that rose from the market a few blocks away with a very worried expression.

Uncles Pityafinwë and Telufinwë were in Alqualondë. Father did not ask their housekeeper why they were in Alqualondë, simply turned them around and got back of their horse. This was par the course. Uncle Tyelkormo had explained it to Tyelperinquar before.

It was called Plausible Deniability.

Uncle Nelyafinwë had been called away to the courts because he was apparently the only judge in a suddenly violently explosive libel case who did not know either party.

“I don’t know how that’s possible,” Father said when the steward explained this, “when he seems to know everybody, but tell my brother I called by and I hoped his day was not too long or too tiring. I cant imagine it is an easy case given those facts.”

The steward smiled and one of the maids slipped Tyelperinquar a square of orange cake before they turned around.

“Well,” Father sighed, resting his head on Tyelperinquar’s head as he thought about it, “well I guess we’ll have to try Father. It is no use hoping Mother might be around. You may have to spend a very boring day with me Tyelperinquar.”

Tyelperinquar nodded, enjoying the candied pieces of orange mixed through the soft sweet morsel he had been given. Uncle Matimo’s cook was the only one who made it this right amount of light on the tongue but blossoming with orange and spices without overpowering.

Grandmother was away at Great-Grandfather Mahtan’s farm so she could focus on her next exhibition. Grandmother was often away at Great-Grandfather Mahtan’s farm. She and Grandfather were done with the living-together part of their marriage, his mother had explained, now they did their own projects and only sometimes lived together. This did not quite gel with what Tyelperinquar had observed amongst his other grandparents and his great-grandparents.

(Though he thought Great-Grandfather Finwë might be happier if the Lady Indis went away to work on her own projects and left him to his. He always looked like he had a stomach ache when she walked into the room.)

((Tyelperinquar did not like the Lady Indis very much but that was alright, mother and father both said, as long as he wasn’t rude to her. She never remembered his begetting day anyway and she always had to talk about Itarillë, who Tyelperinquar barely even knew, whenever Tyelperinquar said anything to her.))

This left Grandfather and the trip from where the Uncles largely had their houses scattered through good neighbourhoods and the outskirts of the city right back to the centre again, time now very narrow for Father to reach the University. Thankfully the Palace and the University was close and Tyelperinquar was prepared. He had a bag of books he wanted to read and some toys, and if he had to sit with father for Piopin’s dissertation defence he would be bored but it would be alright.

Grandfather was always the very last resort and Tyelperinquar had not spent too much time being taken care of by him because Father didn’t like to bother him, and Grandfather was always the most busy of everyone.

To Tyelperinquar’s utter lack of surprise Uncle Návefinwë was at Grandmother and Grandfather’s house (really more Grandfather’s house.) He was sitting in the big, well-lit receiving room which was also the reading room, a pile of music on the little low table that Tyelperinquar could no longer hide under, discarded in favour of the piece he was playing now, lute in his lap and the music propped up against a pillow.

Nobody ever talked about how Uncle Návefinwë existed, when he was not the Lady Indis’ son, and he was not the son of great-grandmother Queen Míriel. It was one of those things Tyelperinquar had been told not to talk about ever, in public or in private. All of that was long ago and Uncle Návefinwë deserved better.

He lived with Great-Grandfather now but Tyelperinquar could remember when he had been very little and Návefinwë had lived with Uncle Tyelkormo.

Then Great-Grandfather had acknowledged and legitimised Uncle Návefinwë which hadn’t changed anything except where Návefinwë lived, because all the uncles and aunts who weren’t his father’s brothers still ignored Návefinwë and so did their children.

And Návefinwë always seemed to be at Uncle Tyelkormo’s house or Grandfather’s like he’d been before. Grandfather’s house was a whole corner of the palace with its own gardens, and Uncle Návefinwë could just cross the gardens from his new rooms in the main palace.

“Oh,” Father said despite the fact that he shouldn’t have been surprised either, “are there not stands for you to use?”

“Makalaurë came by last evening and took them all,” Návefinwë made his lute sigh gently; it sounded sad and alone but at the same time like if Tyelperinquar could eat the music it would taste sweet. “He has three students taking exams you know.”

“We know,” Tyelperinquar said before his father could become grouchy again at the reminder, “we saw him before we came here.”

He was already putting his bag on the table and with a carefully angled jump was on the settee, holding up the music. Návefinwë smiled. It went all the way to his dark eyes that were like great-grandfather’s and Uncle Tyelkormos’s. His smile was like theirs also. It made everything that could feel happy inside Tyelperinquar go warm.

“I’ll tell you when to turn,” he told Tyelperinquar and began to play again, “did you come to see Brother?” he asked Father, polite and without missing a beat. Návefinwë was younger than the twins. He wasn’t an adult yet. He seemed just very grown up.

“Yes, I have Piopin’s examination today and-”

The door they had come in opened again.

“That would be him,” Návefinwë said helpfully, pausing mid chord as his hair slipped forward over his shoulder and fell into the lute’s strings. He frowned and rested it, feeling around in his hair until he found his hair clasp which had flicked open.

“Is it broken?” Tyelperinquar asked him as his father almost ran back to the door to greet his grandfather.

“I think so,” Návefinwë managed to untangle it from his hair and brought it forward to look at it. It was not the usual type of stick and curve hair-clasp he wore but a more complicated set up with a set of tiny springs and clamping jaws, all beneath a twirled spray of snowbells.

“I can try and fix it,” Tyelperinquar immediately volunteered.

“I was just going to see if brother would melt it down for me so I could have the metal remade into something else,” Návefinwë let him have it, “it’s not of much value to me. It was a present from Alqualondë for my begetting.”

It was very nice silver. Tyelperinquar had learned about silver as soon as he could get his father to teach him about metals. It had a nice mark on it too, from a good workshop under royal patronage. Tyelperinquar hadn’t memorised all of the makers marks from Alqualondë yet. Almost though. It was easier than memorising all the marks from Tirion. There were too many from just Tirion. And then there were all the other Ñoldor cities like Formenos where his mother came from. Tyelperinquar secretly thought he’d never be able to memorise them all.

The clasp was unusually plain. Gifts from Alqualondë tended to have nacre or pearls or coral or precious gems by Ñoldor jewelsmiths set in them. This was just plain silver. And very heavy.

Too heavy for a hair clasp it felt like.

“Is it uncomfortable?” Tyelperinquar was sure his head would hurt if he wore it.

“It is,” Návefinwë rubbed the back of his neck, “it pulls. I only wore it because it was sitting on my bureau so long it was beginning to patina.”

It was pretty but it wasn’t very well made the longer Tyelperinquar looked at it. The flowers were nice but the rest wasn’t well thought out. There were hairs caught in those little springs. The claps didn’t quite clap right and sprung out when they were pushed inwards. He wrinkled his nose. He bet he could make something better.

“Can I try remaking it?” it would be nice if he could keep the snow bell shapes. Maybe he could make a mould of the decorative side if it had to be melted down.

“As long as you have permission it is alright by me,” Návefinwë pulled his hair together in a thick tail and knotted it, the weight of it pulling the knot so it held loose at the back of his neck. It was as silver as the clasp he had removed. It was a completely alien colour to the silver of Uncle Tyelkormo’s hair.

Telerin silver, not Ñoldor silver.

Sharp and bright, not soft and pale.

“I won’t miss it.”

“Wont miss what? Tyelperinquar I have you for the day, possibly the night as well. I hope your father doesn’t hurt himself getting to the University. Piopin is not due for another hour at least.” Grandfather walked in. He was wearing his Lambengolmo robes; dark and impressive, the deep purple hues and the crimson belting accented with mist-silver and opals, and he had the Silmarilli on his brow caught in a circlet that looked like it was made of abalone clouds. It was a new setting for them; at least Tyelperinquar had not seen it before. Grandfather had many of them in many beautiful shapes and sizes for different occasions.

“Návefinwë’s hair clasp, he says I can try and remake it better, with permission,” Tyelperinquar immediately got up and went to him, walked straight into his Grandfather’s arms in fact and was blessed with a kiss on both cheeks and his forehead. He made sure to look his grandfather right in the eye when he talked but he did close his eyes for the kisses.

“Sly boy. I suppose if you have no tutor’s work I could perhaps help you plan that,” Grandfather took off the Silmarilli and simply popped the circlet down over his head. It slid down immediately and only stopped because of Tyelperinquar’s nose, the back of it touching his neck. “It would be good apprentice work. But first let me get comfortable.”

Tyelperinquar was released. Grandfather left with his robes leaving a swirl of scent from the incense they had probably been hung over the night before so they were nicely perfumed.

“Návefinwë could you arrange a midmorning meal. Curufinwë said they did not have a meal before he began running all over the city like a chicken without a head.”

Grandfather did not really have servants in attendance. Návefinwë left to probably find one.

Tyelperinquar grabbed the circlet, the middle Silmaril pushing against his palm warm and tingling, and lifted it off his head, turning it to look at the new circlets make up. The Silmarilli flashed at him. He could pretend it was a pattern and they were saying hello.

“Hello,” he said back just in case they were listening. The left one gleamed all on its own and contrary to the light in the room. He tapped it with his finger and then jumped as suddenly he was tapping a piece of coal.

“Grandfather?” he raised his voice. He wasn’t going to panic! No he was. He was! “the Silmarilli became coal!!”

“Are they being cheeky?” Grandfather called back from somewhere deeper in the house, “they have taken to playing tricks Tyelperinquar. They are using light to make you see what is not there.”

Tyelperinquar rubbed his finger. He could feel facets under his finger even though what he saw with rough coal.

“You’re still here,” he told them in his most grown up voice. “You’ve been caught.”

A flash went across the Silmarilli and the left one was normal again. Another flash, rippling back and forth between their facets without light source, bouncing around the gemstones.

Tyelperinquar rubbed the facets of the left one again, amazed. A click of the door and Návefinwë walked back into the receiving room, shaking his head about something.

“Návefinwë a silmaril turned into a coal!” he waved the circlet and the light of the stones left streamers in the air.

“Again?” Návefinwë leaned over the circlet, looking excited, “I did not see it last time they did it.”

“Can they do other things?” he asked Návefinwë.

“I don’t know,” a shrug, some of Návefinwë’s hair already escaping the knot and falling over the abalone clouds where it looked simply like an embellishment. “It only happened a few days ago. Father and Brother locked themselves away with them then came out and warned me that if I saw a lump of coal in Fëanáro’s circlets not to be deceived. They have not done it in public yet. I think they are too vain.”

Tyelperinquar looked into the twinkling flashes and he thought of the warm brown stones that the garden wall of his mother’s herb garden. How they held light. Reflected warmth back onto the garden so that the herbs flourished. The reddish brown with the flecks of darker and lighter minerals.

The middle silmaril tried first and went an off pinkish colour that looked like the inside of a shell. It was too smooth and perfect looking. Then the left one tried, and managed to become darker. Then the right followed and managed to become matte. The other two immediately followed.

“Almost!” Tyelperinquar congratulated them and they lost the illusion immediately and twinkled ceaselessly. He felt a giggle wriggle out of him, the sound bouncing out of his throat like how the light was dancing between facets. He laughed out loud and the twinkling became brighter.

“Oh,” Návefinwë said and got up, “Brother!”

Tyelperinquar thought about every stone he could, first cobbles from the street near his house, smooth and pale, then the smaller ones near the docks which were dark and rough. The first stones were easily copied. The second took two tries between the three. They did not seem to be able to make themselves matte or rough easily. That coal had been quite sleek now he thought of it.

Tiles from the palace almost worked except the colours bled out of the designs and mixed together. Marble was perfect on the first try. Then Tyelperinquar thought about gemstones.

Pearls did not quite work. They were too bright. Like they were glowing from the inside out the way coals glowed when they were hot. Diamonds did not work at all and there were too many hues of green in the emeralds they tried. Rubies looked too much like coals. Opals were almost convincing except opals did not twinkle so and opals were not so intensely gold and silver.

Tyelperinquar thought hard about star sapphires and gasped at the way the stars in each suddenly dark zaffre stone were spread out the way Uncle Carnistir made them in his ink paintings of fantasy starscapes. Galaxies, Uncle had called them.

“Having fun?” Grandfather asked him. He had the black metal casket he usually kept the Silmarilli in when he wasn’t wearing them and a small tool kit. His fine robes were gone, he was wearing the earth toned robes Tyelperinquar usually saw him wearing; ochre colours with hints of brighter colours beneath.

“Yes,” he knew that meant that he must hand them over now. Grandfather took the circlet when he offered it and sat down on the settee right-angled to the one Návefinwë had left his lute on. Návefinwë came back into the room with a tray with a cover from the palace kitchens and his eyes were very wide when they slid to the circlet and then back to Tyelperinquar.

“That was amazing,” he said to Tyelperinquar who was mad that his face immediately blushed but he thought it was amazing also.

“It was,” Fëanáro got out the tiny tools he needed to remove the Silmarilli from their circlet. They turned into abalone like the rest of the circlet when he touched them. He flicked one gently with his nail and a trembling crystal warble hung in the air. It made the hairs all over Tyelperinquar’s neck stand up on end. He reached out and grabbed a piece of the flatbread on the platter Návefinwë had uncovered and put on the small table.

The sound had made his throat feel tight and his eyes feel wet. If he didn’t do something else he was going to cry and for no reason at all.

“Behave,” Grandfather murmured at the gemstones gently and then took them out of the circlet, laying them one by one into the dark nest of cloth in the chest. They cast colours and light across his face, and made his eyes glow like he had two more silmarilli there.

--

Ñólinoss - Learned Family, if I got it right. Nole - lore, knowledge, Noss - family. Inspired by Tar-Vardamir’s sobriquet (new word!) Nolimon which meant “Learned one” apparently.