#i think once with a different character before her

[mofongomuncher]

𝘼𝙣𝙨𝙬𝙚𝙧𝙨 [!𝙎𝙈𝙐𝙏¡]

(Ekko X Reader)

❥ cast : ! Ekko and Reader ¡

The brothel was dimly lit today, the pungent scent of incense and lust hung heavily in the air. The soft whispers of conversations and secrets echoed through the corridors.

As a dancer known for your attraction and intentions, you've seen your share of shady characters seeking refuge from the harsh realities.

Tonight however, was so much more different.

Ekko.

The leader of the firelights, decided to stroll into the brothel with his dark green jacket—its distinct graffits swayed with each step, and his owl like mask made him stick out against the rest of the people around the building.

He was here looking for answers about Silco's people, specifically a woman who once worked here. The only person that actually knew who this woman was, is you.

As he approaches, you feel the heat of his gaze and the weight of his reputation. His sharp, owl-like eyes lock onto yours with unsettling intensity.

You knew he was the type to take what he wanted without hesitation. Babette had warned you about him and the Firelights not long ago.

But tonight... tonight, things would be different.

With a gesture, you lead him to a private room.

"Tell me about her..." Ekko says, his voice rough as he carefully removed his mask, and sat down in front of you. His white locs and hourglass face paint were now visible. The flickering candlelights casted his features, making the intensity of his gaze almost tangible.

You, in your revealing lingerie, feel a thrill of excitement as you danced slowly in front of him. Your movements are fluid, your hips swaying to an unheard melody as you speak, your eyes never leaving his.

You dance closer to him, your fingertips tracing the line of your collarbone as you speak of her, your voice dropping to a whisper. "Her name was Lila....Silco took her in, trained her, used her for his... needs." Your eyes flicker to the side, a hint of sadness in them."she was so clever, always looking answers." Ekko's eyes narrow, his interest piqued. He leans forward slightly.

"What makes you think she'd be of any use to me?" he asks, his voice sharper then ever.  You dip down, your chest brushing against his knee, making him suck in a sharp breath. "Because she knew his secrets..." you murmur, your breath warm against his skin. "And she knew when to keep them...and when to share them." Your hand slides up his thigh. "Anddd...you asked me about her, she must be some good use, hm?" You teased him.

You can feel the tension spiraling within him.

He's a man of the streets, he was used to the cut and thrust of battles, but this... this is different.

Way different...

You move to straddle his lap. He looks up at you, his big hazelnut brown eyes searching yours for a moment as if trying to determine if this is just a trick.

You grab his gloved hands and place them on your hips—forcing him to pull you closer to him.

You lean down, your lips brushing against his ear. "Tell me what you want Ekko.." you whisper, your voice seductive and demanding.

"I want... I need to know." he gasps. "What did she tell you?" His desperation is tangible, his eyes never leaving yours as he speaks. You lean back, a knowing smile playing on your lips. "Everything..." you promise, your voice sweet like honey. "But firsttt, let's make a deal...just you and me." You trace a finger along the line of his sharp jaw, watching as he nods nervously, his breath coming in ragged bursts. He knew exactly what kind of deal you were trying to offer him.

Ekko had never been in a situation like this before. He'd always been too focused on the Firelights, on the constant grind of surviving in Zaun, on fixing what was broken around him. Intimacy had never been something he made time for. His life was chaos.

Now, here he was, sitting at the brothel, with you on his lap, your body close to his in a way that made his heart race. The soft material of your lingerie pressed against him, and he could feel every inch of you. It was all too much, too fast, and yet, it was impossible to ignore the heat flooding his chest.

He hadn't asked for this, hadn't come here for this kind of attention, but now that it was happening, he was finding it hard to pull away. His hands rested lightly on your hips, the pressure of his touch not quite sure of itself, but needing to stay there all the same. His mind was a jumble of thoughts, conflicting desires and responsibilities, but his body was reacting against all of it.

This wasn't a relationship. It wasn't anything deep, he knew that. Yet, there was something in the way your body pressed against his, something in the way the heat built between you, that made him feel a way he couldn't describe. A part of him felt like he shouldn't be here, that he should be focused on something else, find answers elsewhere—but another part of him just... didn't want to stop.

It was messy, it was chaotic, and it wasn't lovely but it was real.

The air in the room seems to thicken as you get off his lap—moving in front of him. Carefully you remove his overalls down to his boots, before dropping to your knees.

As you free his cock from his boxers, you can't help but admire it—thick and long, slightly pulsating, it was like a testament to his masculinity.

Looking up at him through your hooded eyes, you lean in and take him into your mouth, your tongue swirling around the tip before you take him deeper. Ekko's eyes widen in surprise, he throws his head back, his hand reaching for his mouth to cover his groans.

"H-Holy—Fuck" he hisses.

You couldn't help but feel a swell of pride at his reaction.

You suck harder, feeling him pulse against your tongue, his thighs tense beneath your palms. He tastes so sweet and a tad bit bitter, a mix that only fuels your own desire.

Ekko's eyes are squeezed shut now, his teeth gritted as he fights to keep his composure. But you can feel the storm building within him, the tension in his body coiling tighter with each passing moment. His breaths become more erratic, and his hips start to buck. You moan around his length, the vibration sending a shiver down his spine. His hand reaches for the armrest of the chair to steady himself.

"Tell—tell me" he grunts, his voice now strained. "What...What did Lila tell you?"

You pull back, your lips shiny with his precum, and give him a soft smile. "well....only that she had something valuable." you say, your voice a breathy purr. "Information that could help bring him down." Ekko's eyes flash with determination, and he nods, urging you to continue.

"But she didn't tell me what it was." you add, tracing your fingers along his thigh. "Not until I made her feel good..." You stand up, your legs shaky from the excitement.

"And—And did you?" he asks, his voice quivering. "Make...her feel good?" You nod, your chest heaving with anticipation. "Of course I did," you reply, reaching back to untie your lingerie, letting it fall to the floor. Your bare skin glows in the candlelight. "And now.." you say, turning to face him, "it's your turn. Hm?"

Ekko's eyes froze to you, observing your naked body, lingering on the wetness between your thighs. You make his way to him, removing the rest of his clothing, revealing his muscular form. You couldn't help but caresses his beautifully toned chest.

"Tell me..." he says, his voice low and slightly nervous, "everything she said."

You bite your bottom lip, feeling a thrill of power as you hold the key to Ekko's quest. "She spoke of a hidden book..." you murmur, stepping even closer to him, your breasts now brushing his chest. "A list of names, areas...transactions with some of the pilties..." Ekko's eyes widen at the implication, and you can feel his cock twitch against your stomach. "But she never told me where it was.." you add, running your fingertips down his abs, tracing the lines of them.

"Only that it would bring him to his knees."

He sighed in frustration, but the desire in his eyes hadn't weakened. "Then what good are you to me?" he demands, but there's a hint of desperation in his voice.

You lean in, your breath hot against his ear. "Perhaps I can reveal more.." you offer, your hands still tracing his abs.

"If you're willing to make another deal."

Ekko's hand snaps up, gripping your wrist. "You drive a hard bargain, hm?" he says, releasing your wrist away from him. "What do you want?"

You look up at him "Protection..." you whisper. "For her and for me. We're both basically targets if he finds I told you..." Ekko's gaze softens slightly as he nods. "If I find it, you'll have the deal" he promises.

"Really?" You look up at him surprised. He nodded as hand drops to your small back.

For a second you both stared at eachother, that was until the space between you evaporated as you crush your mouth into his, your tongue delving deep into his mouth, You moan into the kiss, enjoying every second. His hands roam your body, exploring every curve, leaving a trail of fire. He lifts you up, your legs wrapping around his waist as he carries you to the nearby bed.

Ekko lowers you onto the velvet sheets, his eyes never leaving yours as he positions himself between your thighs. He kisses down your neck, his teeth grazing your skin, making you gasp.

"Tell me how she felt when she talked about this book." he murmurs softly, his breath hot against your ear. You bite your lip, remembering the desperation in Lila's eyes. "Scared..." you admit.

He nods, understanding flickering in his gaze.  your hand slid down to grip his cock, guiding it to your entrance. His expression tightens, a mix of lust and fear. You position the head of his cock at your opening.

Ekko couldn't help himself anymore, He tried so hard to keep calm, telling himself that he shouldn't do this, he shouldn't feel so aroused by you—that it wasn't right.

But he couldn't, he couldn't control his lust for you.

With one powerful thrust, he enters you. Your back arching off the bed as he fills you completely. His grip on your hips is firm, his movements deep and rhythmic. Each stroke sends waves of pleasure crashing through you, making it hard to focus on anything but the feeling of him inside you.

"Oh F-Fuck." you breathe, your nails digging into his back as he thrusts into you. "Lila... she—she was terrified, but she had this... this fire in her eyes when she talked about the book. She knew all of his secrets.." Ekko's eyes darken, his strokes becoming more urgent as he hears the desperation in your voice. He leans down, capturing your mouth in a kiss.

You break the kiss, panting heavily. "She never told me where it was hidden. Only that it was somewhere in his office." Ekko's grip on your hips tightens, his thrusts becoming more deliberate, as if he's trying to claim his victory over Silco through your body.

"I—I need to know more Y/N." he grunts, his eyes burning into yours.

"All I know is that—that it's well-guarded" you murmur, your voice a soft whine of pleasure as he hits just the right spot. "But she said there's a time when he's...distracted."

Ekko's strokes slow, his eyes narrowing. "Distracted?" he repeats, his voice a low growl. You nod, your body trembling beneath his. "Whe-When ever the Last Drop has those party nights.... His guards are always...shimmered up and distracted." You can feel his cock pulse within you at the mention of the last drop, a place he knew too good and well. "That's when we can get it.." he says, his voice filled with the promise of victory.

He leans back, the sound of skin slapping against skin was starting to turn him on. You wrap your legs around his waist, urging him deeper.

"The Last Drop.." Ekko repeats, his eyes gleaming with excitement. "We'll get that book and bring him down." He leans down to look at me. You gasp, your body tightening around him, your walls pulsing. "Then.." he murmurs.

"we'll see about that deal."

You tighten your legs around him, urging him closer, the pressure building within you. "Pleasee..." you whisper, your voice thick with desire. "I'm gonna—" Ekko grins, understanding exactly what you meant. He doubles his efforts, hitting that perfect spot with each stroke.

Your breaths come in short pants, your eyes squeezed shut as you feel yourself teetering on the edge. You could feel the room spinning, the candlelights playing tricks on the walls as you feel yourself climbing higher and higher. "F-Fuck Ekko!" you cry out, your body arching as the orgasm hits, wave after wave of ecstasy rolling through you.

With a roar, he releases his own climax, filling you completely as your bodies spasm together in a symphony of pleasure.

For a moment, you lay there, panting, your heart racing as you come down from the high. Ekko's head is buried in the crook of your neck, his breaths hot and erratic against your skin. You run your fingers through his slightly dampened undercut.

"Thank you..." he murmurs, his voice rough with satisfaction. "For what?" you ask, your own voice a little shaky.

He lifts his head to look at you, his brown eyes filled with something that looks suspiciously like affection. "For your help..." he says, his thumb stroking your cheek. "And for... that." You can't help but blush, the heat of his gaze making you feel vulnerable. "It was nothing..." you murmur, trying to play it cool. But the way his eyes travel down your body, lingering on your heaving chest, tells you that he doesn't believe you.

Ekko rolls off you, leaving you to lay there, feeling empty and a little lost. You watch as he stands up and starts to gather his clothes. He pulls his clothes and jacket on, the graffiti on the hem fluttering as he moves. You sit up and watch him, pulling the sheets around your naked body.

Ekko's gaze turns to you—his eyes softens for a moment. He made his way to your sad little figure lying on the bed—his hand reaching out to cup your cheek. "when I get this book, we can talk about that freedom you're after." His thumb traces your bottom lip, and you bite back a whimper.

He pressed his lips against yours before making his way out, leaving you behind,your heart fluttering for the very first time as you hear his footsteps faint away.

Check out my Ekko one shots on Wattpad for more stories!! :3

[mayapapaya33]

Well, I haven't read the origins comic yet, so I'll take your word for that. Some of the comic stuff is a bit wibbly on canon so I'm not sure if I do take it as campaign canon really, but I'll just go with it for the purposes of this conversation. (The fact that she never once mentions being run out of town by Yeza in the campaign makes that a little weird but sure ok. It also feels a little retconny to brush over her major fear that her family would reject her even if they DID know it was her under the curse, which was what was implied to be a big reason she stayed away in the campaign, in favor of it being because they DID chase her away based purely on what she looked like before she could say anything. It feels...strange. I'm not sure how I feel about it, I'll have to think about it. It just feels like after the fact justification of her staying away from them to me, but oh well. LET WOMEN BE FLAWED 2025! lol I am eventually going to get my hands on all of the origins comics, I just haven't done so yet.)

My point wasn't really a moral argument about Veth and Lilliana having done equally bad things in the world, obviously that's not true. I could have said It better, but I guess I just thought that was obvious and I was tired? lol, silly me. So to make it clearer: Veth is a hero who helped save the world, and Liliana fell in with a cult and did terrible things under the woefully misguided belief she was doing the right thing. I'm more saying I could see Veth turning out like Liliana if things went differently and their initial act of abandonment is fundamentally similar. Also, it's not just the hag thing btw, that was just the most obvious and memorable example I could reference and know everyone would know what I was talking about without writing a 5 page essay and hunting down obscure time stamps lol.

Another example was her stance in that discussion about justice and vengeance from ep 98 (26:26) with Caduceus. Cad basically said: Hey, going after criminals in the Empire sounds great if you can be smart about it, but if you're just doing it to make yourself feel better, I don't really see the point of that, so maybe don't because you'll probably restart the war if you aren't extremely careful. And Veth's response was very understandable from her characters pov, but makes me think that, yeah, in the right circumstances, she'll do what she wants, when she wants, and damn the consequences and it won't be about justice, it'll be about making herself feel good and she'll find the internal justification she needs to. "You can stand by -You can just watch bad people get away with it?" If the price of stopping one bad person is reigniting a WAR, um yeah, I can Veth. He's basically saying, don't cause more problems than you are going to fix by your actions, and interrogate your motivations and she wasn't having it. I think he might have gotten through to her in the end but I'm not sure because they "dissolved" using mouth sounds and hand waving into the next scene of Jester finding Marion.

There are many things that make me think this about her. Anger and desperation can cause people to make poor decisions. (I think you might have misconstrued the one bit where I was debating whether letting your family think you were dead and staying gone or just saying goodbye and abandoning them was actually worse or not, I personally vote dead being worse but I'm genuinely not sure, like I said. So, in that one aspect I think Veth's worse, but not for everything lol. The misguided hope left behind from what Liliana did might be worse.)

My point was that they both abandoned their families in order to solve a problem. Yes, Liliana left "voluntarily" right from the start in the sense that she wasn't kidnapped by goblins and transformed against her will, her "against her will change" was foisted upon her by a God Eater trapped in moon jail instead. She was essentially kidnapped by her own powers, she couldn't control them and needed to figure out what they were and how to deal with them. So yes, it was a choice for her to leave as you so aptly pointed out, just not quite as voluntary a choice as people keep presenting it as. I suppose it's more accurate for me to say it was Liliana's choice to leave, and Veth's choice to STAY gone (yes, even with the addition of the comic lore).

Don't you remember early campaign Imogen constantly having to be careful and worried about her telepathy? How it hurt her to be in large crowds? How her town DID treat her like garbage, like a pariah, "like an outright monster" even. It's not like Liliana left for fun. She was scared she was going to hurt someone if she didn't learn how to control herself, and worried that Imogen would develop those powers too. (That was her initial reasoning, and then things devolved of course). You said it yourself; The Grim Verity was taking too long, and she wanted to go home so she fell in with Ludinus and co because he promised answers and a solution.

Veth's initial separation from her family OBVIOUSLY wasn't her fault, and apparently in the comics she tried to go home and was run off for looking like a goblin. Well, that truly sucks for Comic Book Veth and she has my sympathy. There are still a variety of things she could have done, including once she befriended Caleb enough where she trusted him, have him go to Yeza in person and explain the curse and everything while she hid at the outskirts of town. She could have told Caleb a bunch of things only Veth would know to help convince Yeza, Etc.

At a certain point, Veth's Choice to stay away from her family was just as voluntary as Liliana's. She could have tried (or tried again if comics are canon) at any time, and she didn't. The problem wasn't solved so they "couldn't" go home and then events spiraled. Again, they aren't the same, I just think their situations parallel each other interestingly. Becoming "not a goblin" was not the only way for Veth to reunite with her family. It's perfectly understandable that she thought that it was considering all of her trauma and her shame and her fear, but that doesn't make it true. It was still an active choice that she made to not try to reunite with her family until she looked "normal" again, even once her circumstances had changed and she could have had help. She didn't try because she didn't want her family seeing her like that and because she was scared of what they would think. (Again, very understandable, but still a choice). What if Caleb couldn't find a way to change her back into a halfling? Would she never have gone home, continuing to look for a solution?

Liliana "couldn't" go home until she understood and could control her powers, a reasonable yet tragic decision, which then spiraled into it being that she "couldn't" go home until she helped "save" the world from the tyranny of the Gods, etc. Somewhat less reasonable I think you'll agree. How long does Veth's decision to not try (or not try again) to reunite with her family until she's no longer a goblin remain reasonable? One year? Five years? Ten years? It was a combination of luck and hard work that got her a new body as relatively fast as she did. Caleb and Essek meeting and becoming magic bffs might never have happened without Caleb's "I'm never going back to jail" moment in the Bright Queen's throne room for example lol.

More than all of that though, I'm not a huge fan of Veth's parenting while she IS present in Luc's life but seeing as Liliana hasn't really been present in Imogen's life for more than like a month, that's about where any parallels or comparisons stop lmfao. A lot of Veth's bad parenting once she's back in Luc's life is also due to the fact that Sam Riegel is a comedian first and an actor second so if he sees an opportunity to be funny, he'll pounce. Which unfortunately for poor Veth, does mean that if you look at her with a sober eye she comes across as a dreadful parent. Hilarious of course, but I did end up feeling bad for Yeza whenever I saw him futilely trying to be responsible whenever the M9 came trampling through their lives being bad influences. Honestly, she wonders why teenage Luc is like that! I learned it from watching you mom!

If the Good Moms of Critical Role ever learn about the shit Liliana's pulled it's on sight 😤

[justtheclippy]

Tips and FAQ for Asks

Hello beautiful humans, I want to do my best to get to everyone's asks so here are a few things you can do to help make that happen! (if you're looking for the cast stream master list, skip to the bottom)

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Q: I've seen people use several different pronouns for you, what are your preferred pronouns? A: They/them and I prefer masc leaning terms generally! I'm queer, NB and very open about my identity. But people will sometimes use she/her because they don't know. I will never get upset with someone for not knowing- it's ok. But now that you've read this, you know! So you can go forth educated. You're welcome to correct anyone who doesn't know, but please be kind to each other. We've all been the person who didn't know before.

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Q: What is your favorite ship? A: Bunnydoll and Buttonblossom, because the dynamics are so much fun.

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BUT

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Q: Where can I find X stream that the cast did? A: Moving forward, I will keep a master list of our group streams in order of date aired, to the best of my ability. If I miss one, let me know and I'll get it on here!

Saberspark TADC Cast Interview

Streamily Signing #1 (Amanda, Michael, Alex, Marissa)

Streamily Signing #2 (Amanda and Michael)

Streamily Signing #3 (Amanda and Sean)

Streamily Signing #4 (Amanda, Sean, Alex, Michael, Marissa, Vera, Hamish)

TADC Fan Game Stream: Game 1

Streamily Signing #5 (Amanda, Alex, Ashley, Sean, Michael, Marissa, Vera, Hamish, Wiz)

Fast Food Simulator Charity Stream (Amanda, Lizzie, Marissa, Michael, Ashley)

[welcome-to-green-hills]

In light of you getting snow mystery. I think that you should make some headcanons of the boys (and Shadow) enjoying the snow

ASDFGHJKL! I am more than happy to share some Snow Day headcanons with you hon (I grew up in Florida and this is really my first Snow Day up north, so I’m learning how to snow 👉🥹👈):

Maddie would definitely be the type of mom to bundle her boys up in five layers of jackets, snow pants, scarves, and hats to the point that they can’t move. It’s all worth it in the end because she ends the bundle with a kiss on the nose.

As soon as it starts getting cold, Maddie and Tom drag their sons to the malls in Spring Valley to try on different winter clothes to wear. They’re growing boys and their warmies are always too small by the time the weather breaks.

Sonic is a UGG girly. ‘Nuff said.

Knuckles is a novelty sock girly. He needs socs with fluff and cartoon characters on it.

Tails is a fun hat girly. He likes wearing beanies with Chao heads on it or something comical.

The boys go nuts for snow cream. But they ONLY like it if it’s got sprinkles on it. It has to be a specific color or they won’t eat it.

Each of the boys like to make snow Puppers in the forms of their family. Unless Uncle Wade gets involved, then it’s an army that they make and pretend to have a snow fight with snowballs projected to one another.

The first time Shadow experienced snow was a shock to him. He was wrapped in some of the finest jackets that Maria stole from the scientists—along with a scarf that she made him—and took him on a stroll in the mountains. He fell over multiple times due to not understanding how to balance in the snow.

Shadow also tried to sneak a snowball into the bunker to show to a Young Director Walters, but got upset when it melted. Maria replaced it when Shadow wasn’t looking just to see him smile.

Tails documents every type of snow flake in Montana, photographs them, and keeps a journal of all of the shapes that he’s seen. He’s shared all of his photos with the family to enjoy.

Sonic and Knuckles are competitive snow sleds riders. They’ve tried once to build their own sled to go faster than the kids in town, but it accidentally caught on fire. Don’t ask. Just know that the fire was cool and they toasted marshmallows over it.

None of the boys can ice skate to save their lives. Whenever Shadow comes to visit he has to coach the boys on how to glide over ice.

Tom tried once to take his sons ice fishing. They didn’t last ten minutes on the ice.

Maddie crochet each of her sons a pair of mittens to wear. Since Shadow visits, she made him some as well to assure him that they do care about him. Shadow always wears his purple gloves whenever he comes to visit.

It’s become a tradition where the Wachowski family will get breakfast pizza (it HAS to be a pie cut evenly into five slices with specific toppings accordingly) downtown and take it to the farmers market to buy holiday goodies.

On very, very cold nights, Tom builds a fire downstairs and Maddie throws bedding on the floor to build a nest. Pillows and blankets cover the floor for all five of them (maybe six or seven if Wade and/or Shadow come) to bundle in while watching black and white films.

The boys go apeshit for frozen bubbles. It doesn’t matter how old Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles are, but they love seeing the bubbles freeze over and leave pretty flakes on it.

If Shadow comes to visit, Sonic likes to wake him up early in the morning to watch the sun rise on the rooftops before everyone wakes up. Neither of them say anything, but they do enjoy a hot chocolate on the rooftop and the sunrise.

[demaparbat-hp]

Hiiii!

Can you tell more about the Hunters AU? How diferent are katara relationship with the others, they reaction to katara 'betray'? how they discover the plan and that her don't really is in FN side?

Hi, and thanks for asking!

Hunters is, above all, a writing experiment. The idea is to change a character's chore trait and see how the story develops from there. In this case, Katara's trust and faith in the Avatar showing up and saving the world.

She blames the Avatar's disappearance for the war and her mother's death (much in the same way she placed her anger on Zuko during S3—it's a coping mechanism, and the basis of her character arc is growing out of it). Katara refuses to wait for anyone else to end things when she can do it herself.

And then Zuko arrives, having witnessed his mother's death and wishing to dethrone his father. He has a plan to end the war. A tangible plan that not only gives Katara the chance to learn waterbending and actively shape her own future, but it also places her in the best place to destroy the Fire Nation: the very heart of it.

They're taking things apart from the inside, doing side missions for the White Lotus, and chasing the Avatar because, well, can't have the throne without an unbanished Heir.

Because of all this, the Gaang is quite different! Suki is the first member, given that she leaves Kyoshi Island as the Avatar's bodyguard, protector, and handler. Then they collect Jet, of all people, and Toph once they look for an earthbending master.

Sokka is unavailable until much, much later, given that he left the South Pole with Hakoda a couple of years before the story begins. Both Zuko and Katara will join the Gaang...sometime.

The thing about Zuko's mission is that nobody can know about what he's really doing. He'd rather not bother with the Avatar at all, but that's not an option if he wants his claim to the throne to be legitimate. However...it was never said that he couldn't deliver a fully-realized Avatar to his father.

This I'll-begrudgingly-look-after-you-until-you're-ready-to-defeat-my-father-but-you-can't-know-I'm-a-good-guy mindset means a lot of Blue Spirit and Painted Lady shenanigans.

I think Aang suspects that both Zuko and Katara are actually good guys, and the White Lotus members they meet will probably hint at this once or twice. Jet is skeptical at best and murderous at worst, Suki is ready for the worst and hoping for the best, and Toph, for the best or the worst, doesn't give a damn either way.

The reactions I'd love to see, however, are Hakoda and Sokka's. How do you think that encounter would go?

[elcor-thespian]

YES I get to talk about my character's names.

Nephele Mercar (my canon Rook): So I unintentionally made protagonists for the first three games that I strongly associate with an element. My Warden, Ilayna, is a fire mage, my Hawke is very Water sign coded and loves the sea, and my Inquisitor, Terrwyn, is Dalish and very connected to the earth. Once I realized that (Maybe like 6 months ago?) I knew I had to make my protagonist for this game Air themed. So I picked a name before I knew anything about the game, and I can't believe that we have a companion named Neve, which sounds so similar to Neph. I also named my Hawke Seraphina and then when DAI came out....I'm just saying if I had a nickel for every time DA introduced a companion with a name that sounded like a shortened version of my character's name, I'd have 2 nickels, which isn't a lot but it's weird that it happened twice.

Nephele means "cloud" and in Greek mythology she was a nymph made from a cloud and was the mother of the centaurs, and is also connected to the Golden Fleece.

Names for my other DATV characters under the cut:

Nasreen "Raven" Aldwir: Each of my characters has a different bird code name given to them by Varric. They are all present at the Lighthouse, but Nephele is the protagonist.

Nasreen is a Persian name that means "wild rose". I really wanted something with a nature connection, and something that maybe hinted at something a little darker/edgier. I also just love this name and I think it's pretty.

Aleksei "Magpie" Laidir: means "protector of man". I gotta be honest, I don't remember why I chose this. I often have a harder time choosing male names. I also didn't have the firmest grasp on who his character was going to be at the time. If I were to name him now I probably wouldn't pick this, but now I'm very attached to it and I feel like it fits him perfectly (Although again, it's close to Elek and IF I HAD A NICKEL)

Brenna "Kestrel" Thorne: Brenna is a name I've liked for a while and wanted to use, and for a bit it was going to be my dwarf character's name. Depending on where you look, it might mean "high hill", "princess", "strength", "dark hair" or "burn". I feel like if you mixed all these ideas in to a soup, you would come out with my character.

Elspeth "Crow" de Riva: This was the DATV OC that I named last. Elspeth is the Scottish form of Elizabeth and means "chosen by God". Again, I do not remember why I landed on this. It's not Italian or Spanish. I don't think Elspeth is fully Antivan, and she had this name when she got to the orphanage. I think some people just call them "El", since it's easier to say in an Antivan accent. Elspeth is non-binary and they don't love their name because it's pretty feminine, but they also don't have a strong idea of what they would change it to. I kind of like that their name is at odds with the type of person they are.

Konstantin "Wren" Ingellvar: Russian name meaning "constant or everlasting". I wanted something German/Slavic/Russian, and this was the name I liked the best. I also think that the meaning works for him. He's not the biggest fan of his code name, and to be honest neither am I. But I'm in too deep now.

Paloma "Dove": Paloma literally means "dove". Paloma is my ex-Saarebas character, and so they chose their name. There wasn't a ton of thought behind it. She does a lot of people watching, and she heard a mother calling for her daughter, Paloma, in the market one day. She liked the sound of it, and she wanted a name that wouldn't stand out too much in Minrathous and she had no concept of what a normal name would be. She practiced saying it over and over and decided she could live with it.

It’s Monday Morning 👎👎👎🚫🚫

It’s the Rook Introduction Hour ! 🥳🥳🎊🎊🙌

For new people, it works like this: I ask you about your Rook, and if you want you can rb and answer, and then I’ll rb it back here and comment a bit !

I really made you all work last week, so let’s do something easier: What is the significance of your Rook’s (first) name? Who gave it to them— did they pick it themselves? Do they have any nicknames (besides Rook)? Who gave those to them? Do they like their name?

Feel free to answer as much/little as you like!

[lurkingshan]

The other day in a conversation about I'll Turn Back This Time, @troubled-mind asked me about my favorite dramas that show the same couple falling in love multiple times, in different iterations.

So of course, I am now here with a list! Takes on the fantasy trope that ITBTT uses--an alternate universe and/or time travel mechanism that sets up the protagonist to fall in love with the same person, or different versions of the same person, more than once--is actually not super common in dramas, but there are a handful of shows that do something like this:

Triage 

If you ask me what is the best QL with this trope, I don't even need to think about it: Triage is the answer. I love this show, and alongside its masterful suspense plot you get to watch these two try (and fail) to get the other to fall for them over and over again. It's a great time.

Someday or One Day 

If you ask me what is the best drama with this trope, period, I have to hand it to Someday or One Day, a Taiwanese drama that is probably my favorite time travel alternate universe romance of all time. In this one you get multiple versions of the same characters falling in love with each other and traversing time and space to find each other. It's so good that a Korean production attempted to replicate its magic. An absolute must watch for people who love this trope!

Every You Every Me

Now we're getting into some with asterisks. In this show you get to watch the same two actors play multiple different pairs who fall in love with each other in different universes--kind of. I can't say more or I will spoil it for those who haven't seen it yet! It's not a perfect show by any means, but it's a lot of fun.

4 Minutes 

This show is not a great example of this trope IMO, but it sort of gets at the experience, as you see a few different versions of the lead characters and their relationship through various narrative turns. I'm keeping it vague because saying much more would be spoilerific!

The Legend of the Blue Sea

A mermaid meets a conman, has a whirlwind romance, and then deletes his memory. But oops! They were already lovers in a previous life, her mermaid powers are not working quite as planned, and she can't stop herself from finding him again anyway. It's all a bit more complicated than that, but the point is you get to watch these two find each other and fall in love several times in multiple lifetimes. And damn did I love it every time.

Until We Meet Again 

In this drama, the story is about two souls who meet again in another life after a tragic end in their first. So it kinda fits here, but their reincarnated souls go into new characters played by different actors, so the experience of watching it is a bit different. This one is less about time travel and choice as it is heavy on the red string of fate.

Extraordinary You 

In this fantasy drama, our mains are side characters in a manwha who gain sentience and start trying to change their story together while an omnipotent writer keeps shuffling them back to where they think they belong and deleting their memories of each other. It's definitely a unique twist on this trope, and you get to watch them fight to remember and fall for each other and find a way to take control of their destiny over and over again.

In addition to narratives with a fantasy construct that resets or produces multiple iterations of the core relationship, I also thought about second chance romances where you get to see both the original and the second chance love story in full, giving you the experience of watching the same two people fall in love twice. Some noteworthy dramas in this category:

Lighter and Princess

This drama centers on two tech genius types who originally fell in love in college and started a company together before something went very wrong, resulting in his incarceration. The story picks up when he gets out of prison and sets out to reclaim his legacy, and you get to live both their first and second love stories in detail. One of my absolute favorites and permanently in the rewatch rotation.

We Best Love 

This story is told in two parts, with the first focused on their original enemies to lovers romance in college, and the second their reunion after a confusing and closure-less break up. It's honestly kind of a mess but I love it so much anyway, in no small part due to the actors.

The End of the World With You 

And now for something a little darker! This one is heavy on the toxic psychosexual vibe, and all the more fascinating for it. Two former lovers meet again at the end of the world, and we see what went wrong for them in college and watch them sort through the wreckage as adults and try to make something of the time they have left.

First Love: Hatsukoi

Two high school sweethearts get separated by life circumstances, and meet again twenty years later to realize they are still not over it. I was charmed by the teen love story in this one especially.

Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo

Let me end on a note of excellence and take this opportunity to again implore everyone to watch this beautiful show. Both iterations of this relationship are compelling and complicated and full of deep feeling; it's one of the most satisfying second chance romances I have seen, and after everything they've been through, it's so rewarding to see these two get the chance to fall in love again.

[funhouse-mirror-barbie]

All of the background/minor characters in Helluva Boss are much more interesting than the main characters and I’m entirely certain it’s because they aren’t forced into the Stolitz universe and they’re the only reason I watch the show now.

Like, look at this imp family/single parent unit here.

They’re watching the trial, but before that the imp woman was washing dishes and the son was grabbing cookies off the shelf.

Hi! Thanks so much for reaching out.

I absolutely agree and I think there are a couple of reasons for this—

First—The imps actually have RULES for how theyre designed as a species.

These rules are really simple, and so pretty much anyone can design an imp.

1. Imps have red skin and yellow eyes.

2. Scars, birthmarks, freckles, and other skin markings are white

3. All imps have horns. Biologically female imps have black horns and black hair, and biologically male imps have white hair and white and black striped horns.

What’s nice is that, even with these general guidelines, there’s plenty of room for variation in designing imps. Some imp’s legs are bent like a satyr’s some have more human legs, they have varying lengths of tails, different body shapes and sizes, etc.

Idk if these design rules were in place for Imps as a species from the very beginning of the show, but I think having these rules helps A LOT because it means the character designers do have freedom to make unique and appealing designs, while not getting TOO crazy, which prevents them from being too over-designed:

(All character design sheets by Erin Frost—former artist and character designer for Helluva Boss)

Second—due to being background characters, they’re less likely to over-designed in general. This hasn’t always been the case (and sometimes still isn’t) with Hellaverse shows, especially Hazbin’s Pilot:

I don’t even think these are all necessarily “bad” or incompetent character designs on their own, but they have a lot of little details, and when they’re all squished together like that, it causes some pretty rough visual clutter. Charlie is supposed to by the main focus of the above shots, but she doesn’t really stand out from the background crowd.

Same with shot of Alastor watching the broadcast—he stands out a little better since he’s silhouetted, but the characters in the foreground having so much going on really detracts from Alastor as the main focal point.

This is also just like. Not a very good composition. I’m really not trying to be mean or rude but, the characters being so overly designed and having such similar color palettes really muddles things.

Also—because there are so many design elements trying to be incorporated at once, we sometimes end up losing all those little extra details that are added due to the visual clutter. I didn’t have any idea Alastor was a deer until like 2 years ago, because his antlers were so small I never noticed them. I thought he was an owl, tbh.

I think we get the most overly complicated designs when the character artists and designers are given like. 3 or 4 different themes or ideas that they have to blend together. Alastor is a deer AND a “radio demon” AND a practitioner of voudo. Angel Dust is a spider AND a mafioso AND a porn star. Some of those ideas absolutely end up being lost because so much is trying to be fit into the design.

The most infamous example of this is Queen Bee, who’s supposed to be a honey bee, lava lamp, fennec fox, party girl, and apparently also an animal tamer?

And I’ll be honest, I’m actually one of the few people who kind of likes her design. I think if you were to simplify her and take out a lot of the extra details, she could still be a fun sparkle dog-type character. But there’s so much going on with her, that a lot of her design elements get lost.

Like, apparently the little pink mark on her forehead is actually a closed eye??? Like I think it’s supposed to be an Ocelli, the third “eye” insects can have:

But it’s just like. Closed usually I guess. In theory, it’s not a terrible design idea for an insect character, but Bee has SO MUCH going on visually that this design choice gets entirely lost. I just thought it was like. A weird symbol on her forehead, and it took me AGES to realize it’s supposed to be her Ocelli or a third eye.

This happens a lot with more of the main characters in Hb and Hazbin, because they’re apparently supposed to be SO many different things that the character designs get too cluttered.

I think this is the main reason for a lot of the less appealing character designs in the Hellaverse, because they’re trying to be like. Ten different things at once. The imps avoid this fate though because, other than maybe their general profession and age, they’re supposed to be imps. They have those design rules we outlined before. I think thats what makes the biggest difference and is also why Mammon is actually the best design of the seven deadly sins because he’s literally just a round jester you look at him and your brain goes “yep that’s a jester” and youre not left trying to figure out what he’s supposed to be for 10 minutes. He’s not trying to be seven things at once. He’s a jester. With some extra arms. Sorry I was wrong when I said it was belphagor before. It’s mammon. Dudes literally just a jester.

[joicecubes]

HEY!!!!! HEY YOU!! (sits you down to listen to me yap about my queer headcanons for gravity falls characters)

mabel - okay lets get her out of the way. this girl is queer as fuck. she may not realize it yet, but in her teenage years i know she’s experimented with every single label and microlabel in existence. she’d try out hundreds of neopronouns. she realizes her obsession with boys as a kid was a result of comphet. i don’t have a specific label for her because i think in the end she’d discover she can’t make herself identify with any one label. because she’s just mabel! unlabeled and proud.

dipper - do i even have to say it… he’s trans. i think every queer person in this fandom headcanons him to be trans. moving on

stanley - he’s kinda unlabeled too, but for a reason opposite to mabel’s. ladies, gentlemen, doesn’t matter to him! i think its fair to assume he grew up believing that being gay was wrong, it was the 60s and 70s and his dad’s a piece of shit, but as he traveled the country and met so many different people and then witnessed the times changing around him… he’d just. grow into his attraction for men. like, yeah i like men? so what? he doesn’t care for labels. “bisexual, mabel? pansexual? quit making up words!”

(more starting with stanford under the cut this is gonna be sorta long)

stanford - hehehheee okay this is my favorite. i’ve thought about his sexuality a lot. he’s definitely gay to me, and i don’t have much reasoning for that other than like… my heart is telling me that’s the right answer. but he’s also definitely on the aroace spectrum. i personally think he’s demi or grayromantic, he feels romantic attraction VERY rarely and its part of the reason why he felt so helpless in the dating department as a teenager, and also why as an adult later on he tells fiddleford he doesn’t understand romance. he’s hardly ever experienced it! and he wouldn’t really KNOW he identifies with those labels until he’s back in his dimension and mabel is in her obsessed-with-queer-microlabels phase. he hears mabel say “demiromantic” and, being the nerd he is, immediately wants to know what this new word means and why he’s never heard of it before. so mabel rolls a big-ass whiteboard in and starts Mabel’s Guide to the Aromantic Spectrum! ford learns something about himself that day.

fiddleford - HE’S GAY. he’s gay. he’s so gay. i know he canonically has a wife but he literally leaves emma may to work on this mysterious project with his best and only MALE friend from college like… BE so fr. he made ford TWO christmas gifts and forgot to get anything for his wife!! i imagine his marriage to emma may was more of a way for him to deny his sexuality and live what he believes to be a “normal” life. and that obviously doesnt excuse the neglect to his family (because what the fuck fiddleford) but its how i personally make sense of his behavior.

bill cipher - bill transcends human comprehension of gender and sexuality. bill is just bill. but in human terms he’s a lover of all genders. as long as he can manipulate them, they’re fair game! (sorry ford)

wendy - okayyy yesss i know i used the comphet excuse once with mabel but i’m using it again god dammit. with the way wendy talks about her past boyfriends and how we see her be so vaguely invested in her relationship with robbie, it makes me think she’s either a lesbian or somewhere on the aromantic spectrum. she’s just not super interested! but she gives guys chances because why the hell not and is never super into any of it, eventually they break up, and she moves on with her life. i imagine sometime after high school is when she reflects on that and thinks… huh. was i ever attracted to men at all?

soos - saving the most anticlimactic for last… soos is straight to me. but he’s an ENTHUSIASTIC ally :)

thanks for reading i really like overthinking the theoretical queer identities of my favorite characters have a nice day (and let me know if you’re headcanons differ i would love to hear what people think!!)

[dangermousie]

The best cdrama you probably haven't watched - Tribes and Empires Storm of Prophecy

Most of my airing cdramas are ending within the week and unless we get a lot of other good replacements, it means time to rewatch a favorite.

And this favorite? The sprawling, epic fantasy Tribes and Empires Storm of Prophecy. Tribes has a huge cast (one of criticisms I've seen leveled at it - but that is why I love it; it's epic in every sense of the world), but it centers around three very different men - Shaofeng Heye (Zhou Yiwei), a son of a murdered barbarian chief who will eventually lead the rebellion that tries to topple the empire, Muyun Sheng (Huang Xuan), a disregarded prince who is half-fae and whose mother was supposedly the emperor's great love who he mourns (the truth is so much darker and more complicated) and Muru Hanjiang (Shawn Dou), the cursed son of the chief general who was abandoned to live on the street due to prophecy. Sometimes they are allies, sometimes enemies, sometimes both at once.

Despite the huge budget, it was not a hit either in China or internationally - people complained about the slow pace, the large cast and the lack of ending (the drama is 70+ eps and tells only half the story.) I loved every second of it. I grew up reading Russian novels which were also sprawling, with a huge cast, deliberate pace and often lack of resolution at the end. Perhaps that is why the one audience where I think it was a hit was the Russian-speaking cdrama fandom (all the MVs I can find, btw, are made by Russian speakers.)

(The above is a gorgeous general MV)

Why do I love it? Other than the amazing visuals (it's directed by Cao Dun, all of whose dramas are genuinely stunning looking), there is the fact that it really feels like a window in a whole other world - epic and a little alien, complex, full of horror and beauty.

And there are the characters and the narrative. Because this drama does not hurry, it's not only the mains who get fleshed out - secondary and even tertiary characters are fully-fledged. Two of my favorite characters are emperor and empress - two intense monsters locked in an emotional cage with each other, clawing at others and themselves, as bystanders die.

This is a dark dark world - made before the censorship tightening up, there is none of that "tireless emperor ceaselessly working for the people" nonsense or even other character spouting about working for the greater good. The emperor and most of the imperial family are monsters, grasping for power, lives of people as ants to them. Some characters do have ideals but they are not glib or easy or fit within modern parameters. This is a narrative that starts with Shaofeng Heye's entire tribe being wiped out because of an act of kindness by a boy (and his tribe and other tribes are locked into a life death struggle for resources perpetually.) Blind loyalty to the crown is not viewed as a virtue - Muru Hanjiang's father is a monster for throwing his infant to die due to a prophecy that states he's a threat to the throne.

(another general MV)

Also, me being me, there are ships. There are a bunch, but my favorite is Muru Hanjiang x Su Yuning. She's a minor noblewoman picked to be a crown princess because her horoscope says that whoever she marries will be the ruler (interestingly, MHJ's prophecy that upended his life is that he will end the rule of the Muyun dynasty - clearly they are meant to marry at some point, heh) and she has no choice about it. Their love is glorious and largely unspoken and kinda doomed; the way the drama ends with her ditching literally EVERYTHING and following him and his clan to horrifying exile that might result in death (and even as he still tries to drive her away to protect her, she knows what he's doing and vows to wait for him) is glorious.

This MV for them is amazing:

I also loved Shaofeng Heye and Princess Muyun Yan Shuang. Not functional in the least but so hot!

(The third main OTP of the prince x spirit, I liked but not as much as these two.)

Anyway, this is my next rewatch.

[angelikook]

Download Error | Act Two

⤿ Pairing(s): Scientist!Jungkook x reader

⤿ Genre: Fluff, angst, suggestive, dark, thriller, sci-fi, medical, yandere-ish behavior

⤿ Word Count: 6.1k (unedited)

⤿ Warning(s): Jungkook is unhinged, major character death, minor character death, cannibalism, murder, drug abuse, and a whole lot of other disturbing things

⤿ Summary: After 50 years of research, Jungkook, an 80 years old scientist, figures out how to upload minds and download them to a new body. This technology is so early in development, failing means potentially creating a monster, and failure is common. But when he’s backed into a wall where he’s about to lose Y/n -his wife- due to a disease, he takes some drastic measures. He’ll do anything for love even if it means creating a monster with the face of 25 years old Y/n.

Full Masterlist | Download Error Masterlist | Join/Leave Taglist

Part 11: The Error

So many things happened all at once. The initial transfer process ran smoothly without issues, but the minute the computer had to download Y/n's mind to her new body, they ran into an error. And since then, the machines had been beeping non-stop. The computers all flashed a message error. And Jinho can only yell Jungkook’s name while doing what he could think of at the moment.

“This wasn’t supposed to happen, Prof.” Jinho was busy typing furiously at the computer. "This didn't happen during your transfer."

Jungkook rushed to where Jinho was and shoved him off his seat. "Fucking move. I'll do it myself, you incompetent bastard." Jungkook read over the message on the monitor and clicked whatever buttons he could reach with his mouse.

"I've fixed the program, there's literally no fucking reason for it to run an error," Jungkook vented while still focusing on the error messages. He closed all the messages with the hope that it could finally resolve whatever problem the machine had. His heart sank and eyes focused, he broke a cold sweat, but couldn't bother with it.

After a while of constant clicking, the beeping stopped. The room fell silent.

"This has to work," Jungkook silently whispered to himself. "It has to."

Part 12: The Forgiveness

Jungkook's browser tab opened overwhelmingly many different search tabs all with similar prompts at once. How to get your girlfriend to forgive you? How to apologize to your girlfriend? Does 'take a break' mean we're over? Can I get back with my ex if I still love her? How can I get back with my ex?

Each time his eyes scanned over the word 'ex', his heart wrenched in ways he never felt before. Surely he'd heard it wrong when Y/n said she wanted to take a break. They were supposed to be star-crossed lovers, nothing could get in between them, but of course their egos got in the way.

Jungkook frustratingly slammed his desk with his fist. None of the advice he read from the internet could actually help him. He only had himself.

He stood from his chair which creaked in response to him and walked out his dimly lit room. He had one objective, he had to go to the store.

The entire trip nor the shopping didn't take too long. Afterall, he already had everything planned out in his mind.

"Is that all?" the cashier asked. His eyes never once met Jungkook's.

"Yes."

"That'll be 150 Dollars."

Jungkook furrowed his eyebrow. "That's so expensive!"

The cashier only shrugged, still unimpressed by Jungkook. "Do you want your girlfriend to forgive you or not?"

"Ugh, fine." Jungkook handed him his cash and walked out the store with the stuff he bought.

But what happened after he reached Y/n's door was completely unplanned.

Upon opening the door, Y/n scoffed. It might be brief, but Jungkook's heart ached at the sight of her. Next thing he knew, she was about to close the door on his face hadn't he held the door with his hand.

"Wait, I have something prepared for you. I promise I can make it up to you," Jungkook pleaded.

Y/n rolled her eyes. "Like what?"

As abrupt as his presence on her doorstep, he leaned in and kissed Y/n's plump lips. The taste of Y/n's strawberry lip balm overwhelmed his taste buds. The same flavor even after years of dating her. The same overwhelming feeling and adrenaline rush.

Y/n didn't push him away or slap him in the face, she melted into the kiss instead, which kind of surprised him. So he took it as a signal to deepen the kiss.

He dropped the paperbag holding the stuff he bought from the store and took Y/n in a warm embrace. His tongue explored her mouth, trying to feel every corner of her mouth all at once.

After what felt like milliseconds, Jungkook pulled back from the kiss to catch a breath which Y/n did the same. As they stared at each other, both trying to fill their lungs with as much air as possible before devouring one another, they broke into a laugh.

"So, that's what you mean by 'prepared'?" Y/n linked her arms around Jungkook's neck.

Jungkook shook his head lightly. "Not really. I bought things you might like." Jungkook looped his arms around Y/n's waist. "Look, I'm sorry for letting my ego get in the way. I know you're capable, but I just don't want you to get too tired. Sometimes you have to have fun, you know?"

Y/n nodded. "I know. I'm sorry, too. I guess I was too tired that night."

"Let's go have fun, then," Jungkook suggested as Y/n already pulled them both back into her house.

Part 13: The Resurrection

The ticking clock felt deafening in Jungkook's ears. The hitch of Jinho's breath didn't help. Even the rhythmic thump of his heart felt too loud. It felt like he was being suffocated by the minutes he spent focusing on his surroundings. So instead, Jungkook walked closer upon Y/n's new synthetic body.

"Jinho, how long until she wakes up?" he asked, eyes not leaving her.

"Yours didn't take long, only-"

"How long, Jinho," he pressed, not having enough patience to deal with Jinho's technical speeches.

"Seconds, Prof."

Jungkook caressed Y/n's new face. The same face that he could only see from their wedding photos. The face that he had missed so much. It wasn't hard to admit that he would want their wedding to be immortalized in the form of his lover's face.

He traced Y/n's cheekbones, then her jaws. His fingers grazed ever so slightly on her soft artificial skin. Flawless and beautiful just like how he liked it.

"She should be up by now, right?" Jungkook finally asked as his hand brushed Y/n's hair and tucked it behind her ears.

"Some things can probably-"

"Shut up, Jinho!" Jungkook whisper-yelled as the body in front of him started to wake up.

Y/n's new body opened her eyes wide like she herself was surprised she could wake up in the new body, and unfocused mimicking the lifeless eyes of AI robots. While it was kind of true that Y/n's body was similar to that of an AI, but she wasn't powered with electricity. She was a robot with a human mind.

Y/n's chest then started to go up and down, a small feature Jungkook added to make her seem more human than robot. If one would look close enough, one could even see the nostrils moving slightly, faking breathing.

Jungkook dared himself to call her. "Y/n? Can you hear me?"

And then, everything happened all at once.

Upon hearing his voice, Y/n turned her head sharply to the source of his voice. Then quicker than what Jungkook could process, Y/n leaped from the bed and jumped down on him, ultimately knocking both of them down to the floor. And like a starve-crazed animal, Y/n took a bite of Jungkook's arm that was blocking his face from Y/n's view.

Just as he was about to push Y/n off himself, Jinho came to the rescue and pulled her off of him. Jinho pushed Y/n aside and helped Jungkook up.

"Prof, are you okay?"

"I don't-" Jungkook's speech was interrupted by Y/n clinging on Jinho's body and biting off his ear. Blood poured from the side of his face instantly.

"Y/n! Stop it!" Jungkook manhandled Y/n and tackled her to the ground. He then proceeded by sitting on her back. "Jinho, help me lock her in the storage room. Get the keys now!"

Just as Jungkook saw Jinho running to grab the keys, one hand holding the bleeding ear, Jungkook pulled Y/n up from the ground while holding her hands behind her back. Even in that position, Y/n growled loudly and tried to turn back and face him.

Once Jinho came with the keys, both of them pushed and forced Y/n into the storage room before finally locking the door. Angry growls and loud banging on the door could be heard, but at least they were safe for a while.

With Jinho seemingly already woozy and having trouble walking straight from the loss of blood, Jungkook said, "Let's go to the hospital."

Part 14: The Proposal

Jungkook's hand had fallen asleep long ago, but he didn’t dare to ruin the moment. He glanced at Y/n which leaned her head on his arm, eyes focused on the movie in front of them, hands holding the hot chocolate he had made for her.

This was one of the extremely rare instances where Y/n could have a weekend off and not have to be on standby on her phone. And of course Jungkook was hell-bent on making sure they spend it alone inside the confines of his penthouse.

It seemed like Y/n had realized the gaze Jungkook had on her. Y/n turned her head around and faced him. A small smile appeared on her lips.

“What is it?” she asked, her face visibly showing she was puzzled by Jungkook’s boyish grin that he threw at her.

“I have a surprise.” Jungkook fished out a ring from his shirt’s pocket.

Y/n abruptly stood up, the movie playing in the background had been long forgotten. “No way,” she said as she cupped her hands on her mouth, eyes started to visibly brimming with tears. “Why? When? How?”

“One by one, babe.”

“When did you buy it?” Y/n asked as Jungkook went to put on the ring on her finger.

“Just after apologizing to you at that time.”

Y/n extended her hand and admired the sparkle on the diamond beneath the dim light of the room. “Why did you think it was the right time?”

“Cause I know you’re the one. Especially after what we did that night.”

Seemingly satisfied with the answers he gave, Y/n pulled him up from his seat and engulfed him in a tight hug. “I thought this day would never come,” Y/n cried into his shirt.

Jungkook only pulled her head to lean on his chest closer. “How come?”

“I was being too harsh on you during the fight. I thought you’d hate me for it because what you said was partially right. I know we don’t have that much time together,” she rambled as Jungkook only swayed both their bodies side to side in slow motion.

“You don’t need to think about that eanymore. We’ve made up, right?”

Y/n nodded while still burying her face on Jungkook's chest.

Jungkook hummed in response, but abruptly stopped his swaying when he realized something. "Wait, babe."

Y/n pulled away. Her face was puzzled as she looked up at him, eyes still red and slightly puffy. "What?"

"I haven't proposed to you properly." Jungkook let go of her and crouched on one knee. "Do you want to marry me?"

Part 15: The Hospital

If it weren't for his assistant, the smell of disinfectant and cleaners would have made him leave the hospital sooner. The injuries Jinho bore required him to get an immediate blood transfusion and an emergency surgery to close up the wound caused by the bitten earlobe. 

"Are you sure he was bitten by a dog?" the doctor asked him after announcing that the short surgery had finished.

"Absolutely. It was a wild dog," Jungkook answered as lies seeped through his lips easily.

"Well, it was a big dog, I presume. From the size of the bite, I think it's almost as big as a human."

"You think so?"

The doctor nodded. "I'm worried that the dog might have rabies, so I also gave Mr. Su an anti rabies."

"Do what you have to do, doc." At this point, Jungkook just kept replying to him just to make this talking process faster.

Unlucky for him, the doctor caught a glimpse of his bitten arm that he had wrapped with a gauze he found in his car.

"You got bitten yourself?" the doctor asked, head nodding towards his arm.

"It's fine. Just a small scratch," he lied, he needed to divert the conversation back to his assistant. "Jinho, though, he got bitten. Bad."

The doctor coughed awkwardly. "Right. The surgery was successful. We just did some stitches and it was all done. Unfortunately, for the time being, there's nothing we can do about the missing ear. We can talk more about creating a prosthetic ear for Mr. Su later when he feels better. For now, he will be transferred to his room and in less than an hour he should be up."

Now it was Jungkook's turn to ask the right questions. "When can we go home, then?"

"Once he wakes up and feels okay, you can start to arrange the payments and his discharge."

Jungkook smiled ironically. "Sure."

The doctor left and the wait began. During the first hour, Jungkook saw Jinho being strolled in his bed into his VIP room. Jungkook himself demanded for the VIP room because of the things he wanted to do to Jinho once he woke up. While the room wasn't as big as what Y/n used to have, it was still spacious enough for Jungkook to sit far from his assistant where he could reorder his thoughts.

While Jungkook was adamant that his methods were right and he didn't bypass any process, Y/n somehow acted like she couldn't register her surroundings well. Like she wasn't conscious, which was obviously laughable because he was sure everything was under control. There was no reason, absolutely no reason for the transfer to fail. No way. Only stupid people would fail and he wasn't stupid.

And then, Jinho began to stir awake from the anesthesia. Jungkook quickly rushed to his side and called the doctor.

"Feeling okay?" Jungkook asked.

Jinho nodded but then grimaced.

"I see," Jungkook said as the doctor came into the room.

"Mr. Su. I'm going to do some checks on you. And if you're alright, you can go home anytime you're ready."

The doctor, along with a nurse, checked up on Jinho just like what Jinho himself did to Jungkook a couple of weeks ago. Crazy how in the span of a few weeks a lot had happened.

"Well, Mr. Su, everything looks good. Should you have any complaints, just call me, okay? Just like I said, you can go home anytime."

Jinho let out a weak, "Sure. Thanks," as a response.

Just as the doctor and the nurse left, it was finally Jungkook's turn.

"Jinho, sorry for what happened to you," Jungkook apologized, even Jungkook himself was surprised he could say sorry genuinely.

"It's fine. The cost of science."

"Right. Science." Silence filled the room before he spoke up again. "What do you think happened?"

Jinho wet his lips with his tongue. "I can't really be sure, but my best bet is that we're left with another case similar to the cat."

If the room were quieter, Jungkook probably could hear his heart dropping. It was one to hear your wife dead and another to hear your wife turned into a cannibalistic zombie.

"Is there a way to reverse it? Or fix it?" At this point, he had almost exhausted all of his options except one. One that he couldn't bring himself to say or even to think of.

But Jinho dared himself. "You need to kill her."

Like it was undebatable, Jungkook snapped, “Absolutely not. Are you out of your mind?”

Jinho took a ragged breath. "I'm sorry, Prof, but she can be a danger even to you."

"No." No one could make him change his mind. He wasn't going to kill his wife again for the second time. "There should be a way out."

"I wish, Prof. But I don't think we can do anything about it."

"Stop saying nonsense! There is a way, we just need to figure it out. You're not behaving like a very good assistant now." If it weren't for the gauze around Jinho's head, Jungkook probably would have hit something with his bare hands. "I'm leaving."

Jungkook walked out of the damned hospital feeling like he should've left earlier.

With every kilometer closer to the lab, Jungkook's thoughts slowly poisoned with doubt. He wondered what if Jinho was right, what if the only right way out is to kill her.

He shuddered at the thought. His heart raced and head hurt. On one hand, he loved Y/n too much to kill her, but on the other side, he knew well that his Y/n was no longer there. Just like the cat.

Just like a game of tug of war, his mind is torn between the two choices, whether to live forever with what's left of Y/n or to live forever with the figment of his imagination of Y/n.

Once he arrived on his lab's driveway and parked his car, Jungkook reached out his trembling hand out towards the glove box. He opened the box and took out his other prized possession, his pistol.

Safe and armed, but still as scared and anxious as before, Jungkook jumped out of the car and walked into his lab.

Jungkook went straight to the storage room door and listened attentively to any sound from inside. But his ear caught nothing besides the sound of the ticking clock on the wall.

He opened the door while whispering more towards himself, “Y/n, I love you. I’m sorry for what I’m about to do.”

As expected, once the sliver of light entered the room, Y/n growled and leaped at the door. And when she noticed Jungkook’s presence, she turned her attention towards him. She came at him and almost jumped him if it wasn’t for the loud bang that rendered her scrawled on the floor.

Y/n began to let out a cry that sounded more like a howl in Jungkook’s ears. If he were honest, her cries always hurt him more than her. But he knew this wasn’t the time to ponder. He had made up his mind and he had to finish what he had started.

Before Y/n could gain leverage to stand up and attack him again, Jungkook mustered all his courage and shot her straight in her heart. Not once or twice, but three times to make sure she wouldn’t suddenly wake up again.

And true enough, not long after, he could see a pool of artificial blood surrounding where Y/n body was laying down and his tears began to fall.

Part 16: The Wedding

It felt unreal. Like he was in a movie show and both Y/n and him were the main characters.

All eyes were on them as the officiant said, "I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride!"

As practiced over and over, Jungkook reached for Y/n and kissed her lips passionately. He intended to make the kiss short and sweet, but when he tasted Y/n's strawberry lip balm and smelled her favorite aquatic perfume, he couldn't take it anymore.

He devoured her as if his life depended on it. He wanted to taste her, feel her, be one with her. He could never get enough of her. And when Y/n reciprocated his kiss, she deepened the kiss, Jungkook was in heaven.

He could only be brought back to the moment when the officiant cleared his throat, seemingly trying to remind him where he was.

Reluctantly, Jungkook let go of Y/n's which looked flustered with red cheeks and plump lips. 'Beautiful,' he thought to himself.

As the wedding ceremony progressed to a wedding party, Jungkook grew impatient. He wanted to get done with the party and taste his wife fully. If he could have his way, he wouldn't have held a party at all. But of course his wife got in the way and vetoed his idea. So the party happened.

White gowns, pink flowers, and everyone she ever knew in her life was invited. Even though he was against it, Jungkook really went out his way to make sure that Y/n had the perfect party she had always dreamed of. Jungkook even pulled some strings just to have all her cousins and elementary school friends come and celebrate their special day. As Jungkook looked at Y/n who mingled with her old friends with a wide grin on her face, he knew he made the right choice of hosting the party.

Y/n was just seen waving off some of their guests before walking towards him with a big smile on her face. Her eyes looked a bit drowsy after hours of talking with her guests but still glistening with excitement. Jungkook could've sworn he had never seen her this happy before.

"It was Seyeon. Do you remember her?" Y/n asked.

Jungkook laughed, remembering how he used to dislike her for clinging to Y/n all the time. "And the guy coming with her?"

Y/n came closer to him and whispered in his ear, "That's her second husband."

Jungkook's eyes widened. He never would have thought a quiet girl like Seyeon would get married multiple times.

"And where is her first husband?"

Y/n shrugged. "I didn't dare ask her. It sounds like a sensitive topic. So let's just be happy for her second marriage, yeah?"

"Sure," Jungkook answered just to make the process faster since their families were already waiting outside the ballroom.

Jungkook looped his arm around his wife's waist and they both walked out the ballroom where the limo that would take them to the airport was waiting.

From the corner of his eyes, he could see every single family member and friends waving and smiling at them. Some even got the chance to bid them farewell like Y/n's mom who kissed Y/n's cheek right before she got into the car.

"I'll keep in touch, I promise," Jungkook heard Y/n tell her mom.

When the door closed behind them, they both smiled wide at each other while holding hands, eyes meeting one another as if they're trying to remember each other's faces. And then, it was finally time to go.

Part 17: The Realization

"Oh, no. No no no. It can't be." Jungkook kneeled beside Y/n's new yet lifeless body.

He shook, pinched, and even slapped her, trying to wake her up, but of course nothing could wake her up ever again. He had totally lost her forever.

"No way. No," Jungkook cried. He buried his face on Y/n's stomach, not even once caring about the artificial blood that started to stain his clothes. "Y/n, I'm so sorry."

Jungkook could only bear so much in his 80 years of living in the world. He had lost his son too early due to overdosing, failed to upload his mind when he was still alive. He had witnessed it first hand when Y/n's doctor read her diagnosis. He had to accompany Y/n through every single chemos until the point where her body was too weak to leave the hospital altogether. He simply couldn't bear the loss of his dear wife. It was too much even for a man like Jungkook.

Jungkook didn't know how long he had stayed beside Y/n. He didn't even care about his growling stomach or his drying eyes. He could even swear that he had fallen asleep for quite some time. For all he knew, he came back to the lab when the sky was already black and now he could see a sliver of light coming through from the small slits on the wall.

Even though his body was man made, his bones cracked and his joints popped when he stood up from his slouched position on the floor. Jungkook stretched his body, popping more joints, as he stared at what he had done the night before.

Y/n was still pretty much in her previous position, but her arms had moved since Jungkook hugged her the night before. Now her arms were just contorting in an awkward position beside her torso. 

Jungkook cringed at the sight. "I need to get rid of the body," Jungkook said to himself.

He grabbed a shovel from the rack inside the storage room, walked out towards the lab's small backyard, and began digging on the damp soil. Once he deemed that the hole was big enough, he dragged Y/n's old body and new body one by one and dropped them into the hole. All the while, his heart ached and his tears threatened to fall again.

No longer being able to hold back his tears, Jungkook cried while he buried both bodies. Drop of tears fell to the newly piled soil, as if sealing the burial site of his lover.

"I'm sorry, Y/n. I failed at being a good husband and a scientist. I failed you," was the last words he said before he plucked a random flower in the garden and placed it gently on top of Y/n's final resting place.

Done with what he had to do, Jungkook went back inside the lab, brought his important stuff with him, and locked the door. He was finally ready to go home, or rather penthouse, as his home had left him for good.

Part 18: The Diagnosis

The beeping sound that usually annoyed him this time didn’t faze him at all. He was busy calming down his dear wife that was laying down on the hospital bed.

“Babe, I’m scared. What if I only have a few months left?” Y/n gripped his hand tight as if he could disappear if she let go for a split second.

Jungkook himself was also worried about that. He, too, didn’t want to be left alone by his wife. But he was just scared to voice it. He didn’t want to actually jinx it, or worse, made Y/n even more scared than she already was.

In a totally Jungkook-style, he replied, "I've almost finished with my technology. Everything will be okay. We'll be fine." All the while, his wrinkled hand softly caressed Y/n's.

As if on cue, the doctor came into the room while holding a clipboard to his chest. His hair was unruly, Jungkook reckoned he might have shuffled his hair in frustration. That couldn't be a good sign, Jungkook knew that and his mind was already running on the worst possible scenarios.

"How is it, doctor?" Jungkook asked.

"Mrs. Jeon is tested positive for Cervical Cancer."

Jungkook's defenses collapsed as he shouted, "No! There must be something wrong. Y/n is fine. She should be."

His ears were ringing, Y/n was sobbing beside him, and the doctor was looking at both of them sympathetically. The world must be pulling a prank on him. If not, the world must be truly evil for letting this happen to him.

Part 19: The Laboratory

Jungkook couldn't remember where he had kept the keys nor could he remember the name of the road of which his damned laboratory was built upon. And frankly, if it wasn't for motherfucking Jinho who insisted he check on the lab, he didn't care.

After the disaster upon disaster that happened to him, Jungkook wanted nothing to do with his failed project and his late wife. He enjoyed life as if he got a second chance to redo his life. And practically, he did get a second chance.

He clubbed, he got wasted, he tried whatever drugs he could get his hands on, he got high, he did one night stands. He did everything he could to forget his past. He partially succeeded, especially when he was so intoxicated out of his mind, until one morning when Jinho came to his penthouse.

It was just another day where he clubbed until 4 am. He was still peacefully snoring when the intercom beeped, signalling that the security was trying to reach him.

Jungkook stretched his body and moaned loudly, all with eyes shut. The room he was in, the guest room, was reeking of sweat and alcohol. His head pounded and throat was desert dry. The intercom beeped again.

He opened his eyes and took in the situation he was in. Beside him, a woman whose name he didn't care to know was sleeping soundly. Low snores could be heard every time she exhaled. Her unruly hair sprawled across the bed and covered parts of her face.

'Good,' Jungkook thought to himself as he pushed himself up from the bed. He didn't want to see the woman's face just yet. The intercom beeped again.

Huffing, Jungkook walked towards the intercom. "What is it?" he croaked.

"Good morning, is this Professor Jeon?" The familiar voice of the security could be heard from the intercom.

"I'm his grandson. What is it? Make it quick."

"Someone wishes to meet Professor Jeon."

"Who?"

"He said his name is Su Jinho."

Upon hearing his former assistant's name, Jungkook groaned. "Let him up."

Not wanting to suffer the dry throat and headache any longer, Jungkook swallowed some Tylenol and threw himself onto his couch in the living room. He had one more problem that was still laying on his bed, but his energy had already drained.

Lucky for him, not long after he slumped on his couch, the problem walked out the guest room. She only wore a bra and underwear. Her hair didn't look any better than it did sprawled on the bed. And her makeup ran down her face, making her look like she just cried all night.

"Should we get breakfast?" the woman had the audacity to ask him that while rummaging through his fridge.

"No. Get the fuck off. I have a guest coming." Jungkook slowly got up from the couch and pushed the woman out of his kitchen.

The woman pouted at him. "But I haven't eaten anything! And my clothes are gone."

Jungkook shrugged. "Nor have I. And who cares where your clothes are."

Jungkook continued to push the woman closer to his penthouse door as the woman struggled against him.

"Why are you doing this?" the woman asked.

"Doing what?" Jungkook opened the door.

"Taking my innocence. I thought you love me."

Not impressed by her unfunny joke, Jungkook ironically laughed. "Haha, that's funny. I don't do love. It doesn't look good on me."

With a final push, Jungkook pushed the woman and locked the door. She began banging on the door, yelling something along the lines of she was naked and left her phone inside, but Jungkook had more problems to take care of.

"She'll get over it," Jungkook mumbled to himself as he closed the guest room, making a mental note to clean it up after Jinho left.

The doorbell rang, implying someone was waiting outside. Not wanting to accidentally meet the previous woman's wrath, Jungkook peeped through the peephole. Luckily, he was met with a familiar receding hairline of Jinho.

Promptly, Jungkook opened the door and said, “Why are you here?” to the man standing in front of him. His eyes couldn't help but train at the missing ear. Jinho probably never cared to get a prosthetic ear, either that or he wore it proudly as a battle scar.

Instead of answering his question, Jinho walked into his penthouse with another question, "Do you know that crying woman in the hallway?"

"Nope."

Jinho took a seat on the couch. "Do you know you're still in boxers?"

Jungkook slumped beside him. "So?"

"Prof, what happened?" This time, Jinho asked with a tone that Jungkook didn't like. Sympathy.

"Cut the bullshit. You know what happened."

"I know. But this is not you."

Jungkook inhaled deeply before lecturing his former assistant. "Jinho, stop reprimanding me. And stop saying clichés. I hate it. Just say what you're here for and leave."

"I just want to check up on you and the lab."

Jungkook let out a laugh. "The lab? Absolutely not. I'd rather you ask me to destroy it."

"No, prof. I want to check what went wrong."

"Why? It's been years. It's better if you get a prosthetic ear than redoing the experiment."

"I don't want to redo it, I just want to publish it."

Upon hearing what Jinho had said, Jungkook grew intrigued. If it were possible, his ears would probably have gone straighter. "Are you finally getting that Ph.D.?"

"That's why I need to publish an article."

"Why didn't you say so earlier?" Jungkook said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Jungkook stood up from the couch at the same time as Jinho said, "Well, are we going?"

"Yeah. But don't get anywhere near the grave."

As promised, once they arrived at the lab, Jinho went straight inside, leaving Jungkook just beside the grave.

The grave looked nightmarish given that Jungkook never bothered to take care of it after he buried Y/n. Weeds grow wildly around and on the grave, making the grave look less like a grave and more like a random bump of dirt.

“Hey, Y/n. Long time no see.”

Out of nowhere, Jungkook felt a sting in his eyes and his eyes watered. This was exactly the reason why he didn’t want to have anything to do with the lab anymore. He was partially fine without the lab and would be better off once he had fully forgotten it.

Jungkook sniffled. “I hope you’re doing well wherever you are, because I’m not.” Jungkook plucked a random pink flower he saw in the small garden and placed it on top of the grave. “Life is shit without you.”

Jungkook looked around his surroundings. Except for the weeds and moss, not much has changed. Things were visibly dusty, but nothing a broom or duster can’t fix. The small garden which was initially Y/n’s idea, now breeds wild ivy almost everywhere. Jungkook snorted at the sight. Both the garden and him weren’t so much different after all. They both came worse off without Y/n tending to them.

Not wanting to ruin the moment by staying gloomy, Jungkook stood up from his crouching position and followed Jinho inside.

Inside was not much different. Dust was everywhere, but Jinho managed to clean two stools and a desk in which he sat at one. Jungkook walked closer and sat on the other chair.

“What did you find?” he asked as Jinho shoved a notebook to his hand.

“Why are you giving me this?” Jungkook fumbled with the book. It was still dirty despite Jinho’s visible attempt to clean it. The leather cover was worn and scratched in places, the pages were turning yellow. Inside, Y/n’s familiar neat writings could be seen but just on the first page. Jungkook wondered why and what did Y/n write there but he kept it to himself. It was something he should figure out himself.

“It’s Y/n’s, I reckon. You might want to have it.”

“Thanks.” He closed the book and put it on the table. “Did you find anything else?”

“Yes.” The answer was short but brooding with something Jungkook couldn’t put his finger on.

“What is it?”

Without words, Jinho pointed to a text on the monitor. On it written in red with big bold font the word ‘ERROR’.

“If my calculations are correct, the transfer failed because of the error. And we didn’t notice that because we deliberately ignored the error signals.”

Part 20: The Notebook

Hello, Jungkook baby,

I’m not sure whether you’ll read this or not, but I still want to write to you something. I’m writing here moments after you visited me and showed me your new body. I can’t express how happy I am to see that your experiment finally came to fruition. There’s nothing better than seeing young Jungkook again before my death. That is if I really am going to die. If not, I will probably get rid of this book. So now that you’re reading this means that I’m no longer with you. But don’t worry, don’t be sad, nor be disappointed in yourself. I know you feel like a failure every time someone close to you passes away, but don’t feel the same when it’s my turn.

I know I won’t live forever and I intend to keep it that way even though your technology might have defied the laws of nature. Life has done some good things to me like letting me marry you, letting me have our son, and even seeing young Jungkook again. I’m so grateful that I have made many beautiful memories with you that I often replay here on the hospital bed when you’re not here with me. And I want you to do just the same.

Let go of all sadness and disappointment and just remember me in your daydreams. Live your unlimited life as best as possible for this is your second shot at life. And if you fall in love with another woman, be with her. Shower her with love the same way you did with me. Because, your second life is for you and her to enjoy, not mine.

Both our first lives had been spent with one another and I want to keep it that way. So, Jungkook baby, be well and live your life. I’ll always love you.

Yours always,

Y/n

[Taglist]

@lyoongx @jjddk @babeejeon @thehopelessromanticclub @okvmv @rg2108 @idkhieveryoneig @misshale21 @dna-black-and-blue @chimggukk @lovingkoalaface @yok00k @bamieeee03 @ihatesnakeu7 @lovelyyylunaa222 @134340-kr @cherricherry @jeonzll @loomipee @haru-jiminn @kissforyouu @mageprincess7 @lachimolalajeon @sglossmin @jjk174 @looneyblues @junecat18 @futuristicenemychaos @aindrila7 @reallygenerouskoala

[zeroseuniverse]

Just Friends?

Word Count: 774 Summary: “Are you two dating?” Haechan would laugh, wave it off, and insist, “Nah, we’re just friends.” Pairing: Haechan X Fem Reader

Haechan had always been a little too loud, a little too playful, and maybe a little too reliant on the presence of his best friend. But that’s how it had always been—natural, easy, and entirely platonic. Or at least, that’s what he told himself.

From the moment they met in high school, they were inseparable. They’d spent countless nights gaming until sunrise, laughing until their sides hurt, and pulling off the kinds of pranks that got them both into trouble. People constantly mistook their closeness for something more, but every time someone asked, “Are you two dating?” Haechan would laugh, wave it off, and insist, “Nah, we’re just friends.”

But recently, the "just friends" label didn’t sit quite as comfortably as it used to.

The cracks began to show at a mutual friend’s wedding. Watching his best friend dressed to perfection, effortlessly chatting and laughing with other guests, made something in Haechan’s chest tighten in a way he couldn’t ignore. His usual confidence wavered when he saw her smiling at someone else, and for the first time, he felt like a spectator in her life instead of the main character.

The night only worsened when someone asked them to dance. Haechan’s jaw tightened, his grip on his drink a little too firm as he watched her take the stranger’s hand and head to the dance floor. He tried to focus on anything else—his other friends, the music, even the buffet—but his gaze kept drifting back to her.

Why was he so bothered?

Later, when she finally returned to their table, Haechan’s teasing smile faltered. “Nice moves out there,” he said, his voice a little too casual. “Should I be jealous?”

His best friend shot him a look, half amused, half curious. “Jealous? Of what?”

“Of your new dance partner,” he replied, trying to keep his tone light, though the edge of sincerity crept in despite himself.

She shrugged, giving him a playful nudge. “Please, like anyone could compare to you.”

The words were meant to tease, but she sent Haechan’s heart racing. He forced out a laugh, but the knot in his chest tightened. What was happening to him?

Over the next few weeks, everything felt different. He started noticing the little things—how her laugh was his favorite sound, how her presence made everything feel brighter, how he always looked for her face in a crowded room.

It wasn’t one-sided, either. She began noticing the ways Haechan had always cared for her, in his own chaotic but thoughtful way. The way he’d bring her favorite coffee without being asked. How he’d always make sure she got home safely, no matter the hour. How his teasing never crossed a line, always laced with affection instead of malice.

Their friendship became laced with new tension—awkward silences that hadn’t been there before, lingering touches that felt electric, and stolen glances when they thought the other wasn’t looking.

One night, after a particularly long gaming session, they sat together in the quiet of Haechan’s living room. The only light came from the TV, casting soft shadows across their faces.

“Do you ever think about us?” she asked suddenly, her voice barely above a whisper.

Haechan froze, his heart pounding. He played dumb, because that’s what he did when things got serious. “What about us? Like, our legendary gaming skills?”

She rolled her eyes, but her smile was soft. “No, I mean... us. You and me. Like, if we ever—” she stopped, shaking her head. “Never mind.”

But Haechan didn’t let it drop. For once, he didn’t deflect.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “I think about it all the time.”

The confession hung in the air, heavy and undeniable. His best friend stared at him, wide-eyed, as Haechan rubbed the back of his neck nervously.

“I don’t know when it started,” he admitted, his voice barely above a whisper. “But I can’t stop thinking about you. And not just as my best friend. I... I think I’m in love with you.”

Her eyes softened, and a small smile tugged at her lips. “You think?”

“Fine,” Haechan said with a dramatic sigh, his humor creeping back in to mask his nerves. “I know. Happy now?”

She  laughed, and the sound made his chest feel light for the first time in weeks.

“Haechan,” she said softly, reaching out to take his hand. “You’re stuck with me forever, you know that, right?”

He grinned, his usual playful confidence returning. “Good, because I’d really like that.”

And just like that, the walls between them crumbled, leaving only the warmth of something real, something inevitable, and something neither of them wanted to let go of.

[th3cadav3r]

Hello! I think a nice sfw fluff scenario for the Tulpar crew would be headcanons of how each character would react when the reader hesitantly tells them they don’t like sex or are asexual. Reader can be gn. Thank you, I really like your headcanon writings!

SFW Mouthwashing Headcanons—Asexual Reader

content: fluff, kissing, cuddling, mentions of sex, very very very slight acephobia from Jimmy(but with a happy ending)

author’s note: Keep in mind that I am not asexual therefore I cannot understand or fully grasp the asexual experience. I just tried my best based on what I’ve seen and heard online. Hope you enjoy!

Daisuke

You and him had been dating for about three weeks

You always held hands and made out a lot, but nothing more than that

His libido is pretty high because of his age, so naturally he wanted more

You were making out on the couch when suddenly you felt his hands start to wander

It was fine at first until his hand started reaching a little too low for comfort

“Wait—”you blurt out

He stops immediately, retracting his hand

“Sorry, did I do something wrong?” His voice is full of genuine concern

“No, it’s not your fault. I just uh…don’t want that”

He was a little confused. “We can move to my bed if you want” He suggests, thinking that you just wanted more privacy than the living room provided

“No, I…I mean I don’t want to have sex. It’s not you, it’s me. I just don’t like it”

He didn’t expect that but he understood. He smiled reassuringly

“That’s alright. I get it”

You breathed a sigh of relief and your body relaxed. You felt like you truly didn’t deserve such a sweet boyfriend

“Here—we can just cuddle instead” He offers with his arms open. You gladly accept

You spent the rest of the afternoon napping together and playing video games when you woke up

This was definitely different for him compared to his previous relationships, but he didn’t care. He loves you for you

Anya

You started dating towards the end of the trip

She’s more of a words of affection girl than a physical touch girl, which is perfect for you

At one point when things started to get a bit steamy, you finally told her

“Before this gets too far…you should know something about me”

You tell her how you feel no desire for sex but that you still love her the same. Of course she’s understanding once you explain it to her

“I appreciate that you told me”

You both have a long discussion about what is and isn’t okay in regards to your and her comfort. And you both come out of the conversation with a much better and deeper understanding of each other

Now whenever you and her get touchy, she knows exactly what to do to make you feel good without crossing the line

Curly

There was no doubt about it: You were the captain’s favourite

You spent a lot of time alone with him in the cockpit just chatting about the most random things

He definitely grew a liking to you and you to him. One day he asked you what exactly he was to you

You confessed your feelings to him and he does the same. While the moment feels amazing, you can’t help but feel worried about his reaction to your sexuality

“Hey, I should let you know–” You decide to just tell him now. “–I don’t really want this to be a sexual thing, okay?”

He’s a bit taken aback, you can clearly see that in his face. But he is by no means offended or upset

“No worries, then,” he reassures. “Thanks for telling me”

For the next few days, he was very overly cautious. He asked if you were comfortable before he gave you any kind of physical affection. It was a bit exhausting at first, but you appreciated that he cared so much

Swansea

Let’s be real: This man is old

His sex drive is almost all long gone

And he let you know this when you told him about your lack of sexual desire

“Yeah, so what?” he says gruffly and bluntly. “I’m fifty-fuckin’-six years old, sweetheart. Just thinking about sex makes my back hurt”

You were totally expecting that response. It still made you smile from ear to ear though

He wasn’t really a lovey-dovey type of guy when the others were around, but when you two were alone in his bedroom he was a lot more affectionate. Cuddles, kisses, caresses…everything he did was so gentle and comfortable

Jimmy

You’re definitely a lot closer to him than anyone else on board, even Curly

Neither of you really knew where you stood in terms of a relationship, but your “hangouts” included a lot of making out and touching

This was fine initially, but at a certain point it became too much for you

“Hold on—”You grab his wandering hand and move it off of your body

“What?” He was genuinely surprised that you stopped him

“This is going a bit too far for me”Your body tenses up, anticipating a very awkward and uncomfortable conversation

“What do you mean?” He sounded a little hurt and a bit annoyed

“I don’t…have a drive like that. I don’t want to do sexual stuff”You laid it all out for him

He was quiet for a bit. You couldn’t exactly read his face so you were starting to get a little nervous

“It’s not because of me, right?”

“No, of course not,” you reassure. “That’s just how I am”

He sighs. Whether it was out of relief or frustration you couldn’t tell

“Alright”

The atmosphere between you and him was a little awkward for the next few days. You couldn’t help but worry

“Sorry if I was being distant,” he finally told you one afternoon. “Just thinking things through”

“That’s alright” You were lying; you were a little upset that he basically ghosted you after you were so vulnerable with him, but you were willing to just let it go, at least for now

“I know you have your…thing. But I still like you”

Well that was a surprise. But a good one. Definitely a good one. You told him that you liked him back

He was a bit disappointed that he couldn’t do everything he hoped to do with you, but he still liked you a lot. Besides, he could always just “take care” of himself in private

[friedcheesemogu]

WHY WILLIAM BRANDT IS MY FAVORITE "MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE" CHARACTER

This is a presentation I made for my discord last year, mostly for my own enjoyment, hopefully someone else will find it fun.

(I will state up front that it doesn't include anything about "M:I: Dead Reckoning" or any speculation on "Final Reckoning." For reasons.) Grab your snacks, here we go:

Hi. Thanks for coming.

Once upon a time, back in 2011, a friend wanted to go see "Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol." I had seen "MI2" in theaters, promptly forgotten about it, and mostly we were going to this because my friend loved Simon Pegg, and this Jeremy Renner dude was going to be playing Hawkeye in the spring in "Avengers" so we were interested in checking him out. I liked the character of William Brandt a lot, and was very relieved when he wasn't the bad guy.

I then promptly forgot about him for the next 9 years.

In the summer of 2020, my housemate brought home the MI blu-ray set. When he put on MI1, I started off across the room from the TV, slowly crawling closer, climbing over the couch, finally committing to it... and had a great time. I mean, MI2 is hot garbage, but whatever, doves, man. MI3 was solid, and then I saw "Ghost Protocol," and I imprinted on William Brandt. Like hardcore. Like it makes me look stupid.

But I can't talk about him without first talking about...

I. ETHAN HUNT

Have you seen this man? Now you have.

So I see the MI series as a long term character journey for Ethan.

Each movie is different and each Ethan is different, based on where he is in life. (And yes, I know that's also because up until a point they all had different directors, but hear me out).

MI1:

The cocky beginner with nothing to lose. Well... he loses a few things, but by the end of it, he's pretty well set up. He also plans to get out of the game until the very end.

MI2:

Ethan's emo phase. He's becoming better at his job and he knows it, he's careless and rash with himself and with other people. And again he walks away at the end.

MI3:

"I'm trying to be normal." Ethan's gotten older, and is initially out of the field, and he wants to try that, he wants to see if he can have a civilian life with the woman he loves, live in a house, have a dog... He genuinely loves Julia and wants to be with her. Even at the end, I think he still has an idea that he can balance this life with IMF.

But then...

MI4:

This is the turning point. This is the crux of the change.

A friend once said that GP "isn't essential to watch" and my argument to that was, "what the fuck." Let's look into this.

Up until this point, Ethan's attitude has been "I can leave/I want to leave."

In MI3, he even asks Luther to "remember a life before all this," assuming and idealizing that as something better than what he is or what he has when he's with IMF

GP is the first time that Ethan is in it from the beginning. He's not green. He's not on vacation. He's not trying to run. He's been in a Russian Prison for two years and he put himself there. Now we start to see that his priorities have shifted, or at least, his priorities have made it such that he feels/needs/wants to be in the game. And here we find out what he's given up to do it: his marriage, his freedom, his physical and mental wellbeing (inasmuch as Ethan ever thinks about his mental wellbeing, but that's a different post)

At the end, it's the first time we see him walk directly towards another mission instead instead of trying to get away.

This is also the first time he seems to really appreciate his team and hold himself and them accountable to each other. After talking to The Fog, the team that was chosen for him.

...becomes the team he chooses.

(Please take a moment to admire how cute they are, how helpful. Jane Carter, my queen. Benji Dunn, my moppet.)

And part of the team he chooses to finish the job includes that guy that they "inherited:"

He chooses William Brandt.

LET'S LOOK AT THESE FINE BITCHES A FEW MORE TIMES:

*muffled "Crew" by Dessa" playing the background*

This image is my phone case.

Anyway, let's get to the main event: why William Brandt?

II. WILL

I'm gonna refer to him as "Will" from this point on, because this man is my baby. He is tattooed on my thigh. We are close, and every time I think about the fact that he is the only team member who never gets called anything but "Brandt" it breaks my heart. So I'm not gonna do that to him.

Will is unlike any team member Ethan has ever had.

Most people want to work with Ethan. Will would rather be anywhere else. He's an unwilling participant. He doubts his abilities and his usefulness even though he has the training and he knows the job. He's nervous. He's not ready for this. He doesn't want to do it...but he has to. So he will.

Ethan can't read him

Ethan is extremely good at figuring people out, or at least coming up with a rough idea of who they are/what they're after very quickly (traitors notwithstanding). But Will hides his true self perfectly. Well... almost.

Until he was actually fighting for his life, Ethan and the others assumed Will was just baggage. The fact that Ethan pauses mid fight to notice Will breaking a dude's leg is notable, because that's the moment he realizes he's misjudged him completely. Will has the ability to blend in and not seem like a threat, when the truth is, he's as fast as Ethan and can more than hold his own.

This scene is so fast that even though I've watched it about 436 times I still can't follow their hands and MY GOD it's so sexy I want to throw my computer across the room.

Will can pass in both the political world that Ethan shuns and on the field. He works with Hunley while simultaneously subverting him. He's able to do the field work in Mumbai and play along flawlessly in London in "Rogue Nation."

There is no literally reason for Ethan to say "you tell me yours, I'll tell you mine" in that tone of voice while they look each other up and down unless...

Anyway.

2. Will has real and believable pain and guilt

Will spends all of GP working with someone whose life he feels responsible for ruining. Whose wife he feels responsible for killing. He's haunted by Croatia and it's visible on his face when he talks about it to Jane and Benji (thank you Jeremy Renner). His emotions are crippling in a way that has never been addressed before, because they bring up what Ethan has only started to accept at this point: the cost of what they do is that you can lose people, forever. You can lose your faith in the job, in yourself, and sometimes that breaks you. Will, for all his high position, skill, and intelligence, considers himself a failure.

It's also worth noting that he and Jane are interesting parallels: they were both in charge of missions where they fucked up and now have to face their mistakes directly to fix them. But Jane is able to take her anger and her pain and turn it around; it takes Will years to even face it, and that's only under duress. That he rises to the occasion is to his credit, but it's hardly unreasonable to be so shaken by how you've failed that it takes a very long time to pick yourself back up.

3. Loyalty

Something I feel Will never really gets credit for is his loyalty to so many things, even at the cost of his sense of self.

He's loyal to IMF - he never left. Even when he was at his lowest, he did something else within the agency. He committed himself to this and he's going to do it, no matter how much it hurts.

He's beyond loyal to Ethan. Without him, Ethan might not have made it away from Hunley or survived the events of "Rogue Nation." In the tie-in comic "Torn Asunder", it is heavily implied that Will is the one who warns Ethan of when Hunley is getting close. He's on the inside making sure Ethan can stay one step ahead. It's true that Ethan ultimately reaches out to Benji, but that's because Will has a cover that's so deep Luther calls him "a sellout." He's also willing to play the part of the traitor successfully because he's kept Hunley at bay for so long. He also straight up kills someone with a car to save Ethan and Benji (and no one ever thanks him for any of this, by the way).

But he's also one of the few people who ever says "no"

For all his loyalty and commitment to Ethan, he's willing to argue with him -over the briefcase with the codes, over jumping, over what the hell Ethan means when he says "do you see" in the parking lot after Benji is kidnapped- to a point that it becomes more of a fight.

Will is not always right in these situations (or right by the standards of the insane people on the team), but he does have to have things explained, have to be persuaded that this is not some crazy bullshit. He wants the details because he knows those matter -that's his job, to find them, know them, and analyze them. It may seem like he's doubting Ethan when he asks "what happens if you don't make it back," but he's making a reasonable request of someone he knows isn't actually superhuman. Will is well aware that they are both fallible humans, and he takes that into account.

He's just so interesting...

4. Will and Ethan's relationship

Will is Ethan's foil. He left "this life" like Ethan tried so many times, but didn't actually leave any of it behind. He is what Ethan could be if he let the entire weight of his whole life on him (which I'm not saying he should do, not until he has time for a whole lot of therapy) and went "oh my god, what happened, what have I done?"

Will knows how to play by the rules, and thereby how to break them; Ethan breaks the rules to play by his own. Will knows the cost and -for better or worse- lets that keep him from acting; Ethan hopes that if he acts enough it'll balance what it's cost to do it.

Something I think about a lot is this: it's not entirely clear if the Serbian hit squad that "killed" Julia was an actual group of people acting independently or whether the entire thing -and therefore Ethan killing six people- was set up by Ethan and the Secretary. If it's the latter they allowed Will to shoulder the entire blame for the incident (which is super fucked up, by the way). Regardless of whose "job" it was to protect Julia, IMF and Ethan threw Will under several buses. Once he knows this, he could use this against Ethan at any point -a reason not to trust him, a bargaining chip to get what he wants- but he doesn't. Will keeps Ethan's darkest secret and is trusted with it, possibly even before Luther. And he protects it, protects Julia, protects Ethan. Ethan asks Will to compromise everything he is while knowing that Will has the means to destroy him, and Will does it, because he'd rather put himself in danger than betray him. I think that says a lot about him (and again, a simple "thank you" would have been nice).

And of course there's this:

Ethan's life has never been more literally in anyone's hands than Will's. For all the ways Ethan fails to trust him for most of GP, Will doesn't hesitate for a second to jump out the window to save the life of the man who ruined his. And he was fast enough to do it, which I think says a little about his skill level.

(Mad props to Jane too, let's not forget her.)

III. Saturn take the leap

*"Hero" by Faouzia playing gently in the foreground*

Will is the kind of character I find endlessly fascinating. He's got so much going on under the surface, but the surface is so artfully crafted that it's distracting. He's withdrawn, but he's not shy. He's physically adept, but the suit makes you think otherwise. He's obviously very intelligent, and also capable of being a complete salty dumbass jerk. He's sad, and he hurts, but when he's challenged he doesn't back down. He's been watching Ethan's back for a long, long time, and because he didn't get a stupid ending in Fallout, I want to believe he still is.

A word from our sponsor:

If you please, Mr. Cruise:

And I'm so sorry that I've forgotten the source for this one, but it leads me into one of the final, most important points:

DAT ASS

*Janelle Monae's "Yoga" plays loudly and aggressively*

OH HELL YEAH THAT IS MY TWENTY DOLLAR PEACH RIGHT THERE

IV. Thank you!

If you made it this far, thanks for reading! I hope you found it at least a little interesting. Most of this was pieced together from notes I wrote last March that I understood then but past me did not account for future me and so I had to rewrite and rethink some of it. But William Brandt came out of obscurity to conquer my heart and become one of my all-time favorite characters. I sleep with a picture of him next to my bed. Yes I am grown up and pay taxes. This is the form my adulthood has taken.

I'm nervous about coming back to tumblr and still trying to find my footing, but one of the reasons I love fandom and fanfiction because there's so many more stories that can be told outside of the movies., and I want to make them and find them and hear about them. What has Will been doing since the end of RN? Are he and Jane besties? Do they all have movie nights where Benji picks the movie and everyone is like "why have you done this to us?" Let me talk to you about my canon divergence fic where among other things Ilsa is still alive and she and Will are not fond of each other... I personally love Will/Ethan as a ship, and I've dedicated my heart to it (AoT, anyone?), but there's so many options for everyone to pick their favorite character, favorite ship, whatever, and go deeper into them that we get to in the bursts of two to three hours they're on the screen. I'd love to talk with people about them and I'm hoping that I'll get the chance here. And then I can also mention my Mission Impossible dollhouse...

But for now, again, thanks. I really love William Brandt, the end.

[diaryofageekgirl]

Cross-posting my meta/ranting from the Helluva Boss subreddit. Originally posted June 22, 2024 (here):

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: I love both Stolas and Blitzø. I'm super invested in this relationship. Both of them made mistakes, but both of them are also coming from places of trauma and previous fucked up interpersonal relationships. That being said, I don't really feel the need to point out how Blitzø fucked up, because so much of the fandom is so biased towards Stolas that everyone is already well aware of that part of the problem. I'm also very aware of the fact that Stolas has grown significantly as a character, but sometimes people in the audience forget the difference between what WE know, and what the CHARACTERS know. Now that that's out of the way...

Oh my god, THANK YOU. There was one particular line in Apology Tour that stuck out to me, especially because Blitzø's reaction wasn't what I hoped it would be.

Stolas: "I don't look down on you! How many times do I ha- when have I ever?!"

Oh, I don't know dude, maybe the entire first season?!

Episode 1: refers to Blitzø as "my little imp" during the phone call (using his bottom-of-the-hierarchy species as a cute pet name is..... bad. It's bad). Also just fully ignores the fact that Blitzø tells him that it's not a good time, that he doesn't understand what he's saying (more than once!) and clearly just agrees to the deal in order to deal with the more pressing issue of being shot at.

Episode 2: CONSTANTLY flirts with Blitzø using incredibly sexual language throughout the episode, even when Blitzø repeatedly tells him that he doesn't want to be flirted with while he's working. (That's not even going into how he completely ignores Octavia's emotions/reactions to what's going on around her and just focuses on himself and what he thinks is a good idea in the moment. That's two for two on episodes where his stunning lack of self-awareness shines through).

Isn't in episode 3 or 4. Though I will take a second to acknowledge one line in episode 3 - when Blitzø charges into the room and challenges Verosika and her crew, one of the succubi says "Is this little imp boy starting a demon duel?" Yet another example of imps being treated as lesser by other demons.

Episode 5: The constant heavy-handed flirting in public, again, even though Blitzø repeatedly tells him not to, again. On top of that, there's the "itty bitty imps like yourself" comment that he makes to Blitzø while in bed, and not even a minute later, tells him in cutesy UWU baby talk that he's "sowwy his cwients wiw have to wait" - not taking Blitzø or his work seriously. And, of course, we get Striker telling Blitzø that Stolas treats him like a plaything.....

Episode 6: ......aaaaaand the very next episode has Stolas literally calling Blitzø his "impish little plaything". Side note, but I feel like most discussions about Stolitz's dynamic and the imbalance present in it focuses on this line in particular, but not the rest of his behaviour throughout the whole first season. He is constantly making aggressively sexual comments, oftentimes right after being asked or told not to by Blitzø, sometimes after being told more than once.

Episode 7, he's actually fine. Hiding his face when Ozzie singles him out isn't great, but he had just been publicly embarrassed, and if you watch in the background, he does get up from the table (likely about to try to help Blitzø) right at the end of Verosika's bit, before he's interrupted by Asmodeus. And while I'm certain he really did just want to "talk, or watch a movie, or cuddle", I can also see how easy it would be for Blitzø to interpret that as him asking to Netflix and Chill, as it were.

(Also, not a major thing, but having a little plush imp doll as a kid (as seen in S2E1) feels.....really weird, to me? Like I know most posts on SocMed and reactions on YT just see it as cute, and I'm probably reading too much into it, and I know that IRL toy dolls and stuffed dolls of people are a common thing, but just the idea of a prince having a plush doll of a low-class citizen feels really bad. A literal plaything, if you will.)

Season 2, Episode 2: Not much, but even though they had a tiny bit of a fight (if you can even call it that) after Ozzie's, and even though they haven't been communicating super well, and even though he's concerned about finding Octavia, Stolas still finds an opportunity to make a sexual comment towards Blitzø.

Season 2, Episode 4: Ohhhhhhhhhh my god, I never even used to be mad about this, but the way that it got brought up in Apology Tour made me pissed. Stolas now getting upset about Blitzø not coming to rescue him when Striker kidnapped him? Telling him that he "couldn't even be bothered to come help me"? Fuck. Off. With. That. As a father of a daughter himself, you'd think that Stolas would be sympathetic to the fact that Blitzø was trying to help out his own daughter in that scene, especially considering that he had to wait 5 fucking years for a mandatory medical procedure. Of fucking course he's not going to skip out on that! And just the way he responds to that:

Stolas: Oh, ha, ha. Well, I do agree that is very important...But, I-

(and then he's cut off by Striker). I urge anyone and everyone to go rewatch that bit of the episode, because his tone of voice is just so dismissive. Like, "yes, yes, that's nice, now drop everything and come rescue me, which is more important". And that's before he even realizes that he's in serious danger!!!

Like, I'm sorry, but where the fuck does he get off getting mad at Blitzø for "always making it about sex"? Blitzø has only ever reacted to the sexual advances that Stolas was putting out - even from the very first hook-up, Stolas just assumed that Blitzø was there to seduce him, and Blitzø just went along with it as a way to distract him while he stole the book. He agreed to the transactional fucking in episode 1 while he was being shot at and was trying to get Stolas off his back. He's expressed annoyance towards Stolas' sexual advances in episodes 2 and 5 of season 1. And now suddenly it's Blitzø that makes it all about sex?!

And what do you mean, "How many times do I ha-" Have to what, buddy? Tell him that you see him as an equal? You haven't done that yet. Tell him that you love him? You did that whole conversation in pretty much the exact wrong order and shut down when he didn't react like you imagined in your head. Tell him that you think highly of him? You haven't done that. Not directly to him, not where he could hear, not before the end of that argument, right before forcibly teleporting him away from you, which, y'know, just reinforces Blitzø's earlier comment about treating him like one of his butlers, and how he "can't just dismiss [him]."

He may not have ever actively viewed Blitzø as inferior to him, but there's a LOT of internalized classism going on that I'm not sure he's even aware of.

(continued in a later comment):

One thing I'd like to add to all of 👆 that: I mentioned a bit about other people in Hell talking down to imps, but one thing I forgot to talk about is how Stolas himself views imps that aren't Blitzø. Quick list (entirely from memory):

Refers to Millie and Moxxie as "you littler ones" in Loo-Loo Land

Refers to I.M.P. collectively as "you little creatures" in Truth Seekers

The generally condescending and dismissive way he talks to the imps of the Wrath Ring in Harvest Moon Festival - if I'm remembering correctly, he also refers to them as little! Like I get it, he's crazy tall, but we all know that's not the only way to interpret that comment.

3.5 Since Stolas (and a big chunk of the fandom) went ahead and compared Blitzø's comments to Striker's, I'm gonna do the same to him! Those comments are so reminiscent of Striker saying "you little things ain't worth the clean-up" to Moxxie and Millie, also from Harvest Moon Festival.

4. Picking up, forcefully squeezing, and swinging around his imp butler while he was mad during his phone call with Stella in Seeing Stars. I'm not saying that he's abusive towards his staff, or anything like that - just that the very fact that he did it at all seemed to be totally subconscious, which in turn suggests that he doesn't realize how demeaning that is.

5. Actually, now that I think about it - the fact that he's so upset that specifically Blitzø didn't rescue him in Western Energy. The main reason he's alive and not bleeding out in the bottom of a mine shaft is because Millie and Moxxie showed up, and they only knew to go there and help him because Blitzø told them/they were there during the phone call. Like, does he even know their names? Is he even grateful that they helped? We don't know!

I saw someone in another thread say that he was essentially at the equivalent of the "I'm not racist, I don't even see colour!" stage of racism, and I completely agree. He doesn't realize all of these internalized prejudices he has, but they are ABSOLUTELY there.

(comment on another thread, building off of the comments I made about s2e4, originally posted July 7, 2024):

Also, a few other points to build off of this & respond to other comments on this thread:

"But he didn't tell Stolas about the first time, and the Carmine-crafted gun that Striker had that can kill royal demons" - You mean the one that Moxxie took from him and still has in his possession at the end of Harvest Moon Festival? The one that Moxxie was shocked that Striker even managed to get his hands on? Remember, I.M.P. didn't know that Striker was working for anyone; logically, that means they would have assumed that he got the weapon entirely on his own, and something like that is both rare and expensive - imps don't typically "make it big" in Hell, and I can't imagine a powerful Overlord would be thrilled to give a weapon that could kill them to someone so far below them in status. With them taking it from him and keeping it at the end of the episode, it means that they would assume that he's no longer a serious threat. They had no way of knowing he was being bankrolled by a royal, with access to three more angelic weapons (two pistols and a knife) (four if you count the rope as well).

"Stolas: You knew someone was trying to assassinate me?" Uhhhhh, yeah? You were there for Loo-Loo Land, dude, you know that people are trying to assassinate you, like all the time. This isn't news in any way - and yes, Striker is generally more dangerous than any of the assassins that we saw in that episode, it still doesn't change the fact that you're already well aware that being rich and royal puts a target on your back. This is really unfair to get upset with Blitzø for. (I'm aware that this is an argument and sometimes you bring up unfair accusations in arguments and both of them were very heated and I shouldn't have to plaster every comment about this episode and this relationship with disclaimers that I'm not hating anyone, just expressing frustration.)

[dykedvonte]

One of my mutuals opinions is the "bro code" thing, that Curly is one of those guys who wouldn't care about the victim because the perpetrator is his friend and I'm really banging my head on the wall like that other anon. I've only played through the game once but Curly's behaviour/reactions etc read completely different from the "bro code" thing and I have to wonder if my mutual and I even played the same game.. like the constant digs at him from Jimmy, his body language in his face reveal and so on like you mentioned in your post. While this game is a little different obviously, it kind of reminded of a point in Alice Madness Returns that makes it very clear that Alice's pain blinded her to the abuse of the other children and her failure to act earlier because of it. Curly is guilty of a similar inaction but it doesn't change the fact he was a victim of Jimmy too. I don't think I can look at it any other way because both of these games have really stuck with me.

I genuinely think it really is the idea that people want a simple easy to blame problem and the idea that the only relatable victims of abuse are those that "surpass" it or do a lot to help others. When it comes to victims, especially those that don't fit the typical demographics, who either accidently perpetuate it, enable it or aren't ideal in some way shape or form, people jump to ignore what they went through as it's easier than dealing with those conflicting sentiments.

The bro-code conversation in Mouthwashing stems from a concept I generally dislike that there had to be something about Curly that made him meet or keep being friends with someone like Jimmy. I think people genuinely underestimate how many like decent and good people just know an asshole or are friends with someone who is really bad outside of their view/established dynamics. The game makes it clear none of the inaction against Jimmy is because of a lack of care, it is a lack of understanding from the privaleged postions they have as men to not have to worry about what Anya does/went through and the type of extremes men like Jimmy will go through to cover it up. They are all too preoccupied in their own strifes.

Another thing I see being oversaturated the idea that you have to be a freak, misanthrope or have a disorder to do the thing Jimmy does. The game is an escalation, it's a spiral that I don't see people comment on that Jimmy was not likely having the mood swings and episodes of rage/frustration we were seeing in the game. This is after they all start experiencing the worst moments in their lives that he got THAT openly bad. Of course, this is just my interpretation but much like in real life, people that go to extremes like that usually live mundane lives. It's a pressure cooker affect to where the stress made them pop. It's self inflicted but still the case.

I really think people need to be more willing to acknowledge that not everything needs to be an extreme or in black and white or easy to understand. It doesn't need to be happy or have an answer or solution, especially in the cases where the abused sadly helps perpetuate what they experience. It's not he should've known better from experience or shouldn't he have known what could've happened because victims tend to not like to think in matters of the worst. Not to mention, especially in cases of abuse where it feels so personally directed that you don't expect to happen to someone else.