#i SWEAR im just screaming into the void at this point | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

stilespeters · 2 years ago

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As the world caves in

(part 1) (part 2) (part 3) (part 4) (part 5) (part 6)

pairing: Kai Anderson x fem!reader

a/n: its starting to pick up from here, i got sverything planned so lets hope it goes according to plan! also im sorry for not uploading a lot lately, life has been hectic

words: 3170

summary: After unfortunate fate, you and the brothers must find a way to escape the Safe Zone in the beginning of the blood moon

warnings: violence, swearing, talks about Geeks

part 4: forming an alliance

It was already starting to get dark when you arrived at the school, and you cursed. You just wanted to take one quick search sweep in the tank station to see if there was anything left, but if it wasn’t for the jeep, you would've arrived at nighttime on foot. You were lucky you ran into the brothers. Although something in the pit of your stomach screamed at you that what you did was wrong. You hoped the brothers would have a place to stay for the night.

You stepped out of the jeep to open the big gate. Since you couldn’t park the car inside the school, you decided to park it next to your emergency exit. The emergency exit was approximately two classrooms away from your safe zone, and was located out of sight, so even if there was a chance the brothers would come across the school, they wouldn’t find the jeep immediately.

You made sure to close the gate and lock it with a padlock you scavenged a while back, and you looked around once again to see that the shadows painted the ground and walls a darker shade. Since almost no light was able to get in, it only made it more dark. It was similar to looking into a void of nothingness.

As soon as you locked everything, you got all of your stuff and the stuff in the ski box, and moved inside. If you played it safe, you would have enough food for the rest of the week, but you would have to go on a diet. Not a normal diet though, a diet where you could probably almost starve. It’s unfair how mother nature made the Geeks have a whole week of hunting.

The rest of the perimeter was luckily already surrounded by big walls, so since the only gate was locked, there could be no surprises. You were praying every night that no raiders would discover your Safe Zone.

After you checked everything, you walked inside the school, then moved straight to your Safe Zone, and locked the door. Unfortunately you weren’t good with your hands, otherwise you’d make your door way stronger than it is now. Luckily there was a cabinet, so you placed that in front of the door.

You grabbed your notebook which was on a table next to your sleeping mat, and you grabbed a pen as you sat down against the wall. Time for a documentary of the exciting tales of Y/n Evans.

Although there would most likely not be a person who would ever see this, You still liked to keep track of your days. Maybe in the future, if everything would end one day, they’d find your journal, and see the point of view in the eyes of a survivor of an apocalypse.

How exciting.

You started to write about the things that happened today. From your stupid morning thoughts to your encounter with the strangers at the gas station.

You wrote everything up in detail. You felt like you had to write it down to make sure it really happened. You were scared that maybe in the future if you didn't write it up, you’d forget about it.

It was very important for you, because the journal you had, also felt like a relief system to vent everything out. Since you didn't have any company, anyone to talk to, you were afraid that you would go crazy if you didn't have a way of communication. So writing in your journal is the closest thing to talking.

When you were done with writing, you yawned as you watched your clock. 05:20 pm.

There was no more sunshine shining through the cracks of the windows, and the little red light that was visible behind the barricade, indicated the blood moon had officially started.

The crimson light scared you. It reminded you that the monsters who lurked out there, were more dangerous than ever. It scared you that their senses heightened, and it scared you that you only had the minimum of protection. Even though you had walls surrounding you, if the Geeks found out you were here, they will find a way to get in eventually.

Which was why it was mandatory that you’d stay inside.

CLANG!

You stilled in your sleeping mat, immediately opening your eyes. Maybe you misheard that? Maybe it’s just in your head?

CLANG!

Okay definitely not in your head. What the fuck was that? Why was that noise from outside of the school? Frozen in your spot, sweat started to appear as you looked at the ceiling.

CLANG! Okay, something was wrong. Horribly wrong.

You tried to calm yourself down. You had practiced things like this in your head, you should be fine if you would be very cautious. If they would manage to actually get inside the school, you were going to the emergency exit and get the hell out of here. It's better to be in a moving vehicle than stay in a school full of Geeks.

You grabbed a spear that was laid next to your sleeping mat on the other side of your notebook, and you slowly stood up.

You wanted to look out of the little peephole in the wood through the window, but you were afraid of what you might see. Yor breathing picked up and it felt like your heart sank. However you composed yourself and looked outside.

But all you saw was darkness with a hint of red. There was no movement. You waited for a jumpscare but nothing happened.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

You yelped when the noise of banging on a wall was heard closer to you. It was like someone was pounding the door of the school. The sound echoing throughout the hallways like a gunshot next to the ear, and the little red flags that had appeared when you heard the clanging sounds, enlarged when you realized that a Geek had made its way inside the gates. Now it was presumably pounding on the door of the main entrance to try and get in.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

At this point you were confident that god laughed down on you and called you a loser.

The banging sounds continued for a few seconds, maybe a few minutes, until it suddenly just stopped. Everything was eerily quiet again. It reassured you but terrified you at the same time.

You clamped with your clammy hands the spear tight, standing in a defending position in front of the door, a few meters back. If the Geek was inside the school, you wouldn't die without a fight.

The reason why you held a self made spear instead of a shotgun, was because at night shooting a bullet was like digging a grave and getting buried alive. If you ever shot something in the night, a Geek would 100% hear you, and he’d bring his friends as well.

One of your most strict rules: Never shoot in the dark.

Tap Tap Tap

Pitter patter of footsteps were heard in the hallways, getting louder and louder, and you almost got a heart attack again.

There were multiple. They’ve managed to breach in.

But how? You checked everything, it was almost impossible to breach in.

Unless…

Maybe Raiders? If you have a strong enough weapon, it is easier to break the locks. Although Geeks were intelligent, they weren't that smart to figure out the locks. So it must be Raiders then, right?

Who was making all that loud noise?

You moved to the door to try and take a glimpse of what was happening in the hallways, but due to the cabinet in front of the door and the self-made curtains you put there to assure no one could look inside, it made it hard for her to peek out. You couldn't see anything.

But you did hear something.

“Did you seriously have to make so much noise?” Male 1 said, to which Male 2 responded: “How else were we supposed to get in? Climbing over the fence would be worse since you would probably fall off from the top in an instant and break your hip.” Male 1 scoffed. “Did you feel the need to say specifically ‘you’?”

You couldn't hear the rest since the voices faded, and you let out a trembling sigh and suddenly had the urge to punch someone.

Great, seriously great. You had an encounter with humans twice on this day. Most times it was even rare to encounter one in a month. Even if you would encounter someone, it would probably be someone from a colony on a supply run. It’s funny how you keep meeting random people while you tried your hardest to avoid them. Which says a lot. Can today get any wor-

Before you could think further, the doorknob rattled, and you immediately jerked backwards as your hands clamped around the spear. You aimed it at the door, willing to skew whatever would come your way. You waited in anticipation as the door knob kept rattling.

Since you knew there were more males than two, due to the many footsteps, you knew it would be easy to get in. Even the cabinet wasn't that strong to hold it back, it was more to reassure her.

Stupid padlock and cabinet.

“Hey guys, maybe this is a bad idea. I feel like we aren't supposed to be here.” A different male voice said and you could hear something familiar, yet you couldn't place your finger on it.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

A much louder sound was heard from the other side of the room where the males were standing.

They banged again, and this time the little metal object flew as it busted. That padlock was weaker than you thought it would be.

The door busted open, but luckily the cabinet prevented it from opening wide. Now the door was only a few inches wide. You could see movement from behind the door.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

The cabinet shook in its place, and you felt nauseous. The sweat was still on your forehead, and you felt your fingers slip a bit from your spear due to anxiousness.

Get it together. You’ve been through worse.

When the cabinet finally inevitably gave in and moved to the side with a loud bang, the door swung open, and what you saw made your jaw open wide. You were about to skew the person right there and then, until you saw four pairs of eyes blinking at you in confusion and shock.

“You…”

“You…” you repeated the word that came out of one of the brother’s mouths. You knew you recognized their voices from somewhere when you heard them talk in the hallway.

Since they all looked the same in the dim light, you didn’t know who said it. They all stood in the doorway, looking down at the tip of your spear, and you felt like you were in a dream. This couldn’t be possible, right? This couldn’t be real, yet they’re all standing right in front of you again. How were the chances they went to this place? It was impossible for them to know you were here.

“Are you following us?” one of the twins asked and you were too stunned to speak.

Were you following them? Were they blind? Obviously they could see all your supplies in the room even through the poor lighting. So how could you be the one following them when they could clearly see someone lives here? On top of that, you were literally driving away from them so how could you be following them?

“Get. Out.” you said firmly, your hands shaking due to the tension. Your clammy fingers simply tried to hold on tight to the spear, but due to sweat, they just couldn’t seem to stay put.

“GET OUT!” you hissed this time, trying to get the message clear for them, and after a few seconds that felt like hours, they still stood frozen in their spot. There was still a chance that no Geeks got in.

That’s until Kai suddenly just lunged into the classroom. He grabbed your spear and threw it to the side. You let out a shriek as he toppled you and you fell down.

He pinned you to the ground and he was stronger than you thought. “Get off of me!” you yelled at him but to no avail.

You were looking at the blue haired man who towered over your body. He had Colin’s machete in his hands. He pressed it against your neck, merely drawing blood.

“There is nothing more dangerous than a man who got his jeep stolen. Where is it?!"

“I crashed it into a tree.”

“Liar! Tell us where it is."

“Shut up,” you hissed, in hopes that he would lower his voice. “You’re gonna draw them here.”

“Fucking tell me where it is!” spit flew around and you clenched your jaw.

“Fuck you.” you gathered saliva in your throat and spit in his face.

“You fucking bitch!” he snarled. You had a pocket knife hidden in your shoes, and as your hand reached for it slowly, you gripped it and slashed Kai’s arm. He let out a grunt of pain and that's when you gripped the blade of the machete in your hand and drew it away from your throat. Your hand was bloody from the sharp blade, but you didn't care. You grabbed your spear again and you held it defensively in front of you and when you wanted to stab him, you suddenly froze as Tate yelled.

“Stop!” everyone froze. “Do you hear that?”

Your ears focused on the sounds, and you could hear banging and moans echo throughout the hallways.

The blood got drained from your face and you widened your eyes. “What have you guys done?”

You walked to the other side of the classroom and looked through a peephole to the big gate.

It was ajar, they broke the lock.

“You opened the gate?” you whisper-shouted.

“How else were we supposed to go in?” Colin mimicked your tone and you dropped your spear silently. Without saying anything further, you rushed to the door and closed it. You then walked to your backpack and began packing everything you had.

“We need to go, now.”

Tate shook his head “Hold up, we are not going anywhere with you. May I remind you that you stole our vehicle? You left us to our fate."

"I let you keep your weapons. I let you keep Rosita." you pointed at the silver bat in Peter's hands. "It's Rosa."

"Whatever. I didn't take everything. I could've also taken your weapons but I let you guys keep them."

Tate scoffed. "The world is a filthy place, a filthy goddamn horror show, there is so much pain and you let us keep our weapons, how thoughtful." Tate retorted.

"It happened okay, it's literally the end of the world. I did what I did in order to survive. I know you miss the way the world was before, but everything changed. People have changed, that's why I robbed you guys. You can't be sad about it forever."

"I don't feel sad, I don't feel anything. And to be honest, the end of the world is an upgrade from what it was before. I kill people I like. I'm helping take then away from the shit and the piss, and the vomit that run in the streets. I help them take them somewhere clean, and kind."

You snorted "Please, you were still in the womb when all of this started."

Tate and Peter both rolled their eyes in unison. These four people were totally different from each other. It looked ike they were all raised from a different household. "How are you all related to each other?"

Peter tilted his head to the side "Well, you know... Our parents they loved each other very much. My mom and my dad they -" he made the gesture with his hands and you closed your eyes.

"No I know," you interjected. “You guys are the dumbest people I have ever met. I don't get it how you dimwits are still alive” you gritted your teeth and they all didn't respond to that.

Tate peeked at the window of the door and looked around in the darkness. “What are those sounds?”

“They’re fucking Geeks, you opened the door for them. Why the fuck would you make so much noise outside and then not close the gate?! They followed you, we have to get out of here before it’s too late.” You hissed and you grabbed canned food in another backpack. “Do you guys not realize that tonight is the first day of the blood moon? It's dangerous making so much sound on a normal night, but during the blood moon you're literally signing your death sentence. Did your colony not teach you that?”

They all stood silently in a line behind you and Kai was grunting from pain. You grabbed a roll of bandage and threw it at him. It landed in his face and again, he launched forward.

Colin however, held him back and you turned around once you got everything in 4 backpacks.

“Listen to me you little shits,” you walked forward and pointed your index finger against Kai’s chest. You eyed every single one of the brothers. “You guys clearly know nothing about how dangerous this situation is. Within 5 minutes, this whole school will be overrun by brainless Geeks, and they will tear you apart limb to limb. I'm sorry for stealing your car, but right now none of that matters because we're all going to die if you don't listen to me carefully. So if you want to survive, you need to stop launching at me. You need to listen to me.”

“You are full of shit,” Kai barked and you pressed your other hand against his slash wound. He clenched his jaw and again, tried to get out of Colin’s grasp. Colin however, was fairly strong.

"Brothers, what do humans love the most? To what do we give our highest value? Is it family, friends, our homes, money, notoriety? No. Above all, humans love fear. She is no different. She wants us to feel fear, she wants us to give her power." Peter and Tate looked at each other and at their brothers. They didn't know what to do.

You were done with this whole ordeal.

“You don’t believe me? see for yourself. If I'm wrong, then just walk out of the door.” you pointed at the peephole on the other side of the room and even though Kai was fuming with anger, he seemed to have a glint of unsureness in his eyes. After Colin weakened his grip on him, he marched to the other side of the window. The rest followed.

“What the fuck…” Tate muttered and Peter looked mortified at the sight. “We’re all gonna die, oh my god.”

It was Colin’s turn to look outside, and even though everything was pitch black, the red light of the moon illuminated the area in front of the gate. Multiple shadows were seen lurking around, and they all walked to the entrance of the school.

Colin gulped and then turned to look at you.

“We believe you,” Colin said and Kai was still salty. “What? we shouldn't listen to her, she literally carjacked us. She wants to leave into the darkness? Maybe it’s a trap, we've seen a Geek before in the gas station, we can easily take them. Why don't we just tie her up and force her to say where our jeep is. We will make it out on our own terms.”

"I think we should do it," Kai rolled his eyes at his brother and clenched his jaw. Colin simply shrugged "What? teamwork makes the dreamwork. She's the chef, we're the sous chef's. What are we cooking?"

Kai glared at him. "Stop talking."

Colin sighed and still tried to reason with him. “She is our only option, Kai. We are totally fucked. She is prepared for things like these. We aren’t. It looked like she's experienced, we're not. Get your senses together.” Kai clenched his jaw again but eventually sighed. He walked towards you and pointed his machete at your face.

“You double cross us, and you’re dead.”

“Duly noted.” you said and you grabbed your spear and shotgun. You placed your shotgun over your shoulder, placed your knife in your shoe and your spear in your right hand. You looked at the brothers. "How do I know you're not gonna turn against me?"

"I would," Kai retorted "You're so fucking irritating. You're lucky I believe trust is the only thing that forges real partnership."

You ignored Kai and you rolled your eyes.

“We’re losing time, grab a backpack, we need as much food as we can get. Do not, under any circumstances, make that much noise again. They will hear it, and they will come for you. I will not say where the jeep is, I will lead you there. We will drive to another safe haven of mine in the mountains. Once we reach the Safe Haven we will stay there till the blood moon ends, and then we part ways. We can do it like civiliced people, no more blood needs to be shed.” They grabbed a backpack and you walked to a small table to grab a flashlight. “Why are you helping us?”

“Because my chances of survival in a blood moon are higher when I’m with a group. Why else do you think that Geeks leave most colonies alone? Not only the walls stop them from attacking, they seek minorities. They search for weaker prey.”

“Then why are you alone if it’s safer in a colony?” Peter asked and you gulped. You looked down and tried to not think about the events that happened a while ago when you were still in a colony.

“Everything falls apart eventually." your voice trembled and you recomposed yourself. "Anyhow, it doesn't matter. For now, we have to go. They already breached the left wing. It’s only a matter of time before they get here.”

“You really think they’re not gonna notice a moving vehicle?” Peter questioned.

”It’s better than staying here. It’s our only option.”

“So how do we get out of the school?”

“I have a plan.” you said and the brothers waited in anticipation. Peter widened his eyes. "Does it involve killing Geeks?"

"I said I had a plan, not a miracle," you sighed.

"Follow me."

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iliveforyouilongforyouvesuvia · 2 years ago

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ok its me again hi AAAHHHH this is so nice i feel so warm im lying on my bed kickin my lil legs i cant believe this thank you for being nice omgggg now im on a roll im gonna say things about julian hkdhjgdgjf

only one song really that i scanned the whole tag looking for to see if anyone said it before and i was so surprised that i didnt find it and i went to check the official playlists on spotify cause maybe its on there already and thERE ISNT ONE WHAT???? i had the muriel one liked on here and id never checked any other ones out lmao but like i swear there had to be one?? like maybe they made it first and its somewhere separately??? julian is like the most popular one how the hell does he not get a spotify list is that how this tag was created?? *gasp* am i discovering the ~fandom lore~

(just gonna say you dont actually need to answer any of that in detail dont waste your time gksgkydgjf im just screaming into the void cause i was so flabbergasted after those 3 whole minutes of research i put into this)

ANYWAY the actual song would be House of Wolves by our lord and saviour MCR! its so good for him with his whole Woe is Me drama king vibe lol and the plaguey thematicssss mmmm delicious TELL ME im a BAD BAD BAD BAAD MAAAAN aight you lil masochist i see u and the "you better run like the devil cause they never gonna leave you alone" you get it caUSE HES A FUGITIVE DO YOU GET THE DEEP UNRAVELABLE METAPHORS DO YOU GET IT DO YOU G aight shut up hkhfjtdy anyway

ok i lied jystfhte heres another one i just remembered i really wanted to put here its not new but just in case somebody hasnt seen it yet lmao its such a masterpiece ill do anything to give it its due here ya go

https://youtu.be/61HltPN_k3g

and the other thing im really glad to have seen people mention here is musical songs cause thats one of the things i love about him the most like yass we love a thespian king slay grl so then anytime im binging a musical there always come the intrusive thoughts of "aw hed love this one" and "oh hed be great for this role" like i went to see f-ing swan lake with my f-ing grandpa and one of the major takeaways i got from the experience was (UH IM GONNA PUT A SPOILER WARNING HERE? I GUESS? IN CASE ANYONE CARES HELLO JULIAN BAD ENDING SPOILERS AHEAD DO MOVE ALONG NOW IF YOU DONT LIKE THAT AVERT YOUR GAZE CITIZENS LMAO LIKE YOU HAVENT SEEN FANARTS N ADS ALREADY ALRIGHT ALRIGHT) "omg jules would be so perfect as that bird guy villain IN HIS BIRD GUY SHAPE TOO OMG WITH THE WINGS ON STAGE THIS IS AWESOME WHY CANT I DRAW GOOD GODDA-"

anyway hed love hadestown (hed at least try to cast muriel as hades cause hes perfectly intimidating for it but theres way too many lines which okay Maybe but AND he has to sing???? nah hes out bkgdhkdt) i dont know what hed think of pierre natasha & the great comet cause its maybe a little eccentric i suppose but i think hed appreciate the cultural roots of the vibe with him being fantasy ruso-slav-ukrainian-whatnot heritage i reckon and hed definitely have a blast at a live performance and hed ABsolutely join in with the actors in between the rows at some point and theyd ABSOlutely let him cause hes that good and game recognize game cmon hes gonna show you amateurs what a real kazotski looks like

i can also see him enjoying sweeney todd, for its delightful edgyness, maybe even some themes relatable for him, and his sappy ass would SO memorise Pretty women to whip it out at an opportune serenading moment khgdturshc im so cringe and loving it

well i cant think of any more shows to throw him together with so thus ends my soliloquy wow i cant believe thats how you spell that anyway i hope anybody who knew what the hell im talking about enjoyed all that jgfztits see you in another 20 minutes when i come back like "AND ANOTHER thing-

Yay, it's the character song essays anon!! :D

I'm glad to see you back, and I will once again be re-linking the song you shared below and adding your suggestions to the tag ^.^

And frankly, I'm 76% certain that one of Julian's love languages is theatre, especially musical theatre. That could be tickets, that could memorizing the lines from one of this favorite scenes and reciting it back to him, it could be showing up to every single performance he's involved in :)

I'm glad to see you back in my inbox, friend, feel free to message me if you ever want to obsess over the characters together! Cheers -

brainrot

youtube

#ask arcana brainrot #arcana brainrot playlist #the arcana #julian the arcana #julian devorak #the arcana headcanons #the arcana hc #the arcana game

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dreamwritesimagines · 2 years ago

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It’s CMA-

I swear to god I’m normally an Anthony girl but the way that you write benedict just does something to me……..

Also though every time I leave an ask or comment after the chapter comes out, I’m always like IM GOING TO HAVE TO WAIT AN ENTIRE DAY MINIMUM BEFORE DREAM ANSWERS. It kills me; I want to scream at you in real time not into the void LOL

Also it’s so funny because the other day I was like ‘oh I haven’t screamed at dream in a while. I’ve mostly been getting mad at the characters’ and now I’m like FUCK dream how could you personally do this to me lmao

Lollll oh that's a really, really good sign my love 😏😈

Listen-

LISTEN, I FEEL THE SAME! 😂 Like, I wait for a day after posting a new chapter to not accidentally give spoilers to the readers who are on different timezones and such, and to give them enough time to read but I can assure you I spend that day reading and re-reading the asks I got and giggling to myself and getting excited about them 😍❤️

You're more than welcome to scream at me darling, that shows that the angst is on point 😂😂

now I’m like FUCK dream how could you personally do this to me lmao BECAUSE IT'S SO MUCH FUN😂😂😂

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ganondoodle · 1 year ago

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something i just realized thats yet another point to the whole "sonau did all the things before the shiekah did, actually" weirdness is the helmets of those unnamed and utter voids of personality ancient sages- their weird ass sonau helmets are very clearly meant to be the titans heads but "sonau" so i guess the shiekah didnt even come up with that design on their own either, isnt that totally coolio (why are they wearing that sonau stuff anyway ... doesnt that too come off as weird?? putting face masks made of the design from the dominant culture of the king ruling everything over the other races leaders heads and not even giving them a name .. let alone a pesonality, or anything to say but the literal same exposition dump 4 times???)

also, though it is a smaller point, the sonau being supposedly "from the sky" also sitts wrong with me bc we know the shiekah had a long history of admiring the stars and trying to read from them etc, which combined with everything else just kinda adds to the weird feeling of the sonau having hijacked all of the shiekahs things in retrospect despite the shiekah as a whole having a wayyy longer history (and no i dont find it inspiring or like ... cool that the sonau are bascially the origins of everything the botw shiekah ever did, it feels not just disrespectful but like it cheapens the shiekah as a whole since now they really had never an original idea i guess lol - i swear if they meant that random "mechanical beast" that zelda apparently rode when she was trapped back in time as some sort of precursor to the eponator zero from botws dlc im gonna scream-)

additionally, the sonau being from the sky is still kinda weird to me given their other heavily used design elements are clearly based on undergound stuff, like the lightferns being literally every lamp bc i guess they knew only one kind of lamp to build, one that only gives off an eery cold slightly greenish light, (not really working in favor with that also cold grey and rather featureless blocky design of all the totk sonau structures) and the design of the constructs looking alot like mini/gigamas, i dont know if i want to believe they invented all of their stuff that isnt grey blocky rock after coming to the surface and mining the underground barren .. given how spread out their mines are they must have had a pretty strong grip on hyrule before they all went extinct from *gestures vaguely* -i think the english version puts it more vaguely but the german text def implies they all died 'somehow'- which is weird and underexplored as well-

all of this really adds to the sonau just ... not fitting into anything, not the world, the history, the design, the story, and their presentation as those only good goodestes of peoples makes me even more sus of them- i know im not the only one who was convinced that rauru was running some sort of scheme behind your back or something like that for almost the entire game (also to the person that added to this post saying that the same rauru statue being over and over at the end of the shrines made him feel even more like an "divine king" kind of dictator vibe, yes i feel like that too) and yet he is only ever presented as the oh so kind and good and perfect king by divine right, with his only mistake ever being not stabbing ganondorf right away i guess, but its fine, he died to seal gan after all uwu, what a noble guy, uwu

*sigh*

... man this entire game is such a mess once you start to think about it even a little, tbh i think zelda fans should be kinda offended this is what we are offered for an even higher price than botw after all this time ... we deserve better man :(

sorry, long post, got totk thoughts ...again

first botw vs totk shrines aesthetic and meaning; then shiekah symbolism thats overtaken by sonau

botw vs totk shrines (not in quality of puzzle since i talked about that a little before, but as in aesthetic, meaning etc)

something that worked well with shiekah shrines in botw was that these things were built SPECIFICALLY to make a future link stronger, theres that denialability to it that kinda make sense when you think about it, they are small challenges for the future hero to test and make them stronger, they are spread around the world bc you wouldnt want to hide some major source of power in one place, a monk literally sacrifices their life to enable you to gain more power their dead body waiting for you at the end (neat!!), they are each a little different in pose and clothing and im pretty sure its implied each monk made the puzzle for their shrine themselves; and the ones that rely on something happening in the world first can also be explained by their ability to see the future, the shrines and towers all rise up from the ground, which gives them that believable sense of they have been down there all this time and been activated via the net connecting them all to signal it is time- their design is also just .. nice? its got a nice contrast of the dark and the ligher brown with eye catching light from orange to blue to pink telling you in what states of operation it is (idle, working/done, corrupted) and their shape design is a very striking mix of bigger emptier spots of dark with the lighter browns wiggly lines coming in in nicely paced patches and the strong lights poking through giving you a nice soemthign for your eyes to look at (their tech is also a mix of magic stuff AND mechanism, they still look and work kinda magical but still have cogs and springs and looks like they are actual maschines put together)

totk shrines have no real denialability to why they are the way they are, its pretty clear that they are there for game reasons (and to copy botw i guess?) with no proper thought given to it (or failed to convey); they are already there when zelda does her time travel bs, and i heard (havent seen it myself? or dont remember) that the sonau shrines were built to .. keep monsters at bay? ok, im not even gonna question that part ( ... but i am .. i guess lightmagic wahtever dont think about it) so .... why do they contain a puzzle at all? its not to prevent monsters from entering since you need raurus hand to activate it (in botw you need the shiekah stone to do so which isnt really found besides yours either but ... their purpose is to test and empower you anyway .. and pehaps in a wider range to strengthen the bond with other folks when you have to work with them to get to it) then they werent present in botw so they must have ... somehow appeared out of nowhere? their connection to the lightroots might have been an attempt to try and make them feel more connected but that didnt work either imo, the shrines on the surface mirror lightroots in the underground, implying they are connected somehow, i at first thought like the lightroot is their root and the shrine is the flowerbud, but its very clearly just some ...magic rock crystal with stuff built around it including a teleportation thing thats pretty much copied from the shiekah ones (??) and you somehow ... enter magic dimension (which is .. fine, but i liked how in botws it was an elevator going down, making it feel like you are put into a physical room underground) but then there .... are also shrines in the sky ... that have no lighroot to connect to .. (i guess .. magic light wahtever dont htinkaboutit) so that part kinda falls flat- and the bring-crystal-to-shrine-spot (uhg) also debunk that thought since its a (tasty looking) green crystal that just kinda warps into a big grey rock ... for some reason, at their end is always the same colorless statue of da kind and his fridge wife (not her build) they are also missing that denialability that they were built for link specifically, sonau cant see into the future so (unless they yoinked that from the shiekah too??).. how does .. anything of that work then? especially with the crystal ones given that they are always a blessing shrine sicne bringing the crystal to its spot is counted as the puzzle but they couldnt have known that thats where it would end up at (and then ...how and why would you put a shrine thing into a crystal thing and disconnect it and throw it whereever when it manifests somehow again thousands years later- i need to stop thinking about it)- then their aesthetic is white green and gold(ish) which is a nice color combination in itself tho its lacking that neat status singaling and the eye catching contrast with their glow, the green glowy bits dont stand out as much, their shape design i dislike alot since it ... looks kinda unfinished and in a strange disconnect to their tech; buildings and statues are very blocky solid colors with the occasional rune or dragon carved into, which is also very blocky and one colored, their shapes are pretty uniform in a blocky way, theres not alot of shape contrast anywhere besides basic smaller block and bigger block, the most interesting looking ones are the ... outer walls of the shrines with their scaled look and the ground with the circle patterns; their tech and clothing is in a strange disconnect, its got a gree-tealish scale like texture in anything solid, be it tech or ornaments, it also features alot more gold and also brown stones that look rather untouched- now, for clothing, that is fine, the shiekah didnt dress like their tech either (.... mostly, ancient armor does exist) BUT the constructs and tech also have that more natural look to them

the fact that the same blocky statue waits for you at the end alsso removes not just coolness but also personality, instead of individual monks that gave their life for you and you setting them free once you take their spirit orb its the same representation of the holy king and queen giving you some light juice to cure you more of miasma .. which doesnt actually matter sicne you get your normal arm back no matter how many light juices you got at the end anyway (their "tech" also just looks less like actual maschinery and much more like .. magic tm, the constructs have nothing maschinery like about them and are just floating rings animated by green magic wiggle lines and function almost the same as literal bokblins with the added thing of being able to fuse/use tech.. the empty spot of a threat like the guardians is very prominent once you realize that the constructs are largely just like a reskinned bokblin, and the miasma hands, while neat, are more like a surprise jumpscare and less like a looming threat and are also not taken to their full potential)

theres also a disconnect between the sonau as we are introduced to them in totk and the actual sonau ruins from botw, which share a common dragon motive but have a much more .. MORE aesthetic, theres even color present you dont see anywhere in totk sonau stuff, like the red paint- you are given the explanation that those are ruins built by hylians as a monument to the sonau but i think it falls very flat sicne its clear it wasnt designed to be meant like that in botw and also looks much more withered than the totk sonau ruins which rarely look withered at all despite being even older than the botw ruins; im very sure its jsut an excuse bc their design for totk sonaus got changed ... for some reason, just like their "barbaric" origins in the phirone/faron region

shiekah symbolism and more kinda overtaken by sonau

so, soemthing i really dont like about the sonau as well is that theres quite a bit that they take from shiekah and kinda... present it as being the origin of it, actually;

we all know the very dominant symbol of the eye/third eye with three eyelashes and a tear drop for the shiekah which is established in the very first chronological game (skyward sword) but also featured in alot of other zeldas, it symbolizing their connection to hylia and their foresight (perhaps even more? i dont know everything); now we got the sonau who ... have a LITERAL third eye (and it doesnt even look special ..) that has three lashes and they paint tear drops under their eyes... (which has only the connection to .. the tears zelda sheds when shes a dragon, no other character does so at any other point, lol?) it makes it seem like we are to assume that the shiekah got their symbols from the sonau, actually, just like their tech wasnt their invention either but the sonaus, actually, who are new to the franchise and have no other connection to anything of past games, unlike the shiekah who have been there from the start really

then theres the tech, the ancient shiekah had very advanced, mystical tech in botws ancient history and now the even MORE ancient sonau had even MORE advanced tech way before them in totks lore which goes beyond even botws ancient history

im not saying symbols gotta be exclusive to one group of people but .. it holds alot of significance carried from the older games too, it feels strange for them to highjack the shiekah symbols and achievements WITHIN the two games that are supposedly directly connected in timeline and world (while also pairing them with those supposedly aniecnt hylian feather crowns and belly out look ... which, im no expert but i raise my eyebrow at that) together with the fact that nearly any and all traces of shiekah tech, except for the little needed parts that are never called that though and are just footnotes .. if anything, are precisely erased feels .... off

another long ramble about my thougths about totk, some people graciously call them analysis but i wouldnt say its that, its jsut a largely incoherent waterfall of words that would have spun around in my head for weeks if i didnt write them out and i keep coming up with more thoughts bc im thinking about the rewrite and well ...

im gonna have art soon again ... promise <(＿　＿)>

#ganondoodles talks #zelda #totk #ganondoodles rants #new addition #saying it here so people that want to read it know i didnt jsut reblog the post as is again #and it might be hidden under the expand thingy #its a long post after all #again ...................#sorry i just keep having thoughts tm

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axolot-of-ideas · 3 years ago

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bad, about to try divebombing the void again because this worlds void loops into the sky and he wants to try trickshotting into water cause he’s bored: this is a perfect use of my time and energy

#the void is comforting to him anyways #too many worlds with only the void for company makes him feel different about the cold embrace as it steals his breath away and the feeling #of falling- he knows it still #hurts but that’s part of the comfort at this point #falling in the void over and over and listening to one of his playlists is coping he swears #he’s fine #he claims its like a cold crushing hug and not like the breath stealing kiss it reminds him of more-#and i mean he does have one healthy coping mechanism!#but he can only do it when he’s completely safe and even then he tries to repress it because he’s haunted by words he’s never sure he was #supposed to hear- and he’s coping doesn’t work well alone- but he’s fine! just time to work and progress and forget about everything #he’s comfy on his islands and he warily calls them home #he’s fine alone with the void as company #okay- maybe sometimes he screams into the void to see if someone will answer-#but he’s fine #yeah just more minesona shitposting i promise /hj #character thoughts i promise #this oc isnt based on me i promise- /s #i should stop talking to him- its only deteriorating me more when im being a bit ignored #its easier with cap and star because i started talking to them after i learned my lesson- but me and dragon have history #fuck- i cant go back to that-#my throat doesn’t want to burn and my legs already kill me no reason to make them hurt more-#it’d be nice though… no no no i promised-#and im already emotionally and mentally and spiritually stressed so fighting would only end badly-#fuck- im too numb to have a breakdown or panic attack #and too depressed to use my one healthy cope #fucking sucks-#might just mood regulate- yay for hypersexuality….#i hope i dont wake up.

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pineapple-crow · 2 years ago

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Alright, heres my rant for the night because I'm tired, cranky, and made the mistake of peeking at the #tradblr side of this hellscape.

I absolutely hate how the shitty alt right fascist conservative bullshit has permeated things that on face value are very much excellent.

Some examples, especially as they relate to me:

Pastel femininity - we're pretty familiar with this though I might be using the wrong term. It's all pastel colors (esp pink), pretty flowers, gold and marble, bows and ribbons, dresses, pretty hair, pretty makeup, and a soft cotton candy cloud aesthetic and shit that evoke the idea of a "soft," "gentle" feminine energy. I love that shit! I don't look like someone who does but I love this aesthetic so much. I think this aesthetic should be enjoyed by anyone regardless of their "usual" presentation or gender expression. AND YET you have these buffoons using it to push "tRaDiTiOnAl WoMaNhOoD" (that's often co-opted with cis whiteness and rejection of the idea that any gender, skin tone, or ethnicity can look gorgeous in pastel pink and roses). Which leads me to my next point...

Cottagecore - just like pastels, cottage core sparks joy in me and I also really love it's representation, especially when combined with the idea of being a homemaker (y'know in that near unobtainable fantasy where all bills are paid for and you can just make bread and weave yarn or whatever). Despite being the current breadwinner in my relationship, I also absolutely love the thought of staying in my own lil cottage and cleaning and doing house upkeep and just baking and shit. Vibing with nature and mindfulness. I DON'T love traditionalist religious nuts (mostly christians but, y'know) who use it to push tRaDiTiOnAl gender roles. No fuck you the moment that shit becomes forced, it's not fun anymore. Anybody should have the freedom to choose to be a homemaker, whether you're a wife/girlfriend, husband/boyfriend, spouse/partner, or That One Friend who has a knack for NOT accidentally making chloroform while cleaning the bathroom! Fuck traditional gender roles and forcing people to be pigeonholed into them without any choice! (And that's not even getting into how toxic it is when it comes to relationships, even hetero relationships! My husband and I realized he was taught how to be a husband (fix cars, fix the house, go to work for the entire day and drink beer/immediately unwind after getting home) but not how to be a partner (help with scheduling appointments, share a portion of the chores, do the chores without being told, other "" womanly"" tasks). That's terrible!)

Heathenry/paganism - SPEAKING OF RELIGION I hate hate hate that I have this constant concern of becoming involved/associated with/platforming white nationalists and Nazis. Fuck Nazis, fuck white nationalists, I have very violent thoughts about them. Heathenry in all its forms, to include Norse Heathenry, is open to all! Not to get too religious but the gods don't care where you or your family comes from! The gods don't care if you're able to stand outside for longer than 10 minutes without turning into a peeling lobster! To use the gods as a method of control or pushing your idiotic hate filled vitriol is to spit on Their image! To say the gods care about whether or not you have 0.01% German/Icelandic/Swiss heritage in your blood is a horribly restrictive box to put the gods in! Not to mention it ALSO gets used to push heteronormative gender roles! Get fucked! I hate that I have to be conscious of my presentation of my faith or else I'll be lumped in with half brain nitwits who smell like weeks old unwashed ass and think their pube face is on the same level as the viking warriors! Tho shit maybe it is who am I to know, fuck bro.

Let me make one point clear. I don't hate that I have to be mindful/critical of the information I absorb, and the actions/words I put out into the world to represent myself. That's okay! That's normal! That should be encouraged! What I DON'T like is the fact that Nazis made some shit up, slapped it on the face of paganism/Heathenry, and have made it so prominent that there is this CONSTANT concern of being lumped in with a group I Do Not Tolerate and, again, have Very Violent Thoughts towards.

Just...aakajsjdjfkgktkd there's so much more I could say on this but I'm really really tired. I didn't think I'd get this heated over it. Anyway I'll finish by saying tradwives/tradhusbands, white nationalists, homophobes, transphobes/TERFS, and Nazis can go shove a pineapple up their asses.

#rant #tw swearing #very strong thoughts #probs just throwing out into the void #but ive been wanting to scream about this for a while #like i work in a male dominated workplace #and im white and cis #well mostly #i think i may be a tad nb?#idk but i like how they/them pronouns coupled with she/her feel #thats not the point anyway #i initially portray heteronormativity #which means i attract these fuckwits #but also means i want to stay ever conscientious of the media and information i consume #and do everything i can not to fall into the brainwashing of the alt right #i forgot where i was going with this im so tired lmao #anyway have a good night #or day #or afternoon

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loud-whistling-yes · 3 years ago

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... So, turns out I did end up writing a part 2 to the oneshot after all, considering im pretty sure red techno anon has now birthed a new au. hooray...?

@wildcardjoey good morning! this thing is 2400 words long. god help me.

(tagging people last i knew wanted a part 2: @parchmentengineer @dragongobrr @carbonated-roses @sunny-is-in-the-void @offcameras @cc3204 )

Edit: now available on Ao3!

“The fuck are you people doing down there?” Tommy hollered, voice echoing down the canyon. The group — five people, he counted, all looked up to him.

“Watch your language!” One of them shouted back, and Tommy snorted, a grin creeping up his face.

“Dick!” He cupped his hands and yelled down at them. “Ass! Fuck! Shit! Bitch! Cock! Dick, dick, dick, dick-”

The one with the red helmet and a stupid backpack stomped their foot. He burst out laughing. Oh well, things were getting a little boring around his house anyways, he could use some entertainment.

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

“How did you get here? Pretty sure this server is private or some shit. Y’all just gonna-”

“Why won’t he stop swearing.” Grian complained through gritted teeth. Pearl laughed.

“You’ve challenged him into a battle. I don’t think you’re gonna win anytime soon.” She grinned, studying the funny boy up the canyon. He had blond hair, tied into a short and messy ponytail behind him, and was that a butterfly clip in his hair? Around his neck was a faded green bandana over a white t-shirt with sleeves as red and loud as his voice was.

The boy squinted. At least, Pearl was pretty sure he was squinting — it’s hard to tell from the distance.

“You guys need a rope to get out? No one dug a staircase down yet.” He hollered at them.

“We’ll be fine, thanks!” Grian replied, pulling off his dummy suit. The rest did the same. Pearl stretched her wings. Hers were nowhere as bulky as Grian’s or Impulse’s bird and demon wings, but moth wings are unfortunately a lot less foldable than theirs. The hard backpack Scar made for her might’ve saved her wings from tearing, but wow was her back sore.

Impulse raised an eyebrow, eyeing Grian’s head. “Grian, buddy... looks like your horns got bigger...”

Grian looked over to him, hands reaching up to touch the side of his head, before humming in amusement. Ever since he first got the Tegg at the start of Season 8 (wow, that felt like ages ago) little horns had poked out from the top of his head. They grew horrendously slowly throughout the season. In fact, Pearl was pretty sure his horns barely grew over an inch over the course of six months? Now though, his horns curved up from his hair, much more similar to Impulse’s than before. It must’ve grown at least an inch- no, two inches since their escape.

How long had they been in the void?

“Your wings are changing too,” Mumbo pointed out, gesturing at his molting wings. Grian’s red-yellow-blue feathers of a parrots’ scattered in a mess on the ground, his wings currently in awkward patches of black and the old colours. He unfolded one of the limbs, revealing that the wing was almost completely covered in black scales, turning purple at the tips. Small clumps of parrot feathers clung stubbornly onto the leathery skin, refusing to come off no matter how hard he shook.

It was silent for a moment. Even Grian himself stared in shock.

“Holy shit, you people have wings?! Where the fu-”

“Grian, when did you have dragon wings?!”

“I mean-” Grian squeaked, everyone electing to ignore the screaming teen above them- “They were molting a bit on the last week before the moon big thing happened, but I thought it’d take forever for them to change completely, not-” He turned his backpack upside down, an impressive amount of brightly-coloured feathers were dumped onto the floor- “this!”

“Well, we did spend like a week’s time floating through the void.” Scar scratched his head. “Maybe that kicked off your dragon puberty?”

“Scar, I love you, but never put those two words together like that ever-”

“Are you guys gonna come up or what?”

“Coming!” Impulse replied for the rest, stretching his own wings. “Grian, you take Mumbo and I take Scar?”

“Sure,” Grian shrugged, trying one last futile attempt at patting off the last of his feathers before grabbing onto Mumbo by the armpits, Impulse did the same with Scar. Elytras were banned on the ship to save space in the suits. Unfortunately, that meant that both Mumbo and Scar will probably have to rely on Grian and Impulse for the foreseeable future. Pearl wished she could help, but alas, having wings as thin as paper was not suitable for carrying the weight of more than one person (she tried it with Gem once; it took her respawning to fix that nasty tear through the back).

Grian flapped his wings. Once, twice, and the two of them lifted up into the air. Then Grian titled to his side with an awkward turn and before they knew it there was a sharp yelp and Mumbo was back on the ground with Grian collapsed onto him.

“You guys sure that you don’t need help?”

“I’m fine,” Grian grumbled, pulling himself and Mumbo up. Pearl turned to the blond boy up the crater and gave him a thumbs up, laughing awkwardly.

“I think the feathers are throwing me off-balance..” Grian dusted himself off, yanking at one of his feathers before hissing in pain when it stayed on the leathery skin. He massaged the area he pulled at, probably regretting his decision.

He flapped his wings again, testing his flight abilities. Once, twice, thrice, he was well over their heads by now, the wind sending the feathers he dumped on the ground flying as well — then he took a sudden swerve right. Pearl ducked as he crashed onto the floor yet again, feathers fluttering back onto the ground and over him.

“I could’ve braided the goddamned rope needed to get you guys out by now with the time you’re taking to fly.”

Pearl giggled, watching as Mumbo pulled Grian off the floor, dusting off his feathers in the process. She cupped her hands, yelling at the general direction above her. “We’re stuck, could you go get the rope?”

The boy sprinted off, presumably to get the aforementioned rope.

“If dragon wings are anything like demon wings,” Impulse chuckled, folding his own wings back down, poking at Grian’s scales. “Then you’ll have to wait till all those feathers drop before you can fly again. They’re really fussy about balance.”

Grian groaned, wings folding out and raised fully like they do when he gets distressed. Back when his wings were feathered they would’ve puffed up as well just to get the point across. Now though the remaining strands of feathers stood up awkwardly amongst the unfazed dragon scales — it was quite a pathetic sight to be honest.

“The horns took forever to grow out,” Grian complained, head in his two hands. “How long is shedding a few damned feathers gonna take?”

“Oi!” The voice Pearl had begun to grow accustomed to echoed down the crater, interrupting their current conversation. The boy from earlier returned, hand full of a large bundle of rope. Beside him was another person, dragging a hammock behind him.

The person- what were they, actually? They looked almost translucent, as if light went through them without any acknowledgement from their part. They wore black-and-white all over, cloak floating and fluttering in odd ways unlike the wind would do. Even their skin was black-and-white, split down the middle, and they were tall, taller than the other boy by a head, if Pearl had to hazard a guess.

They turned to the boy, nodding as he seemed to give them some instructions, before he turned away and disappeared from the ledge with one end of the rope with him. The person sat down, taking the rope with one hand and the other holding- were they tying it to the hammock?

They got up after a while, both hands full of the now stringed-up hammock, peering over the ledge and looking over at the group. Pearl was pretty sure they had green and red eyes.

“Oh, hello!” They— oh wait, it’s a he— he greeted, head tilting as he studied the group.

“Hello!” Scar broke into his characteristic smile, waving at him.

“Tommy’s tying the rope to the fence over there,” The person— ghost?— pointed his chin at the general direction of where the boy had gone. “He said you guys can’t fly? I don’t really know why he said that, considering the only two-��

“Boo!” The boy — Tommy, Pearl now knew him as, hollered from somewhere she couldn’t see. The ghost turned to look behind him. “Yeah?”

Soon enough, Tommy came back in sight, hands now lacking the rope he was holding onto from earlier. He muttered a few words to the ghost— was his name Boo? That’s a cute name— before being handed over the hammock.

He threw the hammock down towards them, the fabric landing on top of Grian, much to his annoyance. A shriek-like laughter rang from above.

“Very funny.” Grian muttered, pulling the green hammock off him. The rest bit back their own laughter.

“Who’s the lightest of you bunch down there?” Tommy tugged at the rope, causing the hammock to jump up-and-down. There was no hesitation; they all pointed at Grian.

“Get in there, we don’t have all day!” He ordered.

Grian crawled into the hammock, grumbling all the way. “This kid is gonna be the death of me.”

“Oh come on, he’s helping!” Mumbo laughed, patting him on the back. The hammock suddenly shot up, and Grian yelped, almost falling off. He swung side-to-side like an out-of-control swing.

“Don’t fucking move!” Tommy’s voice rang down again. “Boo, pull harder- You’re really fucking heavy, you know that?”

Grian gritted his teeth, probably resisting the urge to inform Tommy that if even Mumbo could toss him over the shoulder with one hand it probably meant that Tommy had the physical strength of an endermite soaking with a weakness potion if he found him of all people heavy. Then the hammock suddenly dropped and Grian screeched, before catching his heart halfway up his throat when the falling stopped.

“You guys need help up there?” Impulse asked, hands cupped together and looking up.

“I thought you people- oh my god this was a fucking mistake- coudn’t fly?”

As if on cue, both Pearl and Impulse opened up their wings. Impulse tilted his head at the others. “Are you guys gonna be okay down here?”

Mambo nodded, before continuing his concerned spectation of Grian being dangled up the canyon walls. Scar gave them a thumbs up. “We’ll be fine, I’ll make sure Grian doesn’t go splat on the ground!”

Impulse shook his head, hiding his smile, and the two of them were off. Pearl landed first, earning a startled yelp from Tommy and an amused “Hello!” from Boo, followed by an extremely distressed Grian screaming as Tommy loosened his grip on the rope. The line went taut suddenly, and the screaming stopped.

Pearl turned behind her; Impulse was gripping onto the rope, chuckling awkwardly. “Hey guys…”

“You’re telling me only that guy can’t fly even with wings?” Tommy blinked, before looking over the cliffside to stare at Grian.

“I heard that!” Grian yelled from somewhere below.

The rest of the process went a lot more smoothly afterwards, Grian back on solid ground after several quick tugs with Impulse on the team, followed by Mumbo, and Scar was picked up by Impulse while the rest focused on getting Mumbo up, just to speed things up a little.

“So,” Mumbo started, after everyone had managed to pull him up the cliffside. “Asking on the behalf of everyone else here, who are you guys, and where exactly are we?”

Just as the same time Tommy mutters “Shouldn’t I be the first to ask?” under his breath, Boo answers cheerfully. “Oh, I’m Boo — Ghostboo is my full name, this is Tommy, and you’re on the Dream SMP!”

“I’m sorry, we’re in the what-” Grian cutted himself off, head spinning towards the sky above the canyon, eyes snapping into full attention. “Our stuff!”

The entire group stared at the sky, Boatem searching wildly for whatever Grian picked up, Tommy and Boo squinted at the sky, puzzled at the reactions. A flash of dark colours appeared in the sky, from afar it looked like random objects on parachutes. Pearl focused harder at the spots, a cow, a horse… Nugget!

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

“Is that a fucking horse in a parachute.” Tommy deadpanned, watching as the demon and the moth hybrid sped through the air to catch the slow-falling animals mid-flight. At the other side of the L’Manhole the other three people yelled from the ground. The guy in the red sweater in particular — was his name Grian?— danced around like a headless chicken, staring up into the sky and screeching whenever a weird black object swayed in the wind.

“I think the girl is holding an egg.” Boo shielded his eyes from the sunlight, observing the scene like it was a drama spoken in a different language: you can kinda tell what the people are doing, but sure as hell ain’t gonna know what the fuck is going on in the bigger picture. “Oh wait, no, it’s a black cat- oh wait no it’s a black cat and a big black egg.”

“Why the fuck, in the two damned dimensions, would there be a big black egg.”

“Don’t look at me, I don’t know ei- oh! The demon guy is shoving the cow and the horse towards the water.”

Tommy looked down at the crater. Sure enough, there was the shadow of a horse and a cow slowly growing larger over a pool of water down below. “I think he also has a white cat with him,” Boo added, watching as the girl swooped back down to the ground near the three other people. The guy in the red sweater scooped up the gigantic egg, black wings wrapping around himself protectively like a goddamn mother hen sitting over her eggs.

“Pretty sure the cat is yellow, Boo.” Tommy argued, studying the scene across the canyon. “Also, did the red guy lay that fucking egg or something? Why is he so… like that with it.”

“Incoming!- Oop, the horse is in the water now… and the cow. Do we have to pull them up with the hammock too?”

He sighed, watching the five new lunatics scramble around one of Eret’s towers, rescuing the random animals that fell from the sky. Again, they never told him how they got here?

“What the fuck…”

#whoop #shipwrecked au #hc x dsmp #dsmp x hc #hermitcraft #dream smp #dsmp #tommyinnit #ghostboo #ranboo #grian #pearlescentmoon #mumbo jumbo #impulsesv #goodtimeswithscar #gtws #mcyt #im out of tags i think

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dear-ao3 · 2 months ago

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welcome back once again. i feel like im just screaming into the void at this point guys. is anyone still out there? is anyone still reading? i don't know but we’re back. i know we were just back but were back again cause we’re in triple header hell! but we are in mexico, so at least we get the cool f1 song! today is november 3, 2024 and here we goooooooooo

and im going to let you all in on a little secret here. i have pretty much no idea what happened this weekend. like i know things happened. i have notes written down. but this is going to be a surprise for the both of us. in my defense, i had an anatomy test and a work trip. so apologies if this one is a little rough around the edges.

charles leclerc became a fighter pilot. or at least he did on instagram, as a brand deal/partner thing. sorry that's not descriptive. let me try again.

he got to go on a rafale fighter jet to take part in a french air force training mission and its going to be in the documentary called supersonique.

he also ate what seems to be mcdonalds after

franco colapinto was in a forbes magazine. he was talking about being a driver from south america just ahead of the central/south american leg of the f1 season:

"I know that the Argentines are enjoying having a driver back in Formula 1 as much as I am; seeing when I do well and being just as happy as I am when we get good results… that is something that we all enjoy. I feel that we are a team with all the Argentines, who pushed me a lot to get to where we are; and what we achieved is also part of them. I love that they are happy with everything that is happening this year. I am very happy to see them enjoying what I am doing. Obviously, continuing down this path, seeing that I have so much support from Argentina, is something unique"

oscar was also in a forbes magazine. they somehow managed to make him look like a giraffe.

and it was lewis hamilton’s dog’s roscoe’s birthday he is 12. lewis lightly demanded that everyone wish him a happy birthday and you cant possibly say no to sir lewis hamilton.

valtteri bottas is also selling a piece of his mullet??? i swear im not making this up.

and im not sure if this was during this exact week but one of the williams mechanics? engineers? said that they only just recently got franco to stop taking the bus (like a real. commuter bus) from the hotel he stays at to the williams factory in england. franco thinks that its stupid to waste a car to drive him to the factory when he can sit on the bus and get a nice view. but you know, safety and all that.

one person was not gracing us with his presence this media day was fernando alonso. he was not feeling well and did not go to media day. he did show up later in the weekend, which was good cause it was his 400th gp this weekend. no one else has ever gotten to this many before. he had a cool helmet and everything.

and you know, everyone was well and truly impressed because holy shit. 400 races.

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everyone had only good things to say about him in his 400th race (thats a link to another video that it wont let me insert)

yuki and liam built a giant jenga tower (with the help of standing on a chair)

charles made a second, more unhinged, instagram post, showing off his helmet for the mexican gp. ill just let you watch it.

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then he showed up in his suit, slaying, and trying to speak spanish.

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oscar and lando did a fan stage with franco and alex. oscar told franco that he wants to learn spanish just to understand his interviews because apparently they are really funny.

max reacted to the grid recreating the inchident video. actually hold on this may in fact be from last week. you know what i don't care. its a good video. its going in.

george was also asked about the penalties from the texas week, namely his that he got for his incident with valtteri. he was very GPDA president about it. he said:

“when you watch an incident in slow motion, or you pause it at any given point - my penalty with valtteri, the rule states if you're not ahead of the apex and you push someone wide, you get a penalty. so by the letter of the law, my penalty was correct. but anybody who knows racing, and anybody watching it, knows it was not correct. i don't really know how we move forward. i think we’d probably all want to see the probably the same stewards all year long, so that the drivers and the stewards can all be on the same page, and that we can apply common sense when needed, rather than having to really follow the letter of the law.”

he also said that he could not speak about the other penalties that were given out because he had not thoroughly reviewed them yet. but aparently the driver guidelines are going to get gone over in qatar.

and now, for everyone’s favorite part. the silly season update.

this week it came in the form of a quote from valtteri bottas, saying that should he wind up with no seat at the end of the season, he would consider going back to mercedes as a reserve driver for next year.

why is this interesting??? WELL

mercedes currently has two reserve drivers as we know. one is frederik vesti. who i never really talk about, mostly because mercedes pretty much just kinda locks him in the simulator and that's about it. but hes charming in the sense that he reminds me of this kid who was in one of my algebra classes in high school who asked our teacher if he ate a gummy worm off the floor if he could get extra credit. the teacher said no. the kid still ate the gummy worm for fun.

anyway.

the other reserve driver we have talked about quite a bit and it is mick schumacher.

mick has been reserve driving for merc for two years now, following his untimely exit from haas at the end of 2022. and by untimely i mean he was apparently told during the last race weekend in a hotel lobby that he wasn't signed for the next year. anyway. mick is one of the reserve drivers, yes, but he is also racing for alpine in the WEC (world endurance championship) series this year. his WEC contract was for one year and as of now, when i am typing this, he has not re signed any contracts with WEC. despite the fact that everyone on the team has pretty much said that they would give both their right arm and their first child for him to re sign with them. but, mick is waiting for any news of a formula 1 seat before he signs another WEC contract.

aside from that though. mick did say that if he cant get a seat back on the grid then he wants to stay with mercedes as a reserve driver. so then why. is bottas saying. that he wants to go to mercedes as a reserve driver.

i have no idea. but this is formula 1. so it could either mean everything or it could mean nothing.

and the silly season rumors also continued to swirl around one franco colapinto. who, if you will remember, has no contract for next year. james vowels had this to say about franco: “even if hes taking points away from us [next year] he should be racing in f1.” which is to say that williams would release franco from his contract with them (cause he was in their drivers academy) so that he could sign with another team. and currently only two teams have seats open: vcarb (though they might be locked down with liam lawson) and audi/stake (who everyone seems to be in contention for).

speaking of rumors. helmut marko was back running his mouth (if you're surprised about this, clearly you haven't been paying enough attention to this post) this time about oscar coming to red bull should max leave or retire (like he is presently threatening to do every now and then due to a potentially expanding race calendar and also tighter regulations). and oscar shut that right down in a very oscar way:

“definitely not [going to red bull]. i’m very happy where i am. im under contract for the next two years after this and im certainly not looking to go elsewhere. it wouldnt be a week in f1 without some comments from helmut.”

he was then asked if he was surprised that helmut would say that oscar is going to sign with red bull and oscar said

“not massively. its a nice compliment i would say. but again i am very happy with where i am. they [red bull] have quote a bit pool of drivers they can choose from if they want.”

and zak brown conferred this:

"We're obviously very happy with our two guys and got them signed up for quite some time." though. as we know. contracts don't really mean too much in f1. so whos to say.

but helmut marko wasn’t done talking about the mclaren drivers. he still had shit to talk about lando:

“we know norris has some mental weaknesses. ive read some of the rituals he needs to do to perform well on race day.”

this was in relation to lando fighting for the championship with max, and why helmut thought that max was superior, despite having the inferior car.

andrea stella, the mclaren team principal, responded to this, saying that

“max was addressed for swearing. for me, this is much more severe.”

and zak brown said

“i read marko’s comments. poking at that situation i think is pretty inappropriate and kind of sets us back 10-20 years.”

and of course, helmut responded to them.

“i never talked about mental health. i just said that max is mentally stronger. they are deliberately causing unrest.”

and that may be so. it may not be so. it all depends on how you spin it.

you know what doesnt depend on how you spin it?

alex albon bonking oscar on the head with a boom mic

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and also whatever the hell george is doing here

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now. this is potentially i think the third time that george has had to defend himself saying that he is Not dating another driver (im not sure, my resident George expert is asleep). hes done it before with alex albon (entirely unprompted i might add. in a twitch stream. when people were asking if alex was going to go live. and george said “we might be best mates but he is Not my boyfriend.” which was something no one was accusing him of) and i don't remember what the other time was. but i know that this has happened before. and george. if you’re defending yourself against allegations that no one is making well. that kinda says something.

but lets get on to practice, i say, as it is now 12:30am on brazil race day. really. how do i get myself into these situations.

idk

but alas we had practice. i don't really know what happened, i didn't watch any of it. but! pato o’ward with mclaren was in fp1, along with ollie bearman at ferrari, felipe drugovich at aston, kimi antonelli at mercedes and robert shwartzman at stake.

it was a proper big deal for pato to be in for fp1 because hes mexican and everyone there was really really excited for him to be in. he currently races in indycar and hes a pretty big deal. hes also the mclaren reserve driver. and he put on face paint. really, he is quite funny and i would recommend at least glancing at his social media, its off the walls.

alex crashed into ollie and went spin.

robert saw it happen and his radio was just a tad unhinged:

robert then also got a five place grid penalty for overtaking under a double yellow flag. which is really interesting because that penalty can only be served in a formula 1 race and guess what, robert is not a formula 1 driver. but at least he can now join the club with jenson button for Drivers Who Have Grid Penalties That They Cannot Serve.

then in practice 2 we had a rather large crash from george. by rather large i mean 35g. straight into the barriers. and the way that he hit the barriers, he almost went directly into the concrete.

which is why when he got out of the car and whisked off to the medical center, he was clearly limping and also couldn't breathe.

(if you're new to the world of formula 1, yes this is less than ideal, but he did come on radio saying that he was fine, which is always good and did get out of the car himself, which is also always good. sometimes they just get the wind knocked out of them during the big high impact crashes. lando had a worse one in vegas last year)

still. there was a red flag as they extracted george’s car from the barriers. and we didn't hear anything from mercedes about whether or not george was okay (usually this is something that comes through pretty quickly when a driver has to go to the medical center post crash because sometimes they get sent to the hospital for precautionary checks)

but we did hear from the admin on the LN4 twitter account (?) (one of lando’s official accounts) and they posted something to the extent of “is it in bad taste to say we’re so back” right after george’s crash. it was quickly deleted.

eventually, we found out that george was in fact okay, back in the hospitality, and probably complaining about how his car didn't really work too well.

forward into qualifying we go.

one of the ferrari mechanics decided to do some acrobatics

and lando took one of his famed mid quali naps.

and it had been 4,480 days since fernando alonso’s last pole position in germany 2012.

oh you wanted to actually know about what they did? in the cars? my most sincere apologies. without any further ados:

well there was not a lot of grip. because this is a high altitude track. the highest altitude of the whole season.

it was also checo’s home race. somehow i forgot to mention that. but he is in fact mexican and he is also a HUGE deal in mexico. last year he did not have a good race weekend here, he got shoved off the track at the start by charles leclerc (i think it was a no fault thing but i do not remember, neither of them had anywhere to go) and ended up dnfing on turn 1 lap 1. which was not great. and he definitely did not want a repeat of that this year.

unfortunately he was off to a bad start. in his first qualifying lap he managed only a 1:18.5 and martin brundle said “what did he do there? oh dear. not particularly fast”

he said that he had braking problems and was stuck down in p19.

meanwhile george russell.

they had had to rebuild the car for him after his crash in practice the day before and he had all kinds of old spec parts going on his car. no one was really sure when it was exactly from. some said miami. some said silverstone. in any case, it was not up to date.

oscar piastri was also having a time of it. he only managed to go 13th fastest and then it got deleted for track limits so he got shoved back down to 19th. he had time to go out again though and he did. he needed at least a 1:17.2. he did a 1:17.5. “this is not a cracking lap” said martin brundle.

checo meanwhile got knocked down into the bottom five by charles leclerc. which was slightly cruel after last year. “ah shit,” he said over the radio. “Indeed,” martin agreed. and oscar got knocked down to the bottom five by franco.

“similar position from lando last year, so ill make sure to do my homework to see how he moved through the field” oscar said later. i think last year lando started p17 and finished p5. it was slightly insane.

haas meanwhile, the 300 person team, had both cars through. this year they were really, really making the upgrades work for them. and also bottas was through. hes never not made it to q3 in mexico.

q2 was mostly uninteresting except for when yuki tsunoda went crash. he was okay, but it ended the session slightly early. so himself, liam lawson, fernando alonso, lance stroll and valtteri bottas were all out.

meanwhile. alex albon had almost all but matched the pace of the mercedes. which was really interesting because need i remind you that alex albon drives a williams. and williams is definitely mid field, despite being mercedes powered.

in q3 max made it to provisional pole. but then carlos took it from him. and carlos kept it. he was on pole!

“what a lap,” carlos said

“two laps,” his engineer said.

he also had a great secret third lap where he smacked lando in the nuts

and so lining up for thee start of the race we had

carlos, max, lando, george, lewis, kevin, pierre. alex, nico, yuki, liam, fernando, lance, valtteri, franco, oscar, checo, esteban, guanyu

and once the race started, yuki was very nearly immediately in the wall. he retired. as well as alex albon who was also involved in the incident.

max had picked up the lead from carlos somewhere and carlos ended up going off track and passing max, but when he rejoined he gave the position back.

so heading into lap 2, max was leading, then checo, lando, charles, lewis, george, jevin, nico, gasly, liam, lance, fernando, perez, colapinto, valtteri, zhou, ocon and albon

which meant that checo had somehow gained five places.

the fia thought that this was slightly too good to be true. turns out that he was being investigated for a false start.

checo did not agree with this. “no, no it was a great start,” he said over radio. “have a look because i don't think we were.” apparently he was though, and he got a five second penalty for it.

meanwhile, carlos passed max in a move that surprised everyone, even carlos himself.

“mate,” max said over radio. “what a can i do with a fuck empty battery? what is this stupid mode.” the team did not really look into it, but it became clear that carlos saw the car recharging its battery and still sent it and somehow it all worked out for him. max had had no battery from previously fending off carlos.

next up it was lando’s turn to get through. he passed, then max kind of ran him off the track. lando did not give the spot back. a few corners later max ran both him and lando off the track and charles took that as an opportunity to zoom right past them. i cant insert the video because f1 is blocked on tumblr, but you can watch the moment if you click here

“i was ahead at the corner! same as the last time, he keeps forcing me off i was just trying to avoid a collision! hes dangerous.” lando said over the radio.

this time it did seem to be actually dangerous.

“he overtook off track and pushed me,” lando repeated again.

both incidents were reported up to race control. but lando still got two track limits strikes, which would count against him if he went off again.

almost immediately, max got a 10 second penalty for forcing another driver off the track. “im sorry mate but that was outrageous,” martin brundle said.

max was told about the penalty. he was unbothered. “yeah, quite impressive.”

meanwhile charles got the fastest lap. and george, on his old spec car, potentially from miami, managed to pass lewis hamilton for fifth.

and then fernano alonso had to retire, on his 400th race for i think it was an exhaust issue. or a brake issue. a something issue. which was unfortunate.

also unfortunate was max getting Another 10 second penalty. for the second time that he managed to force lando off.

george’s engineer told him that max managed to get 20 seconds worth of penalties. “wow” george said, speaking everyone’s thoughts.

meanwhile, liam lawson and checo had an incident.

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and then he and lance stroll nearly smacked into eachother as well. checo ended up going into the pits after it (and i think served his 5s penalty) but then came out fine. despite a slight hole in his side pod. the incident did end up going to the stewards, but no penalties were given.

what was hilarious about this though is that it was the second week in a row where liam lawson was picking beef with one of the “old men” drivers on the track. first fernando alonso and then checo perez. and liam did flip perez off (at least i think it was) here.

liam did later apologize for this, saying that "he [checo] spent half the lap blocking me and trying to ruin my race, so i was upset."

after the race, checo said that it was a "i dont think it was a very clever move" and liam said "im not just going to get out of his way"

liam also said, much later on, potentially actually in brazil "im not here to make friends, im here to win"

cause remember that liam is trying to get checo's seat.

still, this was incredibly bad luck for checo at his home race, especially after wanting to get redemption for last year.

max also ended up pitting on lap 27 and served his 20 second penalty.

by lap 30 this was what we were working with:

p1 carlos p2 charles p3 lando p4 george p5 kevin p6 nico p7 liam p8 oscar p9 franco p10 lewis p11 valtteri p12 esteban p13 max p14 guanyu p15 pierre p16 checo p17 lance

this was excited because we almost had a HAM, BOT, VER in the timings, which was very typical of a few years ago when bottas was still at mercedes and max was constantly chasing them down. a few laps later, we did indeed get HAM, BOT, VER

carlos, who was still leading, was told to box a few minutes later “one more lap, one more lap,” he pleaded with his engineers, trying to become his own engineer again as he sometimes does when he is leading a race (a la singapore)

george had also pitted, but he was displeased with it. “why have we done this? surely we could have done 1 or 2 laps more,” he said, wishing that he had put his foot down a la carlos.

conversely, oscar piastri was practically begging to pit. “mate think about pulling me out of this shit,” oscar said, stuck in a drs train as he had been for the last many several laps, unable to overtake and just kind of stuck between haas, rb and williams.

oscar was at this point, sitting in 6th, in front of liam lawson. max was in 8th at this point, but quite a bit behind oscar. and the thought was that they, mclaren, were going to leave oscar as a sacrifice to fight with max to protect lando, who was trying to take as many points off of max as possible.

carlos was still chilling in first, 7.7 seconds ahead of charles.

and george had an asymmetrical front wing. not quite broken but also kind of broken. but still usable. so he kept using it.

max verstappen passed liam. he was now right behind oscar. and oscar had yet to pit.

franco had something wrong with his steering. “something is wrong with the steering mate. something strange. it goes soft stiff soft.” and yet, no one made a that's what she said joke about that.

oscar was finally pulled out of hell and into the pit lane. he came out 13th and very very behind max.

“is it me,” crofty said. “or is it suddenly getting cloudy.”

because that was just what this race needed. rain.

“its getting really dark!” max said.

rain was not expected to hit the track, but it was getting close.

“ive got very small rain drops on the visor,” george said.

“check for sweat george, check for sweat,” crofty said, calling back to that race i don't remember which one where george reported rain but it was really just sweat falling into his eyes.

oscar was meanwhile fighting back through the grid, he was up to 10th.

lando was now putting in the fastest laps, trying to catch charles. he was 20 seconds ahead of george at this point so he was in no danger from behind, but he definitely wanted to try to catch charles.

carlos and charles, because of this, had been told to speed up.

carlos did not agree with this “my opinion is that we are pushing too hard, absolutely no need for the team.” he was saying this because he was about to start lapping cars and thus be in traffic, but lando was too close for ferrari (4 seconds behind charles) to back off. and so they went.

franco took the fastest lap now.

and lewis was still trying to pass george (who, i remind you, is driving a car potentially from miami in terms of upgrades and has a broken front wing) by still i mean that this had been going on for a solid 5 laps at this point.

lando was only 1.5 seconds behind charles at this point.

“i need your best driving now, lets go” charles’s engineer said. ferrari were also having brake cooling problems at this point. and lando put in the fastest lap.

on lap 63 he was half a second behind charles

and then charles went off the track! nearly slammed head first into the barriers but managed to just barely catch it! but it was enough to send lando through to p2!

charles meanwhile was telling his team to “think about the fastest lap”

and george was still ahead of lewis. lewis had been half a second behind him for a long while. and the two mercs were in no mans land in a race with eachother. and lewis finally passed on lap 66. it took him 12 laps. and lewis has the most upgraded version of the car lets remember.

later on george claimed that there was nothing “better” about his car and its version than lewis’s so either, lewis’s car is fucked (as he has been saying this whole year) or! the miami upgrades and a broken front wing were actually better. ill let you decide on that one.

franco and liam meanwhile had an incident. franco’s front wing got smashed and liam claimed that he had nowhere to go.

checo was told “might be debris in turn 12” from the liam and franco incident. “i guess its the same idiot that crashed again?” checo asked.

“you can watch the highlights later,” his engineer said.

checo giggled and said “im watching them now.” so at least he got a little satisfaction from that.

but liam lawson pitted after his scuffle and went fastest.

then charles pitted and went fastest.

and then checo pitted and tried to go for a fastest lap attempt and then failed. probably because he still had a slight hole in his side pod.

so charles ended with the fastest lap. and who won?

CARLOS SAINZ

he was followed by lando, charles, lewis, george, max, kevin, oscar, nico, pierre, lance, franco, esteban, valtteri, guanyu, liam and checo.

he got his “one last win” in ferrari (but didn't sing smooth operator over the radio. sad.) and also! ferrari are now ahead of red bull in the constructors championship!

the standings are

mclaren: 566

ferrari: 537

red bull: 512

and according to one laura winter “ferrari are on a charge”

but lets hear from the drivers first

charles said that “it was a difficult one….race was the best we could achieve on my side today.”

lando said that he “tired to avoid any crashes, carlos did well!....i didn't want to expect such a thing [max’s driving] because i respect max as a driver but i was expecting it and i avoided it” he later elaborated on this, saying that

“i don't want to complain about it, you know. cause you know, this is what i love. i love going into races and knowing like ‘we’re gonna have a good battle today and hes [max] going to put up a good fight’ and all of those things. and i look forward to it. but things like today are just a bit too far in my opinion and obviously in the stewards opinions too and i would say pretty in the majority of people’s opinions. and that's just not how i think many people like to go racing. but i respect max a lot. i want to race hard against him but if i didn't do what i did today and avoid him, id probably be out of the race you know, so…its tough but i played my cards well i knew what to expect in many ways and yeah. points are good for me at the minute. and we just keep our heads down.”

max had a totally different view

“well i mean at the end of the day, if you agree with it or not, it doesnt matter because the penalties are given. so honestly that's also not my biggest problem of the race. my biggest problem was just that we had no pace. yeah, just struggling a lot on the tires. yeah, couldn't really attack and i couldn't follow ferrari and mclaren.”

he was then asked if he would do something different next time. and he had an interesting answer again:

“uh. maybe get a drink in the pit stop.”

so as usual max remains unbothered. you cannot pay him to be bothered because its not in his nature. he just wants to go racing.

one person though was happy with his result and that was carlos sainz.

“i just really wanted this one, i wanted it for myself….with four races left i just want to have fun.”

he was also asked about his overtake on max and he said that

“i needed to surprise him one way or another, i was a bit far back but i had nothing to lose so i sent one down the inside.”

(as a side note they kept calling carlos the “king of mexico” which just. feels wrong? given you know? colonialism and columbus and the conquistadors and all that that pillaged the crap out of mexico and south america? but maybe that's just the history major in me talking)

but it was also good news for ferrari itself because of how much they have gained over recent races and carlos had this to say about that

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by absolute contrast. charles called max “my max” in the press conference

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and then accidentally swore

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and immediately got approached by an fia official after

jury is still out on his punishment, he may need to do community service with max.

aside from. all of that. haas! had a great run of points, p7 and p9, and are now in front of alpine in the constructors championship. kevin said that the upgrades that they have brought recently “have just worked….sometimes we surprise ourselves.” which i think really well and truly sums up the entirely of haas.

he also said that he is at peace with this potentially being the end of his career, though he has been in this position now twice before and has come back. so. jurys still out on kevin magnussen.

and we also heard from franco colapinto. who said that the fans here really motivated him. “in football we are fighting with eachother and that doesnt happen here” he said. but he also said that he didn't have anything else left in the car today.

he was asked about his plans for next year and he said himself that he does Not have a seat for 2025 and there have not been talks. he wants to come back in 26 or 27. but, remember, this is the kid who likes to fuck with everyone. so whos to say. also his team apparently have been talking to people and there is a Chance that he could be in for the RB seat for next year. we will see what happens.

“everybody is tired,” james hinchcliffe said “but everybody is having fun.”

and especially having fun were mclaren and ferrari, specifically zak brown and carlos sainz, who photo bombed eachother.

oscar called lando landito during one of the post mclaren videos

and then lando and carlos celebrated their podium together

they actually went out together with a bunch of people at what seems to be a big fancy dinner thing. and carlos was sitting. next to lando. but across from his own girlfriend. which is kind of hilarious.

and then they went out and carlos sang smooth operator. because what else did you expect him to sing. he’s carlos sainz.

we have one more race in this triple header, and that is brazil. and since i am coming to you from the future, i can tell you all that you’re going to want to tune in for this one. its off the walls in more ways than one. and i promise it will be a much better update than this one. see you all soon :)

the 2024 formula 1 silly season and drama master post, part 2 (part 1 here)

Hello and welcome to ah fucking fuck auto caps fuck fuck fuck how do i turn off auto caps AHA there we go okay. take 2

hello and welcome to the great and very insane formula 1 2024 season drama post, part 2. if you are new here or are just looking for part one (which contains the previous 16 (?) races, the off season, pre season testing and everything else, that can be found HERE. (a word to the wise: open it in a browser, not the app, and preferably on a computer to avoid crashing. its fucking long).

what the hell is formula 1? car go fast. fastest cars in the world zoom around tracks at top speeds of over 300kph, piloted by the top 20 drivers in the world. it might not sound dramatic, but oh man. you will Not be disappointed. this post focuses on the drama, the insanity, the sheer what the hell how is this a serious sport. no legitimately. we've just about seen it all this year. grindr, dogs, watersports, ice cream brands, its all here.

the point of this post? to educate, to catalog the insane drama, and to just have a good time. people like to gatekeep this sport, there is also a lot happening. i try to make it easy to understand. again, probably best to start at the beginning of the post because it does a pretty good job of explaining things, which i began way back in january, and can be found HERE (again, shes long, be careful)

and, as usual, if you do not want to see this post EVER AGAIN, block the tag #saph explains silly season 2024

and a second caution, i assume this post will be getting long as well. including this one we have minimum 9 updates left!

anyway, those of you who have been following along the whole time, welcome back! i know we got a little delayed. and i know we’re on a new post, so lets just briefly take a second for me to explain what the fuck happened. first i had an anatomy test, second i work 2 jobs with fuck ass hours, third tumblr decided to stop letting me look at any of my drafts, fourth tumblr support ghosted me about the drafts issue and the post was half saving half not so i just decided fuck it, were going with post 2, electric boogaloo, and fifth, i decided to start typing this instead in a google docs so. many changes. if you're new here i am usually more on top of this.

but here we are. were back on street circuits. we’re in baku, azerbaijan, for the start of the last third of the season. 8 races remain, world championship titles are still within grasp of multiple people. the drama is dramaing. and today is september 22, 2024 and lets fucking go.

first and foremost, on account of the fact that this post is late (again, see above), were going to have to do a bit of a speed run. if you're new here, i promise that this is not representative of my normal dedication to the update post. and for those asking, yeah, ill probably compile it somewhere better than a tumblr post after its all said and done, but we don't have time for that now.

what we do have time for is the Off Week (and like some of the media stuff). and it was filled with silliness:

george russell decided to wear what can only be described as slightly ugly yellow short shorts with his taylor swift shirt that he got at the eras tour. this was baffling for several reasons, the main reason being that i don't think the internet knew that he was capable of wearing a graphic t shirt

fernando alonso got his aston martin valkyrie finally. in case you are unfamiliar, a valkyrie i think is the worlds fastest street legal car. he posted tweets about this that made it seem like he wanted to fuck the car. hilariously, the car broke down an hour later.

we also had the very thrilling conclusion to grill the grid. oscar won and he somehow managed to look more pleased about his grill the grid win than his first race victory.

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nico rosberg went to the green awards and he wore a fantastically insane teal blue suit. yes i know hes not a current driver. but you all like hearing about him so ask and you shall receive. unfornunately i cant find a picture of it though

and also not a current driver is mick schumacher, but my roommate asked me to include that he was seen on his girlfriends instagram being bad at golf. like. exceptionally bad at golf. like he hit a tree 20 feet in front of him.

also playing golf was lando norris. except he managed to look like try bolton from high school musical 2.

he also talked about the world driver championship with his friend max fewtrell while they were playing golf. unfortunately i lost this link in the sea of technical difficulties, but the gist of it was that he was saying that there is still hope for him to beat max in the championship (hes about 60 points behind right now). lando doesnt usually talk about the championship because he doesnt want news outlets to paint him as “desperate” so this was interesting

charles leclerc had an insane off week. first he rear ended someone in monaco. then he spoke at a yacht conference. he was not scheduled to speak at said yacht conference, he was there doing something else and they were like hey you're cool people know you, heres a microphone. he alsp ended up on a weather channel while promoting a karting event he was doing for the jules bianchi foundation (his god father, the one who died during the f1 race in japan 2014). he also changed his instagram pop and re centered it because some random tiktoker told him it matched his aesthetic better.

oscar piastri posted a photo of himself sitting in the cockpit of a plane and then promptly deleted it. because he posted it on 9/11. for anyone who doesnt know what that is, that was when some terrorists hijacked commercial planes and few them into the world trade centers in nyc and the pentagon in washington dc

max verstappen also posted a plane pic with himself and lando norris, but he did not delete it.

we also had the return of daniel ricciardo’s jpg instagram account, which is kinda like a finsta for photos that hes taken. i think lando started this a few years ago.

heading into the race week we certainly got a weird ass batch of pr. including but not limited to:

lewis hamilton was back on top and slaying in the fit game. as was yuki.

lewis hamilton also exposed george russell as listening to katy perry pre race. katy perry and taylor swift (this was after he claimed that he liked listening to old school rap music.) though, lewis then started singing wrecking ball???? confusing vibes all around

george was not off the hook yet tho because some intern definitely make him say skidibidi toilet or whatever the thing is idk, i might be gen z but im not insufferable, okay? actually george in baku was just all kinds of unhinged

george and alex also got up to something, what it is no one knows but it is clearly something

max pulled up to the paddock de aged about 10 years. picture one is of him in baku in 2015 (i believe he was 17) and picture 2 is this year. no i am not kidding.

and franco walked into the paddock telling everyone about argentinian mate (which is a drink, not a friend)

and max shoved a microphone out of the way so everyone could gossip

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then of course, we had some slightly more relevant drama

haas announced that ollie would be replacing kevin at baku. in case you forgot, kevin magnussen received a total of 12 penalty points over the season so far, which means he gets one race ban. how did he get the points? well he was mostly wreaking havoc on everyone else so that his teammate, nico hulkenberg, could drag his car into the points. lets all remember the time in saudi arabia where he managed to get 20 seconds of penalties by basically driving like a mad man just to make sure that nico could keep his position after he pit stopped. anyway, nico was kind of pissed about the race ban situation and said “maybe the guidelines for F1 penalties need to be reviewed as the stewards ‘want to get involved’ no matter the contact.”

in any case though, k mags was out. and ollie was in. we’ve seen ollie before. notably he subbed in for carlos sainz at the saudi arabia gp when carlos had appendicitis. he managed to get points as well. since then, he has been announced as a haas driver for 2025 and is now subbing in for k mags (haas, later in the week called him a super sub. clearly no gen z person read that over.) he can do this because ferrari has a haas engine so they share reserve drivers.

adrian newey finally got employed. i know! i can hardly believe it either! but he did! and youll never guess where!

ferrari? no that would be too obvious.

mercedes? nah

williams? no too much of a shit show

aston martin? ding ding ding! just the right amount of shit show!

that is right. newey is going to aston for 2025.

apparently he was offered a “good package” according to himself, which i assume means pay and also the fact that lawrence stroll made him a shareholder? stakeholder? whatever its called. in the team itself. basically he has a lot of power.

he said that he always wanted to work with fernando and lewis. and he couldn't do both. and aston had a better package than ferrari.

fernando looked positively evil during all the announcement pictures. and called the team "definitely the team of the future" and for those of you who don't know, fernando is positively evil. hes just been stuck in a shit box and we havent seen very much of him, but man does he know how to evilly slut it up. so that will be fun to see.

by contrast, people said that lance was not excited enough. and well. lance 1. has resting bitch face and 2. never really looks excited about anything. also he lives in a world where take your child to work day somehow became his job. (his dad owns the team).

lewis hamilton was asked what he thought about adrian not going to ferrari, and here's what he had to say:

"i feel like, while I have mentioned before that it would be an honor to work with adrian, i have been privileged to work with two championship winning teams that didnt have adrian."

mclaren announced pato o ward would do FP1 in mexico. who is pato o ward? hes one of mclaren’s indycar drivers and one of the f1 reserve drivers. he is incredibly charming and definitely runs his own social media as seen here:

mclaren Also claim they figured out who their number 2 driver is and they claim its oscar. i say they claim because the statements were a lot more complex than that. essentially, according to andrea stella, the priority is to the team first, then lando and then oscar. so they didn't outright say that oscar is the number 2 driver and i am willing to bet real money that this is because mr mark webber, oscars manager, has something in oscars contract that prevents him from being a number 2 driver. this is of course because mark webber was one of the most infamous number 2 drivers in f1 history to none other than menace war criminal sebastian vettel, who in their time as teammates, managed to win 4 back to back world champions. or, top to bottom if you're mrs darbus from high school musical.

lando was asked about this and he said that yes, the team does support him. though he would not expect oscar to give up a win for him and that it is more complex behind the scenes. i suppose we will see if there are any papaya rules coming out this weekend….

and oscar said "i think the main point is its not purely just going to be me pulling over for lando every single race, because thats how none of us, including lando, wont want to go racing, if we feel that someone has done a much better job on a weekend, whichever way it is, we want that person to be rewarded."

max verstappen commented on the mclaren situation as well. which was funny mostly because red bull has one of the most defined number 1 and number 2 drivers of any team. he said "you look at it form oscar's perspective, he is closer to lando than lando to me. they have to deal with that."

and allow me to put on a tin foil hat as we are about to talk about the future of the red bull seat. because all i have to offer here is a baseball hat and a red bull can.

a long time ago we talked about the red bull cans. the ones that red bull makes to promote f1. at the end of last season red bull put max and checo on the red bull can. this season at the start it was just max on the red bull can. well. now checo has reappeared on the cans too. and i will tell you what i think this means. it means that checo is not getting swapped this season, which was a possibility for awhile.

but! there is more!

daniel ricciardo made an instagram post this week. and it was very interesting. but most interestingly he was wearing a red bull hat.

which he does occasionally, no big deal really. he did race for the for several years, he technically does currently. BUT then he showed up TO THE PADDOCK wearing the red bull hat.

which is Big Interesting. usually you show up in a statement outfit or wearing the team kit. and daniel is not a red bull racing driver. he is a visa cashapp racing bulls driver. they might be owned by red bull but they are Not the same team. so why the red bull hat. in the paddock. well, the rumor is that hes taking checos seat for 2025. and the rumor is that this will be announced before mexico. so checo can have a proper send off.

and with that. the baku lore.

theres a lot that has happened at baku. as i said its a street circuit. and i think its the fastest street circuit. but over the years theres been some notable events.

such as the great kimi raikkonen radio for gloves and steering wheel:

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they gave mini kimi this week gloves and steering wheel in honor of that

the max and daniel crash in 2018 when they were running p1 and p2 respectfully

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and of course. how could we forget. charles’s infamous “i am stupid” radio.

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speaking of charles, he crashed again in fp1. not quite in the same spot, but nearly. he took a picture with the marshalls.

then in fp2 he rage quit, basically saying that the car sucks.

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but he was back and better than ever in practice three because he managed to top the time charts. welcome back fuck ass ferrari.

some other teams definitely experienced the lows but not really the highs of baku during practice. like lance stroll who came on the radio to say “this is not a car” (good thing they have adrian newey now, right?

franco colapinto also cut his ear before practice on the neck strengthener stretcher thing that they all use and the team wanted to give him stitches but he was like no no no i need to be in the car in about 5 minutes im not doing that. so he jammed on his helmet and jumped in the car. he also crashed and when he went to the medical center he took off his helmet and there was blood everywhere and they were like no no no you cannot race! and he was like no! this is not from the crash! and then explained it and they let him do qualifying.

also im pretty sure? ollie bearman crashed? in practice? but frankly i don't have time to google it so whos to say.

but alas. qualifying.

i know i know this is kind of a shitty update. i promise ill go all out in singapore. i PROMISE.

so as i said. its a street circuit. high speed. 90 degree corners. and also windy as hell. we also had the dynamic duo of karun and harry in the commentary box.

max led the first practice, george led the second and i think charles led the third. or some order like that.

slipstream here is almost essential (slipstream: going behind another car to reduce the wind drag so you can go faster)

charles has the last three pole positions (first in qualifying) here in baku, but he has never won. by comparison, red bull have never had pole here but they have won.

and franco has never been to baku before.

i think that's all the exposition that we need here.

q1 started with max complaining about his car. “the car is jumping around like crazy on the rear axle” he said. despite this he was sitting in p3.

the mid field battle though….the mid field battle was heating the hell up. mostly because none other than franco colapinto, who if you will remember, has never been to baku before, had split the two ferraris. he was in third for the moment, .109 seconds behind carlos sainz and .159 seconds ahead of charles leclerc. we still had a lot of qualifying left to go, so this was probably not going to stay, but it was still insane. he was pushing insanely hard, nearly kissing the walls. clearly he had learned from his crash in practice.

the two mclarens waited until the very end of q1 to do their final flying push lap, and oscar made it through, but tragedy struck for lando.

lando was in the middle of his last flying lap, time was ticking down, and there was a Very Brief yellow flag on the track. now, according to rules, you cannot complete your flying lap if there is a yellow flag. so lando pitted and was stuck down in 17th and out of qualifying. this would be the first time that he was out in q1 since vegas last year (which if i remember correctly was also not his fault)

now though, of course nothing is ever that cut and dry. people thought that there had been a mis showing of a flag. yellow flag means that a car is stopped on track, white flag means that a car is going slowly on the track. and people thought that there had been a yellow flag shown when it was actually supposed to be a white flag (if there had been a white flag then lando would have been able to keep doing his flying lap) lando himself said that he had no idea what people were talking about because there is a light on the steering wheel that lights up when flags are called and he had a big yellow light. so it was clearly a yellow flag.

if you're concerned about lando being able to pull it out of the bag, id like to point you in the direction of the mexican gp last year where lando qualified 17th and finished 5th. on a track that was hard to overtake on. he can be absolutely insane when he wants to be. worry not gentle reader.

in any case. also out in q1 was daniel ricciardo, valtteri bottas, zhou guanyu and esteban ocon.

and notably, williams, who was on fucking fire this weekend as we already saw, finished q1 with alex albon in second (ahead of oscar) and franco colapinto in 8th. pierre gasly had somehow managed to also get into 4th. and nico hulkenberg was in 7th with ollie bearman in 13th. i told you the mid field battle was heating the hell up.

q2. everyone zoomed straight out of the gate. they didn't want to get lando norris’d. but, speaking of that, if lando managed to get no points in the race and charles managed to win, charles would overtake lando in the drivers championship. mark webber himself told this to charles, who was absolutely baffled.

in any case, charles was kinda suffering right now and that was because he was not getting slipstream from carlos to make his lap faster. meanwhile, carlos seemed to be actively trying to give charles the slipstream because he came on radio to say “he keeps missing the tow”

and amazingly, franco colapinto was 4 tenths AHEAD of alex albon. alex albon who had not been unqualified by his teammate once since the start of 2023. ex red bull driver alex albon. that alex albon.

max topped the times in q2, followed immediately by charles. insanely, fernando alonso managed to drag the aston martin to fifth. and franco was right behind him in 6th. by comparison alex albon was in 10th.

and from q2 we lost ollie bearman, yuki tsunoda (who has never qualified lower than 8th in baku), pierre gasly, nico hulkenberg and lance stroll. so yes, ollie bearman managed to outqualify nico hulkenberg. this is ollies second ever f1 race.

steaming on forward to q3.

we had, for review, in q3 the following:

both ferraris, both red bulls, both mercedes, both WILLIAMS (has not happened since vegas 2023), plus fernando alonso and oscar piastri.

right out the gate it was wild.

“red bull! theyve re found their mojo! or have they!” karun said. red bull were in 5th and 6th and not entirely sucking for the moment.

everyone did one flyer and then came out at the end for a second flyer.

here were the standings:

charles, carlos, oscar, george, checo, max, lewis, alex, franco, fernando

and everyone was making it to the line and all was going smooth until-

wait a second what is that

could it be! alex albon! with the air box fan still on his car! surely not!!!

oh but it was! and harry and karun were like oh wow so unfortunate for williams tisk tisk

meanwhile ted jumped on the radio to Loudly announce to everyone that this was insane and if i have time here i will put the rant he ranted cause it was Fantastic.

and what do you know i have time

so we had 3 minutes left qualifying and everyone was pulling out of the pits for their last flyer when oscar hopped on the radio to say

"the williams still has the air box fan in"

"oh what an error! disaster for williams!" karun and harry said. they speculated if the marshalls could get it or if the session needed to be red flagged. but alex threw the fan off the car.

and then they asked "ted have you ever seen that before?" and ted did not hold back:

"ITS A MASSIVE YELLOW FAN HOW COULD YOU MISS IT???!!! HOW COULD THE MECHANICS MISS IT???? I CANT BELIVE THEY WOULD MAKE SUCH A MISTAKE DOWN AT WILLIAMS! SUCH AN EXPERIENCED BUNCH OF GUYS AND GIRLS! WHAT IS GOING ON AT WILLIAMS OPERATIONALLY? HOW COULD YOU SEND A CAR OUT LIKE THAT?"

alex, obviously, got fined for an unsafe release 5k euros. he also had to throw the fan off to the side and got slightly covered in dry ice. he did not get to the a second flying lap.

franco did tho!

and here were out qualifying results:

p1: charles p2: oscar p3: carlos p4: checo p5: george p6: max p7: lewis p8: fernando p9: franco p10: alex p11: ollie p12: yuki p13: pierre p14: nico p15: lance p16: daniel p17: lando p18: valtteri p19: zhou p20: esteban

oh ho ho but we werent done yet. because pierre gasly got disqualified from qualifying. for failing fuel flow regulations. and lewis was going to have to start from the pit lane for changing his power unit.

everyone, and by everyone i mean oscar max and checo, pretty much said that charles was going to get pole no matter what, they knew this coming in and the best they were trying for was second

onto the race.

notably, this is considered a checo track. this was one of the three races that max did not win last year. because checo won it. its a track that he does well on, evidenced by the fact that he qualified above max in qualifying. so people were expecting big things from him.

and so, we head into lap 1.

charles managed to hang onto the lead. checo passed carlos straight out of the gate for third and max managed to pass george to take fifth. lando had managed to get ahead of nico and up into 13th. notably, franco held onto 8th and ollie was able to hold onto tenth.

someone who was not doing well was lance stroll, who came on the radio saying that he had a puncture. this was from contact with yuki. lance had to pit for fresh tires and was pretty immediately thrown to the back of the grid.

by lap 2 lando had managed to get past daniel and was in 12th, he was trying to get past yuki next, which he managed by lap 3. yuki also lost a spot to nico.

also slaying in the mclaren was oscar, who took fastest lap. then charles took fastest lap.

and lewis hamilton, who had started from the pit lane, was up to 16th. already. somehow. though he was displeased with the tires, sayig that “this tire is pretty bad” over the radio.

yuki meanwhile was clearly having a problem because he had started going very very slowly. thought the pit wall said that he had no problems. this would later turn out to be false but we will indulge them for the time being.

franco was STILL ahead of alex albon on lap 6. STILL.

lando on lap 8 managed to push his way into points positions, overtaking ollie bearman for 10th. though this was where things were about to slow down for him because in front of him were alex, franco and fernando, who were all very close together and would be hard to get past.

george was back in bad luck hell as a plastic bag entered his airbox. will he ever catch a break.

on lap 11 nico hulkenberg finally caught up with ollie bearman and passed him for 11th.

and max’s car was not working. to potentially no one’s surprise. “i have zero bite in the car” he said. and this was probably true because checo was a whole 6.5 seconds ahead of him. insane gap.

several pit stops later that i will not detail out because we simply do not have the time, alex albon ended up in 4th and lando ended up in fifth. and oscar was about to get undercut by checo.

“mojo seems to be back for checo perez” harry said, correctly.

mojo was back for him indeed. and now he was right behind lando.

and if you will recall, according to mclaren themselves, priority at mclaren is the team first, then oscar, then lando. but oscar was ahead of lando. so what did mclaren do?

they asked lando do hold up perez, but not compromise his own race.

remever a long time ago when i said mclaren wouldn't have any internal drama this season? man how i was wrong.

lando managed to hold up perez for around a lap or two before he got past. this was crucial because this was during when oscar was in the pits.

thanks to lando and the power of the papaya rules teamwork, oscar ended up coming out in 4th, only .706s ahead of checo.

mclaren are working together everyone! mclaren are working together!

meanwhile, turns out that yuki did indeed have problems because he retired on lap 17 with a hole in his sidepod from the contact with lance on lap 1. this was now two races in a row where he had had to retire for reasons out of his control.

several more people pitted. and eventually charles was back out in front, oscar was in p2. until he wasn't. no, he didn't dnf. he overtook charles! he was in p1! he popped out of nowhere! nowhere being 2 car lengths back and just flooring it to spring around charles like a little silly slinky! karun called it a “good, fair and robust defense,” which sounds like its descibing notes in wine. but this was not wine. this was the baku gp. and we were only half done.

ollie bearman was defending against lewis hamilton, holding on tightly to 14th place.

charles was still behind oscar and he could not get past, despite the fact that he was still very much in spitting distance. “they are pushing like crazy or they have more grip than us” he said.

carlos got past both lando and alex albon and was up into 4th

this brought max up behind lando. max was on 11 lap old tires and lando was on 24 lap old tires. but lando still defended like hell and managed to hold onto sixth. max was 0.632 seconds behind lando on lap 25 when he said that “my brakes are not working.” this was hardly a surprise. max has hated the car since china.

also experiencing technical difficulties was sir lewis hamilton. he was stuck down in 14th and was first told to do “everything you can do to get the surface temp down” of the tires. he said “im trying” then several laps later on lap 29 he came on the radio to say “are you seeing how i have to drive this thing?” “yes,” bono, his engineer said. “quite effective though.”

max was still half a second behind lando. mclaren faked a pit stop call over the radio to get max to pit. he did not.

but, george russell did manage to pass him. which was “not good for max’s world champion aspirations.”

this was also when ted very bafflingly said that “if i had a sofa in the pit lane i would be jumping up and down on it” im not sure what that was in response to.

meanwhile, ollie was still holding off sir lewis hamilton. and charles was trying to get oscar to pit again by lying over the radio. it was not working.

lando did a pit stop finally and came out a whole 15 second behind max. he was hoping to catch max by the end of the race. but it might be tight. lets go last lap lando.

“lando, imagine andrea on your shoulder saying ‘zero wheel spin’ in every exit,” lando’s race engineer said. if you're confused, everyone else was too.

10 laps to go and here were the order of affairs:

oscar

+.449s charles +1.865s checo +2.989s carlos +16.530s george +1.909s max +11.535s lando +9.715s fernando +2.589s alex +2.451s nico +4.667s franco +1.590s lewis +1.261s ollie +1.791s pierre +9.205s daniel +23.919s esteban +.789s lance +3.862s valtteri +3.631s guanyu

lando was determined. he took fastest lap on lap 43 and was 8.8s behind max

at this point, the leaders were starting to lap the cars in the back. “the back markers are starting to come up,” checo’s engineer said to him. “its going to get messy.”

“hold onto your hats and if you don't have one go get one and hold onto it” harry said. harry would turn out to be correct.

we had the top 3 all running very close to eachother, that was oscar, charles and checo and “welcome to the party carlos sainz!” who was now 1.2 seconds behind checo in the four way battle for the lead.

definitely not leading was lance stroll, who retired on lap 47 with a brake problem.

oscar managed to pull ahead of charles by 1.5 seconds, finally knocking him out of DRS range. so now it was a three way battle for second. and charles had “no rear tires. no rear tires at all.”

and, just like i said he would, lando managed to pass max on lap 49. he was closing the gap slowly in the championship.

“verstappen’s day goes from bad to worse,” harry said. because lando still had fastest lap, so he would score 3 more points than max. which is important if lando wants to beat max in the championship (though i think hes still like 60 points behind)

meanwhile! franco managed to pass nico hulkenberg for 10th! he was in the points!!!! at his second race!!!

but this was short lived because there was a crash! a big smackeroo! between carlos and checo!! checo was mad, carlos didn't know what happened.

what happened was that carlos was trying to pass checo but checo did not move over. it was deemed an equal fault accident. both of them were utterly confused at what happened and apparently spent 20 minutes in the medical center being utterly lost and aparently saying that sometimes this sport sucks. and! contrary to what several people said! checo did not bang on carlos’s helmet after the crash.

the crash actually caused chef's dad to have a heart attack. he is stable now.

and well. this clip of george from the post qualifying interviews definitely didnt age well:

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but! since we were a matter of a few laps from the end, this meant that the rest of the race was finished under a virtual safety car.

which meant

OSCAR PIASTRI WINS THE AZERBAIJAN GP

and george inherited p3!

and on his own merit too! no safety cars, no team orders, no weird shit!

“yes!” he whispered over the radio.

he almost fell getting out of the car, then gave us all the “one moment” hand gesture before properly celebrating.

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he also got driver of the day!

(this was marginally better than george russell, who said over the radio “i cant get any rubber (to pick up on his tires) all im getting is leaves”)

gunther steiner also hosted the post race interviews. which was interesting.

george said that the most difficult part of the race was “driving full gas into a wall of carbon fiber on the penultimate lap…the vsc should have come out sooner”

charles bashed ferrari because they didn't do any high fuel runs in practice.

oscar was entirely pleased. “i managed to overtake and hold onto it for the next 35 laps..one of the better races of my career.” and honestly, oscar winning a race straight after mclaren basically announcing that he was their number 2 driver is nothing short of hilarious.

and! mclaren was now leading the constructors championship by 20 points! for the first time in ten years!!!!

the top three had a moment outside of the car that was filled with baffled:

and oscar's engineer tom got to stand on the podium with him. he usually takes a selfie with oscar after each race he podiums at, but he was too excited to so george took this picture for them

(george also aparently demomished oscar in a game of uno on the plane, immediately humbling him)

george also shielded himself from the champagne on the podium

the cooldown room reacted to the crash in a very straight forward manner:

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and very quickly cause its midnight and the singapore gp starts in 8 hours, the post race, speed ran:

-mark webber told off laura winter for thinking that oscar didn't have good tire management

-alex albon was “super happy, that's a lot of points for us” (williams finished in 7th and 8th). he cut his own interview short when ollie bearman arrived, saying “I can go, im happy to go” and then waving comically.

-williams was so pleased with this result they blasted everyone with champagne. and they overtook alpine in the constructors championship! this was also their best race finish all season

-(and a quick note, if youre going to really blame logan for being that shit of a driver here, please remember that the car he was driving was several rounds of upgrades behind alex's pretty much the entire time he was driving it)

-ollie became the first driver to ever score points in his first two races for two different constructors because the double dnf pushed him up to 10th place. he said that there was not much difference between the haas and the ferrari, the ferrari was just red

-franco continued to charm everyone and flirt with the reporters.

-they interviewed george and lewis and the camera had to be adjusted for george's height. it was comical and resulted in my favorite edit so far of the season (sound on)

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-lando looked pleased and happy for once. he said about holding off checo that “i didn't hold him up i just had to cool my tires a little.” he was delighted to be leading the constructors for the first time in ten years and he defended alex albon saying “i struggled to get past alex for a while, which is common, alex doesnt make mistakes.” he also ratted on max for going to fast during the VSC and said “i didn't complain, facts were stated.” and to sum it all up he said that “im executing things well, i’m very quick…i’m not going to be the happiest guy, but i am never the happiest guy….car is performing well everywhere…some red cars behind us seem to be our biggest competitors right now”

-by comparison george insulted all of pirelli. the tire people. “pretty infuriating that it (the pace) changes this so much….its black magic, people who make the tires don't understand the tires…..for 20 laps we had a car not worthy of points and for 20 laps we had a car fighting for victory and the only difference is the tires.”

-lewis was notably upset after the race and walked through the paddock with his helmet on, not wanting to talk to anyone. but he did talk to franco and ollie and congratulate them on a job well done defending against him and racing against him. franco even fangirled over this on his instagram.

-charles was clearly upset with ferrari. he was so upset he posted a thirst trap.

-and oscar. oscar was very happy this afternoon. and his mom was there! she doesnt usually come cause it scares her, but nicole was there today!

-mclaren celebrated with a hell of a lot of champagne. both oscar’s wina and lando’s insane recovery, and the fact that they were leading the championship. red bull have been dethroned, at least for now.

-there was so much champagne that lando took off his socks to spray it. all seems well at mclaren.

-at least one thing is for sure, oscar had a better time here this weekend than last year when he got food poisoning and only ate four pieces of toast

and with that. we head into singapore. quite literally as it is starting in a few hours. again, i apologixe about this post. its a little sad, but the next one will be better. pinkly promise.

see you all soon!!!

#not a tag #from saph #saph explains silly season 2024 #got up at 5:30am to finish this monstrosity lol #mexico gp 2024 #its mediocre i promise im better than this #Instagram

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yurtletheturtlehenderson · 3 years ago

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COSMIC - S3:E6; Chapter Six, E Pluribus Unum - [Pt. 7 - FINAL]

A Will Byers x Fem!Reader Series

𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘤𝘩 𝘵𝘰 𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘥 𝘣𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘺, 𝘦𝘭 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘤𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘥 𝘧𝘭𝘢𝘺𝘦𝘳'𝘴 𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘴. 𝘥𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘢 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘨𝘦 𝘢 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘤𝘶𝘦, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘺/𝘯 𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘭𝘦𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘴. 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘪𝘭𝘦, 𝘥𝘦𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘧𝘪𝘹 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘩𝘦 𝘣𝘳𝘰𝘬𝘦 𝘴𝘰 𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘨𝘰, 𝘮𝘪𝘬𝘦 𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘨𝘳𝘪𝘱𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵'𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘣𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘺/𝘯 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘸𝘪𝘭𝘭'𝘴 𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘩𝘪𝘱 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘮𝘱𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘴.

⚠️: domestic (both verbal and physical) abuse (marked for skipping like so: ●●●), fluff if you squint, angst, threats, fear sequence including the following; intense violence such as strangulation/asphyxiation/being held captive/impaling, implied character death (MAJOR).... (again marked for skipping: ■■■) don't read too much into that haha, we're all gonna be just fine 😀 just trust me and read the warnings again carefully. I am holding your hand the whole way my lil turtle hatchlings <3

📝:...... well, here we! Can't believe we're here! One of many big moments in cosmic, as well as the final installment before s4! If you didn't catch my announcement on may 1st, im choosing to put this book on temporary hold until s4 (i explain they why in the announcement). And please, do me a huge favor and take breaks this chapter, this is an intense one 💓...i swear i don't do this for shits and giggles, there's a REASON

||𝟑𝐑𝐃 𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍 𝐏𝐎𝐕||

The winds were harsher down here. They were cold. It was the first time El could physically feel something for herself since stepping foot into Billy's memories.

The seagulls were long since gone, along with Billy and the woman she presumed to be his mother. She was beginning to lose track of how much time had passed, though she couldn't admit she wasn't surprised she had managed to keep track this long. Time was strange in the void. It was almost... flexible. Sometimes her trips stretched on for hours, sometimes they were no less than a minute. But as she wandered the sands on the outskirts of the storm, everything seemed to change all at once.

Not only had the clouds spread all across the sky, blanketing the beach in an eerie gray, there seemed to lurk a familiar, unnatural chill. One El had experienced before. One that carried a certain stench of rot and a recognizable dusting of decay through the air. One many in the town of Hawkins had come to know as the very specific atmosphere associated only with the Upside Down.

This scene felt so familiar in so many ways; the flurry of spores dancing before her eyes. The swipe of her hand through the air to catch the thing she knows isn't there. At the thought, a mix of emotions clashes hard and fast in her chest long before she catches the fearsome shouts of an older man further down the beach.

●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●

"Hey! Billy, stop!"

El's eyes lock on the two figures up ahead and her heart plunges into her stomach. The older man had the second figure—the younger Billy—by the arm. Nearly to the point, she feared it would dislocate. Though they were still daily concealed by a thin veil of clouds, El could still make out the pink in the man's face as he screamed.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" The winds were begging to pick up, carrying a swell of sand that threatened to cloud the unfolding conflict. "What did we talk about, huh? You gotta slide!"

This Billy was wearing a strange white suit of some kind El didn't immediately recognize. It wasn't until she got closer that El picked up on the baseball mitt on his hand. She recalled Dustin and Y/n having one of those. But that couldn't be what this man was so upset about, was it? Baseball? Whatever it was, it twisted her stomach to see. Nothing warranted the behavior she was currently witnessing.

Billy's lower lip trembled as he tried to summon the words. "I-I know,"

"Wait," the man's face drops, its curling back in complete disgust. "Afraid you're gonna get hurt," he mocked. "is that it?"

"No,"

"Well, what then? What?" The man was grabbing him by the arm again as veins began to pop from his face and El gradually picked up speed without thought. "What did I raise, a pussy for a son?"

The tide tore at Billy's feet and the storm close on their horizon roared in anger upon the man's words. Billy ripped his arm straight from his father's grasp and summoned every bit of courage from his chest.

"Leave me alone!" He shrieked with brimming tears, turning tail and heading straight for the thundering red storm clouds.

"That's right, run!" Sneered the man. "Like you always do!"

El was already taking off after Billy, not without sending the man the sourest look she could muster as she passed him. The only thing stopping her from doing something was knowing whatever she tried would fall flat. This was still a memory. But that didn't mean she didn't want to.

El didn't even have this man's name but she knew him all too well. The way he threw children around, the lack of remorse in his cold eyes... El couldn't say she was unfamiliar with the type, and it had her heart broiling in her chest as she disappeared into the storm after Billy.

A clap of thunder shook the earth and several bolts of blinding streaks of crimson lightning struck the sands all around them. Between this and the roar of the winds threatening to knock her over, it was a wonder she hadn't lost Billy before now. He had simply vanished, swallowed whole by the storm but none of that seemed to matter. El had crossed the first threshold of the storm—the gate to a new memory. And the furious shouts of the man she had just left behind were telling her that what she had just witnessed, was the first of many.

"Where were you last night? Where were you?"

"I told you, I was with Wendy."

Another streak of lightning. El dodged it by a hair, far too preoccupied with trying to recapture her sense of direction. The waves weren't even visible anymore, and the more she got closer to the screaming voices the more the storm around her came alive.

"Stop lying to me!"

It didn't take much for El to recognize the second voice—the one Billy's father was accusing. But the distress in her voice had made it difficult to recognize the joyous woman in the long white dress and yellow sandals. This loud, angry man seemed to have that effect on people.

One look and she had found all of them, surrounding a dining table no bigger than the one at the cabin. Billy was shrunken into his seat as his parents fought nearby.

"I'm not lying to you!"

He didn't bother to acknowledge a single word she said. Not unless it fit what he believed. This man was completely blind with rage.

"You saw him again, didn't you?" It was only at this moment El realized the woman's wrist was fighting and twisting against the man's tightened grip. So much so that she could hear the pained cries she was trying to muffle. "Didn't you?!"

"GET. AWAY. FROM ME!" She bellowed, finally managing to wrench her arm free. Knowing him well, Mrs. Hargrove beat him to the punch before he could throw it. She caught the venomous glint in his eyes as he stomped toward her, but glass plate in hand, she was ready. "I said, GET AWAY!"

The plate shattered against his skull, sending Mr. Hargrove stumbling. If only he had stayed down.

"You–" the venom in his eyes turned murderous as he charged forward. "--You whore!"

The next few moments flew past her in a sandy blur, but El still caught it all. She watched helplessly, hand involuntarily flying to her mouth to stifle a horrified gasp as it all unfolded before her.

"STOP IT!" Billy roared, charging forward in a daring attempt to protect his mother. He had come full force at his father's chest, and in his anger managed to hold him off if only for a moment. "Don't hurt her!"

"No!"

"DON'T HURT HER!" Billy's shrieks were soon cut short as his father hurled him to the floor.

"You bastard!"

But Billy was already throwing himself to his feet and after his mother who, in a matter of seconds, had been knocked into the table with the full force of her husband's fist across the face.

"Mom!"

Another squall from this rainless storm had already introduced El to the next memory. And another distressed Billy.

"I don't understand," his voice is so so small. He's heartbroken. He's terrified. "Why not?"

He was sitting on the floor in tears, huddled against his bed as he clutches the phone close to his ear.

"Please, Mom, don't do this," he begs. "Please come home,"

She had left?

"No. How long? How long?!"

Billy's mother had left. And she hadn't taken Billy.

His eyes screwed tight and squeezing out fresh tears, Billy wails his final plea into the receiver. "I miss you!"

A figure darts past her, concealed in the clashing storms of violets and deepened blues making El whirl around on her heel.

"Get back here!" The figure roars.

The voice and its words were already so callous, that El was almost half-surprised to see a still young Billy. He was older than the previous memories, but not by much. He looked about her age, maybe slightly younger, but already there was so much anger within him.

He had just tackled another kid to the ground. Spit was flying from his mouth as he screamed, his knees remained pinned on the kid's stomach as he threw punch after punch after punch.

"Get up! What, are you scared to fight me? You scared?!" Another punch and he climbed to his feet, taking extra measures to spit in the kid's face. "You scared?!" And then a kick. "Get up and fight me, pussy! Pussy!"

The sight made her heart ache in many ways for many reasons. Finally, she turned away, gladly allowing the icy storm to introduce her to the newest memory and take her away from this one. All the people who hurt Billy on her mind, just as well as all the people he would come to hurt himself.

She's walking face-first into the heart of the storm. She can feel it as she fights against the biting winds that nip at her skin and though El had thrown her arms up to shield a majority of her face, she is able to make out the newest scene before her.

"Billy, come over here," It was Billy's father again. El almost didn't recognize him with how calm he was. But her heartbeat still spiked when she swore she made out a flash of bright orange hair. "I want you to meet someone,"

Sure enough, standing hostage at the man's side was a decidedly grumpy, headstrong little girl El knew at once to be one of her now fiercest friends. Her Max.

"This is your new sister," he proclaims to a very angry-looking Billy. "Her name's Maxine,"

Despite the hostile hand on her shoulder and the glare Billy holds her in, she hikes her chin up in subtle defiance and introduces herself. Properly this time.

"Max," she corrects.

●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●●

El turns around at once when she hears the new voice. For it isn't new at all. It's Billy. The Billy she knows. Immediately, she's searching for the voice. She's searching for the source. So much so, that the memory playing out before her isn't even registering. Neither is the fact that both memories are now colliding with one another in a confusing echo.

"Who's there?!"

"Shake her hand,"

–"I said, shake her hand,"

–"I said, who's there?!"

His voice, she realizes, is farther and farther from his and Max's younger selves. It's out of the shadows of his mind, somewhere lost in the raging storm of scarlet growing brighter and brighter as she nears. He's screaming—endless, tortured screams—and El fears just what else is left to find. Two white orbs of light shine through the reddened fog, almost like eyes. But it assures her she's on the right path. The moment she passes the final threshold of the storm's many layers, everything changed.

All at once, everything had fallen silent. The winds and the fog were behind her, and the chill zipping down her spine was colder than ever. El had been completely engulfed by the scarlet storm clouds, and they were closing in quickly.

Her eyes stay fixed on the sky above her as the storm clouds in question close in on all sides. A difficult thing it was, to make El feel truly small. But she did—now a mere speck in the midst of a thunderous blood-red whirlpool of clouds.

A speck in the eye of the storm.

The sun had already set when El spoke to them next. Needless to say, she had put them all through quite the scare. But her sudden evening breaths and the encouraging message she had to relay brought much-needed relief to everyone waiting.

"I think I found it. The source."

"Where El?" Max pressed quickly. Even she had grown worried in the prolonged time her friend had spent in her brother's mind. Needless to say, she was eager for her to get out and return to safety. "Where are you?"

"Brimborne," she recites, eyes locking on the rushed overhead sign with a sinking feeling already taking root in her gut. "Steelworks,"

Jonathan launched himself up off the arm of the chair and ran for the phonebook he had left on the kitchen counter. Nancy met him halfway across the room behind the couch where he had returned, already halfway through the book and thumbing as quickly as he could to the 'S's.

"Steelworks, steelworks, steelworks," he mumbled. "Here steel. Uhh-- Found it! 6622 Cherry Oak Drive!"

"That's close," Nancy gasped.

"Oh shit," Y/n hissed, her nails unintentionally digging into the back of Will's hand as she squeezed his hand in fear.

"Ow, ow-ow-ow!"

"El!" Mike called. "El, we found it. Get out of there! Get out!"

El didn't have to think twice. It was with great pleasure she allowed her eyes to flutter closed as she reached out for her ticket back. But it was too easy to grab.

She hardly had time to consider the command before she felt it again. That give in her gut as the ground was stolen from beneath her feet and it told her all she needed to know: it was happening again. And in all the worst ways.

Everything was wrong.

The very forces she sought to defeat were yanking her away from the world beneath her feet and any and all sense of her metaphysical self was taken with it. Like the riptide that was Neil Hargrove to have caught his son, this force had caught ahold of her. And it was all she could do but scream an empty cry for help as Billy's mind spit her back up.

...Time was strange in the void. It was... Flexible. And one who knew how to traverse its vast plains well enough knew also how to find the right story. Or perhaps, more importantly, they knew how to tell it.

El had found herself at her journey's beginning: falling helplessly through time as foreign memories and feelings passed her by. Completely in reverse.

The separation of Billy's bloodied head with the dashboard as the car is jerked back into place and his screams retract as it does.

The adrenaline is still there as the car spins out. It unwinds itself in her gut as it had in Billy's as they are both undone by time.

He had evolved past his shadowy confines at long last, though he still lurked in darkness. He was darkness.

Billy fought so desperately to cling to the iron doorway where they eventually lost his battle. With a blood-curdling scream, he was cast into--

And yet everything seemed to fall perfectly into place.

--Darkness. That was all that was left after the distorted voice died out with the rest of the booth. His eyes flew everywhere, but not for long. An impossible chill fell over his already frozen body when he realized--

--he was kneeling over Heather with his back to El, knelt over the floor. His dark gray tank and jeans nearly working to blend him into the darkness he's hiding in.

She was closer to the surface, but still so far. El was nearly free. And yet she never felt so far from home.

Heather's paled face was returning to El from far beneath the surface back in the ice bath. Her eyes were locked on El and her arms were reaching for her own. But much like El, she was hostage to this little time warp and its rules that would inevitably keep them apart.

But she was so close she could almost reach it.

She reached and reached but before she could ever break the surface and make it to the safety of El's arms, her frightened eyes were staring right through her before she was thrust back under the tub of ice by an invisible force.

She could see it. There it was. The homestretch. The very thing she had been fighting so hard to grasp.

His pupils dilate and closing in around them are several black veins that cloud the whites of his eyes as he--

--whipped around to face her, sunken, darkened eyes widening as they pierced her own.

Just in time, too.

It all happened so fast, even in the moment and he was left with nothing but the horrifying image of a bloodied tentacle attacking his face.

We were hoping to get started.

All Tom Holloway could do was peer up at the snarling monster from his one uncovered eye as he feels the icy darkness envelop him completely.

But we've been waiting.

All she saw beside the white spots swallowing her vision were the seething eyes of the Mind Flayer peering up at her and straight through her soul.

Waiting for you.

As he watched the life drain from your eyes, he hissed to the one he had been waiting in agony for all these months his final greeting--

Good thing I found you.

The sudden iron grip of freezing flesh snatching up her wrist hurtles El back onto her living room floor downing desperate gulps of air. She rips the headband clean off her head to reveal the light of the Television static casting a soft glow over herself, the darkened living room, and nothing more.

There was no one waiting for her. One look around from her spot on the floor—where they last left her—told her she was the only one in the cabin now. The kitchen was barren, the couch and chairs where she had left them were empty, and a terrible sickly feeling in her gut told her her friends weren't in either adjoining rooms.

Still, El couldn't help the broken call for those she sought most.

"Mike?" No answer.

Her throat was growing sore from the lump already forming inside. "Y-Y/n?"

El sniffled and jumped to her feet. "Max?"

They wouldn't leave her, El tells herself. Not them. Not when they went to all that trouble to make her feel safe in there.

"Y/n?!"

Not when they had each risked so much for her.

"MIKE?!"

"He can't hear you,"

Those four words were enough to still El's heart completely. It stopped the flow of blood in her veins in less than an instant. That voice and the instantaneous consequences it presented to her might as well have plunged her right back into the sand. Back into the ice.

She already knew he was here for her even before she turned to find his towering figure emerging from Hopper's room. And though the mask through which the Mind Flayer was hiding was void of all emotion, there still lies a dark glint in his dead eyes. The remains of a deadened smile waiting to jump out.

"You shouldn't have looked for me," It's almost like He's happy. "Because now I see."

He is happy. Even as he stands here, littered with scorch marks and faded smudges of dried blood staining his white tank. He is happy, especially as he takes the burning cigarette in his hands and snuffs out any remains light in the sand of the ashtray.

"Now we all see,"

Unable to help the tiny, frightened gasp to escape, El stumbled back as he took his first steps after her. Calmly, he strode forward after her with no urgency.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The red door. The deep crimson frame of the Holloway's front door peels open to reveal the disheveled forms of Janet and Heather: the two surviving Holloways as they step out onto their porch. And though their seared and sweating skin sizzles as it is enveloped by the warmth of the breeze, they begin their final journey. The front door El and her friends had visited only nights prior was now left open behind them. Abandoned. But it won't matter. They won't be returning.

They are going home.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

A curious look tilts his head at the sight before him. There's... amusement. This mighty hero of Hawkins—one of them anyway—cowering away before him. Dissolving into a pathetic pool of tears.

And though freezing in every way, his voice had such a scorching effect. El could swear she felt the damning words he spoke singeing away any remaining doubt in her mind that she had always been the monster.

"You... let us in,"

Movement in the corner of her eye, but she's much too horrified to look away. She's transfixed. Just like that, El is that scared little girl, all alone, back at Hawkins National Laboratory. Transported back to the night it all began when she first came upon the Demogorgan and opened the gate—the night she turned the world upside down.

"And now..." but then again, maybe she's not. There's hope yet "you are going to have to let us stay."

Her wide and wandering brown eyes ache to remain on the sight of her best friend—her Y/n—poking her head around the corner of Hopper's doorway where she remains hidden. Even as she ever-so-cautiously slips from the doorway and around the corner, careful that every step she takes is in step with Billy's so that she may travel undetected. But El is smart enough to know to steal every bit of attention she can so Y/n can remain that way. She only hopes the involuntary gasp of relief that escapes her mouth is mistaken only for fear. She needs to keep The Mind Flayer's attention on her, and that meant making him believe she was accepting her fate.

Sadly, that was no difficult task.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

All over town, the fourth of July spirits were reaching their peak of the night. The citizens of Hawkins, none the wiser to the spreading disease to have already infiltrated their loved ones: the rot of the Mind Flayer that had long since terrorized the Vale of Shadows, had at long last tunneled its way into the Material Plane.

One of countless victims is stilled where he stands when he feels a dark chill overtake his body and he loses full control. And though he's been here, the better half of the evening, flipping burgers for the block and watching his kids run and play on the lawn as the neighbors admire the first of many whistling fireworks, he can no longer stand to be here.

All he does know is the unceasing pull in his gut to follow orders. He knows he needs to go back.

Even if that means abandoning his family without a second thought and ignoring the concerned calls from his wife in his peripherals.

"David, where are you going? David?"

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The young boy knew it too. He had been acting so strange since the other day, and now, the fireworks show he had been looking forward to all month...

"Adam!" called the other little boy, distraught and confused as Adam abandoned everything. Including him.

"You're gonna miss it!" he argues, wondering as to why the young blonde was so suddenly marching off in a daze. He was just leaving him! Why? "Adam!"

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The blood roaring in her ears did well to remind her the dangers facing her (way too literally) were still very much a problem and far too real. The Mind Flayer still possessed Billy Hargrove and she had still willingly stepped into their snare that had landed her here. Strung up and too afraid to struggle less she make a fatal move.

"Don't you see?"

It was all she could do to lock her swimming eyes on Billy's own as he herded her all the way to the front door and ignore the sight behind him that dared to brew hope deep inside her chest. The sight of a bloodied up Y/n—but still very much alive—breaking her scorching gaze from Billy and silently grabbing for a very familiar fire poker from the previous year.

"All this time,"

El nearly stumbles when she reaches the edge of the carpet and yet it feels as if she has stumbled to end the edge of the world. There was nowhere to run.

But maybe she didn't have to. Maybe this time, Y/n had come to save her.

The sharp iron hook end she had placed in the palm of her hand was already beginning to turn. It was glowing red hot in the time it took her to catch up to Billy on the tips of her toes, hiding in his five o 'clock blindspot ready to strike at just the right moment. The handle of the poker was now in both hands and leveled with her shoulders, the glowing end inches from his neck and ready to deliver the fatal blow.

"we've been building it,"

It's about to happen. Could they have a chance? El isn't quite sure what the answer to anything is anymore, but she knows she's only ever been this afraid once in her life--

The trembling in Y/n's smirk halts for only a moment when she meets eyes with El and flashes her a wink. And for one glorious moment in this hell, she truly believes they will make it out alive together.

--but the lab didn't have Y/n.

"we've been building it..."

Y/n only has time to curl her lips back in a snarl, baring her teeth, and rearing the poker back to strike just as Billy shifts his teary smile on her.

"for you."

■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■

El's hand was already winching up from her side as she prepared to hurl him across the room—or just anything that could stop him from hurting Y/n. But he was already one step ahead; in a blur, he had wrenched the fire poker from her hands (all while managing to stun her with the butt end of it in her head as he did so) with his left and taken her hostage with his right. Before El could make any psychic moves (or physical) he raised his other hand in warning and tsked his tongue, wagging the glowing poker at El with a malicious smile.

"Let her go," El pleads, now through an impossible-to-see-through wall of tears. She wasn't even remotely sure if the words had made it out coherently and not just in a blubbering stutter. She was fully weeping now. Whatever hope had been building within her, keeping the tears at bay, had been destroyed.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The Flayed have come home. Dozens of them march across the dead grass surrounding the abandoned steelworks where they soon disappear inside.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

He has her now in his poisoned grasp—his large and half-charred hand holds her prisoner by the back of her throat and already she can feel the blood in her major arteries fighting to bring through to her brain under his fingers. But the thing that keeps her from fighting back—the thing that keeps El from fighting back—is the searing hot poker prodding into the back of the young girl's abdomen.

El and Y/n against the Mind Flayer once again, so it would seem. And yet, in this moment, here he was with all the cards. As if it wasn't much of a fight at all.

"After all that work,"

He knows not to waste this advantage he has over his opponent.

"all that pain..."

He knows just what bait to dangle.

"All of it..."

Just what picture to paint.

"For you two."

The Y/n he has conjured—the Y/n this one had practically manifested for him from the furthest recesses of her tortured mind. The strings on the last puppet in he needs to get to the true pest in all of his existence: Y/n Henderson.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The warehouse comes alive as dozens upon dozens more of Hawkins citizens flood in from every entrance that can possibly be found. They march in at a content pace despite the raging fires of the summer air burning away their skin and boiling the black sludge in their blood. Their tepid footsteps against the concrete are the first real signs of life its had in years. And yet there is no life in sight—especially as they head for a single steel stairway. They know their pain is coming to an end, as they are. They are returning home. Going back. They know in the end they will serve a greater purpose.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The poker sizzled as it was dug further into her back as he successfully guided Y/n forward step by step. She let out a strangled cry of pain, eliciting just the right reactions from El. She had been shrinking back in steady sobs despite her trembling hands occasionally reaching out tearfully for her best friend until she felt her back hit the kitchen counter. All the while pushing Y/n forward step by step to remind El just what could happen to her if she tried anything on him with her in such a vulnerable position.

This put a sinister smile on his face.

"And now its time,"

The grit of his teeth was visible through his vengeful grin as he tightened the hold on Y/n's neck so much so that his whole arm started to tremble and her face puffed up almost twice its size. Between this sight and the combined sound of what could likely be her dying breaths and the sizzling of the glowing iron pressing harder into her back, another powerful and horrified sob was wrenched straight from El's lungs.

"Stop it!"

Several tears are streaking down El's face and snot drips from her nose. For the first time in her life, she doesn't know what to do. Her heart felt as if it was skipping every other beat and the need to save her friend and herself from imminent doom without getting either of them killed was leaking out of her in other ways.

"Time to end it."

The windows began to crack, several lightbulbs nearby had burst. All the cabinet doors began to rattle and shake before blowing open full force (some even bouncing back shut) as her mind subconsciously reached out. The TV that still blared static in the living room shattered and shot out a prophetic burst of sparks threatening to sting the threatening force before her as he spits to El her first and only warning.

"We are going to end her,"

Y/n's back arches forwards as the poker breaks another several layers of skin, and though she is already hanging onto consciousness by a thread, her body still manages a pained and choked whimper as silent tears leak from her bulging eyes.

There are signs of pain in him too. The sweat coating his skin from the heat's exposure is telling but it only tightens the clench in his jaw as he seethes the words to El quenched only by the satisfaction of revenge. "and you will have to watch as we tear her limb from limb,"

"No! STOP IT!"

El's head is pounding. It can't produce the tears fast enough, but she still shakes her head 'no' with everything she's got as her lips sow the silent pleas that will never be answered.

"And when she is gone,"

Her hands half-instinctually reach to cover her ears to stop herself from hearing such horrid things. But they keep finding their way back out to Y/n, reaching out reflexively to do something. "No–"

But every time she does, the fire is wedged deeper into Y/n's skin, and the limper she grows in his grip. He's already dragging her shuffling feet across the wood floors as her body powers down.

"--we are going to end you and the rest of your little friends--"

"--No!--"

"--and then..." he is still pained. The trembling in his grasp has nearly spread to his whole body. There is even twitching in his face that has spread to his eyes. "we are going to end..."

His bloodshot, unblinking, watering eyes.

"everyone."

Eyes that now shed a single tear before the iron poker was wrenched back and driven right through Y/n Henderson's stomach.

All sense of time and sound ceased to exist in this moment—had they not, El would have surely heard the blood-curdling shriek she had released as her best friend was finally freed from the grip of the Mind Flayer and his latest host. She had barely stumbled forward, blood already peeking out from her swollen lips by the time Billy was hurled across the room and sent crashing into the wall.

El's arms were thrown out to catch the one she feared she had just lost but it was already too late. She was gone from her hands and El was finally out of the void.

■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■

"NO~!"

A second time the headband was ripped off her head, the blood-curdling screech still leaving her lungs as her whole body fought the tortured image forced into her mind. A second time she finds herself on her living room floor in front of her veil of static.

"NO! NO!"

And for the first time, she finds herself completely outnumbered by people who love her and jump to their feet to help.

"El!"

Mike is the first among them, already throwing himself on the carpet and at her side. No one present fails to notice the jump in El when his hands gently offer her into his embrace. Her head whips to face his, her features ghostly pale and her arm already separating herself from him. Until she ultimately recognizes him by the worry in his eyes and his touch under her trembling fingers. In an instant she's collapsed into his arms, still choking on fearful sobs that are buried within his navy polo.

"El, its okay. I'm here. You're back, it's okay. El?" Mike coos. Tears are already forming in his eyes, just as much as the others lingering on edge nearby.

It takes far too long for anyone's comfort for her to adjust to the fact she's back in reality, and Y/n can't help but notice how violently she trembles collapsing further into Mike's arms. The hearts of El's friends were cracking in two, and for the first time in a long time, Mike, Y/n, and Lucas swore they saw the same fear in her eyes as the night they had found her in the woods.

Over and over the same word kept getting lost in Mike's shirt as she left. A word no one at first could decipher. All Mike could do was clutch her tighter, assuring her safety as many times as he had to. Max was so far on the edge of her seat in worry—ready to jump in at a moment's notice—she was practically halfway across the coffee table. Even Nancy and Jonathan had risen from their seats, frozen at the ready as they exchanged horrified glances with Lucas. And Y/n, she was clutching Will's arm so tight one might fear he'd lose circulation. But like everyone else, he was too worried about his friend to notice or care.

And when El came up for another hiccupping breath, the others finally caught the name she had been weeping endlessly in loss.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The enclosed space is soon overflowing with a sea of the Flayed that thrum endlessly with footsteps as they glide down the metal staircase and into the deep lake of shadows that sat under the steelworks warehouse. The only light that found its way down in the depths of Brimborne was the skylight leaking in from the doorway that illuminated the only possible clue to the sudden phenomenon;

Painting the concrete are semi-faded stains of blood and piles of bone that had found their way home. The new home promised to them by the seemingly never-ending pull in their gut. But the pull had mysteriously stopped when they reached the basement. But the presence of something dark and sinister remained.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

"Y/N!"

Her eyes met with Mike's for only a moment before he gestured for her with great urgency.

"El?" She asks. Her voice alone sends the girl into another wave of shock as Y/n rises from her seat and comes to kneel before her on the carpet. "El, are you ok--?"

Desperately she hurled herself out of Mike's arms and clambered into Y/n's, swallowing her in a bone-crashing hug that nearly knocked the two back before she could even finish speaking. Y/n could already feel El's tears staining her clothes and fearfully, eyes tearing away from her sobbing form to meet everyone's bewildered gaze with her own. All the while, everything in her telling her to hug El back with everything she had.

"El? Hey, come on. You're safe, you're back. We've got you," She mutters into her hair, brows furrowed despite her soft voice.

"You--" another hiccup steals her words, coercing another sob from her body. "--re dead."

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The driving force—the pull—had not vanished but had instead morphed into a warm buzzing that grew intensely worse. It grew hotter and hotter, shaking the very bones in their bodies harder and harder as it spread to every cell at unnatural speeds. Their last thoughts—last true thoughts—were nothing but fear as the chemicals in their bodies worked with the virus in their systems that had taken over as host in their bodies and disassembled them completely.

One by one they twitched and lurched in agony before they fell to the floor, shattering at the many tentacle-like feet that was the force to have brought them all together. The force they had now truly become.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

Carefully, Y/n takes her friend gently by the shoulders to meet her eyes with grave concern. "El, what are you saying?" It's not a question of miscommunication. She doesn't worry she has missed what El has said. Y/n fears she has caught it.

She gasped drastically for air. "You--" More sobs. To everyone's relief, with Mike's help, she was finally able to calm just enough to spit the words out.

"You-- were dead,"

It's easy for her to see now why conjuring a response is suddenly so difficult. Any attempt at reassuring El this time presents itself as neither easy, or worth the effort. Y/n can feel the many the shift in the room as everyone's gaze suddenly falls on her. But she can't bring herself to acknowledge them. Acknowledging their fears meant acknowledging her own and that just made all of this real. Surely, there was a mistake.

Y/n can already hear the weariness staining her tone as she tries to get the words out. "El... I'm fine, I'm okay."

That head that still lay on her shoulder shook fervently. Still weak from the shock in her system, she pulled herself back to meet her gaze through her own puffy eyelids.

"No," she insists through the obvious lump present in her throat. "It's not okay. He wants--"

Another gut-wrenching sob interrupts her words, but she powers through. And when she does, Y/n suddenly feels the weight of her worry collapse onto her shoulders.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

The basement was filled with crunch after sickening crunch as body after body collapsed into nothing. All of them and their remains glistened in the single beam of light as they fled into the realm of shadows that held the true monster.

This monster that had poisoned Hawkins before. This monster that had spread its rot and death, and inevitable decay with everything it touched. It had spread and devoured and killed until all of Hawkins had been ensnared. All of that work, all of that pain... all of it for nothing. Everything he had accomplished—everything he was about to gain—only to be cut down just as his prey had stepped inside.

But not this time. No, this time he was careful, he was diligent.

The Shadow Monster planned to win because this time, he made sure the noose had already tightened.

⊹ ⊹ ⊹

"He's gonna kill you, Y/n. He says he's coming for you."

"...I think that's been established," She grimaces, unable to bite back the remark. But she couldn't quite help it. Fear was already gripping her heart and stealing any logical thought she could conjure in her mind.

"No," she scolds, shaking her head. "No, you don't understand. He has a plan. He," Another breath. "He's already coming for you. Not just him. The Flayed. All of this was made to stop you. To kill you. To kill both of us, and I--"

Another choking breath broke loose but in the presence of her friends—her Y/n, very much alive—she had managed to fight through it. That didn't stop Y/n or Mike from seeing the mixture of horror and grief swimming in her eyes as her bottom lip fought to stay still as she revealed the horrid truth still haunting her.

"Y/n, I saw you dead," her voice is so low and broken, that it could hardly be heard. Breaking such a horrible thing to someone she cared for so much was almost as hard as witnessing it for herself. But she knows, if there's a chance it changes the outcome, she'd do it a thousand times over. "I saw you die,"

And just like that, El's head tipped back over into Y/n's shoulder where she buried her face in the crook of her neck. Y/n had hardly registered the arms clinging to her like a lifeline, the reality of what El had just admitted shifting her whole center of gravity. Her eyes are already far away, lost in the pattern of the rug under their feet as her arms numbly hook over El's back. This time in growing alarm.

Silence has returned to the entirety of the cabin but no one can bring themselves to utter even a single syllable. Like her, they are rendered catatonic by the news. It's as if the air itself is made of glass and one movement could shatter their whole reality.

But Y/n's reality felt pretty broken already. Her entire body was numb, her heart had stilled and despite the unspeakable look of horror burning brighter into her skull than any of the others, all Y/n Henderson could feel in this moment is the invisible noose already tightening around her neck.

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

Mental Health Resources for Young People of Color:

"Young people of color are resilient. But being a young person of color in America today can mean consistent exposure to traumatic incidents directed at their communities, whether in person, on television or through social media. While awareness can spur action that results in change, it can also take an emotional toll on young people that can impact other facets of their lives like schooling and relationships.

Maintaining mental health is important and seeking help can be necessary to stay healthy. In this article, OnlineCounselingPrograms.com has assembled a variety of mental health-focused content and resources to support young people of color."

55 Mental Health Resources for People of Color:

"Mental illness does not discriminate: Nearly 20% of U.S. adults experience a mental illness each year, regardless of race or ethnicity. And while it's clear that mental health is a crosscutting issue that affects all communities, providing effective services for people of color requires acknowledging and understanding their different lived realities."

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And Many More Mental Health Resources Worth Checking Out!

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

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bangtanloverboys · 3 years ago

Text

found again // jhs

summary - forever was a very long time to be alone, but it was the safeest way to save yourself the heartache of losing loved ones. despite that, you still find yourself falling in love with hoseok

pairing - hunter!hoseok x immortal female!reader

genre - fluff, angst; reincarnation au

word count - 5.0k

warnings - strangers to lovers, hisorical inaccuracies, reader is centuries old, takes place in late 1700s, “i can fix that”, falling in love, kissing, proposal, mentioning of harming self, major character death, dogs die, im sorry everything i write of hoseok is sad but happy ending!!

author’s note - another fic inspired by ABC Forever, because i love the concept and i miss it

After nearing three centuries of life, one would think they’d get used to being alone. To the quiet still air of an empty home, void of a family. But it never did, you could never get used to it. It wasn’t that you purposefully chose to live a life of solitude, but rather found it the best way to live. If you were alone, you couldn’t get hurt. With no roots, it made moving from place to place easier. The only thing that got you through it all was thinking back on your family.

They were long gone by now, but that didn’t change the fact you still thought of them often. More than once, you would dream of what they would have thought with each place. How your mother would move every bit of furniture until it looked just right, how your father would go on about how far it was from the village, or how your little sisters would run about the cabin entirely, claiming it was perfect.

Several times you would get so caught up in your daydreams, you would even call out to them, only for your voice to die out before their names could even fully fall past your lips. Each time you’d wince at your own foolishness, before sighing, returning to the task you were doing.

That was simply how you lived until the day that Hoseok arrived.

You were deep into the woods, picking wild berries when a rustling was heard from across the clearing you were in. Cautiously, you made your way over to the rustling bushes. Right as you were about to peek behind them, a young man popped out from behind them. You let out a scream as you stumbled back, tripping over your skirt and sending you tumbling into the dirt.

“Oh my- I’m so sorry!” The young man spoke as he rushed over to you, helping you back to your feet.

“What were you doing? Were you watching me?!” You exclaimed, pushing him away from you as soon as you stood up.

“No! I promise. I was hunting when my dogs stopped.” It was then you were suddenly aware of the two dog heads that poked out from the branches. “I thought they caught a scent of maybe a deer but uh, seems like they found you,” he chuckled nervously, before his eyebrows shot up. “Where are my manners, I’m Hoseok,” he said, holding his hand out for you.

You stared at it for a moment, before you gave him your name, placing your hand in his. Your hand in his grip, he raised your knuckles to his lips for a kiss.

“Pleasure to meet you.” You swore your face grew hot at those words. It had been years since any man had shown you any sort of affection, even if it was the smallest bit. “What are you doing out here?”

“I- uh, berries.” You gestured to your basket that you left across the clearing. “Collecting some for a pie.” You’re unsure why you felt nervous all of a sudden, but with Hoseok’s gaze on your, it made it difficult to not feel shy.

“Berry pie? Oh that sounds delicious.”

Before you could even comprehend what you were thinking, you found yourself asking, “Would you like some?”

“Pardon?” He furrowed his brows at you.

“I mean,” you cringed at yourself before you started over, “would you like to come over? It should only take a few hours?”

A smile lit up his face, and you swear you don’t think you’ve ever seen a more beautiful smile. “I would love that.” The both of you walked across the field, picking up your basket as you reentered the forest, heading into the direction of your cottage. Glancing behind you, you saw the two bloodhounds following close on his heels. No doubt noticing how you kept glancing behind him, he introduced them. “Their names are Mickey and Ann.”

“They’re beautiful,” you complimented.

The rest of the journey back to your cottage was in silence, but it was not uncomfortable. Reaching your small little property, you felt uneasiness wash over you as you motioned to your small cottage. It was already several years old by the time you moved into it, windows didn’t shut right and it took a couple nudges to fully close the door; but it was home. If Hoseok thought any less of it, he didn’t say anything, besides ordering the two dogs to stay put at the front door.

Once inside, you began to prepare the pie crust. On occasion, you’d glance up at Hoseok who was staring at the small things you had collected over your life, mainly assorted coins from each country you visited and a few books. Picking one of them up, he began to flip through it.

“Do you actually understand this?” He asked, gesturing to the words on the page.

“Italian? Yes.” No doubt it was probably one of the first languages you learned when you discovered your affliction. Over the past few centuries, you found out you had quite the knack for picking up languages.

“You must’ve had some fancy schooling,” he whistled as he set the book down.

“Not really,” you flushed as you kneaded the dough. “Just knew someone who taught it to me.”

“Family?” He asked.

You shook your head no. A small Italian artist took you under her wing for a handful of years, deeming you her muse. In return for being the source of her inspiration, she taught you her language.

“Where is your family?”

The question had you cease your kneading. You should have known the question would’ve been asked at some point or another. Not to mention, you were somewhat of an enigma to the nearby village. A young well read woman from far away living in a small abandoned cottage, what could you possibly be doing all the way out here? No one ever said anything to you about it, but you knew they certainly thought something of it, judging by the stares you received when you’d walk into town. If he’d ever been, there was a strong possibility he knew of you already.

“Gone,” you answered, resuming your kneading. “Just me.”

“Oh, I’m sorry about that.” His voice was soft as he apologized, like he regretted asking.

“Not your fault, they’ve been gone for a while.” A long while.

The comfortable silence was gone, replaced with an air of tension. Like a string held so taught that the smallest movement would cause it to snap. The topic of your family always stung, no matter how much time had passed.

Quite possibly wanting to ease the awkward atmosphere he created, Hoseok quietly made his way over to you in your small kitchen. Standing beside you, he smiled.

“What can I do to help?”

Pushing down the butterflies that had erupted in your stomach, you stepped to the side and handed him the basket of wildberries you collected. “Make the filling?”

The rest of the afternoon consisted of both of you struggling to make the pie. Hoseok apparently wasn’t all that good with following directions as whenever you turned your back to do something, he would try and sneak a nibble at the filling. On occasion, he’d inquire about your knowledge of languages; curious to learn different phrases. It was only when you put the pie in the oven did Hoseok finally cease his linguistic questions. Sitting on a stool, you allowed yourself to catch your breath as you watched the young hunter, who’s gaze was fixated on your roof.

You were well aware of the shape your cottage was in, due to its old age it was in constant need of repairs. The most important one being the leaks in the roof, thankfully it was the dry season so you didn’t have to go about fixing them just yet, but you knew you’d have to get to it eventually.

“I can fix that.” He gestured up to the roof.

“Can you really?” You raised a brow at him.

“Consider it my way of repaying you for the pie.”

And that was the beginning of your friendship with Hoseok. He’d stop by every other day, tools in hand and work on sealing up your roof. A few times, he’d even bring in a few of his kills, offering it to you to make some dinner. Each time you refused, but he always insisted.

“A lady needs her food.”

A little over a week had passed and Hoseok finished the roof. It was then you realized how badly you hated being alone. You’d missed having someone to talk to, to cook for. Having grown so used to his presence in that week, you pointed to the old busted chicken coop that resided on your property. It had been empty since you’d moved in and you thought having fresh eggs from a nice chicken coop would be nice. Without hesitating, he agreed to fix the coop. And your front door, and your windows, and your fence. Each time he completed something, you found something new for him to fix.

While he worked on repairs, you’d either read or cook up dinner, not only for you and him, but for his dogs as well. Mickey and Ann were complete sweethearts, waiting patiently by the front door for their owner to come in and join you all for food. When he was working on your windows, more than once you saw him peeking through as you sat at your kitchen table reading as Mickey laid his head on your lap.

Eventually, the cottage was practically brand new. There was nothing else to be fixed and you had to prepare yourself to say goodbye to Hoseok. Your heart ached as he walked away from your home for the last time, his dogs trailing behind him. The following morning, you resumed your usual chores and activities; tending to your (new) chickens, work in your garden, and reread your books.

You’d been fighting off tears all day, and it was as you were preparing supper that the tears began to fall. Perhaps it was foolish of you to get attached to him anyways. No matter what would have happened, it would’ve turned out the way it usually did: with you disappearing.

A knock on your door, pulled you from your thoughts. For a moment you were confused, no one ever from the village ever came up to visit, you wondered what could’ve happened. Quickly, you wiped the tears from your eyes and made your way over to the door, where the unknown visitor knocked away.

“Coming, I’m coming!” You called as you swung the door open, revealing- “Hoseok?”

The young man was at your door, a handful of freshly killed quails in hand, and both hounds standing behind him, panting happily. “What, I’m not late am I?”

“No, no,” you shook your head, “that’s not it at all. I just- I wasn’t expecting you?”

“Why wouldn’t you be expecting me? I thought we had a nice little arrangement going on?” He questioned.

“We did, but I have nothing else for you to fix so I assumed-”

“Y/N,” he cut you off. Cupping your cheek, you had no choice but to look up into his sweet, adoring face. “I thought it was pretty obvious you wanted me around for some other reason besides being your handyman.”

Feeling your face grow hot, you slowly nodded.

He chuckled at you softly, his eyes never leaving yours. “So is it alright, I come over for supper?”

“Of course,” you breathed out. You don’t think you’ve ever felt so happy in so long.

So the two of you fell into a routine of sorts, he would stop by some meat for you to cook for your supper. Over the meal, you’d catch up on your day to day activities. By the time the food was gone, and you were with full bellies, Hoseok would excuse himself.

“Goodnight, I’ll see you in the morning,” was what he would say as he left your cottage for his own home, somewhere in town. A few times you’d stayed up so late that it was well past midnight, so you offered him your place for the night. Purely because you didn’t want him out so late, but each time he refused; saying it wouldn’t be right.

Slowly, your dinner meetings would begin happening in the day time. The last few days of summer were upon you and you wanted to spend it with Hoseok, having a picnic with him.

You dragged him up a tall grassy hill, basket full of bread, cheese, and jam. He laughed as he allowed you to pull him up towards the top, Mickey and Ann trailing behind at his heels, barking happily. Hoseok allowed the dogs to wander around the area, occasionally calling them back if they went too far.

All set up, you both sat down and enjoyed your lunch. It wasn’t long after you finished that you scooted closer to him, and closer until your hands were almost touching. You were about to slip your hand underneath his when Hoseok’s hand moved, taking your’s and placing it in his. His hands were rough to the touch, small calluses riddled his palms. A smile playing on your lips, you rested your head on his shoulder.

Neither of you moved for hours as you watched the day go by from that little spot on the hill, relishing in the late summer sun. Out of all the years you lived, you had to think that that moment there was the most peaceful. There was no need to run, no overwhelming sense of loss, just you and Hoseok.

“What was your family like?” He questioned.

Taking a deep breath, you began talking about your late family. “My father was a miller, he’d often take me on his runs to deliver flour, giving me a little sack to carry as well,” you smiled fondly at the memory, the villagers chuckling at you as you teetered behind him. “When I was even younger, I used to lay down by the fire and watch my mother sew. . . scolding me for growing up so fast.”

“Did you have any siblings?”

“I had two younger sisters, parents weren’t able to have anymore after the youngest,” you sighed, remembering how hard your parents tried. “They adored flowers, wanting to cover the cottage we lived in with honeysuckle and wild flowers.” Your vision started to get blurry as tears welled up in your eyes.

“They sound wonderful,” Hoseok murmured.

“Yeah, they were. . .” You sighed, blinking back the tears.

“Hey,” he pulled his shoulder away to look at you. “You’re okay, it’s okay.” Hoseok’s hand moved to cup your cheek, brushing the stray hairs from your face. “Your parents are looking down on you, so proud of the woman you are today.”

Meeting Hoseok’s eyes, you’re overwhelmed with the love and adoration pouring from his gaze. Never in your three hundred years had a person ever looked at you that way. As much as you wanted to give into his love, you were scared of the inevitable. One day Hoseok would begin to age and he would notice you still look the same as the day you met. He would grow old before your eyes, leaving you no choice but to leave him broken hearted. To love him would be selfish of you.

The sound of his voice calling your name pulled you from your spiral. You watched as his eyes flickered down to your lips for a moment, before he slowly leaned in. For the first time ever time felt like it stood still. There was no inevitable ticking clock, no fear or thoughts of the future. Just you and Hoseok, on that grassy hill on a late August day.

You should’ve known better than to have let him kiss you, as you knew as soon as you felt his lips on yours, there was no way you’d be able to let him go. Being alone for so many years, perhaps this time you could allow yourself to be selfish. One day you’d tell him about your curse, but until that day came, you were going to let yourself be with him.

As the seasons changed, your relationship with Hoseok only grew stronger. He’d visit you daily, bringing gifts of flowers, baked goods, and other assorted courting gifts. The two of you would spend all day together, reading or he’d help you take care of your chickens. Each night, he would leave, despite your insistence on him spending the night.

“I’m courting you, let me do this right,” he whispered once as he kissed you goodnight.

While you appreciated the sweet sentiment, he should’ve known your relationship was anything but orthodox. If your mother was still around, she surely would’ve been scandalized to hear you kissed him before you even married him. In fact the more you thought about it, the more horrified your mother would be at what you’ve done before marriage. But despite everything you may have done in the past, everything with Hoseok felt like a first.

Whenever Hoseok was with you, never did it feel like time was passing. Like it was only the two of you in your own little bubble of the world, frozen in time. Thoughts of your curse were far from your mind, but each time he left for the night, you knew you had to tell him eventually.

As the days grew colder, that ache you felt in your heart only became more apparent. Soon, you’d think to yourself, I’ll tell him soon. But it couldn’t come soon enough.

Snow soon covered the land, leaving you and Hoseok nothing much but to huddle yourselves inside your cottage. Both of you were huddled in front of your fireplace, desperate to keep warm. Hoseok’s dogs were curled up beside you as well, Mickey’s head resting on your lap as you lazily stroked his fur with one hand. You were rereading one of your novels, simply enjoying the warmth of the fire when you could feel Hoseok’s eyes on you. It wasn’t uncommon that he would stare at you as you did any sort of task, but there was something different about him. Behind his eyes, there was a particularly soft warm glow, making your body feel a thousand times more warmed than the heat of the fire in front of you.

“What are you staring at me like that for?” You finally asked, setting your book down.

“Have I ever told you how beautiful you are?”

Within an instant you felt your cheeks warmed by his words. “Yes,” you responded shyly, avoiding meeting his eyes.

Scooting closer to you, he took the book out of your hand, placing it off to the side. Both hands now free, he took them in his as he said your name. “I don’t know how else to say this but, I love you. I don’t know exactly when I fell for you, but I don’t think I ever want to stop.” Removing one hand from yours, he reached into his pocket, pulling out a delicate copper band.

A gasp escaped your lips as he held out the ring for you.

“It would give me the greatest pleasure, if you were to be my wife.”

“Yes,” you whispered. “Yes, yes!” You repeated as he slipped the ring onto your finger. Not even looking at it, you threw your arms over his shoulders. Unprepared for your sudden movement, you both went tumbling to the floor, the dogs whined as they rushed to move away from your colliding bodies. You pressed your mouth to his, smiling into it as he returned your kiss.

Until that moment, all your kisses had been brief. Fleeting kisses of hellos and goodbyes, never lasting more than a second. This kiss was different. His hands held your gently at your hips, keeping you in place on top of him. A fire ignited deep in you as you kissed him, you didn’t want to let him go now, not tonight. Keenly, you began peppering Hoseok’s entire face with kisses. His grip on you tightened as your lips traveled lower along the side of his jaw, nibbling at his neck.

“Wait,” his words came out in a groan. Calling your name, you only responded by moving back up to his lips, wanting to kiss him again. “No, not yet.”

“Hoseok, please,” you whined, breathless from the kiss.

“I know, I know, my love,” he panted as his hand came up to cup your face. “It’s getting late,” he sighed, noticing how dark the sky was outside once you were both sitting up again.

“You could stay the night,” you offered once again. Before he could protest, you continued. “Besides, we’re engaged now. What difference would it make?”

Hoseok rolled your eyes at the logic. “The difference is I would like my first time with you, to be with you as my wife.”

“You’re such a romantic,” you huffed as he stood up, gathering his things for him to leave.

Once all his things were together, he lowered his head down, kissing you one last time. “Goodnight, my love. I’ll see you tomorrow.” With that, Hoseok and his dogs left just like they would any other night.

You stared at the door, waiting for the faint crunches of his footsteps in the snow to disappear. Now alone, you knew you had to tell him. Hopefully his love for you would trump any doubts he would have. While you could try to hurt yourself as proof, you doubt he’d want to see you harmed. Death was a jarring thing, no matter if you were to come back or not. Regardless of the outcome, you knew you’d tell him tomorrow.

The following day, you got up like you would any other. You got yourself dressed, and began your daily activities. Everything was the way it normally was, but something felt off. You couldn’t place what was, but you knew deep down that something wasn’t right.

Covering yourself with a thick shawl, you made your way over towards your chicken coop. Picking out the eggs from your hens, ready to make something for breakfast. Once you had enough, you made your way back over to your house. It was then you heard barking.

Turning your head, you saw the familiar faces of Mickey and Ann, but there was no Hoseok. Setting the basket down, you lowered yourself to the ground, ready to greet the hounds.

“Hey, hey,” you cooed as you pet the dogs, both of them clearly very distressed. “What’s going on? Where’s Hoseok?” As the mention of his name, Mickey barked at you while Ann whined, pulling at your skirts.

“Excuse me, miss.” A new voice called from across the way. Looking up, recognizing the face as the innkeeper. You’d seen him a few times in town and Hoseok spoke of him often, as he had been renting one of his rooms the past few months. “You knew Hoseok, correct?”

“He’s my fianceé,” you responded cautiously as you straightened up. You hugged your shawl tighter around you as the innkeeper’s eyes saddened at your words. “Why? What happened?”

“I’m very sorry for your loss, miss.”

“What?” That moment, you could’ve sworn your heart stopped. Deep down, you wish it did. No, Hoseok couldn’t be gone. It couldn’t be. You wanted to accuse the innkeeper of lying, or perhaps he mistook someone for Hoseok. But the look in his eyes was clear: Hoseok was dead.

A ringing started in your ears as you stumbled back into your cabin, the dogs following after you. Barely able to hear any other word the innkeeper might’ve said, but it didn’t matter anyways. Hoseok was gone. There couldn’t be anything else to be said.

Alone once again in your home, you collapsed onto the ground. Opening your mouth, a deafening wail passed your lips. You had died a number of times by now; you’d been poisoned, stabbed, hung, shot, drowned. You’ve felt almost every measure of pain there was, but nothing compared to the pain you felt when you’d lost your beloved Hoseok.

You became a ghost of yourself after that day. Simply going through the motions of each day. Your only company was Mickey and Ann, who too missed their late owner. They were your only comfort, knowing that taking care of them was something Hoseok would’ve wanted you to do. Every night, they slept on your bed, curled up beside you as you lazily pet their aging bodies.

Ann was the first to die. 10 years have passed since you lost Hoseok. You’d moved out of that cottage a few years prior, knowing it was only a matter of time before the village had caught on to your affliction. The move was particularly hard on the two hounds, not wanting to move far from the only town they’d ever known. But you had no choice. It became very apparent that Ann wished to return, always sleeping by the door, hoping you’d change your mind. That’s how you found her one spring morning, lying quietly by the door, having passed in her sleep.

You buried her in your garden, under a bed of roses.

Having lost both his sister and Hoseok, Mickey followed soon after. He rarely left your bed, only getting up to eat or to go outside. It was only three months later did you bury him beside Ann.

The only reminder you had left of Hoseok was the ring on your finger. You rarely took it off your finger, fearing that one day you might forget it or Hoseok. Often you’d find yourself staring at the copper band. It was simple, bearing no special engravings or jewels, but it became your most prized possession.

Unfortunately, time didn’t stay still for you to wallow in your misery. You had to keep moving forward. But as time moved on, so did the world around you. It was strange how fast technology advanced, but as helpful as it was to the people around you, it became your worst nightmare. It became harder and harder to disappear, small towns and far away cabins no longer felt like the safe haven they once were. Which was how you found yourself deep in the city.

It was strange how easy it was to disappear, to simply become another face in the crowd. No one spared you a second glance, no matter how many times you may have seen them over the years, no one recognized you and your lack of aging. As long as you kept to yourself, you managed to stay hidden in plain sight.

Off the corner of 3rd street, you had your own little hole in the wall bookstore. You purchased the store from a sweet old couple a few years back, it was a quaint little bookshop, already having its own group of loyal customers. On occasion, you would get a few new faces, but it was usually the same ones everyday.

Until today when you saw a face you hadn’t seen in almost 300 years.

Per your usual morning routine, you were taking inventory of the store when you heard the bell over the front door ring. “I’ll be with you in just a moment!” You called out, trying to finish the last few rows of books. Finished, you made your way back towards the front of the store, dusting your hands off. “Well, is there anything I can help you with-” You stopped dead in your tracks as you saw the man you had entered your store. His eyes were cast downwards and he looked over the titles of the front shelves. Hearing your arrival, familiar dark eyes faced you.

“I’m just browsing,” he said, lips curling into a smile you swore you almost forgot.

In front of you, was Hoseok. It was, had to be. He looked every bit the same as that cold winter night when you last saw him. Your mouth opened and closed several times, before you finally gained your senses.

“Well, just, let me know if there’s anything specific you had in mind,” you responded, smiling as you spun around on your heel, wanting to make a break for your back office.

“Actually, there might be something.”

Swallowing thickly, you turned back to face him. “Oh?”

“I’m thinking of getting into cooking, do you have any cookbook recommendations?” He asked.

“Y-yeah, follow me.” Quickly, you walked over towards your cookbook section, feeling his eyes on you as you walked him over to the shelves. Dragging your fingers over the spines, you pulled out the one you were looking for. It was an older copy, you recognized from the late 80s. Inside were recipes of different types of baked goods and other dishes. “This one, I think I’ve made just about everything in it twice,” you said, pulling it off the shelf and handing it to him.

As the man flipped through the pages, you found yourself fiddling with the ring that now hung around your neck. Long ago, you strung a chain through it, nearly losing it down the drain. You stared at him in front of you, still not able to wrap your head around it. After nearly six hundred years, you don’t think you’ve ever seen the same face twice. Maybe this was your second chance with him, to start over again. But at the same time, you knew it would be foolish. The man in front of you was a complete stranger, not Hoseok. For all you know, he could be completely different than your long lost fianceé.

Shutting the book, he nodded. “This is perfect.”

Shaking you from your thoughts, you nodded. “Great. I’ll ring you up over here.” Walking back towards the cash register, you both fell into a silence as you rang him up. “Alright, here you go,” you smiled, handing him the book.

“Thank you so much.” Cookbook and receipt in hand, he made his way towards the front door. He couldn’t go just yet, there was something you needed to know.

“Wait!” You called out right as he placed his hand on the door. “If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your name?”

That brilliant smile played on his lips again as he responded. “Jung Hoseok.”

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