#he fought. a fucking TANK. with a SWORD.

[evilkitten3]

never forget this:

I think the Bradleys are unintentionally the funniest part of fmab. Wrath is the leader of a country but King is his first name, not his title. His adopted ten year old son is actually at least 350 years old and his oldest brother. Mrs. Bradley somehow seems unaware that her son does not age or get injured. Pride is so scary and fucked up that even other homunculi don't like him, but he apparently goes to school like a normal little boy and writes essays on how cool and awesome his dad is. Wrath and Pride both hate humans but they both agree that Mrs. Bradley is pretty great. When they die, Wrath ages several decades in like seconds, and Pride gets turned into a fetus. What the fuck is up with them

[deputyrook]

Impressions- 6/?

PART 1. PART 2. PART 3. PART 4. PART 5.

You're a psychic. He's a detective. And a serial killer.

(Enter: FBI)

Mark Hoffman x psychic!Reader (trouble in paradise?), with a teensy tinge of Strahm x reader. Sue me.

Word count: 5002

WARNINGS: Corruption, abusive dynamics, general Saw-levels of horror & violence. Mentions of child abuse. Not much romance in this chapter, sorry! Reader is still drinking the Jigsaw Kool-Aid.

---

How many derelict warehouses can one single man own?

The meat processing plant that you're making your way through isn't exactly easy to navigate. Much to your chagrin, Mark has left you to make your way through it yourself, apparently having "work" to do. You're not sure whether he means detective work or Jigsaw work, but you don't ask for details.

The place smells like metal and blood, two scents which are becoming more and more familiar to you with each passing day. You tap your cane along as you go, the vibrations travelling up your arm. It's taking time, but you're slowly getting used to the tool.

The responding echoes of the different sounds reveal to you the type of surface you're stepping on- concrete floors, metal grating, scattered pieces of glass. This abandoned plant is cool and quiet, your footsteps by-far the loudest sound you can hear.

The cane also keeps you from running into walls. Still, it's slow going. Not having any idea where John Kramer is doesn't help. If the echoes are anything to go by, this place is huge.

Strangely, you suddenly wish that Kerry could help you out with this sort of thing- not that this was the universe she belonged in, or the side she fought on, but you could almost hear the dry, sardonic comment she would make about the state of this place.

After fifteen minutes of wandering in mounting annoyance, you think to yourself- could this be another test? Marco-polo? With John, everything had the potential to be one.

You do have another tool that you can use to get information about your surroundings. With a sigh, you flex your fingers on the cane and reach out with your awareness instead, scanning.

There. High above you, forward and slightly to the right. No one else flutters against your awareness, confirming for you that it's just you and Kramer, alone in the plant.

Now where the fuck are the stairs...?

Slowly making your way around the warehouse, you go from room to room, feeling your way around. Every so often, you'll hit the edges of some strange, metal contraption that's impossible for you to get a clear mental picture of. You just feel jutting edges, sharp points, and thick bolts, and back away.

Eventually, you find a railing, which lets you know you've hit the bottom of a set of stairs. Climbing very carefully, you keep your senses trained on John Kramer's signature like a hunting dog on a scent.

It leads you to a closed metal door. You rap on it with your knuckles, waiting. When you don't receive an answer, you shove it open anyway.

"I know you're in here," You say as you enter, "You couldn't have met me on the ground level?"

You freeze in place, though, when you hear a shuddering breath and the hiss of an oxygen tank.

The cancer has spread like a rot, making even simple tasks difficult for him. It wrings the time from him like blood from a soaked cloth. He has a hard time even holding a pencil, anymore. It used to be his sword.

He would have met you on the ground level if he could. But he can't.

"I had faith you'd find your way," John says, after taking a deep breath.

"And so I did. You can't say I'm not resourceful," You lean your cane against the wall and walk over slowly, feeling your way over to the area where John is seated. You hit the back of an armchair, and ghosting your fingers over it, manoeuvre yourself to sit down across from him.

"And gifted," John adds. He seems to have caught his breath now, as his voice, though shaky, grows stronger, "You've experienced firsthand the kind of growth that being tested allows. What do you think of it, now?"

He's already gearing up to his thesis point, the reason why he asked that you come here today. He doesn't have the time to waste on small talk. You entertain his question.

"There's no doubt it's changed my life," you say magnanimously, "Being in a traumatic, life or death situation has a way of isolating what's important to you. Of cutting the fat from the bone."

Back when you could see, you never would have thought that one of the hardest things about losing your sight would be the social aspect of it. Not being able to gauge how people are reacting to your words- without delving into the nebulous depths of their souls, anyway- was socially stifling.

Particularly when the reaction you're trying to gauge is that of a hair-trigger serial killer. Ah, if Kerry could see you now- trading philosophical quips with Jigsaw himself.

"Detective Hoffman doesn't see the purpose of all of this, not the way he should. He's sharp, but shortsighted," John says, sounding almost wistful about it. "You've taken a liking to him, and he, you. That much is obvious. Overall, I've come to believe it's for the best. He'll need you, if he wants to continue my work... uninterrupted."

You can feel John's concern. The way he dwells on the future, knowing he won't be here to see it. Will the embers of his creation smoulder and burn out into ash after he's gone? Will it have all been for nothing?

"Amanda... she understands the lessons she's supposed to teach, but she's too emotional- unstable, at times. She will need to be tested again. Should she pass, she'll need an anchor. Someone to keep her... grounded."

Yeah, okay. That seems like a stretch. Amanda hadn't seemed to like you all that much the one time that you met her, but you don't bring that up. Instead, you ask, "So what, you want me to keep the peace between them? Make sure they play nice? Bit hard for me to keep my eyes on them now, don't you think?"

There's a pause, and you hear John move in his seat, before he takes a deep, rattling breath with the oxygen mask. Then, he continues.

"The ability to accurately predict human behaviour is my greatest asset in my work. It is an ability that, of my apprentices, you singularly possess. The others may be able to create the instruments, but only you can design the tests. Only you can choose who needs to be tested, and predict the outcomes, in the same way that I can."

You hum to yourself, mentally noting that he just referred to you as one of his apprentices. He has a point, though. Similar to the one that Mark had been impressing on you. There's a feeling of doom that lingers on the periphery of John's empire. Without you there to notice it, to be the stalwart defence and augur of his work, it would swallow everything he held dearly whole.

Gripping the arm of your chair, the words come before you know what you're saying.

"It's kind of a funny coincidence. My mom tried to drown me as a kid, you know," You're not sure why you tell John this. Surely it's a mistake to be so open with him. "She said the world was too sick. That it was easier to die."

"I know. It was in the paper. They printed your name, and everything," John replies, and it's a bit of a slap in the face. You wonder if he learned about it before or after he strung you up in the acid trap. You wonder if Mark knows about it, too. He's a detective, so it isn't too much of a leap to think he'd searched for information on you. It feels like a betrayal, just a little. "What did that teach you?"

You purse your lips, and choose not to answer his question directly. It seems the two of you keep doing that- replying to questions that the other hadn't asked. Maybe you're more like him than you thought.

"Mark thinks that your actions are justified, and that you're doing the world a service. I'm not sure how Amanda justifies it- maybe she just wants to be close to you, I don't know." You pause, considering.

"To be honest, I think what you do is monstrous," You confess, "It's brutal. Absolutely inhumane," You can't see John's reaction, and you get absolutely no read on him. He's silent, before you continue.

"But. I think this world needs monsters, sometimes. And that I'm one of them. That's what my mom taught me. That's what you and Mark taught me, too." You smile to yourself. "Probably not the answer you were looking for, right?"

Would Kerry think you were a monster for this? Maybe not initially, but after hearing what you'd been up to the last few months, you had to think that she probably would agree with you. That she'd be disgusted-

You freeze. Why do I keep thinking of Kerry like this? Out of the blue?

"Kerry. What're you doing with Kerry?" You ask John quietly. He takes another slow, shallow breath, before he responds.

"I was wondering if you would notice," He murmurs in reply, and you think you detect a note of amusement in his tone. "Like you, she is being tested. Right now."

"She has the will to live. Stronger than anyone I've met," You say steadfast. But there's a creeping feeling, hiding somewhere behind your lungs, that says wrong, wrong, something is wrong.

"We'll see, won't we? Like so many of her colleagues, she neglects life to focus on death. You know better than anyone." Despite how shaky he sounds, John somehow manages to sound smug.

Suddenly, it all seems like bullshit to you. Or at the very least, a resource issue.

"There are a lot of people out there who overwork themselves," You snipe, "But it's the lead detective on the Jigsaw case you happen to grab. Funny. You know, there are other ways to get good people off of your case."

"You're angry with me," John remarks, "Our work needs to continue. If she survives..."

Something occurs to you, then. John keeps talking, but his words are drown out by a whooshing in your ears- the thundering sound of blood coursing. You can't hear what he's saying, but one thought dominates your mind.

You could kill him. Right now.

You wonder how he'd do in one of his own games. One he couldn't anticipate or control. To be thrust into a situation where fear overtakes him, where his brain needs to desperately try to find a way out of the situation. If you had the time, you'd be interested to see how his philosophy fared under a bit of pressure.

But you don't have that kind of time. Instead, you could lean across the gap between you, wrap your hands around his throat, and squeeze the rest of the life out of him. You were blind, yes, but he was already dying, halfway to the grave. You would win a physical struggle.

Even if you weren't able to watch him die, you'd know- he would die afraid, angry that this wasn't like he planned. Terrified that it was all for nothing.

His reign needs to end. More... capable hands need to take over.

The only thing that stops you is a consideration of the consequences. If you were able to confirm that you could fully trust Mark... maybe you'd be able to make it out alive. But Amanda was out there, and she would want your blood for it. The accomplice, Dr. Gordon, was a wildcard. You had no idea how he'd react.

Patience. Be patient.

Your fingers twitch on the armrest. Abruptly, you stand.

"Goodbye, John. I don't think I'll see you again," You tell him, voice cold.

"You will. In one way, or another," He answers cryptically. Unlike your own, his voice almost seems to have a warmth to it now, "And you'll understand me, in time," He pauses, before he finally claims the last word- the last thing you ever hear him say.

"Goodbye, Oracle. I'm glad we met."

--

Kerry is dead.

Kerry is dead, and you don't know how, or why. And nothing makes sense.

You need answers. You need to speak to Mark- you'll find the answers in his soul and yank them out, if you have to.

Kerry didn't need to die like that. She shouldn't have died like that. You should have seen it coming, you should have warned her, you should have-

The door to the interview room opens. A man strides in, a presence you've felt before, though distantly. A woman trails into the room behind him, quiet as though deliberately trying not to make a sound. You sit in an uncomfortable plastic chair, your hands on the table in front of you.

"Comfortable?" The FBI agent asks, "I've got a few questions for you. Hope you don't mind."

The man's tone of voice conveys that he really doesn't care if you mind or not. It's immediately obvious that this is the man that Kerry was in contact with- he's brash, demanding, and you catch a hint of something a little feral, just beneath the surface.

"Of course. Happy to help, if I can," You pause. "You're FBI, right?"

You hear a shuffling of clothing, and deduce that he's pulled out his badge. As if realizing you can't see it, the man quickly adds, "That's right. Special Agent Peter Strahm"

Strahm. The one who knows the water as well as you do. He pulls out the chair from across from you, and sits. The woman's presence remains hovering like a spectre toward the back of the room.

"I'd say it's nice to meet you, but..." you grimace, "Allison was my oldest friend. It's only been a few hours since I heard that they'd... found her. Sorry if I'm not all together."

"You didn't hear it from Detective Hoffman first?" Strahm asks. Every word he speaks seems tinged with irritation, as though everything is moving too slowly for him and he's waiting for it to catch up wit where he's at. Ah, so he knows.

"No. I expect he was busy with the fallout from the discovery. She was his friend, too," Forcing the words through your teeth is a bit harder than expected, "The station radioed me and asked me to come in. They told me... the basics."

"How much did they tell you? What do you know, exactly?" Strahm's words are like daggers, pointed and direct. The man is quick, and gives no quarter in his pursuit. Clearly, he'll be a dangerous adversary for you and Mark.

But maybe it's the water thing- you find that you kind of like him, right off the bat. Short-temper and barely-concealed-rage and all.

"Just that she was found... uhm, in a Jigsaw trap. I didn't even know... she was missing. We haven't spoken in a few days, but she was pretty busy, so it wasn't that uncommon. And then suddenly I get a call-"

You'd met with John several days prior, and when you'd gone home, you'd tried to reassure yourself- Kerry is a survivor. She would be fine. You'd texted Mark, anxiously looking to talk. He hadn't replied.

Days had turned into nights with no news. Your dread had grown, until you got the call.

Guilt is choking you. If you'd just done something... been a good friend, a good person. Maybe all of this had been a mistake. It's too hard to think logically, rationally.

Kerry is dead.

"Sorry," You mumble, wiping the tears from under your sunglasses, "it's been a lot to take in."

"Take your time," Strahm says, the subtext in his tone demanding that you don't. Then, after barely a moment has passed, he moves on and adds, "Open the door and you will find me."

"Excuse me?" The phrase is so strange it snaps you out of your misery spiral.

"Mean anything to you? Did Kerry ever say anything like that?"

"No?" For once, you're drawing up a complete blank at the phrase. It means absolutely nothing to you. "Was it... was that something she told you guys?"

There is a long, pregnant pause. The air in the room, already stuffy, grows thicker.

"What did you just say? Can you repeat that?" Strahm asks, an edge to his voice that is equally quiet and dangerous. You wonder if you've slipped up somehow, in a way you haven't caught yet.

"Did she tell you that?" You repeat, still confused.

"Who were you referring to when you said 'you guys?'" Strahm asks. Your sightless gaze slides over to where you know the woman is standing, and you realize your mistake.

Clever. You'll have to watch yourself around this one.

"You and your partner" You say, gesturing her way. No point in pretending you don't know she's there, "Who I guess you haven't introduced yet."

"What I'm wondering," Strahm says as he stands and walks over to your side of the table, "Is how you knew she was here, if I didn't introduce her. It was Jigsaw who abducted you and blinded you, isn't that right?" He leans down, bracketing his arms on either side of you.

A man used to using his physicality to intimidate. He reminds you of Mark.

You smile up at him. Gloves off.

"I guess I've always been perceptive, Agent Strahm. It doesn't mean I'm not really blind," you reply.

You're not sure what you're expecting him to do, but it comes as a surprise when he grabs your sunglasses and takes them off of your face. He's close enough to you that you can hear his sharp intake of breath when he sees your eyes- or what remains of them.

"Sorry to disappoint. I assure you, the police department here isn't that incompetent. You can check the hospital records too, if you want. They ran a bunch of tests which boiled down to acid will do that." You look up at him, still smiling a little sheepishly, in a way you really hope creeps him the fuck out.

"That won't be necessary," He hisses out, pissed. It's hard to tell if he's angry with himself, you, or the world at large.

You pluck your sunglasses from his outstretched hand, without bothering to pretend that you don't know where he's holding them, and slide them back onto your face.

"Special Agent Lindsey Perez. Good afternoon," The woman finally introduces herself, and you nod in her direction, "As I understand it, you're dating the lead detective on the Jigsaw case- Mark Hoffman. How did you meet?"

Strahm leans away from you, retreating from your side of the table. You get the distinct impression he wants to flip it.

"Well, I knew him a little through Allison," You say, "But then when I was kidnapped- he was the one to find me. I got to know him better, after that."

"How charming," Strahm sneers, "How well do you know Detective Rigg?"

"Uh, not particularly well?" The questions are coming quickly, non-sequitur. Probably to keep you on your toes, "Don't tell me something's happened to him too?"

"No, don't worry. We just want to get a sense of how involved you are in all of this. Jigsaw frequently targets the police, and those associated with them," Perez makes a good good-cop to Strahm's bad-cop. Her voice is soothing, a stark contrast with Strahm's demeanour. You can see why they were partnered.

"And you're right in the heart of this. Tested yourself, and you lived to tell the tale. Your best friend is murdered. And your boyfriend's the lead investigator," Strahm makes no effort to hide his suspicion, "I'm going to take a wild leap here and say you know more about this case than the average civilian."

"That's true," And because you can't help it, you add, "Allison did tell me the FBI agent she was in touch with was a real pain in the ass to deal with."

Perez coughs, in a noise that sounds suspiciously like a laugh. Strahm doesn't. He slams his palms down on the table, in a move that makes you jump.

"And now she's dead," he nearly shouts, killing the levity as he moves back over to tower over you, "And you've got nothing to add whatsoever. You didn't see anything when you were taken, you don't know anything now, is that right?"

"It is," You answer evenly, "But I can tell you this. She never gave up on Matthews. She was sure he was alive out there. And... you're right, about me being tangled up in this. It's obvious Jigsaw goes after people who are getting close to him. I've been tortured already, so I'd turn my gaze toward the other people at the forefront, if you're worried about finding his next target."

"So how were you?" Strahm all but murmurs in your ear, hovering close to your face once again, "Getting close?"

Shit. You really have to mind your words. He's good. A truth here was better than another lie.

"I take it Allison didn't tell you she brought me in as an advisor to the case, at one point? Before I was tested." You reply quietly, "I didn't want to say- to make her look bad. We were all a bit embarrassed by it. Me, her, Rigg, Mark-"

"Why the fuck has no one told me this before now?" You hear Strahm ask in annoyance, his head turning toward Perez, "Kerry brought a civilian into the investigation, and the whole goddamn precinct knew? And no one mentioned it?"

"Because I was brought in as psychic," You reply, still unable to keep yourself from cringing.

There is another long pause of silence.

"Run that by me again," Strahm says, voice tight.

"I told you I'm perceptive. Allison believed-"

"No, no, no-" You feel like you can hear Strahm pushing his palms into his eyes, "You've got to be kidding. Is everyone at this division a complete moron?"

"This is why no one told you. It didn't go anywhere, we didn't get any leads from it. It was a last ditch attempt. But maybe Jigsaw is superstitious. He must have found out somehow. I don't know." Skirting around the truth seemed to be working better than evading his questions outright.

As Kerry had often said, you weren't a good liar. But maybe you were improving.

"Is that how you could tell I was here?" Perez asks, sounding genuinely curious. Strahm lets out a noise of complaint and protest at her question. You nod in response.

"Yeah. I guess," You shrug.

"Great, great. A complete circus, all of this. Christ. I think we're done here." Strahm walks back around to the entrance of the room, his steps tinged with a frustration that echoes off of him in waves. Before he leaves, he turns to you.

"Oh, any predictions you want to tell me before I leave? Like who the killer is?" He asks, like he still can't believe what he's heard.

You say the first thing that comes to your mind.

"Just one bit of advice. Keep a ballpoint pen on you," You say. With another scoff, he leaves, slamming the door to the room behind him with so much force that the room shakes.

---

[4:53PM - Outgoing] We need to talk.

[5:12PM - Incoming] little busy right now

[5:13PM - Outgoing] I spoke to the FBI today. I swear to God, Mark. If you don't talk to me I'll ask for a follow-up interview.

[5:17PM - Incoming] you do that you burn yourself

[5:19PM - Outgoing] My best friend is dead. Fucking try me.

---

Mark calls you. He can't even spare a visit.

"Do I need to be actually worried? Or are you just blowing off steam?" Is the first thing that he says to you when you answer your phone. You immediately get the impression that he's not concerned in the slightest that you might actually report him.

"Did you rig Kerry's test to fail?" You demand to know.

"Answer my question first. Did you mean it when you threatened me?" Mark huffs out a laugh, "Because if you're going to threaten me, you should mean it."

Just like that, all of the fight in you, the anger and the fury and the guilt, is snuffed from you like a candle light. God, you're tired. You've missed his voice.

"What am I supposed to do, Mark? How else can I get your attention?" You hate how much it sounds like you're pleading with him. "You haven't spoken to me in days. You leave me in the dark. My best friend turns up dead. What am I supposed to do?"

He sighs. "I wanted to keep you out of it. Knew you wouldn't like Kerry being tested, and I didn't want you more involved-"

You laugh, strained and almost delirious as you cut him off. "Involved? Mark, up until now you have gleefully drawn me further and further into this chasm. Don't tell me you regret it now."

"Things... are going to get bad over the next few days," He tells you, voice low, "I needed you separate, so that if things go south-"

"Did you rig Kerry's test to fail?" You repeat, voice like stone, "No more secrets, Mark. You want us to be partners. I need to be able to trust you. So this is it. Tell me the truth."

"No," He answers, and you can tell he's holding something back. At your silence, he relents and continues, "But I suspected Amanda would. She's been killing all of her targets."

You let out a shaky exhale. You don't feel angry. You feel empty. Mark continues.

"Kerry was getting closer to the truth. And with those FBI Agents on our trail too... listen. John's going to be dead by the end of the week. Amanda too. I figured these FBI Agents, they'd be able to pin it all on her. Then after she's dead, it's a nice and neat end to the story," You can hear him frown. He sounds tired by it all, too, "But they know about me. They know there's an accomplice. They realized Amanda and John couldn't have strung Kerry up like that alone. I'll need to kill them both, too."

John Kramer had certainly been right about one thing. Without your influence, his empire would crumble under Mark's leadership alone.

In your mind's eye, you see a pile of limbs. Bodies piled high, twisted and broken, jagged pieces of metal jutting from their sides. The pile seems to move, breathing like a beating heart. An amalgam lump of desperate moves. One of the corpses looks at you with empty eyes. It looks like Mark.

"You can't kill every single person that catches your scent, Mark," You tell him incredulously, "You think this will end well for you if you just murder anyone who gets in your way?" You feel exasperated, but its mixed with a kind of relief: that you're talking again, that he's being honest with you. That maybe, you can move forward and get through this. That you can help.

"I can until they stop coming," Mark mutters darkly. A chill runs through you as you realize he's not kidding. He really would kill his way through hoards of people, until the walls closed in around him. Corpse pile, indeed.

"And then what? Mark, come on, think about this. You can't slaughter the entire FBI," He growls in frustration, and you continue, "Run me through the current plan. Let's talk. Two heads are better than one."

And he does. Mark tells you everything about his plan for the next game- John Kramer's final one, it seems. The testing of Jeff Denlon, his wife Lynn, and Rigg, with the two games played simultaneously. Jigsaw's magnum opus, with the dramatic return of Eric Matthews. Mark would be indisposed, cast as an apparent victim through the trial. To swoop in at the last moment, a hero.

"And if Amanda doesn't fail- well, I'll make sure she does. Amanda and John will die. You leave that to me," Mark tells you. You nod, working through the plan again in your mind.

"Okay. Listen, I really think you should hold off on trying to kill the FBI agents. They are not going to die easy, Mark. Fuck, if we just had more time, we could stage this better, to really get them off your trail..."

"You think I can't handle a couple of FBI agents?" He remarks, and you can feel the excitement at the challenge of a rivalry in his tone. You can't exactly fault him for that. Part of you had been a little thrilled during the interrogation earlier, too.

"Fine, give it a shot, then. Have it your way. Don't say I didn't warn you," You sulk. What is the point of being psychic if no one listens to you?

Mark's problem, you think to yourself, is that he doesn't realize how close this all is to the precipice of complete ruin. That he is proud enough to believe he would be able to take up the mantle of Jigsaw alone, once this last game with John Kramer and Amanda is through.

You wonder if he sees you truly as a partner, or as one of his accomplices. Despite his honesty with you, you file that thought away for later- what is it? Just paranoia? Or a problem that will need to be dealt with?

Speaking of problems: Strahm and Perez know that there's an accomplice. Likely a male accomplice, one who could do the heavy lifting.

Until they find one, they won't give up- not the agents, nor the FBI itself, which would undoubtedly send more agents in their stead to pick up where they left off.

Hm. An accomplice of Jigsaw's. You smile to yourself.

Good thing you know about a spare one of those. Who needs to sacrifice a rook, when you could play a knight?

---

A/N- Sorry this took (checks clock) four months to write. I figured it would be better to just stop agonizing about the writing/rewriting and put it out there. Do you guys mind that we're drawing away from the romance, and more toward the MC's journey? Is anyone still reading this? If not, then I'll just do what I want, anyway 😌

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[the-hellhounds]

Walking around in the cemetery, Ravi grumbled to himself as he carried a dead supernatural being in his arms. "Stupid windigos," he muttered under his breath as he found one of the nemetons in which was placed beyond the cemetery. "Always making a mess when they eat humans."

Dropping the supernatural to the tree, he wipes his jacket off from the blood that leaked off of the wendigos' mouth. Having had to fight off the being from potentially running off again to feast on more unsuspecting humans, Ravi had arrived on time to witness it bite a deputies arm.

"Now burn in hell, you shit face." He growls lowly as he sets on fire the body of the wendigo. Leaving it to burn into the nemeton, he walks back to the rows of graves and headstones until he stops dead in his tracks. Raising his head as his nose picked up the familiar scent, Ravi makes a turn towards a burial that had two stone creatures in the shape of kitsunes.

Upon further approach, his senses go on high alert as he hears the heartbeat of someone buried alive.

"They're coming..." Jake says by the window of Jaemin's house as he peeked out to see their lost friends stalking towards them in beserker outfits.

Johnny breathed out as he rolled his shoulders and looked to Jaehyun. "Let's not die today, okay?" He says to his friend as they all got ready to fight the biggest fight of their entire lives.

As Chenle and Renjun got everyone's mates and loved ones hidden in the bunker, the rest stood their ground. Igniting themselves to be engulfed in flames, they let out deep roars to indicate that they wouldn't back down.

Pulling out an unconscious Taeyong from the grave that had oxygen tanks buried with him. Ravi couldn't believe he had found the leader to the pack that had gone missing for months.

"Come on... come on, wake up." He shook Taeyong's body, hoping he'd gain consciousness, but nothing helped.

"He won't wake up unless they get the sword through the nogistunes' heart." A deep voice says from behind Ravi. Turning his head, he spots Chanyeol standing before him. "It's how they got Donghyuck back. But they must piece back the sword quickly before it notices that you found Taeyong." Chanyeol says.

Without wasting another minute, Ravi quickly pulls out his phone and calls the first person on his contacts. "Get the sword fixed." He barks out into his phone as he hears the growls and roars of his pack from the background on the other end of the call. "I found him."

Getting thrown halfway across three houses in the territory, Haechan groans in pain as he gets Sunwoo thrown onto him. "How much do you weigh?" He groans as he pushes the younger off of him.

"Not as much as you do," Sunwoo answered with snarl as he looked down to see a gash in his thigh from one of the beserkers. "Fucking great. Now mom's going to lose her shit."

"How old is your mom?" Haechan asks, getting an unbelievable stare from Sunwoo as if he didn't just ask something ridiculous at the time.

"You're not fucking my sons mother!" Hanbin growled as he stood in front of them to protect Sunwoo from getting hurt further.

Whining from behind him, Haechan pouts. "Why not? You got to her first!" He says just as Hanbin moved when a berserker threw another punch that landed on Haechan's cheek. "Fuck!"

"Karma's a bitch, isn't it?" Sunwoo snickered as he ran off to help his father with an Oni that was attacking him.

Making a face towards the new kid, Haechan snarls his lip as he fought back the berserker.

"Haven't you learned your lesson?" Jaemin says as he appears and helps him with Jeno. "You just can't be throwing yourself at other men's women like that, or you'll get punched by a beserker, which happens to be one of our friends." He says sarcastically.

Grumbling, Haechan held the arm that had a sharp bone as a weapon so they could take down Kai, which was the beserker they were fighting among the others.

Running to hide from the nogistune while Johnny distracted it, Jaehyun held the sword that would be used to vanquish the spirit.

"Then why cause so much chaos?" Johnny yelled as he got beat down by the Oni that held him. "What for? It only causes pain to others."

The nogistune smirked in such a way that looked frightening on Taeyong's face. "Because how else would I feed? I can't feed off of others' happiness, and I know Taeyong isn't happy." It says as it walked dangerously slow towards Johnny that heaved in pain from the wounds he had. "Haechan wasn't happy either, but somehow, his loved ones always found a way to get him back."

"Loved ones," Johnny spits out, "something you'll never have."

Throwing a punch to his jaw, Taeyong growls into his face. "And it'll also be something you'll never experience-" he goes to say, but stops when he senses something. Turning his head up to the sky, the nogistune feels that the real Taeyong had been found. "No. This can't be..." He whispers as he doesn't notice Jaehyun approach him.

"But it can." Jaehyun plunges the sword deep in the nogistunes back as it pierces it right through his heart.

As the nogistune lets out piercing cries, the Oni begin to disappear into thin air. The beserkers stop attacking, their eyes fading into their normal colors as if snapping out of it.

The hounds all let out relieved breathes as their friends begin to take off the bear skulls they had on.

"Guys, I feel funny," YangYang says as he drops his skull helmet to the ground.

"That's because you have a gash on your side," Ten tells the younger as he walks over to him in his own beserker outfit.

Looking down to where he now felt the pain, YangYang felt dizzy. "Oh," he says before collapsing into Kun's arms from seeing so much blood.

"Everyone hurt, get to my medical hut," Kun announces as he takes an unconscious YangYang with him.

Baekhyun stared at Changkyun, his sharpened bone weapon having missed Kyun's head by an inch into the dirt ground. "Kyun?" He asks as the younger stared with widen eyes up at him.

"YOU ALMOST KILLED ME!!" Jake suddenly yelled feet away from them as both Baekhyun and Kyun looked over to see Chris having stabbed the ground between Jake's legs.

"Mate, why were your legs even opened!? You dodge if a sharp weapon comes at you!" Chris yells back at him as he too had snapped back to normal.

"You were about to stab me in the dick!! I had to open them after you swiped my legs!" Dropping his head back, he breathes heavily in pure tiredness from fighting for his life.

As everyone was getting treated, San sat down next to Taeyong, who had been silently drinking beer.

"You okay?" San asks as he opened up a can of beer to drink with him.

Taeyong sighed as he dropped his head back, his neck popping as he lifted it back up. "Not really..." He answered. "I'm the leader to my pack. I should've protected my friends, my family... but I failed. I put them all at risk."

"You didn't fail them," San tells him with a pat to his shoulder. "Having a nogistune inside you is something no one can avoid, but having friends to help get you back means that you've proved yourself as a great leader."

.

"Papa?" Minjun asks as he comes waddling over to Haechan and Jeno with power ranger bandages.

"Thanks, buddy," Haechan smiles softly to his one year old that looked up at him worriedly.

"I don't think a power ranger bandage will cover much..." Jeno whispers while holding his thigh that was covered in blood. Lifting up the baby hound in his arms, he cradles him while Haechan cleaned up his wound. "But thank you for helping, Minjunnie," he smiles as he presses a kiss to his cheek.

Ravi appears to help out! 🤧: @badbf-cb ( lisa ♥︎ ) - @fantasyaespa ( ningning ♥︎ ) - @fallenangel-oc ( staci & alya ♥︎ × ♥︎ ) - @lovesick-hyuck ( ♥︎ ) - @witch-renjunnie ( ♥︎ ) - @raiden-oc ( 🌺 ♥︎ ) @monsterhigh-cb ( jaemin ♥︎ ) - @livealittleoc-cb ( jay & ace ★ × ♠︎ ) - @multi-esme

[gamer-paramnesia]

happy halloween!! have some fighting headcanons! (characters, obvs)

long-ish post

etoiles!! he is a warrior at heart, honest and loyal

I would think his fighting style is heavy on the footwork and agility + doing the most damage in as little strikes as possible

visually graceful, but almost impossible to follow?

matches pace w his opponents

very much on the offensive majority of the time

heavily trained (common style of fighting, but super fucking good at it so that it seems extremely unique)

soo so unserious tho

fights for the thrill!! the only time he actually got serious was the battle against the 3 codes (where he fought code!pomme… n where he died…)

incapcitates, then kills

honorable fighter! will not play dirty

tanks

large bladed weapons are his go to (swords, scythes, etc)

phil!!! survivalist extraordinaire

picks his fights! knows when he cant win

also very movement based,, uses his wings as a counterbalance more often than not (therefore making a lot of moves that are physically impossible to normal humans)

defensive fighter, fights to incapacitate?

more unique style, as he learned from mostly himself n he refined it

efficient but an honorable fighter as well

fast. like, scary fast

keeps his emotions in check (funnels his emotions into his swings)

doesnt like fighting much (lie)

will play dirty if desperate!

tanks!

best with scythes n axes

fit!!!!!!! 2b2t historian, did you know that 2b2t is the oldest-

also picks his fights (very carefully!)

hard hitter, more on the barrage type instead of the strike n wait

on the offensive, prone to switching to the defensive tho

generally unpredictable movements (hes batshit insane)

sporadic, hard to pin down style

not the most serious fighter. taunts a lot, goes quiet when focused (first i lol'd, but then i serioused >:0)

dirty fighter!! all those years of 2b2t taught him that :D

goes for the kill when stakes are high

will play honorably IF he respects his opponent/considers his opponent a good person, but even then he'll use every trick up his sleeve to win!

although,,, he will back out of a fight he knows he cant win (and even if he could win, he'd weigh the pros n cons)

kinda,, support,,,

he makes me think of a scavenger tbh

prefers smaller, more handy weapons (axes, explosives, knives, etc)

bad!!!! totally-not-a-demon demon

im gonna say it again (its that he picks his fights)

goes for the confusion tactics (feints n tricks n misleads n misdirects etc)

similar to fit in the taunts n unseriousness n the silent focus

enjoys the hunt

falls in step w his opponents when the stakes are low

refined fighting style (had a lot of time to work on it and boy did he)

when the stakes are high,,,, his fighting seems frantic yet somehow practiced, every move is deliberate

a shadowed blur on the battlefield

goes for the jugular lolz

when he has the upperhand.. he plays with his food tbh

bites off more than he can chew sometimes

prefers the defensive

also a barrage of attacks instead of wait n strike (death by a thousand cuts kinda)

plays SO dirty its not even funny (it is a little funny..)

avid scythe user!! (likes comically oversized weapons tho, like his warhammer)

roier! idk that much abt him but ive heard that hes a great fighter as well so im gonna throw in my guesses as to how he fights

gets underestimated a lot? works on his side tho bc he is a ruthless fighter

a very emotional fighter, but uses it to his advantage

on the defense a lot, brutal on the offense??

surprisingly graceful

incapacitates

not the most refined style, but very efficient

sword guy!! but like a perfectly weighted sword? (very particular about his weapons?)

jaiden!!! havent seen her pvp much but these are headcanons so-

learned from the best! (roier)

hard hitter, zones into an enemy and doesnt let up

stays in one location, pivoting is key (stands her ground)

uses her wings to gain extra speed if she had to change locations

not super experienced, but a quick learner

very defensive

channels emotions into swings (kinda wears her heart on her sleeves tho)

goes for the kill for opponents she has grudges against?

another scythe enjoyer!!

pac! also idk that much about him but he seems ergonomic

VERY graceful fighter

underestimates himself?

footwork is very particular and careful, almost like a dance

defensive fighter

either quiet, focused fighting or screaming, crying throwing up fighting, no in between LMAO

kinda a dirty fighter as well? not super on purpose but learned it from prison times

he seems like a rapier kinda guy (swords!!!)

feel free to add on!!! esp if u have disagreements w my hcs hehe

[deliverred]

♡

Callum means "dove" figured it went well with the "peace/light" of Geoffrey and Lukas' names

Clearly takes after Geoffrey more in looks, though he did inherit the pale ass freckles that become more prominent if he's been hanging out in the sun from Lukas. Built like a Disney prince, fuckin' Dorito shaped.

Knight pipeline kid, some sort of heavy armor mounted unit like a Great Knight. HP/Atk heavy, with well rounded but sorta mid def/res/skill, abysmal spd. Exceptional with a lance and not too bad with a sword because of auntie Lucia, do not give this boy an axe for the love of god.

An excellent rider, of course taught closely by Geoffrey from a young age. Has a big, beautiful tank of a buckskin horse named Haymaker! Partly because of his coat color, but also because he'll lay people out. The one time Lukas got within the same vicinity as the horse, he was promptly kicked hard in the ribs (fucking busted, laid up for over a month and only mildly arguing with Geoffrey that he shouldn't have been standing behind the horse at the time) and never went near the animal again. Callum is still trying to convince him that Haymaker is sweet...

Wonderboy overachiever burnout so hard....

When you have two parents that both fought two different gods, that's sort of a lot to live up to -- even if neither of them pressure him about it. Callum has wanted to become a knight for Crimea or the One Kingdom ever since he was little, and he's worked hard to make it happen but he absolutely did not pace himself. Not sure if he's cut out for it, but really wants to follow in his fathers' and others' footsteps (he grew up around so many knights...)

A tad too serious and scathingly sarcastic at times, he can come off a bit cold towards new people but offers quiet and gentle companionship once he warms up to people. Breaking the ice with him is actually as easy as telling a good (or bad) joke; once he's laughing or trying not to smile, you're all good.

[yb-cringe]

It’s 2 am I should be sleeping but instead of sleep brain there is just VEGERETISH. Not even coherent thoughts at this hour. Just what if Eret and Vegetta fought a bunch of withers together for fun. Technically it’s because Eret needs Nether stars for beacons because they wants to make another big gay beacon thing BUT Foolish finds wither fights annoying and Eret is still too nervous to approach anyone else for help. So starts fighting them herself. Vegetta sees her get the achievement and is like “why is this crazy guy fightinh a wither what the fuck”

Goes to check it out. Cut to his jaw dropping when this crazy book nerd is tanking withers in nothing but vanilla gear. No modded weapons or armor!!! She says they get in her way!! What the fuck! What the fuck!!!

Or if Vegetta saw Eret and Foolish sketching building designs together and got jealous because he thought that was THEIR shared interest thing. What do you mean Eret designed their own castle AND L’Manberg’s walls (those are SEXY WALLS) this is so not cool.

Although. Vegetta will begrudgingly admit they seem to have good taste.

holy fuck yeah.

Eret would 100% tank withers in vanilla gear. She's so used to her other servers that all this modded shit is so weird to her-- She never uses it. It's interesting to catalogue but thats all. She prefers familiarity.

Which is very sweet and also batshit insane considering Vegetta bathes Foolish in moonlight swords and spiderclimb gear and goddammit!! shes gonna get herself killed! and thats foolish's partner!! he cant just.. let that happen

so he does Try to give her armor. gear and weapons etc. it goes Not great mostly bc eret doesnt understand why he's just trying to give her things and why he gets so upset when she says nah im good.

She continues to be frustratingly good at holding her own without vegettas help. she does begrudgingly allow him to come with her on PARTICULARLY dangerous quests. jsut bc vegetta looks like a kicked puppy when she starts to say she's fine.

[libertys-lovers]

So I had a dream where a group of heroes & I were looking for this sword that had literally unlimited power? And because my dreams give me the abilities of my sona (and my sona’s fucking OP), the group decided I was the only one strong enough to handle it??? I guess???

So ya know, I pulled it out of the ground, and of COURSE as soon as I did we got ambushed by these… creatures? A disembodied voice called them Eldritch, but they were more like trolls that looked like stone. And the whole point of the ambush was to test the sword & the people that wanted it.

Anyways, I’m telling you this, because you’ll NEVER guess who was in my group

fucking LÚCIO!!!

THAT’S RIGHT! You thought it was a normal dream, but it was actually me, SELF INDULGENCE!

He wasn’t wearing his normal aesthetic though. Like he was wearing all yellow? I distinctly remember a yellow tank-top. His locs were shorter than normal too, I noticed. But like it was still obviously him ya know?

Anyways it was just really fucking cute. We were teaming up & fought together! And despite us being in this action-packed scenario, we still found time for us to smooch a lil 🥺🥺. I could really feel him man…. It was so damn wild 😭🙏

[soulsxng]

I got hit with the sudden urge to do Tank/DPS/Support/Healer for the muses yesterday, and so that's what we're doing now, strap in y'all. (Just 10 at a time though, because god knows I'm gonna end up rambling about some of them longer than I meant to, and if I did all of them at once it would be the length of a soccer field or something)

Jaspern - Pure DPS; phys (He does fight with a big fuck off scythe, so midrange usually) with a little magic-- usually death oriented magic that has the added benefit of a slow but constant strength sapping effect on those it hits.

JJ - DPS/slight support; phys (He fights with his dual-bladed spear, Ahzeel more often than not these days, but is a nightmare with just about any weapon in his hand), uses more magic than Jas does, though that's usually for the support side than outright attacking.

Ber - Support/Healer; doesn't really like being part of a fight, so he will bubble himself at the back of the battlefield, and just focus on buffing and healing his comrades. Side note, but just because he's not a DPS, that doesn't mean he can't DPS. Piss him off too much, and he'll be insta-casting about 50 meteors at the back of your head in 2 seconds flat.

Melchior - Tank/Healer; my dude really is like a weird sort of paladin. Technically, I feel like he doesn't have the defense stat to be a full-on tank, but he's that type that doesn't want to have anyone else on his team get hurt, and he can mitigate damage with his healing easily enough, so here he is. Making himself the tank anyway. Damage is phys/magic balanced.

Eluvias - DPS/Tank; Luvi goes absolutely berserk in a fight, which is why DPS is primary. He pretty much just leaps at whatever is attacking, and starts shredding regardless of if he's taking damage too or not. That's evidently why he could also be a tank. Even if he's hurt, it's like he doesn't notice it, he just keeps going until he legitimately can't. Technically he can use magic, but usually he gets so carried away with the physical side that he forgets to even use it unless he's really in trouble.

Zahine - Healer/DPS OR, pure DPS. Zai is pretty much the healer with a gun meme. Usually he'll stick to just healing, and will pick people off with magic-based DPS here and there...but man. MAN. If he goes pure DPS it's because he's angry, and then whoever is against him is better off just running away, because he's not above fighting dirty, and he's completely ruthless. Especially when the charming powers start coming out-- that's when even Io and Luvi (Or Pythius, in the few times that he's fought alongside Zahine) just take a big step back and let Zahine do his thing.

Orin - Pure support; they really couldn't fight well to save their life (literally, in this case), still, they actually are capable of using quite a bit of magic that can protect allies, or essentially debuff opponents. Baby doesn't wanna fight though, so please don't make them.

Vanyllo - DPS/occasional Support (surprisingly); his main focus is always going to be DPS, but if things are going south, he's trained pretty extensively to be able to use his magic for all kinds of different traps/ensnarements, so he'll dip into support sometimes, too. Can also use magic that limits opponents range of sight and that sort of thing.

Darrow - Tank/DPS; one of his domains is protection, after all! Aro knows how to take a hit just as well as he knows how to draw (and keep) an enemy's attention on him, to keep some of the heat off of his allies. On top of that though, he's very accurate with both sword, as well as fang and claw, so the amount of "critical" strikes that he tends to land on his foes means that he has a pretty high overall damage output too. Primarily phys damage, but he tends to bolster that with fox fire and divine damage, as well.

Eleare - Tank; another one that might be surprising. Most of the reasoning is just because they feel it's easiest to control the flow of battle from that position, but another reason is that Eleare has a lot of magical abilities that create barriers for themselves, can diffuse or weaken some magics, etc. So they're pretty tough to land consistent damage on. Most of their damage is more close-ranged magic, but they're not shy about getting more physical with their claws or fangs, instead. Or, what usually happens, is that they just shift into a massive fox/dragon/hawk/what-have-you, and they just go ham like that.

[girlswithambition]

OUAT Fic Draft part 1 - Explicit, White Swan

Emma Swan/Snow White/Mary Margaret

Bittersweet, smut, angst, a good kick in the feels (hopefully).

Context: Before the first curse broke, Emma slept with her then-roommate Mary Margaret. After the curse broke, she fought a dragon and realized her roommate had known her in an entirely different context. Emma takes this news as well as you might imagine.

Content warnings: accidental consanguineous sex; purposeful later on. Mentions of system-typical child abuse and neglect.

Comments or whatever you please is greatly appreciated from the bottom of my heart - and you don't even need to pull it out of my chest!

Emma fought a dragon. She drove her own father’s sword into an honest-to-forsaken-God, this-is-not-Jurassic-Park Dragon. She woke an entire town from a nigh-30 year curse, restored fairytale identities to each of its residents, and saved her son with a True Love’s Kiss. And most importantly, Emma fucked her mom.

The revelation came some time after the fanfare of the broken curse. It took a few moments to let the reality of her parentage sink in, and then the horrible realization of what she had done with one half of that parentage.

Emma promptly ran to her apartment (her mom’s apartment, fucking hell), locked the front door behind her and barely had time to slip and toss off her leather jacket before she locked the bathroom door for good measure and sank helplessly onto the mat by the sink, her head in her hands.

Goosebumps spread on her now-bare shoulders. A tank top wasn’t exactly fit for this weather but if Emma couldn’t shed her own skin, the jacket would have to do. She heard the crumpled noise of it sliding to the floor from wherever she’d tossed the thing in haste, but otherwise the whole apartment was silent. At least for now.

Emma had hid herself for most of her twenty-eight years, and this hadn’t been one of her better ideas. Someone would come for her. 

Emma heard the sound of keys rattling desperately against the front door. As if her stomach hadn’t already fallen to the floor, it did again.

“Emma?” asked Mary Margaret. Snow White.

Her mother.

Emma listened for the noises outside the door. Footsteps drawing away from the bathroom, and the slip of Mary Margaret picking up the leather jacket to hang it back up–not on the chair, but with a more faraway sound like on the coathanger. Only a moment of thoughtful silence followed before the footsteps beelined to the bathroom door.

A firm set of knocks. “Emma?”

Snow rattled the locked doorknob, pushing only slightly, but it met enough resistance to give away Emma’s position. Even if Emma only uttered a tiny gasp, the still-locked but threatening door stilled. There was no more searching necessary.

“Emma, are you all right?” Pleaded the voice behind the door. “No one knows. Only–”

A pause. Your father was probably Mary Margaret’s thought, as Emma listened to her mother carefully consider her words.

“--only David. And he understands. His phone is on for whatever you need.”

Emma had no words to fill space in the apartment. She heard the clicking of the ancient (or cursed) radiator, but that was the only thing. She wondered if Mary Margaret could hear her breathing behind the bathroom door. Probably. Mayor Mills wouldn’t have passed up an opportunity to curse her with thin walls.

Snow’s voice behind the door carried conviction even beyond the slight waver. “Listen. If you want me to go, I’ll go. I love you with everything I have left. If that means letting you go again, Emma, I will.”

Still, Emma had nothing to say. 

Snow’s tone softened.

“I can move away from the door. Otherwise it’s the other door…or the window. I can’t stop you, but you should know that’s a tough drop. If you’re gonna do that, please reach for that ash tree–”

“--and roll it out. Yeah, bail bondswoman, remember?”

Emma could hear the smile in Snow’s voice. “Bandit. Formerly. But really, Emma, I’ll move. You don’t need to end your day with two broken ankles on my account.”

“I don’t know, Mary Margaret.”

Emma looked at the bathroom window and its tacky bird-themed curtains hiding the worn, chipped paint on the pane. She could slip right out and walk out of her mother’s life forever. She could take Henry, or better yet (given what she’d done) talk with Regina about how Mayor Evil Queen was the only acceptable mother figure for him.

Snow interrupted her consideration. “Did you lock both doors, Emma?”

“No.”

“Did you want to?”

Emma’s admission came out so quietly that she wondered if Mary Margaret had heard it from the other side of the door.

“No.”

Evidently she did, because Emma heard some shuffling noises she couldn’t quite place until Mary Margaret opened the second bathroom door. She held a mug in her hand hastily piled over with ice cubes.

Mary Margaret locked the other door behind her. Now it was only them, taking up space in a tiny apartment as they had been before they knew who they really were.

“A glass of water. If you want it.” Mary Margaret put the glass down beside Emma, but didn’t reach for her beyond that. She sat on the mat against the tub.

Emma’s mouth was dry, so she took it and sipped. It gave her something to do other than looking at her mother.

Still, Mary Margaret broke the silence. “I asked David to text if he’s on his way back. He’s watching Henry.”

“Door’s locked?” Emma heard Snow lock the other bathroom door, but she meant the front door. No stranger could come in and no David or Henry could either. Emma didn’t need to specify, though; Snow understood.

“Yeah.”

“Fuck, I shouldn’t have done this. Shouldn’t have done any of this. I am so sorry, Mary Margaret.”

“There’s nothing you have to apologize to me for, Emma.” Unlike Mary Margaret’s, Snow’s gaze held firm and sure. Emma remembered her in Mary Margaret fashion, curled on her back and bucking her clit against Emma’s thumb while still unsure what to ask for.

“Can you really tell me that this was what you wanted?” Emma asked to keep her mind away from what had happened between them.

“No. I wanted to raise you in the palace, away from the–away from Regina. You would have been safe and I could have seen…everything. But that’s not what happened, Emma. I can’t wish for the past to change.”

“Isn’t your whole thing wishing?”

“Sure it is.” Snow shrugged, her warm embrace of a smile fading to an ember, just on the edge of a frown. It couldn’t go out entirely, even with sadness behind her eyes. “But sometimes we can’t reach all the things we wish for.”

Emma had nothing left to fill the silence that followed. She’d already discarded her jacket to escape every sensation she remembered, but the crisp Storybrooke air swept goosebumps on her bare arms. Cursed radiators didn’t exactly heat efficiently.

Emma sipped from the mug Snow gave her, and didn’t stop her mother when she moved next to her on the bath mat, leaving space for the mug between them. Emma kept it in her hands.

She wasn’t sure what to do in this proximity to someone. Emma was never really sure. Fucking would be easy enough, but just sitting with Snow felt more present than Emma had ever been comfortable with. 

Snow must have sensed that, too. “Does this feel okay?”

Emma took a few seconds to deliberate, but nothing really came to mind. This wasn’t the time for the polite ‘yeah it’s fine.’ Snow genuinely asked. What her mother wanted was her honesty, and somehow that had buried itself deep in her heart without Emma wanting to lie.

“It doesn’t…feel not okay. Not really.” She paused, the words swimming in her mind without quite making it out of her mouth. “It didn’t feel not okay.”

“You’re gonna have to see me after class for that string of double negatives. I’m almost impressed.”

Snow extended her hand, which Emma took.

Just hand-holding. Emma tried to sort through how exactly she felt, but found that more difficult than it really should have been. It was only hand-holding. 

And how reverently Snow held her hand.

Emma had never taken the time to really see Snow’s gentleness without pretense or ulterior motive. Even as Mary Margaret, Emma had felt how genuinely she cared. Her mother was not the soft-spoken witch waiting in the woods, but the piece Emma had been missing for so long.

“Are you cold? You’re cold. Let me get you a towel.”

“Oh no, Mary Margaret, it’s fine, I–”

But her mother wouldn’t be dissuaded and had already begun fishing in the bathroom closet for the basket full of clean but yet-unfolded laundry. There were plenty of folded towels on the shelf, so this confused Emma until she saw Mary Margaret return with a familiar knitted blanket that she draped around Emma’s shoulders.

A warm, all-encompassing weight washed over Emma. Snow’s hand pressed softly between the other-worldly yarn and her shoulder. It was softer now, freshly-laundered, and smelled faintly of lavender.

“I washed it. You kind of drool when you sleep, just like Charming.” Snow sat back down beside her. “And yes, you do sleep with it. I’ve known for a while.”

“You realize how fucked up this is, right?

“I was beginning to think about it when, I don’t know, the twenty-eight year town-wide curse broke and I was no longer a schoolteacher. Or tragically heterosexual. Minus that one time.”

“Oh, God, stop. Okay, fine. But David can’t possibly be whatever he is about this.”

“And why wouldn’t he? He knows. He understands. It’s not what he expected, but he’ll talk on his own terms and yours.”

“What if I don’t know what my terms are?”

Mary Margaret sighed. “Well, we can start smaller. How are you feeling right now?”

Feeling seemed to come so easily to Snow. It ran in the family, apparently, and skipped over Emma herself. As a bail bondswoman she prided herself on her suspicion, knowing whether some jerkass was a flight risk so she could tell the DA “I told you so.” That line of judgment hadn’t served her as well in being intimately, painfully close to someone.

Emma couldn’t find pain in her mother’s arms, or even the obligation to share anything at all in frustrated silence.

“I mean the shock hasn’t exactly worn off, and there’s the whole fairytale curse thing. Other than that…” Emma sighed, racking her brain for anything Snow asked of her. “It’s a pretty blank page. Sorry. I don’t have anything else.”

“Any bad feelings? Uncomfortable ones?”

Emma shrugged. “I don’t think so. It’s all shock, really. I can do shock. The magic is a bit of a surprise but so is your average day in Tallahassee.”

Once she got past the whole magic thing, Emma had seen worse in Florida.

“Sounds like an uncomfortable feeling to me.” Snow said. “Just because you’ve experienced it before doesn’t mean it’s easy. And if you don’t believe me, believe your goosebumps. Or your thousand-yard stare. Your voice changes when you’re scared, too.”

“I’m not–” Emma knew exactly the type of horseshit she was about to spin for her mother, and Snow did too. 

Emma relented, clinging tighter to the mug in her hands. “Fine. I am a little scared, I guess. You’re too good at this.”

Was that a Snow thing, a Charmings thing, or a mother thing? Maybe all rolled into one–Emma couldn’t yet tell. Her mother’s perceptiveness pierced right through her ribcage, and yet beside Emma’s lonely foster memories was a more recent past, just as real, of lying in bed clinging to Mary Margaret while her fingers tangled through sweaty, blonde waves. No curse had done that. They had.

She had.

While Emma considered the weight of her realization, Snow broke the silence beside her.

“Do you want me to hold you?”

[macgyvertape]

FF14 Stormblood thoughts

Lets see, I posted my running commentary on wrapping up Heavensward in Oct '22 so it's been a while. My friend and I got busy and took a break from the game.

A long time ago I forget who posted:

“#do new players know any opinion they have about stormblood is basically akin to #someone finishing da for the first time this year and saying they have some thoughts about anders they'd like to tell you about #like cool it's understandable you have these thoughts. i however am running for the hills”

which now that I've finished Stormblood I understand, and that's with skipping a bunch of non MSQ stuff.

I'm so excited for Shadowbringers, it was impossible for me to dodge spoilers since people I follow for D2 were posting about it, so I'm going into it knowing a lot of the big spoilers while the friend I play with has no idea. So I was very excited to see a certain skunk haired character pop up post expansion patch.

Actual running commentary on Shadowbringers below, I'm so glad I took notes for when I took a break

Wow so theres swimming in this new city?

I know vaguely who Zenos is and he’s the main antagonist. Just waiting for him to be introduced since the antagonist in the beginning is a joke of a dude with a hammer

Zenos shows up with like a golf club bag of swords, I know this dude is supposed to be this game’s attempt at Sepiroth but I’m not impressed

It was very easy to predict that some of the people we just did quest for were going to die. But damn something happens to Y'shtola every expansion 

This storyline is very serious and draws on real world issues, which could not be more of a contrast to my friend and I playing it as we hangout and eat dinner

Fighting an unwinnable fight with my 2 applicable WHM damage spells. Sure he slashed me up but I feel like in universe I can heal tank through anything but a drugged drink

Wow the Black Rose is some serious warcrimes chemical warfare. 

I thought Lolorito was dead what’s a dude working for him doing here

Fuck this fish-dude with the bell. Its totally personal

Wow so the imperial viceroy is a asshole who has people kill their family for displeasing her. Really casting the imperials as absolute monsters

Wow huge underwater sections, also didn’t know the dragon-ppl lived underwater

The more Yotsuyu talks the more I’m like “hmm maybe Ilberd had a point”

Susano is a delight, he’s just hamming it up

Huh so apparently Kurenai is the real princess and the person we fought was the body double, I’m going to continue this questline even though it isn’t worth it exp wise just to see how this plays out

Gotsetsu returning to the village: not sure if the intent was to have him be naive, but he comes off as an asshole with talking about how he is owed hospitality and complaining about the tone people talk to him in. Like dude, the whole village is going to face deadly repercussions if you’re seen.

I didnt realize there was a wolf-person race. Why can’t we play as them?

I thought Yugiri was gonna die when we fought Zenos round 2. Guess he’s one of those trope “lives for a strong fight”.  

Took a week break then coming back to another new faction with Cirina kinda feels like its killing the momentum

I wasn’t expecting this Sun cult, Magnai is such an asshole, like fuck off with the slavery and a double fuck you with the sexism

Gosetsu is so arrogant, like if he would just shut up things would go so much more smoothly

Is Koko and Sadu of the Dotharl trans or non binary? Great if they are. Like their belief in reincarnation seems pretty understandable if you factor in the later lore about sundered beings being shards of each other and merging over time

Can’t believe we’re letting this empire dude run away for a second time

Yotsuyu had sad childhood backstory, still not sympathetic for the injustices she commits now. 

Hien is gonna flood Doma Castle, i know this is like a historical tactic but all I’m thinking of is Rains of Castamere

Damn Gosetsu got taken out by a falling rock (ceiling), how anti climatic I’m not really torn up about it because all the characters just stood around talking

I’m gonna really hope Hien actually killed Yotsuyu with that sword blow

At first i thought some of the questnames were coincidences, but no Doma part of Stormblood has a fair amount of Hamilton references

Oh no Krile, feels like a real kick the dog moment for Fordola

Summoning a primal to bring back a dead child, the question isn’t if this will go poorly but the extent of how poorly it will go. (Although you can resurrect people in battle so I guess thats gameplay and story difference)

I appreciate how Allisaie tried another option

The Shri Lakshmi mechanics were hard and annoying, most challenging fight in a while

Big fire the death star vibes for Fordola, also I just realized she has thigh high tights with the gap between the skirt. WHY instead of armor like other characters get

A randomly appearing Estinien, how did he know to come here? Why now? I have no idea but what a cool entrance, this is the hottest he’s ever been

Does Fordola have the fuckin sharigan?!

Lyse looks hot in the new dress but its the most impractical thing for a fight wtf. Its total fanservice, player character and her fly towards eachother in what could easily be framed as a kiss then the achievement is called “cheek to cheek”

Key to Victory is the quest type I hate where I don’t have firm directions where to go and I got instawiped by the npc followers getting close to the wrong enemy. Wish I could start on very easy

So we freed Krile, what about the rest of the people in the pods?

Zenos turns into the primal dragon that used to be Ilberd, talk about desecrating Ilberd’s belief in using the power to fight the empire

This is a very anticlimatic ending to 4.0. I’m not emotionally tied to Zenos either enjoying him as a villain or hating him as a rival, more like “ah not this asshole again lets see who wins the fight by virtue of plot armor” 

So Zenos killed himself after getting 1 good fight, but I know he’ll be back. I’m imagine my character standing there like the Saitama “ok” face

Ok so Estinian stabbing the eyes means Lahabrea and Igeyorhm are super dead

Guess Elidibus stole Zenos’ body. They should have burned it

Nero being Cid’s ex is the funniest way to interpret him joining the Ironworks

Why is this Arnevald guy talking like he knows me

All of the above written before Jan 2023 and then I took a break till November

Got back into the game and its like “here’s a backstory about a guy who was the product of sexual assault from an occupying military force and his horrible childhood” and then “here’s Fordola’s sad backstory where her father was stoned to death by a mob for collaborating while he was protecting her”.

So that’s really sad, then the next quests are the Sultana’s backstory and “go to the golden saucer, try not to get distracted, challenge impossible”

The orb dissipation duty sucks, I just failed it so I could do it on very easy mode

Me: Alphinaud is gonna fuck up paying for this sword, he’s talking to a pawn broker. 30 min later: yeah he fucked up

Patch 2 sure is my least favorite, I don’t like Gosetsu or Yotsuyu 

Wow not a surprise  the Imperial diplomat is also an imperial zealot, and he’s Yotsuyu’s brother meaning that whole family tree is fucked up

Me: guess the Tsukuyomi wasn’t so infinite. My friend: One Piece was a better anime

The camera really emphasizes Asahi’s crazy eyes and obsession with Zenos. Funny since Zenos then is obsessed with the Warrior of Light

This Garlean with a bunch of Ascian mask trophies is kind of intimidating, but he much have just killed the weak sundered ones. I have no idea who he is, but funnily I know what Ascain is running around as Zenos

Extremely annoying 2 part solo duty that I had to redo when almost getting to the very end, followed by very funny Y'shtola shooting down a guy who had the hots for her

Hell yeah Exarch showing up, now the fun begins because I’m very spoiled on Shadowbringers and my fiend has no clue 

Me: Mr nap time himself! My friend: whose this guy. Such a fun intro with Emet being mean to his family and hamming it up, where he’s ???? until the name Solus is dropped

I appreciate the non serious tune and amount of dutch angles in his intro

Oh shit the Ascian hunter is Gaius (not Balter), I didn't recognize him at all since the part of his old mask around the eyes was white I thought that was his skin color

Oh I’ve been mispronouncing Emet-Selch with a ch sound. Also lmao he takes time to be mean to Varis

Ok after the 2 part negotiation with Varis I want to see Solus bully Varis some more. He deserves it

My friend doesn’t recognize the Crystal Exarch from the brief bit at all, if he didn’t remember who Lahabrea is then no chance he recognizes G’raha Tia except that G’raha has been in Dawntrail marketing 

Damn so Stormblood ends with a fade to black and then a jumpscare evil Varis grin…

Post quest cutscene: Zenos bodyhopping I guess

[hotbowlofstew]

Surprisingly they all had like.... different reactions. Somehow. Maybe not drastically different but they all were different. To some degree.

Alidae's first encounter with a primal (Ifrit) was out of necessity. She was the only person nearby with the Echo, and therefore a chance to fend Ifrit off while waiting for backup. Sure she canonically had... like the trust system with other adventurers. But whether or not those adventurers had the Echo is a different story. She was horrified. As an Arcanist with honestly more Archer training than Arcanist training under her belt, she was still fumbling with spells. She starts to get desensitized to primals by the time she fights Garuda, but Ifrit and Titan were not fun, to say the least.

Both T'lyr and Touya fought Shiva as their first primal. Which, hilariously, neither of them are fit for the cold. T'lyr is a born and raised desert lad. Meanwhile in all of Touya's traveling years, he never once lived in a cold climate. They both were the tanks in that fight. Touya had both this internal amazement and terror, while outwardly he was collected and headstrong (likely the main tank). All the while T'lyr is actively trying not to die from simply his metal armor being too conducive to ice attacks.

The funniest encounter was with Koren and Raana. Who's first primal was fucking Susano. At this point in Stormblood MSQ, T'lyr and Touya had already been sent back to Kugane to rest (lest they work themselves to death). The Viera twins have heard the horror stories at this point. But neither of them were expecting the relic gathering to lead to a primal summoning (mostly because I, too, was not expecting a primal). So queue Raana death-glaring Koren-- who was the one carrying the relics at that point --asking him if he knew that was going to happen. KOREN DID NOT. HE DID NOT KNOW. I also personally think that the twins both have to take on Susano's sword mechanic. Which again, is incredibly funny, considering neither of them are tanks, and they had just sent both tanks back to Kugane. Tis fine tis fine.

As for Sthallona, I can't say for certain who was her first primal. Lightwardens aren't really primals... but they also aren't not primals. But I think it would also be funny to think that she just happens to solo Ravana, who was re-summoned. Because she was in the vicinity when it happened, and the Vath were very worried. But also... she wasn't phased. She grew up with the Scions, in Sharlayan, where they probably had a research project on primals or some shit. I think if anything, she thought that Ravana was hilarious.

Another silly shout out to when Koren and Raana fought their first Eorzean primal... which was a re-summoned Titan. And they were both standing there, mortified, while they watched T'lyr and Touya bouncing Titan back and forth between each other... And looking to their side as Alidae comes running in, with nothing but the face of "Aw shit, here we go again", cocking her gun yelling expletives.

4/10/24

What was your wol(oc)'s reaction to first encountering a primal?

[frombeyondtheblackhole]

Hermit DSMP Swap AU: Part 9.1

[TW: Blood, violence, severe injury, bone related gore and zombie/undead related body horror. Please take care of yourself and stay safe. Warnings bracket the worst of the potentially triggering content and a summary is provided if you feel the need to skip that part. Some violence and minor injuries are outside the brackets. If there is a specific TW that you would like me to include in the future feel free to let me know and I will do my best to add it.]

Quackity, Purpled and Charlie, spent over an hour searching through the woods and the land around Las Nevadas, well mostly just Quackity and Purpled while Charlie hovered around asking annoying questions. Neither The Zombie nor Foolish were anywhere to be found. 

Quackity told Purpled and Charlie to Head back to Las Nevadas and look there while he did one more check around the perimeter for any clues as to what happened. Quackity took his time. Now that he was by himself he was able to think more clearly. He shoved his hands in his pockets and frowned.    

Quackity wasn’t exactly sure what he had witnessed. He’d never seen something exactly like it, one minute Foolish was standing in front of him and the next he was gone and this zombie lady was in his place. He might argue with the other Las Navadas recruits, and they might not have the best opinion of him, but one thing was certain, if anyone messed with them, especially on Las Navadas property, They were messing with him and he wasn’t about to let anyone push him around, not anymore, never again. 

Quackity looked up as he rounded a sand dune, the walls of Tubbo’s “cookie” outpost looming up on the edge of Las Nevadas land. Quackity Scowled. One problem after another. The whole conflict about the walls hadn’t really been resolved, Tubbo was being stubborn, unreasonable. But that wasn’t a priority at the moment, he would deal with that latter, right now, he had bigger problems. 

Quackity followed along the wall and stopped short on the road in front of the Las Nevadas toll tunnel. Ranboo and Tubbo stood on the road coming from the other direction.

They stared at each other, neither side moving. Then Quackity broke into a smile “Hey there, Fancy running into you two here. You seem to hang around here a lot, have either of you seen Foolish or a strange looking Zombie by chance?”

Ranboo fidgeted and looked away but he was always fidgeting and he was never one for eye contact so that wasn’t exactly a tell. 

Tubbo on the other hand, Quackity had been in the same cabinet with him during Schlatt’s presidency, and in the cabinet during Tubbo’s presidency, he knew what the kid looked like when he lied. 

“A Zombie you say? What makes you think we would have anything to do with that?” Tubbo shrugged. 

Quackity didn’t drop the smile. “Don’t play dumb with me. You know exactly what I am talking about.”

“Honest big man, there are no Zombies here, that's why we built the walls.” Tubbo insisted.

Ok so the kid was getting better at lying. Quackity frowned but the smile returned a moment later. “That's all good. Just be careful, she did something to Foolish, he’s gone missing, I’m worried that if she is allowed to roam free and do whatever she wants then she might do what she did to Foolish to someone else. You understand. I would hate to hear that one of you two went missing.”   

Tubbo and Ranboo looked at each other.  They definitely knew something they weren’t telling him. 

“Thanks for the warning big man, we’ll let you know if we see anything,” Tubbo smiled tightly before grabbing Ranboo’s arm and pulled him aside to whisper in his ear.

Called it. Quackity smiled, his sharp gold tooth glinting in the sunlight. He turned on his heel and headed back down the tunnel towards Las Nevadas. 

---

Cleo looked down at the dark water lapping against the stone pier where she sat, her legs dangling over the edge. The air smelled of salt, cold stung her lungs. She wasn’t shivering despite the fact that a crop top and shorts was chronically under dressed for the weather. She didn’t really notice. 

Her heel bounced against the wall of the peer as she stared out to sea. Snowchester was secluded, nice and peaceful, but it also felt vacant. There were houses but no one lived in them. Not that that was anything all too strange, Hermits built empty houses all the time, but these felt different. The empty houses the Hermits built were intended just for show, or to conceal functional builds. These houses once housed people, and now were abandoned.  

Cleo looked up at the sound of footsteps crunching through the snow and the clunk of boots against the wood at the beginning of the peer. Tubbo and Ranboo stood looking back at her. Tubbo had his hands in the front pockets of his coat and Ranboo stared at her over Tubboo’s shoulder. He never seemed to blink, it was a bit unnerving. 

Cleo pursed her lips “Um, thanks for letting me stay here kids, but-”

“You can’t stay here anymore,” Tubbo blurted out. 

Cleo blinked.

Ranboo flinched “Sorry about all this, it’s just…”

“Don’t worry about it kid,” Cleo said, getting to her feet, “I was going to leave anyway,” She shrugged.   

“Oh really,” Ranboo sighed.

Tubbo frowned “Why? What changed?” 

Cleo chuckled hollowly, “I could ask you the same thing.” 

Tubbo pursed his lips but didn’t push the issue.

Cleo walked past the two of them and started up the path.

“Wait,” Ranboo called

Cleo stopped.  

“Where are you going to stay now?” Ranboo asked. Tubbo just glared at her.

Cleo shrugged and smiled a bit to cheerily “I’m sure I’ll find a nice cave somewhere, after all I am a Hermit,” 

“Um,” Ranboo looked off to the side, tapping his fingers together. “If you need it there’s a hotel in the Greater Dream SMP. It’s big and red, hard to miss.”  

Cleo chuckled, “I’ll be alright, don’t worry ‘bout it.” 

Tubbo was still glaring at her. She turned to leave again.

“Just know that if you try and mess with us we can and will defend ourselves,” Tubbo said.

Cleo didn’t turn around “Oh, I know,” She smirked as she walked away. This Tubbo kid had guts, she could respect that. 

---    

Quackity taped his fingers against his arm impatiently as he waited in the ditch on the Greater DSMP side of the speed tunnel to Snowchester. After talking to Tubbo and Ranboo he had watched from a distance and followed them here. 

The splash of oars cutting through the water reached Quackity’s ears as a boat made its way towards his hiding spot. Quackity took a steadying breath, stealing himself as he listened carefully. The boat scraped against the shore and there was a crunch of sand as someone got out of the boat. Only one person. 

Quackity stood up and moved into view. The Zombie jumped, summoning her sword as she spun around to face him, teeth bared.

Quackity held up his empty hands and took several steps back. “Woe, woe woe. Hold on. I think we got off on the wrong foot.”

“You think?” She scoffed. She didn’t attack but she still had her guard up. 

“Just tell me what you did to my friend and maybe we can resolve this peacefully,” He smiled tightly. 

“I didn’t do anything! And even if I did, why would I tell you? You already tried to kill me once?” She said. Then her expression changed, as if just remembering something. She lowered her sword and straightened. “What do you know about perma-death?” She asked calmly.

Quackity sucked in his breath and took a step back. Was this a threat or a legitimate question? He looked at the determination in her eyes… It was both. 

He fought the urge to summon his axe. 

“Do you really think you can kill a Zombie? I’m already dead. The rules don’t apply to me!” She strode forward and pointed her sword at him. Quackity staggered back looking up at her standing over him on the edge of the pit framed by the crystal clear sky behind her.   

Was she bluffing? 

Fuck. 

She spun on her heel and ran the other direction, across the field. 

The trance was broken. 

[TW: Blood, violence, body horror. Skip to the next bolded text to avoid the worst of it] 

“Shit, Get back here!” Quackity scrambled up the bank, summoning his crossbow and letting loose the bolt. It struck her in the leg, but she didn’t even seem to slow down. Had she even felt it? An ender pearl replaced the crossbow and a moment later he felt a sudden rush as he flew through the air, switching to his axe mid-flight. He crashed into her back, embedding his axe between her shoulder blades.

Quackity pulled his axe out of her back and staggered backwards. She wasn’t dead. She hadn’t despawned yet. Maybe she had been telling the truth about being unable to die. Oh wait, she was moving.

She pushed herself up onto her hands and knees coughing up dark sickened blood. She staggered to her feet and turned around to face him again, fire and determination in her eyes.

How was she still standing? That last hit had to have broken several ribs. Quackity glanced at the exposed ribs poking out from under her crop top, edged with decayed flesh. Those had been that way before. Maybe broken bones didn’t matter?  

[TW End: Summery: Quackity chases after Cleo, she tanks a bunch of damage but is able to keep fighting despite severe injuries]

Why were his knees shaking? She hadn’t even scratched him this time, and she wasn’t as good at combat as Dream or Techno. Yet she refused to die? 

He clenched his teeth and scowled, “I’ll give you one more chance. Tell me what you did with Foolish?” He demanded. Now he was bluffing. 

“I. Don’t. Know!” She yelled as she lunged at him, summoning her sword mid swing as she brought it down on him. 

He didn’t have time to block. Instead he moved back and swung the axe up. The blunt side of the head struck her in the chin as he felt her sword cut into his shoulder and graze his chest.

She staggered back and switched her sword out for a gapple. 

Oh no you don’t. Quackity raised his axe about to lung when he felt someone jump on him from behind. Arms wrapping around his neck in a choke hold. The axe returned to his inventory as he grabbed at the arms around his neck. They were invisible, his attacker was invisible.  

“Cleo, Run!” the invisible man shouted. 

She froze, the gapple halfway to her mouth “Etho?” 

“I said run!”

She turned on her heel and started running, only pausing for a moment to eat the gapple and keep going. 

Quackity clawed at the arm around his neck. This Etho guy was invisible. That ment he wasn’t wearing armor. Quackity summoned a sword in reverse grip and stabbed behind him. He heard Etho hiss as the sword grazed him. His grip loosened and Quackity was able to wrestle free. Summoning another pearl he threw it, getting away and landing near some trees. He staggered against one of the trees, coughing and rubbing his neck. He gritted his teeth, his face twisting into and ugly snarl. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. She got away. And she had an accomplice.  

They made him look like an idiot. He quickly rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. He had promised never to let himself feel helpless again. Never to let other people control him. Yet he had let himself get pushed around by some random Zombie and one guy with an invis pot. Fuck this. He needed to do something about this. He couldn’t let this stand.

[lananiscorner]

Silver Snow is done!

I finally finished Silver Snow!!!! Woohooo!!

With this, I have officially played all routes of this game (including the DLC). This time I gave myself the challenge of using only characters affiliated with the church and War Monk Byleth. I will play the final map another 9 times to S rank all the female Eagles and Church characters + Linhardt and Ingrid. Seriously, I’d rather do this final map 9 more times than kill Dimitri, Dedue, Sylvain and Mercedes 6 times in Crimson Flower (this way, I’ll only have to do that twice).

A word of advice for anyone who thinks a church characters only run is a great idea: do not pick Black Eagles. If you choose to go Crimson Flower, you will lose half the church characters, and if you choose to go Silver Snow, you’ll get them so late, they will be auto-levelled absolutely horribly (especially Cyril). So… how did it go?

Total play time: 63:29

S support: Rhea (loved it, Rhea actually owning up to all the shady shit she pulled and appreciating Byleth for who they are, not for who she wants them to be is superb)

Most frequent MVP: Byleth (10 times and to no-one’s surprise, since he was all I had for the first 5 chapters)

Most battles won and fought: Byleth, with 999/999 respectively. Thank you for being such a good dodge tank for adjutant+knowledge gem levelling.

Shortest battle: Protecting Garreg Mach, Falling Short of Heaven and Salvation at the Chapel (with 5 turns each)

Longest Battle: Red Canyon Dominance and The Gautier Inheritance (33 turns each--I wasn’t even skill point farming this time, but this is what happens when you only have 1 character on the field and still try to route the map)

Favorite character in terms of gameplay: Anna. I made her a sword-wielding Falcon Knight and she was the RESsiest dodge tank that ever RESsed.

Favorite character in terms of… character: No-one, really. I feel like everyone was pretty much on equal footing here. I will note that the Black Eagles all felt much more... alive on this route than on Crimson Flower (which is hilarious, because I deliberately did not put them on the battlefield lol).

Final pairs:

Seteth/Flayn (I like this ending less each time I read it)

Catherine/Shamir (hell yeah!)

Hanneman/Manuela (good)

Dorothea/Ferdinand (I farmed their supports with meal time since I didn’t want the Eagles to end up all solo and this is one of my favorite pairs in the game)

Bernadetta/Linhardt (more meal farming)

Petra/Caspar (even more meal farming)

Forever Alone:

Ingrid (recruited her for the Galatea corps)

Ashe (recruited him to get Catherine’s paralogue, since she only joins after the expiry date)

Alois (good ending, I like)

Cyril (same as Alois, also forgot to recruit Hilda for his paralogue--oops)

Anna (forever married to capitalism)

Balthus (good fucking riddance--I had him as Byleth’s adjutant since day 1 to get his A support for male Byleth, since I had already gotten Yuri and Constance during VW 2. His fucking A unlocked after its expiry date. Jerk.)

Next up: Non-hypocritical Crimson Flower run, in Japanese, with male Byleth, to get his supports with Edelgard, Hubert and Jeritza. This means:

No help from the Goddess or her children or her powers (no divine pulse, no relics, no combatants with crests).

Everybody rises and falls by their own merits (no recruitment, no adjutants, no instructing--work tasks and goals are ok though).

No using church battalions (RIP Stride). No prayer/goddess rings.

No choir practice/hymn recitals/participation in national holidays of Faerghus/Leicester.

No restoring the saint statues.

Therefore, the only characters allowed to participate in active combat are:

Caspar (will be a wyvern lord)

Petra (will be a wyvern lord)

Dorothea (will be a dancer and physic bot--I would like to make her a gremory for extra Physic, but 5 Move is laughable and levelling her Faith without her hidden talent is... yikes.)

Hubert (will be a dark bishop)

Other characters, if force-deployed, will be allowed to move, use torches and open chests--nothing more.

[fallingappleshurt]

im in the mood for angst, so for your dff au, could you please writing a one shot or smth along those lines of techno coming home from a particularly tough duel and everybody else’s reactions? ty!!! <33

YES HELLO I WRITE

Yes Hello I’m a writer and I forgot about asks but here we go!! I’m sorry this took so long and that it’s really bad but here it is!

This is very poorly edited I’m so sorry lol, this takes place in my dff AU! It’s spunky

And it’s been awhile since I’ve written for this AU so things are a little weird, kind of missed the angst but I got ideas don’t worry

TW: violence, fighting, description of injury but nothing too graphic I think

Dicey Nights

Sword in hand, solid stance, deep breath. He could do this.

Techno tapped his foot anxious against the cement floor, waiting for his opponent to climb over the ropes and enter the arena. The air was thick and hot from the muggy night’s humidity and the crowds incessantly loud cheering. The arena was dimly lit around the stans, all light coming from a giant overhead, casting grimmy light over the blood splatters that stained the rough concrete.

His opponent entered the ring, eyes flashing in the light, lips quirked up in a barely perceptible grin. Techno’s anxiety shot from his stomach to his heart, this man was like a tank, tall with bulky limbs and long flat sword.

Techno pushed his worries away, he had taken on opponents bigger then himself before, just not that big, but they needed the money, he had to win this.

They both walked to the middle of the platform, shook hands, the other man gripping too tightly to be friendly, then they turned and walked back to their starting places.

The buzzer sounded and the man shot forwards, sword swinging in an arch, Techno’s sword clashed with his, metal screeching pierced the air as the man tried to overpower Techno, putting his weight on the sword.

Techno kicked him in the knee, the man sputtered and slipped, allowing Techno to dodge to the side then ram into the man, sending him to the ground. He moved to slash his sword at the man’s neck and fake out the audience then the duel finished, quick and easy if the man stayed down for the three count.

Suddenly the man lashed out and landed a kick square into Techno chest, sending him reeling. Techno scrambled to his feet, stifling a groan. His ribs protesting vehemently, sending shockwaves of fire through his chest, he watched as the other man rolled back onto his feet.

The man, Techno heard the crowd cheering ‘Go Thrasher!’, ran at him again, opting to not overpower him but overwhelm him, he swung wildly, he obviously never had any training.

Techno took the defensive, slash, stab, dodge, block, kick back, and repete, analyzing Thrasher’s fighting style, his patterns and goto movements. Once he memorized the motions he switched to offense, changing his own patterns as well, quick slashes and jabs, forcing Thrasher back, Techno would kick at the man’s legs then go back to swinging.

In a ditch effort Thrasher whipped his sword around only for Techno to kick it out of his hands, sending it flying. Techno slammed into the man once again, taking advantage of his distraction, and knocked him to the ground.

He pointed his sword at the man’s neck, looking down the blade at Thrasher, the crowd around him screaming, “Go Blade go!” He tried to keep his face emotionless, waiting for the announcer to call it off.

Thrasher wasn’t giving up, he kicked at Techno again, who half dodged half stumbled away. Thrasher moved faster then Techno had even seen, Techno lashed out, slicing his arm but it didn’t faze Thrasher. Rage blazing in his eyes he jumped on Techno and knocked him to the ground, half pinning him, a knee on one of Techno’s arms, knocking his sword away.

Thrasher punched him across the face, Techno’s head jerked to the side, pain flaring in his face, nausea rising in his gut as the man reared back and hit him again and again.

Techno weakly grabbed for his sword but came up short, his vision was blurring, hot blood dripped down his face, matting his hair. In a last ditch effort, he threw a punch, aiming for Thrasher's throat, he hit his target dead on and hard.

Thrasher gasped and faltered, his grip loosen and Techno took his chance. He yanked himself away and sent another kick to the man's chest, scrambling towards his sword.

He didn’t know what he was doing, he couldn’t win this, the adrenaline would wear off soon and he’d lose, he wouldn’t be able to fight after this, he’d have to go home empty handed. That thought alone made him feel even more sick.

Thrasher rose to his feet, breathing heavily, Techno got into a weak stance, prepared to go down fighting. You weren’t allowed to kill in the duels but Techno was scared Thrasher would chuck those rules out the window. Thrasher’s fists were clenched, cracked and bloody at his sides, fire in his eyes, he let out a roar. Techno’s grip on his sword tightened and he prepared to swing-

The buzzer sounded.

The fight lasted 10 minutes, the announcer called it a draw. The audience booed and complained as Techno went to shake hands with Thrasher.

Thrasher looked at Techno’s hand in disgust before slapping it away, “You fight dirty, freak.” He growled, Techno scowled but bit his tongue and flipped Thrasher off and stalked off as dignified as he could with the room spinning like a toy top.

He grabbed a bottle of water from the sidelines and chugged it when one of the organizers threw a small pouch at him.

“You’re off your game,” The women commented lazily, not looking up from her clipboard, “I expected better.”

“Then you hop on in there,” Techno grumbled, not making eye contact as he pocketed the pouch, he sheathed his sword.

“I’d rather die,” She said, eyes flickering up from the page, “Just like you almost did.”

Techno snorted, “Please,” He said, shouldering his bag and walking towards the bathrooms, “I neva die.”

He somehow managed to get to the bathroom without collapsing, he pushed open the door and stumbled over to the sinks. He gripped the edge tightly, waiting for the room to stop spinning, he looked up at the mirror and realized he was fucked.

There was a gross cut on his hairline, trickling blood down his face, the right side of his face was covered in blooming bruises, blood from his nose smeared down his chin, he looked like a mess.

He felt like a mess.

Techno grabbed a paper towel and ran it under the faucet then scrubbed it against down his chin and along his hairline, ignoring the sting. He dried his face off then filled up his water bottle, dreading the fact that he couldn’t hide this from his family. He hoped to get home before Wilbur or Tommy woke up, he knew he couldn’t avoid Phil, he got up extra early to be able to commute to work.

Techno started home, not bothering to stay for any other duels, he wouldn’t be able to win, not in the state he was in anyways. He squeezed past the security guards and tried not to fall while walking, the trip home only should have been around forty minutes but between his slow pace and stopping to take breaks so he wouldn’t pass out it took him over 2 hours to get back.

The rusty metal stair squeaked as Techno climbed them, they groaned as he put his weight on the railing, god he wanted to lay down.

He unlocked the door, trying to push it open as quietly as possible, of course the door made that impossible as it creaked loudly.

The door cast a shadow on the soft light coming from the kitchen, Techno could hear dishes clicking quietly.

“Hey Tech,” Phil said, as Techno locked the door again, “You’re back later then usual-” He stopped, staring at Techno’s face, Techno immediately put his hands up, “Now I know what you’re thinking but let me just say; it’s not that bad.”

“Sit,” Phil said, setting his coffee cup down, Techno rolled his eyes, but sat down anyways. “Yeah I saw that coming,”

“Please tell me the other guys looks worse,” Phil prodded at the bruises on Techno’s face, Techno shrugged.

“Please tell me you didn’t get your face fucked up for nothing,”

“I hope? I mean I got a few good hits in, oh that reminds me,” Techno leaned over, rummaging through his bag for money pouch,

He immediately regretted it because it made the room spin again. He grumbled but found the pouch and tossed it on the table.

”It’s not a lot but it’s something,” Techno trailed off, he could have stayed longer, fought harder, been more useful but a few bruises sent him running back home. “I can go back tomorrow, get us more-”

“What? You’re not going back, you look like shit!” Phil said incredulously, checking the cut along his hairline,

“But we need the money,”

“We’ll get by,” Phil’s eyes narrowed, mouth in a tight line.

“That’s a lie-”

“No it’s not,”

“Phil I’m not stupid we need more and I can go back, tonight was just an off, when I go back I can get us more-”

“You’re not going back!” Phil said firmly, “You’ll get hurt again-”

“It’ll be worth it-”

“No! It’s not! Nothing is worth you getting this hurt!” Phil snapped, he took a breath, shoulders slumping. “I’m sorry it’s- it’s just not worth it, you need to be okay too, you deserve to be okay.”

Techno sat there, not sure what to say. Phil looked at the clock and swore under his breath, “Shit, I’m gonna be late,” He grabbed his coat, “I’ll see you later, take it easy, alright?” Techno nodded as Phil walked out the door.

He sits there for a minute, not sure what to do, he wants to sleep for 45 hours but he is also hungry. He opted to grab a banana when he hears Wilbur yell from the other room;

“Tommy brush your hair!” The bedroom door opened, “No! It looks fine!” He didn’t notice Techno as he walked into the bathroom, Wilbur followed him out a moment later.

“Hey Wil,”

“Hey Tech, you're up earlier and oh my god are you okay?” He trailed off to the next point, gesturing gingerly at Techno’s face.

“Yes, I’m fine, I promise,” Techno said again, putting his hands up and rolling his eyes. Wilbur nodded, they stood there for a moment before Wilbur asked;

“Did Phil flip out?”

“Oh yeah definitely,”

“Well, at least something’s normal,” Techno snorted.

“Hey Wilbur, we’re low on toothpaste again-” Tommy said, coming out of the bathroom, he looked at Techno and trailed off.

“Uh, Techno, You’ve got a little something,” Tommy gestured to his own face, hand hovering over the whole right side, “on your face, like everywhere.”

Techno snorted and smiled softly, “Thanks for telling me nerd,”

“What happened?”

“Not important,” Techno said, grabbing an orange from their fruit bowl, tossing it at Tommy, who caught it with ease, “What is important is that you’re gonna be late for school, now get going.” He hadn’t told Tommy about the arena fights, he didn’t know how Tommy would react and he didn’t want to encourage it or risk it.

“No I’m not, you’re just avoiding the question!” Tommy protested, jamming his finger into the skin of the orange.

“You sure about that?” Techno nodded to the clock on the wall, 7:06.

“Oh shit, I gotta go,” Tommy said, Wilbur slapped the back of his head, “Language,”

“What come on! You say it all the time!”

“Yeah cause I’m older then you, now grab your shit,”

“Now you're just rubbing it in!” Tommy said, grabbing his backpack off the hook by the door.

“You’re right, now let’s go, I’ll walk to you,” Wilbur stopped in the doorway, Techno could hear the creaks of the stairs as Tommy jumped down. Wilbur looked at Techno, eyes soft.

“Go to sleep Tech, you look like you need it,”

“Well I was going to but now that you said that, I think I’ll stay up,” He teased, Wilbur rolled his eyes.

“If you aren’t asleep by the time I get back I will crush you,”

“I’d like to see you try,” Techno shot back as Wilbur closed the door, locking it.

The banana forgotten and set back on the counter, Techno slipped his shoes and laid down, hoping the others wouldn’t worry too much, he fell asleep almost immediately.

[alicepooryorick]

Actually ok no. Let's just... Go ahead and go over some of Cassandra's accomplishments. Just a few. Cassandra has:

Taken an entire magazine of bullets to the body on purpose to shield the guy behind her WHILE RUNNING AT THE SHOOTER.

Fought a battalion of Amazonians.

Tanked multiple punches from various battle dieties.

Got dropped into spirit world and instantly started fucking demons up with one sword she found.

Dodged a bullet. shot point blank. Because fuck you.

Cassandra is anything but street level. And Shiva I'm fairly certain has beaten Superman in a fight (citation needed)

The spiders get through Scott free because they have Spidersense, but beyond that... Again, Cass on her own took on a group of Amazonians on their own turf. I don't think Moon Knight has much hope (tho he might have the "I'm so mentally ill I don't know what I'm about to do next so you can't read me" thing Harley has over Cass)

And then just remembered that Shiva trains the most dangerous people in the world only to kill them for the slightest hope of a challenge, and Cass was the only one to ever defeat her. (and at first, they tied.)

I brought this up on hellsite, and like I genuinely don't like Marvel vs DC discussions because they can always get heated, but I AM curious about this...

So, how many of Marvel's street level characters do you think Lady Shiva and Cassandra Cain can logically beat? I'm curious to hear answers from y'all here!

[oreosmama]

Hey! It’s the anon that requested for the yandere!garou headcanons, I just want to say that I’m so happy that you took time to write my request and I really love it, it’s so cute my heart just went 💓💖. But I was wondering if you could do something a little darker for him because I kinda wanna see how he is when he is a little more darker.

The Gift-Giver (Yandere Garou x Reader)

*GIF not mine*

Summary: Belts, tank tops, even a metal bat. All these “gifts” from the Hero Hunter’s fights on the news keep showing up at your doorstep. Today, you expected no different, except it is; an empty suitcase is there, and the white-haired man in your bedroom wants you to pack up for your new home. 

A/N: Aight my dude. Here’s the request you actually ordered lol. I’m such a freaking simp for this guy that I can’t hold back my uwus, but I rly hope this one is better suited for what you wanted. Enjoy! (Don’t mind me, I’m just gonna rename the other one now 😐) (Also: Thanks for 1.1k followers!)

Word count: 2941

        The first was a black belt.

       Laid peacefully upon your doorstep, it stunk of drying sweat and metallic blood. It was the first gift of many that you hid inside a closet of your house on the outskirts of City S.

        That’s what you liked to call them-- gifts. The name was much more appealing than what they actually were. And they never stopped coming either. 

        Tank tops, a magician’s hat, even a slingshot. The most recent? A metal bat. Each and every one of them greeted you on your return home from work like a message. 

        “I was here.”

        You weren’t stupid. You knew exactly who these objects belonged to. Reports on the news had clued you in that your biweekly Santa Claus was the Hero Hunter. But what could you do, call the police? Yeah, how innocent you would look with armloads of beaten-up heroes’ possessions. 

        Tonight was the night marked on your mental calendar. A new gift would arrive on your doorstep like every other Monday and Friday. 

        An oncoming headache took full-force as you jerked your car into park. 

        Here we go.

        With a deep breath and a massage of your temples, you pushed out of your car and slammed the door shut. Eyes were watching you, watching every step you took as you approached your doorway. The feeling wasn’t new and it didn’t shock you either. 

        No. What did shock you was tonight’s gift. You had gotten off work late today, so in the darkness of what was eight o’clock at night, you could only see the outline. 

        It was huge.

        It wasn’t a sword or another tank top. It wasn’t a fake dog tail or even a hero’s cape. No, not at all, because today’s offering to you was a suitcase. 

        Right off the bat, you expected a body. It wasn’t long ago that your stalker had apparently fought a hero without a signature outfit and had settled for gifting you with his disembodied limb. 

        You buried the hand in your backyard and prayed to God that no dogs would go sniffing. 

        So as your heels clicked up your home’s steps, you plugged your nose and held back tears as you opened your door. “No, no, no, please no.”

        What truly surprised you was that the suitcase was empty. No bodies or body parts, no fingers hidden in zipper pockets, no nothing. 

        Clicking on your living room light, you set down your bag and keys on the side table before locking the door behind you and continuing your inspection alone. Even in the artificial glow of the TV you always turned on to make your house feel more alive, you couldn’t see anything but the slippery, plastic material of its interior. 

        Part of you was suspicious, but the rest of you just wanted to thank God that your stalker hadn’t been as barbaric tonight. 

        “Thank fuck,” you hissed as you lugged the suitcase upstairs. Of course, you would still hide it in the closet across from your bedroom, but you were just glad it would seem less suspicious compared to the rest of the paraphernalia you had gathered. 

        After making your way up the stairs, you glanced into your bedroom on your way to the closet. A small glance, simple and unexpecting. 

        You should have expected it.

        There, standing in your bedroom with your ceiling light on was a man. Muscles you didn’t even know existed were defined through his tight, black long sleeve shirt while the rest remained hidden in loose-fitted sweatpants. White hair stood up at attention on his head, parted in two directions with a split in the middle while his eyes were half-lidded as he fiddled with something on your bed. The spheres of gold weren’t even watching you and their piercing gaze made you want to curl in on yourself and disappear. 

        “Welcome home, Angel. How was work?” His voice was deep and much too casual for a stranger, especially one that had broken in to your house. 

        You were speechless. Nothing, not even a whimper could escape your closed-up throat. Your whole body had frozen in fear while you watched him, suitcase still sat on the floor of the hall with the handle in your palm. 

        “Wha…” Your mouth moved, but really nothing worth hearing was coming out of it. 

        The man, the Hero Hunter, only trailed his gaze up to you for a second before dragging it back down to the bed, a single eyebrow raising. The corner of his thin lips curled up into a smirk. 

        “Speechless, huh? I’m not surprised, though I am disappointed in how naughty you dress when I’m not around.” His tone dipped in disgust as his long fingers finally stopped picking at the colors on your mattress. Then he lifted a hand, your panties dangling off a single index finger while he growled. 

        “Red lace. Who were you planning on showing these to, Angel?” 

        Fear spiked through your heart at his dangerous lilt. His tongue had spat the words at you like poison, but you still felt glued to the floor. 

        Maybe it was all a dream. Maybe that’s why you couldn’t move. Surely this couldn’t be real. 

        When he made his way for you, though, you knew it was only wishful thinking. Hand outstretched, you were almost certain he was going to strangle the life out of you thanks to the look in his glowing eyes, but he only used one abnormally sharp nail to lift your chin. 

        “The only one you’ll be wearing these for is me now, understood?” 

        “Who are you?” you finally choked out, lungs practically gasping for air as you held your breath in fear. “W-what do you want?”

        Evidently, the second question was much more hilarious than the first, as he let out a chiding snicker. “Oh, my sweet angel,” he shook his head. “My name is Garou, and I want you.” 

        Apparently he could see your eyes widen in horror, as he tsked while thumbing over your cheek. “You don’t need to be afraid, YN. I’ll take care of you now. All I ask of you is that you listen.” The word is partnered with a squeeze of the skin below your chin, daringly close to your throat. 

        “O-okay.” What else could you do but stutteringly agree? This man had a strength in his body that flimsily held back a wrath you received the after-effects of, and you had a whole closet to prove it. 

        Your submission makes him grin, leaving your stomach churning. “Good,” he pressed a searing kiss to your forehead that makes you want to rub away the skin. “Now start packing. I got you a suitcase and everything, my Angel. You’re gonna love your new home.” 

        You don’t respond this time, only settling for a nod as he pats your head like a good little pet and leaves the room. 

        He was gone. Garou had finally left you alone, but you still felt the scorching burn of his touch. The look in his eyes had been so greedy you weren’t surprised he didn’t take advantage of your panicked silence to explore. 

        It seemed, though, that he had already done some exploring of the sort, as your room was an absolute mess. Clothing was strewn everywhere, the more revealing of which had been clawed to shreds, no doubt from Garou’s razor-edged talons. With a small look in the mirror on your wall, you could see his own pricking under your chin had sprouted a dribble of blood. 

        Oh God.

        It was only now that you had a moment alone that the realization settled in. 

        Oh God.

        Oh shit! Oh fuck! FUCK FUCK FUCK!

        How could you get out of this?!

        Your bedroom window? 

        No, YN, what are you, insane?! This isn’t a movie, and you couldn’t run away from a man like that after a second story fall. 

        Maybe you could slip past him downstairs? Escape through the back door? 

        No. Once again, you didn’t have the speed or the stamina to outrun him. What you needed was a distraction. 

        Maybe you could start a fire. But your lighter for your living room chimney was downstairs. Overflow the tub? No, that would take ages and would not even phase him. 

        Then the perfect idea hit you. Your phone.

        It was still in your pocket from when you had checked it while walking into your house with the suitcase and used it’s flashlight for the inspection. 

        And now you could use it as the best distraction of all. 

        Calling the cops and telling them the Hero Hunter was here. That could bring on so much trouble for Garou while you slipped away and hid until he would finally be taken into custody. It was perfect! 

        Your fingers still trembled from the shock of it all. A man just a floor below you was trying to kidnap you and do God knows what else after that task was accomplished. 

        The beeps from every button you dialed almost echoed throughout the room. You were certain Garou could hear them, but by the time you tried to silence it more, the call picked up. 

        The same line as usual sounded, then “what is your emergency?”

        “Please help me, someone broke into my house and is trying to kidnap me.” A rather lame explanation, but in the heat of the moment, there was really no other way to put it. 

        After giving them your address, you hung up and took a deep breath, trying to ignore the pounding in your heart. 

        I’ll be okay. They can save me. I just have to stall for a few minutes.

        It had completely slipped your mind that you never told them it was the Hero Hunter in your home. 

                                ***

        The suitcase was packed. 

        Your door had creaked a few minutes ago, signalling Garou had returned from snooping around your house to inspect your progress. His light footsteps trailed in and it had only taken one small look for him to deduce that you were too slow. 

        “I’ll help you pack, Angel. Obviously, you’re concerned about what I want you to wear, but trust me when I say I only want you to feel comfortable in your new home.” That was the least of all your worries. “You don’t need to try and impress me, I love how you look in everything.”

        Truly, it wasn’t what he said, it was the way Garou said it that made your skin crawl. Like he had literally seen you in anything, so there was no point in showing him what he had already seen. Though it was true that you had felt like someone has been watching you for weeks now, you never really noticed that the gaze was real until this moment. 

        Oh God, this could be my life now.

        No, you couldn’t think like that yet. The cops and hopefully some Class S heroes were on their way. All you had to do was keep Garou here just a bit longer. 

        Silence falls after his words and you resume folding your clothes and dropping them into the suitcase. Time to time, you hear Garou digging around in your dresser behind you before dropping a pair of your more scandalous undergarments into the case. The remainder of the moments spent in your room with you, he stands directly behind you with his bulky arms wrapped around your waist, solid as concrete. Sometimes, his chin sits on your shoulder and he watches you work. Others, he presses his lips to your bare skin, barely covered from your t-shirt, and runs his mouth up to your ear and down to your collarbone. 

        Of the two evils, you preferred the former. 

        You bite your tongue to stop from gagging at his wandering fingers. They’ve trailed up into your shirt, leaving your breath hitched, and now they’re making a move lower and lower. Just as the tips of his nails brush the zipper of your jeans, you start a conversation in effort to stop him. 

        “Garou.” 

        It works, and you almost cry out in relief when his hands draw back to your hips once more. “Hmm?”

        Now that you’ve halted his movements, you’ve almost forgotten how you planned on keeping him preoccupied. Then the perfect question hits you. 

        “...Why me?” 

        Killing two birds with one stone, you were genuinely curious as to why the Hero Hunter had chosen you to be the object of his affection. 

        Though, apparently your question was hilariously easy to answer, as he lets out a deep chuckle after your words. 

        “Because, YN, you were made for me. I can tell. And I can’t let this world hurt someone so pure like you. I promise I’ll take care of you for the rest of-” 

        Police sirens in the distance cut off his declaration of love, approaching faster and faster. Garou mutters a curse under his breath, separating from you to open the blinds of your window. 

        Flashing red and blue lights grow brighter before he cuts them off completely with a flick of his wrist. When he turns around, his eyes are darting, searching for some clue as to how they knew- oh shit.

        At last, his gaze lands on your phone, still sitting on the bed, face down. Your entire form stiffens and you berate yourself for not hiding it earlier. 

        Son of a bitch.

        “YN,” he seethes, voice low enough to make you flinch. Your heart beats hard enough to climb up your throat as his eyes burn a hole into your forehead. “I sincerely hope you’re not that stupid.” You gulp but keep your head low, hands still fiddling with a pair of folded jeans. You don’t dare reply to him. 

        “Oh Angel, you’re about to learn who exactly you’re dealing with.” With one last glare in your direction, he strides out of the room. His gait is no longer light and disguised. 

        No, he’s no longer patient and sleek. Instead, his stomps echo all the way to your front door. You can almost hear the wind blow through your house as he whips the entrance open and steps out to greet what you hope are your saviors. 

        The sirens’ screeches have finally stopped but their lights still flash through the cracks of your blinds. From what you can see, there are only two squad cars. 

        Judging by Garou’s well-built yet lithe physique, you’d say those officers are more than screwed. 

        Not even two seconds later, the horror begins. The door to your bedroom is open, but God how you wish it was closed. Maybe it would muffle the pained screams. 

        Gunshots sound, rattling your ears as you stay put, praying that they’ve hit their target. 

        No man can escape a bullet. You hoped that philosophy would apply to this moment as well. 

        For a single second, silence hangs in the air enough to hear a pin drop. 

        Then you’re placed into real-time horror movie audio. 

        Broken cries of “Oh God,” and “No, please, I have a family!” slam through your body like tidal waves. 

       You wanted to run, but you felt frozen in place. The godawful sounds floating in from outside kept you locked in your spot over the suitcase.

        Finally, your knees aren’t strong enough to hold you as they falter under the weight. With only your bed to support you, you wilt to the ground like a browning flower petal, collapsing in on yourself and whimpering into your kneecaps. 

        “Please,” you whisper.

        Crack. 

        “Not me,” you rock back and forth.

        Gurgle.

        “I don’t want this.”

        Shing.

        “I never wanted this.”

        Splash.

        “Why?”

        Slump.

        By the time the sounds are over, you’ve smashed your palms against your ears hard enough to leave bruises. The taste of copper in your mouth reveals that you’ve been gnawing on your lip too. 

        Large, rough hands tug you off the ground and into a hulking embrace. Not a single indent or raise in Garou’s form is soft enough to give you comfort. You feel trapped against a brick wall, sobbing and shivering at all the screams, shouts, and snaps you had just heard. 

        One of his hands digs into your hair, yanking your head close enough that it’s ducked into his chest while the other uses its nails to pierce the soft skin of your lower back. 

        “You made me do this, YN.” 

        You can feel it against your face, the blood soaked into his shirt. Deep down, you know it’s not his. 

        “I need you in my life.” 

        This was your life now. Cops couldn’t save you. The heroes whose possessions you hid in your closet couldn’t save you. This man-

        “And nobody’s ever going to take you away from me.” 

        This monster was unstoppable. Garou, the Hero Hunter, the Human Monster, had taken you as his own personal possession. 

        After gifting you with the trophies of his own wins, he would finally accept you as the ultimate prize. 

       “Now let’s go home, Angel.”