#he is not a man and i will kill someone if they insert that
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ratatatastic · 2 months ago
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vanha kauppahalli date but the dessert edition aka the more enjoyable edition if not because sasha has a sweet tooth so we can like these foods freely
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sasha in the midst of eating merengue and almost choking to death because he thinks any comment out of maffhews mouth is funny maffhew sweetheart we have to think about the effect we have on the people around us for a single second here
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abyssalpriest · 1 year ago
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God I could and should write a whole fucking book by the end of this life here on Lev and his symbols
ill write it then burn it before anyone else gets a copy. or i wont. im supposed to be helping him this incarnation here to get a better anchor in this plane so maybe it would help more than itd be weird - im just getting from him the energy of "yeah no people already effectively have these things, people on my plane already know me inside and out to an extensive degree, may as well have it here too" you know. fair
#~abyssal murmurs#ugh god i love his tone saying that tho. i kept trying to prod to see if it was a ''ugh yeah people know me inside and out and Yes Its#Invasive But -'' but no#oh my god man. his like energy towards his people is..... BEFORE I SAY THIS#I HOPE YOU ALL KNOW IM ANTI PROPAGANDA. the biggest reason i dont work with Lu and others is bc theres this tendency to#be like ''we're darkness but also light! we're teachers we're enlightened we're pure in our own way and the kings are here to#teach you how to empower yourselves and they love all worshipers and they reject all tyrannical authority and they are the good guys#against the chrxstian god who (insert specific atrocity that actually was committed by the kings not the 'chrxstian god' - and#''demons'' should KNOW that because it was AN IMPORTANT PART OF THE WAR so either theyre LYING orrrrr) and we're actually#really down to earth and more holy than anyone else bc we're enlightened - i mean uh uh no wait that contradicts us being#against the love and light style of enlightenment chasing'' like. i will tell you that my boss has massacred a lot of people i will tell yo#im anti monarchy and i dont believe that the kings' peoples are any better than 'angels' and i will tell you a lot of innocents on both#sides have been lost bc of royalty and rich families the kings are directly tied to#so i hope you know that when i say the way lev treats his people in his mind is..... holy shit#i pick apart everything he does. ive seen sides of him that are dark af (and i love him for them lmfao) but as soon as his people are#involved... have you ever been w someone getting hot and bothered and a kid walks in that you thought was sleeping and you just switch#completely into parent mode like. he'll have complex fictions w me helping me write stories about corrupt monarchies and shit#and then no. he is like. hes very good at mindset switching and going immediately into different faces but i swear#his ''i am a king and a king is a head of a mass of people - a king is a servant to his people'' mode is like. impenetrable#he is so. fucking intensely single-minded and trained to be a king unlike anyone else. anyway what was i talking about#OH YEAH. his tone w what i wrote in the post. was so switched into that mode of ''my viscera is theirs to eat as Im splayed on their table#and this is divine ruling. this is my purpose with them'' type shit. PURE thought. there is no other energy i can find in it other than#pure ''this is my job and i do it''. pure as in distilled. a pure tone like a sine wave played on a synth as opposed to a string plucked#leviathan //#ive. im nervous about saying the shit ive said here lmfao but ive had his OK before to say it ALSO. AS I SAID. theres no way his people#dont know the massacre was done by the kings lmfao. like. yall were involved. and also you all have to know that one of the#people that pretends to be the christian god is. two of the kings actually and since lev commonly appears to people and lets them#decide who he is bc hes never arsed making a show of Being Leviathan and whatnot im sure hes been called God plenty of times#too but like. cmon. I dont know who started the ''oh the uh the invading heaven and killing off half the population was the#chrxstian god'' rumour but i was first exposed to it through lu and (his wife) worshipers so yall get the blame - that said...
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twentyfivemiceinatrenchcoat · 9 months ago
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:((((((((( i ran out of tags . tumblr hates to see me thrive!!!!!!!
ok niku just . read the tags first and then come back here ok 🙏🙏 i have a lot i still need to say this is so important to me . this fic changed my life .
(WARNING this got long ….. really long ….. mysteriously. i got carried away 💔 PLS don’t feel the need to respond to any of this btw i mean that sincerely i know this is kind of a Lot i just need you to know much i adored this fic <3333)
BACK TO GOJO ok so his talk w reader…… it was just so satisfying to see them finally get to tell someone about their experience. it must’ve been such a great feeling for them !!!! to get some of it off their chest :((( … and to have Gojo Fucking Satoru our safe harbour of a man there to believe them and listen to them and reassure them. he’s so mature when it comes down to it and you captured that so well…… like as much as he acts childish and teasing this is exactly how i picture him interacting w someone he doesn’t know in a situation like this!! he’s flirty and unserious but he tells you he’ll protect you and means it. (i’m so down bad it physically hurts)
sorry i’m abt to go on a tangent i think BUT I JUST 😔😔 really… REALLY love their dynamic…. how it evolves so much even though he doesn’t even know reader exists for most loops!! and to them he’s just this beautiful Something that they can’t help but look at…… ”inhumanly attractive” is a great way to put it like he’s just….. this magnetic force……….. and i feel like even before they speak to him for the first time they probably find some kind of hope in him.
AND that’s so important bc to me that’s like . the main Theme of the fic? hope. reader has to find some kind of hope to make it through shibuya and more often than not they find it in gojo!!! in just seeing a familiar handsome face, in learning how to navigate the timeline through his actions, in talking to him and finally having him on their side. their choice to trust him fully at the end just made me soooo insane. and obv the hope theme continues even after that because gojo believes in them!!! believes that they’ll be okay in the prison realm….. more on that later actually bc i Still. have a lot to talk abt 😔👉👈 i’m just wildly flipping through my notes at this point i’m sorry to throw this at u when we’ve barely interacted but in my defense this fic reached into my actual skull and started rewiring my brain so!!!! yeah.
i got completely sidetracked there but . yes!! the conversation between them when gojo gets sent back in time is. so good!!!!! so wonderfully written!!!!! i haven’t mentioned it that much yet i think but i love your writing i devoured every line…… i struggle w the flow of my own writing SO much but this just flows so incredibly well??? it was sm fun to read????? and the rhythm of the paragraphs (that sounds. Insane but i hope u know what i mean 😭😭) is so distinct!!! and ofc there are SO many banger lines in this in general…. the gore descriptions and the lines abt reader and their fixation on hope. on gojo!! ”He's a terrifying sort of beauty and you can't help but be captivated by him.” <- this is just one example but!! idk i’m just so enamored by ur writing style.
and the dialogue!!!!!!!! i cried!!!!!! it’s so consistently gojo…. him going all ”oh?” ”interesting…” but not explaining anything … the ”ding ding ding!” after making reader guess what he should just be telling them (it’s the teacher in him <33) AND AND AND these too!!!! :3
“Just think of it like having a lot of MP.”
“You know, your technique kind of reminds me of save scumming.” 
THEY JUST FEEL SO CANON that’s our gojo…… that’s exactly what he would say…… he’s so unserious and so funny and so charming 😔😔 sigh.
ANDDDDD reader telling him good luck!!!! gojo beaming and squeezing their shoulder!!!!! the lil wave!!!!! 🥺🥺 that made me smile so wide niku he’s so infuriatingly cute . it felt so genuine!!!! pls know that this gojo will probably live in my brain forever like genuinely . i’ve been brainrotting over him all week and this was the final nail in the coffin. i’ll never be free.
ok but also !!!! extremely important !!!!!!! before i get to the ending i just need to tell u . how much i loved kenjaku in this ……….. kenjaku nation (me & six others) will never forget these crumbs of content like he just feels so real!!!!! and he’s so interesting!!!!! made me realize how truly down bad i am for him bc these lines made me so fucking happy 😭😭 brain started releasing serotonin like CRAZY i’m so ashamed.
“You can come out, you know.”
”How interesting.”
"I'll be nice, though. I'll make it painless."
…….. he’s just ….. yeah. yeahhhhh. 😔😔 i’ll never be normal abt him. i think it’s SUCH an interesting detail that he always makes reader’s death painless in every single loop…. he never lies about it. that feels so in character to me too!!! he’s kinda fascinated at first and when that interest disappears he kills them. but he doesn’t make it unecessarily cruel because there’s just. no need. kenjaku is a sicko but he’s oddly polite at times and i’m just……. yeah. gonna need you to take over for gege akutami actually 🙏🙏 get in the writer’s chair!!! the fandom needs u!!!!!
wait while we’re on this topic pls just know the entire confrontation between reader and kenjaku was one of my favorite moments in the entire fic <333 not JUST because i’m a kenny stan ok……… reader’s resignation and ”I appreciate it.” made my brain spin because it’s just . kinda chilling? kinda sick? that they aren’t even really afraid of death anymore… or more like they’re just so frighteningly used to it.
AND AND ANDDDD niku your writing in this scene 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫 gutted me like a fish.
Time doesn't flow in the box. He didn't lie. You die again.
i exploded btw . ackkk i wish i could explain it better i just!!! :< adore your writing. these lines made me go completely batshit they’re just so good. and the ”time doesn’t flow in the box” line … how that ties in with the ending and reader’s choice. whewww.
segway time <3333 this is the final rant i promise!!! i just need to talk about the ending bc it was so perfect and like many other things in this fic it made me insane …. have i said that already …. probably at least a couple times 😔👉👈 it’s true ok!! it’s just sooo interesting to me and obviously so wellwritten and fitting and just. thematically ties everything together so well? i was FLOORED
hhhhh i don’t know where to begin so i’ll just start w the final convo between reader and gojo :> he asks for their name !!!!!!! i cried !!!!!!!!!! calling someone by their name or knowing their name as a form of like . Closeness or Affection is one of my greatest weaknesses and i also think it’s soooo telling that GOJO wants to know Your Name. he wants to know you. to hear that from someone who seems so inhumanly beautiful and violent….. for him to kind of extend a final olive branch and attempt to connect w you :((((( it just says so much without spelling it out and i. started chewing at my desk. it’s so good!!!!!!! such a genius way to tie everything together!!!! and reader’s final words to him…
“Thank you, Satoru Gojo.” You burn the glittering glow of his brilliant bright blue eyes into your mind.  And then, everything is engulfed in an unending black. 
first of all!!! so so sooooo pretty. wowow. second of all THE THANK YOU ☹️☹️☹️☹️☹️ that’s also such a perfect conclusion…….. reader finally put their trust in someone and had that faith returned. and they thank him!!!! i like to think it means something to gojo too…. likeeee how often do people really thank him for what he does? how often is his hard work to protect people acknowledged and appreciated? sorry to bring gojo back into the discussion all the time sadly i AM in love w him….. 😔😔 and this fic made it worse so technically it’s your fault. kind of.
okay so my brain is kinda spinning away again so i’ll get to the final final thing!!!! for real this time!!!!! reader’s decision to be imprisoned in gojo’s stead… that’s so . genius? i’m so in awe??????? it makes so much sense from a character perspective based on what they’ve been through — after being at the mercy of time for so long, wouldn’t it be nice to be free of it? completely? it’s almost kind of chilling and just the idea of it scares me LMAO but it makes sm sense that reader would be drawn to it.
AND like i mentioned before!!! how it leads to a deeper connection between them and gojo, and how at the very end of the fic he’s the one who has faith in them. faith that they’ll be alright, of sound mind.
…… and that brings me to the final final final thing because. it’s just like the opening poem!! reader is the cat in the box. nobody can say for sure if they’re alright, not to mention alive, until the box is opened. and we don’t get to know!!! you leave us on a cliffhanger and that’s so good bc it really is like the cat in the box…. we can only wonder but it also gives us the freedom to decide for ourselves if we think they come out okay or not and i’m just………….. in love. with this fic. and the ending and the reader and gojo and you.
hopefully you’ve noticed atp but i really did go completely insane reading this 😭😭 i said it at the beginning but just to reiterate!!: for SURE one of my all time favorite gojo fics . AND loopfics in general…. thank you sm for your hard work :’3 aaaa i can’t tell u how much i admire the time you spent working on this??? your storytelling and writing and characterization skills????? i genuinely feel sooo giddy and excited and happy rn bc. i just adored this fic!!!! i’m so lucky i got to read it!!!!! :33 pls pat your gojo on the head from me and let him know i love him…. it’ll boost his ego but that’s a risk i’m willing to take 😔😔 i hope you have theeeee loveliest day or night a human being can have bc you made mine <3333333
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beyond the unending night (reader + satoru gojo)
notes: it's finally here. the long awaited halloween fic. yes, i know it's march, but i did start working on it in september. haha. there's so much i could say, but i will leave it at that this fic is, in every sense, a fic that i would not normally write. and yet here we are.
contains: f!reader (no physical description or gendered language is used), no explicit romantic pairing (though you don't have to look hard to find the reader x gojo implications), major character death (played with), semi-graphic depictions of death, blood and violence, minor suicide ideation, canon retelling (lines of dialogue are pulled from the jjk english dub because i'm a dirty dub watcher). opening poem is from higurashi no naku koro ni (minagoroshi-hen). fic title is from giga's beyond the way.
please note that this is a time loop fic and, by nature contains repeating scenes (particularly from canon). please do not read this fic if you do not like that sort of thing.
wc: 21,883 read on ao3 (account required)
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Please tell me what happened in this night. It's like the cat inside the box.
Please tell me what happened in this night. You don't know if the cat in the box is dead or alive. Please tell me what happened in this night. The cat in the box was dead.
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The first time, it is instant— you don’t even know what’s happening.
The second, it is by flame, but you barely realize it, barely feel it— a second of mind numbing heat before nothing.
The third time, it is something slicing across your throat; you see the blood spilling everywhere, then the pain follows— a moment of pure agony before nothing.
The fourth time you realize what’s going on; what’s really going on.
You realize you’ve been dying.
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You think your head is going to explode.
At first, you think it’s because the subway platform is crowded, insanely so— there are hundreds of people shoved into this space alongside you, packed like sardines in a can. You’ve never been one for crowds, but it’s the reality of things when you live in Tokyo. For the most part, you’ve learned to accept it, but even this crowd is a little much and you wish you hadn’t listened to your friends when they said you should go party in Shibuya for Halloween; you don’t even like partying.
There’s a sharp pain in your temple followed by a thought so loud that it feels like someone is screaming it at you through a megaphone positioned right next to your ear.
It’s the night of October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
For the eighth time.
Before you can even question the thought, images flash in your mind’s eye, blurry at first before they come into focus. The platform gates open. Chaos ensues. People dropping onto the subway tracks— spontaneously bursting into flame— their heads, necks sliced off, stomachs cut open—
Bile rapidly builds up in your throat, and you clamp your jaw shut, trying to force it down. Not here. Not now. You try to focus on something else, anything else happening outside of your brain. There’s a pair next to you musing about the people standing on the subway tracks, wondering what the two (the four?) of them are talking about. You blink back tears as you look. You can only see two: a freakishly tall man with white hair dressed in all black, and another man, dressed in strange, yet more traditional looking garb. Are those costumes too? You don’t have a lot of time to think about it as another image forces its way into your brain.
Your corpse— lifeless on the ground.
Your corpse— burning to ash.
Your corpse— bleeding out.
You can’t hold it in any more. Every fiber in your being screams at you to get away from the subway tracks, but instead you rush toward them, shoving people left and right as your hands desperately reach the stability of the gate. You grip it like a lifeline as you retch over the side of it, the contents of your stomach spilling all over the subway tracks.
There’s a quiet murmur of disgust behind you but you can’t be bothered to respond. You need to get out of here. You need to leave. You need to do it before—
The gates open and the crowd starts to move like a tidal wave, pushing and shoving their way through the gate. You’re swept away, vomit long forgotten as you and a few dozen others tumble onto the railway.
Alarm bells go off in your brain, loud and deafening. A voice in the back of your head screams for you to get off the track! Get off the track now before—
The platform erupts into a cacophony of screams, drenched in horror, saturated in fear. You are surrounded by people, by corpses— beheaded, sliced open, bursting into flames.
Your terror roots you to the ground as the carnage ensues around you. It’s only when another person, another corpse, dressed in a magical girl costume collides with your body that you can finally move. But it’s too late, you realize, despaired and helpless, as your bodies fall to the ground.
It’s too late.
You die an eighth time.
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You think your chest is going to explode.
At first, you think it’s because it’s so hard to breathe, frustratingly so— there are hundreds of people squeezed into this space alongside you, packed like cattle for slaughter. You've never been one for crowds, but it’s the reality of things when you’re in Shibuya. For the most part, you’ve come to accept it, but this crowd is way too much and you wish you had just stayed home and ordered a pizza; though honestly, the thought of pizza kind of makes you sick.
There’s a dull throbbing in your forehead, followed by a thought so loud that it feels like someone’s hollering at you from a loudspeaker that’s been installed in your brain.
It’s the night of October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
You think it's the ninth time now.
Behind you, you hear a woman screaming, her voice crazed and terrified. You turn your head automatically to look at her and when you see her you realize you recognize her yellow and white magical girl costume. You can say with certainty that you’ve never seen her before and yet—
Before you can ruminate more on it, images— memories assault your mind’s eye with a clarity that is absolutely sickening. That woman colliding into you, your bodies slamming into the subway tracks before you both— Your stomach churns violently,
and you feel like you’re going to puke, but you force it down— can't afford to right now. Instead, you make your way over to the woman.
Her head is in her hands as she mutters over and over again about how everyone is going to die. People around her figure that being stuck in here with the crowd has probably gotten to her. You, however, know better.
“...hey,” you say softly.
Her muttering comes to an abrupt halt and slowly she raises her head to look at you. There’s a flash of recognition in her eyes and she grabs you violently by the shoulders. “You! You know, don’t you? That we’re going to die?”
If it weren’t for the fact that you have indeed experienced death here eight times already, then you would have thought she’s lost her mind. Slowly, you nod and she seems relieved by it, her grip on you loosening.
You can’t help but feel a little relieved too— glad to know that you’re not the only one experiencing this nightmare. There’s a voice in the back of your mind that’s confused though. Why is she only remembering now? But then again, it took you a few times before you realized yourself.
Around you people start to gasp, and you glance back toward the railway to see an abnormally tall man with white hair and dressed in all black jump down from the atrium onto the railway. He lands rather gracefully for someone who jumped at least one floor and starts to converse with the other three people (you think they're people— two of them are in some pretty wild costumes) on the track.
Wait. Isn’t it supposed to be just two people: the tall man and the one in the traditional clothes? Where did the other two come from?
“We have to get out of here,” the woman says. “Before they kill us.”
Her grip shifts from your shoulders to your arms and she starts to shove at everyone around you, trying to force her way through. She seems to know, just as well as you do, that any second now the gates will open and the crowd will start spilling onto the railway, littering the tracks with bodies and ash. Neither of you can let yourselves get swept up with the rest. If you do and you end up on those tracks, you’re as good as dead.
People move aside at a snail's pace, many of them too focused on trying to see what is going on on the subway tracks. This isn't good. You need to move faster or else—
The collective sound of the gates opening echoes in your head, a metallic hiss that makes your stomach fold into itself. Before either of you can stop yourselves, you both whip your heads back to look, to confirm, but it’s a mistake.
The briefest lapse in attention is enough to pull you both into the current of people, and try as you might to fight against it, the crowd splits you and the woman apart as it swallows you both whole. You’re both spat onto the tracks at the edge of the platform and your head collides with the metal rails of the track. It feels like your skull is about to crack in two, and it takes every fiber in your being to scramble to your feet. You're close enough to the platform that if you can just climb up it, then you'll be—
“Help! Help!”
It’s the woman’s voice. You turn to see that she ended up a couple meters away from you. She’s staring at you, eyes brimming with fear filled tears as she extends her hand in your direction. You take a step toward her, reaching out.
And then, her entire body is engulfed in flames, the skirt of her magical girl costume a ring of fiery death around her.
Her blood curdling scream is the only thing you can hear, her burning flesh, the only thing you can see. You don’t know what to do.
You can’t save her.
There's something touching your back. You can barely feel the pressure, but it's hot, scorching hot, mind numbingly hot, painfully hothothot.
You know this sensation. You have felt it before. The scent of burning cloth, burning hair, burning flesh clogs your nostrils. It's too late, you realize, helpless, despaired as the flames eat at your body— your soon to be corpse.
It's too late.
You die a ninth time.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
This is the tenth time.
Your head hurts, but you ignore it. There’s something more important that you need to attend to. You immediately make your way to the woman you met during your last round, the one you watched burn to death. Her costume is still pristine, unmarred by fire and death.
For now.
She’s not screaming this time and while there’s a little voice in the back of your mind that’s concerned by this, you try to ignore it.
“Um, excuse me?” you say when she doesn’t acknowledge you as you approach.
The woman turns to look at you. You’re taken aback by the distinct lack of recognition and it feels almost as if the woman you encountered previously and the one before you now are two separate people. In a way, they technically are.
“Do I… know you?” she finally asks when you don’t say anything.
Your mouth is dry. How do you even answer that? You don’t know her. You just watched her die twice. You know her. She begged you for help. You couldn’t save her.
If you explain all of this you know she’s just going to think you’ve lost your mind. Maybe you already have— you’ve died nine times after all.
You give her a weak smile. “I… just wanted to tell you that you think your costume looks great.”
She blinks, taken aback by your words. There’s no doubt that she wasn’t expecting you to say that. It’s the truth though, her costume is nice; she’s dressed up as a character from a magical girl anime that was popular a couple years ago.
“Thank you! I made it myself!” The woman breaks out into a genuine smile and your heart hurts. In a few moments she’ll die and the costume she worked so hard to make will be nothing but ash on the subway tracks.
“Sorry,” you blurt out before you can stop yourself.
“For?”
For watching her die. For not being able to save her.“...I just kind of came up to you all of a sudden…”
She laughs. “It’s okay.”
It’s not.
You consider telling her that she should try to move. That if she stays here she will die. You don’t want her to die. Again. You can still hear her screaming in your ears as she burned to death. You want to tell her.
You don’t.
“Stay safe, okay?” you say. It almost sounds like you’re begging.
She gives you another smile, kind and gentle and you think you’re far too undeserving of it for not telling her what fate will soon befall her. “You too.”
“I’ll try,” you say and move away from the woman just as the gates open and the crowd surges toward the railway. You do not fight it as you are swept up into the crowd and despite what you said, you do not try, this time, to stay safe.
You die for the tenth time.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
This is the fourteenth time.
There’s a slight ache in your head, but it’s subtle enough that you can ignore it. The pain you feel lessens with each round and you think it’s a sign that your body no longer feels the need to remind you of the precarious situation that you’re in.
Or maybe you are just becoming numb to everything: your death, the death of the people around you, the death of the woman in the magical girl costume—
You try not to think about it too much as you reach into your bag to check the time on your phone: 8:37PM. There’s not a lot of time: you need to move.
At the very end of your last attempt to escape this nightmare you realized something. You need to know exactly what is going on around you so you can plan accordingly: where to not stand, where to not go. Up until now, you’ve relied almost solely on the knowledge gained from your previous failures to try and survive, but obviously it’s not enough to keep you alive. You’re not sure why you didn’t realize this earlier. The panic, maybe? The fear?
Maybe you really are becoming numb to all this.
Unlike previous iterations, this time you elect to move closer to the gate, positioning yourself somewhere against it where you’re unlikely to be pushed off the platform in a couple minutes when they open. You take great care to place yourself where you can see the ones responsible for the slaughter very clearly. At the beginning, you could only see one, the one who looks the most human, but with each repetition, the other two have become more and more clear. You wonder why. You don’t have time to think about it.
Murmurs nearby alert you to the arrival of the fourth major player involved in the night’s events. You look up and see the white haired man dressed in all black descending upon the platform like an angel from the heavens. This is your first time really looking at him and you realize there’s something almost inhumanly attractive about him. You can’t quite put your finger on it, but it occurs to you that you shouldn’t even try; you don’t have the time to be drooling over some handsome stranger.
You’ve naturally never taken the time to try and listen to whatever the conversation the man and his opponents have before all hell breaks loose on the platform, but you try and lean closer to listen. It’s hard to hear over the dozens of conversations going on behind you, but you try anyway. There might be a clue to what’s actually going on— or better yet, a clue on how to get out of it.
It’s obvious that you’re missing context from what bits of the conversation you do manage to hear, but honestly it all sounds like stuff out of a shounen battle manga. There is one part of the exchange that you manage to hear with a startling sort of clarity. It feels almost as if your heart stops beating as your blood turns ice cold in your veins.
“If I run away, you’re just gonna kill everyone here, right?” the man in black asks.
There’s a pause, and if your heart was still beating it’d be long enough for just four heartbeats.
“If you run away?” The monster with cane repeats, the sadistic grin spreading wide across its features, displaying its charcoal black teeth. The gravelly sound of its voice sets fire to the blood in your veins, your stilled heart thumping wildly, in fear, in anticipation. Soon. It’s happening soon. You brace yourself. “We’re going to do that even if you don’t!”
You die a fourteenth time.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
This is the seventeenth time now.
Things are going surprisingly well, even as the people around you tumble onto the tracks. You manage to hold on, desperation keeping you from falling into the abyss. This is good, you tell yourself, despite the fact that it’s not the first time you’ve achieved this. Every little victory is worth celebrating, but you have to remain vigilant. This is yet another information gathering loop, and while you know that maybe this time you’ll be lucky and live, there’s still a chance, a big one, at that, that you will die again.
You have to make the most of each and every death.
It’s such a morbid thought, but the ends justify the means, or so you tell yourself. If you have to die a few times to make it out of this unending nightmare, then so be it.
The spot you’re in is a good vantage point; it’s easier to see everything happening below you. It’s so good that it’s actually sickening. You watch as the monster with the cane and one with what looks like branches for eyes slaughter the people on the track, mowing them down, setting them aflame. In another life, in another many lives, that was you down there, and for what feels like the first time in forever, you feel like you’re going to be sick. You feel like, at some point, you likened the scene before you to some kind of shounen battle manga, but you think that was wrong.
This is borderline horror.
Everything plays out before you like a scene out of an action horror flick. If you didn’t know better, you’d think you were just an extra on set, but you know the reality is that you’re just an extra to whatever phantasmal battle is taking place in front of you. The monsters and the strangely dressed man all try to attack the man in black, but he manages to block every hit effortlessly, as if he is protected by some sort of invisible barrier. When it seems the two monsters are about to hit him, he merely jumps out of the way and the two monsters seem to collide, the force of their combined strength sending a gust of air throughout the crowd. The man in black neatly lands on a nearby platform half wall and says something about curse users, whatever those are, to the monsters, before he starts to mock them, pulling down his strange blindfold in the process.
And this, you’ve found, is where you start to get in trouble.
You clearly remember thinking, at some point, previously, that there was something attractive about this man. You still don’t know what it is. You haven’t had the time to try and figure it out, but there is one thing that you do know: you can’t keep your eyes off of him.
He drops back down onto the tracks, antagonizing his opponents in an arrogant tone as he approaches. When he comes to a stop between the two monsters, the second round of their fight begins. They try to hit him, but he dodges still, gracefully, fluidly, like the three of them are embroiled in some sort of passionate, yet violent dance.
You cannot turn your eyes away as he cruelly rips off one of the arms of the one-eyed monster.
You cannot turn your eyes away as he brutally kicks the branch-eyed monster in the abdomen, sending them flying to the other side of the platform.
You cannot turn your eyes away as he effortlessly hurls the one-eyed, now one-armed monster in the same direction, sending them smashing into the wall.
Only when the man in black seems to fly to the other side is the spell over you seemingly broken. Still, your eyes give chase, and your body too, rushing from one side of the platform to the other. You can’t lose sight of this fight, you tell yourself, settling in a spot you recall being safe during your last round. Doing so could mean another death, another loop, another October 31.
You watch as the man in black acrobatically dodges what looks to be vines or roots that the monster with branches for eyes seems to have summoned from the depths of the Tokyo metro. He lands on the monster’s shoulders, balancing on them as he uses its branch-eyes for leverage. The look in the man’s eyes is so crazed that you can see it from where you’re standing. He says something to it and then—
With a feral and sadistic smile, he rips their eyes straight out of their skull.
Your heart is pounding wildly in your chest as you watch the fight unfold. It is horrifyingly, disgustingly violent, yet still you watch as people on the track are killed by the human-like person, blood raining down as their freshly beheaded skulls go flying into the air. He and the one-eyed monster launch their counter attacks against the man in black and the blowback is so intense the power goes out causing everyone to scream.
There’s a faint glow where the man in black is standing that starts to grow brighter and brighter. You can make out his form turning to face the wall, and it seems almost like he’s slammed the monster that had branches for eyes against it with some sort of telekinetic power. Despite the panic from the people around you, you manage to hear him, chuckling like a mad man as he draws closer and closer to the monster.
The one-eyed monster yells out a name, a name you think must belong to the man, but he doesn’t hear it. He doesn’t hear the one-eyed monster as he extends his hands out toward the eyeless monster, exerting some kind of force that you can’t really see. He doesn’t hear the one-eyed monster as the eyeless monster’s entire body is vaporized in a flash of blue light. He doesn’t hear the one-eyed monster, as the lights flicker back on revealing a smoking crater stained with purple blood where the eyeless monster once stood.
But you do.
Satoru Gojo.
You make sure to remember that.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
And this is the eighteenth time.
You watch as the man called Satoru Gojo stalks through the crowd of people on the subway tracks, chasing after the one-eyed fire monster. It throws people at him, in a clear attempt to slow him down.
It does not work.
Satoru Gojo climbs back onto the platform in a way that you can only describe as inhuman, and the people nearby shriek and move away from him, out of terror, out of fear. You, on the other hand, draw closer, refusing to lose sight of him.
He is relentless in his pursuit of the one-eyed monster. It continues to throw person after person at him, but he does not stop and the people float there, suspended in midair before they are gently lowered to the ground by some unseen force and scramble away.
No one dares get close to Satoru Gojo, everyone on the platform seems to know that doing so means certain death, yourself included. But you still feel the need to keep an eye on him. The monster and the strangely dressed man are focusing more on him than the crowd— anyone in between is just collateral damage.
But not you.
Especially since you’ve made it this far— you’ve never made it this far before.
A voice echoes throughout the platform; you realize it’s the automated announcement.
An eight car train is pulling in. Please wait behind the yellow line.
You can hear everyone’s relief coming from all sides. The train is coming! The train is coming! A ripple of hope makes its way throughout the crowd. With the train comes the chance to get off the platform and the senseless violence that’s been happening here. Some of the people around you are talking excitedly and others are running toward the gates, toeing the yellow line they’ve been instructed to wait behind. And you, you should be excited, you should be hopeful.
All you feel is dread.
It eats at your stomach, at your chest, at your mind. Clawing and gnawing at you in a way that leaves you paralyzed on the platform. There’s something wrong here. You can’t be sure because you’ve never made it this far, never survived long enough for the train to come, but something is just not right.
No.
You must be paranoid. The train coming is a good thing. It has to be a good thing. You are just paranoid. It’s normal. It’s natural. Dying seventeen times would do that to anyone— rob them of hope, condemn them to an existence full of fear.
It is not lost on you that the thought of dying more than once, much less, dying seventeen times is not normal or natural in the very slightest.
But you need hope, you crave it, wildly, desperately. The hope of freedom, of escape is the only thing getting you through this unending nightmare. Every time you die, every time you wake, it is with the hope that maybe, just maybe this iteration will be different, maybe this one will be the one where you make it out, make it back to your friends who must be waiting for you, make it back home where you can be safe and sound. You need the hope to keep going. Because without hope, what will you have left?
The train screeches as it pulls into the station and the people around you laugh in both disbelief and relief. They start to push and shove toward it, fighting to be able to board because there’s no way everyone here will be able to get on an eight car train and being left behind at this point is practically synonymous with death. Unable to decide if you believe in the train as a symbol of hope or a new layer of fear, you are pushed along with the crowd toward it.
The doors of the train cars slide open and the current passengers all rush off as they disembark. You as well as everyone else on the platform can see with a horrifying clarity that the train is filled to the brim with monsters. Monsters that reach out and grab anyone their hands can reach. The woman to your left. The person to your right.
You.
Hope is gone.
What do you have left?
You die for the eighteenth time.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
This is probably the twenty-sixth time now.
If there is anything this entire ordeal has taught you, it is that you are resilient. Whether it is some innate trait that you never had any reason to uncover before or just a byproduct of being trapped in an unending cycle of being dead and not dead, you don't know. What you do know, though, is that even if you no longer have hope, you at least have your resilience.
Whether you want it or not.
You check the time. It’s 8:35PM. Something flickers in your chest, like a faint light in a sea of darkness, but you ignore it. You don’t have time right now.
With a nimbleness born from your previous failures, you weave your way through the crowd. You’ve done this enough times to know where the gaps are— who will yield and who won’t. Your destination is the escalator that leads off the platform and up to a higher part of the station. You’d noticed previously that the escalator along with every other entrance onto the platform will eventually be blocked by vines or roots of some sort (the work of the branch-eyed monster probably). It’s not a perfect plan because you don’t know what happens on the other side, but whatever it is has to be better than whatever is happening on the side that you’ve been on.
You’d tried to get to the stairs during your last two rounds, but you’d just missed it. You hadn’t been fast enough and had gotten caged and slaughtered along with the rest. But this time, this time you have more time. It’s just one minute, but it’s enough. You know it is.
The flickering in your heart grows stronger. Hope. You try not to pay attention to it— you don’t want to be disappointed yet again. But you want to so badly. A voice in the back of your mind tells you to focus on the good, tells you that if there was truly no way out of this endless nightmare, then why would you get more and more time with each round to escape your fate?
With that thought in mind, you break out into a run, recklessly rushing through the crowd, shoving anyone who will not yield to the side. Out of the corner of your eye you can see the stark white of Satoru Gojo’s hair as he descends upon the platform.
You need to get up those stairs.
Now.
If you remember correctly, the roots and vines don’t close off the area the moment he touches down, but a little after they start talking, so you think there is probably some time, but you can’t leave it to chance.
The stairs are packed, and for some reason no one is moving. The escalator right next to it is just as full and the power doesn’t seem to be working. You don’t have time for this. You clamber onto the escalator’s rubber handrail, ignoring the weird feeling that passes through your body as you do so. You don’t have the time to worry about whatever that is. The people around you start exclaiming around you, but you don’t care, you don’t listen. You wobble as you try to balance yourself and when you think you’re steady you try to run.
But you trip.
And you die for the twenty-sixth time.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
This marks the thirtieth time.
And you have, finally, finally made it up the escalator, up the stairs with barely a second to spare. You pause, glancing back as the roots or vines or whatever the hell they are seal off the entrance to the platform. You notice that the area where the plants come down is actually fairly clear, despite the crowd. It seems weird, but you don’t dwell on it.
A strange feeling envelops your entire body and your legs turn into jelly. As you sink to the floor, you realize what you’re feeling is relief as all the tension, maybe thirty iterations of Halloween 2018 worth, seeps from your being. You don't remember the last time you felt anything other than fear and dread; it’s weird, but not unwelcome.
That voice in the back of your mind tells you that you can't relax just yet: October 31st isn’t over. Even though you have repeated this night again and again, burning the events that play out on the platform into your memory, you do not know a single thing that happens over here. It would be smart to scope everything out.
Legs still shaky, you rise to your feet and start walking. You think it’s probably for the best to try and head up to the surface and you make your way up to the next floor.
It’s packed with people here too, but relatively peaceful, especially when you compare it to the pandemonium taking place beneath your feet. Still, you can make out the undeniable hum of displeasure resonating throughout the crowd. People complaining about how uncomfortable their costumes are, people complaining about how much they want to go home, people complaining about how much their nights have been ruined because they couldn’t meet up with their friends and—
A thought hits you like an eight car train.
You were supposed to meet up with your friends.
That’s why you were on the platform in the first place— you were waiting for them to arrive, but then the trains stopped working, and people just started pouring into the station out of seemingly nowhere (you think you heard some people say they’d come from the crossing?). Soon after that is when everything went to shit.
You check your phone, though, for once it’s not to look at the time (8:56PM). Instead, you open LINE to check your friends’ group chat. There’s no signal here, for whatever reason, so if there are any new messages, you haven’t received them. The last one was from Kei, mentioning he was enroute, but as far as you know, you’re the only one who made it to Shibuya before the trains stopped.
Did one of them maybe make it here though? Surely, you would have run into them if—
The image of a woman in a magical girl costume fills your vision, burning to death before your very eyes as her screams echo in your ears. It is the first time in what feels like forever that you’ve thought about her and your stomach churns violently. You couldn’t help her, you can’t even help yourself, so how could you even expect to do the same for your friends if they were here? The mere thought of having to watch them die over and over is almost enough to send you over the edge. You don’t know if you could do it.
Would you even have a choice?
No. You can't think like that. You have choices. You've had choices. If you didn’t then, you would still be down below, among the fire and brimstone. Dying, if not dead already. However, instead, you are up here, where, for the moment, it is quiet and peaceful.
That thought, in of itself, is enough to give you a shred of solace, a glimmer of hope.
You take a deep breath and fiddle with your phone a little more, changing your lock screen to a picture you and your friends took at a photo booth not too long ago. The four of you are huddled together, faces squished as if you're all struggling to fit in the frame, despite there being plenty of room. You're mid-laugh because it's the first time you've been in a photo booth in years, Mio and Shin are grinning mischievously and finally, Kei is smiling, but only just slightly, the embarrassment clear on his face. It's probably only been a few months since you all took this picture, but the fact that it feels like it's been years makes your heart ache.
You press your forehead to the screen, like a prayer, like a promise.
You will make it out of this nightmare.
No matter what.
A shrill scream yanks you from your thoughts and you are instantly on your feet, alert as your eyes flit around frantically to identify the source. It doesn't take long for you to find it and when you do, you think you might have stumbled upon a new layer of horror to this nightmare.
It’s not the corpse, dangling by a noose, that terrifies you— by now you’ve seen dozens upon dozens of dead bodies that the sight of just one more doesn’t faze you in the slightest. The thing that’s the most mortifying, that’s the most disturbing is that right next to where the body is tied are two girls, two teenage girls still dressed in their school uniforms.
You can accept monsters and weirdly dressed men being responsible for the carnage tonight, but children too? Both girls look like they’re barely in high school and try as you might to rationalize things, to chalk it up to coincidence, you cannot ignore the ominous energy radiating from them.
The very notion that these two children could have killed someone here is a hard pill to swallow, but so is the fact that you’ve died.
And you’ve had to swallow that pill thirty times now, so what’s once more?
“Listen up!” one of the girls yells over the crowd, but she is mostly ignored; you don’t think everyone here has noticed her and the corpse dangling from the rafters. She scowls and turns to the other girl and says something quietly to her. The other girl nods and almost instantly she’s stringing up another person, another example. You want to look away so badly, and yet you cannot bring yourself to and you watch the poor soul choke to death.
“I said listen, you dumb monkeys!” the girl shouts, and this time she’s caught most of the crowd’s attention. “If you don’t want to end up like these two, you’ll listen to what we have to say!”
There is clear dissent among the crowd, people dismissive as they utter their disbelief. Some seem to think it’s a prank, but you know better. It takes two more examples before the crowd goes silent before the two high schoolers.
“About damn time!” The girl roars and then points toward the atrium, which is currently covered by roots and branches. “All of you move over there!”
You have a bad feeling about this.
Still, you comply; the girls have made it abundantly clear that failure to do so will result in death, though, at this point, you're almost certain this iteration is a bust and death is all but imminent. You try to keep positive— thinking you can at least gather information or, who knows, maybe there's a chance that this one is the one.
Yet when you step onto the mound of vines and branches that cover the atrium it feels as if you've crossed the threshold into hell. Your footing is stable… but for how long?
An eight car train is pulling in. Please wait behind the yellow line.
It's faint, but you can hear the announcement from below. The liquid in your stomach curdles at the sound as you recall the train and, in particular, what is on board. Soon enough, those monsters will be swarming the platform, massacring everyone in reach, guzzling down their blood, feasting on their flesh—
It dawns on you that the people on the platform are the monsters' first course.
And you, and those around you here in the shrubbery, are the second.
As you realize this, the branches and vines disintegrate beneath your very feet and suddenly you are mid air— falling, falling into the abyss below.
You die for the thirtieth time.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
You've done this nearly sixty times now.
After countless failures, you've decided that you're just not going to go upstairs any more. No matter where you try to go, you still end up herded onto the death trap above the platform where you ultimately fall to your death. You've tried positioning yourself in the same spot, tried bracing yourself for the drop— but nothing seems to work: upon landing, assuming you manage to land without hurting yourself or dying in midair (which has happened a couple times) you get grabbed and killed by one of the monsters from the train. It's probably not impossible, you just don't have the physical prowess or reflexes for it.
If anything, you can try again later, but you sincerely hope you don't have to.
It's 8:32PM, and you have plenty of time to get to your chosen spot for this loop— it's close to the stairs, in the very center of the platform. Here, there's little risk of getting pushed off onto the tracks when the gates open. You'll probably have to move when the train comes, or even before (assuming you survive) to avoid the monsters, but you'll get to that when it's time.
You can't really see the fight once it breaks out after Satoru Gojo arrives, but you still try to keep track of it as best as you can. You see when he hurls both monsters across the platform and you're not sure if it's muscle memory or what but you have to fight the urge to move to the side and watch. It's been a while, yes, but you've seen the fight countless times before— it doesn't change. Satoru Gojo will give chase. He will rip the branches from the branch eyed monster's skull. He will use some kind of power to eviscerate them.
You don't need to watch, but there's something in you that wants to.
It doesn't make sense, you've seen it all before; if you're unlucky you'll see it all again.
The lights go out and people start screaming; Satoru Gojo is ending the life of that one monster. Soon enough he'll be back on the platform, in pursuit of the other. You think at that point it would be good to move, reposition yourself as far from the incoming train as possible.
When he rises from the tracks like a demon straight from hell, you realize it's the first time this loop that you've actually gotten a good look at him. You remind yourself, again, that this isn't the first time you've seen this man, this scene. You can't help but watch, but stare at Satoru Gojo as he stalks through the crowd in pursuit of his prey. His expression is an eerie sort of calm that's at odds with the acts of violence you've seen him commit— his eyes an unnaturally bright blue.
He's a terrifying sort of beauty and you can't help but be captivated by him.
An eight car train is pulling in. Please wait behind the yellow line.
The sound of the announcement sends your heartbeat into a frenzy, snapping you out of your little trance. The train is coming and you need to get moving. As you dart to the edge of the platform, the thought occurs to you that even if you avoid the initial wave of monsters, it's likely you will inevitably be caught by them and killed. It wouldn't be impossible for Satoru Gojo to turn his attention to them instead of the two he's currently facing, but he's just one man— can he truly defeat all those monsters?
You can see the train pulling in and you brace yourself, praying that it'll work out somehow.
The doors hiss open and the screaming starts again as the monsters come bursting out of the train, biting and mauling anyone they can get their hands on. Those who were lucky enough to not be at the front start to scramble away and the monsters give chase. Your body is taut, ready to try and dodge any that come your way.
Out of the corner of your eye you notice something moving through the air. A person? With blue hair? You take the risk to look— they're attacking Satoru Gojo. He tries to punch them but they fly away from him to dodge— disappearing into the crowd.
You hear a loud cracking sound over the cacophony of the crowd and your stomach twists; you know what that sound is. The roots above the atrium disintegrate and bodies from above start to rain down onto the platform.
And then, you're not sure what happens— it's so quick that you only manage to see what looks like an explosion of blood surrounding Satoru Gojo. Corpses litter the ground around him and even from here you can tell he is shaken by the carnage.
The monsters have finally reached where you're standing, and you duck under one as it lunges at you. Although it's big and scary, you realize it's moving kind of slow. Right after it another one comes at you and you take a side step to avoid it; this monster is kind of slow too.
Maybe you can do this.
As soon as you think that a strange feeling courses through you. Every hair on your body feels like it's standing on edge and the voice in your head is telling you to look at Satoru Gojo. You don't understand why because you think he's the least of your worries right now, but you do it anyway.
He's in some sort of stance, one hand raised to his face, fingers bent in some kind of gesture. There's some sort of aura, oppressive and frightening emanating from his form.
Satoru Gojo is doing something.
You just can't tell what.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
And you are utterly confused.
Barring your first few loops when you weren't fully aware of what was happening, you have very distinct memories of how each of your previous iterations of this night have gone— of each and every one of your deaths. But for your last round, the last thing you remember was feeling the immense power radiating from Satoru Gojo's body, but that's it.
You do not remember dying.
In fact, you don't think you did.
And yet, here you are again, back at the start: it's 8:32PM and the monsters and strangely dressed man are standing on the subway tracks waiting for the arrival of Satoru Gojo.
You don't understand what's going on; you didn't die but you're still stuck in this damn loop. Up until now, your death has served as the trigger to restart the loop. It's not impossible that maybe you suffered a quick and painless death but you're almost certain that isn't the case.
Something else must have happened.
Something having to do with Satoru Gojo.
You have to find out what. If you don't, you won't know how to avoid it, and if you can't do that, then you really might spend an eternity stuck in this nightmare. And so you take great care to repeat the steps of your last round. You need to make sure to survive to the same point you made it to last time.
Miraculously, you do.
The moment you feel that sensation again, a prickling sort of feeling that envelops your entire body, your eyes are on Satoru Gojo— trying to figure out what the hell he's doing. His eyes are crazed with a desperate kind of focus. You see his mouth move— he's saying something. A spell? A prayer? A curse?
You don't know.
You do know.
Your brain feels like it's going to explode.
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Again.
It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
Again.
You do not know how many times it's been the night of Halloween in Shibuya: you stopped counting around the hundredth loop. It feels like it's been a while since then. Or maybe it hasn't? You don't know any more.
What you do know is that this night ends up going one of two ways before you are forced to repeat it. Either you die, in some way, shape or form or something happens just after nine that forces you to reset. You still don't know what it is exactly; you only know that Satoru Gojo is responsible for it.
You do prefer it to dying— it's far less painful.
But if anything, you wish you could just die permanently and never have to repeat this night ever again.
Unfortunately, you know better.
The only good thing you’ve noticed about all of this is that you really do seem to keep waking up earlier and earlier. The last time you checked, it was at around 8:30. It might take hundreds of thousands of loops, but eventually you’ll certainly wake up early enough to avoid this damn entire mess.
But by the time that happens… will your sanity still be intact? Will you really be able to go back to a normal day to day life after living the equivalent of hundreds of years, repeating the same night over and over again? You don’t even know how you’ve managed to stay sane all this time and as much as you want to believe you could do it…
There has to be a breaking point.
For both your mind and this time loop.
If you’re lucky, you’ll reach the latter first.
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There’s a dull ache in your head that feels foreign yet familiar. Your mind is foggy, all your thoughts hazy as you try to recall what the word for this feeling is.
Groggy.
It feels as if you’ve woken up from a nap and you blink the sleepiness away from your eyes. When was the last time you took a nap? It’s been a while… You think you maybe tried once or twice, but you were too nervous, too on edge. Awake or asleep, it didn’t matter because, either way, you were doomed to repeat this nightmare.
As you think this, you realize that something is different.
You’re used to how the start of each loop feels like waking up suddenly and abruptly and it becomes clear to you that you haven’t looped. This is completely uncharted territory.
You need to find out what’s going on.
The first thing you notice is that it’s quiet. Almost eerily so, especially when the last thing you remember was screaming and chaos. You glance around you and find that it looks like all the monsters from the train are dead, the ground littered in their bloodstains and corpses. There were so many of them, you don’t know how someone could have wiped them out so quickly… Could it possibly have been Satoru Gojo’s doing?
More concerning than the complete eradication of the monsters is the fact that nearly everyone else on the platform is standing stock still, their mouths ajar with blank expressions on their faces. It’s almost as if their souls have completely vacated their bodies…
Were you like that too before you woke up?
You hear voices, and your body immediately goes tense as you turn your head in their direction. A little ways ahead of you, you see a man dressed as a monk conversing with the blue haired person from earlier and before them is—
Your heart nearly stops: it’s Satoru Gojo, restrained and on his knees.
Honestly, you can’t make heads or tails of the conversation they’re having; it’s more shounen battle manga nonsense. Satoru Gojo doesn’t seem to be enjoying their conversation either, and he interrupts them, clearly annoyed.
“Are we gonna do this or what?” he asks. “The view sucks and I’m just kinda bored.”
“I wanted to enjoy this sight for a little bit longer, but you are right,” the monk says. “I wouldn’t want anything to happen— gate, close.”
When he says that, Satoru Gojo’s restraints move, the weirdly shaped cubes at the ends of them closing in around him, trapping him in a giant red cube. It starts to shrink until it’s small enough to fit in the monk’s hand.
You gulp and hope they don’t notice that you’re awake. The fact that they haven’t slaughtered the rest of the people standing around you is a good sign, but you don’t want to find out what happens if they know you’re cognizant.
It’s not hard to play the part of a living statue, especially when you compare it to everything else you’ve had to suffer through on this night. You watch as the monk’s allies, the ones who had attacked everyone on the platform, wake up, but before they can do or say anything, the box holding Satoru Gojo slips through the monk’s fingers and makes a dent in the concrete. The look on the monk’s face makes it clear that it’s a problem he wasn’t expecting.
You don’t know a damn thing about Satoru Gojo, but you feel like this kind of thing is the norm for him.
The blue haired person suddenly looks in your direction and you nearly stop breathing. Have they noticed you? It takes everything in you to keep perfectly still, in hopes that maybe they didn't, that maybe they’re looking at something else. They raise their arm and it extends, their hand acting like some kind of projectile. You almost shut your eyes and brace yourself for impact, but their hand flies upwards and hits something on the ceiling, destroying it.
Inwardly, you breathe a sigh of relief— you’re still safe.
For now.
You listen to their following conversation and while you still don’t fully understand everything, it’s clear they’re talking about what to do next since they’ve taken care of Satoru Gojo. Something having to do with someone named Yuji Itadori? The group seems split on what to do about him but it’s clear he’s their next target.
Eventually, everyone but the monk (you heard the blue haired person, who is apparently named Mahito, call him Geto?) runs off, probably to find this Yuji Itadori person. Once they’re gone, Geto speaks and, at first, you think he’s talking to you, but it becomes clear he’s addressing someone else. “Those cursed spirits are actually smarter than the two of you.”
“Give him back!” a voice hidden among the crowd hisses. Your blood runs cold at the sound. You recognize it; it’s one of the high school girls from the upper floor.
“We cooperated with you fully and kept dropping monkeys for you,” says another voice; it must be the other girl that was with her, the one who hung all those people.
“Now give us back Master Geto’s body like you promised!”
“Don’t toy with Master Geto any further than you have!”
You blink in confusion. Isn’t the monk named Geto? The way the girls are talking it sounds like they’re talking about someone else… Is it possible that the body is ‘Geto’ but the person they’re talking to is someone else possessing it? It sounds kind of crazy, but then again, so is every single thing you’ve experienced tonight.
Your suspicions concerning this ‘Geto’ are confirmed only seconds later as he says, “Now begone, or is it your desire to be killed by this body?”
One of the girls vows her revenge and you hear shuffling somewhere else in the crowd as they scurry away. Now you think it’s just you and whoever it is that’s puppeting Geto’s body. You see him plop down in front of the box (the prison realm, you think he’d called it) that���s holding Satoru Gojo.
“You can come out, you know,” he says after a while.
You freeze. The rest of the platform is completely silent. This time you think he might actually be talking to you.
“I know you’re there,” ‘Geto’ adds, his voice casual. “If you’re insistent on hiding, you should know that I’m not afraid of using whatever means necessary to smoke you out.”
Given everything his allies have done, there’s no doubt in your mind that he’s serious. You were hoping to hide out among the crowd until he decided to leave, but it looks like you won’t be able to now.
Looks like this loop is a bust after all.
Your heart starts to race as you weave your way through the crowd. In every single one of your loops, you were always treated like a bit character, never noticed or singled out by any of the major players of the night. Although this is your first time encountering this ‘Geto’ it’s clear to you that he’s involved with everything that’s happened here and honestly, you get the feeling he might actually be the mastermind behind the massacre.
That makes you even more nervous.
You come to a stop in the place where Satoru Gojo was once kneeling before he was put in that box. Now that you’re out in the open, ‘Geto’ looks you over with some sort of nonchalant curiosity.
“You’re…” he starts, sounding thoughtful, "not a sorcerer, are you?”
Sorcerer. You heard that term thrown around by him and his group a few times. It’s what they’ve been referring to their enemies as. It probably wouldn’t be smart to lie and say you are one; you get the feeling he’d see through your lie anyway. “I’m not.”
He hums. “How interesting.”
“...what do you mean?” you ask before you can help yourself.
“It’s just you have an abnormally large amount of cursed energy for a non-sorcerer,” he explains. “Though, I suppose that all just sounds like gibberish to you."
You nod and look down at the box lodged in the floor. It has eyes, big creepy looking eyes. "...are you going to do the same thing to me as you did to that man?"
He laughs, "...fortunately for you, the prison realm only holds one person at a time and I need him sealed away more than you."
"...does that mean you're going to leave him in there forever?"
"If I'm feeling nice, I might unseal him in a hundred years or so."
One hundred years? At this point, you've probably lived roughly that amount of time through your loops alone, but for Satoru Gojo… "Won't he die first?"
"Only if he decides to," 'Geto' says, looking completely and wholly unbothered. "Time doesn't doesn't flow in the box, so when I unseal him, he'll be the same as he was just now. Physically anyway. Who knows how deteriorated his mind will be after all that."
Time doesn't flow in the box.
The words echo in your mind over and over. Time doesn't flow in the box. In other words, that means time has stopped in the box, and if that's the case then—
"Anyway, rather than worry about him, shouldn't you be more worried about yourself?"
You look at 'Geto' and he's smiling at you, it's friendly, but ominous. There's no doubt what is going to happen next, though you had already resigned yourself to this iteration being a bust; it was only a matter of time.
Time doesn't flow in the box.
"I was thinking I might keep you around, even if you aren’t a sorcerer, your wealth of cursed energy would serve my plans well," he muses. "But… it would be too much trouble trying to teach you how to use it in time."
As he talks, you realize this is probably the first time your death is intentional— every other death you've suffered has just been a byproduct of the ongoing slaughter. You were just another casualty, a victim, never a target.
You're scared.
Even though you know that once he kills you, once you die, you'll just loop back to around 8:30 again. You'll be on the platform again. And you'll play out some sequence of events before you eventually die again. And again and again.
Time doesn't flow in the box.
"I'll be nice, though," 'Geto' says, raising a hand and another monster appears out of nowhere. You don’t even bother trying to figure out from where. It doesn’t matter, especially since this monster will surely be the one to end your life. "I'll make it painless."
"...I appreciate it," you say and close your eyes hoping that he's not lying about it.
Time doesn't flow in the box.
He didn't lie.
You die again.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
And you're trapped.
You don't know how and you don't know why, but you are stuck in a time loop— forced to suffer through the horrific events of the night before you die and begin it all again. It's been a long time since you stopped counting how many loops you've gone through, but if you had to guess, it's probably somewhere in the hundreds now.
You are so very tired.
But it doesn't stop. It won't stop no matter what you seem to do. You are stuck. You are trapped. You are doomed.
“Time doesn't flow in the box.”
Ever since that first loop where you heard whoever is possessing Geto's body say that, the words have been stuck in your head, playing on loop.
You finally realize why.
“Time doesn't flow in the box.”
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It's 8:25PM when you wake up; that should be plenty of time.
You need to find Satoru Gojo.
After hundreds of loops you've come to a singular conclusion: you need to prevent him being sealed in the prison realm. You've witnessed it enough to know that you won't be able to do it alone; you'll need his cooperation.
You rush upstairs as fast as you can, ignoring the shiver that runs down your spine as you step onto the stairwell. According to your previous loops, Satoru Gojo arrives on the subway tracks at 8:40PM. With how crowded the upper floor is, you don’t know if you’ll have the time to intercept him and talk to him, but if you can at least figure out where to find him, then you can try and talk to him during a subsequent loop.
When you reach the fourth basement floor, however, you don’t know where you should even start. He’s pretty tall so you think you could spot him in the crowd, but… there are still so many people. It occurs to you that maybe it would be better to try and look from a higher vantage point so you head to the stairs that lead up to the third basement floor. You check your phone again. It’s 8:35PM; you need to hurry.
Luckily for you, you find him very easily on the third basement floor.
The only problem is that he’s in a hard to reach spot— squatting above a sign hanging over the crowd.
You check your phone again. It’s 8:38PM and he’s starting to move, presumably to meet with those waiting for him on the subway tracks. It’s good that you found him, but there’s no doubt about it.
You’re going to need more time.
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The moment you wake up, you immediately bolt toward the stairs. It's taken many, many more loops, but you've finally brought the time you wake down to around 8:15. You're still not sure if it's enough time, but there's only one way to find out.
You barrel your way up to the next floor and zig zag through the crowd to get to the next flight of stairs. By the time you get to your destination, you're completely out of breath, your chest heaving as your lungs clamor for air. You’ve done this so many times, yet your body acts like it’s always the first. It sucks, but there’s nothing you can do about it. You slow to a brisk pace to catch your breath and check the time. It’s 8:27— a new record. Hopefully it’ll be enough.
The goal is to catch Satoru Gojo before he moves to his lookout point above the crowd. While not impossible, it would be difficult for you to follow him there. You eye the safety barricade that blocks off the area where he’ll be moving in just a few minutes warily.
Yes, getting over there would be extremely difficult.
You don’t want to think about it right now; you’ll deal with it when the time comes.
Especially since Satoru Gojo has now entered your field of vision.
Your heart starts to race at the sight of him and it feels like it’s beating a million times a second. There isn’t a lot of time. You need to talk to him, but your legs only wobble, your feet planted firmly to the ground. This is not good. You need to move. You need to move.
Finally, after what feels like both an instant and an eternity, your feet finally budge, propelling you in Satoru Gojo’s direction. The beating of your heart only grows louder as you make your way toward him, mingling with the single thought that’s echoing throughout your mind right now: will he even hear you out?
You need to make him.
“Excuse me!” The words nearly come out in a stutter as you realize that you are actually talking to Satoru Gojo. You have watched this man at a distance for so long that it almost felt like he wasn’t real, like he was just another fixture in this nightmare that you’ve been living for far too long. And yet, here he is, right in front of you, in the flesh.
And his attention is on you.
All sound stops: the crowd around you, the thoughts in your head, the beat of your heart. Even though you cannot see them through that blindfold of his, you know that Satoru Gojo’s eyes are on you and the thought of that, the knowledge of it is actually a little overwhelming. Your mouth is dry and suddenly you don’t know what to say, but you need to say something. You need to say something before he thinks maybe you bumped into him by accident and just walks away without a word.
“I need to talk to you!” The words just burst out from your mouth and something about it is just absolutely embarrassing. You’re not sure if it's desperation or the fact that you haven’t really talked to anyone other than the existence occupying Suguru Geto’s body in nearly forever.
Satoru Gojo’s lips slowly start to form a smile, “Oh, yeah?”
The sound of his voice makes your mind go blank. There’s something different about it right now; more playful, amused even. Maybe it’s because he’s talking to you, a harmless human being and not a monster trying to kill him. It’s almost kind of jarring, but you know, with certainty, what Satoru Gojo’s voice sounds like. And the fact that he’s actually talking to you right now has you kind of excited. You nod, doing your best to not show how thrilled you are that he’s not ignoring you.
He hums thoughtfully, “Sorry… but unfortunately I kind of have some business to attend to right now.”
“I—” You start to say that you know that he’s headed down to the platform below to fight with…Choso and Jogo, you think their names are— you don’t know the name of the monster with the branches for eyes. “It’s— it’s really important!”
Gojo tilts his head a little, clearly thinking. You should probably say something else, something to try and convince him to stay a little longer and hear you out, but your mind is both full and blank. Where do you start? From the beginning? Or do you start with what is most important? Maybe you should say what you think will get his attention. You’re not sure, and you realize you really should have thought about this earlier because you’re running out of time right now.
“...mind handing me your phone?”
You stare at Gojo, completely and wholly confused, but he just holds out his hand expectantly. When you don’t move, he wiggles his fingers a little, a silent gesture telling you to hurry it up. Without thinking, you reach into your bag and unlock your phone before handing it to him.
“Kind of sucks that cell service isn’t working right now,” he remarks as he types something into your phone before handing it back. “But! Here's my number.”
You look down at your phone and, sure enough, Satoru Gojo has added himself as one of your contacts. He’s even added a little star to the end of his name. That’s… a little unexpected. Why his number though?
“Are you… hitting on me?” you mutter in your confusion.
He laughs, “Well, you said you had something really important to talk to me about, right? So just give me a call when you get home or some time tomorrow and we can talk then!”
You’re not going to make it home, or even to tomorrow, and neither will Satoru Gojo. As you start to tell him this, he steps past you. Desperate, you try to grab him, but somehow, for some reason, you can’t. You remember he did this with Jogo and the other monster, made himself untouchable.
This is not good.
He gives you a little wave, cheery as he says, “I’ll talk to you later!”
You watch, helpless as he hops over the barricade beyond your reach.
Gripping your phone tightly, you take a deep breath. It's fine, it's not like you didn’t expect things to go well anyway.
You'll just have to try again.
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Every time you’ve tried to solicit help from Satoru Gojo, it has gone the same way. He just won’t give you the time of day, and in some ways you can’t blame him; he’s clearly here to deal with the monsters down on the platform. You’re fairly certain that he probably thinks that whatever is going on with you is a much lesser issue in comparison.
Plus, it probably doesn’t help that in the times that you’ve approached him, you haven’t been able to articulate yourself particularly well. Once you start talking to him, you just get hit with something akin to stage fright and the connection between your mind and your mouth just stops working. It’s gotten better with each attempt, but…
It’s just so frustrating.
It is interesting that Gojo has given you his number every time, star symbol and all. You’re not sure what kind of person you were expecting him to be, but after witnessing him literally and viciously rip monsters apart, you’d figured he’d be a little more somber. However, in the fragmented conversations you’ve had with him he’s come off as far more friendly and playful than you would have thought. Is he the type of person to get more serious when the situation calls for it? You can’t help but wonder, but ultimately, it doesn’t really matter.
What really matters is that you’re able to convince him to help you.
You have to convince him.
“Excuse me!” you say, stepping in Satoru Gojo’s path. You don’t stutter this time, and your voice is more sure. This is good.
“Yes?”
His head turns in your direction and you gulp. Gojo’s gaze, despite that blindfold of his, still feels just as overwhelming as it did the very first time you approached him. You have no doubt that he’s sizing you up, but there’s just something about it that makes you feel like you’re being picked apart.
You take a deep breath and step closer to him, hoping your voice sounds firm enough as you say, “I need your help. I’m trapped.”
He chuckles a little, “I know, but yours truly is on his way to go beat up the bad guys keeping you all trapped here, so soon enough you’ll be all free to go on your merry little way.”
Right. You were so caught up in your own plight that you nearly forgot that technically you’re not the only one ‘trapped.’ Satoru Gojo obviously knows that everyone else is confined to this station, but you doubt he knows that you’re confined to this night alone.
“That’s not what I mean!” you sputter.
“Then what do you mean?” Gojo asks. Should you tell him that you mean that you’re trapped in a time loop? You’re honestly not sure— in the movies and manga you’ve read about time travel, revealing that sort of thing risks creating a time paradox which seems to be a bad thing. If you have to tell him, you will, but— “Oh, I get it.”
You stare, bewildered. Did you maybe just spew all of that aloud?
Gojo gives you a mischievous smile. “You’re hitting on me, aren’t you?”
“No!” The word comes flying out of your mouth. You can’t deny he’s attractive— you’ve thought it all this time, but that is not what’s happening here.
“No need to be embarrassed,” he continues, ignoring you. “I totally get it, so if you want, I’d be happy to give you my number!”
Again? You’ve received Satoru Gojo’s contact details in every loop you’ve talked to him, star symbol and all— you even have his number memorized. There’s something kind of odd about how he keeps giving you his number. Part of you wonders if he’s got some sort of ulterior motive, but you haven’t thought too deeply about it. There are way more important things going on.
“I don’t need your phone number,” you say. “I need to talk.”
Your response seems to give Gojo pause. Did you somehow manage to get through to him? No way. Your suspicions are all but confirmed when he gives you that familiar apologetic smile.
“Like, I said, I’m sort of in the middle of something, but…” Gojo reaches into his pockets and rummages around until one hand fishes out a folded up piece of paper. The other hand keeps digging around in his pocket and when Gojo seems to give up on whatever he’s looking for, he turns his attention back to you. “Got a pen?”
What?
Gojo tilts his head. “Well?”
“I do, but…” You trail off, unsure why he’s asking.
He holds out his hand waiting for you to just hand him the pen. You still don’t get it, but you reach into your bag’s front pocket and pull out the pen and hand it to him. Gojo looks almost like an excited child when he takes it from you, quickly scribbling something onto his paper before shoving it and your pen back into your hand.
You look at the paper; it looks like a receipt. For a disturbing amount of mochi that Gojo bought earlier today. The amount of money he spent is almost sickening; way too much to be paying for mochi. More importantly, you notice something juxtaposed over the receipt’s print.
It’s Satoru Gojo’s name and number.
He even drew a little star next to his name.
“If you change your mind later, just give me a call!” he tells you cheerily. “I promise I’ll make it worth your while!”
You gawk at him. He cannot be serious. You literally just told him that you didn’t need it and yet he still gave it to you. He must want you to contact him later, but you can’t even begin to understand why. It can’t have been something you said or did, right? Unless, he’s actually—
“Later!” Gojo’s voice cuts through your thoughts and you notice him walking off with a wave.
You can’t let him get away.
Again.
You crush the receipt in your hand and rush after him. Despite the crowd, Gojo seems to move through the people with ease and it almost seems like they are yielding to him naturally. It’s good for you. Makes him easier to chase.
“Wait!” you yell, but Gojo doesn’t even look back. Bastard. Your muscles strain as you try to run faster. You know you won’t be able to grab him if you get to him, but there has to still be something you can do to stop him. Circle around him? Cut him off before he—
Satoru Gojo reaches the barricade.
“Wait!” you yell again. “Satoru Gojo, wait!”
He does not even acknowledge you.
You’re almost there though. Almost. If you reach out your hand, then maybe, maybe you can grab him. Something in your head tells you that it’s useless; you’ve never been able to touch him. But, you don’t care, you don’t care because you have to try. You stretch out your hand, desperate and hoping, but just as you do, Gojo effortlessly jumps over the barricade, moving to survey the crowd.
Due to your momentum, you almost collide into the barricade, but you manage to stop yourself. You stare at Satoru Gojo through the glass. He watches the crowd for at most three minutes. Is this just another bust? Is there really nothing you can do? There must be a way you can get his attention. Is it possible to climb over the barricade? No, it’s too high. There’s nothing you can grasp onto or use as footing either.
This fucking sucks.
Another minute or two and Gojo will be on the move again, and there will be no way you can follow, no way you can get his attention. You press your hands against the glass, pushing against it. Naturally, it doesn’t budge. Why would it? If only you could get it out of the way. If only you could break it. This stupid barricade is the only thing between you and Satoru Gojo and there’s no way you can climb it, but if only you could break it.
If only you could fucking break it.
Suddenly, the glass feels warm. Satoru Gojo’s image starts to look a little distorted as the warmth beneath your fingers grows. Something is happening. The glass starts to vibrate and shake. Violently. The tremors grow stronger and stronger. You should stop. You should back away.
You don’t.
The barricade starts to crack and fracture and soon the sound of shattering glass resounds throughout the entire room. Everyone starts screaming. No one knows what’s going on— not even you. But you don’t care. It’s gone. The barricade is gone.
You take a step forward, toward Satoru Gojo. He’s on a beam that’s about a two meter drop from where you’re standing. That’s fine. That’s okay. You can make it. You have to. Without a second thought, you jump—
And you land on the beam. You look up and Satoru Gojo’s attention is back on you. He’s finally, finally turned toward you, face twisted into an expression you can’t decipher or even comprehend, but—
Something’s wrong; your world is turning on its axis, but—
Satoru Gojo is looking at you, and—
Up is very quickly becoming down, and—
Satoru Gojo is coming closer, but—
You’re slipping—
But he’s right there, and—
You’re falling, but—
He’s trying to catch you, but—
It’s too late. It’s too late.
The last thing you think you feel—
—is Satoru Gojo’s arms around you.
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It’s October 31, 2018— Halloween in Shibuya.
And you are causing a commotion.
“Shit! Fuck!” you curse loudly. The people near you start to shift away but you barely notice; you don’t really care.
You were so close, so fucking close and yet… yet here you are again. It’s quarter past eight and you are back on the goddamn platform. You don’t know what happened; you remember falling and thinking you were going to die, but you are absolutely certain that, once again, this time, you didn’t die.
Is Satoru Gojo at fault again? Did he do something? Like he did all those other times you looped without dying? When you think about it more, you don’t think so. You don’t know what happened; all you know is that you tried to get to him, but you slipped.
And he caught you, you definitely remember that.
You still don’t understand why you looped, but there’s not much you can do about it now; it’s not like you can go back anymore. It just sucks, because you think he might have actually listened if you’d talked to him.
Or he would have come after you for… whatever happened with the barricade. It could have been taken as an attack on the crowd… But if he thought you were doing that, then why would he catch you?
You don’t know.
All you know is that you have to try again.
The only problem is that you don’t know how you managed to shatter the barricade. You think about it as you make your way up to where you’ll find Satoru Gojo. There is the possibility that it wasn’t you and something else happened to it instead, but that feels way too coincidental. It had to be you. That’s the only thing that makes sense. You just can’t figure out how you did it outside of wanting, wishing, praying for the barricade to break. It’s not like you have supernatural powers like Satoru Gojo and his enemies.
Despite your mind being completely and wholly occupied by trying to figure out how in the world you managed to break through that barricade, you still manage to make it to the second basement floor of Shibuya Hikarie by 8:25PM— a brand new record. Satoru Gojo doesn’t show up until around 8:34PM, so that gives you almost ten minutes to try and figure out what you need to do to try and replicate shattering the glass barricade again.
Except—
Except Satoru Gojo is already here.
The thought that maybe you’re mistaken flashes in your mind before it’s quickly dismissed; there’s no way you’d mistake anyone else for him. There is absolutely no denying it: that is Satoru Gojo. Bewildered, you double check the time on your phone. Maybe you misread it and you’re actually late but sure enough you read it right— Satoru Gojo is here early.
What the hell is going on?
Of the thousands of times you have experienced this night, this hell, this sort of thing has never happened before. Everything happens at a specific time, as if adhering to an unseen schedule. It’s likely that what happened in your last iteration did delay Satoru Gojo’s arrival onto the platform, but other than that there has never been a deviation to the time table.
And yet, here Satoru Gojo is, nine minutes early now.
You realize that that’s not the only thing that’s strange: he’s not moving. In previous rounds, when you encounter Gojo here, he’s walking to the lookout spot beyond the barricade. But, right now, he’s just standing there, hands stuffed in the pockets of his jacket. It almost looks like he's waiting for something.
Or someone.
This unexpected turn of events has you rooted to the spot. You’re not sure what you should do. No. This shouldn’t change anything. You need to talk to him. As concerning as a change like this is, the extra time it gives you should be a good thing. Despite knowing that, your feet are still firmly planted to the ground.
The crowd shifts and you see Satoru Gojo start to move. Toward the barricade? No. He’s not heading in his usual direction, rather he’s—
You stop breathing.
He’s headed toward you.
All sound stops: the crowd around you, the thoughts in your head, the beat of your heart. Even though you cannot see them through that blindfold of his, you know that Satoru Gojo’s eyes are on you and the thought of that, the knowledge of it is absolutely mind numbing.
He comes to a stop before you, lips curled up to form an amused sort of smile as he says, “Soooo, you needed to talk to me?”
You try to answer but no words come out of your mouth. Are you dreaming? You have to be, right? There's no way that this is actually happening. Could it be that, after thousands of loops, you’ve finally lost it? Your mind shattering along with the glass of the barricade at the end of the last one?
Gojo tilts his head, indicating that he's still waiting for an answer. When you open your mouth, at first, nothing comes out, the words stuck in your throat. You force them out, your voice cracking, “...how did you know?”
He smiles, looking almost mischievous as he reaches up and lightly taps the side of his head. “I remembered, of course!”
All you can do is stare at Satoru Gojo. He remembered? How is that possible? From his perspective, this is the first time you’ve met and while it shouldn’t be possible for him to remember there’s something in your mind that’s keeping you from completely dismissing the possibility.
Gojo laughs, “I take it from the look on your face that you’re not used to this sort of thing happening. Is this the first time?”
“No.” The fact that the word is out of your mouth before you can even really think about it surprises you and you really have to think. Your face scrunches together as you try to remember. Is this really not the first time? Then, the memories assault you, overlapping as they replay simultaneously in your head— a woman in a yellow and white magical girl costume— begging you for help as she burns to death— smiling as she tells you she made her costume herself. “...it happened just once a long time ago.”
“‘A long time ago,’ huh. Sounds like you've been at this for a while now.”
“...unfortunately.”
Gojo hums. “So when you said you didn’t need my phone number…”
“You’d already given it to me a few times,” you say, figuring that’s where this conversation is going.
“Really now?”
Does he not believe you? Or is he just being an ass? You’re not sure, but since you had taken the liberty of memorizing Satoru Gojo’s phone number you recite it back to him to prove your point.
Just when you think you may have stunned Gojo into silence he starts to laugh, obviously finding something funny about the fact that you know his cell phone number. “Seems like you've got quite the fascinating technique there.”
Technique? What is he talking about? Your confusion must be plain on your face because he adds, elaborating, “The time travel.”
You continue to stare at him. You don't think you'd consider what you've been going through time travel, because traveling implies moving from point A to point B, but you've been stuck walking in circles at point A for a long time. What really gets you is… “What do you mean by ‘technique?’”
“You mean you don’t— oh. I get it; no wonder you’re trapped.”
That does not answer your question in the slightest. “Can you please explain what you're talking about? What do you mean by ‘technique?’”
“Right, right… So basically, a technique is like a special sort of power,” he finally explains. “Like I said, your technique seems to be a kind of time travel. Whenever you activate it, your mind is sent back in time.”
What he's saying makes sense, but… “How come you were sent back too?”
He laughs again. “Isn't it obvious? Think back to before— do you remember that I caught you as you were falling?”
You nod slowly. The memory of his arms around you is almost embarrassingly vivid. “...is it because we were touching?”
“Ding, ding, ding! That's correct! Anyone you happen to be touching when you activate your technique gets affected by it too!”
Something about his tone annoys you, but you try to ignore it. He could have just told you rather than make you guess. “How do you know that for sure?”
“Well,” he continues. “You’ve done your little time loop a bunch of times, right? If your technique affected everyone, or even a few people in a select range you would have noticed for sure. And if it affected only just you then we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now, now would we?”
When you think about it, you do think that the woman in the magical girl costume might have bumped into you before the loop where she remembered.
“That’s honestly just conjecture, but I've got pretty good eyes, so I’m hardly ever wrong.”
Gojo gives you a grin and while you do think that his reasoning is sound enough his confidence is a little grating. More than that, though, you’re glad that this conversation is actually going really well.
“Either way,” he says thoughtfully. “It doesn’t look like you can control your technique. Usually a person’s technique manifests when they’re a kid, but you seem to be a special case… in fact, I bet your technique activated for the very first time tonight— probably under some pretty extreme circumstances, too.”
“...dying counts as an ‘extreme circumstance,’ right?”
“Oh, absolutely. Or legitimately thinking that you’re gonna die, but it seems like your body has been unconsciously activating your technique as a sort of defense mechanism. Which is why you’re trapped.”
“So, if I could control it I’d be able to make it out of this time loop.”
“Yeah, but in this case it probably wouldn’t end very well for you,” he points out with a chuckle. “It’s not like you actually want to die, right? I mean, if you did, then your technique wouldn’t even activate in the first place.”
You don’t; what you want is for this night to finally end. To be free from the endless cycle of dying over and over again and again. You don’t think death is quite the answer; even if you were to learn how to control this supposed technique of yours, there’s no guarantee that you would just unconsciously activate it when the grim reaper comes knocking on your door. No, the answer is…
“Anyway!” Gojo’s cheery voice cuts through your thoughts. “I highly doubt that you’re the type that makes a habit of jumping off ledges for the funsies, so the fact that you’ve been dying tells me that some pretty gruesome stuff is about to go down, so, tell me what happens tonight.”
The sudden drop of his voice sends a shiver running down your spine. If it weren’t for the fact that you’ve seen how serious Gojo can get, the sudden shift in demeanor would probably freak you out a bit, but it doesn’t. This is the Satoru Gojo you’re familiar with.
You do have one concern though. “That… won’t create a time paradox or anything, will it?”
“Nah,” Gojo shrugs. “You wouldn’t cause one with the way your technique works, besides, if you’ve only been going back at most an hour or two in time it’s hard to believe you’d be making a really big impact… unless you really believe in the butterfly effect.”
You’re still not quite sure.
“Trust me, it’ll be fine.”
His voice sounds strange. Gentle. Kind. It's the most soothing thing you've heard in a long time and it makes you want to believe him.
“...okay.”
Anxiety is still gripping at you, but you try to dispel it, taking a deep breath before beginning your explanation. For the sake of brevity, it’s probably best that you’re as concise as possible. There isn’t much need to really get into the nitty gritty of things unless he asks specifically.
Naturally, you begin with his arrival onto the platform and how soon after a fight breaks out and how the crowd is unfortunate enough to be involved. Gojo’s expression is passive for the most part, but he does crack the faintest hint of a smile when you mention how he manages to eviscerate one of the monsters.
It disappears once you tell him about the arrival of the train. Between the dozens upon dozens of people being dropped onto the platform by those two high school girls and the hoard of monsters disembarking from the train, everything devolves into pandemonium.
“Wait,” Gojo holds a hand up and you pause. This is his first interruption since you started recounting the night’s events for him. “Everyone is able to see the monsters?”
You stare at him. What a weird question. “...yeah?”
His mouth twists and it looks like he’s thinking about something. You can’t even begin to imagine what. Finally, he comments, “Makes sense.”
It does not, but you don’t ask him to elaborate. Surely if it was important he would have just done so.
“Anyway, in the middle of all that, you… you do something.” Your brows bunch together as you remember the stance Gojo took, the crazed and desperate look in his eyes, the feeling of your head about to explode. “I don’t know how to describe it. At first, it would just force me to… activate my technique, I guess. But now, it just knocks me out for a few minutes.”
Gojo frowns and he rubs at his chin, obviously thinking about what you’ve said. Eventually, he raises a hand and bends his fingers into a familiar gesture. It’s the one that preludes whatever he does on the platform. “Do I do this?”
“Yeah.”
He hums. “Interesting.”
You wait to see if he’ll explain. He doesn’t. Great. Even if he doesn’t think you need to know, it certainly would be nice to. It’s annoying otherwise, but you ignore the feeling and continue. “I can’t tell you what happens when I’m knocked out, but when I come to everyone is basically a zombie and all the monsters from the train are gone. I think you kill them.”
“I probably do,” he says casually. “But what about Volcano Head?”
“...you don't…get a chance to kill him,” you say slowly. Gojo tilts his head, waiting for you to elaborate, but you hesitate. You have to tell him, you know you do, but…
You have seen the interaction so many times and though you don't know the exact nature of the relationship between them, you can tell that seeing Suguru Geto (or rather seeing his body) shook Satoru Gojo to his very core.
There's no doubt in your mind that he will not take this news well.
“Come on now,” Gojo's tone is light-hearted, unaware. “Don't keep me in suspense here.”
It's as if you're withholding the punchline to a joke. In a way, you suppose you are, but you don't think he's going to find it funny.
You take a deep breath. You need to tell him. The worst thing that could happen is that he doesn't believe you, but if that's the case… you'll probably just end up repeating this all again until you find a loop where he does.
Having made it this far, you'd like to avoid all that.
“Before you can get Volcano Head you get restrained by something called the prison realm,” you say slowly, “by someone calling themselves… Suguru Geto.”
The second the name leaves your mouth, there is a clear and obvious shift in the air. Gone is Gojo’s laid-back and frivolous demeanor, replaced with something more somber and almost frightening. The tension grows more and more palpable to the point that you think it might almost choke you.
You almost wish that it would.
“You can’t be serious,” Gojo finally says, once your words have fully sunk in.
“I—” You start to speak, but come to an abrupt stop when you see him shove his hand into his pocket to yank out his phone of all things.
The both of you know full well that there’s no reception here, but you don’t think that he’s planning on making any calls. Gojo scrolls and scrolls on his phone before he stops and shoves the screen in your face. It shows a picture of three people— a teenage girl with a cigarette in her mouth, a younger, happier version of Gojo sporting a pair of round sunglasses and—
“When you say ‘Geto’ is this who you’re referring to?” Gojo demands, using his other hand to point at the third person in the frame— a handsome young man with long dark hair pulled up into a bun.
“Yes, but—”
“That’s impossible. It can’t be him,” Gojo interrupts, his voice firm, cold even. “He’s dead.”
There’s a note of finality in his words that is definitely meant to leave no room for argument. It doesn’t stop you, though. Instead, you glare at Gojo’s stupid blindfold and say, “...being dead doesn’t mean a damn thing! I’ve died hundreds of times and yet I’m still fucking here, but—”
“Your situation is different,” he interjects, the temperature of his tone hiking up, his words like heated hissing. “I killed him almost a year ago. There's no way—”
“You didn't get rid of the body properly!” You cut him off, raising your voice in hopes that he'll take even just a second to stop and listen. It seems to work and you add something you remember ‘Geto’ saying. “You should have had Shoko Ieiri get rid of it, but you didn’t and now some… some kind of gross brain thing is possessing the corpse!”
The air between you both is silent as the grave. Though you can't see it, you can feel the weight of his gaze pressing down on you. He’s definitely having second thoughts about everything you’ve said so far. There’s a chance he might even think you’re his enemy now. You stare him down though, refusing to look away. You’ve made it this far, you can’t— you won’t back down.
“...you’re not lying, are you.” Gojo’s words are more of a statement than a question. There’s no doubt in your mind that he knows the answer, and yet he’s still asking. You wonder if maybe he’s clinging onto some vain hope that maybe, just maybe this all a sick, cruel joke that’s gone way too far.
“I’m not.”
Gojo holds your gaze for a second longer before he lets out a curse. “Fuck!”
“...I’m sorry,” you say quietly, mostly because it feels like the most correct thing to say at this moment. You don’t know the whole story, but it seems like they were close. If so, then it must have hurt Gojo a lot to have killed him, and must hurt even more to know that someone is desecrating the body. You hate that you, a complete and utter stranger, happened to be the person to tell him, but…
It had to be done, for the sake of getting past this unending night, it had to be done.
Gojo runs a hand through his hair and lets out a ragged sigh. “Okay. What happens after that?”
You give him a rundown of what follows; he gets sealed, the monsters wake up and all but ‘Geto’ leave in search of their next target. When you mention the high school girls demanding the brain give Geto’s body back, Gojo snorts loudly.
“Fat chance of that,” he says derisively.
You nod in agreement. It was clear to you that the brain parasite has no intent on giving it up any time soon. “After they leave, he… talks to me.”
“Probably couldn't ignore all that cursed energy you have,” Gojo remarks offhandedly.
You stare at him, expression twisted in a way that shows that you have absolutely no clue what that means. It should be fine for you to ask this one question; it actually concerns you after all. “What does that even mean?”
“Exactly what it sounds like, though… probably doesn't make much sense to you, does it?”
You give him a pointed glare and all Gojo does is laugh.
“Just think of it like having a lot of MP.”
“...Like in a video game?”
“Exactly!” Then, Gojo tilts his head, clearly thinking. You don't bother asking; you don't feel like he'll explain.
“He does ask me if I'm a sorcerer, whatever that is. Is that why?”
“Probably. Ordinary people don't have even a fraction of the energy you're packing.”
‘Ordinary people’ he says as if you’re not an ordinary person who got caught up in all this supernatural sorcery bullshit. Or at least you were, but if the time loops are really a product of your own doing…
“Does he kill you when you answer?” Gojo asks to get the conversation back on track.
“Not right away. What happens next kind of varies,” you answer. “He usually lets me have a question or two before he kills me; I've asked him a couple different things.”
“Really taking advantage, aren’t you?” Gojo says and you're not sure what to make of his tone. Is he mocking you or is he easing back into that laid-back persona of his?
“If I’m doomed to repeat the same situation over and over, I might as well make the most of it,” you respond flatly.
“You know, your technique kind of reminds me of save scumming.”
He’s definitely gone back to acting almost completely unserious— all signs of his earlier agitation are nearly gone.
“So what did you learn?”
“Well, the prison realm only holds one occupant. Once they’re sealed, time stops for them and the only way out is if the bearer unseals them or if they choose to kill themselves.”
“I see… And what about our body jacker?”
“He didn’t go into detail but he said something about… striving toward the evolution of mankind?” You frown a little at the memory. He didn’t explain further because he said that you wouldn’t understand.
“Huh. Interesting. Wonder how he was gonna go about doing that.”
“I don't know, but I can't imagine you'd like it since he goes out of his way to seal you into that box,” you say. “Said you’d get in the way because you’re too strong.”
Gojo shrugs his shoulders and grins a little. Cocky. “Well, I am the strongest sorcerer around, you know.”
You would think him overconfident if you hadn't seen the magnitude of his strength first hand.
“Anyway, that's as far as I ever go. When he's decided he’s done talking to me, he kills me and I loop back.”
“So, in short, what you want help with is getting past that point, right?”
“More or less.”
“And all I have to do is avoid getting caught by the prison realm?”
You nod.
“What’s it look like?” he asks. “A big cage with a bunch of metal bars?”
Now that you think about it, you haven’t woken up early enough to see it before it traps him, but you can’t imagine it looks that much different. “No.. It’s a small box with eyes… It gets big enough to fit you in it, though.”
“Huh.” He stretches his arms out above his head as if he’s trying to emphasize how large he actually is and shoots you a grin. “Should be easy enough then. I bet our body snatcher used the shock of seeing Suguru to trap me but since I'll see it coming, avoiding it'll be a piece of cake.”
Gojo makes it sound so easy, and maybe it really is as simple as that, but you can't help but be worried still.
“Don't tell me you don't think I can do it,” he says, tilting his head.
“It's not that,” you admit. “I'm just concerned I might die before we can get to that point.”
Truthfully, since you know that will just result in another loop you're less concerned with dying itself and more worried about losing the progress you've made in convincing Gojo to help you. Even though it's been clearly proven you can loop him as well, there's no guarantee you'll be able to make the physical contact needed to do it upon death.
“You've made it pretty far on your own, though, right?”
“Yeah, but… I’ve messed up plenty of times.” More than you can even count. “There's also the possibility that taking the time to talk to you might have thrown things out of whack.”
Speaking of time, you check your phone. It's 8:39PM. You curse.
Gojo leans over to check your phone. “Let me guess, I'm supposed to be somewhere right now.”
“Yeah, this is when you’re descending down onto the platform.”
“You know where I am down to the exact minute?” He asks and you tilt your head back and forth a little. It’s not exact per se, but it’s close enough. Gojo chuckles a little. “Man, I didn’t realize that you were actually that into me.”
That earns Gojo a glare from you, but he just laughs it off. “I doubt being a few minutes late is going to make a big difference.”
You certainly hope so.
“Don't worry,” Gojo says and you notice he's using that tone from earlier. “You won't die.”
It’s hard to argue with him when he uses such a reassuring sounding voice and yet, you still open your mouth to try— to voice your doubts, but what he says next silences you before you even can.
“I'll protect you.”
You think your heart stops beating in your chest and your words dissolve in your throat.
He grins at you. “Did you fall in love with me just now?”
That catches you a little off guard. You're willing to admit he's hot, but surely he must be joking. “How could you even think of something like that at a time like this?”
Gojo laughs again. “Well, since someone is so worried about their time table being all messed up, I better head down there; can’t keep Volcano Head and friends waiting, right?”
You blink. Is that it? “Wait, shouldn’t we make a plan or something?”
“Isn’t the plan for me to not get caught in the prison realm?”
Yes, but… “But what about me? Is there anything I can do?”
Gojo stares at you, or at least you think he does. “...I don’t know, is there?”
You’ve seen the encounter between Satoru Gojo and those monsters so many times and you try to picture a version of it where you intervene and… all you can see is yourself getting in his way. You’re no fighter, no… sorcerer, or whatever he is, you’re just some ordinary person that was unfortunate enough to get all caught up in this mess. The most you can probably do is kick the prison realm out of the way when the time comes, but otherwise… “...no, I guess not.”
His expression turns sympathetic. “You’ve done plenty by telling me everything that happens. So just wait up here, and let me handle the monsters.”
You almost nod. Almost. But then you remember what transpires up here above the platform. You know it sounds safer up here where you’re less likely to get involved in the carnage, but… “Wait, no, if I stay up here then I’ll fall to my death when those girls—”
Gojo laughs, interrupting you. “Don’t worry about that. It’ll be fine.”
“How?”
“Just trust me.”
“I…” It’s hard to. After everything you’ve gone through it’s hard to trust in anything, to believe in anything. Even though you’ve made it this far this time, the worry that something will go wrong and that you’ll have to do it all again still lurks in the back of your mind.
Despite all that, you want to believe.
You want to believe that you can make it past this unending night, that one day you’ll wake up and it’ll no longer be October 31, 2018. And the first step towards that is trusting in Satoru Gojo.
“...okay,” you say quietly. “Okay.”
Gojo chuckles then asks, “Anything else before I head off?”
You start to ask if there’s anything you should say, in case things don’t work out, but you stop yourself. You’re choosing to trust him, to believe in him— you can figure out that stuff later if things end up going south after all. So, instead you give him a smile and it feels a little weird because you don’t remember the last time you did. “Good luck!”
For a split second, Gojo looks almost surprised, but then he laughs again, beaming widely at you. He starts to move past you and reaches out to give you what you think is meant to be a reassuring squeeze of the shoulder and then he’s off. You turn to watch him go, the crowd, once again, parting almost naturally for him.
When he reaches the barricade, he pauses, raising his hand as if he’s giving you one last wave. Then he jumps over it onto his little perch and then less than a minute later he’s gone, descending to the platform below.
Now, all you can do is wait.
You check your phone again and it’s 8:44PM. If you remember correctly, the high school girls start threatening everyone right before 9PM. With Gojo’s arrival being shifted back almost five minutes, does that mean that they’ll be shifted back too? It would make sense, but you’re not too sure.
Out of habit, you keep checking your phone and at nearly 9PM, you hear the shrill voice of one of the girls over the crowd, commanding everyone to do what she says, her partner stringing up bodies until everyone listens. Everything plays out just as you remember it, which is mildly comforting, though you know that the events that happen up here are more or less independent from what happens below.
Surely, just as Gojo said, a few minutes aren’t going to change anything, but—
No.
You agreed to trust him. To trust that everything would be fine.
When the girls start to demand that as many people as possible climb onto the roots and vines covering the atrium your heart starts to hammer in your chest. In just a few minutes, all the foliage will disintegrate beneath you, and you and everyone else here will fall into the abyss below.
You are afraid.
There isn’t a single loop where you’ve really survived this fall. If you don’t die in midair, you die right after landing. It’s a death trap, and that’s why you’ve stopped coming up here. There’s a part of you, the part that knows what’s about to happen, that wants to try and run back onto stable footing. But you can’t, because you know if you do then the girls will kill you for sure; you have to stay.
It’ll be fine, you tell yourself, it’ll be okay.
You just have to trust Gojo.
An eight car train is pulling in. Please wait behind the yellow line.
You hear the announcement faintly below you. It’s almost time. You brace yourself and try to stay calm. Gojo said he would protect you, that you wouldn’t die. You don’t know how he intends to keep that promise, but all you can do is believe in his words.
It’ll be fine. It’ll be okay.
The vines and roots start to crack and the ground beneath you starts to give out. You squeeze your eyes shut as that sickening weightless feeling overtakes you. It occurs to you that this is actually quite literally a trust fall— will Satoru Gojo really be able to catch you?
As you fall, you realize almost instantly that something is different.
You’ve experienced this fall dozens of times and so, even though it has been a while since you’ve gone this route, you are very familiar with what it feels like. Something is different. You’re falling faster. The trajectory is changing. It’s like some force, other than gravity, is pulling at you.
Is this Gojo’s doing?
Just as your body collides with the ground you hear the sounds of mutilating flesh meld with the screams surrounding you. Blood and severed limbs litter the ground, but you try to ignore it. You need to focus on your own survival right now. Quickly, you scramble to your feet scan the area around you; you’re on the platform right now and right in front of you is—
Right in front of you is Satoru Gojo.
His back is turned to you, his focus currently elsewhere. Looking at him you realize you recognize this scene, though it’s much closer and at a different angle. He’s about to do that thing, that thing that knocks you out.
Something in you tells you to move closer to him, after all, he used his mysterious powers to deliberately bring you closer to him, right? You rush toward him and as you do something he said earlier pops up in your mind.
Anyone you happen to be touching when you activate your technique gets affected by it too!
Whatever he’s about to do… Is that his ‘technique?’ And if it is, would it work the same way as yours? If so, there’s only one way to find out: you need to touch him. You dodge monsters and other people as you run toward Satoru Gojo and—
A monster still manages to grab you, its large hands wrapping around your wrist. You try and yank it free, but it's much stronger than you are.
“Shit!” you hiss as the monster starts to pull you toward it and away from Gojo. What do you do? Your other hand is still free, should you try to punch it in the face? Or—
Before you can do anything, something blasts the monster’s head clean off. Shocked, you stare as the monster’s body slumps onto the ground, its grip loosening on you instantly. You whip your head around to find that while Gojo still has his back to you, his arm is bent back in your direction, his palm open as if he fired some invisible blast from it.
Then you feel it again, something pulling at you, but this time it's more forceful. Your body is yanked toward Gojo and the second you feel his hand press against you, you see him make that gesture with his other hand.
“Domain Expansion,” he whispers in a strained voice. “Infinite Void!”
Something happens and your vision flashes for a fraction of a second. And then—
The room is enveloped in an eerie stillness; all the violence and bloodshed coming to an abrupt stop. Monsters and humans alike stand like the living dead, unconscious with their eyes wide open as if they are staring into an infinite abyss. You recognize this scene, you’re familiar with it because it’s similar to the one you wake up to after being hit by Gojo’s ‘domain expansion.’ The only difference is the presence of the monsters, who are all but gone when you regain consciousness.
The pressure from Gojo’s hand is gone and he says to you, his voice still low. “If you’re squeamish when it comes to blood and gore, it might be best for you to close your eyes.”
And then he’s gone.
You do not take his advice. You do not close your eyes. How many loops were you unable to witness what’s about to unfold? A few hundred? A few thousand? And if all goes to plan, then you will never get another chance again: there’s no way you could possibly look away.
And what you see unfold before you is that Satoru Gojo was right.
He is the one to kill all the monsters.
It’s not as if you really had any doubt, after all, it seemed like the most logical conclusion to come to and yet…
There’s a difference between knowing and seeing.
All the violence resumes and the platform is engulfed in the sounds of carnage and slaughter once more. The lack of terrified screams makes everything more disconcerting— without them, all you can hear is the squelching echo of mangled flesh and blood splattering all over the place. You can’t really see him, but you can tell where Satoru Gojo is in the crowd as he leaves dozens upon dozens of decapitated heads soaring in his wake. Once or twice, he leaps out of the crowd and even from where you stand you can see the crazed glow of his inhumanly blue eyes as he massacres monster after monster.
Even though you don’t think you have anything to be scared of, you are still terrified: Satoru Gojo is no longer a man, but violence incarnate. You want to move closer to where Gojo gets trapped, but you’re afraid to. What if you get in his way? What if he kills you by accident?
Dying again when you’ve made it this far is definitely not ideal, but isn’t being killed by Gojo the best case scenario? Because then the two of you would probably loop together again and—
No.
Gojo said you wouldn’t die.
He said he’d protect you.
It’s hard to believe when he’s in the middle of a massacre, slaughtering monsters left and right, but you remind yourself yet again that you have to believe in him.
You take a deep breath and start moving, taking care to keep an eye on where Gojo is. You don’t know how long this is supposed to take, but you do know where he ends up when he’s just about done. The closer he gets to that spot, the sooner the prison realm will be unleashed upon him.
There’s a small group of zombified people nearby and you settle yourself among them. It’s not super close, but you think it's close enough that you'd be able to run over and kick the box away from Gojo if you have to. You do a quick survey to see if you can spot the body snatcher, but he's nowhere to be found. Hopefully, he hasn't noticed you moving around, or, if he has, he's more concerned with Gojo than he is with you. Given that you always seem to be the last thing he acknowledges, you'd like to think that he doesn't consider you a threat.
Which you're not, not really anyway.
The sounds of slaughter start to die down and you look to see Gojo approaching the spot where he gets caught. He looks beat, his eyes unfocused and his breathing heavy. You do another quick scan around him and notice a small box a few meters away from him, wrapped in what looks like paper charms or seals or whatever they're called. That has to be the prison realm— though it looks different than what you saw before. Gojo seems to notice it right after you do, his gaze honing in on it, examining it with some measure of bewilderment. Then, some invisible force slices through all the paper seals covering the box and it expands, the corners of the box floating up in midair to reveal what looks like a large sheet of dark red flesh with a large bloodshot eye stapled to the middle.
Disgusting.
If Gojo didn’t realize before, he seems to now, because he takes a step back, away from the grotesque thing. Good, good—
“Hey! Satoru!” Your blood runs cold at the sound of the body snatcher’s voice. He emerges from the crowd, smiling widely as he gives Gojo a wave. “Long time no see!”
Satoru Gojo’s entire body goes rigid. Shit. You told him, you warned him about what was going to happen, who he was going to see, but was that not enough? It’s possible that no amount of warning would have been enough to mentally prepare Satoru Gojo for the sight of the man he said he killed a year ago. After all, you know that there’s a stark difference between knowing and seeing. Even then, if Gojo doesn’t gather his wits and move now then he’s going to get caught and you can’t let that happen.
Your body moves before you can even think about it.
You scramble out from your hiding spot in the crowd and throw yourself in between Satoru Gojo and the prison realm. There’s no way you can kick it away from him now, not when it’s in this form, but maybe, if you get between them you can at least keep it from capturing him.
The eye quivers erratically, as it flits from Gojo to you. Every hair on your body stands on end as it watches you, the pupil dilating and contracting uncontrollably. You can’t look away from it, your own gaze fixed to your image reflected in the black abyss of the pupil. Something in the back of your mind tells you to stop, to get away, it’s dangerous, but you keep your feet firmly planted to the ground.
A second, or maybe even a minute passes and the prison realm shifts, its fleshy form morphing to restrain you.
The body jacker looks at you, his frown tinged with disgust. “Don’t you think you’re being rather rude by butting into what could have been a touching reunion?”
You scowl. Is he still trying to play the role of Suguru Geto?
He sighs and looks past you at Gojo. “Satoru, I thought bringing lesser sorcerers to fight alongside you was more trouble than it was worth?”
You hear Gojo snort from behind you, “It is… but this person here isn’t a sorcerer… Just like you aren’t Suguru Geto.”
The faker almost pouts and presses his hand to his chest as if Gojo's words have wounded him. “Satoru, I’m hurt, how could you say such a thing to your best friend?”
“Cut the bullshit,” Gojo snarls. “You can’t fucking fool me. You might be in Suguru’s body but I know with all my heart and soul that you’re not him.”
The corpse snatcher stares at Gojo, expression blank before he sighs once more. Then, his gaze shifts back to you, his eyes narrowed as he looks at you with sheer disdain. It feels as if you’ve been drenched in ice cold water. There's no smile this time but you already know what's going to happen.
He’s going to kill you.
“I intended to deal with you later since you seemed harmless enough,” he says, raising a hand to summon a monster— the same one he always uses to end your life. “But you’re in the way. So, I think it’s for the best if I just get rid of you right now.”
Instinctively, you try to take a step back but the prison realm’s restraints keep you in place. Not that it would have mattered much, even in the loops where you’ve tried to escape the faker’s monster, it still kills you, too fast and too agile for an ordinary human like you to avoid. All you can do is squeeze your eyes shut and wait for the monster to kill you. At least, it’s always painless.
Something touches your back.
Your eyes shoot open.
Before you is the monster, wiggling and writhing only mere centimeters from your face. It gurgles and snarls at you, desperate to fulfill its master’s wishes and kill you but it doesn’t move any closer. You stare at it with wide eyes, unsure of what to do.
Someone behind you clicks their tongue— Gojo. You try to turn your head to look at him, but your movements are too limited, the most you can do is turn your head to the side. The sounds the monster is making start to change, sounding more frenzied, almost as if it’s in pain, and you flit your eyes in its direction just in time to see its entire body explode. The monster's guts and bright purple blood fly off in every direction, getting on the floor, the ceiling, the zombified bodies of the people unfortunate enough to be nearby, but not on you.
This is Satoru Gojo’s doing.
He steps in front of you, half turned towards you as he moves in between you and the body snatcher. His hands are shoved in his pockets as he loudly says, “Did you really forget about me?”
You’re not sure if he’s talking to you or the body snatcher.
Past him, the imposter scowls, raising his hand once more, probably to summon even more monsters, but Gojo’s quicker, and it almost looks like his eyes are glowing even brighter, the blue looking almost white as he whips his head in the faker’s direction. The sound of mangling flesh and breaking bones echoes throughout the room as Gojo, using that mysterious power of his, seems to break the faker’s arm.
The body snatcher hisses loudly and despite the fact that his face is twisted in very obvious pain, he tries to shoot Gojo a mocking smile. “Do you really think you can kill your best friend again?”
“I already told you,” Gojo turns to fully face the monster inhabiting Geto’s corpse. He tilts his head a little to the side and some force starts to squeeze at the faker’s neck. “You’re not Suguru.”
You hear a loud crack as Gojo telekinetically snaps his neck.
The head rolls onto the ground and you almost look away, but then you notice his eyes still moving, looking around. Is he still alive? Then you remember: the thing possessing Suguru Geto’s body was some kind of parasite. “Gojo! Wait! The brain!”
He reacts almost instantly, head turning and in an instant the skull is crushed and all that remains is red splotch on the ground.
You almost relax. Almost.
But the body is still standing.
Horrified, you watch as it quivers violently before falling to the ground. Then what looks like dozens of black spirits start to erupt from the corpse and the entire room is engulfed with a shrill howling.
What the hell is going on?
“Those must be all the cursed spirits he consumed,” Gojo explains uselessly, voice barely audible over the screaming. “Guess he was empty before.”
You don’t bother asking what he means. There are bigger problems right now. “What do we do?”
“No choice to exorcise them,” he answers plainly.
For him to exorcise them, he means. You both know that there’s not much that you can do. You still can’t move and honestly, you don’t even know if it’s possible to get out of the prison realm’s restraints. Not without dying. And if you die now…
Everything will have been for naught.
You’ll reset time and have to do this all over again— assuming you can even get to this point again.
There has to be something, you just have to think outside the box.
Or rather—
“Gojo!”
He glances back at you.
“You need to seal me in the prison realm!” you exclaim. He turns to face you fully, looking bewildered and you start to explain as fast as you can. “Those things are going to attack any minute right? I can’t move or try to hide and I can’t expect you to protect me the entire time and if I die then I’ll end up looping time again, but— but, if you seal me in the prison realm then that won’t happen.”
Gojo frowns, looking conflicted. “You don’t think I can do it?”
“Wouldn't it be easier if you didn’t have to?”
He tilts head and you think he’s conceding your point.
“Please,” you beg, staring at him desperately. “We don’t have much time. The other… cursed spirits will wake up soon too!”
You don’t have to explain that you mean Volcano Head and friends.
It takes only a second for Gojo to consider the very few options you have. “...how do you seal it? Do you know?”
“I think so,” you answer. “There’s no guarantee it’ll work but I think that if you say ‘prison realm, gate close’ it should seal me inside.”
If anything, it’s worth a shot.
Gojo nods. “Do you know how to break the seal?”
“I… don’t,” you confess. You never asked, and you don’t think the body snatcher would have told you even if you did. He only told you that it holds one and that…
That time doesn’t flow in the box.
“...you don’t have to break the seal.”
Gojo frowns, “Wait a sec—”
“Even if I make it past tonight… What if this all happens again? What if I inadvertently trap myself in another time loop?” you ask. “I… I don’t want to have to go through all of this again. It’s better for me in a place where time doesn’t pass.”
You don’t know for sure if it’ll be better, but right here, right now, it seems like the best option.
It feels like an eternity passes before Gojo says anything.
“...fine,” he agrees and you don’t quite know how to feel about it. The howling around you all grows louder. You wonder why the cursed spirits haven’t attacked yet. Maybe Gojo’s power is holding them at bay… for now anyway. You both know that he can’t ignore them forever.
“...before I do, though, mind if I ask you just one thing?”
You blink. “Not sure what I can do for you in this state…”
He laughs. “I just want to know your name.”
What an odd request. Though, now that you think about it, you don’t think that during this loop or any other loop really, you’ve ever told him your name. It only seems fair to tell him, since you’ve known his for longer than he’s known of your existence.
You tell him your name.
He nods, looking as if he’s committing to memory. Probably easier to remember than his phone number. “Any last words?”
You try to think of something. Nothing comes to mind and you just shake your head.
Gojo takes a deep breath, “Alrighty then… Prison realm, gate close.”
Just as it did the many times you’ve seen Satoru Gojo sealed away, the boxes and restraints around you vibrate a little before they start to close around you, growing large enough to fit your body as they approach.
You won’t see it, but once you’re inside the box will shrink and become small enough to fit in the palm of someone’s hand.
Will it be quiet inside?
In your final seconds, some words, some last words come to mind, and you say them, hoping that he hears them in time. “Thank you, Satoru Gojo.”
You burn the glittering glow of his brilliant bright blue eyes into your mind.
And then, everything is engulfed in an unending black.
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It’s November 30, 2018— morning on the campus of Tokyo Prefectural Jujutsu High School.
Satoru Gojo strides through the school grounds, casually tossing a small silver box with eerie blue eyes known as the prison realm up and down in his grasp. Walking at his side is Shoko Ieiri, a pretty woman who’s been unfortunate enough to have been Satoru’s friend since high school.
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Shoko asks, twirling a few strands of her long brown hair.
“What do you mean?” Satoru responds nonchalantly. “All my ideas are good ideas.”
Shoko hums in clear dissent, but doesn’t say anything more. Even she knows better than to try and waste her time trying to argue with Satoru. “I’m just worried about their mental state. Didn’t you say that time doesn’t flow in the box?”
“I’d be worried if it was some normal person,” Satoru says. “But after what they’ve gone through I think they’ll be fine.”
“...well, if you say so.”
The two arrive at their destination: the largest training area on the Jujutsu High grounds. Satoru places the prison realm at the center and takes a few steps back with Shoko standing behind him, in case anything happens.
He doesn’t think it will, but it’s always good to take at least a few precautions.
“Gojo, are you sure we should be doing this?” Shoko asks again. “Didn’t they want to remain in the box?”
“Of course I am,” Satoru says with his usual air of confidence before looking back at the prison realm nestled in the grass. He grins and then—
“Prison realm, gate open.”
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if you made it this far. thank you. it's my sincerest hope that you enjoyed the ride. 3
#OHHHHHHHH MY GOD.#okokokok this is gonna be. Really Incoherent sorry in advance 🙏🙏 niku this made me…… insane. fully. someone needs to restrain me#one of my favorite gojo fics Ever??? like genuinely????? this was SUCH a pleasure to read i have sm i wanna say :((( hhhhhh#FIRST OF ALLL the higurashi poem…. what a banger <33 i LOVE how it ties in with the ending too but more on that later :33#but it’s also so perfect bc reading this fic rlly did feel like playing a vn in the BEST way possible…. just. seeing all the tiny variation#experiencing the loops along w reader…… it was just SUCH an enjoyable experience i can’t even describe it!!!!!!!!! i’m so floored!!!!!!!!!!#like i ADORE timeloops it’s my favorite trope Ever and this fic was just . a godsend?? perfection??? the best loopfic ive read?????#I’M STILL GOING FULLY INSANE OVER IT BTW it satiated every single craving i have for timeloop content. my brain is leaking endorphins rn 😵‍#i LOVE the opening lines and the constant reusage of ”It’s the night of October 31 2018— Halloween in Shibuya”…… just so satisfying somehow#and reader’s mental state was also so thoughtfully depicted… it was so easy to insert myself into them but they’re also. rlly charming?#them latching onto gojo as the one anomaly of the timeloop…. fixating on him and his beauty (real as fuck btw)…. and searching for hope!!!#finding hope in gojo!!!! learning to trust him!!!!! :((( it feels kinda like a very twisted one-sided slowburn … and i ate it up.#i also rlly like that it’s not explicitly romantic!!! there’s enough subtext to enjoy a romance aspect but it’s not the Focus yk??#and i like that!!! the focus is on reader and the timeloop and both of those aspects are woven into gojo rlly naturally :>#ok so i’m using that as a segway. bc OFC i need to rant abt gojo fucking satoru and how much i love him and ur take on him 😔😔#every once in a while i’ll find a fic where i’m like. this author knows Gojo Satoru personally. they speak to him on the phone every night.#and this fic is ABSOLUTELY one of those like….. this gojo is Canon to me. i’m so serious abt it like that’s HIM !!!#and it just reminded me of why i love him sm bc this rlly does feel exactly like the gojo from the manga and that’s SO impressive 2 me ….#i’m in awe of u niku. i don’t even know where to begin w gojo bc i loved SO many lines and lil details u put in………. 😵‍💫😵‍💫#he’s just. soooooo charming :/// he truly is. he’s beautiful and handsome and he gives you his number every loop . w a star symbol!!!!#asks you for your phone or a pen and gets all excited writing his name… the mochi receipt…. 🥺 he’s so endearing we need to put him Down.#HE’S SO GOODDDDD I CAN’T SAY IT ENOUGH…. his convos with reader were a huge highlight for me and i loved loved LOVED#the moment he finally understands their situation. when they speak and he hears them out and he’s almost gentle. sooo reassuring.#starting to think you’re genuinely gege akutami btw like . gojo is so complex but you just. captured him perfectly???#he’s cocky and playful and teasing and a killing machine and he’s Kind. he’s playful even when you’re a stranger#and when he finally hears you out he speaks softly and says he’ll protect you :((( reader is better than me i would’ve cried LMAO#THE DIALOGUE IS SO GOOD N FEELS SO REAL ”did you fall in love with me just now?” NOOO ….. ☹️☹️☹️☹️ …. (maybe ……..)#ack. he’s the most charming man in the universe my heart was fluttering like crazy this isn’t… normal human behavior………#WAIT i almost forgot …. i too adore the jjk dub and every time gojo spoke i heard kaiji tang in my head <33 10/10 would recommend!!!#writing ✩
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hoshigray · 7 months ago
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This is my first time requesting something but HEAR ME OUT, "Slow Cuddle-fucking with og Sukuna while he is holding (and caressing) Reader (His wife) tightly and praising her (with him having size(difference) and breeding kink) oneshot please please please PLEASESSS😭
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𝐚. 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞: NAH CUZ I SEE THE VISION, HOLD ON–
⊹ 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬: true form! Sukuna x fem! reader - explicit content; minors DNI - size difference - monster-fucking (he got 2 dicks, y'all) - double penetration; anal and vaginal - spooning dp position - breast fondling + nipple play - breeding kink - clitoral play (pinching and swiping) - dacryphilia - pet names ([little]dove, good girl, my wife, woman) - soft! kuna, but not too OOC - mention of drool/spit and tears.
⊹ 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1.5k
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“Stay still, woman…Mmnnn, good girl, nice and easy…”
It’s not a rarity for Sukuna to have his hands on you as you two slept through the night. After all, he is the King of Curses; asking permission to touch his is beneath him. You were made for him to hold – sculpted for his cursed hands to touch – everyone else was far behind or had no standing compared to your demonic husband. And with you both sharing a futon every night, who’s supposed to tell him to keep his hands to himself?
You, his little spouse, knew of this. Marrying the King of Curses was something you never imagined would happen — let alone falling in love with the giant man! You’ve always had dreams of becoming a sweet little partner to someone; for that to be fulfilled by the cursed man who could kill thousands in the blink of an eye is astounding. 
And, of course, being a wife entails all the duties accompanying the package. Especially now, as you two lie together on the floor, nude bodies nestled close on the futon above the tatami floor, and your naked figure trembling from the insertion of one of Sukuna’s paired cock. And your heart drops at the second one brushing up against the crevice of your ass when he pushes the one inside your throbbing, velvety channel. 
“Mmmph…! Sukuna, no,” you whined, your butt inching away from the second member. “I can’t handle both—“
“Don’t lie; you’ve done it before and did it well,” a hand brings your waist to him. “Or maybe I should just have one of the concubines take care of me, seeing as though my own wife is neglecting their duties.” 
He wouldn’t do that; Sukuna’s interest in his insignificant mistresses had long been diminished once he took you up as his bride, practically collecting dust as he hadn’t visited them since you shared a bed with him. Now, he uses them as tools to probe you. And he has to hold back the mischievous snicker when your eyes widen with anxiousness, wrapping your arms around his neck in desperation.
“N–No, please!” You pleaded; it was the only sufficient approach. “I’ll be good to you, I promise!”
The four-eyed curse scoffs. “Then do what you’re supposed to,” Each crimson orb takes in information about your bashful expression, “And attend to your husband like a wife should.”
Further complaints cease at his command, so you quiet down and arch your behind to him submissively. Sukuna takes your initiation with his hungry bottom hand on your ass, squeezing the flesh as you guide his other dick to your lubed asshole. With a hum, he pushes himself and forces you to take his cocks with your bottom, needing a few seconds to breathe when your holes reach the base of his members.
“Good girl,” he says to your ear to make you shudder, and he lifts your leg with the hand that finished groping your asscheek. “Obeying me so well like always…”
He begins to move without a signal, slowly pulling himself in and out of your warm wetness that coats his length with your slick. You can’t help but grip the girth limbs that massage your insides, involuntarily throbbing on them with shaky breaths.  
“Mmmaah, ohhhmyG—Mmm!” Speech isn’t easy, even with his upper left hand cupping your cheeks. And your brows furrow as the upper right sneaks to grope a breast. “Faaahh, Suk..una, I’m too full already…”
“Mmm? Is that so?” Sukuna asks with a patronizing tone, licking the helix of your ear to hear you gasp. “But we’ve barely started yet, my wife. Don’t bore me before I can enjoy you yet.” 
His hips go at a gradual cadence that has you keening a mess, the sensation of the veins of his cocks felt by the walls of your holes. You howl silently, not wanting to make too much noise.
But that doesn’t fly with your husband, speaking to your ear with that hoarse voice. Almost has you melting as he squishes with your cheeks, “Let it out, princess,” he commands. “I want to hear that voice; don’t you dare hide that from me.”
Fuck, the way you felt on his dicks was so fucking good, having the cursed behemoth burrow his face into the cubby of your neck. Slow kisses on your skin segway to sucks that should mark for later. He could never get enough of how small you were up against him. His giant palm swallowed your tit, your ass bouncing with every thrust, and how damn tight you were as you accommodated the two members making your entrances busy. 
Goddamn it, he bites his lip, dialing up the speed of his ruts a bit. Scratching your inner walls has you squeaking louder, unable to stop yourself when he grinds his hips after a sudden grim pound. So warm and snug for him as if you were meant for him. He knew you were meant for him — taking his huge, fat shafts with no objections, just arching your back further so the sensation could be more pleasurable like the loyal, little pet you are. “Hmngh…! Yeah, just like that, little dove; keep clenching around me like that…”
Restraint was gone long ago, letting your voice and shrieks fly out and fill the quiet bedroom. The sound of his skin shaking against your ass, the heat of your cheeks making it hard to think, and the shivers crawling your spine with every graze to your sweet spots. Everything feels like a haze, your brain too clouded to think outside this moment. 
And then you sense the hand on your breast let go, slithering down to your unattended clitoris, which has your eyes shoot wide as your demon husband presses down. “—Khhff! Nooo, ‘Kunaa, you mustn’t…!”  
He lifts a brow with a grin; you dare question him? “And why shouldn’t I?” He pinches the delicate bud, resulting in a scream sneaking past your lips. “Hmm? Plead for yourself.”
“Becau—Ahhh! Mmmm, I’ll cum. I’m gonna cumm…”
“Then don’t,” Sukuna doesn’t remove his digits playing with your clit, and the hand on your chin pulls your face to look at him. “Cum without my permission, and I’ll make sure to not be so kind next time...” His words carry a warning filling your bones with apprehension, yet his soft lips greet yours and he hums into your mouth. The kiss serves as a distraction from his thick digits gently swiping on the pearl.
The rhythm of his hips, however, increases in speed and prompts more moans to be taken by Sukuna. Drool trickles down your lips, same with tears that welled up earlier from the insertion of his girth inside your ass. Your eyes roll at the jab to your silky walls, breaking the sweet yet passionate kiss to cry out as your husband’s fat balls smack your ass. 
“—Ooooo, fuuuck, I can’t,” your eyelids shield your vision, using the rest of your senses to indulge in this euphoric pleasure. “‘Kuna, I’m so close, so—Ooohh!”
“Me too…Ghhh! Shit, me too…” Sukuna presses his hot face to yours when you throw it back, licking the tears off your sweaty skin. You looked so stunning like this, all disheveled and immodest because of him. “Gonna take my load, huh?” He licks the sweat off your shoulder and bites when you don’t respond. “Answer me, Y/n.”
“—Ahhh, yes!”
That’s not enough. “I said,” he pinches your clit again as he gives slow yet rough ruts to your holes. And he can tell by your twitching that you’re doing everything in our power not to come. “Answer me.”
Holy shit, this was borderline torture. “Mmmph! OhhhLord, ‘Kunaaa, I want you to fill me up. Pleasee, pleasepleaseee, I wanna be full; wanna be all ‘round and fat with your child…!”
“Keh, dumb pet; who said I wanted a brat, huh?” He scoffs, yet you can hear the groan as he licks and sucks on your neck while squishing your hot, tear-stricken cheeks. “Fine then; go on and cum with me. So damn needy for my seed…”
Sukuna brings your chin for another steamy kiss, his lower left hand holding yours as his pelvis goes at an irregular pace. Your muffled shrills are taken by feisty lips, teeth clashing with his fangs before sucking on his tongue, and the upper left hand releases your chin to caress your chest once more, tweezing the nipple along with swipes to your clit.
Release gradually creeps up your shaky frame, crying to his mouth when your chasm and anus pucker around the lengths that graze your walls with the tips. Sukuna is not too far behind you, pumping his load into you with a few harsh plunges, making your contracting cunt and rear full of his hot and thick semen. The lower right hand propping your leg up leaves soft kneads on your inner thigh, hoisting it up further so his shafts are deep enough until his pulsing balls meet your ass.
You withdrew from his lips to breathe, your figure quivering through the aftershocks, and your slit and asshole still flutter around his girths. And you mewl when he kisses your cheek and temple.
“Mmm, that’s my princess,” he purrs while placing your leg down to massage your waist. “Such a good dove…”
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© 𝐇𝐨𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐲2024 – reblogs and comments are appreciated wholeheartedly ✩ dividers by @/benkeibear.
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obsessedwrhys · 9 months ago
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ᶻ 𝗓 𐰁 .ᐟ The Seven x Deadpool!Reader
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t/w: loooots of dark humour/jokes, reader is insensitive and an asshole since they're also a supe working at vought, your powers are the exact same as Deadpool (even the skin condition), mention about killing, death, gore, r-pe, n@zis?!?!, alcohol, some intimacy (?). Also reader is gn!!
ᯓ★ here's a version with the boys <3
HOMELANDER
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This man hates you so fking much
Has tried to kill you multiple times, he tried lasering you, tearing you in half and even throwing you into the sky but you just always manage to come back like the damn plague
Eventually he gives up trying to kill you and just had to deal with the fact you'll be kept alive... just temporarily though... he's still looking for ways to kill you
However, your powers gave you dozens of advantages when around Homelander.
He can be having a meeting about something serious and everyone would be listening to him due to their fear towards him, then there's you who'd be doing your own thing and just shout out unrelated things like "Donald Trump just blocked me on Twitter!! HAH!! SUCK IT CORNFLACKS!!"
Everyone turning to you with startled expressions while Homelander simply rolls his eyes before continuing his presentation.
You are a complete nightmare to the PR team, that's why for interviews or any events, you'll always be paired up with Homelander so he can keep you under control and stop you from saying weird shit that could ruin the company's image.
"So Deadpool, how does it feel being in the Seven working alongside Homelander? You've been working together for almost 3 years now" A reporter would ask as you two are surrounded by screaming fans.
"Like I'm in the twilight series, not because of the fantasy but because I'm still waiting for the part where he impregnates me—"
"O-kay! That's enough, just silly ol' Deadpool with those inside jokes"
"You can tell in this eyes that he wants to fuck me right now. HE'S GONNA FUCK ME!!" You shouted as you're being dragged away by him.
Obviously when you had found out about his relationship with Stormfront, especially her background, you had to say some shit about it. Not giving the slightest care about the fact he could be grieving over her death.
He'll be in his room standing in front of the window and you'd just storm in, being as loud as possible.
"I can't believe you dated a N@zi!! Is it because I'm Jewish?!" Which may or may not be true, nobody knows your origin.
He may hate your guts but if he ever needs someone to help him do some dirty work, you're the person for the job, you never ask why or how, which could be the only thing he likes about you.
"Y'know, maybe if you didn't have such a big mouth, you'd be tolerable"
"All the people I've slept with have said otherwise"
Compatibility? 50%
STARLIGHT
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Before she joined the Seven, she had an image of what kind of person you were, she just didn't know it was this worse.
When you found out she used to work at this Sunday School Church, you just haaaaad to say something about it.
"So like, you say that prayer always works, but every night I pray for my hair to grow and it never does. Do you think God has me blocked? How do I get unblock?"
"Uh..."
You two surprisingly get along without one wanting to slice the other's throat, except sometimes the things you say can really piss her off. Which is why when the company assigned her a new costume, she was trying her hardest to avoid you, but you found out anyways.
"Holy shit Starlight! Nice costume, is this your Miley Cyrus breakthrough? Girl power!"
Insert her groaning out of annoyance.
Again, the second you discovered she was dating a guy behind the death of Translucent, you were heartbroken :(
"Of course this happens right when my therapist gives up on me!"
Despite your behaviour, you pitied her when it was revealed that she was taken advantage of by The Deep, so like any good friend, you took revenge by cooking his friend octopus and eating it happily in front of him.
"Revenge does taste sweet" You'd say happily while Starlight just watches by the side, both grateful and horrified at your actions.
In my opinion, you would definitely be the person she goes to once she starts working with the boys, you'll always be providing whatever information that happens in the company for her to use.
It helps her worry less about getting anyone killed 'cause you literally can't die.
Compatibility? 60%
QUEEN MAEVE
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You're half the reason why she rethinks about her life choices when she wakes up in the morning
Not because you're a handful (which you are) but because you're always paired together on missions
"Deadpool! The hostages!"
"OKAY! God... you act just like my drunk uncle"
Which is a joke/nickname you like to address her by because of her alcoholism (yikes)
Whenever the company needs you for something, half of the time she's the one assigned to search for you.
There was this one time she caught you trying to have Anika track down Kanye West's location, nobody knows what shenanigans you were up to.
Another thing to mention was that you two were chosen by the company to sing a Christmas song for the year's Christmas ceremony.
Just imagine during the bridge of the song, she's singing normally while you're completely going off, your high note so high you were sure you had Mariah Carey a run for her money.
Even though she finds you a lot to deal with, you're actually her buddy to train with.
Since you're very skilled with Katanas, she likes to practice her swordsmanship with you.
You like to tease or make fun of her everytime she fails to strike you which is good motivation for her to get better. Maybe you guys bring out the best of each other?
Last thing I'd like to add is when she was found out by the public that she was a lesbian (She's bi but you get the running joke), you had gifted her a t-shirt that says, 'Biggest Dick in Town'
Compatibility? 80%
THE DEEP
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Your human punching bag
If Vought was a high school instead of a company, you'd be the bully and he'd be the nerd getting stuffed inside the locker room.
For example, Homelander could be confronting Starlight about her relationship with Hughie and everyone would just start raising their voices til you come in yelling "SHUT UP!" to the Deep who had not said a single thing during the entire time.
Just imagine him staring at you like 😐
To be honest you also ate his friend octopus so you guys are actually never getting the chance to make up.
"Look dude, I don't appreciate your tone"
"I don't appreciate your haircut either but we can't all get what we want"
You may be a crazy person but you weren't going to be okay with the fact he violates every woman he sees, so not only did you cook the octopus but you also called in a male stripper disguised as a woman just for him to celebrate on his birthday.
Just imagine him all happy when you tell him the news and later that night he'll run inside your room, completely pissed off at your act after finding out but you just laughed and said.
"Happy April Fools 😚!"
"That's next month dipshit!"
Also, you never understood his weird fantasies. He has a thing for sea animals??You've caught him multiple times either flirting or getting off to one. It was concerning even for you.
"From how many animals you've fucked, you might just turn from the ocean's 'Seaman' to 'Semen'." You joked which he did not find funny.
Maybe you messing with him could just be your way of getting along with him since you're the same with everybody else, it's just he has more flaws to poke fun of and he's sensitive about them.
Compatibility? 5%
A-Train
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He thinks you're fucked up in the head.
Half of the shit that comes out of your mouth just has him reacting like in the GIF
Buuuuuut you're the one he always brings to the club because you always know ways to give the party life.
You've somehow even got on the wall of fame, a lovely portrait of you with your hands making out a heart.
Also, you know about his business with Compound V waaaaay before anyone else did. He's still grateful you didn't tell anyone.
Just like everyone else, you also enjoy messing with him except he's fast and constantly avoiding you.
"Hey A-Train, how much do you wanna bet that I can die faster than you?"
"Dude... seriously?"
You guys rarely get sent on missions together because you're always slowing him down, not basing off the fact he's fast but because you get easily sidetracked with other things.
"Alright, we're here now, how much C4 do we use?"
"Fuck math! Let's use all of 'em!"
You ended up detonating all of the C4 on you before he could object the idea, he was able to run out in time, your action nearly getting him killed while you ended up dead.
But it's fine you'll just grow back.
You know that race he has against Shockwave? You'd be at the VIP section standing near where Homelander and Queen Maeve is, waving your huge banner that has a picture of A-Train's face and yours pasted over a figure carrying the other in bridal style.
Compatibility? 55%
TRANSLUCENT
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He makes people paranoid but you make him disgusted.
There was this one time he was bored so he snuck in your room to see what you were doing.
At first he was confused why you had so many cute plushies but then the more he explored your room, he realised your room is basically every collector's dream.
You even had a huge teddy bear in the corner of your dressing room.
The reason why he doesn't like to spy on you is because the last time he did, he saw you putting your hand in the blender, then proceeding to put your private part into it.
Never again, he thought, never again.
He doesn't need to witness you carry out your intrusive thoughts.
Surprising enough, you're close with his son, I'd like to think that after his death, you practically became the kid's godparent. Though you can be sort of a bad influence, leading up to how he is in Gen V.
You always tell him you hate kids but he thinks otherwise.
After all, he can read people well.
You guys like to pull pranks on each other since you guys like competing on who's more sneaky
There was this one time, you woke up to find your suit gone so you ended up walking around the building, completely naked and unfazed by people's stares.
It was when you walked around the corner that you found your suit worn by someone else, turns out it was Translucent under it.
"Why is it so fucking tight dude? How do you stay in this shit all day?"
"You get used to it"
Compatibility? 85%
BLACK NOIR
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Lovers.
He doesn't mind your attitude because he actually can't say anything about it.
No seriously... he can't talk.
But hey he's got a good shoulder to cry on.
"I just... hffgh... I can't believe my album didn't surpass lady gaga's... She doesn't even know how to use Katanas like I do!" You'd let out a loud sob while he just stares at you for a while before placing a hand on your shoulder, patting you gently.
You know the scene where he's playing the piano for one of the company's party? You'll be laying down on top of it and singing in your usual overdramatic high pitched voice.
He finds your humour amusing so he always does this little head tilt like in the GIF when you say some weird shit while waiting for his response.
Since both of you are the only members of the Seven that wears a full body suit, obviously you had to try on his but since it was impossible to achieve that, you just had the company make a copy for you.
He'll be walking down the hallway doing his normal routine until he notises another person in his suit, the moment you speak and he realises its just you is when he let's his guard down.
"I just got some transplants done to my ass, that's why I look different"
You both are never sent on missions together 'cause you guys don't work well, pretty much nobody works well with him since he's the silent type.
Example, you two were hiding behind some crates ready to jump on the bad guys who were snucking in illegal drugs. He gestured for you to wait as he went to check again, only to turn back to see you gone.
"Marry Christmas motherfuckers!"
He heard your voice shout and he found you standing on top of the stacked crates, machine gun in hand and began shooting aimlessly.
He didn't even do anything but just watch until you ran out of bullets. However, multiple survived and began shooting at you so you ended running towards where he's hiding at.
"Yankee yankee!" You yelped.
You know the video of the two girls taking off their wigs to reveal that they're bald and they start bonding over it? I'd like to imagine that's you and Black Noir with the skin condition under the suits.
One more scenario I wanna add, you guys could be having a meeting but since you were bored and you always hated meetings, you'd draw a big heart on a piece of paper and show it to Black Noir from across the table. Surprisingly he'd draw a heart back to you.
You were overjoyed so you began to draw you and him doing it, doggy style. He stares at your doodle for a while before choosing to just focus on the meeting instead.
Compatibility? 90%
(This took a while cause I was on vacation)
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orzuie · 1 year ago
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I finally watched Across the Spiderverse and I want to take Miguel by the hair and knee him in the face and tell him not to pin his guilt and trauma on a teenager who is going through his on shit, shit Miguel could help with if he wasn't as far up his own ass
really there are several people he is pinning his guilt on but he is blaming Miles the most
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orchid3a · 2 years ago
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A CHRISTMAS MIRACLE. ( zhongli x reader )
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╰┈➤ you always believed in christmas miracles, but he took this concept to another level for you.
pairings — zhongli x fem!reader.
warnings — reader and zhongli are single parents before meeting each other, t*xic relationship (not with zhongli), mentions of domestic v*olence and ch*ating, a bit of misogyny and overall prejudice of the society with single mothers, fluff with children and between the parents, sugestiveness at the end.
word count — 5k
notes — this is a repost from the beggining of the year bc i had some problems back then, but this fic was supposed to be a christmas one and for zhongli's birthday. either way, it's now here! reblogs and feedbacks are appreacited &lt;3
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you’ve always loved christmas. 
it was a time when everything was magical, especially when you were a child, but such a magic didn’t die when you were growing up — it actually only grew, especially after you had your daughter. her father, your ex-husband, wasn’t the biggest fan of christmas. zandik was a doctor, and a logical one, and he almost spilled to your daughter that santa wasn’t real in the last christmas you three spent as a family, though you couldn’t tell if he was being mean or the idea of santa claus was so illogical that he didn’t comprehend why your daughter should believe it. 
either way, nahida still believed in santa, and you were sure your boyfriend and his children would do anything to keep such magic in your daughter’s life — and you couldn’t be more grateful. 
ganyu and xiao were two sweet hearts, accepting to go shopping with you to buy presents for your daughter and their father. it was a tradition that was passed down from your father to you, always bringing you along when he went to buy presents for your mother and siblings — you loved nothing more than to choose what they would be given, and seeing their eyes lighten up with the perfect gifts you had chosen. you used to take nahida with you, too, when you and zandik were still together, and you knew she loved to see the small smile on her father’s face when he opened his gift and saw the shirt or the new white coat his daughter had chosen for him. 
but that was in the past now, and your ex-husband didn’t want anything to do with nahida now. 
it was a shame, though. despite the bad way your relationship ended — with him cheating on you with one of his coworkers while you stayed at home taking care of your little treasure and doing everything to please him — nahida was still his daughter, a child that he had spent hours and hours talking when she was still in your belly, a child that he had treasured and did lots and lots of plans with you while she laid on his bare chest in a warm night of summer. but ever since your divorce, he hadn’t made any effort to be present in his daughter’s life again, but it didn’t seem like nahida was missing him. 
your boyfriend was a better father figure to her, anyway. 
after your divorce, you didn’t have anywhere to be — your ex husband made you quit your job after you got pregnant, so you could put all your energy into taking care of your baby and raising her the bestest you could. your best friends, cyno and tighnari, offered you a place to stay until you had a job and a good income to be able to live on your own with nahida, and you couldn’t be more grateful to them. if it wasn’t for them, you wouldn’t have been hired in your boyfriend’s company as his secretary and become the neighbor of his younger brother, who played matchmaker for the both of you. 
zhongli was a kind boss, always understanding when you needed to call a sick day whenever nahida needed you, to the point that rumors about your involvement began even before you two were actually together.
apparently, he had always looked at you with a lovestruck expression that everybody saw except you — because, in your head, how could a man as successful as him, as handsome and kind as him, would look at you with love in his eyes instead of pity? with a failed marriage and a little girl to take care of, you had already made up your mind that you would never find love again. but zhongli was stubborn and would do anything to show you that he was different than your ex-husband, his plan coming to fruition when you found a job in your actual line of field, with venti’s and ei’s help. 
you were, at first, a bit hesitant in opening your heart again for another man. but you came to know that you and zhongli had passed by the same situation, a cheating wife that left him for her new affair, leaving two small children for him to take care of. if it wasn’t for venti and ei, in the words of the said younger brother of your ex boss, zhongli wouldn’t be able to raise his children to be such good kids. another thing that made you more prone to open yourself to him was the way he treated nahida, in such a care that you never saw your husband treating her — zhongli always coaxed giggles and giggles from her, and you knew you were in love with him watching him play with your daughter as if she was his own. 
now, after one year of being together and two months of living as a family, it was the first christmas you five would spend together. 
“aunt y/n, do you think daddy will like a new shirt? we can buy it blue to match with my hair!” ganyu’s excited voice took you from your thoughts, and you smiled at the young girl, nodding at her words, like xiao glared at his older sister.  
ganyu and xiao were nine and seven, and the kindest children you ever met. they had accept you and nahida in their lives as if you both had always been a part of it, and the three of them had a very special bond — none of your friends had children on nahida’s age, and it was good to see the sibling bond she was forming with zhongli’s children. she and ganyu became sisters in less than a day, and while xiao was shyer than his sister, nahida was already calling him big brother by the end of the first week you all were living together. you and zhongli couldn’t be happier, being able to be together and watching your children getting closer — he’d always whisper how good of a mother you were while kissing your forehead, making you hide your face on his chest due to embarrassment. 
“i think he will love one.” you agreed, hand messing ganyu's blue curls. “but maybe for his birthday? we need to remember that we need to buy two gifts for daddy.” sometimes it was bothersome the fact that your boyfriend's birthday was in the new year's eve, a date when people were already celebrating, but you tried to make it more special for him — zhongli's birthday celebration started as soon as he wake up, and it went through the whole day. he would turn thirty-four this year, and you wanted to make it as special as you wanted christmas to be. 
“why didn't daddy choose a better day to be born? like us, or nahida!” xiao's complaint was cute, his hand clutching your skirt and his brows furrowed in an unhappy face. 
you smiled at the younger boy, watching as ganyu looked at the dress shirts in the store. “we don't choose the day we're born, little man.” it was cute how he still flushed at your pet names for them, and you wondered if someday he'd grow too tired of them and ask you to stop. you hoped not, because both of them, ganyu and xiao, already had their special places on your heart — right at nahida's, but you feared it was too soon to call them like that.
“hmpf.” he pouted and you giggled, fighting the urge to pinch his cheeks and call him cute. 
“aunt y/n!” ganyu called you, a beautiful blue dress shirt in her small hands. “i'm sure daddy will like this one! it's like my hair!” she proudly exclaimed, a smile full of white teeth adorning her chubby cheeks. but before you could answer, you heard an irritated sound coming from xiao’s mouth, who was still clutching your skirt, narrowed eyes looking at the shirt his sister chose. 
“what about my hair then?” he asked and you sighed, knowing it would take a while to make those two agree on something. 
— 
zhongli smiled seeing the christmas’ lights shining on nahida’s green eyes. 
he had always worried about his relationship with your child, even before you two were a thing — it was embarrassing how much he had daydreaming about being in a relationship with you, a thirty two three old man fantasizing about his twenty-seven secretary, but he couldn’t help himself. not when you smiled so sweetly at him, always making sure that he had a cup of water and coffee with him and that he wasn’t overworking himself. you were zhongli’s dream woman, and he knew he needed to court you properly. 
you first told him about your daughter in a rainy day, after you had received a call from your friends, eyes glossy with tears — you explain that she had a fever through the whole night and you left her with your best friends so you could work, but it seemed like her condition was worse since you left. zhongli didn’t think twice about offering you a ride to your friends’ house then to the hospital, his heart contracting itself seeing your distressed face. you reluctantly accept, and the rest was story. 
that day was the confirmation that you needed that you should accept his moves on you, already searching for a new job so you could fully welcome zhongli in your life. the way he made nahida feel safe, despite the doctors' scaring and the needles in her little body, made the tears you were holding back to fall from your eyes — your ex-husband’s last words ringing in your head, of how much of a bad mother you would be without him and his help.
now, zhongli was walking hand in hand with your six-year-old daughter through the jewelry store, trying to look for the perfect ring to propose to you. 
“what gem do you think mommy would like, nahida?” he asked, his amber gaze eyeing some diamond’s rings on display, hands unconsciously reaching to take nahida between his arms so she could help him choose. she nuzzled between them, sighing contently before casting her green orbs on the rings and gasping softly. zhongli suppressed a chuckle — he missed when his children were small and innocent like her.
she pointed to a gold one with some green details, the diamond shaped in a heart with some emeralds around it. he wasn’t surprised though, as her favorite color was green — even the tips of her hair were dyed green, a courtesy of the day she, ganyu and xiao spent with venti. “that one, uncle ‘li!” she exclaimed, her face lightening up at the thought of your finger adorned with it. “but why are you gifting mommy it, uncle zhongli? my papa used to give her clothes or books.” nahida was the most intelligent and curious kid zhongli ever met, and he knew she’d ask why he wanted to give you a ring — though the mention of her father brought a sour taste to his mouth, he could never be angry at her for bringing him up. 
she was too small to understand how much her father made her mother suffer. 
“well,” he started, smiling at the vendor and pointing to the ring nahida liked. “i want to marry your mommy, and i’m going to ask her with the ring i’ll buy today. do you think she’ll accept it?” 
he didn’t want to admit it, but his heart was hammering inside his chest like he was a teenager once more — nobody knew about his plans of proposing, and zhongli wanted to keep things a surprise to everyone, but he knew he needed to ask nahida’s permission first. she was your entire world, just like his children were his, but he wanted to make a space for himself there, like you and your little girl had on his. and nahida’s acceptance was what he needed to feel confident enough to ask you those three little words. he knew you wouldn’t do anything that would hurt or put her in danger, and he couldn’t blame you. you were a single mother in a world that looked down at you with disdain in its eyes. 
though, nahida’s words caught him by surprise. “you promise you won’t make mommy cry like my papa did?” he looked puzzled at her, though he understood what she meant. “mommy thinks she hides things from me, but i’m not dumb. i remember when papa left us, she cried so much! and i don’t want to see her crying again.” she hid her face on his neck and zhongli sighed, stroking her back. 
“i promise, my sweetness. i will never make mommy cry sad tears, alright?” he almost didn’t notice her small nod, but he felt her small hands gripping the back of his dress shirt tighter. “does that mean i can marry mommy?” 
his heart felt more at ease when he heard her giggles. “of course!” nahida exclaimed while coming out from her hiding spot, a big smile on her face. “does that mean you’ll be my daddy, too?” as much as her voice had excitement on it, zhongli could recognize a bit of shyness, alongside the soft pink dusting her cheeks — but he felt his heart warm, and even though nahida didn’t know that, he already considered her his child, his youngest daughter. and to know that she wanted him to be her father figure was better than any other scenario he could think of. 
“yes, i’ll be your daddy too, my sweetness.” 
you looked down fondly at ganyu and xiao, both of them looking at their ice creams as if they were the richest treasure in the world.
at the end, they decided to buy a blue shirt as zhongli’s christmas’ present, and a gold wristwatch, with his black ornaments, as his birthday present. it was adorable to see how dedicated they were to find the perfect gift for their father, debating and arguing to try to find what he would like the most — in the end, you knew zhongli would use his gifts to work, showing his employees how cute and thoughtful his little angels were. 
“this ice cream is so good, mommy.” you smiled, at first, hearing xiao’s words, napkin ready to clean his lips off the almond cream around it — but you stopped dead in your tracks when you noticed how he called you. 
you never wanted to take their biological mother’s place in their lives, though zhongli always said that she never loved them like a mother should — she saw them as a way for him to continue married to her, so she could maintain her lifestyle as a ceo’s wife intact, partying and cheating on him behind his back and leaving his children to be taken care by nannies. once, he admitted to you that his biggest regret was choosing such a woman to be the mother of his children, whispering soon after that what happened to him and her led him to you, and zhongli couldn’t be more grateful. hearing him calling you that, although, filled your heart with warmth and your smile grew wider. 
xiao was more introverted and reserved than ganyu, perhaps because of the so little time he spent with his mother before she and zhongli divorced. you thought he would be the last one to call you that, and you would be alright if he never did — the love you felt for them and the love they felt for you couldn’t be described in just a simple title. 
“you’re getting your mouth all dirty, dummy.” as a good older sister, ganyu scolded him gently, though her mouth was dirty with some of the chocolate toppings of her ice cream. “it isn’t mommy’s job to clean you.” 
you didn’t know if it was influence of her brother or just the mood that made her call you like that too, but you swallowed the lump in your throat. “it is mommy’s job to clean him, baby. it’s mommy’s job to look after the both of you, and nahida, and daddy too.” you tried to explain, napkins ready to clean them both. they giggled and, to any onlooker, you looked like a happy and small family — as you were, though two components of it were missing. 
however, your giggles died down when you spotted familiar curls of light blue hair and a pair of red eyes looking straight at you. 
you could recognize zandik’s eyes anywhere you went — they were sharp and calculating, the emotion shining on them always indecipherable. you used to find them beautiful, especially in the early days of your relationship with him, when they used to shine and sheer adoration, but now they only brought a sour taste to your mouth. but as soon as you noticed his presence there, you returned your eyes to your children, continuing to smile at them. 
“mommy!” before you could say something, you heard your sweet girl’s voice, her small hands waving at you while she was perched comfortably between zhongli’s arms.
“daddy and ‘hida are back, xiao!” ganyu exclaimed, feet already taking her to where her father was standing. you offered your hand to xiao, who took it with more enthusiasm than normal, you two followed his big sister to finally find the two other members of your family. 
though you could still feel your ex-husband’s gaze on your back. 
you sighed relieved when zhongli’s arms embraced your body, burying your face on his neck — his sandalwood scent managed to ease your heart a bit, though you were still waiting for disaster to happen with zandik around. you heard the girls’ giggles and xiao’s little ‘tsk’ at your display of affection, and you could feel your boyfriend’s smile while he kissed your lips. 
“i hope these little rascals didn’t give you any trouble, my dearest.” he spoke, voice deep and soothing, as if he could sense your distress at the moment. you smiled, shaking your head, while ganyu and xiao snuggled themselves in your sides. 
surprisingly, xiao was the first one to speak. “we would never give mommy any trouble, daddy.” you watched as surprise and pure love passed through zhongli’s features, his eyes the warmest you ever saw — it was as if he had dreamed about the day his children would finally acknowledge you as their true mother, despite the blood running through his veins. ganyu nodded and joined her brother’s chorus, nodding. 
“you’re the only one who we give trouble to, daddy!” 
you ruffled their heads. “i hope my little rascal didn’t give you any trouble, my love. i know how curious she can be.” you returned his question to him, hands still caressing xiao’s and ganyu’s hair, winking at your little girl who giggled between zhongli’s arms, that being your favorite sound in the world. she looked so at ease and at her place being nursed and loved by him, as if he was the one supposed to be her father from the very beginning. 
“my fault. she inherited it from her father, i suppose.” 
you didn’t remember his voice being so cold, as if it was the chill of the first snow of the year — it wasn’t fitting no, as your husband hailed from the west, from a place that never snowed. maybe it was the influence of some of his coworkers from the north, but you still remembered when that voice used to be your source of peace and comfort. “zandik.” you greeted him, not bothering to turn around to look at him, more concerned in protecting your children from his venom. they seemed to understand how dangerous he was, clinging to you even more. 
though, the worst part was watching nahida’s expression seeing her father after so long. her eyes were wide, but her lips were trembling and her small hands were clutching zhongli’s shirt with a strength you never saw before. you wanted nothing more than to just take her away from here, but zhongli’s expression told you he was willing to protect her like you would. it hurt you to know that your daughter was aware of the monster her father was, and you felt as if you had failed your mission to protect her childhood innocence. 
he chose to ignore your presence, focusing his attention on zhongli and nahida, as if his ego was hurt by the fact his daughter didn't run straight to his arms. “why a strange man is holding my daughter, y/n?” you turned to face him, instinctively putting ganyu and xiao behind you, hoping to protect them.
“he's my boy—” 
“he's my daddy!” nahida's voice cut you off, leaving everyone speechless. “he's going to marry mommy and not make her cry like you did, papa.” she explained, voice quiet like a feather reaching the ground after failing — though, to you, her words resonated inside your head, for two reasons: she was too young to be worried about someone making you cry. 
and zhongli wanted to marry you. 
zandik answered with a dry chuckle, his eyes shining with the same anger it did back then. “what poison about me did you feed to my daughter, you bitch?” you watched as his hand started to move towards your figure, and you closed your eyes, memories of the day when you confronted him about his cheating played in your head — the screams and the tears, the harsh words and his hands bruising your face. 
though, the impact of his fist in your jaw didn't happen again. 
you opened your arms to see zhongli in front of you, nahida being supported only by one of his arms but looking worried at your shaking form, his other hand holding zandik's arm, fingers squeezing your ex-husband’s wrist — even ganyu and xiao got away from their hiding place, now in front of you, as if they were ready to protect you. 
“do not ever dare to touch my wife like that again, scum, or i will make sure you regret messing with my family again.” zhongli said, voice firm and demanding. “get out of my sight or else nobody in this world will make me stop hunting you for hurting y/n.” 
— 
it pained him to see you like this. 
zhongli could see how strong you tried to look for the children, especially nahida. after the encounter with her father — and his boyfriend now, the same man who zandik had cheated on you with, who was lurking in the shadows until zhongli stepped up — she was visibly shaken up, not leaving your arms until your little family arrived home. in the walls of her safe place, nahida regained her light, and xiao and ganyu seemed relieved, ready to play with his little sister. 
nor you or zhongli touched the subject in front of them, and he was waiting for night time, the only time when he was alone with you in the confines of your shared room, to extract your real feelings. he could see how your smiles didn’t reach your eyes, or how your laugh seemed forced — it seemed like the kids did too, all three of them snuggled in your arms during the movie you were watching, while you were snuggled at his side. he couldn’t ask for anything better than to have the love of his life and his children safe in his arms, though his mind was running miles trying to find a way to make your husband pay for what he made you and nahida go through.
another thing that he wanted to discuss was the little secret nahida spilled. 
he didn’t blame her, of course. zhongli understood it was her way of protecting him and her mother from her father’s words, and he couldn’t be more grateful for her actions — it was a testimony of how well you were raising her, and also a testimony that you both were better without the shadow of zandik looming over you. nahida now had space to grow her opinions and be whatever she wanted, and zhongli was happy that he was able to provide such an environment for her, alongside you. 
the sound of the door opening made him tear his eyes from his book, gentle gaze now focused on your form. you were wearing some pajamas pants and an old t-shirt of his, and he swore you looked the most beautiful you ever did looking like that — perhaps, you in a white dress walking down the aisle to meet him could beat such a sight. he opened his arms and you took no time to just jump between them, face nuzzled on his neck, his warm hands drawing circles on your lower back. you sighed contentedly. “how is she?” he knew you were putting nahida to sleep, being the one who aided you in putting the children in their respective rooms, staying a bit more in her room to make sure she was alright. 
“she’s still a bit shaken up.” you answered, voice muffled by his shirt. zhongli tightened his arms around you, kissing your hair. “i explained to her that zandik will never take her away from us, but she made me promise it at least three times.” your chuckle was a sad one, and he feared you bursting into tears for someone who didn’t deserve it — though, he couldn’t help and feel warm inside by the fact you included him and his children in your family. 
he kept his silence, only humming, knowing you had to say more. “why is he like that? why i couldn’t see how horrible he was from day one?” you seemed defeated, and his blood boiled at the sensation of your tears soaking his shirt. 
zhongli knew very well how you felt. “love normally clouds our senses, dearest.” you took your face from its hiding spot, meeting his amber eyes — gentle and shining with endless love for you, making your heartbeat race just like in the first time you saw them. “but he will never try to approach you or nahida again, do you hear me?” he held your face between his large hands, thumb caressing your cheeks in a loving way. you nodded, giving him a smile that resembled your normal ones. 
“i wish you were nahida’s father from the start, ‘li.” you admitted, a pout on your lips. he pecked them briefly, almost giving you no time to melt into the kiss, kissing your forehead soon after. 
he helped you to get up from his embrace, legs straddling his thighs, while taking a small black velvet box from under your pillow. “if you say yes, i can.” 
you looked between him and the velvet box as if you didn't understand what was happening, but in reality, you couldn't believe it. why zhongli, a man so fine like the most delicious wine, wanted to marry you? a poor excuse of a woman and mother, who still got shaken up with the presence of her ex-husband? you knew he deserved someone so much better than yourself, but you wanted to be that person — but the tears were already glossing your vision and your head came to rest on his chest, his hands holding you close to his body.
you cried like a child, the velvet box between your hands and zhongli's long fingers between your hair. his warmth was almost soothing you, almost whispering that you were made and born to be in that position, between his arms and feeling his love for all eternity. 
your sobs calmed in the same intensity zhongli's love professions became more and more passionately, his words making you see that even if you didn't feel like you were deserving of his love, he felt like you were. and that was enough, you came to realize — zhongli's love was his to give to anyone he deemed worthy of, and he deemed you and your daughter worthy of his endless affections. 
“yes.” you whispered against the pale skin of his neck, now a bit red from the small love bites you gave him after you calmed down. the velvet box was still resting in your hands, and after giving his neck another kiss, you positioned yourself to face him and his amber gaze, eyes already tearing up by the love shining on them. 
zhongli's hands were ready to open it, showing you the most beautiful ring you ever saw in your life — a gold band with a heart shaped diamond in the middle, some emeralds, as the same color as your sweet girl's eyes, around it, making the ring perfect for you. you nodded again, heart racing when he took your hand in his and put the ring on your finger. as soon as you felt the cold band in your warm skin, you cupped his face, bringing his face to meet yours in a passionate kiss.  
“thank you.” zhongli whispered against your lips after he broke the kiss, and you smiled, though not ready for his next words. “thank you for loving me, for choosing this scarred and brute man to be your husband.” you just stroked his face, letting him talk his heart out. “thank you for being the best mother for nahida and now to ganyu and xiao.” his lips soon found your face once again, now caressing your cheek. “i love you.” he whispered with his nose on your cheek, his plump lips pressing a big and sloppy kiss there, his hands now roaming through your body — you knew what he wanted, already grinding your hips against his. 
“you'll make me cry again.” you managed to say between the shaky breaths leaving your mouth due to his wandering hands. “i— ah— love you.”
both of you couldn't wait to be intertwined as one for eternity, expressed by the sounds and movements of your bodies — and the proposal would always be remembered by you as one of your christmas's miracle.
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kooqitas · 3 days ago
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♡ [18+ mdni]!! # loss of virginity, rival to lovers (?).
you weren't surprised when seungcheol brutally threw you onto his bed. i mean, you spent the last few weeks fighting for any stupid reason that appeared. it was obvious that every unfounded hatred had something behind it. he kissed your neck in an uncontrolled way, biting and sucking the sensitive flesh as if he wanted to mark you. you spent most of the makeout in silence, knowing that if you opened your mouths it would only be to tease the other. it was a little pathetic, yes, but it was hot, and seungcheol was hot. fuck, you choked when you saw him take off his shirt, his strong arms completely exposed to you, the silver chain hitting your face. he laughed before grunting and kissing you again, pulling down his pants in a somewhat clumsy way. you just did the same, pulling your dress quickly and getting rid of your panties as soon as you saw him get rid of his underwear. okay, fuck, that was fucking big! you saw seungcheol grab a condom from the drawer, and you avoided thinking about how normal it seemed to him, and then he put it on, going with his glande in your cunt. the sudden act scared you, enough for you to stutter. "c-cheol!" you called him, receiving a look from man. "can you… take it easy? i… i'm a virgin." cheol's mouth opened in a perfect 'o', at that moment he removed his member from inside you, and at the same moment you protested, asking him to go back, just be… calm. "fuck, why didn't you tell me this before?" "you would give up…" "what? of course not, i just…" he shook his head, showing was better than telling. he removed the condom, but didn't get off your body, his hard cock was now touching your groin, while he sucked on the tip of your tits, the light bites on the hard nipple making you moan a little louder than expected, seungcheol lifted his head sometimes just to see you with your eyes closed while moaning, he went down kissing your belly, the wet kisses making your skin tingle. and seungcheol always checked on you, letting out a few laughs when their eyes met. "open" he said kissing your thigh, and you trembled, obeying. fuck, you'd never felt anything like that, the way his tongue went through every part of your cunt, the way he seemed to want to devour you. your moans and contortions becoming greater as he inserted one finger, and then another, and another... he kept 3 fingers inside you, and you clung against the sheets, wetting his hand. "cheol~" you groaned, as a request. and he laughed. you rolled your eyes. but the next second he took another condom, opened a tube of lubricant and poured it into it, there was not so much need, you were lubricated and the condom already had some lube, but he was worried. and then he entered, slowly, feeling you relax on his cock. 'so hot!' he moaned in your ear as he started to thrust, you couldn't even think. "you look so much prettier like this, under me, moaning" cheol was slow in his movements, yet precise, and you thought you were gonna die when his thumb went to your clit, making a pressure there that made you cum. "hold on a little, please" he basically begged, waiting for your nod to re-thrust, shit, you were so sensitive after cumming, your sly moans were making him crazy. he squeezed your left nipple and the loud moan you gave made cheol cum in the condom...
''damn... that was... fuck" he said, lying on your side after removing the condom. "who knew our academic rivalry would end... like this" you teased. "i was able to cum inside you then... i kind of won this game like hell," he laughs. "you only say that because you took my virginity, in fact, if you tell someone that, i'll kill you" "tell someone? damn, never! you're mine, i'll never tell anyone what happened here." "i am what?" "that's right. shhhhhh." he kissed you before you could say anything. "you need to pee" you stared at him confused. "something about needing to pee after sex, don't ask me, i don't know very well either, i saw it on tiktok" you laughed, getting up and going to pee, even if you didn't feel like it. when you went back to bed, you ended up in a silent agreement to sleep there, and that's how you fell asleep nestled in seungcheol's arms.
and that's also how you ended up having your first morning sex.
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moonlight-prose · 4 months ago
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This is just a food for thought thing bc I have no where to really share this. I (ofc) do the self insert/day dream thing with Logan, and yeah like most fan fics I tend to put others first and TRY to be kind. But I'm also very stubborn and protective. And I know MY ass would get all defensive and "I'll beat the shit out of you for insulting him" about Logan (even if he's taller and stronger), but I never would about myself. So imagine tiny lil s/o reader being held effortlessly by Logan when they get mad at how someone for how they treated him
this concept actually has me swooning as someone with my father's temper. i would go down bloody and bruised in a fight for logan's reputation, but he wouldn't LET ME.
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He's laughing. You've got vitriol on your tongue, rage fueling your actions, and blood spread across your knuckles and he's fucking laughing. You aren't sure what's worse. The words the man - now stumbling away from the bar - spewed, or the fact that Logan has his arm clamped around your waist - a grin curved around the lit cigar he's been puffing.
"You about done bub?" he chuckles, hand yanking at your hip to turn you into his body.
The glare you give should send him six feet under, but the pride on his face kills your rage quicker than you would have liked.
Whatever argument transpired was petty. You knew this. Logan knew this. He just never expected you to throw your drink in the drunk's face. Proceeding to nearly break his nose by slamming his face into the bar-top.
"He called you a piece of shit," you growl - feral and untamable to others. Cute and his little spitfire to him.
Logan shrugs. "Been called that before."
"Not with me around."
"And what were you gonna do about it huh? His face is bleeding. I think ya made your point."
Anger trickles down into the petulant grim expression you wear like a mask. It's sobering to know that you'd be laid out flat on the filthy floor of the bar if you kept that fight up. If Logan hadn't yanked you away from the man, curses flying out of your mouth quicker than Wade's jokes.
His hand is warm against your cheek, the amusement clear in his expression. "He can call me a piece of shit boyfriend all he wants. I'm fine with that. You know why?"
The pout isn't cute - you know that - but the sight of it makes his grin deepen. His hazel eyes sporting a shine of awe he only wore for you.
"Why?"
"Cause I have you. And he doesn't."
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pumpkinfyre · 4 months ago
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The Realms Pearl
note: just a ramble on how I think the yandere! hotd cast would be with a darling who is daeron's twin sister ♡
warnings: yandere content, platonic and romantic relationships, darling is religious like her mommy, incest mentioned, aegon and helaena have the hots for their sister, lol, this is based on my oc daenys but is a reader insert for inclusiveness, spoilers for s2
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Viserys and Alicent are very similar in the way they treat her. In the books, we know that Viserys was very close with both of his daughters. He was a girl dad! He adores his youngest daughter, and she often reminds him of how Rhaenyra was when she was a child. He spends long hours in (Name)'s company, letting her read to him as he fiddles with his duplicate of Old Valyria. Once he gets much sicker, close to his death, she'll remain by her father's bedside, speaking of old stories.
Alicent, on the other hand, is fiercely protective of her youngest daughter. She adores both Helaena and (Name), so she keeps them both close to her. Daeron is sent away to Oldtown at a very young age, but Alicent chooses to keep her daughter in Kings Landing. Having her sweet girl sent away would destroy Alicent. As the youngest of her children, (Name) is kept safely away and rarely makes public appearances in court. It's her parents' way of making sure that she isn't corrupted by the politics of Kings Landing.
Her two older brothers, Aegon and Aemond, are tasked with keeping an eye on her when Alicent has things to attend to. Aegon is the more fun brother, always helping his little sister to sneak in the kitchens to steal a piece of cake. He's especially funny, never failing to make (Name) laugh. As they all grow older and mature, Aegon becomes very dependent on his sister. His relationship with their mother is strained, and after being married to Helaena, he feels isolated and odd. Aegon turns to his youngest sister for comfort and companionship. His feelings for her perhaps go deeper than a sibling bond, but it never goes farther than that. Aemond is similar, but he's more of a stick-in-the-mud. He's less inclined to give in to games, like his elder brother. He absolutely adores his baby sister, of course, but he focuses more on her protection than her happiness. Once the Dance begins, she's locked in the Keep and not allowed to mount her dragon, Grey Ghost. Aemond takes on the role as her protector, and in doing so, he is less kind.
Helaena is the closest with her sister. Helaena is the second oldest of Alicent’s children, and as such, (Name) often goes to her older sister for advice. Once the twins are born, (Name) spends even more time with Helaena, as she absolutely adores her niece and nephew. Jaehaerys and Jaehaera are always with her if they're not with their mother. Helaena loves her sister. I think her feelings would be similar to those of Daemon and how he felt about Viserys. Helaena sometimes wishes that she were born a man, so their mother would allow she and (Name) to marry each other. Helaena daydreams about living a quiet and peaceful life with (Name), and even after the death of Jaehaerys, she keeps her sister very close, fearing that someone will kill her darling.
(Name)'s twin brother, Daeron, sends her letters from Oldtown on a constant basis. While they were separated when they were very young, she sometimes travels to Oldtown on Grey Ghost to visit her brother and uncle Gwayne. The letters often consist of how Tessarion is growing and how he wishes they could be together. Gwayne tries to convince Alicent to let his niece stay in Oldtown for the benefit of Daeron. Gwayne and Daeron plan to move (Name) to their home once the war is over.
Kings Landing obviously isn't safe!
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this is such a ramble, but my mind is reeling from s2
who else is super excited for daeron and tessarion ♡♡♡
masterlist ᡣ𐭩
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juniperdugong · 5 months ago
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Relationship Quirks 97s ver.
Aka habits I can see the boys doing in a relationship || 95s || 96s || 97s || Maknae line ||
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The8 Wears your favorite color
Now this one is truly an unconscious thing that Hao does. You mention your favorite color one day during a random conversation and he doesn't do much with it... until the color starts becoming more eye-catching.
Suddenly more and more of his wardrobe is taken over by your favorite color; Not in a way that cramps his personal style but in a way that adds to it, of course. And even when he isn't wearing clothing that's your favorite color then his nails will definitely have sort of accent in or completely be (insert fav color here).
It's funny because he vehemently refuses to believe that's what's happening. If anyone, especially you, brings up how often he wears that color then he will scoff; Something about "no one being able to shake his personal preferences" or something like that.
"Been liking purple a lot lately, huh?" "No, I haven't." "But your nails are purple, your beanie is purple, and your cardi-" "Maybe, It just fits with my current style???" *Rolls his eyes and then buys a belt he's been "eyeing for ages"... just so happens to be purple*
DK Brings you up in every conversation
This sweet summer child~! (He's older than me) You would never in the world have to be jealous when with this man. Because chances are if he's talking to someone and it looks like anything interesting is happening AT ALL he's probably talking about you. Honestly, his dedication to talking about you might make people think he's obsessed (...he is) Maybe people would be even more interested in him because of that though... Call me crazy but dedication is sexy!
Either way, you're the only person in his sight and he swears it up and down. Doesn't leave any room for doubt either! The boys and your mutual friends are constantly telling you how appalled they are at how sweetly Kyeom talks about you when you aren't there. You're at the forefront of most of his conversation when you're with him, you can't imagine it being worse when you aren't around, but apparently, you are DEAD WRONG.
Seeing a pair of shoes can turn into a rant about what pairs of shoes you like. Ice cream flavors remind him of the time that you got ice cream for him when he was feeling sad and he just has to tell the guys about it. A talk with his manager about his recent health suddenly takes a turn and now he's sobbing talking about how much you take care of him. It's all you you you~
Mingyu Has to hold your hand
So we all know that Gyu is the biggest cuddler of all time, there's no doubt that he isn't clinging to your side when you're around. But hand-holding is different, Gyu can stand to not be hugging you 24/7... as long as you're holding his hand.
Claims that it feels like he's missing a piece of himself when he lets go, and also claims that you practically disappear if you aren't holding his hand, endless sulking. (Dramatic ass) And why can I vividly see him holding YOUR hand while clinging to the members??? Like he'll be swaying your arms back and forth while LITERALLY HOLDING WONWOO BY THE WAIST & BACKHUGGING HIM!!! Then has the audacity to be offended when you let go.
Also, has to hold your hand to sleep. He would love to cuddle! And he often does!... For like 10mins before this human space-heater gets too sweaty and has to move to the opposite side of the bed. Holding your hand in his sleep is a good compromise though, of course until you're letting go to use the restroom. (Deffo the type to follow you to pee, sits on the sink too)
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A/N: I ain't even gonna lie... all of these headcanons could have been turned into full fics. I went insane imagining these habits, the 97s have been killing it in terms of looks and popularity lately. On a real note though, FUCK PLEDIS! PROTECT THE BOYS! Still so fucking pissed about what they let happen to Mingyu and TWS. Calming down... Comments and Reblogs are like super fuel for my writing and are much-appreciated lovelies!
TAGLIST (open): @bemybabiibish @bath1lda
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silent-sanctum · 30 days ago
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"Jotaro Kujo is Weak at His Core"
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As a writer and avid character psycho-analyzer, I find this concept fascinating because I wholeheartedly agree with what OP has quoted from a "What opinion would get the community to do this? *Insert Johnny getting torn apart*" post.
Before I begin, I know some people will see this, misread it, and immediately say "lmao did we watch the same show? He's strong, badass, and can kick anyone's ass. Like do you know Star Platinum bro?". Trust me, I've seen the replies to this post and they said this same exact thing.
And I'm here to say that to said people, if you truly are not the illiterates I'd like to term you as, you'd take the time to realize that when we say "he's weak", we're not referring to his physical prowess because we know he's one of the strongest characters in the show.
If you don't like to, then you're just proving the accuracy of the last sentence: "You can't stand seeing your edgy badass image of Jotaro as vulnerable."
Pushing that aside, I'd like to expand on OP's opinion/headcanon with some depth to it and explain how exactly he's "weak" outside of being a skilled and strategic fighter.
I've learned that to be holistically healthy, one needs to develop and maintain all optimal functions of oneself: Physical, Emotional, Social, and Mental.
Obviously, Jotaro excels in the physical category. He's conventionally attractive, taller than the average male population, well-defined with a muscled build, fit as hell, street and book smart, and highly in tune with his environment making him adaptable in any circumstance.
He's "strong" in that aspect we all know at a superficial level.
However, we start to see the core problem once we strip this good-hearted man of his physical appeal:
Emotional? He believes he doesn't need to express them to others because why should he. He refuses to process them and instead keeps them behind a locked wall of stoicism and aloofness.
Social? Can't communicate to save his life. He's reclusive and doesn't know how to socialize outside of work. Guarded and skeptical around others. Too much of a workaholic to bother making new acquaintances (if he even knows how) outside of familial connections.
Mental? At 17, he went on a death crusade over Asia and the Middle East, almost died numerous times, and most likely lived with unresolved PTSD that carried over into adulthood, and further deteriorated his already poor social and emotional skills.
What do we have then? If we look past that powerful exterior of a man, we have inappropriate emotional expression, poor socialization, and constant fatigue of dealing with bullshit that relates to his trauma.
And this is what we mean by his "core": His mindset. His inner machinations. The soft spot his enemies would need to target in order to defeat or kill him, strategy-wise.
I. Emotional
We pretty much already know how this man handles emotions. And this may come off as "irrelevant" to the dudebros and the meme riders who believe "haha feelings are for pussies, I advocate for edgy autistic Florida man who don't give a fuck, elopes with dolphins, and berates women".
But believe it or not, he has them, just like any other human being on the planet. I said it once and I'll say it again: Not everyone will wear their heart on their sleeves. Some will convey emotions publicly with no issue, while others would prefer to keep to themselves.
But how does this contribute to him being "weak" at his core?
Essentially, it's similar to how someone with depression may behave (not everyone, some of them). One may appear friendly, sunny, and bubbly to everyone around them, not knowing they're actually suffering from a void that eats them up from the inside when alone.
For his case, it may look like he doesn't care about what happens to him and everyone around him, considering his nonchalant and aloof behavior, but beneath that cold exterior, he cares way too much for his family, friends, and allies. He feels too much to the point where once his allies are endangered, he would sacrifice his well-being without a second thought.
And that's an issue to him.
To him, emotions make him vulnerable and in his circumstance where enemies are actively hunting him down trying to find his weak spots, his emotions should be kept behind doors because he doesn't know how to regulate it on the outside so it's either total stoicism or lashing out.
I found someone saying this line about him that fits him so well: "He's a good person who doesn't know how to be a good person."
This is a man who means well and truly wants to help out of the goodness of his heart, but because of his inability to convey his emotions properly and is unable to pick up emotional cues, it can lead to shit tons of misunderstandings due to inappropriate tone & expression, and that can change how someone views him in the long run, thus leading to unintended deterioration of personal relationships (which contribute to the social aspect of his weakness).
I found a visual representation of what I just said above. Just to give context: The show is about a married couple who struggles to keep their relationship afloat, having to navigate through family politics, work & life balance, and miscommunications so they could find why they loved each other in the first place.
The emotionally-reserved character here with the poor communication skills is the girl. She's a CEO who just received a call, came out from work, and meets with her husband, asking him to accompany her to a doctor's appointment.
Observe how she thinks she views herself VS how others actually view her as.
Other's POV: Demanding, brash, and insensitive Her POV: Anxious, hesitant, and confused
Now remember what Araki had written about Jotaro? "He doesn't believe he must reveal his emotions to others because he thinks everyone can figure him out, leading him to be a victim of misunderstandings. Others think him to be cold-hearted, rebellious, and insensitive."
II. Social
With emotions as our base foundation to poor communication skills, this leads us to his weak socialization aspect.
In a recent quote reblog about how he was raised as a child may have contributed to his tough persona, I mentioned something about his need of "Security".
Growing up, it was mostly just him and his sweet pacifist mother Holly. Joseph couldn't have visited often (he hates Japan) and his dad is a busy musician with a packed schedule on tour. As a kid up to early adolescence, he was coddled by his mother and raised as a good student. Everything was going great for him.
[In popular headcanon] Once he passed puberty, the change to his Part 3 MC era began. People began picking fights with him and bullying him, and he began to see the world as a threat to his safety. Knowing his mother, he wouldn't rely on her to defend him against these dangers. She was too kind, too friendly, too loving for her to deal with the harsh life he now has to deal with.
So he had to be the stronger one for both of them. He already had the physical attributes for it, so why not use it to his advantage?
He got on the popular delinquent trend back in 80's Japan, integrated a couple of cool masculine-esque personalities as his own from his favorite Western and Crime media, and is then able to project this menacing aura everyone should be afraid of, to ward potential threats away from him and his mother.
But Mijin, how does this make him weak? What does this have to do with his need for security?
Think about it: The poor guy's already introverted, doesn't feel comfortable with his emotions that he can't express properly, and now he has to be skeptical with people around him because he realized how shitty society can be, which leads to intimidation that wards off not only potential foes but potential friends as well, making it look like he's anti-social.
On the outside, people are likely to think that he likes being this way when in reality, he seeks a reliable support system on which he can lean onto. Everyone with a sound mind wants that subconsciously because we are social creatures. It's part of our nature.
He's constantly fearful of his surroundings, growing even more vigilant as he ages, but he doesn't look afraid because he chooses to put on a brave face to challenge said fears instead of acknowledging he's scared. I read somewhere in an ask that's not mine that in the manga, some panels actually depict Jotaro shaking/trembling in a mix of fear and adrenaline during some of his fights.
He wants to be around people who he can trust. People who he can lower his defenses with. People who are capable of protecting him just as he is capable of protecting them. People who can face his intimidating aura and challenge it to stand on equal grounds with him or to remind him of his place when he goes too far with certain things. Hence, why he seems comfortable being with the Crusaders.
For once, he wants to feel safe.
To not feel like he has to be this strong pillar of hope that everyone depends on.
To be someone being protected, instead of the other way around where he was always the strong protector. He wants a life of normalcy where he can just be a marine biologist and a professor with a loving family he can come home to.
But that can't happen. The inner circle of friends he counted on is either dead or far away, leaving him even more fearful of the world around him. This results in even more guarded skepticism, always watchful of who's an enemy Stand user and what their Stand could do. Because of his cautious nature, this leads to minimized socialization with others.
With little to no solid support system he can count on, he has no one he feels completely secure with because he believes danger will always come to hurt and/or kill those near him. He doesn't want to burden others with the issues & responsibilities of dealing with Stand users. He wants them to live the normal life he could no longer have.
He doesn't trust in the capabilities of his loved ones when it comes to defending themselves against the amount of potential threats and dangers he has faced, and yet he cares about them dearly. So, he commits to what seems to be the most practical solution in his mind: Self-Isolation.
To be a distant beacon where danger is attracted to and away from those dear to him.
(As we see in the beginning of Part 3 where he willingly locks himself in jail as soon as he sees himself as the threat, and in Part 6 where he stays away from his family once he realizes his enemies were targeting him).
"Your family is your weakness."
All this leads him to become what Araki always envisioned him to be: A lone hero.
III. Mental
Now onto the last part, this part of the essay will focus more on the popular headcanon the community has made about him: "Jotaro has PTSD."
Considering what he's been through at only 17, it would be no surprise that he'd acquired major trauma after those 50 days. Think about it- he gets injured more times than he can count, almost dies numerous times, sees his grandfather get "killed" in front of him, and all this combined with the constant reminder that his mother's life is also on a time limit. A failure to kill DIO meant a failure to save Holly.
The amount of pressure and risk he had to endure for her (and there will still be people who adamantly believe that he hated Holly because he said "bitch" to her twice in the first two episodes).
Now, remember when I said about him having this mentality of over-independence when dealing with stressors? It was still manageable during Stardust Crusaders, but because of what had transpired in Cairo, that mindset carries on to the rest of his adulthood, more so if we consider that he most likely didn't get any therapy or treatment for his trauma.
It might be normal for a teenager to hold onto this stubborn notion of "I can do this by myself" and be casual about it, but with trauma now involved, that notion warps into a persisting belief of "by doing this myself, no one else will get hurt" (i.e. refusing help, doing solo fieldwork, self-isolation).
But Mijin, you keep saying "mentality" this, "mindset" that. What are you talking about?
There's an old Tumblr post I found that talks specifically about this in great detail, but to put it shortly: Jotaro has always wanted to do things by himself because he believes that not only will the task be done with, there would be no one else involved with it, making it better for him to cope mentally if ever shit hits the fan (tying back to poor emotional expression and insecurity in bonds).
If any injuries were to be inflicted, he would be the one to receive them, and he alone, because who knows how he'll react and/or cope when his allies are harmed instead of him over and over again? (refer to the trauma of Jotaro surviving Cairo while the majority of the team that went with him died a.k.a "survivor's guilt")
(Also, refer to how he had exhibited great distress when Jolyne was about to be struck by a rain of knives that Pucci sent)
This might also be the reason why he's more self-sacrificial as an adult: Will be the bait during the rat episode instead of Josuke, takes the brunt of Sheer Heart Attack's explosion to spare Koichi, dives straight onto a path of bullets to save Jolyne, etc.
The only possible solution so he could snap out of that belief he holds on to is that strong, reliable support system he internally needs. People who can help him without sustaining fatal injuries in the process [social]. People who he can approach to release any pent-up frustrations and inner conflicts [emotional].
If he had found those people, then he might have been able to deal and/or cope with his trauma better instead of letting it linger and change his outlook in life [mental].
But we all know how his life went in canon. One moment he's a kid playing ball with his mother, then in his last, he dies by having his head bisected by a time-altering Stand.
Jotaro is a person with a gold heart and a rough exterior. Someone who wants to help and protect his loved ones from the unpredictability of the world the best that he can. But even then, his best wasn't enough. His fear was masked with an air of strength and capability, perhaps as compensation for everything else he lacked:
Adequate processing of emotions.
Stable connection with familial, platonic, and romantic bonds.
A sound mindset that stems from effective coping for his PTSD.
We could only hope in headcanon land that he had a better chance at life in the Ireneverse where he finally could develop his inner core better and get that long-deserved break he had always wanted.
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oceantornadoo · 8 days ago
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lavender haze (price x f!reader, explicit use of weed/smoking mention)
it was the happiest day of your life. john was on one knee, smiling and holding a ring box up to you. your smile was too big for your face. as you reached forward for him, the ground shook, causing you to look up. that wasn’t right - you were in a hellscape. the air clogged your lungs, buildings were burning and screams rang out. the cries of innocents permeated the air. john was still on his knee, smiling. a popping sound surrounded you, then he wasn’t smiling anymore. the ring lay in a pool of blood as your captain’s eyes glazed over…
“wake up, lieutenant.”
you couldn’t stop looking into john’s eyes. and where was his hat? he never went to battle without it.
“c’mon, you need to wake up.”
you could hear them coming for you. the same footsteps that killed john. they were right behind you and-
“baby please, wake up.”
you woke up with a gasp, the room pitch black around you. a lamp flicked on, casting the motel room in an eerie glow, illuminating the man next to you. your captain, decidedly and platonically just that, was a bit flustered, his hand on your back to track your breathing. “y’ were having’ a nightmare.” you nodded, sucking in greedy amounts of air into your lungs as you calmed down your body. it was routine now, waking up in the middle of the night and walking yourself off the ledge of a panic attack. unfortunately, this time had to be when you shared a bed with your captain. platonically. for the mission.
“i find a smoke helps when i can’t sleep.” he’s still here, rubbing your back in small circles. your heart jumps and you kill it with a reminder of how he fist bumps and shoulder taps the men on your team. it means nothing, he’s just being a good captain. “don’t have anything on me.” your voice is gravel, hoarse from the phantom screams in your dreams. “‘s ok. i could use a smoke too.” he drops his hand, moving to get out of the rickety mattress this establishment calls a bed. you avert your eyes at the sight of him in a casual t-shirt and boxers, willing your overactive imagination to go away. the imagination that thinks about how he’d look after a one-night stand or a casual lie-in with his lover. the one that inserts you into the fantasy.
“c’mere.” the room has a small balcony, barely enough room for two, but he gestures to you anyways as he unlocks the door. there is something in his hand, but your sleepy brain tells you it’s too small to be a cigar. odd. when you walk outside, you’re immediately met with the edge of the balcony. it’s truly standing room only. a glance to your left reveals your captain looking for threats in the night sky, finally satisfied when his shoulders drop an inch. he takes out a lighter, something with the image of a santa claus that you can imagine gaz gave him as part of his old man jokes. john raises something to his mouth. the smell is odd, not that of his regular cigars, and it takes you a second to process as you wrack your brain. “is that…weed?” he exhales in a partial laugh, restraining a cough since you ruined his proper exhale. “surprised, lieutenant?” you scoff, reaching for the joint. his fingers brush yours, the joint really too long for that to be necessary, calluses on calluses setting your body aflame. you take a hit, trying to remember how to inhale correctly as it’s been a while since you’ve smoked weed on a balcony with someone. not to mention, your captain. “big inhale, lieutenant. not just a mouth breath.” you hum as you exhale, satisfied you’re able to follow his instructions. “good girl.” he is too, apparently. you shake off any underlying message.
“can’t believe my captain smokes weed.” he takes the joint back wordlessly, fingers brushing yours again. “rarely. jus’ for nightmare occasions. never on a mission.” funny, since you're both waiting for exfil the next morning. a bit closer to a mission than you imagined he usually did. “technically, we’re still on a mission.” you were on your third hit now, time going fast when it was just you and john on this lonely balcony. “necessary exception. can’t have my best lieutenant runnin’ on an empty tank.”
you bit back a smile at his compliment. “i won’t tell ghost if you won’t.” john rewarded you with a chuckle, a deep belly laugh you’d only heard once or twice. so this is what he was like high - a man who allowed himself to have fun. you could work with that. “won’t matter. y’ve got him wrapped ‘round your finger.” a jilted gasp escaped you as you refrained from stomping your feet. “no way! if anything it’s soap since ghost calls him johnny. i couldn't get away with half of the things soap does.” the joint was almost finished and you hadn’t even realized. he offered you one last hit before putting it out on the railing. disappointment sank heavy in your stomach, a feeling that the moment was almost gone.
your captain turned to you, a string pulling you closer until you were standing under him. his eyes were red, smile lines fresh. “you look good. sorry, relaxed. i see why you smoke now.” you murmured. his hand reached out into the space between you, then dropped back down. weird for him of all people to make an uncertain move. “think soap is to ghost what you are t’ me.” this had to be a cruel trick the universe was playing on you. “you mean you’re wrapped around my finger?” he nodded slow, the weed sinking its claws into him. “you’re just high, captain.” he frowned unexpectedly. “‘s john.” oh. oh. you nodded silently. the next steps were fuzzy, a dance you’d never learned.
“what was your nightmare about?” that was not what you thought he would ask. “um. the usual. the battlefield and dying and…yeah.” this time, his hand had a direction. it raised to your hairline, tracing the skin gently as his thumb led the way down to the curve of your ear. he felt that too, seemingly enamored with the softness of your earlobe before dropping his hand completely, like it never happened.
“you said my name, before you woke up. screamed it, practically gave me a heart attack.” his eyes were questioning, burning into yours like an interrogation. “oh. yeah, it was, um. youwereinmydreamandyoudied.” you practically spit the last part out, turning your head to study the skyline instead of finding whatever was on his face. unexpectedly, the weed made you both talkative and shy, a combination you didn’t expect. maybe it was sativa. “what happened before i died?” it was like he knew what happened, even though there was no way. right? you couldn’t resist a sideways glance, tracking the open earnestness of his face. “you were…proposing.” the last word was a whisper. “which is crazy, obviously. just a stupid dream.” you cut in before he could open his mouth. there was that frown again, one he rarely directed towards you. before tonight, that was.
“like this?” there was a yearning in his voice and when you blinked, he was on one knee. somber, not smiling like in your dream. he was realer, a wrinkle here and a gray hair there. your feet took you closer until his view was your thighs. that’s when you remembered you’d gone to bed in only a t-shirt and underwear, not having packed for an extra night in a motel. the triangle of your panties peeked out from your shirt and embarrassment creeped up your skin.
“i’m sorry, this is inappropriate. i shouldn’t be dressed like this, i'm sorry, captain.” his gaze hadn’t moved. “john.” a low exhale escaped him, like you saying his name had lifted a weight from him. unlikely, but a nice visual.
“‘ve never heard you say my name.” he was still on his knees, but he moved his head until he made eye contact. “guess i never had a reason.” he tilted his head to the side. “what’s your reason now?” you were scrambling off the edge of something you couldn’t see. you didn’t know this game you were playing. “you- you told me to.” he nodded, raising back to his full height off his knee. for some reason, you were disappointed. “you’d do anything i ask you?” it was the weed, surely, that made you nod vigorously. “get on the bed, then.”
you got on the bed. could feel him vibrating behind you as you walked towards it. turning, you sat on the very edge, legs tightly pressed together. “you’re high.” he shook his head. “barely. bein’ high doesn’t make me lie, sweetheart. quite the opposite, in fact.” you had no mental energy to get into the word sweetheart. it had already warmed your belly and turned you inside out.
“i’m high.” he said nothing. “barely.” you added with a whisper. “out of excuses yet?” you spread your legs instead of answering, letting him step in between them. he bent down slowly, turning your chin to him like you were something precious, something to take his time with. the kiss was slow, both of you tasting bitter because of the weed, and it was magical. you wrapped your legs behind him until he got the message, pushing you down. he grinded into you, hard and wanting.
“i’d propose to you now, y’know. jus’ don’t carry the ring with me on missions.” it took a second for the message to get through, especially since his lips moved to your neck, biting and sucking. “there’s a, fuck john, there’s a ring?” he was leaving hickies, surely. the weed had turned him into a teenager, and you giggled at the thought. he misinterpreted your laugh, pulling back until his eyes met yours.
“you got a problem with a ring?” you whined at the loss of him on you. “no. no. c’mere.” he leaned down for a kiss and you flipped the both of you over, straddling him with ease. his hands landed on your ass, pushing you closer until you could feel his hardness. he was such a possessive kisser, biting you when you drew back for a millisecond. his scruff scratched you pleasantly and you hummed like a cat in the sun. his neck felt so delicious under your fingers and you decided to explore it, small kisses and kitten licks until he was growling.
“you wet f’ me, baby?” his tone unlocked a memory. “you called me baby earlier. when i was sleeping.” john didn’t give you an answer, staring at you expressionless. “and?” it sent you sputtering. “you can’t call women baby when they’re asleep.” there was that frown again. “‘m not callin’ women baby. ‘m callin’ you baby. because you’re mine. got a problem with that?” you shut him up with a kiss. he was infuriating.
the wetness between your thighs was concerning. your hips were grinding of their own accord, the feeling of his clothed cock between your folds addicting. the weed supplied you with confidence, fingers reaching down to move your panties to the side. he let out a groan at the feel of your bare cunt against his boxers, soaking them through.
“not fuckin’ you like this, baby. not here.” you nodded against his skin, tongue darting out to lick at the beads of sweat that hard formed. “still want to come, though.” if weed made him laugh like this, you were determined to get him high every day. his hands tightened on your hips, pulling you harder and faster against him. the angle was perfect, the contours of his body catching your clit with every grind. his eyes were open, tracking your every movement.
“john,” and he understood you completely, catching your mouth with his lips again. he tasted like yours. pressure coiled in your stomach at the thought. john was yours. “captain,” you groaned against his lips, reveling in the strained sound he let out. “gonna make me come before you do, sweetheart.” his mouth left yours, instead biting your breast over your shirt. it was too much: the sweat, the grinding, the bites he delivered with vigor. he pushed you down harder, the motion brushing your clit and sending you over the edge.
“fuck, baby.” it sounded like you both said it at the feeling of his cock leaking cum beneath his boxers, the fabric soaked both ways. time stopped as you both looked down, taking a second to take in the sight. it was absolutely carnal, the grinding without fucking. a claiming.
“‘m tired.” you whispered. neither of you had a change of clothes so you both stripped them off, reveling in the sight of your naked bodies together. he pulled you into him, tucking you under his chin as you wrapped yourself in his body heat. so strong, so capable. your hands traced his chest, tangling in his body hair, until sleep overtook you. finally, a nightmare-free sleep.
--
i have no idea what made me write this since i haven't smoked in like over a year. if my depictions of being high are inaccurate, welp. also yes i headcanon price as a smoker but very occasionally just when he's stressed
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allpiesforourown · 18 days ago
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every time you drop a jiuyuan post i get so excited because you get it.
i need shen jiu to be strange and obsessive about shen yuan at all times. bro can’t have a normal bone in his body when it comes to the only man in the world who is gonna coddle him but also hold him responsible in the most respectful loving way. and there’s just so many good flavors for jiuyuan… shizun! sj + disciple! sy or vice versa, both disciples, both shizuns, etc. all very scrumptious.
all this to say i really liked how you wrote them in the binghe self insert fic even if it wasn’t fully jiuyuan. your horny posting and aus and writing fill me with joy.
god bless.... thats exactly why i love jiuyuan because tbh shen yuan is one of the only people who doesnt have an extreme love or hate relationship with shen jiu and actually treats him like he'd treat any other person
Some people let sj do whatever he wanted with no consequences, which enabled him to be worse. whereas on the other end of the spectrum, those who didn't hesitate to curse him out/hurt him also pushed him into being more spiteful and angry. either way he only ended up more miserable. shen yuan is basically one of the only characters who goes "I understand shen jiu's actions, but they are still unforgivable" and i think it would drive sj insane. can you imagine
shen yuan: that was wrong of you to do
shen jiu: either kill me or shut up!!
shen yuan: ??? Why would I hurt you?? look, I understand why you did it, but that doesn't make it okay. I expect you to apologize, but i still care about you
shen jiu being treated like an actual person for the first time ever: h..huh..? I don't get it. how can you feel any way about me other than grovelling for my approval or wanting to abuse me
He would get hit with the "i'm disappointed, but I still believe in you and when you make it right, I will be here to tell you I'm proud of you." Shen Jiu would have no idea how to act. the mommy wife beam would ruin him.
also I like to believe shen jiu would act like he hates shen yuan but still be extremely defensive about him like
shen jiu: how dare he tell me what to do. apologize? me? who does he think he is, my mother?
someone: yeah he sucks-
shen jiu grabbing xiu ya: YOU TAKE THAT BACK RIGHT NOW.
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naoyoki · 4 days ago
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can we get reader who ran away from home and is living on the streets and then toji stumbles into her after he got some stuff from the 7/11 and feels bad so he offers her to stay at his rundown apartment for a bit (can you add in some smut perhaps 🤭)
a/n : of course belleza !
✦★mdni , some angst , smut , afab!reader , loss of virginity implied , face fucking , cunnillingus , thigh biting , marking , fingering , oral , implied curse au .
PINNED PREVIOUSLY
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"i don't have a home," your gaze was low, afflicted with guttural shame that twisted and churned at your stomach, or maybe it was the hunger, "not anymore, at least."
the man in front of you, frankly, made you pee your pants out of complete fear. yes, this man might be handsome, but he was menacing nonetheless. there were moments you had crossed paths, and the neon light of the 7/11 proved his features to be eerie. not his actions though, he wasn't around much but whenever he did he placed some food in front of you, and left without a word. but for whatever reason, he stayed today and began to...chat?
"haven't you asked for a job at the convinient store?"
you scoff, "don't you think i have already tried?" taking a fat chunk of the sandwich this bizarre man gave you, you continued, "they think i'm a junkie or something."
he crouched to your level, green eyes merging with your own, "you don't look like one though."
you laugh, even though it was muffled due to your full mouth, "because i'm not."
"want a job?"
you stop, ".....what—mmmgh, what kind of job?" you were homeless and poor, but your dignity and integrity was yet to be mangled. and if you had to run for your life in a few seconds because this guy turned out to be a psychopath, so be it.
"i need someone to clean my house, since i'm not home a lot. you up for it?" you exhaled your worries away. thank god it wasn't something fucked up! but hold on.
"you're...not gonna kill me, are you?" your words make him drop his head while he chuckles.
"not wasting my time with murder, c'mon." he extended his hand once he rose from the ground. your hand twitches in hesitance but nonetheless accept this kindness.
it took some months to adjust to toji's rhythm. he would come to his apartment, which wasn't anything pretty but livable nonetheless, spend three or four days around, then leave for weeks. his actions were completely shady in nature.
but with these months flying by, your relationship deepened. one summer night, when fireworks ignited the sky, you two had a heart to heart. conversations of sorrow, grief, and longing for life to be different turned into a hug and tear wiping, and this turned into you relinquishing to the desperation of closeness.
it was an unfamiliar yet thoroughly welcomed feeling of toji's tongue dancing on your cunt. you grabbed onto the strands of his dark hair as he split your folds open to insert his muscle. it was like a starved man tasting a five star meal for the first time, liking, teasing and nibbling on your skin.
"fuck you're so good, fuck keep going~" your hips moved at the compass of his rhythm. you jolt once you feel a finger penetrate you out of nowhere.
"shit! toji, what are you—oh~!"
"loosening you up." he said in-between kisses through your thighs. delight filled your heart by the blatant desire, of which has never known itself to you.
the tears you shed were due to a mix of emotions. pain, pleasure, comfort and happiness. quite the strange combo, but getting the embrace you have only dared to dream of. and you believe this feeling was mutual as toji held onto you delicately.
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iguana-braces · 21 days ago
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That sub!Jayce post really popped off, huh?
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Ehehe okay here's my rambly thoughts about it (I'm literally sitting at work clocked out writing this instead of going home because THOUGHTS)
Building my theory off of this post:
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And this one with all the examples of how Jayce's love language is clearly physical touch
*Disclaimer: there's a lot about season 2 that irked me in terms of plot and characterization so this is me retconning a little bit and picking and choosing what examples make the most cohesive argument. Like, in season one they're like "Jayce has this brotherly relationship with Caitlyn and him and Mel have this deep, meaningful relationship" and then season two was like "No more relationship building, it's time for trauma now" but, I digress*
First things first, he's a people pleaser. He does what he's told, clearly (against better judgment but like). And he's clearly committed to the people he cares about. HE BROUGHT VIKTOR BACK FROM THE DEAD (AND THEN KILLED HIM) AND THEN DIED WITH HIM AGAIN. You can't tell me that wouldn't translate to an "I'll do anything for you" attitude in the bedroom too.
I already did the bed gif but I also have to draw attention to the following:
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Okay but season two, post-horrors!
Mr. Dopey Heart-Eyes McGee is NOT the one calling the shots here.
Season one Jayce? That man is whipped. One glance from his partner and he's on his knees like it's a religion. Whoever you ship him with! Mel, Viktor, both, a secret fourth option--
He spent an indeterminate amount of time alone, in the bottom of a pit. He's touch-starved but also! Traumatized!
Imagine, if you will, that he survives the astral plane. Imagine he goes to find Mel, or Viktor also survives, or imagine your own y/n, OC insert scenario here. Whatever floats your boat.
In such scenario, and in the aftermath of his self-awareness epiphany where he realizes that yeah, he's kinda been used (by everyone really), I think that in regards to any potential sexual relationship, he would have to become more dominant, more in control of the situation. Especially if it's with Mel, since he does pointedly blame her, or even Viktor, who has literally shaped the course of Jayce's entire life since he was a child. The man needs to set some boundaries with people and good for him.
So I think dominant, scruffy Jayce does have a time and a place.
However, I don't think he'd stay that way forever. It's kinda like him trying to be a politician-- it's a different role that he can pull off, but it doesn't fully scratch his itch.
BONUS HEADCANON: Wouldn't it be just so interesting if he survived the astral plane and goes back to whoever, and while he's looking for comfort and reassurance and all that physical contact he's been deprived of, he realizes that he really doesn't like people touching his head.
I hypothesize that in regards to canon relationships, Mel and/or Viktor, once they regain his trust and show that they're not trying to use him again, he's 100% going to be simping for them even worse than before. Like, that relationship would've gone through the fire and only come out stronger on the other side. You might even say it's been vulcanized.... 🤭
From the on, he can go back to letting his walls down around them and letting them be the dominant one because he knows there's solid trust and respect there now.
Feel free to agree or disagree 🤷‍♀️ also please feel free to tell me all your thots about this too!!!
He's got all this beautiful hair that needs to be tenderly pushed away from his eyes by a loving hand, but he's a little fucked up from the times Mannequin/Mage Viktor did that little murder mind meld.
Like, he put his head in Mel's lap TWICE, you know it would kill the man if he couldn't do that anymore because having someone's hands near his forehead is too reminiscent of... well, basically his death.
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