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soulmate-game · 3 years ago

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Well, here is the stupid thing I was alluding to. It’s mostly a filler chapter, but yeah.

Harley’s Plea for Help, Chapter 3

“Well, that took a while,” a relatively deep female voice smoothly drawled. The plants placed right next to the window pulled away, no longer blocking the pathway inside. The two figures who were perched right outside the windowsill took the invitation and climbed inside, the shorter of the two looking at the woman who had spoken and smiling widely.

“Auntie Ivy!” Marinette happily exclaimed, making the redhead across from her grin back.

“That’s me. It sure is nice to actually see you in person, little Marigold,” she held out her arms for a hug, which Marinette instantly ran in to accept. “Video calls are never quite enough, are they? You’re so tiny! Are you sure you eat alright?”

“Auntie Ivyyyyyy,” Marinette whined, knowing full well that Ivy was just teasing her.

“So, what took you all so long?” Ivy asked Red Hood, even as she kept her arms wrapped around her soon-to-be daughter in law. “Usually you bats are all about getting back on the streets to punch people, we didn’t think you’d be bringing her in at almost one in the morning.”

Hood shrugged, thumbs hooked in his pockets. “Your little garden fairy nearly gave us the slip. Went straight out the back exit instead of doin’ anything showy like we half expected and we almost missed her.”

“I stopped as soon as I noticed who they were, I swear!” Marinette pulled away from Ivy, holding her hands up in mock surrender. “I didn’t expect Momma to send them to babysit me before our first full day being in Gotham. In hindsight, though, I really should have.”

“Yeah, you should’ve,” Ivy agreed with a smirk, ruffling Marinette’s hair and making her pigtails go a little crooked. “And I know for a fact that you’ve done some stunts off your balcony back in Paris, so at least I know you can be responsible and hold yourself back from doing the same here. Must get that from me, because we both know it doesn’t come from Harley.”

Marinette and Hood both had to laugh at that. Being responsible was definitely not a trait that Marinette could have inherited from anybody in her family tree, that was for sure.

“Are ya makin’ fun of me in front of my daughter?” the comically scandalized voice announced the arrival of one Harley Quinn, who walked into the room in white onesie pajamas with a poker print on them. All of the “joker” cards were crossed out heavily with red sharpie, and a few of them had black-sharpie devil horns and handlebar mustaches vandalizing them. Marinette even caught one such card with a googly eye on it, the matching eye having fallen off and leaving only a small circle of since-dried hot glue where it used to be. “If you guys are gonna be that way, fine! Ivy dyes her hair!”

“No she doesn’t,” Marinette deadpanned, clearly fighting against a giant grin. The corners of her lips gave her away, they never stopped twitching with repressed mirth. “But you do. I got the pictures to prove—- aah!” Harley tackled her daughter to the ground, attacking her with tickles immediately.

“Take it back! My hair is naturally blond!”

“Yeah, naturally— hahahahaha! Sandy blonde! You— hahaha! Have just as much brown— stop I can’t breathe! hahahaha!— as yellow!”

“Hmph,” Harley finally backed off, crossing her eyes and looking away from Marinette with an exaggerated pout. “How dare you reveal my darkest secret?”

“I was a natural redhead even before I got my powers,” was all Ivy had to say, looking all too amused at this turn of events. “Your original costume completely covered your hair.”

“Don’t worry, Harley,” Red Hood butted in, reminding the three girls that he was still here. His tone suggested that he was definitely smiling under his helmet. “We found out about your hair dye years ago.”

“I just cover up the brown parts! It’s not like I’m changin’ much,” she argued before standing up again. “Thanks for gettin’ my cupcake back safely, little birdie. Oh, that's right! I made cupcakes! Hang on, lemme grab one for your trip back!” with that, she span on her heels and ran back further into the apartment. Marinette dashed over to Hood, immediately shoving him to the window.

“Quick, save yourself! Momma can’t bake for her life!” she whispered urgently. “I’ll say you were called away for an emergency, just hurry!”

“It’s not even a lie, getting away from Harley’s baking is an emergency,” Ivy agreed, waving as the vigilante took their advice and fled. It was only three seconds later that Harley slid back into the room, nearly falling due to the feet of her onesie having pretty much zero friction. Her face immediately fell when she saw that her victim was gone, leaving her standing there with a cupcake that was about twice as much frosting as actual cake, covered in sprinkles like a kid’s craft project that was smothered in glitter. The frosting was also shapeless, just heaped on the cake like a half-melted scoop of ice cream. She sighed in despair.

“There goes my chance of giving a bat diabetes. You guys warned him, didn’t ya?”

They both nodded shamelessly. “We’re not that cruel, Harley,” Ivy defended, getting up from her spot on her cushioned armchair and wrapping an arm around her fiance’s waist before she kissed the top of her head gently. “Hood got our little Marigold back safe and sound, and he’s even started a garden at his apartment. He doesn’t deserve to be poisoned by you.”

“I thought you said he got a single cactus at the flea market last month,” Harley deadpanned, making Ivy shrug.

“Might as well be a garden for him, and it’s something he’s not likely to kill so that’s a plus to me. He’s actually taking really good care of the little baby.”

“Speaking of garden!” Marinette gently took the sad excuse of a pastry away from her mom and sat it down on a side table before ushering both of them over to the living room and onto the sofa. “My garden back home is growing so big, I don’t think I can keep everything much longer. I barely have room to walk on the terrace, with all the vines and leaves and branches. Got any ideas of what I can do?”

“Of course! Do you have pictures, Marigold?”

—*—*—*—*—*

Slipping back through her hotel window at six in the morning was risky, since it involved climbing the wall and hoping nobody saw, but her classmates were so unpredictable that it was the only way she could be sure nobody would find out that she had violated curfew and snuck out. Of course, having Red Robin waiting outside her mom’s apartment’s terrace to escort her back helped. At least she knew that no street cams would record her comings or goings, and his grappling hook made the whole scale-the-hotel-wall business much more efficient.

Once she was inside, she sighed happily. “Thanks, now—“ her apology was cut off as Red Robin held up a finger to tell her to wait.

“Hold that thought, be right back. Don’t move.”

Thinking, rightfully, that something was wrong, Marinette obeyed. She watched Red Robin leap off of her hotel balcony and disappear into the streets. Immediately, she began a search to make sure her room had been left untampered— everything important had been packed in the backpack that she had taken to her mom’s place, but still. Could never be too careful. By the time she finished checking for bugs or any signs of snooping, Red Robin landed back on her balcony.

“Here we go.”

Turning to face him, Marinette opened her mouth to ask what the problem had been— only to tear up a little and walk over to the vigilante.

“Oh, my hero. Truly, my one and only savior. Knight in shining red Kevlar. I’m running on two hours of sleep and you have read my mind!” The pigtailed drama queen eagerly took the coffee that he offered her, and he sipped from a larger cup that looked like he had grabbed it from the same place. Marinette almost instantly sighed in gratitude when the hot drink lightly scalded her tongue. This. This was the elixir of life.

To his credit, Red Robin was able to restrain himself to merely an amused smirk. Probably because he was running on just as little sleep as she was. “Sorry it’s only a small, I figured it was best to have something you could finish quickly and easily hide the evidence for. If you need more caffeine, I happen to know that Wayne Enterprises has a very good coffee shop in their main hall. You’ll be touring there today, right?” He asked, taking another sip as he waited for the answer that he already knew.

Marinette nodded absently, drinking in the euphoria of her coffee as she tried to both savor it yet finish it as quickly as safely possible. When she came up for air, she said; “Yeah, that’s right. We’re touring Wayne Enterprises for most of the day, having lunch there, and leaving for dinner after the tour. Then we have a visit to the Gotham Museum of Fine Art, and we’ll stay there until about eight-thirty before heading back to the hotel.”

Red Robin nodded, then turned and looked out the window at the slowly rising sun. Sunrise was always a bit later in Gotham, partly because of the abundance of high-rises and partly because of the thick cloud cover and ever-present fog on the edges of the city making everything seem darker than it should have been. He had to be at work soon himself, which is why he had been chosen to escort her to the hotel in the first place, but that meant that he had to be heading off.

“Alright. We arranged for a bodyguard we trust to keep an eye on your class during the WE tour, but he doesn't know who you are or that we’re the ones who asked. We’re still in the process of arranging someone to shadow you after the tour, but we’ll tell you about that once it’s solidified. Until then, follow the usual self-defense procedures if you suspect anyone of following you. You have the panic button we gave you?”

Marinette nodded, gulping down the last of her coffee and carefully putting it in her room’s tiny trash can. “Got it. Thanks, again. Seriously,” she met his eyes— or, probably did since they were hidden behind that weird white film that the whole Batfam had covering the eyeholes of their masks. “I mean it. For listening to me, for listening to Mom. It means a lot. I’ll keep the panic button on me, and I’ll use it if I think I can’t handle a situation on my own. I’ll cooperate with the people you get to watch over the class, and I’ll do my best to not get into any trouble. No promises, but I’ll do my best,” she maintained eye contact until Red Robin nodded, hiding his expression behind his coffee cup. After a second, he cleared his throat.

“Well then. We’ll contact you once we have anything to say about your intel. Until then, I gotta go. And by the way?”

Marinette tilted her head curiously as Red Robin paused for just a moment on her balcony railing, aiming a smirk back at her. “Yeah?”

“Welcome to Gotham.”

And if she couldn’t help but smile widely as he grappled off into the fog-veiled sunrise? Well, only she had to know. She wasted no time closing and locking the glass balcony door, and pulling the curtains over it completely. Once that was done, she couldn’t help but do a little shimmy of Joy. She was caffeinated, she met Auntie Ivy in person for the first time, she got to sleep next to her momma— and she was in Gotham! Technically her hometown— or town she was conceived in? Didn’t matter. Point was, even with the chaos and dark energy clouding the very air, she couldn’t help but feel like she belonged in that city. Like that was where she was always meant to end up, where she could thrive and the environment that she was made to thrive in. The environment that she was born to start fixing.

She beamed at herself in her bathroom mirror as she gave herself one more once-over. Yeah, so far her visit to Gotham was going much better than she could have hoped. Now, she just had to make sure it stayed that way.

Three businesslike raps sounded against the door to her room, just in time for Marinette to feed Tikki one more cookie and straighten her purse on her shoulder. Madame Mendelieve’s voice called out from the other side of the door in her usual no-nonsense bark;

“Dupain-Cheng! Room check! It’s time to get up, we’re meeting down in the lobby in ten minutes.”

Marinette ran up to the door, not quite able to contain her energy, and swung it open with her trademark large, beaming smile.

“Way ahead of you, Madame Mendelieve!”

Her science teacher blinked, adjusting her glasses on her nose as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was seeing.

“Ah. You’re already awake and ready?”

Marinette giggled and nodded. “Yup! I was so excited for the tour that I could barely sleep! Does the hotel breakfast include free coffee?”

—*—*—*—*—*

The hotel breakfast did, in fact, include coffee. What it did not include, however, was free coffee that Marinette could reasonably stomach. Especially after the heaven in a cup that Red Robin had gotten for her earlier, the watered down motor oil in the hotel lobby had been unbearable. She had barely managed two sips before regretfully throwing the rest away. Which is what brought her to stand in line at the very same coffee shop that Red Robin had mentioned was in the main hall of Wayne Enterprises, as the rest of her class mingled and waited for their teachers to check their tour group in and their tour guide to arrive.

“Hmm. Sorry, this is my first time ordering here,” she apologized when she reached the counter, gaining a slight lopsided grin from the barista at the register. “Um, I usually like strong coffee, with a lot of caffeine, but I also like something sweet. I don’t need anything too complicated though, do you have any recommendations?”

The barista gave her a customer service smile that seemed just a tad softer at the edges than usual. “Sure! So, we can add an extra shot or two of espresso to any of our drinks, to make it stronger and give it an extra kick. If you’re looking for good sweet flavors, the classics are our white chocolate or caramel. But we also have a seasonal syrup right now that I personally love, which is our cinnamon butterscotch. Did you wanna try that?”

Marinette smiled widely. “That sounds delicious! Then, if I could have your largest size café latte, hot, with… two extra shots and that syrup? Does that sound good?”

The barista actually let loose a soft laugh, already keying in the order. “If you’re a coffee lover and a sweet tooth at the same time, then you’ll love it. If not, come back during your tour’s lunch break and I’ll make you something else.”

Marinette made a little more small talk as she handed over the proper cash for the order, and grabbed her drink after just another minute’s wait. She turned around, taking a sip of the unsurprisingly heavenly coffee and started off to join her class.

Only to realize none of them were where she had left them. She sighed, starting to reach into her purse to see if anyone had texted her about where they were going, but a heavy presence stopped her. She could feel him approaching from in front of her, slightly to her right, but she couldn’t hear him at all. On guard, she straightened up and turned to observe the potential threat.

A security guard. Marinette blinked, running over what she had been told earlier that morning. Was he..?

He seemed to notice her instinctually defensive posture because he raised his hands to show he meant no harm. “Sorry, didn’t mean to catch you off guard,” he apologized. “I’m the guard that was assigned to your tour group. I offered to stay behind until you got your coffee while the rest of your group went ahead and got the run-down on all the boring rules and whatnot of the tour. Figured you’d already know everything they had to say anyway, you’re the class president right?”

Marinette relaxed her posture, nodding and sending the man a relieved smile. “Yeah, that’s right. Well, that explains why they left without me then. Usually Madame Mendelieve is strict about following rules though, how’d you convince her to go on without me?”

The man chuckled, jerking his head to show that she should follow him as he began to lead the way to a side door. Marinette kept her guard up just in case, but wasn’t too worried. If nothing else, she was still in the middle of a super crowded building and the other security guards around didn’t seem concerned. She could easily yell for help if she needed to.

“Well, can’t you tell it was my devilish charm?” He teased, grinning. He waited until she rolled her eyes to continue; “but really, I’m like a second tour guide. She made me show a lotta proof that I’m actually assigned to you guys and not just faking it, not that I can blame her. Eventually she saw the logic in my suggestion and agreed. See, there they are,” he pointed casually ahead of them in the large side hallway they had entered. Sure enough, near the end of the hallway was her class at what looked to be the tail-end of a standard rules-and-guidelines speech from the tour guide. “By the way,” the guard spoke up again, holding his hand out. “My name’s Jason. You’ll be seeing me more often, since I’m supposed to guard you guys for all of your visits to the Tower. Call me if you need help with anything, ‘kay kid?”

Marinette grinned, now positive that this guy really was the guard that Red Robin had said was assigned to her class. She switched the hand she was holding her coffee in so that she could properly grab Jason’s hand for a shake.

“Got it, Monsieur Jason. Let’s both hope I don’t end up needing your help though, I think that would be easier on both of us,” she joked, earning a chuckle from the large man. And— yeah, now that she was relaxed, he really was big, wasn’t he? Then again, Marinette didn’t always realize when people were a bit larger or more buff than they should be. Living with her dad had seriously skewed her perception of the normal size of an adult male (which, she learned when she was seven, most definitely was not almost seven feet tall and muscled enough to make a pro wrestler jealous). But she would like to think she had gotten better in that aspect, and Jason was definitely a big guy. A little over six feet tall, she thought, and though the guard outfit hid a good portion of his physique, she could tell he carried enough muscle to do serious damage if he wanted to.

With a wave, she left him to join her class and sipped at her latte. She had figured that the Bat Clan’s criteria for civilians that they would put to guard her class had to be high, but now she had to wonder just how high. Most police officers or security guards were fit, sure, but not like Jason. Casting a quick glance back at him, she confirmed that he had quite a few faded but visible scars. Again, more than your average officer even for Gotham. Who had they tasked with her class’ safety, exactly?

An elbow in her side distracted her from her thoughts, forcing her to blink and stop her cup from going back to her lips. The grin of none other than Adrien Agreste greeted her when she snapped out of her own head long enough to pay attention to her surroundings. He jerked his head to indicate that the class was already starting to move off.

“Come on, Mari or you’ll get left behind again,” he teased. She grinned back at him, rolling her eyes but falling into step beside him as they followed at the back of their class. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were gonna marry that coffee. You haven’t zoned out that badly in years,” his tone was light and cheery, but Marinette didn’t miss the concern in his emerald eyes. She sighed, gently bumping her shoulders against his in silent reassurance.

“I’m fine. Just didn’t get much sleep last night, that’s all. But this really is good coffee. Elixir of the gods,” then, just to provoke him, she took a giant gulp of the still steaming hot drink. Adrien grimaced in pained sympathy even though Marinette didn’t seem affected at all.

“Oww, Marineeeeeeeeeette,” he whined. “Don’t do that, my throat hurts just watching you guzzle hot coffee like that,” he complained, rubbing at his neck to make his point clear.

“Wimp,” she teased, unrepentant. Adrien just groaned dramatically.

“I’m not a wimp, you’re just concerningly used to burning your throat from the inside out,” he accused. “Anyway, how’d it go?” He was being deliberately vague, but it was obvious to her what he meant. He was only one she had told about visiting her mom, after all, just in case she needed a quick getaway.

In fact, he was the only one of her friends that she had even told about her biological parents. Alix knew too, but only because of time shenanigans. Marinette was fine with it now, but still.

“It went great,” she smiled widely at him, keeping her voice low but casual. “If I have a chance, I’ll introduce you sometime during the trip. I have a feeling you’ll love Auntie Selina, but I have to meet her first. All I have so far are stories.”

“Fair enough,” Adrien agreed easily. “But you don’t have to, you know that right? I’d love to meet your family, but I’m also fine just being your pseudo-brother like I have been up until now. I know it might be a bit… uncomfortable, for you.”

“Nah,” Marinette shrugged. “Nerve wracking, maybe. But that’s also about half the things that I do in my life period, anxiety is no joke. I’ll catastrophize for a while, but I know you’ll love them and they’ll love you.”

“Sounds like they have paw-some taste,” he didn’t even miss a beat with his puns, earning a playful glare for his efforts.

“Never mind. You’re a heathen. Disowned. Who are you?”

“Mariiiiii,” he whined, causing them both to laugh for a while before focusing on the tour.

So far, so good, Marinette thought.

—*—*—*—*—*

Part 1 Part 2

@emotionalsupportginger @alysrose-starchild @emistar0 @kibastray @justanotherfanficlovinbitch @alyssadeliv @blackroserelina @blackstarlight-co @readingalldaysleepingallnight @maanae @aespades @jaybird-and-co @fleursroses @probably-a-hologram @misterpianoman @deathssilentapproach-blog @user00000003 @frieddonutsweets @blur-of-colours @prettylittlebutterflie @ladyqnoirr @a-star-with-a-human-name @mizzy-pop @laurcad123 @dorkus-minimus @chocolatecatstheron @tazanna-blythe @golden-promises @literaryhiraeth @asrainterstellar @hewantedbeefintheparkinglot @miraculous-trinity-leo @missanalysis @lovelyautumnsunflower @lolieg @ann0631 @whitetiger1249 @meow-now @toodaloo-kangaroo

#maribat #ml x dc #mlb x dc #soulmate-game #marinette x damian #damian x marinette #damimari #dc x miraculous #dc x mlb #bio!mom harley quinn #eventual daminette #probably #daminette #platonic jasonette #platonic timinette #platonic timari #platonic dickinette #platonic brucinette #Joker can choke on a cactus

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mirrormania · 3 years ago

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@winds-son ASKED: || ❝ This isn’t from a meme or anything, but just for fun: how do you think our muse’s first kiss went? :) ❞

[ hahahahaha :’}

Well, considering we’ve decided it took a bit of time for Makani to even realize his father’s weird doctor was somewhere between trying to be a DILF and simultaneously trying to pass for a 20 year old and ask them out, I imagine it took a little bit of time.... but all the same I love to imagine it was the first time Myron finally moved his mirrors all the way away from his face and looked them in their eyes. ( Just imagine all his mirrors folding back behind him in a wave like a wedding veil haha-- )

Myron deciding to do that is always a serious sign of trust or attachment, so weird a man as he may be, that means a lot to him, if nothing else.

Although, he was absolutely checking his lips and putting on chapstick the entire date he decided he would try and go for it.

Though-- the dumb cliche half of my brain is like.... what if.... it was in the rain. And Myron used his mirrors to block them from getting wet, and that’s why they were away from his face? haha... Myron’s mirrors can make a little roof there’s so many of them tbh. And then woops- there he is, fully visible and unobstructed. And woop what if we kissed in the Inverted Reflection Chamber while we wait for the rain to lighten up. And from the outside they look like the upper half of a disco ball but on the inside it’s Gay.

sajdasdgahd I am not good at coming up with these things without lead-up, but

Listen, Myron may be slightly uncanny in his perfection, but he is soft and he does like having very soft lips, and I’m not saying he kisses a lot of people, but he’s definitely not inexperienced and I’m just saYING he might be a good kisser a little bit-- ]

#winds-son #👁️‍🗨️ *Don't look at me! 👄 || o.o.c.#👁️‍🗨️ *You can spare me a little time! 👄 || ask.#[ im gonna need a tag for makani huh- ]

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siramay-the-showgun-dragon · 4 years ago

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Nothing changes

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28144008/chapters/77507987

Just to make things clear... (go on) Last night, I was attacked by someone wearing a mask... (yep) And whoever that was--now they're... I don't know why, but now they're laying dead in front of me... (I can neither confirm nor deny this query)

Makoto: what is that supposed to mean.

Siramay: I can neither confirm nor deny this query sorry you’re on your own.

So after seeing the corpse they began to investigate what could possibly have happened and then they tried to tell who it was and take of her mask and then

*KABOOOOOOM*

Siramay: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO LOOK AT HOW THEY MASSACRED MY GIRL WHY MUST YOU BE SO CRULE UNIVERES

...there was a blinding light, and a deafening roar. The body...blew up. It blew up it blew up it blew up it blew up it blew up it blew up it blew up it blew up!

Needless to say the survivor gang tried to put out the fire, but the damage was done WAS HER DEATH NOT ENOUGH FOR YOU! YOU GO AND DAMAGE HER BEAUTY TO!? Well even so may she still be an angel at first they all thought it kyoko, but they did bring up the possibility of it being the mastermind.

Makoto: Is it the teenage girl Kyoko told me about? The Ultimate Destrawberry...?

Siramay: you still doing that?

Makoto: you can never be to sure, also its funny

Siramay: true

Then makoto told the others about mukuro ikusaba the ultimate des-…. I’m running out of food… destarfruit.

Byakuya: There's another student here, and it's a female? That *would* match the body's characteristic...

Aoi: And that phrase, the Ultimate Des-

Siramay: NOOOO!!

magic

Aoi: Desblackberry--it sounds super mastermind-y, doesn't it?

Makoto: what did you do this time siramay?

Siramay: now no one can say desboysenberry MAHAHAHAHHA.

IT WAS THE ONLY THING SHE HAD LEFT WHAT DID SHE DO TO DESERVE THIS!? …do I even need to answer that?

yasuhiro: Okay, so...the mastermind is this girl Mukuro? And she's a student here? And she's the Ultimate Desdragonfruit? But if she's been hiding here in the school like some teenage Bigfoot...how'd she wind up burnt to a crisp!?

Well needless to say they went to investigate the body, also toko is ok what makoto saw was a strange key on the ground, then bayakuya kicked makoto out to look for the door the key opens.

Siramay: it opens the data center.

And makoto immediately went to tell them, REALY NO CHECKING!? then when they went they forced makoto to open the door incase it blew up, rude and so he opened it.

Siramay: behold…. THE MASTERMIND LAYER!!

Dramatic pose Epic thunder sounds

Makoto: where that come from?

Siramay: where do you think.

So yeah they saw all the cameras and such the mastermind uses to watch everyone.

So they all think mukuro was the mastermind BASELESS SLANDER and that shes dead, eh I don’t care I got a David bowie stash to find and steal then they wanted to investigate the data lab to find out secrets since they think zetsu was murdered.

Byakuya: Naturally. The state of the corpse makes it plain as day. There is absolutely no doubt the mastermind was murdered.

Siramay: ah not clearly they laid down put their coat on top of them and stabbed themselves in the stomach.

Makoto: really?

Siramay: no!

Well anyway they began to investigate the room like how the monodoor was locked and oh look a tv antenna witch they had yasuhiro use to connect to the tv which showed them and on every channel to how confusing oh and look monokuma was here.

Siramay: HES ALLLIIVVVEEE

They also said he’s acting different, but I don’t get that they seem the same to me, must be the madness of isolation.

Makoto: Oh yeah, that's it. Puhuhu... The look on your faces right now is sublime!

Siramay: it is kinda funny.

Monokuma: That's what I wanted to see--the moment you went from hope to despair.. I can say it myself naegi!

Siramay: OH NO I FORGOT MY MAGIC DOSENT WORK ON THEM AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH

Then siramay jumped away in a portal in fear

monokuma: Well, it's almost time to cut off your past so full of hope and begin to DESPAIR at the future ahead of you! I want you to all have way more fun in this killing game!

Then monokuma said other things

This life isn't all bad ya know! I mean, there's stuff you won't like about life no matter where you are!

Siramay pops his head out of a tiny portal.

Siramay: that’s fair

Toko: Are you s-serious? This place is the w-worst...!

Monokuma: If it's the worst, does that mean you're in...despair? Ahh-hahahahaha!

Siramay: man you’re running millage on that word guess it makes sense its all you have left.

I say holding the secret stash of David bowie music I could burn this all right now in their face… no I shouldn’t I could use this later anyway also as a music man the songs are indeed quite good so anyway monokuma talks about how the tvs a clue.

Monokuma: Everything has a meaning, you know... All those hints I gave you, all those tantalizing tidbits about the school's mysteries... Even me luring you here right now... Why would I do any of that without a reason?

Siramay: ah so you admit it!

Monokuma: It was all for my captive audience--to show them true despair like they'd never seen it before!

Siramay: riiiiiggghhtt all right keep your secrets and ignore me not like I care!

Monokuma: I became the director of a despair-based production! This is the ultimate reality show! The best in despair entertainment!

A single tear sheds from siramays eye from being ignored.

Course monokuma went on and on about there evil but then he stopped cause after all if there still alive that means there not the body and if there not the body that means there’s another murder a foot and if there’s another murder a foot that means A TRIAL SHALL SOON COMENCE BUM BUM BUUUUMM

And then...he was gone. Reality was incomprehensible, the truth hopelessly out of reach. All we were left with...was despair. (monokuma: GOT IT! New ringtone!) We stood there for I don't know how long, frozen in place. I couldn't think- AW I COULD HAVE SAID DESPUMPKN GOSH DARNIT! (monokuma: you lose!) (it’s not over till the despair lady sings!). It took everything I had just to keep myself standing upright.

Yasuhiro: I don't understand any of this... What's "deswatermelon entertainment"? (monokuma: don’t start this again!) (to bad!) And...how is he still alive!?

Also byakyua thinks kyoko is dead cause his blatant and disrespectful slander of saying mukuro is the mastermind SLANDER I SAY! Course makoto refuses to believe it WITCH IS FAIR AS ITS AS FALSE AS ZETSUS HAIR COLOR and so the investigation begun, and so makoto went back to the garden, he saw fragments a knife, also makoto got all worried about murdering them awe no baby boi you didn’t do that then they checked the chickens.

Siramay: THERES NOT FIVE ANYMORE

I count four chickens.

Siramay: HINA YOU ATE A CHIKEN AND DIDN’T SHARE

Makoto: really?

Siramay: no

Then he recalled how the body looked before the boom, then they talked about the body was found, and byakua was suspicious about makoto thinking he’s the killer witch is not true at all, though I will admit it’s a fair point BUT MAKOTO IS AN ANGEL HE’D NEVER KILL and then makoto looked closer at the body..neeeeeerrr

Siramay: sad dragon noises

Makoto: … yes?

Siramay: look at those fake nails shed never where them she was forced to she couldn’t even have the honor of dyeing as herself what sick twisted monster would do that to a girl sob.

Makoto also noticed the wolf tattoo.

Siramay: yee I say she liked wolfys makoto but uh it had a more bisunessy reason but can’t say but shes a good girl she deserved head pats and love I hope she gets all the love in heaven, because she never got it here sob.

The upper half of the body got set on fire in the explosion, so it's totally blackened... Also, the top half of the body is wet.

SOB

Siramay just kinda stayed looking at the body in sadness.

Makoto also saw a tarp in the toolshed, then makoto wanted to investigate kyokos room, but first he realized the thing about the bomb but then they were allowed to go to kyokos room saw a woodblock key, then after talking to byakuya he recalled kyokos last will and testament sadly instead of giving makoto money or at least a boot to the head all it said was “under the sheets” in which makoto found a note about mukuro.

Siramay: aaayyy that’s my giiirrllll.

“Name: Mukuro Ikusaba

Sex: Female

The Ultimate Soldier (so coooool)

Although small for her age, she was a military specialist trained in every weapon type imaginable. (she could crush your skull with her thighs!) She showed an interest in the military from childhood and soon found herself completely absorbed in it. In elementary school, she won a survival game tournament and began writing for military magazines. (soooo cooool oh I already said that…well its true)

Just before entering middle school, while she and her family were on vacation in Europe (Ireland specifically shes half Irish don’t ya know makoto)...she disappeared. The story of a young Japanese girl being kidnapped quickly took over Japanese media outlets (her grandfather died! But he had it coming). An intense international investigation turned up no information, and she was never found. (she must be smart to stay hidden or at least I think so clever girl but never appreciated)

However, she reappeared in Japan three years later (could have sworn it was 4), alone and completely unannounced. She revealed that she had joined a mercenary group known as Fenrir for those three years. She insisted that she hadn't been kidnapped, that she'd received battle training of her own volition. However, she never revealed why she decided to return home when she did.” (…its complicated you know hard to explain with parents dying and your father figure telling you not to give up on family and siblings who may or may not have turned super evil while you where gone….. I don’t wanna talk about it)

Then byakua said how he recognized Fenrir

Siramay: oh yeah I know about it to!

Makoto: can you say anything about it.

Siramay: awe yeah its multiverseal! I’ve heard in many words I traveled to of the infamies Lycan family and there gang of fighters who follow the wolf loving war and all that heard about them all the way back in the 1800s with the great vvulf from the DD dimension though maybe they are older then even that and of course I can’t forget that cunning Worriz and the twisted gang in the 1980-2000s nearly killed a good friend of mine that guy did, though in your time in this world it was run by a Mr. Wayne Lycan he was cool a bit on the scrawny side though that’s why he worked twice as hard to prove the worth to his father that he could leady the business named ATM to Fenrir how fancy oh he was like the father mukuro never had and always wanted though I do have to question how sensible the man was to just allow a 10-11 year old into a mercenary gang but he did care about her he cared about her greatly he was so proud to see her fight and be victorious in battlefield… he must be just as sad as I about her death and what that cruel excuse for a sister did to her he said it himself he said “if anything happens to mukuro I’ll kill everyone on the battlefield then myself” so if he wasn’t already dead I assure he’s dead now

Makoto: how do you know all this

Siramay: I know everything makoto and also nothing at all.

And then monokuma showed up and was all mad about rule breaking and making a fuss about it.

Monokuma: Of course I am! A proper school life is built on the dedication to organization and order! Which is why even I, as the school headmaster, have to follow the regulations myself!

Byakuya: Oh? So you're saying you have to follow your own rules, as well?

Monokuma: Absolutely! I can't have you complaining about how unfair it all is, now can I?

Siramay: riiiigggghhhttt

Makoto: ?

Siramay: I’m just saying makoto there are two types of villains, villains who will literally kill themselves when their world order is broken and villains who will fuss about it but when the time comes will break the rules as easily as they made them, now just look at monokuma and everything he’s done and ask yourself which type he looks like

Then monokuma admitted how there where 16 students and he is one of them then he also revealed kyokos secret about her KFH (kyoko fried hands)

Monokuma: You know how she wears those stupid gloves day in, day out, all the time? Well, don't tell anyone I told you, but... She wears them to cover a bunch of hideous scars that she doesn't want anyone to see!

Makoto: ...What?

Monokuma: Puhuhu. Okay, NOW that's all you get! Ahh-hahahahaha!

And then they left

Siramay: how rude talking about kyokos hand scars I bet you wouldn’t like it if I talked about your back scars.

Makoto: they have scars?

Siramay: yeah but it aint like kyokos that come from burning hers come from FLAELLATION!!

Siramay pulls out said tool above you know classic family abuse I would talk about it, but I feel its cliche, so I don’t wanna be rude.

Makoto: they used that!?

Siramay: oh no her parents used more a basic stuff like riding crops and their fist though he did have big fist like bigger than a mug I think, there was this one tool, but I can’t recall the name OH WAIT!

THE SJAMBOK! these things hurt like death…. but as I was saying oh yeah that old whip was more used by good old grandpa damian, he was the old Irish one I was talking about he was a flagellant and a sado-masochist, so he was delusional but still she was just 10.

Makoto: TEN- makoto covered his mouth as not to react deeply.

Siramay: at least he never got to use the metal ones like this thing!

makoto almost fainted at the thought of what siramay brought up but siramay with a portal grew another hand to catch makoto.

eh its ok makoto whats a little mental damage between friends eh? After all scars may be forever (unless you get scar removal surgery witch they possibly did) but psychological damage will last even longer

anyway with monokumas info makoto realized the corpse can’t be kyoko, cause clearly me constantly calling the course mukuro was totally not valid proof…. Then again mukuro does mean corpse in Japanese maybe makoto just though I was being weird again, but no he would know her name yes! eh I digress anyway byakuya talked about mukuro and kyoko honestly it was pretty confusing.

Byakuya: We thought Mukuro, the Ultimate Despair, was the mastermind's true identity.

Makoto: don’t say that word!

Byakuya: why?

Monokuma getting aroused in the background.

Byakuya: But if that's true, Monokuma's behavior makes no sense. Why would the mastermind go out of their way to reveal themselves to us?

Makoto: That's a good point...

Well anyway they went to investigate the dojo to look at the locker and there where arrows and tape then they went to the archive to learn more about mukuro.

Yaaahhh more mukuro lore

Byakuya: "Fenrir is an elite fighting unit base out of the Middle East (it’s always the middle east why can’t they spice it up by fighting somewhere like Canada) (makoto: Canada really?) (I couldn’t think of anything but man that’s far from Europe don’t yah think. I think they were on draft world tour you know how it is). Unlike military contractors, they are a fierce group of soldiers who engage in direct combat. (fierce wolfy woos) They claim that a single member is equivalent to an entire company of regular soldiers. Just like Fenrir, the Wolf of Ragnarok, their mere presence is enough to strike fear into any enemy. They have been involved in countless military battles and operations, most of which are highly classified. (ou like the great battle of the heart of darkness a literal Eldredge abomination… wait that wasn’t them they were just commissioned by the cultist who found it oh, but they were defeated by the team who did defeat it I can still remember how they sliced vvulf in half)

"However, some time ago, they completely ceased all activity. At present, their continued existence cannot be confirmed. There are unconfirmed reports that the key members of the group were all neutralized. Rumors indicate they were killed to keep them from revealing the many state secrets they'd acquired. Some, however, believe there was mounting internal tension within the group, and they simply imploded." (WAYNE NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO) ……(PLEASE DON’T BE WHAT I THINK HAPPENED) (makoto: what do you-) (IM NOT SAYING!! As long as I don’t think it happened it didn’t happen, no no… oh no I can see nonononononoon! MAKOTO DISTRACT ME)

Makoto: ...

Siramay: at least Wayne and mukuro can reunite in heaven…

Byakuya: ...What is it?

Makoto: This all just sounds like some kind of...alternate reality.

Byakuya: Well, it isn't. This is *our* reality, the *only* reality (that’s not exactly true!). These people are part of our world. Their battlefields aren't much different from our lives here. An unpredictable, unimaginable world...

Also makoto realized the Fenrir people getting tattoos and that mukuro had a wolf tattoo and then it was time for the class trial, so as makoto went to the red doors siramay…started to beat box.

Siramay: bum bum bum bum bum bum bum a body’s been discovered a person has been murdered one of your fellow students is dead there’s a giant pool of blood and your names dragged through the mud gotta prove who is messed up in the head.

Well despair starts coming and it don’t stop coming don’t break the rules or you better get running dosent make sense why you’re trapped in here not what you expected from a new school year.

you’ve called it quits you’ve had enough so whats wrong with picking the knife up you’ll never leave if you don’t kill you’re gonna die if you just chill.

hey now! you’re the blackened! time for trial how sad!

Hey now! look what happened you got found out to bad.

And not its punishment tiiimmmee killers have to pay for their criimme.

Eh? Eh?

Makoto: …that was actually pretty good.

Siramay: YEAAHHH

Well when makoto got in the elevator everyone assumed him and byakuya where being gay (NO THEY WENRT) yes they were makoto, and so they where waiting for the elevator to go down… but go down it did not, it was a little over ten minutes, then monokuma showed up to explain the predicament, and then, like a hero in the climax of the movie, like a great explosion in a mine KYOKO WAS HERE ALLLIIIIVVVVEEEE even if yasuhiro thought she was a ghost so the others went to the elevator but makoto had a heart to heart with kyoko first, where makoto ask what kyoko was doing and she says how she was on the second floor dorms revealing that the key she had was a master key that could open any door in the school but they didn’t have much time to go further as they had to go to the trial, then kyoko sounded suspect but that ok cause it was trial time

Being the last one left, I stepped into the elevator. And the doors slid shut... This time, the clunking was loud enough to hurt my ears, and the dread began to consume me once again... I can't imagine ever getting used to the mental pressure that comes with preparing for an execution. In that dusky darkness, nobody said a word. We just stood there, silent, and still. After an immeasurable period of time, the doors opened without warning... A dazzling light penetrated every depth of my eyes. But it wasn't the illuminating light of hope... It was the blinding light of descarrot.

Makoto: OH SNAP NO IT WAS THE BLINDING LIGHT OF A FASHION DISASTER OH KODAKA! WHO DID YOUR HOME DECORATING? MY WORD IVE SEEN ANIMACROSSING HOUSES BY PEOPLE WITH BLINDFOLDS ON THAT LOOK BETTER THEN THIS

Siramay: I’ve heard of eyestrain but my word.

Monokuma: …rude Ahh, I've been waiting for this! I feel like it's been forever since we got together like this... The time for pointless jokes and jabs has passed. Let's get on with the show!

And so, the curtain opened for the fifth time... A deadly judgment... A deadly deception... A deadly betrayal. A deadly riddle, a deadly defense, and deadly faith... A deadly...class trial...!

SOOO COOOLL so the trial started.

Started with hagakure saying kyoko was dead and the one on podium was a GHOOOOOSSSTTT hahahahahahah thankfully makoto proved that argument wrong as they now needed to identify the real body victim …not thinking about it I guess that’s why he needed other not me proof to prover her identity he can’t just say “its mukuro cause the magic dragon only I can see told me so” hahahah they think he’s crazy so they talk about her tattoo.

Toko: Her master m-must have made her get it...to be like, "You're my *censored* ."

Crying cause shes not entirely wrong in a sense

But yeah so they all realized the corpse is mukuro.

Monokuma: Ah-ha-ha-ha! You sound surprised! But you're absolutely right! Yes, indeed! The trial this time is to solve the murder of Mukuro Ikusaba!

Siramay: SHE WAS TOO GOOD FOR THIS WOOOORRLLLDDD

Anyway

Aoi: But I mean...being the Ultimate Des-

Makoto: HINA NO!

Aoi: uh des…lettuce seems like a pretty mastermind-y title to me... sorry we’ve been out of fruits we have to go with vegetables now.

Monokuma: I don’t like this idea that’s spreading…

Byakuya: : Maybe we shouldn't have been thinking of her as the Ultimate Despair (makoto: EGGPLANT) in the first place.

Monokuma: I heard it~

Needless to say as they were talking about masterminds and all that and how mukuro wasn’t the big bad monokuma wanted to avoid the subject and move on to the fact the only 2 subjects that could have killed mukuro are kyoko and makoto, despite neither doing it but I digress so makoto had to clear his name so he explained cause the body’s dry (besides the water outage) that it had to have happened during 7:30-9 course that leaves kyoko without an alibi but kyoko wants to live to solve the school mystery says it’s a trap by monokuma (witch it is) but byakuya does state she had a motive

Byakuya: She thought Mukuro was the Ultimate Des-(makoto: GOARD). In other words, the mastermind behind everything... So she killed her to try and put a stop to all this. Isn't that right, Kyoko? But you made one catastrophic mistake--Mukuro wasn't the mastermind at all.

So in this scenario kyoko opts to bunk makotos alibi unintentionally pining blame on him

And thus began the game OF BLACNKED TENIS where makoto and kyoko kept throwing the title of blackened back to one another stating why they went the killer framing the other in the process crazy right?

Like saying the blood on the body was actually chicken blood to make it look wet when it could have been dry

Makoto: wait why did they have to stab a chicken for the blood couldn’t they just stab the body?

Siramay: blood coagulates sometime after the body dies though.

Makoto: well how long?

Siramay: uhhh I donno, OH like at least 10 hours or so

Makoto: that would have been plenty of time!

Siramay: … cringing cause he knows mukuro was dead for over a month so her blood would be long past coagulated but unable to tell makoto cause if he revealed that he would be spoiled for knowing something is suspicious about the trial right.

So they continued with this argument and then kyoko brings up the ultimatum that they couldn’t have had the dojo key cause the dojo key was in their room and they couldn’t get in their room cause byakua took their key, but makoto knew otherwise since she had the master key and so makoto was left with a huge choice call kyoko out or keep it to himself.

Makoto: siramay what should I do

Siramay: well I can’t say due to the universe but what I can tell you is to follow your heart for you are an angel and your word will always be divine even if not at first glance.

Makoto: what does that mean.

Siramay: you’ll soon find out.

...I've made my decision. I have to believe in Kyoko. There's no way she would kill someone! There has to be some secret here, something that has to do with the mastermind's trap that Kyoko mentioned.

But sadly by holding that info the suspicion crashed down finally on him and stayed there despite makotos please that something is wrong but monokuma wouldn’t have it and ended the trial.

Monokuma: Now, who will be chosen as the blackened? Will you make the right choice, or the dreadfully wrong one?

Makoto: Hey, hold on! siramay! Is this supposed to happen?

Siramay: …

Siramay just sat in silence looking at makoto.

Monokuma: What's it gonna be? What's it gonna beeee!?

And so makoto was deemed guilty.

Makoto: What...? You think *I'm* the killer...?

Yasuhiro: Sorry, man...

Aoi: Yeah, s-sorry...

Toko: It's all your f-fault...!

Byakuya: ...

Makoto: Everyone...you're wrong...! You've got it all wrong! I didn't do it!

Monokuma: Good job, everyone!

Makoto: G-Good job...?

Monokuma: Yeah. They got it right!

Makoto: N-No, I know that's not true... None of this makes any sense... This whole trial doesn't make any sense!

Monokuma: It makes perfect seeeeEEEENNNSSSSSEEE!!! It's the same as always! It's just like all the other class trials! And I'm gonna end it the same way! It's time for your heart pounding, positively thrilling punishment!

Makoto: W-Wait! Why do I--!? siramay!

But siramay just looked at him and started to sing.

[SIRAMAY] Poor, poor Makoto, what'cha gonna do? Things look bad for you, hey, what'cha gonna do? Poor, poor Makoto, what'cha gonna do? Things look bad for you, hey, what'cha gonna do?

Makoto: ... Kyoko--!

Kyoko: I don't expect you to forgive me. I know this is all my fault...

Makoto: Kyoko...?

Monokuma: Let's give it everything we've got! It's...PUNISHMENT TIIIME!

And so he was dragged off to his execution and I could hear him beg.

SIRAMAY! SIRAMAY PLEASE HELP ME SIRAMY? SIRAMAY!!

…

youtube

[SIRAMAY] Why the struggle, why the strain? Why make trouble, why make scenes? Why go against the grain, why swim upstream? It ain't, it ain't, it ain't no use You're bound, you're bound, you're bound to lose What's done, what's done, what's done is done That's the way the river runs

So why get wet? Why break a sweat? Why waste your precious breath? Why beat your handsome brow?

Nothing changes.

Nothing changes, nothing changes Anyhow…

And at the final moment when it seemed all hope was lost for makoto alter ego showed up and opened the trash shoot saving makoto just as expected thank goodness its still sad to see though did have to scream it truly scared me to death I’m glad he’s safe though.

[SIRAMAY] Oh now survivors, how low can you stoop? You make a sordid group, hey, how low can you stoop? Poor, poor makoto, sent off to his grave Situation's stay, hey, sent off to his grave.

And so siramay jumped down after him.

#danganronpa #the tale of depravity #siramay #makoto naegi #monokuma #mukuro ikusaba

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purplesurveys · 4 years ago

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1162

What is the youngest age you can remember back to? I was 3 and I had just woken up in a Winnie the Pooh tent with my sister, who was 1 at the time. Our parents let us go ‘camping,’ which was really nothing more than a tiny tent set up on the floor in their room.

What sports are you trying out for this year? Wakeboarding and rock climbing.

Did you wear your hair in a ponytail today? Yeah it was in a ponytail for the whole day as it helps me focus better at work. I’ve kept the ponytail on even though it’s 11 in the evening right now, but now it’s because it would be too warm with my hair down.

Who do you have on speed dial? Nobody. I’m not sure how to do that with my phone, and even if I knew how to I don’t know if there’d be anyone I’d want to put on speed dial.

What colors do you like to paint your toenails? I never do anything with my toenails except clip them.

Would it be cool to learn how to DJ at a club? Sure!

Where are you going to be three hours from now? It would be 2 AM by then but I highly doubt I’d be asleep by then. I just bought all 7 of the BTS Cold Brew Americano bottles (yep, so much happened while I was gone and I am apparently an Army now...) so I’m drinking from one of them tonight; and they are strong as fuuuuuuuck.

What job would you NEVER take, even as a last resort? Anything related to sex work. Not that I’m against it, but it’s just not for me.

If you broke your computer, would you be able to fix it on your own? Only if it’s something a hard reboot could easily fix haha. If it’s beyond that, I don’t think so.

If someone looked in your closet, how would they judge your style? That I need to update my wardrobe. Most of them were trendy at some point, but not so much these days. They would probably comment that I need to add more colors as well.

What was the shittiest hotel you’ve ever stayed at and why? I’m not sure we’ve stayed somewhere I absolutely hated. I know my dad hated our first hotel in Palawan since the whole vibe of the room felt cheap, the bedsheets looked kinda tacky, and the power went out at night, but that’s also just the luxury liner executive in him. Since I don’t really travel just to stay all day in our hotels, I personally haven’t had any experience where I was like, “never again.”

Have you ever gone on a boat and been sick the whole time? No; I get seasick but I can handle it. It’s carsickness I have a problem with.

Did you get a good sleep last night? Not really. My sleep actually felt very shallow and it really felt like I had been up all night even though I’m pretty sure fell asleep by around midnight. Anyway, I’m getting a 3-day weekend since it’s a national holiday tomorrow, so at least I have a lot of time to catch up on much-needed sleep.

What is the weather like outside? It’s pretty chilly and I feel a few breezes every now and then, but it’s not enough. I’m not sweating, but I also need to have my hair up in a bun because otherwise I’d be too warm. Phone says 27ºC.

If someone makes a spelling or grammar mistake, do you ignore or correct? Mostly ignore. I only ever correct if it’s me who made the mistake by accident.

Do oversized sunglasses actually look good on you? I’ve never tried putting any on, so I wouldn’t know.

What is the most overrated thing in the world? Milk tea. It’s great and delicious I like having my own occasionally, but it’s seriously nothing life-changing.

Have you heard any completely untrue rumors about yourself lately? No. I’d feel sorry for someone who would still be making up rumors in their 20s.

What is one word to describe your room? Progress. It’s come a long way since the breakup.

Have you ever kept something from the wild as a pet? Not in the sense that we caught it ourselves from the wild, but there was one time my sister won a baby chick at a fair when we were super young and we had him for a few days. We tried our best to care for him, but we just weren’t equipped and knowledgeable with what baby chicks need so he didn’t last too long.

Do your parents try to plan out your future for you? No, and I’m glad they aren’t the stereotypical Filipino/Asian parents that dictate how I should be living my life. My mom will sometimes let a comment like “get a boyfriend already” slip through, but she also knows I don’t have the patience for remarks like that so she doesn’t bring it up most of the time.

Do you think that surveys are a huge waste of time? I personally don’t think so. Any activity that helps me relax and gather my thoughts isn’t something I’d call a waste of time.

Are you wearing a hoodie today? No. I would hate to be wearing a hoodie right now lmao, I’d be too miserable in the heat.

Did you sleep alone the last two nights? Yes.

You’re single, right? Yups.

How long was your last phone conversation you had? It lasted like 10 seconds because when I picked up, their signal was very choppy and his voice wasn’t getting through at all.

Who was it with? A delivery rider who sent me a package that Bea apparently arranged for me :’) It has all my favorite Korean snacks and goodies and she even included a cup sleeve of Jin from BTS cos she knows he’s my favorite :(((((

What was it about? Like I said, I never got to talk to him on the phone because his signal was poor, though he probably called to ask for directions. He eventually got to my house.

Excited for anything? Binge-watching Run BTS and Bon Voyage all weekend, and digging into the Frankie’s order I got for delivery tonight.

Got laid last night, didn’t you? Nope.

Do you have drama in your life? Kind of at the moment, but it’s something I couldn’t give less of a shit about so I’m not even getting into it lmao. What’s something you really want right now, be honest? To be able to get out of the house and get my cafe visits on weekends back.

As of this minute, what is going through your mind? That these instant noodles I’m eating are really spicy.

Have you laughed until you cried? Many times.

What are you listening to right now? I can hear a neighbor’s dog barking every now and then and a few airconditioners in the neighborhood whirring.

What color are your shoes? I’m not wearing any right now, but most of my shoes are white anyway.

Can you crack your neck? Nope.

What is the last thing you drank? I took a sip from my banana milk right after I had a forkful of my noodles. Too spicy hahaha.

Where would I have found you last night at 11pm? I was cuddling with Kimi in bed while watching Bon Voyage.

What’s your plans for next Friday? So, tomorrow? Just watch a shit ton of BTS videos since they’re my latest obsession.

Does anyone hate you? Possibly.

Would it be hard seeing someone else kiss the person you like? Erm, don’t really like anyone at the moment. Do you think someone is thinking about you right now? No.

Could you go out in public looking like you do now? Probably to the nearest McDonald’s or 7-Eleven, but I wouldn’t go out to the mall altogether with what I’m wearing.

Who will you be sleeping with tonight? Just meeee.

Is there anyone you wouldn’t mind punching in the face now? Not in particular.

What do you have pierced? Just the ears. < Same.

Do you know anyone that smokes weed? A few people.

Where is the person you want right now? I’m not into anyone.

Are you too forgiving? I’m not forgiving in the first place.

Will this weekend be a good one? Continued from last night. I’m just glad I’ll get to relax for three days, but I don’t have any big plans for the weekend that would make it something exciting.

What is your favorite thing about being sick? I don’t think being sick is particularly fun, even if it means skipping school or work...

Have you ever done something you told yourself you wouldn’t do? Many times, which is why I’ve stopped using the phrase, “I’ll never do X.” I always end up doing whatever the thing is at some point.

Are there any people who don’t like you? It’s possible, but I don’t care.

The boy/girl you truly care about needs you at 3am, would you go? Only for my best friends, and maybe close family members. If you had to get a piercing right now, what would it be? I would get a nose stud or maybe a lip ring.

Do you have any bruises on you? Yeah I have one on my thigh. As usual, I have no idea where it came from.

Are you ticklish? Everywhere.

Ever liked someone who treated you like crap? Yes.

Who do you like right now? BTS? Lmao

What’s the largest age difference between yourself and someone you’ve dated? A month and a half.

Are you gonna get high later? Nope. I know Andi’s always gonna be around as my ~supplier~ if I ever wanna try it out, but I have no plans to any time soon.

What was the first thing you said when you woke up today? That I wanna take a shower.

Do you blow dry your hair? Only for special occasions when I immediately need my hair styled in a certain way.

Do you look decent when you wake up? Some days, I think so.

Have you ever liked someone older then you? I mean they’re all celebrities, but yeah.

Is it hard to make you laugh? Not at all, I like to laugh.

How late did you stay up last night? Around 3 AM because I was watching Bon Voyage, and also memorizing BTS fanchants hahahahaha HELP

Which is worse for you: being hot, or being cold? I fucking hate being hot.

How many drugs have you done in the last three days? Just the caffeine in my coffee and nicotine in my vape.

#survey #surveys

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cassandras-nest · 5 years ago

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.Invisible man.

So here we are, the first chapter is here (and i’m terrified..)

disclaimer 1: english isn’t my first language, so i apologize for any mistake

disclaimer 2: this fic uses references to the very first internet service, chatrooms & all, i was 20 back then and there were no smartphones yet.

disclaimer 3: Deakster:John CoolCat:Cassandra

pairing: 00s John Deacon x OC Cassandra

warnings: brief mention of divorce and paranoia. Age-gap (20/50), extremely slow burn, very angst, probably sweet at very end (multichapter)

thanks @binkyisonline for everything, without her i wouldn’t be here, writing silly things

summary: Newly divorced John Deacon joins the Queen forum’s chatroom with a fake account and start talking with someone who completely understand him and make him feel alive again. He finds himself obsessed with her pretty soon....

"Yeah, I think that laughing makes me feel better. I try to think about good things and smile, even if I had a bad day. It’s better than worrying too much." - John Deacon 1979

*CoolCat is online*

……………………..

CoolCat - Hey D., you’re already here :’D

Deakster -…today was quite boring, so yeah…how was school ?

CoolCat - a really big NOPE day…but I’ll tell you in a bit.

Deakster - oh ok…still busy?

Cool Cat - oh no, not so much, I just came back it’s all..

________

This was her new normal from one month and a half, almost since the day she joined the official Queen forum and the chat room as well.

She was in London from less than a year attending the London Fashion College and apart from people from her classes she didn’t know anyone in particular; she wasn’t much an outgoing person anyway, but it was ok. In her perspective, now her studies were more important.

One day, too much free time on her hands leaded to, finally, join the official Queen chatroom. She was already registered onto the forum but she didn't have time to actually talk to people or post something but that day she was bored, more than usual, and while the school was closed for winter holidays, she found herself with nothing more to do..

Now thanks to an impulsive decision, she found so many people to talk to with the same love and passion for a band that changed her life forever.

Luckily she found some new “friends” too. One in particular who she talked to almost every time she was there, between school, her new part time job and a almost non-existent private life.

She didn’t know much about him, he was nice and very well behaved so she assumed he was a bit older than her. She even didn’t know his real name, not that it wasn’t important but it was ok, for now. She only knew that he lived in London, like her, but she never asked where exactly and he didn’t tell her too. It was just a really nice and easy chat to pass the time and probably she will never see his face so... why bother about all this anyway?

________

CoolCat - so?Why a boring day? Tell me..while I finish up my dinner : )

Deakster - I’m no that interesting y’ know?i don't know why you still talk to me anyway

CoolCat - don't start, i talk to you ‘cause i want it to ...so go on then, wanna know..why boring?

Deakster - I was at home all day, cleaning up…listening to old music, I wasn’t much in the mood for tv or reading today.

CoolCat - sounds interesting ;D

Deakster - i told you it was boring, no need to mock me ):

CoolCat - I will never ;D

Deakster - as much as I want to believe you, I don’t. Are you laughing at me right now, aren’t you?

CoolCat - I assure you I’m not, ok maybe a little bit.. picturing you doing all things housewife-y is fun..and cute, maybe.

Deakster - am I cute now? Now you totally making fun of me, you little devil :’(.

CoolCat - oh, you realizing it now? That i am indeed evil? I thought you said that you were smart once… :).

Deakster - that i am, i didn't know i was going to meet a tempting devil on my way ;)

CoolCat - eh, life's full of surprises …

CoolCat - back on topic, do you still want to hear how bad my day was instead? It's funny...in its own way

Deakster - and probably much more interesting, go on tell me then…

CoolCat - alright …..in short, they didn’t like my patterns at all..not even one….

________

He didn’t even know why he was still there.

It was supposed to be a one time only...twice at least, just to ease up his boring life a little.

But now?

At first the idea of joining the official band forum was absurd - its own band, what the hell he was supposed to do or say?

Hence the idea of creating a fake account, he really missed the people, the noise, the attentions that once were given to him. In short, he missed the fame and he was bored out of his mind..

Newly divorced, although he and his ex wife were still on speaking terms, she was one of the few people to know him well after all, but still, life had put him through a lot and his life had changed so much in few years

Now he find himself in up-north London, all alone in a small fancy apartment, and 50 years old already.

He didn’t want anyone to know it was him, he wanted to be free, just be himself and not the worldwide famous rockstar. So the idea he had seemed the best way to do it

- and quite silly- his ex wife commented once with a laugh..

It was basically hiding in plain sight, if people knew better, his nickname gave it away a lot, but in a Queen forum not really, not so much…

________

Deakster - so you have to do them all over again? Like you did last week ?

CoolCat - basically yes, but better and it’s so frustrating…I know it’s for my own good, I know it but..fuck….. uh, sorry, it slipped :/

Deakster - hahahahaha don’t worry about it, I used to be worst than that :D

CoolCat - really? You didn’t say one single bad word since I’ve known you..

Deakster - that’s because I can behave in front of a young lady ;)

CoolCat - LOL omg! you know, you talk like a really old man.

Deakster - I am an old man !

CoolCat - you’re not, you’re funny! ;D

Deakster - I can be funny and old at the same time y’ know?

CoolCat - haha yeah right xD …

Deakster - ..and you’re mocking me again.. :/

CoolCat - am not, I told you you’re funny..thank you btw, you really cheered me up, sorry about the rambling...

Deakster - my pleasure and..don’t worry about it :D

________

She didn’t know why it was so easy talking to him, but it was indeed, even if they had a limited time whenever they chatted, every time it was worthy it. She felt safe with him, from the first moment they spoke, relaxed even and she really didn't know why..

It was the first time that a man didn’t ask her for special pictures or talk to her in a creepy way and, honestly, it was quite a relief.

Each day that passed she, slowly, became the curious one but and didn’t know how to tell him just after two months but she really wanted to know more about him.

She liked their unusual friendship and really didn’t want to ruin it, so maybe it wasn’t the right time anyway..

CoolCat - as nice as it was, now I have to go..i’m so sorry D. : (

Deakster - oh, it’s ok… :’(

CoolCat - oh don’t cry, I’ll see you another day isn’t it? :D

Deakster - yes! This old man could use some nice company, every now and then..

CoolCat - I’m flattered :* ..i’m a nice company after all…

Deakster - less when you, clearly, make fun of me :P

CoolCat - ouch! You hurt me ;) …. Now for real, I have to go or I’ll have to pay way too much for my internet.

Deakster - allright..allright, listen…

He stopped for a second, torn between his rational mind and his instinct...a question in his mind for days.

Deakster - Can I ask you something?

CoolCat - maybe next time D. but if it’s important…i can stay a little more..i think

Deakster - no, not all…next time it is :D

CoolCat - ok, bye :*

……………..

*CoolCat is offline*

It wasn’t an important matter, but he really wanted to ask...he had that question in his mind for two weeks or so already…

It was stupid? Probably.

It was too soon? Absolutely.

But he felt different, he felt at peace, he felt alive again, all thanks to her..and that’s what he needed these days.

Almost everyday he was there waiting to talk even if for few minutes and he didn't know why. Infact, he knew little about her, but he didn’t wanted to seem too pushy even if he wanted to know more every time.

In almost two month they talked about almost everything: he knows she was a Queen fan and it was a “family thing” like she said; her mother was a long time fan so it was natural for her to knew about the band. She didn’t have a favorite one, she was more into their music and, to his delight, she liked almost every song he wrote, making him feel really proud. He knows she was attending the London College of Fashion and he smiled to himself at the silly coincidence.

She was a big time fan of fantasy literature, especially Tolkien.

What he didn’t know was her real name, it wasn’t important per se but the more they talked, the more he wanted to know.

Was it the same for her? ..

Next time, maybe...?

________

What they didn't know was that the following days soon took an unexpected turn…

Her life was already messy, but this week seemed much more chaotic than usual.

At school they had a bunch of unexpected tests, mostly pointless and boring and at work they changed her shifts without asking and now she was on the afternoon one; It wouldn't be a problem if only she could still study too, but every night she came back from work too tired to do anything more than sleep or eat. So every morning she woke up an hour or two before her actual alarm so she could did something, even if it meant to probably fell asleep in class...

Every night was a struggle to sleep. Her mind wandered to all the things waiting for her the next day and to a specific person, the one who had soon become a pleasant habit in her life and on how much she missed their small late talks.

She sighs, hoping to come back online soon.

The truth was that she really missed him..

________

He was a mess.

He logged in more than usual that week, just to check if she was there, ignoring anyone else, but nothing showed up.

Many times a little voice inside his head told him that this was pathetic, caring for a young girl like that, a girl that didn't know who he was, a girl that had a very busy life, full of interests, a girl that, surely, was not thinking about him like he was with her.

But he did, he can't help it.

She was somehow special to him, someone who listened to him for once, that talked to him not because of his fame but because she wanted to, someone that made him laugh. She was nice to him, that's all.

However deep down he knew it was all a lie.

What will happen when she would discover who he really was?

That thought scared him the most, but still, he was still there looking for her.(missing her)

________

A week passed with no news whatsoever.

She was always tired and impossibly busy, sleeping on her day off..

He was stressed with family issues with no one to talk to

He still hoped that she would showed up one day or another.

Meanwhile his paranoia started to tricked him in the worst way ever...

________

opinions?advices?constructive criticism?..please tell me what you think..

and if you like it, comment and..maybe reblog? thank you

taglist: @bluewillowmom @iwanttoridemybri @deakysgurl @deakys-chesthair @deacytits @spacedust1124719 @stormtrprinstilettos @dontstopmemeow @mydeakydoesme @culturefiendtrashqueen @babyzellodeacon @sitonmyhot-seatoflove @myguardianmailman @raven974 @chasingthespiders @bismillahnah @acdeaky @sohoneyspreadyourwings @supersonicfreddie

sorry two tags didn’t worked properly

#My writing #queen fanfiction #john deacon fanfiction #john deacon x oc #invisible man #John Deacon #oc cassandra #2000s internet #2000 #chatrooms #silly writing #fanfic writing #Queen

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lululawrence · 6 years ago

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lululawrence’s April 2019 Fic List

Click here for previous months’ fic lists

Guess who’s back, back again... I actually wrote that when I drafted this post a month ago and I’m keeping it cause it’s funny ahhaha So this month has been a ride, hasn’t it? I’ve read some amazing fic though, so I’m super excited to talk about it with you! I read quite a few from the Shake Off the Dust collection as well as fics from the beginning of round 2 of @onedirectionbigbang and other various things as I tried and failed to keep up with all the new fic coming out haha We are so blessed to have so much amazing fic. So, without further ado, here are the fics I read and loved this month!

Hazy by @nikogda / nikogda This fic was written for me because I was anxious one day and they saw a post referring to it and they wrote this as a soothing fic for me and lemme tell ya, IT WORKED. It was so soft and... well... hazy. haha I loved it. A great fic to come back to on a rough day, for sure!

Keep Your Hands Up, So I Can See by @goodmorningtoyouuniverse / GMTYUniverse This fic was such a great HP AU! It was enemies to lovers with a touch of misunderstanding and frustrations and just all the good things with cameos by some of our favorite characters from the original series! I loved it very much a lot. It threw me into the world and made me smile quite a bit.

it's in his kiss by @disgruntledkittenface / disgruntledkittenface This is where Maggie took what she wrote through requests on ask and posted them to ao3 for the kiss meme and lemme tell ya! There’s some ships she wrote that I never felt a desire for, and she wrote them so perfectly that I almost started shipping them hahahaa Each chapter is it’s own little world and it pulled me in so entirely that they felt like full fics! How does she do that in such few words? I dunno. But they’re all glorious. Every last one. Defo a great read when things are hard too, i’d read a chapter when I had a moment and it made my busy, stressful days so much better.

Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now by @allwaswell16 / allwaswell16 I think this one was written for the short fic fest, and I loved it so so much! She describes Harry’s movements as “giraffing about” or something like that and I will never stop laughing about that. Add to it that Harry in the fic legit thought Louis was a mannequin and I just DIE. It’s amazing. Such a silly, fun fic!

Soju (소주) by @gettingaphdinmomo / gettingaphdinlarry This is a Shiall fic that just drew me in. It has such a visual and atmospheric pull to it, like all of her fics do, and it makes you almost feel as if you’re somehow there. I dunno how she does it, but her magic is worked for sure with this fic and I had to just sit there, and process when it ended. A fun, short fic to easily get lost in.

Just Go With It by @rainbowsandlovehl / rainbowslovehl (Larrymateforlife) This fic!!!! Meet Cute heaven! It was light and fluffy and awkward and silly and I loved it so much and for real this Brett character was TOO MUCH. hahahahaha With the added fun of the little jokes like talk of organic guacamole etc and I loved it so much. It was the smile I needed.

All I Want Is To Fall With You by @2tiedships2 / 2tiedships2 Mel keeps posting fics that are so fun! How does she do it? This time the crew takes on a ski trip and Louis has to deal with stupid alphas staying in the same cabin without knowing about it beforehand and of course nothing goes to plan! That’s half the fun, though, right? Besides. The alphas aren’t that bad. haha

Do You Wanna Ride by @phd-mama / phdmama She wrote this fic for @justalittlelouislove and I screamed reading it the whole time. I took so long reading it because I kept stopping to scream and share how uncomfortable I was over the obvious awkwardness and sexual tension and it was just SO SO SO GOOD. The embarrassment just gahhhhhhh I loved it.

Strawberries & Cigarettes by @dimpled-halo / dimpled_halo A year later I FINALLY read this and I loved it as much as I knew I would. I wanted pain, and it gave it to me! It gave me pain and healing and a gorgeous story. It was such a great read, I’m so so happy I finally had the time to dedicate to it because it was just. So much of everything I love.

Let It Down by @red--special / red_special This fic has also been on my to read list for ages and I am also so so happy I got to read it finally! It was such a great fic and so much fun and so sexy and funny and awkward and I wanted to bask in it a little longer. It was so so good. hahahaha I keep thinking about the tattoo and I can’t stop giggling. Just do yourself a favor and read this fic. haha

Like A Siren In The Night by @crazyupsetter / whoknows This is an a/b/o fic that I could not get enough of or read fast enough. It’s historical, though that doesn’t play a major role, and the playing with the world building was SO MUCH FUN to read. The way their relationship developed as well was just DELICIOUS. I loved every second of it.

please forgive me if my lips quake by @disgruntledkittenface / disgruntledkittenface Girl direction! With a cat! I was heart eyes the entire fic and once again, such feeling was evoked in it that I wanted to just sit and enjoy it for awhile longer. Sigh. What pure enjoyment! I loved it.

I was the King (tonight let it go) by @sadaveniren / SadaVeniren I... Okay listen. lollll I didn’t write this obviously, but it felt like such a self indulgent read I almost wished I had? If that makes sense? It was everything I love. I LOVE the emotional side and thought behind BDSM. Like, that’s most of what makes it so so so interesting and fascinating for me to read, and Sada gave that to us with this fic in DROVES as well as the fighting against natural inclinations etc etc etc. It was just a fab fic and I loved so so so much of it.

Failure to Launch by @all-these-larrythings / Rearviewdreamer Michelle has a way of taking things I don’t know about and making me love them so so so much. This film was one that many I knew loved and I felt mainly meh about it, but I knew if Michelle wrote it I would love it, and I WAS RIGHT. She took all the things I was not fond of in the original and twisted them so it still referenced the original source, but made it so much better. I loved it so so so much because it was so very much like the original film, but also very much her own.

Come Home to Me by @pocketsunshineharry / ishiplouis I wanted pain, and pain was what I got. I cried and I kept waiting and waiting for things to come together again and they finally did! But WOW the pain leading up to that! It was amazing how much was harnessed in it. I will say, please beware the tags. Some heavy topics are handled in the fic - including some depression/anxiety etc - so please be safe with that. A great read, though!

fondre ton absence by @scrunchyharry / scrunchyharry OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG I just. I’m a sucker for WWI and WWII period anything. It’s one of my favorite periods in history for the social, political, militaristic, just EVERYTHING historically. I find it fascinating and I adore it. I was both excited and wary how this would go then, knowing how much I love it. Well. I cried the entire way through and was in awe of how the time period and everything was handled. It’s an amnesia friends to lovers wartime period-typical homophobia acknowledging fic which basically means it is my dream fic. I cannot rave about it enough, much less the incredible art that was done by @whenthebodiesspeak!!! It was STUNNING and yeah. Just. Amazing. A masterpiece.

An Unbalanced Force by @kingsofeverything / FullOnLarrie MAROLD HAROLD with art by @goodmorningtoyouuniverse! I cried a few times during this one and it was such a realistic and beautiful and comprehensive view of a relationship, of adulthood, of trying to find love again after, just... all of it. It is a study of flawed individuals trying to make do and learning where their lines are and it is gorgeous. I loved it so so so much and I keep randomly thinking about it. A great fic and worth the wait and teasing she gave us over the months! hahahaha

That's What I'm Here For by @taggiecb / taggiecb ANOTHER DREAM FIC, ANOTHER FIC THAT MADE ME CRY! I cannot rave enough about how this big bang has kicked off, like, I just truly cannot. @noellehenry did a gorgeous moodboard for it as well, and I just. Demisexual farmer Louis who has been on his own for so long he just. Hardly knows how to be social anymore and Harry has to come and teach him and I’m about to give away spoilers so I’ll stop but this fic is so close to my heart, okay? I love love love love love it.

To Carry Onward by @londonfoginacup / LadyLondonderry THIS LITTLE FIC!!! I keep yelling, I know. Sorry not sorry. But for real it’s 500 words and just...so full of love and longing and mystery and hope and I cannot. I love Emmu’s words and worlds and this is no exception.

A Spell and A Spark by @dinosaursmate / dinosaursmate It’s out in the world! This fic was everything I needed when I read it. I was having a really rough time, and I would get to the end of those days and get to read this fic and it soothed me, cheered me, and took me away to another world. It was so much fun and just pure joy to read. And then the art that @londonfoginacup made for it! It was such a great combo of writing and art. Another wonderful fic for big bang!

{insert acclaimed artist} was never even in love anyway by underthesunlight This is the first of several fics I read from the Shake Off the Dust collection and it was such a fun read. It was domestic and silly and soft and it made me smile.

Primtemps by @londonfoginacup / LadyLondonderry She’s just so good, isn’t she? I finished this fic and almost immediately went back to the beginning because I wanted to read it again. It’s so soft and you could almost SMELL what she was describing. It was a perfect read of a perfect day and it made me long for the days in the past that I’d had like it. Glorious.

Taking Care of You (Is My Favorite Thing) by @allthelarrylovex / cherrylarry Niam! Not usually my pairing of choice, but I loved it so much. I also very much identified with the shitty allergies aspect of it as I am dealing with that myself at the moment, so it just had me sitting there nodding like IT REALLY DOES SUCK BABES I GET IT hahaha

You Keep Me Warm by @crinkle-eyed-boo / crinkle-eyed-boo (KimmieRocks) I’ve not read Own the Scars yet, but I still read this despite it being a time stamp, and I’m so glad I did. I loved it and it made me smile. It also made me want to read the original, so I can’t wait until I have a chance to!

Love's Gentle Spring by @laynefaire / Layne Faire (HisDarlin) This is also a continuation! It’s a fun addition to her spring drabbles from last year, which are not necessary to read in order to enjoy this, though it does add to the fun hahaha I loved that little series so much and was very very glad she made this addition!

Housewives of Our Lives by @homosociallyyours / homosociallyyours I’ve never watched any of the housewives shows, but that didn’t matter. As usual Megan wrote a fic that had me wanting to be their friend and hang out with them as they did these ridiculous things because it sounded like such fun. I loved it as well.

A Larry Limerick by @kingsofeverything / FullOnLarrie I know this was mostly silly and to be funny, but I enjoyed it so I’m including it here hahaha

sun, here it comes by @louandhazaf / YesIsAWorld and It's been a long, cold, lonely winter by @kingsofeverything / FullOnLarrie I’m putting both of them here, because if you haven’t read them yet you should. They are two sides of the same story, and I fully recommend you read them in the order I listed them too haha I did and it was wonderful and delightful and basically all things good. SO much fun.

just me, him, and the moon by HazHas4Nips This was cuuuuuuute! I don’t even know what more to say, I just keep sitting here and smiling thinking about it. So I guess if you want a fic that makes you smile, this is a great little one.

Spring Break by @allwaswell16 / allwaswell16 This fic came out of a partially true story and it was so much fun to finally be able to read what Anitra did with it haha I was giggling and loving it so so much the entire way. As usual. Can’t go wrong.

What's Mine is Yours by @uhohmorshedios / yeah_alright This fic is listed as a Narry fic, and it is, but it’s Narry friendship which made me giggle so so so much! hahaha It was so funny and the way Harry was described and Niall’s just...almost annoyance? I can’t even explain. It’s so much fun.

Latching Onto You by @reminiscingintherain / reminiscingintherain This fic is pure fluff. Fluff and silliness and all things sweet and good. I was trying to find the best way to describe it and the first thing that came to mind was it was a bowl of sweet dessert and I finally realized it’s a parfait. It’s got layers, but all of it is sweet and soft and yummy. hahaha SO if that sounds like something amazing in a fic, then you defo wanna give this a read!

Face Your Fears by @sadaveniren / SadaVeniren I’ll be honest, I finished this one around 2 am after a very long day and had to wake up too early again this morning, so I still haven’t fully computed this fic lollll Just know the pain is real, it is glorious, the journey the characters all take and the way Harry and Louis’ relationship grows is so incredible, I just... this fic is everything I’ve wanted in an a/b/o since I started reading a/b/o almost five years ago haha

And that’s my very long fic list from this month! I hope you enjoy them as much as I did if you give them a try. And please remember to leave nice comments and kudos for the authors who work so hard to gift us with these stories! Happy reading :D

#mine #fic list #my fic rec #fic rec #april 2019 fic list #28th appreciation #fic writer appreciation

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sshmaign · 5 years ago

Text

Lemme show you some of our out of town gala... Also my first vacation with my boyfriend. So ayan, my parents allowed me because I’m of legal age and I pay my own tix? Hmm ;)

Cebu, 2017.

Visited the City, Cebu, where I left half o my heart and where I promised myself to bring with me my loved one the next time I will be visiting it. 🖤 Went with two of my closest friends, Sheena and Chelsea, which happened to be their first out of town also. Aint that exciting, huh? Here are some of the photos...

First two, as you can see is the Famous Simala of Cebu. It was overwhelming visiting such place with someone you love. Parang sinagot na poon prayers ko? But then... temporary lang pala yon. Hahaha! But it’s fine, felt thankful narin I was given the chance to feel that kind of love. Then last two, it was in IT Park, where he had his epic experience. Hahahahaha! Fuck wait. Still makes me laugh hard whenever I remember what happened that day. Sa sobrang nakakatuwa yang trampolines na yan, it ripped off his pants. Hahahaha! I actually have it’s video pero couldn’t find it na. Anyway, good thing we were going back to city and brought with us our clothes kaya may extra siyang pants na dala jan. It was one adventurous experience tho. :>

I actually forgot where this is, but it’s one of Cebu’s nicest hotel somewhere in Mactan. Aslo my first to wear two-piece in public, bitch. Hell yea with my confidence. Hahaha. At kasama pa ang jowa, binggo ano?

Manila, 2018

After a year, we decided to have our second vacation in a different place this time, altho not with almost the same people pero hindi tlga mawasala official photographer namin, Si Sheena, also my partner everytime I plan to book ticket out of town. Haha! We have couple of pictures pero hindi ko na mahanap, mabuti na rin yon para hindi ako magdamdam. Hahaha. Oa lang. As you can see from the photos I’ve posted, it isn’t the picture that you want to see from a blog or even worth posting in any social media account but I was left with no choice. Ang story kasi niyan, we were in Manila Ocean park, as you expect hindi tlga na eempty yan place nyan, especially jan sa may aquarium, but fortunately, universe is coinciding, we were given the chance to have pictures. Yung may kukuha tlga samin, at nagkataon pa na may dumaan one of the staff, kaya masaya talaga kame. After taking couple of shots ang saya namin and we gracefully thank that staff, not knowing what the result could be. The momet we saw the pictures, gusto ko nalang mapamura. Hahahaha. Koya naman, blurred lahat! Tangina >_< oh dba? Sayang kasi may mga tao ng dumating after that. Hahaha hayy atleast may pictures kame, idaan nalang natin sa edit. Dami pang nangyari jan, like away naming dalawa na akala mo hindi na matatapos. I just have to say this ( for remembering purposes in the future). Whenever we go on a trip, feels like he’s a different person. It’s kinda like, he isn’t him, parang nakawala sa cage na gustong mag mukhang single, at walang pakealam sa kasama. And the other one is, napaka clingy in public which does not always happen in Zamboanga. So both advantage and disadvantage. You get my point m right?

Manila 2.0, 2018.

This one’s our last one. Literally LAST ONE. 😂😂😂

It wasn’t actually planned at all. Know why? That was when I was about to depart Philippines. This time iba naman kasama namin, si Yam, one of my close friends also. Ang dami mong closee friends ano? Thank You, Lord. ♥️

I went to Manila days before he did, kasi nga I was waiting for my Ticket to Doha nalang, then back then he had this serious violation sa hospital and was sanctioned to suspension. I don’t know if it was God’s plan but I believe it was one way for us to spend our quality time together before I finally let go... Hmm. Premonitions, sense that, huh? So ayon, humabol siya sa Manila and stayed there for 5 days. It didn’t go well at all. Ikaw ba naman, sobrang mixed na emotions ko nyan, jusko. Sa umaga I was euphoric, like I was spending time with him worrying nothing. Tapos sa gabi, iiyak nalang ako kasi another day has ended and paikli ng paikli ang oras but all I ever needed was to stay strong and spend the most out if it instead. Photos taken in a mall, before kame manuod ng movie, Exes baggage,which again took part sa lives naming dalawa. Hindi ko alam pero tlagang everything that had happened in Manila, happened for a reason. Evey fucking single thing... Pero wala pa yan sa mind ko those times kay mas pinili ko nalang magenjoy. Second photo, Sam G with bb and Yammy. My god ang struggle to be able to be there. Unli lakad? Reached different branches na siguro, and finally sa branch na pinagusapan namin ni Yam. Hahaha. Of course we had fun grilling and eating. Hayyy last na pala yon. 😂

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meny-sempai · 6 years ago

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MO DAO ZU SHI IS A MASTERPIECE – part 04

Hey guys!

First of all:

How is it possible that there are only 19 votes for this? Jeez…

This week’s newsflash!

Quote from the novel:

“Every day when Wei Wuxian was free, he played with the toddler Wen Yuan, son of Wen Qing’s cousin. He either let him hang on trees or buried him in the ground, fooling him that he’d grow faster if he was watered and bathed in sunlight… Turning around, though, he realized that Wen Yuan was gone. He almost turned pale, searching for the toddler all along the streets. Suddenly, he heard the wails of a child, and he immediately rushed over…

…

Wei WuXian, “Do you want one?”

Wen Yuan thought that he was going to buy one for him. He spoke embarrassedly, “Yeah.”

Yet, Wei WuXian walked in the opposite direction, “Haha, let’s go.”” (ch74)

Wei Wuxian, my son, you are so adorably horrible at parenting. Do keep it up. AND. If you think I’m not gonna use this in my favour, you’re wrong:

“Wei WuXian laughed madly, “Hahahahaha! Lan Zhan, congratulations! He’s taken a liking to you! He hugs the leg of whoever he likes, and he never lets go.”” (ch74)

“Jiang Cheng didn’t know when, but a child about one or two years old crept over and hugged his leg. Raising his chubby chin, he looked up at him with his dark, round eyes.” (ch73)

My boy JC = instant like. The children know.

Aaand that’s a wrap, see you guys next time!

… You wish. Let’s get started!

Before I begin I’ll just repeat this for the new readers:

I’m not a native English speaker so please bear with the mistakes I’m bound to make. I did read the novel, but only as far as the Exiled Rebels Scanlations translated it (thank you Rebels, you’re gods). I know a lot of spoilers, but I can’t say I know the whole story – If I start theorising be aware that I’m just theorising, I’m not actually telling the plot, but, just to be sure: SPOILERS ahead, I will use the facts I know for my analysis.

In this short series I’ll talk about the episodes, but I’ll also have long monologs about a certain topic.

EPISODE 07 – or, man I hate the Wens but I LOVE that theme music of theirs

… Has anyone ever told you the story about the boy who cried wolf?

And half of the fandom just died in the most satisfying death. I love how he just took a glance at the tables and was like: Nope, I’m not having any of this shit. And I’ll be theatrical and dramatic about it for all to see.

Remember what I said in one of my posts about the clans - how they don’t seem to be willing to play as a team and mostly watch their own? I think there’s a lot of truth in this and I suppose this is one of the reasons why the Wens grew so much in power. Nie sect obviously has a grudge against the Wens and wants to act on it. Now that Nie Mingjue is old enough he could do it. In theory. But without the assistance of other sects it would be suicidal. Was that why the Wens left Nie Mingjue and his brother alive after they killed their father? Did they know the other sects wouldn’t be willing to lift their fingers for the Nie? We can assume they didn’t react to the murder of Nie Mingjue’s father, so why would they help the Nie in revenge?

From my POV and understanding this advice of Lan Qiren should be pissing the hell out of Nie Mingjue. He is telling him to suck it up. Yes, for the sake of his clan, but also, because any kind of mess like this is endangering the other sects. Other sects chose to keep to themselves, so the advice is also: You do this, man - you’re alone.

On the other hand, this sentence can be also seen as how Lan Qiren himself feels. We saw him being enraged by the Wen clan because they let the Waterbound Abyss in their territory. But he can’t voice out his dissatisfaction, because he himself is sucking it up for his sect. If we see it that way, he’s basically saying: Even if we both riot it would be a suicide (Because, you see that yellow prick behind you? He’s not gonna help us and he’s the richest of us all. Jiangs are playing friends with them, they want to be family. We can’t count on any other help.)

And Lan Qiren is right. Nothing happened after Cloud Recesses was vandalized.

I don’t think the four big sects trust each other very much. The Wen sect actually brought them all together with all the shit they did. But teaming up happened mostly because the young ones took over.

I don’t even think they like each other. Which is kinda expected – they are all very different - their origin, mentality, temper, code, cultivation method. It’s actually funny how the Gusu Lan and the Nie are showing the first signs of teaming up since they are completely different in everything.

Instant confirmation to both Nie Mingjue and Lan Qiren. If you are understanding the scene like I described it, this guy laughing after what Lan Qiren said gets a whole new meaning. UGH. I don’t know why, but I really like the sound of his voice. Ugh…

And now we get the Jiang’s POV. The leader of the Jiang doesn’t care about the sitting arrangements (about the current situation of the sects). For him, the way things are, everything is already settled and can’t be changed in the present situation. What he cares about is THE FUTURE. Who will come after Wen Ruohan? Considering we know how deeply Jiangs value their family we can assume Jiang Fengmian is only thinking of how all of this will affect his children. Especially the future leader of Jiang.

What if? Jiang Fengmian always talks about the clan’s moto, he cherishes the “attempt the impossible”. But he himself is a very mild mannered man who doesn’t seem to have accomplished anything “amazing” in his years. And the way he acts could be seen as “weak” – he “accepts” the Wen sect, he “accepts” the wife’s anger, he “accepts” the marriage, he “accepts” the betrayal of his servant and friend. He is actually… very similar to Jiang Cheng.

What if the reason he’s being so strict and emotionless towards his son is because, in his way, he’s trying to make his son a better man than himself. Attempt the impossible/be like Wei Wuxian – don’t be like me. The future is bleak, and as a leader, you, my son, my heir, you can’t be like me.

Once again, MDZS makes a fabulous scene out of nothing.

Not at all.

My god, I love the dialog in this. Also, remember what I rambled about Wen Xu? Could this also be a hint? Did the sect leaders maybe hope to see him there? Instead, they got an untalented punk – worse than his father.

I’m sorry, for some reason I always laugh like an idiot during this exchange. I don’t know what it is that makes this scene so hilarious to me. Please, someone explain it to me.

He’s so precious!

Ah… JC, we meet again. I’ll talk about this moment down below. Just, remember it.

*squealing from love and insufferable pain*

JC: “Let’s split into two groups, then gather at the exit later.”

WWX: “Hey, where the hell are you leading me to?” (smiling)

JC: “Stop complaining! Just follow me.” BAM

WWX: “How about we go back the way we came? Rest assured. I definitely won’t tell anyone.” (teasing)

JC: “Just shut up, will you!” BAM

WWX: “Ahahahaha! Jiang Cheng.”

JC: “What now?”

WWX: “Look.”

I laughed my ass off the first two times I watched this. The third time… I noticed something.

Jiang Cheng takes the lead the moment the archery tournament starts, as an heir should. He gives out orders and goes into “follow me” mode. He has a path in mind, this strange and hard path looks right to him. He has a gut feeling he’s right in his decisions and he follows his gut. Wei Wuxian questions the plan like any of us would if someone started to drag us through “tight spots” for no reason. He questions him but he follows him nevertheless. I don’t think he even questions him for real, I think he’s just having fun watching his brother plays leader. And that’s one of the problems. Jiang Cheng is not playing. He’s trying to prove himself. This is his chance. So, when Wei Wuxian pokes fun at him he snaps like he usually does, but this time there is also an injury. Their conversation and Wei Wuxian’s comments hurt. Hence the head bumps. You can clearly see the change in Jiang Cheng’s expression after the first bump. He’s not so decisive anymore. He actually looks sad as if he’s starting to question his decisions too. But he can’t back down now so he just keeps going. And the smart-ass Wei Wuxian knows his brother too well. From his next comment we can see that he figured out what is bothering Jiang Cheng and as any decent sibling he pokes at it. Of course, Wei Wuxian doesn’t mean any harm, he’s just playing like the brothers always do. JC says some harsh things to Wei Wuxian too, it’s all part of being siblings. Sure, Wei Wuxian makes comments, but he still follows. He’s not even truly questioning anything, he’s annoying, but he completely trusts JC’s lead. He never thought of leaving his side, not even during “tight spots”.

Jiang Cheng doesn’t get hurt because of what Wei Wuxian says, he knows Wei Wuxian is probably the only one who doesn’t and won’t ever mean any of it. And that’s the biggest problem. Jiang Cheng believes in Wei Wuxian, he believes in WWX’s love for him, he trusts Wei Wuxian, but he doesn’t trust others. When someone says similar things that Wei Wuxian would jokingly say to him, Jiang Cheng can’t ignore it. Why? Because the same things have been said to him by the people who should love you the most. When your mother is always attacking your brother and saying you’re a fool to love him, when she is constantly dissatisfied with you and even says things like:

“You really are an idiot. I’ve told you long ago that you’ll never in your whole life be able to surpass the one sitting beside you. Not over cultivation, not over night-hunting, even over shooting kites, you can’t surpass him! … Your mom tells you countless times not to fool around with him, yet you’re still defending him. Just how did I give birth to a son like you?!” (ch51)

When your father never acknowledges you, when your parents are fighting because you’re not good enough, how do you feel? Wouldn’t any kind of comment affect you? Wouldn’t hearing that you’re worse at archery than some guy who missed the whole target hurt you? (But, they’re fighting because of Wei Wuxian and his mom, not because of JC.) Sure. But, would that be such a big problem if Jiang Cheng was as good as Wei Wuxian? If he was as good, wouldn’t that make his mother as good as the other woman? Wouldn’t that make his father love them equally? Besides, what child doesn’t think it’s his fault their parents “don’t love each other”?

“Jiang Cheng told him from inside, “Go sleep somewhere else! This is my room! You’re even gonna steal my room?!”

At that time, Wei WuXian didn’t know what Jiang Cheng was mad about at all. After a pause, he replied, “I didn’t steal anything. It’s Uncle Jiang who told me to sleep with you.”

Hearing that he was still bringing up his father, almost as if he was purposely showing off, Jiang Cheng’s eyes reddened as he yelled, “Go away! If I see you again, I’ll call a bunch of dogs to bite you!””(ch71)

This scene ripped my heart to shreds. Poor WWX, so confused and scared. Poor JC. Yes, this, THIS is jealousy. A full blown toxic jealousy attack, but there is also a lot to be read between the lines. Why is he exploding like this out of the blue? He was ready to forgive the fact that they’ve taken his only friends away from him. He was ready to share the room with the person for whom he had to give up his dogs. So why? He’s a child and he’s jealous, but is that really it? You know, seeing your father hugging someone should not be a trigger. It’s not normal to compare yourself just because of that. There has to be more, more unspoken reasons why someone would instantly compare oneself with someone. JC is someone who puts up with a lot of shit without saying anything – such people tend to explode for “no reason”. Realizing he’s been hugged only five times is the last straw.

When a very young child is unsure of whether his father loves him – you, as a parent, are doing something wrong. When a child is so afraid that his mistakes will make his father not like him even more – you have a very insecure child. An insecure child/person has a very low opinion of himself.

“Looking at Wei WuXian’s legs, Jiang Cheng’s face was full of nervousness. If any other disciple or servant learned about this and told Jiang FengMian, after Jiang FengMian knew how he threw Wei WuXian’s sheets out and made him hurt his leg, Jiang FengMian would definitely dislike him even more. This was also why he only dared chase after them alone and didn’t get anyone else.

Seeing how worried he seemed, Wei WuXian took the initiative, “Relax. I won’t tell Uncle Jiang. I only hurt myself because I suddenly wanted to climb a tree last night.”

Hearing this, Jiang Cheng sighed in relief. He swore, “You can relax as well. Anytime I see a dog, I’ll chase it away for you!”” (ch71)

I do believe this was the beginning of the ultimate trust. Also, after his jealousy attack, JC immediately realized what he did and felt bad. Yes, he was afraid of his father, but I do not believe for a second that that has any significance in his love for Wei Wuxian.

“Jiang YanLi put Wei Wuxian onto her back and began to walk back, wobbling in her steps as she spoke, “A-Ying, no matter what A-Cheng said to you, don’t bother about him. He doesn’t have a good temper, so he’s always home playing with himself. Those puppies were his favorites. Dad sent them away, and so he’s feeling upset. He’s actually really happy that somebody’s here to be with him. You ran out here and didn’t go back for a long time. I came to find you only because he’s worried that something happened to you and went to wake me up.””(ch71)

I love A Li, I’ll talk about her more later. She’s a great sister, but she does sometimes unintentionally do things that are unfair to Jiang Cheng (don’t attack me, wait for the next post for the elaboration). In this particular scene she was amazing. She didn’t get mad at JC (out of all the people he trusted her to bring back Wei Wuxian and don’t tell father about his mistake – that’s love). She carried them both (which is a nice contrast to Jiang Fengmian who carried only Wei Wuxian in the scene before). She tended to JC’s wounds from falling into the pit and encouraged him to say sorry. She. Was. Great.

But, let’s address one more thing. What does she mean by JC not having a good temper? What kind of a bad temper can a child have to not be able to have friends? Older JC is stiff and grumpy, but he does have friends in his sect and other people want to be his friends (Nie Huaisang for example).When you doubt your own worth, you can’t trust people to like you. Being around people can be hard. Being around dogs that have unconditional love for you can be very easy. It’s pleasant. I think Princess, Jasmine, and Love were healing his soul (like dogs often do) and taking them away was way more tragic from JC’s POV than it seems. No wonder he was wailing.

It’s funny how Wei Wuxian is afraid of dogs, but has so much unconditional love in him for his family.

I’ll talk about Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng more – the juicy episodes are coming. I’ll just say this: I really admire both of them. It would have been so damn easy for those two to hate each other’s guts, but they just don’t. And, yes, I don’t know the whole story, but right now, I believe JC never truly hated WWX, not even after everything.

Anyway.

Back to the scene from the donghua.

So, JC bumps his head and we laugh because it’s funny. If you are overthinking, like I am whenever JC appears on the screen, then you might see the head bumps as a metaphor for the comments JC has to live with. There’s one more way we can take this scene. Let’s say this is some form of foreshadowing. JC becomes the leader. Through thick and thin he leads and WWX follows him. JC’s decisions are not always the best, but the one who gets hurt by those decisions is him. Let’s go further and say the first bump is Shijie’s death.

Wei Wuxian: “How about we go back the way we came?”

I don’t know how it happens, but JC most certainly refuses to go back to how things were, he can’t go back. Even if you see honest hurt on his face, he continues and his leadership and decisions hurt him again. The death of Wei Wuxian. Even after this, JC continues on and in the end he reaches his destination. He was right all along, the path did lead to their goal (feral ghosts in this particular scene), but when he’s finally reached his goal he doesn’t see it. Not until Wei Wuxian points it out. When JC lost all of his family (Wei Wuxian in particular) he lost his focus. The goal became invisible because it had no worth anymore.

The two heroes of Yunmeng Jiang – Jiang Cheng needs Wei Wuxian in order to be himself and show his best.

I can’t wait for more chapters of the novel to analyse all of this and have a full picture of their relationship.

I know, ladies… Aahh… I know.

Well, you are extremely striking, Wei Wuxian, I’ll give you that. You’re so damn pretty here, my son.

One starts, the other one finishes. Both in their own ways. I just remembered this quote from the novel while re-watching:

“The two knew how to continue each other’s words ever since they were young. Now, one sentence after another, the argument flowed seamlessly…” (ch62)

I TOLD YOU NOT TO CRY WOLF! LOOK WHAT YOU DID! Calm down, Lan Zhan, breathe, my child brea-

HOLY FUCK! Down, Lan Zhan, stay down, remember the code! Remember, you’re a good boy, the best bo-

OK. OK, yeah, let it out. That’s healthy. Just… yeah. O.O (You better not piss off this dude. Fear the quiet ones, FEAR THEM.)

How can you be so smart, yet so stupid? XD Seriously, did you or did you not copy the damn rules for a month??? But, yeah, poor Lan Zhan, and poor Wei Wuxian – he is honestly confused. He wasn’t given a moment to properly apologize and he clearly wanted to. These two… they’ll be the death of me. Btw, the whole ribbon thing is so interesting, such a nice detail to the world building. But! I do admit that you most likely wouldn’t know about it if you follow only the animation. They should have made it more obvious. Unless. They did it like this on purpose, only to reveal it in the next season, which is also cool.

He feels so bad. TT_TT Don’t make that face at him, Lan Zhan, he’s a gentle soul. He doesn’t look like it, but he is.

Exactly. We won. Love is strong in JC. And look at those dorks. Precious. These moments are truly the blessing that we got from the animation. For me at least, it made me care about those guys even though I can’t remember their names. Those two nameless purple boys were the ones who made me drop my first tear in ep 11. These small things are so important. This is how you write a scene.

Envious much? I get you, though.

EPISODE 08 – or, where have all these bitches come from???

Diminutive - used to express the fact that something is small, often either to show affection or to suggest that something or someone is not important: Adding diminutive suffixes is often a disparaging tactic. MDZS has this fascinating ability to tell and show without actually spending too much time to tell and show.

Once again, such an imaginative way to progress the scenes.

“The cultivation clans kept silent in indignation (after the fall of many clans), only to share their resentments secretly. In the same year Wen Ruohan commanded his eldest son, Wen Xu, to aggressively intrude and burn down the Cloud Recesses.”

Ah, Wen Xu, I had so much faith in you. But, at least you didn’t burn everything and killed everyone like Wen Chao did. And defying your father/leader is a no-no. Eh, dunno, I wish we had more on him.

Don’t touch my baby! *animalistic growling*

That was really… cruel. But, I already talked about it. I want to say another thing here. I think the main reason why Wei Wuxian immediately jumped to the chance to go with Jiang Cheng is because Jiang Cheng will be safer with him than alone (I think Jiang Fengmian knows this too). Wei Wuxian is very protective of his shidi, he always saves him from (physical) danger. Man, I really love the Jiang siblings.

This is a nice parallel to that one moment when Wei Wuxain absorbed resentful energy in the earlier episode. The core melting must hurt as hell. Since I know almost all of the Jiang family lost their cores in similar fashion I get so pissed whenever I see The core melting hand (I don’t care for his name, he doesn’t deserve to have a name, I actually hate him more than any other Wen. He knows what he’s doing is wrong, he knows his lords are evil and he does nothing and his excuse is some favor. I totally get why Wei Wuxain was so furious with him.)

SCREENSHOT!

Don’t do something that will kill you.

Also, I like how the moment Wen Chao said “Who else dares to defy my orders?” Wei Wuxian immediately showed up in the frame. It’s such a nice touch to his personality and it’s a nice “invisible way” of foreshadowing.

He’s such a good child… *ugly sobbing*

The world doesn’t deserve Wei Wuxian. The world punishes people like Wei Wuxian and everyone knows this fact. The world is just not ready for someone as good and righteous. It probably never will be and that’s sad. But being “good and righteous” is complicated and debatable. The world will never agree on “good and righteous”, the agreement can never be pure and open-minded – someone like Wei Wuxian will never be accepted in the real society. We can all say we admire him and we truly do, but we also call him a fool.

He is so creepy. I love the VA for this guy. The way he laughs and yells Yahoo adds to the craziness.

All of them are so cute here. Lan Zhan too, with his childish jealousy. They just look like kids playing around. Also, Nie Huaisang, I can’t wait to see more of your shady ass in the future.

… I just think this shot is beautiful.

Jin Zixuan: Did you just touch my shoulder with your filthy finger?

Me: Fret not, babe, I’ll have Wei Wuxian make him eat that finger.

Lan Zhan and Jin Zixuan started it, Wei Wuxian brings a whole new level to “Fuck you”. I mentioned this before, I’ll say it again: I really like how our MC fights first with his smarts and even when he’s physical you can see that he’s using wits and tricks to win. That’s not usually the case with MCs. In this particular case, because he used his wit to disgrace Wen Chao and the Wen sect, he got remembered and became the main target to Wens’ revenge. JC must be eating himself up over this. He tried so hard, yet at the end he let his brother do something that will kill him. Honestly, though, I would have done the same as Wei Wuxian… and then I’d be feeling guilty for the rest of my life… just like him.

… Um… Wei Wuxian sweety, your Yiling Patriarch is showing.

“Attempt the impossible” sequence is a go. Also, this is such a cool shot.

Can’t you see a giant killer turtle behind you??? Good to know what your priorities are. You dumb bitch. Also, that scream… That was a really good scream of Wei Wuxian. Well… not good. You know what I mean.

And that’s all for today. I always say to myself I’ll make it shorter next time and I always fail to do so. Well, hope you enjoy my rambling. See you!

#mo dao zu shi #grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation #wei wuxian #lan wangji #jiang cheng #jiang yanli #jin zixuan #wen chao #nie huaisang #donghua #animation #character analysis #analysis

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bigskydreaming · 6 years ago

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Btw, for those who’ve been asking, just a quick update on the jaw sitch:

I had that last appointment on Thursday and it went really, even surprisingly well? Like, better news than even she’d hoped for. We were crossing our fingers that the last CT scan (the one to map exact dimensions we’d need the prosthetic to be) would match up with a premade prosthetic so we wouldn’t have to wait to order a custom made and could jump straight to trying to expedite the surgery.

Turns out I don’t actually need a prosthetic at all. The top of my jawbone, the condyle, which everyone thought was completely destroyed from all the previous scans and was part of what had to be replaced, its actually still there and largely intact. It wasn’t snapped off or eroded away like they’d been thinking, it actually just got bent enough at the top of it that somehow it slipped and got shoved up....underneath my skull, or behind my skull, I’m honestly not sure what the right word is to describe it, because of the angles/dimensions involved. The reason they could only see it with this last scan and not any of the others is this last scan like....looked through the back of my skull essentially, and showed the inside curvature of the side of the skull that’s where all the Drama is. And that’s where they saw, oh hey, he’s still got an intact condyle, its just been stuck inside/under/behind his skull this whole time instead of resting in the joint where its supposed to be and allowing for proper opening and closing. And as it got worse and worse this past year and a half, it wasn’t because I was constantly grinding down on what was left of the bone and wearing it more and more away....it was that it was actually constantly shoving up more inside my skull, day by day. So, still not fun, just a different kind of suck than they thought, lol.

I’m actually a little bit miffed by the reveal, not gonna lie, because like....it literally is EXACTLY what I’d been saying it felt like the problem was to me. For a year and a half. From the very start. From the very first time I went to the ER after it first snapped or slipped out of place or whateverthefuck, the very first doctor I met with, I literally described it as feeling like my jawbone got stuck up under or behind my skull and couldnt get loose or descend properly. And they were like nah, that’s not a thing, must be TMJ. And literally every other doctor I went to since then (including this one), I told each and every one of them the same exact thing but noooooooooo, why listen to the dude whose body it literally is lol why would he know what it feels like is the problem. Lmao. Ah well. Doesn’t change anything at this point and not worth souring my relationship with this doctor since at least she’s getting results for me and is easy enough to work with and way better than that other one I was going to before. But still. Annoying. It gives me no pleasure to be like ‘ugh I was right, I told you all’ because like, lol I don’t need the fucking ego boost, I would have much rather taken the ‘get started fixing all this a year earlier than it took to find the solution and thus spare myself a lot of time, money, aggravation and oh yeah pain’ option. BUT OH WELL.

Anyway. So this changes things a little but not a done. The general course of treatment is still the same. They still have to do the exact same surgery, only now instead of opening me up and putting in a new prosthetic joint, they’ll open me up, cut off the bottom part of my jaw so that they can then basically dig out the upper part from where its stuck behind/under/inside my skull, do something *mutters vague medical-ese in place of the details I glazed over here and didn’t totally catch look I am still very sleep deprived all the time*, then manually reset the condyle/top of the jawbone in the joint they restore via the vague medical-ese mumble mumble stuff, manually realign the whole rest of my lower jaw and then screw the bottom and top pieces of jawbone back together with like a plate or something.

But now at least we don’t have to wait for a prosthetic, or pay for one, so that’s at least a couple thousand dollars cheaper though the rest of the surgery is still the same as before,like 20K out of pocket or thereabouts. And its always better when they can use/salvage your natural body instead of having to use prosthetics or insert foreign material - theoretically, this means I should heal faster, regain more or fuller function of my whole jaw, and there’s less risk of nerve damage since all the muscles and everything are still attached to the jaw and just unable to do their job because its literally just stuck, but again its always better if like, they don’t have to try and reattach or reintegrate muscles and all that around a brand new piece of bone or prosthetic that they place in there for the first time.

So its literally just a waiting game now? She sent off her updated notes and case file to my insurance company now to try and expedite getting a greenlight on the surgery. It only takes two weeks to book the surgery and get into an OR somewhere, and the only thing we’re waiting for now is payment, basically. As soon as I can afford the surgery, we can schedule it, and two weeks later, bam. So fingers crossed that my insurance company will approve it - she feels pretty confident they will, because she thinks she’s made more than enough argument and provided plenty of documentation to prove its an absolute medical necessity (hahahahaha just let them try and argue w/me about that, I WILL DEVOUR THEIR ENTIRE SOULS, MY JAW IS 90% UNHINGED ALREADY, IT��LL BE EASY).

So mostly its just a matter of how long it takes to get an answer from them, and if they’ll approve the whole thing or only part of it, and if the latter, how long it’ll take me to raise the rest. She said give it a week before I start calling the insurance company directly myself, to nag them, lol. But that her best guess is it’ll probably be around three weeks or so to hear back, for something like this.

So, fingers crossed that I get a quick answer and a good one in terms of paying at least most of the surgery. And then....blessed scalpel and morphine drip. *weeps in I Have Never Been So Excited To Be Cut Open On A Table Like A Fish, Seriously, What A Weird Thing To Have Be Like Christmas and My Birthday and Some Other Random Assortments of Holidays Used As An Excuse for Gift-Giving*

She’s planning on doing the surgery on a Saturday as its usually easier to book an OR on the weekend, and the surgery itself should only take a day and I shouldn’t need to stay overnight after all. BUT I still need to figure out finding some way to stay with someone for the ten days after the surgery though, which - no idea how to go about that just yet lol, working on it. But my jaw’ll have to be wired shut for the ten days post surgery, liquid diet only, so she was like “LOL yeah no, you should definitely not count on being able to talk for the first couple weeks of recovery. Or stand up really. Or like, get out of bed at all pretty much. As much as it sucks right now, its gonna suck even more then, you will definitely hate everything and it’ll hurt even more before it gets better, BUT then it’ll actually get better. Finally.” Like, I’m paraphrasing, but that was my takeaway, lol. Yay. Things to look forward, much excitement, can’t wait.

Nah but like, I will literally put up with anything at this point in order for it to be over, and after that, I shouldn’t need more than a month or two of physical therapy before I have full function of my jaw back. But she thinks it’ll be if not quite as good as new, at least close enough for there not to be much difference. She said she sees no reason for there to be any lingering or residual pain or nerve issues or vertigo once my recovery period is over, and my face should look pretty much the same as it did before all this started then. Said there’s a slight possibility, depending on certain things with how the surgery goes, that my chin might end up a little more recessed than it had been originally, but not enough that it’d be especially noticeable - if anything, it probably would only show as different from before when looked at in profile, from a side view.

LOL, she was like, there is an additional procedure I can do right then and there while we already have you under, that’ll bring your chin forward and compensate for any differences there and its easiest to do it right at the same time as everything else. But that’s essentially just a cosmetic procedure, so your insurance likely wouldn’t pay for that. And I was like okay, well just so I know, how much is that procedure? And she’s like, oh, 8K. And I was all HAHAHAHAHAHA, doc, you funny. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m vain and shallow, but I’m cheaper and broker than I am vain and shallow, so that’s gonna be a hard pass from me. I’ll stick to just overcompensating with my wit and dazzling personality, mmkay.

LOL. Anyway, so that’s where things stand right now, just....waiting. And hoping. And crossing fingers. And trying not to fall into my usual trap of assuming this slight uptick of good or positive news means IMPENDING DOOM elsewhere. Like, there is still a slight risk of nerve damage with the surgery itself, not the potential for full face paralysis that the other doc was saying might happen, she’s not worried about that at all, but she did warn that in like 10-20% of cases with this surgery, there’s a chance of nicking a sensory nerve that means like, ending up with your face numb around the chin and above and around your mouth, where you basically can’t feel much in those areas. Sometimes that lasts for a month or two, and occasionally there are some people who never regain sensation there, but she stressed that its not a huge risk, again only 10-20% of the time, but she did want to make sure I was aware. Course, my cynical ass is like OKAY BUT YOU UNDERESTIMATE HOW MUCH THE UNIVERSE LIKES TO MAKE EVERYTHING IN MY LIFE LINE UP WITH EXTREMELY LONG ODDS AND UNLIKELY POSSIBILITIES, WHY WOULD YOU TEMPT FATE WITH A DIRECT CHALLENGE LIKE THAT, DO YOU HATE ME, DO YOU WANT ME TO DIE????

LOL. Look I’m a Melodramatic Melvin, this is canon. And in the immortal words of Ugh Stiles, I’m almost to the point of no longer being able to ‘milk this anymore’ so I gotta cram my last good angsts in while I still can, y’know? Nah, but srsly, I’m gonna try and not stress about that too much because she said there’s literally nothing I or she can do to minimize that risk, it just is what it is, and the one thing I do know is that my body/brain tends to be highly suggestible and psychosomatism tends to play a huge role in my health and how well or quickly or thoroughly I bounce back from stuff. So. Trying to do the whole positive thoughts, eyes on the prize, Speak Only Good Stuff Into Existence until I’m out the other side. Like, take it for granted that the odds aren’t gonna fuck me this time so I don’t end up accidentally stressing myself into the perfect position for my body to be like Screw You Baby, One More Time.

I mean, we’ll see how well that goes, lol, but you know. Goals.

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feralninjaprincess · 6 years ago

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State Recap

This post is probably going to be long.

We left at 7 Friday and got down to Galveston about 3. The cell phones were out all over the island so communication was terrible.

Found our condo, got unloaded, grabbed my gi and weapons and headed to the venue. Most of karate tournaments is waiting. You wait for your division. Then you wait for your turn. It’s tedious, and it’s time for nerves to psych you out. I had a panic attack before my weapons and self defense divisions started. A literal panic attack. I looked at my brown belt, I looked at Master Chambers and it hit me. What if I’m not good enough to be wearing this? What if I embarrass Robi? And I cried. And I couldn’t breathe. Thank God Tracy was there. She kept me sane and calmed me down.

Self defense was just weird. One dude just did one steps, (it’s a karate thing) instead of actual self defense. I don’t even know how he outscored us. The judges were scoring everything super low too. And there was no consistency to their scoring. Kittie stumbled and almost fell down and she scored higher than me pushing me just out of the medals. At first Robi thought she and I tied. I told him if that happened I would just give it to her because she’s my uke. It’s not fair for her to have to perform hers over again, then be my partner for mine a second time. But she was a tenth of a point higher so no biggie. It’s the only event I didn’t medal in this year.

My power wood breaking event was up at the same time as weapons. I was having to run between two rings for a few minutes. I didn’t break as well as I wanted to. I think I was psyched out about hitting my thumb and low and behold what did I do? It’s fine though. Bruised it a little that night but nothing serious. I was bowing in for weapons so I missed them calling out who placed where in breaking, but apparently Larry announced to the crowd in that ring that I broke boards with a broken thumb so I got cheered and didn’t even get to enjoy the moment. Hahahahahaha.

Weapons could’ve gone better. I messed up my kata but hid it well and kept going. The judges didn’t know. This is the first time I’ve ever placed in weapons. As soon as I can hold my katana again, I’m going back to samurai sword. It’s my first weapon and the one I feel most comfortable with. I want to really work on refining it. I think it’s good to know how to use the others, especially as an instructor, but for competition, sword will be where I stay. Anyway, I placed third. It was my first time to place in weapons at state.

Then I had to wait for hours to compete in power concrete breaking. Hours. Like I finally broke about 11:30-11:45. Got home, devoured pizza because I hadn’t eaten since breakfast then went to bed. I blew that concrete up. The awards for that were gis and a world title. Of course they were out of gis in my size but Larry is supposed to be ordering me a new one.

I fell asleep about two am and woke up at five on Saturday. At six, Arthur and I went to ihop while everyone else slept. I walked five blocks down to the venue while everyone else was getting ready. One of our families screwed their kid out the chance to compete in kata, because they slept in. I was texting them for an HOUR to get him there and that was after telling them the night before what time they had to be there. They showed up just after he’d been disqualified. I was so mad at his parents.

Spent the morning running from ring to ring, coaching our kids. They did great. None of them took first but several of them brought home second or third.

Third was my major number this year. Third in weapons, 3rd in breaking wood, 3rd in kata, 3rd in sparring.

Kata went ok. I watched Sensei talk through the whole thing so when he cheered for me at the end, I rolled my eyes at him and laughed and said, I know you were talking. I’ll never be great at kata because I’m too goofy and too smart ass with Robi. Hahahahaha. After kata, one of the black belts did tell me that he never wants to be on the receiving end of my kicks or punches. He’s a dude that I’ve watched knock dudes out. He’s a beast so that was a HUGE compliment.

One of the other guys that’s a brown belt almost black, told me that I’ve proved that I belong here. And that was such a big deal man. He didn’t know about the panic attack the night before. It was like the universe was speaking through him in that moment.

My fight to get to the championship round didn’t go as I had hoped. The chick I fought was fast. She was all over me before I had time to react. I wish it was bogu. I could’ve taken her down and finished it on the ground but it’s point sparring. It’s about speed and timing and mine was off.

After the fight, I was cool until the head judge, who is a dear friend told me to keep my head up. Of course that made me cry. I walked off the mat and Len (another black belt friend) and Robi were there. Len was on me about crying. I told him I’d have been ok if James hadn’t said anything. Hahahaha.

James pulled me aside later and made me cry again. He talked about how my time will come, he’s always cheering for me even when he’s judging me, and about how that girl only shows up in her region, takes her trophy and goes home. I jump in and help at every tournament, I travel all over the state, I’m a big supporter and helper of the entire organization and it doesn’t go unnoticed. He said that I matter to the AOK. She’s just another competitor. That might have been the biggest compliment all weekend. He also told me I’m beautiful and he loves me about thirty seven times all weekend.

Larry proposed to Leslie at the banquet. I went with Robi and Tracy to the hotel bar at the Hilton after the banquet. Tons of karate folks there. We drank til the wee hours and laughed and talked. One of the black belts might have tried make a move on me. I said I wasn’t sure, Tracy said it totally was. Hahahahaha. We will see how things go next year I guess. When I got ready to leave, Robi hugged me (and not a half hug, a real one) and told me how proud he was of me.

The girls I rode with I took the scenic route on the way home. It was fun. Now I have a cold. My immune system couldn’t take any more not sleeping and stress. Lol.

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aj-moment · 2 years ago

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So in case you weren't aware, Overwatch 2 is about to come out, and Overwatch 1's servers are down for matinence ATM (though they will be going back up soon? IDK I don't really follow it). A lot of people are saying it's a dead game now, and rightfully so.

Now Overwatch is an easy target. An incredibly easy one. Blizzard being blizzard, the obvious brownie points forced diversity, and just general cringe corporate bullshit plastered all over it. But I played it religiously for a year or so in 8th grade (I was a 13 year old white boy I was basically obligated to), so in this reminder of the errors of my youth, I want to reminisce a little on overwatch. Think to myself, maybe the game is actually good and HAHAHAHAHA no. It's not. This is a rant about why overwatch is terrible from someone who consistently played it when I was a kid.

It's not even remotely an exaggeration to say that overwatch was the single most miserable casual experience I have ever had the misfortune of subjecting myself too. The biggest offender here is by far the balance patches. If you're not aware, after about a year or so of its life (around when I started playing) Overwatch started hyperfocussing on its esports scene. And what this lead to is a huge influx of patches that probably made the game more balanced, but failed to take into account that some people actually wanted to have fun with the game. And these weren't just small changes either, there's a reason like half of all overwatch channels were entirely dedicated to patch notes. It was a regular occurrence for a patch to just, massively change how an entire character works on a fundamental level overnight. By far the worst of these changes was when they basically took away roadhog's one shot potential in favor of making him fit into the dive meta at the time more (which actually made him worse ironically) when the one shots were literally the entire reason to play as him. They just made the character more generic, and straight up less fun so he could potentially be "meta." And it just straight up sucks when your favorite character suddenly plays nothing like they used to. That was actually exactly the tipping point for me, when my most played character, Mercy, got massively reworked, and even though she got better (actually broke the game and was stupid OP from what I know), the fact that I just didn't have the same character I had always played anymore, she was removed from the game in favor of this better version essentially, sucked massively and was the reason I stopped playing.

Then there's the ranking system. Dear God. So most online games have some sort of rank they give you as a general idea of how good you are. I'm sure I don't need to explain this to anyone with any experience with online multilayer games. And just like the balance patches, the ranking system of overwatch focuses on the top like, 5% of players who are super dedicated to the game, and leaves the casual players with a frustrating an unsatisfying experience in almost every way. How it worked is first, you played 10 placement matches which would determine your rank. That part was fair. Now when I did my placement matches, I was really bad at the game. I ended up being put in the lowest rank (bronze) which iirc consisted of less than 10% of the player base. So I was at the literal bottom of the barrel. After playing a few matches in ranked and doing poorly in general, I decided I wasn't ready yet and went back to free play to hopefully improve, which i did. And eventually, I decided to go back to ranked. Well, the ranked mode works on a season model, and it had been several seasons since I played ranked iirc, and what that meant was I had 10 more placement matches to get through because rank resets every season. But, it's not a true reset. Your rank one season is based on your rank from the last seasons, including the placement matches. Now on this second set of placement matches I did really well. I had improved a lot, it'd been a few months, and I ended up winning almost all of them, 8 or 9 to be specific. And all of that? Across 10 games doing really well, and essentially proving I wasn't in the bottom of the pack anymore? That earned me almost exactly 100 rank points. The average you get for winning a game is about 50. All those placement matches did was put me right back where I was before when i lost almost every match. And the games weren't short either, completing all 10 took a good 2-3 hours iirc, so all that time I spent on it? It did absolutely nothing. Had I just kept my rank from previous seasons I would be gained around 4x as many rank points as I did in the placement matches. All it did for me as a casual player was waste my time. And I don't think I ever touched the normal game modes ever again after that point.

I say normal game modes for a reason though, because there was actually something I enjoyed about the game, and even to this day I'll defend. The arcade. The arcade was where all the wacky shit went. The stuff that would never be a good idea for normal gameplay. Especially where I spent time in the game was thr custom battles, where you could turn everything up to 11 and have the most chaotic game ever. This was the only reason I ever player for more than like 2-3 months. Because this was the only part of the game that was actually fun, and not some tryhard bait marketable esports monolith. And that honestly just says a lot about what the actual game overwatch is like. The only reason I enjoyed the game was because it let you play in ways they never intended you to.

I don't think anyone who follows me would be even remotely interested in overwatch, but if you are, just don't. Any joy you can potentially squeeze out of it will be gone in no time. The game is designed in a fundamentally anti-fun way. Just play splatoon and move on with your life.

#long post

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purplesurveys · 5 years ago

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[Elementary School] Do you still remember any dreams you had a a child? Like, sleep-dreams? I still remember some of the nightmares. I forget the weird ones as soon as I wake up. What was your favorite game to play back then? 10-20 served as my favorite for the longest time, but I did enjoy other games like PANTS (place, animal, name, thing, and the S stood for score lmao) and Twister. How many best friends did you make through the years? I only had one constant best friend who stuck with me through thick and thin. I wasn’t exactly the most sociable kid and I found it hard to make friends. How many enemies? A couple, but in my defense I only ever made enemies with kids who had a bit of an attitude and caused trouble for my nicer classmates. There was this one problematic kid that everyone had an issue with because of her rotten fucking attitude, but I think I was the only one brave enough to have beef with her (shoutout to the violence and fighting I saw in my own home). Our fights got big enough we ultimately got sent to the guidance office, hahaha. I also fought this kid who was a known bully, andddd I enjoyed making fun of one kid who was a notorious spoiled brat and would throw a tantrum when things weren’t going her way. Did anything tragic happen to you when you were little? Home stuff that are still burned into my brain, yeah. School was a little nice to me though, so it was always nice to be not in the house.

Did anything absolutely amazing happen? I wouldn’t say my childhood was amazing. It was just... barely decent. I was provided the essentials by my family - I was fed, given vitamins, sent to school, but I missed out on all the other stuff that I needed for my development. No one ever spent time with me at home, my attention competed with five other kids’, both parents were absent, cigarettes were the first thing I smelled in the morning and brandy was the last thing I smelled at night. I was kept safe and alive lmao, but I wouldn’t call the whole thing a blast. How was your relationship with your parents back then? Weak. They barely had time for us so they made up for it by always buying us the toys, books, and DVDs we wanted. I appreciate the alternative effort but it also meant never getting to build a healthy, trusted relationship with them. Did you believe in cooties? No, that’s definitely not a thing here. I only learned about cooties from watching Fairly OddParents lmao. Did you ever get a cootie shot? What was your favorite snack to eat? The cafeteria’s corndogs were SO so good, I was so bummed when they took it out. I was also introduced to kikiam by Sam, a close friend in Grade 1. Did you own any pets during this time? We had a few goldfish here and there, but my pet rabbit hung out for a while. What was your personality like? I was mostly shy. Wouldn’t budge, even if you approached me. What was your favorite song[s]? Idk, I didn’t have much of a music taste back then and just really vibed hard to the High School Musical and Camp Rock soundtracks hahahahaha. What kind of toys did you like to play with? I loved homemaker toys lmao. I was really into cash registers, and I’d also ask my mom to buy me makeup sets, kitchen sets, restaurant sets, cooking sets, and dollhouses whenever I see one I liked. But at the same time I grew up with boys, so I also enjoyed toy soldiers and Star Wars figurines. [Middle School/Junior High] How did your personality change from Elementary to Middle School? It took a turn for the worse, really. The fact that I was pretty aloof and already struggled to make friends was paired by two factors: puberty (and the self-hatred and identity crisis that come with it) and the adjustment of moving to a new house. Needless to say I failed to adapt and I was lost and empty for a bit. What was your favorite thing to do during this time? I mostly watched wrestling as a means to cope with the loneliness. And it helped, a lot. That time is a blur to me now and I mostly forgot what else I had done to like, sustain myself lmao. Who were some of your closest friends? I had no friends and I sat alone for recess and lunch and walked by myself during dismissal. How often did you get involved with Middle School drama? Like, not at all. There was one rumor about me that managed to get out but literally no one cared about me to care about the rumor, so it fizzled out in like 5 seconds lmao. What kind of "clique" were you in? Or did you not beleive in cliques? We didn’t really have cliques, we just had friend groups everyone knew about. I was in none of them. How did people treat you? They mostly didn’t mind me. Like I didn’t cause trouble for anyone and never did anything bad – I just didn’t do anything. I was always quiet, a wallflower. I think nobody knew how to approach me, which I don’t blame them for. It was impossible to pry me open in those days. Do you look back on these years fondly? Did you hear how I just talked about that time? Lmao. What was your typical kind of lunch during school? This was around the time we just moved into our new house and my mom was adjusting as much as we were. Money was short as well so we had to contend with canned food, most of which I didn’t touch both because I didn’t like it and I was too depressed to eat. I practically starved my way through middle school, now that I think about it. What school[s] did you go to? I went to the same school for preschool, grade school, and high school. Was it really as bad as some people say Junior High is? I didn’t get junior high. Did you like to read? Yes. My favorites during this time were the Septimus Heap and Percy Jackson series. I also started reading Gone with the Wind thanks to Gab, and Les Mis because of the movie that had come out. What was one good memory you have of this time? Meeting Gabie. It made all the loneliness go away, and it was nice to finally have a friend who just talked to me and acknowledged and minded me.

Were you still enemies with someone from elementary school? Yeah, this was around the time I cut ties for Marielle because she was a dick. If you could go back and change one thing, what would you change? I’d remove the depression, obviously. [High School] Are you still in High School? Nope. I graduated exactly four years ago. Welp, it’s 1:59 AM so it’s technically four years and one day now.

Who were some of your close friends? I was (FINALLY) in a friend group in high school – Angela, Sofie, Athenna, Fern, Kaira, and Chelsea were there. We also merged with a certain friend group from one of the all-boys schools – Dave, Aaron, Raf, Jez, Jedric, Hans, Luis, Rap, and sometimes MJ were in that group. Who were some of your enemies? Nah, no more enemies. I let myself FLOURISH during this time lmfaoooo. How did your personality change from the previous years? I was definitely happier. I had best friends, close friends, and was in a friend group; this was also the time I realized high school grades aren’t worth shit in the real world, so I stopped putting much pressure on myself to perform well, and to just let loose and enjoy my time in high school, because I wasn’t ever going to get those years back. Going in, did you really think they were going to be the best four years ever? I HAD to have hope in it, because grade school made me miserable enough. I kept thinking there was no way my rock bottom could get even rockier, so I was just weirdly, forcibly optimistic about it. If that makes sense. Were they? [or are they if you're still in High School] The latter half of high school was definitely some of the best times. I was still adjusting in freshman and sophomore year. What's one memory of High School can you look back on and grin? The day Zayn Malik left One Direction, all the Directioners in my batch met up at the corridor and started crying and hugging one another. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA Did you ever cry while you were in school? Yeah, mostly when I got failing marks. How was your love life? It did okay by the time I was in junior year, which is around the time it usually gets good for people in my school anyway. How was your social life? So much better. Gabie’s friendliness with everyone highkey helped me find my own rhythm in making friends, and soon enough I was talking to people. Did you have any teachers that you just absolutely loved? Sure. Did you have any teachers that you just absolutely despised? Yup. How were/are your GPA? We don’t have that here but my general average when I graduated high school was like a 93. Did you know anyone who got pregnant? No, no one got pregnant while in high school. I have batchmates who are moms now, though. [There's no time like the present] Do you currently have a job? No, not yet. And honestly this coronavirus might stall me from getting a job just yet haha. I was so ready to apply by June or July but since the term might be extended to make up for the lost classes, I might not be able to follow that schedule anymore. What kind of job do you *want* to have? I’d like to be in PR. I did an internship in it and it was so fun and so much better than journ. What do you like to do on your free time? There’s a variety of stuff. I like eating out, spending time with my dog, going to the mall, going to museums, doing surveys, watching TV shows, watching on YouTube, reading articles. What's your relationship with your parents now? A little better, partly because I’ve found my own voice through the years and I’ve learned to take no shit from them – I was very submissive when I was a teenager, just to compare. Do you own any pets? Yes, my dog who has been with me for 12 years now. How many places have you traveled to? A buuuuuuuuuunch. Do you own a cell phone? If so, what kind? Yes, as do most of us these days haha. An iPhone. What are your goals for the future? Achieve a goal or two. Survive. What's your favorite kind of drink? Non-alcoholic: water. Alcoholic; Long island iced tea. Did you ever get into the Twilight saga craze? Yesssss. The craze started when I was in Grade 4 but I got into it in Grade 5.

What about the Harry Potter craze? I was around when it happened but I never got into it. Where is your mind at: The Past, the Present, the Future, or all around? Mostly present, but I’d mull over the future too sometimes. What's a really good movie you've seen recently? I can’t tell you about movies, but I just finished BoJack Horseman which was a brilliant fucking piece of television. Are you happy where you are right now? I’m satisfied, but I can’t call myself happy yet.

#survey #surveys

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pengychan · 7 years ago

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[Coco] The Bedside Ghost, Ch. 4

Title: The Bedside Ghost Summary: The bell falls but, instead of waking up in the Land of the Dead, Ernesto de la Cruz finds himself with a broken spine - and an unwanted guest at his bedside who claims he can let him have the sweet release of death, if he gives back what he took from him… Characters: Ernesto de la Cruz, Coco Rivera, Héctor Rivera, Julio Rivera, Imelda Rivera. Rating: T Status: in progress [This is the fic’s tag for all chapters up.]

[Also on Ao3]

A/N: If you thought Ernesto was going to come clean right away, think again.

***

“You’re joking.”

“I absolutely am not.”

“You set a rooster free in a church, really?”

“And it went straight for the holy bread. No communion that day.”

Coco pressed a hand against her mouth, trying to smother a laugh. It came out of her nose as a painful-sounding honk. “Pffft! Hah! Sorry, I… why did you do it?”

Ernesto laughed. It had been a somewhat jarring sound at first, like she supposed an instrument would sound when left unused for too long, but now it sounded more like an actual laugh. The more he talked, the more she could glimpse the man she remembered from when she was little - healthier, livelier. At that point she wasn’t sure which one of them needed that conversation the most: if her to hear about her father, or Ernesto to reminiscence of better days.

“I honestly can’t remember that,” he was saying. “We must have thought it a good idea at the time. We probably wanted an excuse to be out of there early.”

“Haha! Did they ever find out it was you?”

“We lived to tell the tale, so... no.”

“Was it that bad?”

“Quite a bit of commotion. A nun fainted. I think the rooster got to bathe in holy water before it was caught and became someone’s dinner, but didn’t go down without a fight,” Ernesto said, and laughed again - only that it turned into a coughing fit after a few moments, and Coco’s own smile faded quickly. She stood in sudden alarm, unsure of what to do.

Ernesto coughed again, and glanced down at the table, at the glass of water Griselda had left there when she’d come to leave some coffee and sweets - for her only, though, and she could only assume he wouldn’t want to be assisted eating and drinking in someone else’s presence - and Coco immediately went to pick it up.

“Here,” she said, reaching to cup the back of his head with one hand, and brought the glass to his mouth. He gulped down half the glass before pulling back, resting his head against the headrest of his wheelchair and breathing deeply through his nose, eyes shut. She put the glass down and reached for a clean napkin without thinking, to dry off the water that had spilled down his chin. “Is everything all right?”

Ernesto swallowed once or twice, and nodded. Suddenly, he didn’t look lively at all - like the coughing fit, and the need for her help, had brought reality crashing back down on him: he was no longer a healthy boy up to mischief with his best friend, but a man just over fifty unable to even lift a hand to get himself a glass of water, or wipe his own face.

The thought caused something in Coco’s chest to ache. She hadn’t meant to humiliate him, she only wanted to help. “Would you like me to call Griselda, or-”

“No,” Ernesto rasped, and cleared his throat, opened his eyes. When he spoke again, his voice was firmer. “Not just yet. She’ll be here shortly, anyway. I would keep you company for dinner, but…” he paused, and gave a smile that was almost a sneer. “As you can imagine, I cannot eat on my own. There is phone you can use, if you’d like to reassure your family that you arrived safe and sound.”

The idea of asking for a phone to call the inn in Santa Cecilia and leave a message had crossed her mind, but she’d forgotten to. Coco nodded, and smiled. “I’ll do that. Thank you again for your hospitality.”

“Anything for Héctor’s family,” he muttered, and there seemed to be something bitter in his voice - but before she could ask, he suddenly cackled. “Hah! That was a good one!”

“Huh?” Coco blinked, taken aback, when Ernesto’s expression opened into what was nothing short of a grin.

“You might like to hear this one,” he said, and Coco sat back down, rather relieved to see him like that again. “We were in Oaxaca. There was… yes, there was this one time when we really needed to make a call. We needed to have a telegram sent but we had no money to. We knew someone who could send one for us if we asked, but we had to get in touch. There was this fancy hotel that had a phone in its lobby, one of the few at the time. Only that of course it was for the personnel and guests, and we were neither. So I had an idea--” he trailed off, and Coco could have sworn his eyes flickered to her left for a moment before he rolled them. “All right, fine,” he muttered. “So, Héctor had an idea.”

That caused Coco to smile a bit. She remembered her father as gentle, tender and yes, fun to be around - but she had never known how much of a trickster he could be, always coming up with far-fetched schemes, pranks, and stories to get out of trouble that ranged from surprisingly convincing to absolute nonsense.

“What kind of idea?”

“Well, we… he figured that no one would turn away a man begging to make a call while his wife was in labor.”

How far along are you, dear?

Coco made an effort to push Griselda’s question in the back of her mind - it was only a guess, after all - and found herself smiling. “Did you find someone to play the part for you?”

“Well, we did find someone who could let us borrow a dress and a hat.”

“... What?”

“And a pillow. It fit Héctor pretty well. The dress, I mean, not the pillow. That was a bit of a struggle to get under the dress, but we managed.”

Oh. Oh . Coco reached up to press a hand against her mouth, but it did little to keep back her laughter. “Hah! He went and pretended to be pregnant?”

Ernesto nodded, the grin back on his face. “Well, I wasn’t going to be able to pull it off convincingly. Plus, the dress didn’t fit me.”

“And they believed it?”

“To be entirely fair, Héctor knew how to wear a dress. He had to shave his goatee, though, and I am sure he cried a bit over it,” Ernesto said, and seemed to pause for a moment as though listening to something before laughing. “Yes, he definitely shed a tear or two. But it grew back quickly, so no harm done. I was able to make the call and have the telegram sent while he was in the lobby, shrieking like an eagle that the baby was coming. Except that one of the guests was a doctor and was called downstairs before I was done, so he had to hold him off before he tried to examine ‘her’ and things got complicated.”

“Hold him off?”

“He pretended to panic and ran from him through the lobby like a headless chicken. Or maybe he was really panicking. He would have had a good reason to, with half the place’s security nearby. We were able to run off, though, and as far as I know they never... is everything all right?”

For a few moments, Coco was unable to reply: she could only try and fail to hold back the braying sound that only vaguely sounded like laughter, reaching up to wipe her eyes. Jesus, she was tearing up and her sides hurt, but she couldn’t stop laughing. “Hahahaha! I-I’m sorry, I just-- hahahahaha! That must have been a sight!” she wheezed. With the mind’s eye she could see her father’s face, from the torn scrap of photograph she’d salvaged, and trying to imagine him in that situation brought forth another gale of laughter.

And yet, even now, there was something in her chest that hurt, the thought that she should have heard that tale years ago, and from him. He should have told her while she sat on his knees, and they would have laughed together. Maybe her mother would have laughed, too, though rolling her eyes in that way of hers to show disapproval. Maybe.

What would she have thought? What would she had said? I don’t even remember how they were around each other. He played music and she sang, but I remember nothing else.

She would never know, of course, because there was no way she could tell her mother that story without ripping open a wound that, she knew, had never quite healed. Coco knew she had a right to know, but her mother also had a right to forget. She needed those stories, but she could never force them on her mother. She could never tell her, or anyone else at home.

It was that thought that finally stopped her laughter. She muttered an apology, wiping her eyes, not entirely sure those were all tears of mirth anymore. She tried to think of something else to say, but before she could there was a knock at the door. When she turned, still wiping her eyes, Griselda was stepping in.

“My apologies. It is time for dinner. Would you like la señora Rivera to join--”

“No,” Ernesto said, very quickly, and Coco couldn’t fault him for not wishing her to be there while he was fed. “She… see that she’s served dinner. She may require the phone as well. Whatever she asks for, make sure it's provided,” he added, and turned to glance at her. The mirth seemed to be already gone from his face, leaving it oddly blank. “I hope you don't mind dining on your own. I would be of poor company, I am afraid.”

She nodded. “I don't mind at all. Thanks for the hospitality. And for telling me about papá.”

“I had to,” Ernesto murmured, sounding very tired, and very frail. “I will see you in the morning. Have a good night.”

“You, too,” Coco said, and watched in silence as Griselda wheeled him away, hoping with all her heart that he’d have a more restful night than the previous had been.

***

Héctor did not follow him upstairs. It was a relief, really, being able to have a meal without his jeering. All that he had to listen to was Griselda’s constant stream of words as she talked about the garden, the weather, late deliveries and another dozen small things that Ernesto honestly couldn’t even begin to care about, but that felt so soothingly normal.

She insisted for him to have at least a tangerine - he had two - and he dutifully agreed that yes, they did taste really good. He was spared conversation for most of what followed; she knew all too well that he preferred to keep his eyes shut and pretend nothing was happening throughout most of the routine of preparing him for sleep. She only spoke again while tending to the ulcers on his back. “It felt good to hear you laugh, señor de la Cruz.”

Ernesto opened his eyes, but he may as well kept them shut. He was resting on his stomach, head turned to his left, facing the wall. He could see her shadow on it.

“Were you eavesdropping or what?”

“Oh, you offend me,” Griselda quipped. There was the sound of a bottle being opened, a strong smell of iodine. “You could be heard all the way from the front hall. You should do it more often. Your voice was never damaged.”

Ernesto would have happily traded his voice for just being able to move his arms, but chose not to say as much. He closed his eyes again. “We were talking about better days,” he finally said, very quietly. “A long time ago.”

How long had it been since last time he’d allowed himself to think not only of Héctor as he used to be when he was alive, but of everything that had been before he’d taken his life and that damn songbook? Decades, at least. He’d left it all behind, stored it away like you would with old broken toys in a dusty attic, and never turned back.

But now he had and it all felt so vivid, like it had happened hours earlier. He’d walked into the attic and brushed the dust off that heap of broken things to see that they were not broken, after all. It had been a good time. They had a good time. When had he forgotten that?

Never, really. He hadn’t really forgotten a thing, as it had turned out. The more he talked the more came back to him, and he found he couldn’t stop remembering - even more so with Héctor spurring him on, leaning on the armchair his daughter sat on. She laughed at the stories, and he could hear him laughing as well.

“Hah! That was fun, wasn’t it? Hey, hey! Tell her that one time we tried to ride your father’s horse! And remember when that wild dog chased us up a tree? Oh! And the rooster in church! Don’t forget that time - wait a moment, that was my idea, don’t try to take credit--!”

He’d looked like he had as a boy most of the time, but sometimes he had looked like he had before his death too, and he had also acted like it: no sneers, no mocking, laughing with him rather than at him. That was… no, it wasn’t new, it was how it used to be. Like nothing had ever happened. Like that night had never happened.

Except that it had; memories from before had been a respite, but nothing more. He’d traded all that there had been for songs, and fame. Fame had come, sure enough, but then the bell had come crashing down on him. It should have spelled his end but it had snapped his spine instead, he was stuck there and there could be no going back. He’d give anything - his mansion, his fame, all of it - to go back to the life he’d had Santa Cecilia.

Play in the plaza, go out for a drink, laugh and boast and poke fun at Héctor at any chance he got. Getting him in trouble with Imelda if he kept him out too late, rolling his eyes when Héctor brought his wife along but grudgingly admitting she could sing. Complaining when he was tricked into babysitting duty, and getting payback by singing very inappropriate songs to the laughing toddler. It had seemed such a limited world back then but oh God, how he longed for it now. If he’d known what price he’d pay for his dreams, he’d have never thrown-- him -- it all away.

“... Señor de la Cruz?”

Ernesto tried to ask her what was it, what did she want, but he found he couldn’t do it; a keening sound was all that left him. There was something stuck in his throat that kept him from speaking, kept him from breathing in anything but short gasps and it hurt, it hurt, it hurt.

There was a touch on his head, calloused fingers running through his hair, and thank God no words at all. He kept his eyes screwed shut, focused on the touch, and little by little he got his breathing under control, the knot in his throat loosening. I want to be gone, he thought, and tried to say as much, but that was not what left his mouth.

“I want to go home.”

If Griselda heard his mumble, she said nothing. She murmured something he supposed was meant to be soothing, finished tending to his ulcers, and moved him to a sleeping position on his side before pulling the covers over him. He felt her brushing his hair back again.

“Would you like an injection, señor?” she asked, very gently. “To help you sleep.”

Ernesto nodded, keeping his eyes shut. “Por favor,” he rasped.

That one plea, at least, was answered.

***

Coco couldn’t sleep.

Not that she didn’t need to: she was tired in a way she had ever been before. It had been a long journey to get there, and the entire thing had been emotionally draining to say the least.

She had been accompanied into a bedroom that was larger than her home’s living room, and far more luxurious. She was resting on her own on a bed larger than the one she shared with Julio, and yet she couldn’t bring herself to relax in it. It was too far removed from anything she’d ever known, too far from home.

She had gotten little to no sleep before she left, too. She had stayed wide awake for hours, with Julio’s arms around her and their mijita resting snugly between them - because she may be too big to sleep with mamá and papá, as she often claimed, but she wasn’t yet old enough not to be scared at the notion her mother would leave for days early the next morning.

If the tale of her disappearing grandfather had taught her anything, it was that no good things come from a parent who leaves the household and heads to a big city. Coco and Julio had done their best to reassure her that she would be back soon, and hopefully she believed them, but some things are hard to shake off. Coco would know; she’d grown up tip-toeing around the subject, while her mother worked herself to the bone to provide for her and make up for that unspoken absence at the same time.

The thought of her mother was another stab in the gut. She had said nothing to her before leaving, hadn’t even seen her, because she’d feared she would say something that she’d regret… or, worse yet, that mamá would convince her to stay, to just forget all about it, all about him, like she’d been trying to do for all those years.

Coco couldn’t fault her; she had been left in a difficult position. Betrayed in the worst possible way, alone with a child to raise, she’d still been the best mother she could have asked for. Coco had struggled to accept that her papá would never be part of her life - and she had never really accepted it, holding onto a tiny hope she hardly knew was there until the moment she had read Ernesto’s letter - but her mother had needed to fight, tooth and nail, for everything they had; to keep the family she’d brought together against all odds.

Leaving was not a decision Coco had taken lightly, but she had to do it, and she was certain now that she had made the right choice. She needed to know more about her papá if she was to ever put him to rest as her mother wanted, and that was the only way.

If only she could tell her as much without hurting her, gather the courage to explain that part of her had always, and perhaps would always, stare out of the window waiting for her father to come back home - that no ban on music, no amount of pretending he never existed could change that. It was something she couldn’t erase in any way, even though she had done her best - they all had. Her uncles had always been there, too, entertaining her as a child, sometimes covering for her when she went dancing in the plaza behind her mother’s back, walking her down the aisle on her wedding day.

They all had worked hard to give her a happy and secure childhood, and now she had a happy and secure life. There was nothing they could have done any better than they had, and to say that they just couldn’t entirely compensate for that one absence seemed terribly unfair… but it was also how things were. She couldn’t help that, like she couldn’t help holding onto the letters, photos and memories she had of him.

Coco thought of the face that would stare back at her from a scrap of photo, looking younger and younger with each passing year, and she had to swallow a lump in her throat. How could her papá just walk away and never turn back? How could he never miss home? She missed it already, was aching to have her little girl in her arms again, and her husband’s presence by her side. Had he ever felt that same longing? Did he ever lie awake like she did now, wishing to be back, or had she never been as important to him as Victoria was to her?

No, he had loved her, at least up to a point. Even after he’d left there had been the letters, lots of them. Poems. So much love poured on paper that sometimes she could still feel it, like a warm blanket on a cold night, and she refused to believe it had been anything but real. But then the letters had stopped, and he had vanished somewhere in the wide world. She knew now that he would never return, but she wanted to understand why he’d walked away, to understand him.

Had travelling made him realize his old life didn’t suit him, that his family was not enough? Had he felt trapped in his marriage, trapped by her very existence? He and his mother had married so young, several years younger than she’d been when Julio had worked up the courage to propose, and Coco was fairly sure she had not been born prematurely as her mother always said. Maybe it had been too early; maybe he hadn’t been ready.

Ernesto might know what had gone through his mind; he had been his friend, after all, his brother in all but blood. They had clearly stayed in touch, if he’d known of his death after he had left them behind. Her papá must have talked to him about his decision, surely, and she should have asked Ernesto about that; it should have been the very first thing she asked, really: she had come there for answers, not stories.

And yet she’d found herself unable to ask why had he left them, when had he died, and how. She had wanted to know about his life, grasping for bits and pieces of the man she barely remembered. Maybe what she wanted to know wasn’t the same as what she needed to know, after all.

With a sigh, Coco turned around in the bed to lie on her back, staring up at the ceiling, wishing more than anything to have Julio by her side. She’d called the inn in Santa Cecilia, sure enough, and left a message with the innkeeper - the journey went well, I am fine and will be back soon, give Victoria a kiss from me.

She knew that Paula would pass it on to her husband as soon as he came in asking… but it wasn’t the same as hearing his voice. A short message couldn’t replace a conversation; she knew that well, too, having read and re-read her father’s letters so many times she knew them word by word. And plus, she thought, a hand resting on her stomach, there were things that could only be said in person.

Griselda may have been wrong, of course. She was late, come to think of it, but she’d been before. She had only been feeling slightly nauseous, and a dizzy spell or two were easily explained by the journey, the emotional strain, the little sleep she’d had. It was only speculation, and mentioning it to her family now that she was so far away would only lead to more worry - just about the last thing any of them needed.

She would see things through there, learn everything she had come to find out. She would finally lie the memory of her father to rest and return home. She would mend things with her mother and, if it turned out that she was with child, she would share the news with everyone.

Victoria would be delighted to be a big sister, she was sure of it. Maybe they would make a shortlist of names for her little brother or sister, and let Victoria pick one. Coco was certain she would take that duty very, very seriously. The thought made her smile, and the smile turned into a yawn. Her mind a little more at ease, Coco closed her eyes and turned to rest on her side.

As she drifted off to sleep she hummed, very quietly, a song she’d learned a long time ago.

***

“Abuelita?”

Imelda was not the kind to wince easily, but when the voice rang out suddenly, breaking the deep silence, she couldn’t help it. She almost dropped the pen, and looked up from her desk to see Victoria standing at the doorway, barefoot and in her tiny blue nightgown, hair all ruffled. Under one arm she was holding that odd doll Óscar and Felipe had made for her out of a shoe and some buttons.

“You should be sleeping, Victoria. How many times have I told you not to go barefoot? You could get a splinter in your foot. If there’s something we’re not lacking in this household, that’s shoes.”

Then child entirely ignored the last statement. “You should be sleeping, too,” she said instead, not moving an inch. She was far from a troublesome child, but she had a stubborn streak a mile wide. Imelda had wondered aloud, once, who she got that from. The silent glances the rest of the family had exchanged at the dinner table weren’t lost to her. She didn’t think they had realized she had said as much in jest. Most people had trouble telling when she joked, and she rather liked it that way.

“I have to take care of some business,” Imelda finally replied, looking down at the accounts book. She had been staring at the numbers for a while now, not really getting any accounting done despite her wish to keep her mind busy, but her granddaughter didn’t need to know that. “I’ll be going to sleep soon. Go back--”

“You’re worried for mamá.”

It was a statement, not a question. Typical Victoria. Imelda smiled weakly, too amused to be annoyed at… well. Too amused to be excessively annoyed, at least. “No, I am not. You shouldn’t be either. Your mamá can take care of herse-”

“It’s not that,” Victoria cut her off, wrinkling her nose as though insulted by her attempt at deflecting the real issue, and padded up to her, her bare feet silent on the floor. She grasped her sleeve with a tiny hand, and held tight. “I am not worried and you shouldn’t either. She’s gonna come back, you know.”

Don’t worry, mamá. Papá is gonna come back soon. I know it.

She had believed that too, for a time, but she had been so wrong; Coco had been wrong. Both her trust in the man she’d married and her daughter’s childish certainty that her papá would return to her had been crushed when the letters had stopped, and he had never shown his face at their doorstep again. Coco had held onto hope for much longer than she had; Imelda suspected that she’d never stopped, until Ernesto’s letter had come.

Ernesto, who had taken Héctor away from home in the first place, talking of glory and childish dreams. If he’d never filled his ears with those fantasies, perhaps Héctor would have never left. Imelda found herself wishing that the stage accident had killed him instead of maiming him, so that he could never write that damned letter and break her family apart again. First Héctor, and now Coco.

Papá is gonna come back soon.

She’s gonna come back, you know.

Something in Imelda’s chest ached, and she pulled her granddaughter on her knees, in her arms. For all her bold words, Victoria clung to her far more tightly than she usually would.

“Of course she is,” she said, trying not to think of last time she had given that same reassurance to a child. “I know her too well to think otherwise.”

You also thought you knew your husband, a tiny voice whispered in the back of her mind. Imelda did her best to smother it but it stayed, like the constant drip of water eroding stone.

***

“I told you, señor, the new gardener knows what he’s doing. They have never looked so good before.”

“Hu-uh,” Ernesto mumbled absentmindedly. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see young Héctor climbing up one of the apple trees, swinging from branch to branch. He ignored his childish voice calling out for him to join him, like he had so many times when they were children, and glanced up at the tree he was beneath instead.

For once he was grateful that Griselda had insisted on taking him out after breakfast, pushing his wheelchair across the lawn, past the fountain and flower beds, and among the trees. There was something soothing in the rustling leaves, the bits of blue sky he could see through the green.

On a day like that, back in Santa Cecilia--

“Oh, señora Rivera! I sure hope you have been served breakfast!” Griselda’s voice snapped him from his thoughts, and it was probably for the best, all things considered. He turned to see Socorro - Coco, she had asked to be called that - walking up to them. She had tied her hair back in a braid, which was now loose her back rather than pinned up in a bun; it reminded him of how Imelda used to braid her hair, back when Héctor had begun courting her… with disastrous results, at first.

But then he had somehow won her over, she had become more important than anything and anyone else to him, and it had been the beginning of the end. The birth of their daughter had been the last nail in the coffin of the dream they had shared since they were children, one that Ernesto had tried desperately to keep alive, and now look where it got them - Héctor was dead, and he wished he were.

“No, Ernesto, mi hermano. This is where you got us,” Héctor - the adult Héctor, the one who had clutched at his stomach in empty street a long time ago - said quietly, leaning against the same tree where a younger version of himself had been climbing a minute earlier. There was no bite to his remark, no mockery, but Ernesto had no time to wonder about that.

“Yes, yes. It was delicious, thank you,” Coco was saying before turning her gaze on him. When she’d first seen him the previous day, horror and pity had been plain as day on her face; now her smile didn’t waver, and oh God, had Héctor’s smile, too. “I hope you had a good night.”

He had, he supposed. A full night of dreamless sleep was nothing short of a blessing and, for the first time in a long while - he wasn’t certain he wanted to know how long, he felt he would go insane if he did - he had been awakened by the sunlight creeping through the curtains and not by a mocking voice telling him to rise and shine: when he’d opened his eyes, Héctor hadn’t been there at all.

Of course he’d turned up eventually, first as a boy running through the trees and now as the man he’d last seen falling limply on the ground in Mexico City. He stood silently on his left, watching. Ernesto was not surprised, he had known that he wouldn’t go so easily, but there had been respite. He had given him respite.

Maybe he would let him go, once he was satisfied. He prayed that he would.

“I did,” Ernesto said, and turned slightly towards Griselda. “Could you leave us alone for a few minutes?”

“Of course. I will get your medication ready.”

As she left - not without telling Coco something on how she was welcome to any fruit in the grove, a lot of it went to waste and it was such a shame - Ernesto’s gaze moved to Coco. She watched Griselda’s retreating back, and only spoke when she was some distance away.

“She’s very fond on you,” she commented

“Got it in her head she’s your mother,” Héctor muttered, sounding amused. “Only that unlike your mamá, she doesn’t call you Tito all the time. Old Alvaro would call us ‘Tito and Teto’ for a while, remember?”

He did, but he made an effort to push the memory away - he’d been annoyed, so annoyed, that was a stupid nickname for children and it wasn’t how he wanted to be called - to acknowledge Coco’s comment. “I pay her well,” he said, more drily than he’d meant to, and tiled his head slightly on the side. “The satchel on the wheelchair - there is a pocket on the side. Would you…?”

“Of course,” Coco said, and approached to reach inside. When she pulled back, there was something in her hands - a leather-bound, red songbook. Worse for wear now than it had been when he’d taken it and fled, moving on to the next city before Héctor’s body was found; he had flipped through those pages so many times, even after learning each and every song by heart.

Keeping it had been a foolish move, Ernesto knew it: it contained all of the songs that had made him famous, and was entirely written in what was very obviously not his handwriting. If it had fallen in the wrong hands, it would have caused him… problems. Nothing he couldn’t deal with, but problems nonetheless. He should have transcribed the songs, and then burn it, but he hadn’t. He couldn’t.

“Keeping the guitar was a stupid idea, too,” Héctor muttered. “Such a unique piece. It was a small risk, but a risk nonetheless. You could have had another one custom-made at any point, but you kept mine and you played no other. Did you want to keep a trophy? Got sentimental? Both?”

Was there a difference? Ernesto wasn’t sure, and he was too tired to wonder. He ignored the ghost and looked up at Coco, whose gaze was moving from the book to him and then back on the red cover as she clearly wondered what that was about. Ernesto found himself smiling faintly.

“You can open it, it won’t bite. It belonged to your father. It... fell in my possession after he died.”

That caused her to recoil. “Oh,” she exclaimed, and immediately opened it. He watched are her eyes scanned the page, almost hungrily, and he drew in a deep breath. He was remarkably unafraid, all things considered. Any moment now she would recognize those songs, and she would know he had taken credit for her father’s work. Would she react with anger? Would she demand to know how he had gotten his hands on it? Possibly. He was not looking to confess more than he had to, but if she guessed, he wouldn’t deny a thing. There was an odd relief in that, in knowing that whatever came next was entirely up to her. For the first time, relinquishing all control was not horrifying or frustrating.

“Are these… songs?” Coco murmured, flipping through the pages. Instead of anger, what showed on her face was surprise. “I recognize the words. He wrote some in his letters. I… I thought they were poems.”

… Wait. What? “You… never heard them?” Ernesto asked, taken aback. There weren’t many people in Mexico who hadn’t, and he’d have imagined someone from Santa Cecilia especially was bound to have heard them. As a response, Coco gave him a rather sad smile.

“I heard very little music. It is… sort of banned from the household. My mother won’t have it.”

“Wha-- she loved music!” Ernesto blurted out, but even in his surprise the irony wasn’t lost to him. He could no longer stand listening to music, either, especially not his own. It looked like he and Imelda had something in common now. Fate had a sense of humor.

“Too many memories. Music is why my papá left,” Coco explained. Beside him, Héctor’s ghost sighed.

“You. It was you, not music,” he said quietly, resting a ghostly hand on his shoulder. Once again, there was none of the bite Ernesto had grown used to in his voice. “Your dream is why I left. Your ambition is why I never made it to the train back.”

You tried to leave me behind, it was all that I had ever wanted and you were taking it away, Ernesto thought, but he said nothing. No point in arguing with ghosts: it would make him look crazy, and achieve nothing. His own argument sounded weaker and weaker each time he uttered it, anyway. Regardless what he had done to keep it - regardlessly who he had sacrificed for it - that dream was empty, now. It seemed unbearably cruel.

“So you see, I heard none of the songs before,” Coco was going on. “I knew of you - you were… you are too famous for us not to hear about. But music is banned in our house. And we don’t talk about my father. I never knew he was your songwriter.”

No one does. No one but you and I, and you have no idea.

“He… was never too eager to play for huge crowds. He liked it, but he was at his happiest writing songs,” Ernesto found himself saying. He had not expected that situation, hadn’t anticipated it at all. “There… if you’d like to listen to them, there should be still some recordings around somewhere. I am certain Griselda knows where to find them.”

That caused Coco’s face to light up, and somehow that made him more uncomfortable than her anger would have. “Oh, thank you! I would love to hear--” she began, only to trail off and look up at something on his right, suddenly startled.

Ernesto turned, and caught a movement out of the corner of his eye. “Who’s there?”

“Uh… it’s Ramírez, señor. Fom security,” someone muttered, and a man stepped within his line of sight. It was a man from the security, sure enough, those three or four idiots his manager had insisted for him to keep around. They usually stayed well out of sight, and Ernesto didn’t even know their names.

“And what are you doing here? Guarding apples from blackbirds?”

Héctor let out a guffawing laugh. “Good thing old Rafael had no security to keep us off his land - only a mutt you could bribe with scraps. What was his name again?”

Diablo, Ernesto recalled vaguely. A big scruffy thing, but a good dog once he had a full belly - nothing like a devil, easy to befriend. Ernesto had named one of the chihuahuas he'd had later in life after him.

“I, uh, came to check on you, señor,” Ramírez was saying. He was a large man, built like a bull, but he looked like a chastised boy. “I saw Griselda returning without you, and I thought I’d make sure all was well.”

Ernesto snorted. “As you can see, all is well,” he said. He faintly wondered if the man had heard anything of what had just been said, but he found he didn’t care at all. “But you can make yourself useful and tell someone come here and bring me back inside in ten minutes.”

“I can--”

“Not you. Get lost,” Ernesto snapped, and the man nodded. With a mumbled apology and a nod towards Coco, he walked past both of them and back towards the mansion. Ernesto sighed, leaning his head against the headrest. “My apologies. I don’t know why Armando insists I keep them around.”

“Armando?”

“My manager. He seemed convinced there would be crazed fans trying to break in constantly. There were at first,” Ernesto muttered, faintly wondering when last time even was. He waited for Héctor to make a biting remark about the family he’d gotten himself - “some familia, huh?” - but none came. Héctor was nowhere to be seen. “If they’d refused you entry, I would have had an argument to fire them all,” he added, causing Coco to laugh a bit.

“I’m sure he was just trying to help,” she said, and looked back down at the songbook. “Thank you very much for letting me see this,” she said, and moved as though to put it back.

Ernesto shook his head. “No. You can keep it.”

“Oh! That’s very kind of you, but…” she paused, and there was no mistaking the hungry look in her eyes, the way her grip on the songbook tightened even as she spoke again. Had he looked at that same red cover that way, too, when he’d taken it from Héctor’s suitcase? He supposed he might have. “I could never,” she finally added. “He left it to you.”

Left it to him. The notion was so ridiculous, so wrong, and Ernesto almost laughed. Almost, because when he looked over her shoulder Héctor was there again, shaking his head slowly, causing laughter to die in his throat. He looked, again, like a corpse.

“You know I would have given it to you if you’d asked, right?” he said, his voice like old paper. “You only had to ask. I would have moved--”

“... Heaven and Earth for you, mi amigo,” Ernesto murmured, and closed his eyes, letting out a long breath. When he opened them again Coco was still looking at him, clearly confused. He shook his head again. “Keep it,” he said. “It’s yours.”

Coco crouched before his wheelchair, and Ernesto had little time to process what was happening. By the time he did her arms were already around his neck. “Thank you,” she said, very quietly, against his temple. He could hear tears in her voice. “Thank you so much.”

Ernesto tried to speak, but something was stuck in his throat, something that tasted more bitter than any medicine he’d had to swallow in those past five years of hell. A few steps away, Héctor looked at them with milky white eyes.

“I would give anything to be in your place right now, old friend. Anything.”

Ernesto closed his eyes not to see him and leaned his head against Coco’s shoulder, saying nothing.

***

[Back to Chapter 3]

[On to Chapter 5]

#coco #ernesto de la cruz #hector rivera #imelda rivera #coco rivera #bedside ghost

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prince-boi · 7 years ago

Text

From Your Dearest

Reader x Mark

Word Count: 2,760~ish words idk I didn’t count properly, I know there’s 1,034 “i”s in this fic

Angst, Like really angsty, like get some tissues angsty. Major Angst ahead lol. Like I felt like a horrible person writing this. I want to punch myself in the face.

(Btw I just copied and pasted half of a fic I wrote like idk last year or something and I changed the ending of the story too. So don’t get pissed and call me out if you think I’m lazy or something, mate.)

We met each other at the grocery store:

“Mum! Who’s that girl!” a small boy asked in while pointing to y/n.

“Oi! Don’t point! That’s rude Mark!” the parent scolded. The boy pouted, he only wanted an answer.

Y/n’s parent bent down to his level, “I’m your mother’s friend, this is y/n, she will be staying at your place for a little bit because I need to do some grown-up things. Is that okay with you?” Mark looked up at his mother with a questioning face, she chuckled and nodded. Mark sneaked a glance at the shy girl that was hiding behind the unfamiliar adult and held out his hand, smiling as he did so,

“Let’s be friends!”

When we entered primary school:

Our parents sent us to the same school, we knew no one else besides each other and some other kids from our neighbourhood. We all ran into our lines, ready to be welcomed into a neat classroom as the bell rang.

“Good morning students! My name is Ms Gonsha, I will be your teacher.” Little Lunch Reference.

The teacher started calling the roll, and after we started our first lesson: Art.

Paint few here, pencils shreddings were being emptied in the bins, glue was being eaten, crayons were being snapped in half.

“Art is my favourite subject” You stated happily to Mark. You and Mark had grown close to each other since the first day they met, they were a troublemaking duo, partners in crime.

“Mark! Come sit with us!” Y/n called over.

It was lunch-time and Mark was sitting on the swing-sets alone, eating his chicken sandwich. You ran over, grabbing his wrist and lunch box, dragging him back to your lunch table with all your other friends.

After you all finished eating, you played tiggy with all the other kids until it was home time.

Highschool - Junior years, a place with a cess-pool full of moody and rowdy kids:

“Boys are better than girls!! We’re stronger!”

“Wrong! Strength doesn’t make someone better! It’s obvious that girls are way better!”

Here we go again, the groups are fighting over the lunch tables. Mark could see that you weren’t having much fun in this, and neither was he. Mark wanted to get out ASAP. Sneaking over, he tugged your uniform. Grabbing your arm, he pulled you away and sitting you under a tree.

“It sucks that you’re taller than me, you’re a girl!”

“Nah, you just haven’t had your growth spurt yet.” You loved teasing Mark with your height, it was typical for girls to be taller than most boys at this age, after all, you just hit puberty.

You and Mark had kept your distance during your time in 7 to 9th grade. Everyone always seems to think that someone was dating even if they were JUST friends.

Finally, Senior year of highschool. We’re almost mature and fully grown adults, graduation on our minds:

It wasn’t a surprise that you two got shipped a lot in school. Almost the entire year level knew you guys were the best of best friends. It was obvious too, you two were the clowns of the class.

However, that was when you found out you had a disease in your cardiovascular system. A sickness that affects the function of the human heart that could lead to the grave, if not treated. Nobody knew this, not even Mark, only the people in your family.

The first time you found out, you were crushed, devastated.

Mark was always there by your side though. He never knew the reason for why you were also so upset, tired or growing weak so suddenly. It took a while to pull you out of your hole of misery, but he did.

Through this journey, you learnt many things about appreciation, value and time. You experienced many emotions, most of which were new to you. However, one emotion struck you hard.

This emotion or ‘feeling’ is the driver of passion, anger, desire, lust, insanity or spirit within many people.

This feeling is known no other than ‘love’.

Which one day lead to you leaving a secret love letter in a special someone’s locker on Valentine’s Day.

University and College, we’ve been separated, but we were only a few blocks away from each other. Is this fate that we’ve been together for so long?:

Laughing filled the dorm room.

“HAHAHAHAHA, STOP IT NOW MY STOMACH HURTS.” one of your colleagues yelled. You just cracked one your all-time joke, the best joke you had used since you were young.

Life was good, well, except for the fact that you still had the heart disease and still never told Mark how you really felt about him. It was too late for that now.

Since you guys were separated into different study centres, he managed to find a girlfriend. Well, the girlfriend found him really. It hit you hard the moment he told you, but you were happy for him, even though you felt a BIT bitter. read: very

The future - the one thing no one can correctly predict, nor can they promise success or failure. This powerful thing contains the fate that could send you to the streets or lead you to your dreams:

You were happy, we had your dream job, moved overseas and you were still young. Mark had made it into SM Entertainment. He is in a group called NCT. Not only did he debut but he did it THREE times, too!(and possibly more in future). Another thing was that he wasn’t dating anymore, the girl he went out with turned out to be a mongrel.

Cliché or not, she was a backstabber and used him to get what she wanted: to make her ex jealous. Leaving Mark dangling with insincere memories.

You still loved him. You still looked at him with all the love in the world. All the love the universe could give you. The pure, innocent, puppy love waaaay back in highschool.

Halfway through the year, you got an emergency call to go to the hospital.

“Miss (your last name), I’m afraid your heart can’t take it anymore, you still have long left. We estimate you to only live 1 more year unless we find a matching heart donor.” the doctor said in a stern tone.

There. That was the moment. The sentences that made the cookie crumble.

You broke down, your life was perfect the way it was, a loving best friend, a wonderful job, a beautiful home. What did you do to deserve this?

Later that week, you manage to find courage. After getting a grip on yourself, you decided to go to Mark’s dorm to tell him the long-awaited news.

3 knocks on the door were all it took for you to suddenly hear someone storming to the door, flinging it open.

“WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME EARLIER?!!” Mark screamed. You saw that he had tears on his flushed, rosy cheeks, glassy, swollen eyes and red tinted nose. You glanced behind him, seeing a wire bin, filled with squishy tissues, probably from runny snot and tears.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to–”

“I AM YOUR FRIEND. No. YOUR BEST FRIEND. FOR HOW MANY YEARS?! I THOUGHT YOU WOULD TELL ME THESE THINGS!” you’ve never seen Mark like this in a long time. He was broken, roaring out all his bottled anger and frustration.

You were about to say something when he embraced you in a tight grasp.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry for not being there, I’m sorry for yelling….” you felt your shoulder getting wet, and lead him. Sitting him down on the sofa.

You calmed him down and consulted him. You lightened the mood a little by telling Mark his favourite joke. Light sounds of laughter were heard throughout the night.

Mark decided to let you stay at the dorms for the night.

You only had 3 months left, I promise to give you everything, even if it kills me:

You had never felt so alive for so long. Mark had shown you places you never thought you’d see, both physically and spiritually. Nothing was on your mind but what was happening at the moment. Mark had taught you how to live - to live in the present and not worry about the future or dwell in the past.

After the many adventures, the both of you had been on, Mark said that he had to start promoting with NCT again. You hadn’t seen him for almost 2 months. The first month he had some issues to sort out with his company, before meeting you again. However, it was only a short visit before he had to return to Canada to visit his family. Staying there for 1 month.

You received a letter from the hospital, saying that you were blessed. They had finally found a heart donor that matches you!! You were so happy and in complete bliss. You wanted to call Mark and tell him about the notice, but he didn’t pick up. You tried again for the next few days, he still never picked up.

The night sky shone through the window as you laid in the hospital bed. You checked your phone one last time before you decided to sleep. Then you realized Mark had finally contacted you by text.

Mark: I’m so sorry y/n, I won’t be able to make it to you on time. I hope surgery will go smoothly. Trust my heart.

I’m sorry, last goodbyes are always difficult. Please know that I’ll be watching over you:

The day finally came. You were getting your heart transplant. As you entered the operation room, you were scared, but you thought of the text Mark sent, it calmed you just a little.

When you healed, the first place you went to was Mark’s dorm. You continued knocking. Until a very sleepy Haechan swung open the door.

“Who are you, and why do you have to visit us at such an ungODLY HOUR on the weEKENDS!”

“MorNING HAECHAN!! Is Mark here?!”

No answer.

You cocked your head at Haechan’s reaction. Usually, he would’ve given you a snide remark or joke about what Mark was up to. However, this time he lowered his head. Shuffling back inside, leaving the door wide open for you to come in.

You run in the living room, not a sign of Mark. Just Jaehyun, Doyoung and Taeil watching a movie. They turned to you, Doyoung opened his mouth to say something but you heard someone call out in the kitchen. Waving politely to the three boys sitting on the couch, you headed towards the kitchen.

“Hi Taeyong, Yuta, Winwin! How are you all?”

“Hi y/n! Back so soon? Shouldn’t you be resting after your surgery?” Taeyong asked, surprised by your greeting.

“It’s all good! The doctors said that I’m fully recovered and that I should be good to go.” You happy replied.

Taeyong smiled, “That’s good! Oh, can you pass those bowl to Sicheng and Yuta? They’ve been starving all day.” yuwin

“Sure thing.” You went over to Taeyong and carefully carried the 2 bowls of steaming phở to Yuta and Winwin, who were sitting on the kitchen bench.

“Thanks, y/n!” They said in unison, before starting to scoff down the food.

“Oh! By the way, do you guys know where Mark is?” You curiously asked.

Just before you finished talking, Yuta started choking on the rice noodles, causing Sicheng to panic.yuwin Taeyong spun around, accidentally knocking over the bowl full of water and bean sprouts.

“Ah- y/n, did he not tell you?” Taeyong suddenly asked, not caring about the mess he made on the floor.

“Whats all the commotion about?” Before you could even form a response, Johnny rushed into the kitchen, “Is everything okay in here guys?... and Y/n?”

There was a long silence, the tension began building up slowly.

Taeyong bent down and started cleaning up, “Well, we were on the topic about... Mark.”

Johnny’s face dropped. His usual cheery attitude seemed to have faded away. “Oh.”

You couldn’t take it anymore, you were confused and frustrated. You now had a bad feeling growing in your gut, “Guys! I just want to know where Mark is! Did something bad happened to him while I was gone?? I’m lost...”

Straightening himself up, Taeyong signalled to Johnny to clean up whatever was left of the mess on the floor.

“Come with me, y/n.”

Slowly, you were guided into his room, then left alone. You slowly twisted the knob.

It was completely different to the last time you saw it. Lifeless, boxes stacked in neat towers, the bed covered with a large plastic sheet. His roommate, Haechan, no longer was in the room and had probably moved into a different room with another member.

You walked around the room, observing everything closely. Everything was packed up, either wrapped or boxed. You passed his desktop. His phone laid there alongside his laptop and headphones. What seemed like hundreds of pages, containing messy scribbles of passionate lyrics and doodles, stacked neatly in a pile.

You tip-toed over to his bed. No blanket or pillow, just the bare mattress covered by a plastic wrap. You checked under his bed, feeling more sentimental than ever.

There you saw his beloved guitar. His favourite pair of sneakers and a shoe box. However, that caught your eye was the shoe box. It had a ribbon hanging out from it. Letting your curiosity taking over the best of you, you carefully pulled out the box.

You picked it up carefully and placed it on his bed. Warily opening the lid, you were presented with a number of items the box contained. You looked through the many polaroids of Mark and the other NCT members. Some of them have cute little messages written behind them. Then you found a framed portrait of him in Canada, posing with his family during Christmas.

You smiled warmly, he was always close to his family and loved them dearly. You placed the frame down next to the box with the utmost care and continued exploring through the box.

You then found another framed portrait, this time it contained you and Mark. You stretched your head, thinking of they he would frame such a photo like this. It was taken on the day that he officially debuted, when ‘The 7th Sense’ was finally released to the world. In the picture, Mark was giving you a piggyback, your hair wild and tossed from the wind.

Putting that portrait down next to the one of his family. You gave one last look in the box again, seeing a familiar red card. Picking up the card, you opened it. Skimming through the message inside it, you realised that it was the same love letter you wrote to him in high school. But you noticed there was more writing on the back. This time, with Mark’s handwriting;

Hello, my wonderful Y/N!!

If you’re reading this, it must mean that the surgery went well! :D

Haha, jokes aside, I’m sorry I wasn't there to see you going in but I hope you weren’t too nervous. I’m so, so sorry, be happy and smile for me okay?

This love letter... I always knew this letter was from you y/n, I always had. I’m not as dumb as you think I am ;)

I loved you since 7th grade and wanted to confess to you so so so badly for all these years. But I was a coward I guess. A chicken, a fool, a dullard, call me whatever you want, but when I heard you had that heart disease, I wanted to make it up to you. So I made it my goal to get rid of it.

I searched for the perfect heart donor. I searched, I really did, far and wide to find one. But perhaps I’m just unlucky because I never found one. However, after I became an idol, I had to do health checks. When I got my results back, I was shocked to see that we had a match!

I informed my company and needed to visit my parents to confirm my decision, it took a while, but here we are.

If you haven’t figured it out yet, yes, I am your heart donor. Jeez Y/n, I thought you were smarter than that.

I may not have been the perfect best friend or your maybe future husband/boyfriend, but I least I can be with you to the end of time.

My heart will keep you going! So please, look after it and look after the boys of NCT! I’ll miss you... I hope you’ll miss me too...

From your dearest, Mark Lee♡

Fucking idk whether to cry or cringe.

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