#i WILL incorporate them all into the mud fic

[bolithesenate]

on obscure canon/legends jedi

gently cradles...

Thame Cerulian

Master Unskette

Sar Labooda

Sarrissa Jeng

Yula Braylon

Rael Averross

Cyslin Myr

Jaizen Suel

Anoon Bondera

and assorted others in my hands.

i just think they are neat (and criminally underused in fic)

[hollowdeath]

I LOVEEEEE YOUR HARRY FICSSSS 😭😭🙏🙏 I literally cannot get enough, your harry fics are amazing ❤️

I was wondering if you'd be willing to do an enemies to lovers type thing with dark!harry, similar to the one you did with "the dark side" fic, but maybe they're rivals due to quittich, yet they both just have tension they don't know gow to handle, so one day they just kind of get so worked up in an argument they start making out. (P.S. I loved the thing you did where harry came from y/n saying he hated him 😫😫 also the part where harry gets turned on from y/n scolding him. If possible, could you incorporate that in there? Thank you smm ❤️❤️) I hope it's not too much trouble ❤️❤️❤️

thank you so much for requesting this, i hope you enjoy!!!

pairing: slytherin!harry james potter x gryffindor!fem!reader (18+)

summary: you and harry have been quidditch rivals ever since you've become captain of the gryffindor team. the tension between you two rises until one of you needs bandaged up by the other, leading to you making a discovery about the school's bad boy that leaves you baffled and insanely curious.

cw: smut!!! angst, mentions of blood, degradation kink, sub!harry x dom!reader, dry humping

word count: 7k

it was your final year at hogwarts and, more importantly to you, it was your last year as the gryffindor quidditch captain. you took major pride in your status as captain, and dedicated a majority of your time outside of class to leading practice, coming up with new plays, and making sure that annoyingly good slytherin captain kept his distance from you and your team.

harry potter was well known at hogwarts years before he even came through. the boy who lived, or whatever. you had never paid him much mind to begin with because you knew he reveled in his own notoriety.

see, potter wasn't just the slytherin quidditch captain. he was the most vile, egotistical, disrespectful wizard you'd ever had the misfortune of interacting with. on top of thinking he was some kind of miracle that blessed everyone's presence wherever he went, he specifically treated you worse than the mud on his shoes. not just because of your status as gryffindor captain, but because you were the only student who wasn't afraid to stand your ground with him. had it not been for quidditch practice 4 times a week and games every friday, you would've done everything you could to keep your distance. however, things didn't work out that way, and you ended up forming a sort of rivalry with the boy that the student body found all too exciting.

it started last year when potter and his friends made a dumb poster and hung it up in every boys bathroom: a drawing of someone falling off their broom with your face printed out and glued to it, along with harry's whose drawing had just knocked you off victoriously. they had put "[y/l/n] vs potter: this friday at 6" at the top like it was some kind of promotional advert. and, as much as you hated it, it actually somewhat worked.

from that game on, the other kids began picking sides every week to see who would win. the crowd turnout became the largest it had been in your entire time at hogwarts. some came in support of potter or were otherwise afraid of what would happen if they didn't, while a good amount of students started to become your biggest supporters the more you showed your skills in the game.

see, you didn't just become captain by having a recognizable last name unlike some other people; you had been playing quidditch since you could fly from a young age, and made the team every single year before finally being nominated for the position by your own teammates. you made a promise to them that day that slytherin would no longer be known as the winning house, and that they finally had some competition to sweat over.

and sweat they did. your first game as captain was an easy win, and so were the next 3. it wasn't until the slytherin players learned they actually had to try in order to win now that they began winning every other game as well. that's where harry stepped in.

harry was someone you always tried to avoid during your years at hogwarts. you didn't socialize with many slytherins to begin with as you found some of them to be rather grating and obnoxious, but especially not with slytherins like potter. it was students like him that gave the entire house a bad name. everyone thought he was so charming besides his cocky attitude, but you saw through his act right away. you think that's partially why he singled you out of anyone as his target.

once he set his sights on you, it was impossible to avoid him. it's like he had some sort of tracker on you the way he always managed to pop up in the most random of places simply to upset you. not that you'd be surprised, as along with harry's sickening bravado came his disregard for moral ethics. if there was a way to cheat, lie, or steal your way into getting what you wanted, potter was already on it. he knew no bounds when it came to his little schemes either. from stealing your game plays and sharing them with his teammates to spreading rumors about your players to playing clearly illegal moves during the game only for nobody to notice but you, potter seemed to revel in the rivalry everyone pushed onto you.

you hated giving him the satisfaction of breaking your cold demeanor, but sometimes his antics pushed you too far. he knows how protective you've become over your teammates, so he'll target them when he can't get to you, especially the younger ones. this is where you've blown your cover quite a few times as you can't stand seeing your first years cower in fear anytime they see potter. yelling, spitting, nearly getting physical with him on several occasions when he ignores your threats to leave the kids alone or else. it's as if he rather enjoys getting such a rise out of you, and not just to fuel the public rivalry.

today was your last day of practice before the last, biggest game of the semester. your team knew to meet at the field at 5 pm ready to go as you had plenty of plays you wanted to perfect before playing against the slytherins tomorrow night. practice had only just started with a few flyers in the air before you heard a commotion of voices coming from behind you.

you turned and saw harry leading his team onto the field, laughing obnoxiously and pointing at your teammates in mockery. you swear you felt steam coming from your ears when you told your team to wait and let you handle this.

you stormed up to potter with an accusatory pointed finger. "you. get the hell off my field now before i call mcgonagall out here, potter." you spit at him before pushing his chest. harry takes the push and just laughs, shaking his head at you.

"[y/l/n], i'm not sure how many professors have to tell you that this field isn't yours before you let us use it for practice as well," he said with a smirk, changing his grip on his broomstick and letting it rest on his shoulder. you narrow your eyes at him and cross your arms over your chest. "you know damn well we practice here every week at this time, and yet you're never able to find a time outside of that to spend with your own team. curious, isn't it?" you ask him sarcastically, your tone biting.

harry's smirk drops slightly. "are you suggesting that i'm trying to sabotage your chance at winning the season tomorrow? because i'd never do such a thing, [y/l/n], and it hurts that you think of me in that way." he responds just as sarcastically. a few of his players snicker and laugh just behind him, earning a nasty glare from you that has them shut up quickly.

you look back at harry who's waiting for a clever comeback from you, nearly on the edge of his seat to see what you have to say this time. you hate how much he thrives off getting you upset.

"fine. practice, then. you'll need it." you tell harry with a cold tone, giving him a disgusted look up and down. you take a step forward and point your finger back into harry's chest, your faces less than a foot away from each other. "but if you mess with any of my players, even as a joke, i will gut you like a fucking fish." you tell him in a hushed tone. you think you see his pupils dilate slightly, but you were probably mistaken. "got it?"

harry's smirk only grows as he starts backing away slowly. "got it, princess." he laughs, turning to his little group of followers for approval before they run off to the other goal post opposite from your team. the nickname is new, and for some reason it made your stomach drop and heart race like crazy. that potter kid just knew exactly how to get under your skin.

you tried to focus on your own team's plays for the rest of practice, but you could clearly hear harry and his friends saying your name and laughing too often for your comfort. anytime you happened to make eye contact with harry, you made sure to scowl at him and promptly turn your attention away. just his sheer presence made your blood boil and skin crawl.

for the most part there were no issues in the sky, the slytherins mostly kept to their side besides the few times harry's friends were messing around and ended up coming close to a few of your teammates. you scolded them each time, but they would only laugh at you and fly off to tell harry about your outbursts. other than that, you ended up getting a lot accomplished in order to be prepared for the game the next day.

however, towards the end of practice, your teammates were having some difficulty with a new technique you taught them, so you took the time to demonstrate it with another player in the sky. you were just about to start instructing when your teammates started calling out to you frantically. you didn't have enough time to process what they were warning you about before you felt someone fly into you from behind, nearly causing you to fall off your broomstick.

you could feel yourself falling to the ground, but your grip on your broomstick remained tight enough to quickly get it under you just in time to somewhat break your landing. you tumbled to the ground with a pained groan, and heard someone else fall just to your left. you could feel the wind get knocked out of you in the air, so it took a moment for you to properly breathe as you tried to sit up.

your teammates got to you in seconds, asking if you were okay and trying to help you up. that's when the pain set in. standing up-right you could feel your rib cage aching and your shoulder throbbing. "i'm fine, i'm fine," you told everyone, brushing off the grass stains on your clothes. you turned to see who had fallen next to you, and who else would be lying there but harry potter as his slytherin teammates rushed to his aid as well.

they're helping him stand up and you can feel the rage building inside you. you break away from your teammates' grasps and march up to harry as he's wiping the grass stains off his own clothes as well.

"you did that on purpose, you pest." you snap at him. harry looks at you incredulously as he fixes his practice jersey. "are you mad? it was an accident, i wasn't looking where i was going, drama queen." he snaps back, giving you a dirty look up and down. you can feel your jaw clenching and fists balling at your sides. "oh yeah, sure, you just so happened to run into me of all people in the sky. you know, you're such a…"

you pause in your anger noticing a gash on the side of harry's face with blood starting to drip down his cheekbone. harry notices your concern and gives you a confused look. you sigh and instinctively pull down the sleeve of your sweatshirt to hold it against his wound. "now you have a giant cut on your face, for fuck's sake," you tell him, your voice a mix of panic and exasperation. harry winces at your hand making contact with his face, but his eyes grow with concern hearing your panic.

you turn to your team and start guiding harry towards the school. "practice is over, do not be late tomorrow." you announce to them hurriedly, trying to keep your sleeve against harry's injury as you rush him off the field.

harry actually manages to stay quiet on the way to the infirmary despite your anticipation to shush him the entire way for making crude jokes. instead he remains silent and lets you urgently guide him through the empty halls.

once you arrive at the infirmary wing, you notice the entire room is full of people. every bed is taken, ans every nurse is running around frantically from patient to patient. you and harry share a confused look before you roll your eyes and find a nurse between beds. "excuse me, ma'am, i'm sorry to bother but um, potter here was being an idiot and got a cut on his face that just needs to be bandaged quickly." you motion towards harry and feel him give you a nasty look out of your peripheral for calling him an idiot.

the nurse, completely exhausted, sighs and motions towards a room to the side of the check-in station. "look, we are swamped with a potion experiment gone wrong here. if it's just a cut that doesn't need stitches there's a first aid kit in the little room over that way." she tells you quickly before being called away to another patient. you try to intervene but she's already jogging away, leaving you with a bloody harry in your hands. literally.

you sigh, clearly annoyed, and turn to examine harry's cut again. pulling your blood-soaked sleeve away, you see the blood flow still hasn't slowed and decide to just bite your tongue and help harry despite your hatred for him only growing in this situation.

you drag harry towards the little room, opening the door and turning on the lights to reveal the smallest examination room you'd ever seen. you had no idea this was even here, but it only contained a sink, a cot, a locked medicine cabinet, and a first aid kit. you closed the door behind harry and locked it. you grab a few paper towels from next to the sink and walk harry over to the cot. "sit," you command him, practically pushing him with your other hand to sit down.

harry looks up at you softly, way softer than he's ever looked at you. it makes your heart skip a beat but you ignore the feeling quickly. "here," you tell him coldly, handing over the paper towels. "just apply pressure on it while i get the first aid kit."

harry does as he's told and you slowly pull away your sleeve, making a disgusted face at the stains left on the cuff. you sigh and pull your arm back through the sleeve, starting to take off the hoodie altogether. "well, that's ruined," you complain, throwing it to the floor, leaving you in a tiny tank top and workout shorts.

harry's watching you intently, adjusting his glasses and shifting his weight in his seat. you walk to the sink and thoroughly wash your hands in case any blood happened to get on you as well.

opening the first aid kit up you find a tiny bottle of isopropyl alcohol, cotton rounds, and bandages. pouring alcohol on the cotton, you turn to harry and still find him watching you.

you give him a look. "what?" you ask with pinched brows. harry, for once, looks flustered as he turns his eyes away from you, instead staring at the floor below his feet. you just roll your eyes and set down the alcohol, walking towards harry and pulling away his hand from his cheek.

"here," you say, moving his jaw to look up towards you. "this is gonna hurt a little," you tell him before gently cleaning the cut with the cotton round. harry winces, but his eyes never leave your face. you try to ignore his gaze but it becomes even more intense the longer you take to stop the bleeding. you can practically feel his stare burning holes into your skin, and you start to feel that familiar annoyance rise in your stomach.

"i know i'm pretty, potter, but can't you look anywhere else?" you complain, giving him a cold look before returning your attention to his cheek. harry's eyes drop again, but end up falling on your chest this time. you back away and scoff, throwing the cotton pad into the trash next to the cot. "perv," you mutter under your breath.

just as you're preparing the bandage on the counter next to the sink, you hear harry say something from behind you. "you're gonna have to speak up, kid," you chuckle, throwing away some wrapping in the trash. "your, um, your back," you hear him stutter.

you turn to give him a confused look. "what?" you ask. harry motions towards your back, and you turn to look at yourself in the mirror above the sink. you look at your back and pull up your tank top slightly to see a massive bruise forming on your ribcage. you gasp at the size and color, immediately turning your anger towards harry.

he already looks prepared for your rage before you can even start to say anything. "you bloody prick, i know you did this on purpose. do you seriously want to win so badly you'd nearly break a rib to get there?" you snap at him, pulling your shirt back down and angrily marching towards him still sitting on the cot.

"i told you, [y/n], it was an accident." he says. you pause. he's never called you by your first name, at least not to your face. you were actually surprised he knew what it was in the first place.

harry looks up at you innocently, his eyes soft and brows raised. this just angers you again. you take another step towards him, your legs practically between his as harry tilts his head up to keep looking at you.

his glasses are crooked, his hair is a mess, and the cut on his cheek is still raw. and still, for some reason, your heart skips a beat looking down at him. you've never been so close to his face. you've never noticed his freckles before.

"you should just be glad i haven't targeted you the way you've targeted me all these years, potter. you're lucky i'm a nice person and don't believe in revenge, or else you'd be the one with nearly broken bones and a bruise the size of your lungs." you spit in his face, your tone razor sharp.

harry's expression hardly changes at your words. if anything his eyes only soften more watching you become filled with anger.

"and wipe that innocent look off your face before i do it for you. you should be thanking me for patching up this cut and not making it worse." you continue to vent at him as you step away to grab the bandage from the counter.

you're just starting to press down on the adhesive of the bandage around harry's injury when his eyes meet yours again. "thank you." he says, his voice broken and whiny. something about the way he says it makes your stomach drop to the floor. harry's usual annoying temperament was completely gone, no longer making mocking jokes or insults towards you, instead only speaking softly and looking into your eyes even softer.

confused and feeling a strange mix of emotions, you finish applying the bandage on harry's face without a word.

you start to put away the first aid kit, taking one last look at your bruise in the mirror with a sigh.

"i'm sorry." you hear harry say quietly. you look at him, his expression empathetic and almost concerned for you. it was then you started to believe the incident really was an accident. why would harry ever be apologetic for something he'd usually take loads of pride in, like knocking you off your broomstick?

you swallow nervously and look away from him, fixing your shirt. "you should be," you try to remain cold, but your voice is breaking. "i'm just glad you also hurt yourself in the process. you deserve to feel some of the pain too." you say in a deadpan voice.

you pick up your sweatshirt off the floor and start soaking the sleeve in some hot water to at least try and get some of the stains out.

"you're right." harry says behind you, his voice somber. you roll your eyes at his pathetic attempt to seem remorseful, turning to him curtly. "i know i'm right. and you know what else? you're just a loser who picks on people to feel better about yourself because you're insecure." you insult him.

you expect at least some kind of reaction from harry, but he just continues to watch the ground with a sullen expression. "i know." he says quietly.

you groan and turn to shut the sink faucet off, walking towards harry with the same accusatory pointing finger from before. "and you can stop with this whole act you're putting on 'cause it's pissing me right off," you nearly yell at harry, getting in his face. he just looks up at you with those big blue eyes again, biting his lip harshly.

you went to scold him again when you noticed a rather large bulge in his pants from where you were standing above him. you thought you were just assuming, but once you took a step back, you knew exactly what was happening with a smirk growing on your face.

harry nervously looked down at his crotch before quickly attempting to hide his obvious erection. he adjusted his pants and tried to use his shirt to cover it, but you were already laughing at him. "this cannot be real, this has got to be a setup. there's no way you just got turned on by me insulting you for 10 minutes straight." you could hardly get the words out from laughing so hard.

clearly embarrassed, harry looks between you and his erection with fear in his eyes. it only makes the situation that much better for you as you continue to humiliate your own bully.

"u-uh, this isn't, um–" "don't try and tell me this isn't what it looks like, potter. i know exactly what's going on here." you interrupt him and cross your arms. "you're such a loser that the only way you can get off is by having girls hate you. y'know, most guys get erections from making out with a girl, not getting threatened by them." you mock him, still a hint of anger laced in your voice.

harry's looking at you with that same innocent expression, but there's something else in his eyes that makes you pause. he's not just embarrassed, he's actually enjoying what you're saying to him. you can see his pupils dilate just looking at you, his bulge only becoming more obvious the longer you mock him.

you want to be disgusted at this situation. you want to hate the way harry's looking at you and leave the room with a huff to tell everyone about his little kink. you want to call him a disgusting creep and slap him across the face for ever thinking of you in such a way. but, you don't. because you can't.

you should be disgusted. you should be creeped out. but, for some reason, you're just not. you should be filled with rage ready to tell him off again, but, instead, you find yourself full of curiosity and…flattery?

of course it's never flattering for a guy to get an erection thinking about you being upset with him, if anything it's quite morbid. however, with you and harry, everything finally started to make sense. this is why he was always pushing your buttons just to get a rise out of you, or why he seemed to thrive off of your heated interactions. because he did. he found pleasure in your anger.

again, you should be fuming, but you're just not. your heart is racing and so is your mind. you're completely flustered at this point, possibly even more than harry is. you can feel the blush on your neck and cheeks and can't tell if the embarrassment you're feeling is secondhand or not.

still looking up at you, harry attempts to cover his erection up again with his pants. you just laugh at him again as there's no real point, you're more than well aware of his predicament at the moment. his blush is so severe he's nearly completely red, and you can see his hair start to stick to his forehead from the sweat. while you'd usually feel nothing but contempt looking down at harry's innocent expression, this time you feel a bit different. he almost looks younger now, his eyes soft and lips slightly hung open.

you notice the bandage around his scar starts to lift a bit around his eye, so you sigh and place a hand on his bandage to help reattach it. again, harry almost winces at your movement, and you can see his erection twitch under his pants. god, he really does get off on this.

while fixing it, harry's still watching you intently. "i'm sorry," his voice is soft but deep, making your blood run cold. you pause to look him in the eyes. "and what are you sorry for?" you lead him on.

harry's brows furrow together slightly. "for…well, y'know," he trails off, offering a fake, awkward chuckle. you smirk as you look back at his bandage. "no, i don't know. so why don't you tell me, potter?" you ask teasingly.

without fail, harry shifts in his seat uncomfortably and tries to subtly hide his erection again. your smirk only grows at his predictability.

"u-uh, well, i-i'm sorry for…for, um, getting turned on by you…" his stuttering is only making you enjoy the moment more. maybe part of you likes seeing him squirm like this under your hand. "by me…?" you lead him on again, taking a step away to examine his bandage. harry swallowed nervously watching you. "by you…being mean to me." he says meekly, his voice small and embarrassed.

you smirk at him again and decide to test the waters. "good boy."

harry's face absolutely drains of color. you can practically see his heart thumping out of his chest. and, if you weren't wrong, his hands actually started shaking in his lap.

you start laughing again at his reaction, hardly able to hold back from how funny this situation was to you. harry potter, the school's bad boy, the top slytherin student, the quidditch captain, your biggest rival, has a literal kink for being degraded. and he had the nerve to ever try and call you a loser.

"sorry, it's just so funny to me," you tell him between laughs, wiping tears from your eyes. "actually, no, i'm not sorry. i think you deserve to be laughed at for this. what guy actually gets horny from girls being mean to him?" you ask rhetorically, crossing your arms again and examining harry in front of you.

he's completely disheveled and getting sweatier by the minute. he breaks eye contact after your question, nervously scratching the back of his neck to waste time. "uh…" he starts off, clearly not knowing what to say to that. you just continue smirking, watching him struggle. "i mean, is it every time a girl is mean to you this happens? i'd imagine with your attitude that would be pretty often." you joke, partially curious but mostly just trying to make him squirm more.

harry shakes his head, both of his hands rubbing at his face and wiping the sweat from his hairline. "n-no, it's, uh…" he starts again, eventually trailing off with a sigh. you start tapping your foot impatiently. "i'm waiting." you say in a mocking tone.

harry tenses again, still not looking back up at you just yet. his body language is clearly uncomfortable and defensive. "it's not…all girls, okay? it's just…you." he finally spits out, clearly struggling to put his thoughts into words. "this only happens with you, i swear. a-and it's only started this year, and i don't know why." he rambles, speaking with his hands, his eyes still fixated on the floor.

for once, you're speechless. you weren't expecting that confession from him, and you certainly didn't know how to react to it in the moment. i mean, this potter kid has had it out for you since day one, he's practically made you two enemies on the field and off, and now he wants to tell you all this? it's a bit confusing, to say the least.

harry sighs, resting his face in his hands once again. "look, i'm sorry about all of this, okay? all of it, not just today, but everything. i shouldn't have been so rude to you all this time, especially not for the reasons i have…" you can practically hear harry wincing at his own words. he uncovers his face but continues to look down. "just…please, please, don't tell anyone. i know that's asking for a lot considering all i've done to you, but…please, [y/n]." he's nearly begging.

you just watch him carefully, trying to figure out how to respond to all of this. on one hand you're inclined to feel insulted, disrespected, and downright disgusted at this information, but in reality…you're just obscenely curious. i mean, how often does a guy get turned on by you being mean to him? and not just you, but specifically, only you. does that mean he actually likes you? or is it only a sexual thing? and how would that even work?

as your mind continues to raise more and more questions, you feel yourself speaking before you even decide what to say.

"fine, i won't tell anyone. if," you take a slow step towards harry. he looks up at you with flushed cheeks and wide eyes. your heart leaps at the sight of him so vulnerable beneath you. it's as if you can see him thinking anything, anything for you.

you're not sure what's possessing you in this moment, but you can't stop yourself from pushing the limits further between you and harry. again, your mouth starts speaking for you.

"if…you let me help." you say with a smirk, closing the gap between you and harry and standing between his legs once again. he's looking up at you in complete shock, his eyes examining every inch of you in front of him. he's trying to speak but his mouth just keeps opening and closing, gasping for air and nervously chuckling.

arms still crossed, you wait for harry to say something and enjoy seeing him be the speechless one this time.

he eventually looks back up at you, biting his lip again and leaning back slightly. "help…me?" he asks, confused. you laugh at him, shaking your head. "yes, potter. help you. can't have you leaving here with that," you motion down to his pants with your head. "can we?" you ask seductively.

again, you're not sure what's making you act like this right now, but you honestly didn't mind it. you already got a kick out of insulting harry anyway, why not watch him struggle a bit harder under your thumb in this tiny exam room?

harry's completely frozen. you smile at him this time, the most genuine one you could muster in the moment. "if you want to, of course," you say quietly, softening your gaze at him and fixing his messy hair. harry makes a soft sound and leans into your touch, his eyes closing. you giggle to yourself, he just looks so innocent resting in your hand.

the moment didn't last long as you tighten your grip on the hair on the back of harry's head, pulling it so he's looking right at you. his eyes open and a soft whine escapes his lips. "i'll take that as a yes?" you ask smugly, leaning down until your faces were nearly touching. harry does his best to nod his head, swallowing nervously and glancing at your lips.

you smile at him again. something just felt so right when you were in control, seeing harry's front disappear as he became a mess in your hands. you felt powerful, confident, and, to your dismay, insanely turned on from the entire situation. your feelings of hate and desire for harry drove you mad, yet he seemed more than willing to be the recipient of both.

so, you lean forward, and you kiss him.

it's soft at first, slow, shy, you feel like harry's barely breathing. eventually he catches up, nearly moaning into your mouth as you feel your stomach fluttering. you put your other hand on his cheek and sit on harry's lap, your knees resting on the cot around harry's hips. you feel his hands tread carefully up your thighs and under your shorts, his fingers digging into your skin roughly.

this time you can't hold back your moans, causing harry to melt even more into you. his lips were soft, careful, but so eager. it's like he was starving and yet still took his time with you.

you pull away slightly, your breath heavy and forehead resting on harry's. "lay down," you command him, climbing off his lap. harry quickly lies back on the cot, kicking off his shoes in the process. you do the same before crawling back on top of him, carefully resting your ass directly on his erection.

harry openly groans, his hands reaching for your hips and squeezing the skin roughly. you bite your lip to hold back another moan. you slightly adjust your position and cause harry's head to roll back against the cot. "[y/n]..." is all he manages to say in his broken voice.

he's already such a mess and all you've done is sit in his lap. who would've known all this time his teasing you was just a cover up for this?

"this'll be easy. you're already practically falling apart on me, potter." you tease him, your cold fingers finding their way under his jersey. harry's body shivers, his hands moving from your hips to your waist. his fingers crawl under your shirt as well and cause your skin to break out in goosebumps.

he slightly smirks at this reaction, but you don't let him have his moment for long. "and don't get cocky," you warn him before you start grinding on his erection. his head rolls back in pleasure again, his mouth hanging open and fingers digging into your skin. you smirk to yourself. "don't forget you're the loser who likes to be insulted here." you remind him harshly, your hands running along his chest under his jersey.

harry's noises are completely pathetic, his hips bucking into yours for even the slightest bit more friction. you stop grinding into him and he lets out a shaky breath, looking at you with needy eyes. he looks so worked up already and you've barely done a thing.

"shirt off," you tell him, pulling at the material. harry, again, doesn't hesitate to follow instructions. he removes his hands from your waist and quickly takes off his jersey, throwing it to the floor.

your breath hitches in your throat looking at harry's soft, sweaty skin in the dim fluorescent lighting of the exam room. you never realized just how toned his shoulders and chest were, or how many scars and bruises he seemed to have, both new and fading.

you look back up at harry, his eyes nervously watching your every move. you lean in to kiss him again, messier, needier. his hands return to your hips and practically force you to start grinding on him again. you would've intervened if you weren't just as desperate to continue rolling your hips into harry's hard erection.

a soft moan comes from your lips as you grind into him harder, your hands resting on his chest for support. harry groans, his brows furrowing. "shit," he mutters, only encouraging you to go faster.

you could feel how wet you were through your panties. your stomach was tightening already, making you feel a bit embarrassed of your own desperation. seeing harry be so willing to please you only had you wanting him more.

just as you start to feel yourself blush at your lack of self control, you notice harry's panicked expression, his grip on your skin guaranteed to leave bruises. "what's wrong?" you ask, somewhat sarcastically and also concerned.

he struggles to get a sound out. "hmph, gonna, fuck, please, don't," he's stumbling through his words, barely able to keep his eyes focused on you. his hands try to stop your hips, but his grip his weak.

"stop what?" you ask curiously, slowing your hips slightly but rolling into him harder. harry moans, his hand covering his mouth hearing how loud it echoed through the tiny room. you just laugh at him and pull his hand away, guiding it to your chest. harry's eyes widen, trying to pull his hand away.

"stop, gonna…cum, if you don't," harry whimpers, squirming under your weight as his legs try to escape. you take your opportunity and pick up your pace, giving harry an evil smile.

"aw, already?" you ask, forcing his hand back to your chest. you guide his fingers along the curves of your breasts through your thin tank top, causing him to breathe even heavier. "you haven't even gotten to see these, and you're already about to cum? i was right, you're such a fucking loser, potter." you tell him, guiding his hand back under your shirt.

you can feel him struggling under you even more, his torso only getting sweatier. you just grab for his other hand and guide it under your shirt as well. he watches as intently as he can, his eyes still rolling back in pleasure at the pressure in his lap.

you help him lift his hands higher and higher until he's cupping your tits under your shirt, your breathing becoming hitched at the feeling of his rough fingers running across your sensitive nipples.

"fuck," you say under your breath, loud enough for harry to moan and grope you rougher, lifting your shirt above your tits. you gasp at the feeling and look back down at him, a sweaty mess with eyes barely open.

"please, please," harry starts begging, his hips still trying to squirm away from you. you place your hands on his sides and push him down, continuing to chase your high. "just stay still, harry," you nearly whimper. you realize you've never called him by his first name either.

that's when he comes completely unraveled beneath you. he's practically crying out in pleasure and desperation, his hands roughly squeezing the soft skin of your tits as his head is thrown back against the cot. just watching him fall apart like this has you shaking on top of him, feeling the warm wetness of your panties leaving a mark on harry's jeans.

it takes a few moments for both of you to come back to earth. harry's hands eventually loosen their grip on you before quickly pulling away, his eyes wide and panicked again. "sorry," he says quickly, his cheeks completely flushed.

you just shake your head and laugh, climbing off of harry's lap and adjusting your shirt. harry sits up and runs his hands through his hair, trying to catch his breath still.

the room is a bit awkward, but you eventually start to chuckle and push harry's shoulder lightly. "so…" you lead him on. harry chuckles as well, hanging his head low. "so…" he repeats, his voice still soft.

"so…is it wrong of me to assume you might actually like me?" you ask, picking up harry's jersey and handing it to him. he offers you a shy smile and puts it back on, shaking his head. "y'know, i'm not sure there's a way i could've made it more obvious." he admits half heartedly.

you laugh again, feeling a blush crawl up your cheeks. you turn away from him and grab your sweatshirt from the sink, the sleeve still completely stained.

"i really am sorry about that, i have a few you could borrow if you'd like." he says with a smirk, pointing towards your sweatshirt. you roll your eyes. "well, good to know your cockiness hasn't gone anywhere." you respond, suppressing a smile.

he chuckles. "never will." he says confidently. you give him a look and take a step towards him, causing him to swallow nervously.

you laugh at him again. "yeah, okay, pretty boy." you tease him, stepping away and towards the door. he follows behind you, still blushing like crazy.

leaving the exam room you notice all the nurses are still running around like lunatics, having no idea what's just happened only a few feet away from them. you and harry share a knowing look before running off together, laughing as you reach the halls.

"y'know," harry says between laughs, looking over at you with nothing but love in his eyes as you continue walking the empty halls. "don't think i'll go easy on you tomorrow just because of…that." he says, motioning behind him with a shy smile. you smile back at him and offer your hand. harry looks a bit hesitant, but shakes it anyway. "wouldn't want it any other way, potter."

tag list:

@gorlsinmultifandoms @treacletartlett @lucasinclairsgf @stvrlavs @dinomdubs

if you'd like to be part of my tag list, just leave a comment or message me! if you enjoyed this please let me know, your comments make my day <3

[celestial-sphere-press]

IT'S FANFICTION WRITERS APPRECIATION DAY!!! TIME TO SHARE SOME LOVE!!

Fanbinding: Mud Knights by @lightshadowverisimilitude

John had obviously managed to take care of himself just fine before he met me, and he had Cujo the Linebacker to take care of whatever he couldn't himself (though I got the impression that John was perfectly capable of handling most threats). I'd only known the man for a few hours and I'd apparently already dragged him into my friend circle whether he wanted to be there or not – all of that meant that it was my job to keep him safe.

This fic is so fun and by lovely fellow Temeraire fan ladyshadowdrake! Their copy arrived last week so here are the two of them together! Harry Dresden & John Marcone (& Hendricks!) get a little down and dirty in Undertown. This is definitely a common reread fic for me; the prose & humor and characterization is spot on.

This is a color palette I haven't really worked with before and I'm loving it!! The greens and the browns are lovely. The moon on the cover is inlaid marbled paper, the cloth is colibri, and the endpapers are by @renato-crepaldi.

I found a very cute Chicago skyline watercolor, which incorporated in a line art trace on the cover, on the title page spread & section titles with a watercolor moon. To finish out the spread I grabbed a jousting knight, and I'm very happy it how it turned out.

While the spine is a little curved there due to some styling on my part, this is technically a flatback book... which I had previously stated I would never sew an endband for bc I though it wasn't worth it. Whoops. I didn't realize until afterwards because these little sewn endbands felt so integral to making it cohesive 😅.

Much love to you, @lightshadowverisimilitude, for sharing all your wonderful work & creativity with us, and for being a lovely friend to hang out with in fandom.

[uselesstaroth]

Over two weeks ago I made this post

And here it is.

Sonic gets attacked by new eggman robots that he cannot damage in any way, and he gets separated from all his friends.

His only leads are:

The robots are similar to the ones from Starfall Islands

A gut feeling that Sage might be involved

A mysterious medallion he found after nearly drowning to death appears to reveal a map to a location he's never been in

Creative process beneath the "read more"

So, Sonic Underground came out in between the JP and US releases of Sonic Adventure, meaning it is completely divorced from moder Sonic media.

I always wanted to make a post-frontiers story that didn't involve some form of Evil Sonic or dead/missing Sonic.

I also noticed how few appearances Sonic makes in my usual stories, so I thought him as a focus would have been fun and a change of pace.

I watched Sonic Underground a lot as a kid, and I have held to this day that the most interesting thing that show did was giving Sonic two siblings to bounce off of that are the same age as him.

Now for the actual fic:

Most of my fics are LARP'd / music daydreamed before I write them down, which is why most of them are based on songs, and this one is... Actually an exception.

The post linked at the top is essentially how I came up with if this one. "What if Sonic Underground comes after Frontiers", and that's it.

That means that Sonic, Manic and Sonia have been apart for many years after their childhoods and that influenced how I wrote them.

I wrote Manic as a sort of community pillar vibe because of his scrappy upbringing evolving into a sense of community and activism. It also complemented with the decision to make a cymbal shield his main weapon of choice which does appear on the show. Him always breaking silences will be a running gag, don't you worry.

Sonia is a little more stick in the mud, mostly because right now she's in "business" mode, and I do plan to have her relax a bit as they make progress in saving the world. Also, the keyboard gun is not my invention, it's in the show, and that influenced her personality in this first chapter for sure.

Sonic is Sonic. Self explanatory in my opinion. The main changes from canon I suppose is that he's a lot more awkward around the other triplets, which just came about naturally, the fact that he's careful now (I imagine because Tails eventually gave him an earful about his attitude in Starfall Islands). Changing the laser guitar into a guitar sword is my firm belief that's how they'd do it if Underground had come out after Sonic and the Black Knight. It also helps him stand out from Sonia who also shoots lasers.

The most important thing I avoided was making the triplets eager to call eachother siblings. There's no way they get there quickly, they've lived their own lives for far too long. Manic being excited about it probably says something about his character.

The ending of this chapter comes from me realizing the seven chaos emeralds aren't a thing in Sonic Underground, and wanting to incorporate that in some way.

Also Infinite! What's he doing here? Not too sure.

And that's the gist of it

[charmwasjess]

ill gladly help you procrastinate u know that

23 & 17 👀

Boli, you are simply magnificent. I've spent upwards of thirty minutes not working while I was writing this up. 17. there should be more of this type of fic/art This isn't a problem so much as a good sign of the thriving fandom economy where people are writing big, rich, interesting stories - AUs, fix-it, time travels, what ifs - and I read those fics avidly. But I've been really craving the old "slice of life" one shot recently. Let me hang out with your dudes (gn) just doing their thing for a couple thousand words. Small moments, ordinary daily things. I love it. Same for art. Little domestic snapshots just get me. This is also a chance to say something I like about your writing specifically, Boli, because you incorporate a lot of this kind of scene into Mud fic while balancing the bigger plot elements. Thinking of that great bar scene. <3 23. ship I've come around to Syku is probably the big obvious one here since I spent so long (decade) waffling on writing Dooku in any kind of romantic thing. Then, reason slipped from my nerveless fingers and shattered. I dissolved About Them. But you poor people watched that happen to me in real time so I won't go on and on about it. No description can match the experience of watching me daily embarrass myself on here over them.

You know what one I weirdly have come to love? Obimaul. At first I was like "oh sw fandom, you'll ship anything lolol" and then I watched the Maul Clone Wars episodes and I was like... okay... okay... yeah, so, I get you want to specifically murder him and everything, but the way you're keening "Kenobi" right now...

It's kind of really fucking sad? Like Maul is this person who had been literally broken in half, and that's before you get to the metaphorical damage of being essentially enslaved by Sidious his whole life. I mean Maul's origin story makes Dooku's kid trauma look like a trip to Disney World. This person who fundamentally does not know about love, having been fed a diet of pain and hate all his life, getting into the murderous jealous one-sided sexual obsession with Obi-Wan, which is part inability to distinguish hate from lust, and part a pure desire to be Obi-Wan because he's representative of everything that was taken from Maul. He embodies every chance Maul never got. The (loving) Master. The community of people like him. The family. It's so dark and doomed and fucked up, but also so sad.

But I realize I'm not here to talk about shipping normal things, since my problematic main ship somehow manages to be both a Fridging and a Kill Your Gays trope...

[vryfmi]

talk shop tuesday!!!! I love love LOVED your piece for the tea toast & ghosts zine – what was your experience in planning and creating it? was it a challenge to combine both art and writing, and did your art influence your writing or vice versa? I'd love to hear about your thought process in the creation of that really cool piece :D

thank you so much! it's really nice to hear especially since it's my first posted writing!

if im being honest i wanted to write an article from the very beginning, it was the overall idea that was ever changing but eventually i found it. since TTG zine's topic was your favourite thing about l&co, and i had no idea how to incorporate skullyle and it was too much work to come up with technical parts of ghost-lamps (tho i did dive deep into street lights' wiring at one point), i figured i'd stick to my favourite thing of all - worldbuilding and dark stuff!

The Idea™, at first, was to come up with a few cases and illustrate them, but the longer i rotated those the more i didn't like the prospect of making something separate and not rooted into canon. so i skimmed through the books while looking for any mentions of Fittes and Rotwell cases, since back then i already decided to use the Mud Lane Phantom's story. the other two i took are from TSS and THB and they were vague enough to be able to lengthen them to an article entry.

i outlined ideas first, what themes i wanted to convey, what i wanted to put out there for fans and how these cases would've work with each other. from the that point i started drawing the illustrations. quite a backwards process. and it all sounds good on paper but in reality irl struggles really weren't making me any favours and i wasn't meeting deadlines at all, but mods team was patient and understanding with me, they are literally the best!

for Mud Lane i went for slight mockery of pioneers because, well, yeah. there was quite a lot of made up lore that i decided to cast aside (like what if "today" at the crossroad there's a statue of Fittes and Rotwell? a museum? a tourist attraction? a gift shop?). overall im just really proud of illustration that i did, i should draw more of Marissa and Tom at some point.

fun fact and easter egg of sorts: Marissa's pose was supposed to be an homage to first poster of the series and the way Lucy stands in it! i think it got lost along the way as i changed the pose but i think it's still readable enough. i love drawing parallels between the two (:

[id: a side by side of Marissa in illustration, where she's holding her lantern with her right hand and looking beyond the viewer, and Lucy from the first Netflix' poster, where she stands in a simillar manner but points with her rapier at something out of view./end id]

picking one case set 50 years before the others ment that i'd have to contrast them, draw a parallel and make them work against each other to bring up the best and the worst. The Shoreditch one was, admittedly, more of that coming up with something that wasn't there in the first place. first book only mentioned patrols and i latched onto them. (plus i was drafting it at around the same time as l&co bigbang came out and i was massively inspired by my teammates work which incorporated those patrols but in metro tunnels. great case-fic btw). mainly i went for darker aspects of agent's work there, thinking that to fit in sewers the team would've been of smaller children, and that Kipps (yeah, he's there in illustration) would be as close to them as possible, unlike other inspectors we are used to seeing.

Holland Park Hounds was the one that i was the most excited for because wdym we as a fandom don't talk about possible animal-ghosts?? sure, it could've been Changer(s) but is it really? plus how badass of Holly to be part of it AND it was famous enough that Lucy knew of it as well!

Holly Munro pushed a stray hair or two behind her ear. ‘Well, I’ve seen some things. I was there in the Holland Park Cellar case, when our party got blockaded underground by those seven spectral dogs. It was quite a tight spot. And after that—’ ‘I heard about Holland Park, Holly, and I can tell you the thing that makes the bloody footprints is ten times worse. I’m only saying. I don’t want to frighten you. I just wouldn’t want you to get hurt.’ (THB)

innitially i wanted to do something about a horse-phantom that was mentioned somewhere but for the life of me i couldn't find it in books, so i'll leave it for my next reread. but this case has so much more ties to the main gang and especially Holly herself. i really wanted to draw a picture of her and her team after the case but no composition really worked so i kept it to park's plan (my urban planer friend said it looked good even). plus giving a plan and thorough haunting information somehow felt very Rotwell to me.

aaand i think that's it! not much to say for back cover only that my friend really disliked my choice of comic sans for one of the adverts. and that i wanted to make it gritty, as if its a wall right around the corner of the Fittes ball court.

[paula-in-dreamland]

Twenty Questions for Fic Writers

Thank you for the tag @ladyaldhelm :)

1. how many works do you have on AO3? None - BUT, hope to have one on there in August or sooner :) I used to be on fanfiction.net - 9 stories still posted there.

2. what's your total AO3 word count? N/A - Although my longest story on FF is ~ 57.1k words. And I have a feeling I am going to surpass that with my current fic...

3. what fandoms do you write for? The Last Kingdom currently, may return to Twilight, previously Power Rangers, considered a few others

4. top five fics by kudos: N/A for A03, but Finding Love on FF has 147 favorites and 172 reviews.....

5. do you respond to comments? I likely will...On Fanfic, I tried to interact with people who PMed or Commented as much as possible!

6. what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? I don't think I ever had something have an angsty ending? Just an angsty beginning/middle? Especially since I wrote my published fics at age 14/15? But I hardcore am into dragging my muses through the mud right now.

7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? Probably Finding Love lol. It's a very wholesome fic.

8. do you get hate on fics? I did on the first ever fic I published. The worst part was that it was on stuff that I thought you were supposed to do based on reading tons of other fics. It shook me to my core since I was FOURTEEN. Sad to say - the fic is now gone from fanfiction and my computer and it's my biggest regret :(

9. do you write smut? Yes - But I've actually never published it now that I think about it! And have not written as much as my brain is convinced?! Oh wait that was my rpg days thats why.

10. craziest crossover? No crossovers. Just really into AUs.

11. have you ever had a fic stolen? Not to my knowledge!

12. have you ever had a fic translated? Either someone wanted to translate Finding Love or get it bound into real books...I cannot remember LOL.

13. have you ever co-written a fic before? Nah.

14. all time favorite ship? No pls don't make me choose :( I'm going to say Rosalie and Emmett from Twilight because they were the first ones to inspire me to write my own fic.

15. what's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will? Honestly? I have SO many Stiorra and Sigtryggr fics that are 60% plotted, but I don't know if I'll ever get to writing all of them? Unless I keep my fixation for the next 10+ years, especially with wanting to write my own stuff. Plus, maybe Finding Love the Sequel...I made a lot of sad people when I did not finish it.

16. what are your writing strengths? Dialogue. And maybe action?

17. what are your writing weaknesses? Show don't tell and being ~poetic~ and introspection? I struggle with 3rd person.

18. thoughts on dialogue in another language? I love it! And I want to incorporate it into a few of my fic ideas. However, I am not sure HOW I want to do it yet - i.e. Google translate OR just "They spoke in xyz language". When done well, it can be a great plot device!

19. first fandom you wrote in? Twilight!

20. favorite fic you've written? Currently the one I am writing.

No pressure tags: @azriona and anyone else on here that's a writer!

[angerissue]

Yeah, so I posted this on my personal blog already and I'm posting it here too. Recent events consisting of health issues and harassment, along with my recollections of what other people have been through lately on this website, have made me rethink my priorities. I'm going to be stepping back from tumblr.

I'll move my fics to AO3. I'm still deciding what to do about my collaborative writing and all the threads and headcanons.

Honestly, leaving has been on my mind for a while. But the absolute bullshit behaviour I've seen demonstrated towards me, and so many other people, has made me seriously question why I'm still here. I've never posted anything controversial. I've never intentionally tried to hurt people, or spread bad ideologies. I'm a conscientious person of what I think is good moral fiber. But holy fucking shitballs, what has happened to this website? The last few years on this site have been atrocious with all the harassment, the dogpiling, and the other shit where people derive, frankly, a scary amount of joy and amusement from attacking others like it's some kind of entertainment.

People have discovered that if you want attention here, you can do it quickly by fabricating "outrage porn" and dragging someone through the mud. People will believe it without hesitation, because they are so angry about what they are being told, they don't stop to think. People really eat up the "us versus them" mentality, especially when it allows them to feel like a part of a group, and when it gives them a purpose in harassing and/or getting rid of people who are designed to not be in that group. It's especially insidious because all of this harassment seems to be rationalized and justified by the groups participating in them. It's all in the name of this-or-that, it's just moral crusades, just socially-acceptable bullying and/or death wishes with a fresh coat of paint to appeal to a younger crowd. Because it really does seem like a vast majority of the people doing this stuff are in their early twenties or in their teens.

I really do understand why other people have left this website - it is such a buzzkill to feel like you're swimming in a shark tank. I have no desire left to share my work in a place like this. Why make content for a website where its users are so quick to steamroll others, for a quick laugh, no matter how vanilla the content? Why put in the effort to get suspicion; why put in the effort when it feels like I'm just rewarding a Bad Thing, at least to a sizable extent?

Like, I've been posting in the Bruce Banner tag since The Avengers came out. I've been here since many of those popular ship tags were literally empty. And despite the positive reception and complete lack of criticism, despite the masses of people who liked my content, I'm completely unmotivated to post things there now. Last year, there was an isolated incident with fanpols and moral panic people, where one person went out of their way to post some untagged ship hate in the Bruce Banner tag, and after I told them to tag it, they spent three hours scouring my blog for ways to retaliate (and it seems they still haven't blocked me). It was a textbook case of, "lol, let's point and laugh and tell someone they're better off dead because they write a character yet don't incorporate my own headcanons, let's call them [a dozen different types of bigot without due cause]." Predictably, none of their followers reached out and actually inquired about what they saw in the person's smear campaign (all the "damning" screenshots they posted of my blog were headcanons for Bruce Banner, none of which were any indication of personal views and were easily chalked up to either bad wording, ignorance, or literally just nothing because they were reaching farther than Elastigirl to find shit, and upon later inspection, it appeared they even shared many of the same personal headcanons they had harassed me for, which... Eugh). Nobody asked for clarification. They were told what to feel, which was outraged and vitriolic, and they clamoured. Guess what happened when I woke up, saw all this, and blocked everyone because I wasn't having that shit? "Lmaoo they must have blocked me because of my gay ships lmao what a homophobe".

I just. What.

How are people okay with saying this kind of stuff. Like, my brother in christ, you were blocked because you were a twatwaffle, a participant in an outrage porn dogpile. I have dozens of Bruce Banner versions in my headworld, and a shit ton of headcanons of both Bruce and other characters that run the entire gamut of sexuality and orientation; I'm literally a trans person with gay ships; the first ship I ever made fanart of was Cherik, for crying out loud, and two of my favourite ships have always been BrucexLoki and BrucexTony. You are not as accurate as you think you are. Not at all. Get off your high horse before you fall off, it's made of playing cards.

Oh, but I guess it's "funny". I guess it's okay to throw around loaded terms in that case.

Some of this stuff genuinely was funny to me. Because this person had literally scoured my entire blog (and when I'm saying "entire", I mean they went through every page, every post, every single bullet point in my extended reading portal, and there's a load of content in there, folks, and all their visits were recorded in my statcounter so it was pretty easy to see they had spent three hours on there looking for "bad stuff"), found one line in a headcanon that said (in keeping with official canon) this specific Bruce tends to be most attracted to people of the same ethnicity... And they sent me an ask saying, I kid you not: "does Bruce hate black people".

What even. How does this compute. The ask couldn't even offend me if it tried at this point, it was hysterical because of the total quantum leap in logic. I had literally never posted anything else, not a single other line, about ethnicity in any sense, nor would I ever insinuate what they were claiming. It was just a line I threw in because, like most lines, it's nice to paint a more complete picture, and if you've ever seen my content and how outrageously exhaustive it can get, I love painting.

It was less funny when they used this single throwaway line to call me a racist.

But seriously - the entire harassment campaign was based around stupid shit like that, and funnily, it was all tacked onto the original ship hate post this person had originally posted, which was pretty much bait for attention in the first place. Some of the screencaps they took even had contents that directly contradicted what they were even trying to roast me over.

In the end, once they realized I'd blocked them, they dared me to, just about verbatim, "come back and defend this boring white bread man you created".

Sure. Boring. So boring they needed to read all my content for hours (which showed a huge inability to curate their content consumption like an adult), and so boring they stalked my blog for months after the fact and made fun of the fact I went to the ER for an unrelated health issue. It's just ridiculous, especially because if all this criticism about my headcanons had actually come from a place of reparation and not using me as entertainment fodder; if someone had actually talked to me about something that concerned them, I would have completely cooperated and taken the advice. Because I really don't want to be a dick on the internet, I actively look for edification, and I really do want as best as I can.

But I digress.

It's strange, because despite what happened with these clowns, it's not that I'm afraid to be here. I haven't been intimidated into keeping quiet. Rather, I simply have zero motivation to be here or contribute. And really, I'm just deeply disappointed in all the disgusting actions I've seen in this fandom and elsewhere on tumblr, the brazenness of it these last few years. I don't know what happened, but it was never this bad. And people don't deserve it. I've seen a lot worse than what I've received, and let me tell you. It is horrible. Content creators don't deserve to feel like they're playing Russian fucking roulette every time they post some new content, or be fearful that the wrong person will see their work and make a playdate out of harassing them for literally no reason. And on top of that, nope, tumblr just enables this bullshit and doesn't do a thing.

There have been three cases in the last, what, three years, where people I know were dragged severely for doing absolutely nothing wrong. For making boundaries known, for writing certain things, for not responding within a certain time frame. In all but one case, it was always the same ending; they left.

Participation in fandom should not be this stressful for anyone. It really makes me miss the 2012-2015 era, because while it certainly wasn't perfect back then, it was a lot better than nowadays, with all the renewed moral panic shit that is doing nothing of value. It's just carpet-bombing the userbase, and disincentivizing people to make new things, any new things. If there isn't something obvious for the impassioned bully to hit, or something they can manipulate, they'll just make shit up on the spot. Want to guess how many people of good character have been ousted from the Marvel fandom alone since, say, even 2018? Well, I don't have the numbers, but I'm sure they're substantial.

It just kind of sucks, because I've written this version of Bruce here for over twelve years. And seriously, I have never seen anyone take issue with my headcanons until the harassment last year. I'm pretty careful about what I write, so naturally with the harassment aside, I did review all the headcanons I had written, but after that, and after getting the opinions of a few trusted friends (which I am so grateful for), there wasn't... Anything to fix. They were just headcanons. Not only was this harassment limited to the last year or two, but almost all of the harassment my friends have received has been within the last couple of years, too. Like, alarm bells should be going off there, because wow. Especially when I also consider how much harassment has happened to people outside of my friend group. Especially when I consider how commonplace it has become to throw around shit like "kys" or "I wish you died in the ER" to people you don't like. Especially because it seems like it's just getting worse and worse. I'm seeing this kind of shit in casual posts now, not even directed to anyone. "Go kill yourself". I can open ten carrds, and five of them will have "swallow a knife :) :)" or something in them.

Is it a wonder there are so few content creators here now? Especially fandom olds?

So yeah. I'm out.

If you're a genuinely good person who doesn't make a pastime out of harassing people, and if you ever recall seeing my stuff in the tag and enjoying it, be it my gifsets, my headcanons, or my fics, thank you for that.

If anyone here wants my AO3 or discord, send me a message.

Toodles.

[sir-yeehaw-paws]

🍉💌

(Sending good vibes 🔆🌻)

Real Writer Asks

Aww how sweet. Right back at you Anon!

🍉in what ways has writing helped you process trauma and/or navigate through your own life?

Interesting ask this one is. Because I feel like I'm the kind of person who hasn't used fic for trauma processing. Yet I know that isn't fully true, either. I definitely incorporate some of my own life experiences into my fics, and as a reader, have sought out media with topics I find too difficult to take to a table IRL. But I also spent over 20 years in therapy so I was lucky enough to have that space. I could say that, much like when I'm a player character in a video game, writing men in particular has helped me tremendously with the long, uphill battle of being trans. But I don't actually write trans characters that much. I feel as if perhaps I prefer the point where all the negotiating aspect is gone, and I can just fully embrace the final package. Fully-formed men or, whatever you want to call it. I am an incredibly intense daydreamer, for instance. I talk to myself regularly, I am constantly finding myself in a daze. Fantasizing. Looking at things in reality and being reminded of the media I enjoy. I am a creative, but I can struggle to stay consistent. Writing is a constant in my life. And one that has provided an outlet in so many ways. I've made brief mentions of the incident before. How in a huge fit of mental breakdown I wiped all my creative works (My original AO3 works, my tumblr, live journal etc) from the world. I did this all within days of my inpatient admission to the hospital, and when I came out of it realized I'd just dumped a huge portion of things I'd created over years of hard work and friend interaction out the door. I erased a large part of myself when I did that. And have promised myself no matter how bad it gets, I am never-ever doing that again. It is not worth it. But I acknowledge I wasn't thinking clearly, either. That I was in a place where my head was nowhere on earth; and the decisions I made that night. Offline and online, were a sign of something bigger. Beyond me. Art, creativity, outlets. These are so important in our world. But everyone gets something different out of it. I have been writing fanfic since I was 17. I'm now 32. Huge parts of my personal growth have come with writing, and some of my life events took place around it. That's crazy to think about sometimes.

💌share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

Sure! You can have some snippets of this BBKaz fic I'm writing right now that is from BB's POV. I almost never write BB, and never his point of view because I find him so hard to write. So I feel like, for once, I'm developing some confidence about doing so. Which is exciting. He feels almost obtainable to write out for me and I'm excited to see how I do and how it comes across.

Tidbit's Below Cut:

“An enemy, a friend. Incapacitate, when possible, Jack. Just because we have strengths does not mean we need to abuse them.” But she was wrong, wasn’t she? She was the deadliest force he’d ever known.  How true. How easy. They’d have turned on him. Against the pile, the thick cloy of blood, John listens for the kick of weak feet up ahead. The tallest man of the lots sagging hard. From his vantage point, glancing down his smoldering barrel, John can make out that bright blonde hair. Matted, sticking to his scalp from blood, mud, and trickles of tissue from a comrade or two. His men. The ones John slaughtered in the counted heartbeats charging up his lungs. Three broken fingers scramble for a nearby machete, John takes a leisurely stride. “You’re lost, Commander.” He knows the man speaks English. The contract hinted at it. Aviators, cracked with John’s own wild-mane hair, blood-stained cheeks in their reflection slip down a haughty nose. “Then kill me!” such an odd voice. High pitched, scratchy. Incredibly, the man continues to make demands, “The machete, take it. Cut off my head!” Intrigued, John wanders towards it. Steps over the crumpled form of the man’s deceased second in command. Feels the strong heft and weight in his calloused palm. One of the man’s hands is defiantly held under his back, John only manages to catch a tell-tale grip on something round and solid, clearly bumpy in that fumbling grip. Complete, utter defiance. A trick up his sleeve. Bastardized hope reaches into the deep crevice in his hollow heart. A sudden burst of CPR adrenaline thick. Water in his desert. Light in his tunnel. “I don’t think so.” John thrusts the machete up, pushing the flat of the blade hard against the man’s side. Sends those shattered frames to ground as he rolls him to brace on his hip. Pins his wrist with that threatening edge, digs into those fine, tender bones and new blood coats it’s shiny-dented steel. His captive thrashes, whines with angry fear when John leans over him, wiggling the grenade he wrenches free of his palm in his face. Face to face with a cracked skull inches away, the Commander sneers, sputters. “It was a good try.” John’s breath stumbles as he wraps an arm about the captive’s throat, imagines a man with such fire. Such pride. Clever and desperate.

[sinsandsuccubus]

Hi Luna I’m the anon who suggested doing the one sentence concepts and just wanted to tell you that you’re doing awesome! I sent in the concepts and they were so great to read I loved all of them so much! Thank you so much for writing them ❤️❤️ I’m really glad the one sentence requests helped you get back to writing a bit 🤩 I messaged 2 of my favorite writers about your blog and how you made a post about how you were struggling your work. They were kind enough to allow me to share their name and blog to you so here they are:

@ neon-lights-and-glitter

@ jackharloww

They have so many fics to read and I hope you enjoy them. Hope this helps 💗

Thank you so much for helping me! I literally sat there last night, excited like a little kid.

You have no clue how much this means to me.

I’ve been stuck on writing for a while, even in my personal life. I’ve been trying to write a book, and I’m literally stuck on the first chapter because I can’t figure out what to say, and don’t know how to go about it. The first chapter is typically the chapter that sets everything off, so I need to do that before anything else.

But with your advice, I think I’m going to incorporate that same concept into my writing. Giving a concept or idea I’d like to see in the story as a sentence, and following along with the sentence. Then I’ll add all the sentences up to make one large paragraph, that hopefully turns into a chapter.

I have a terrible habit of overthinking, and while I’ve been working through it in therapy, there’s still those moments I have when I get stuck. And with writing, as you’ve seen recently, I’ve been stuck in the mud.

But now that I’ve seen how the one-sentence blurbs play out, I feel a lot more confident in my writing again.

So thank you. I greatly appreciate your advice and your kindness.

[weavingstarlight]

7. Who is your favorite character to write, and what do you like about how you portray them?

10. Do you plan to write anything during the LU Write-a-thon next month? If so, what are you planning?

I already answered #7 here, but since I got the question again, I figured I’d go ahead and elaborate a little on things I said then.

Of the LU boys, Wild is the easiest for me to get into character for. I’ve spent the most hours in his game, and unlike some of the other Links, he has in-game dialogue that establishes his personality and speaking style. I’ve read a lot of fics with really interesting interpretations of Wild’s character, some of which I try to incorporate in my own characterization, some of which I just enjoy reading without trying to emulate. But beyond all that, Wild is a character that I feel like I understand. His external confidence, curiosity, and sense of duty are familiar to me, but so are his doubts and regrets. I may never have experienced the kind of cataclysm that leads to Wild’s 100-year sleep, but I think many of us have felt like we failed at something vitally important at one point in our lives — whether or not it was truly our responsibility. And, as JoJo says, what feels like failure from the inside is sometimes seen completely differently from outside — proof that you have endured, despite all the things in life that have tried to bring you down. I think that dichotomy is also beautiful.

Legend, on the other hand, is an excellent agent for delivering whatever is needed for the story. His breadth of experience, tool for every occasion, and tendency to speak volumes mean that when I hand him the talking stick, he tends to run away with a scene! From what I’ve heard from other writers, this is a common phenomenon with Legend — he just likes to talk. I may struggle a little bit with bringing across his snark (it’s hard to write a character that’s wittier than you), but if there’s something I need to convey to the readers, through words or through deeds Legend is often my go-to instrument.

For #10 — I hope to write a whole bunch during September’s Write-A-Thon! I won’t have as much time to mod, so I’ll try to make up for it by writing instead. That’s how that works, right?

I started a one-shot fic during July’s Write-A-Thon and continued during August’s, so that’s what I’ll be focusing on. It’s technically a glitch fic, but I ended up getting artsy with it, so now it’s more like a personal prose challenge that happens to have a premise based on gameplay.

Just for fun, here’s a snippet of the untitled fic, enjoy ~

*

With a running jump, Link launched themself into the air, ready to haul out the paraglider at a moment’s notice. Their feet slammed into the wooden expanse, causing it to rock and sway like an infant’s cradle. When they were sure the wood beneath them wasn’t about to crumble away to nothing, Link started the steady climb up the steep, slippery wooden pathway — nearly a ladder, with how vertically it sat on the slant — setting aside their bow and using their hands when necessary to haul themself up to the next patch of dirty grass.

When they reached level ground, slightly out of breath, they found themself on the edge of a pool of hot mud, malodorous and steaming. Two bokoblin archers had perched themselves on opposite sides of the fetid pond, each settled on a raft-like patch of broken wooden planks that looked as though they had broken free from above and slid down the hill.

Archers were dangerous. Especially with more explosive barrels strewn around the edge of the mire, and the rain already lightening up. Link set an arrow to their own bow and drew back swiftly, letting it fly with minimal time to aim. They didn’t need it; at this range, the arrow pierced rain and flesh alike. The first bokoblin slumped in death, already sliding towards the consuming swamp as it disintegrated into smoke.

*

[seancekitsch]

Thank you so much for incorporating my ring token of affection idea into a fic ;^; It was beautiful!

If you'd like something to write about and bring the laces/boots into the plot, what about they get caught in bad weather and the reader's dress gets muddy, or snagged on branches, so she rips the bottom of her skirt to stop it trailing behind her. It reveals that she's wearing her not so refined boots with his laces under her fancy dress - noble expectations be damned! 🥰

- nona anon

Neither of you had expected the carriage to get stuck in the mud, but with the storm last night, it really should have been something you prepared for. Now you trudge back home, with your driver and friends all riding the horses, yourself and your bodyguard walking. Your driver had offered you the horse he was on, not wanting you to fall or ruin your dress. You had waved off his concerns, much preferring those options over riding a horse. It made you sick. You weren’t sure whether it was the smell or the rocking of their gait, but horses were an absolute nightmare for you.

Cahir keeps looking over at you, being gentlemanly and offering his arm when it gets to a particularly slipper patch on the path. It’s nice; gives you an excuse to touch him and everyone is none the wiser. He whispers “careful, love” in a tone the others can’t hear, and you hope the heat of your cheeks goes unnoticed. Amazing, how he can elicit this response from you so easily.

But all the sweet words and gentlemanly arms do not change the slippery terrain, or the weight of your dress. It has accumulated mud along the way, and soaked through. Damn fancy clothes, you think, and decide to make your day a little easier.

“Cahir, do you have a small blade on you?” you ask, doe eyes you know he can’t resist working their magic. He produces a small dagger, but not without a quizzical look twinged with worry on his handsome face.

“Thank you,” you say, and get to work. You stop, prompting everyone, even the people on horseback to stop as well. You make a show of bending down before gathering the skirt and ripping at it with the dagger just above where all of the mud stopped. You hand Cahir back the dagger and hand tear the very last part, before stepping out of the fabric circle on the ground and continuing your pace, now no longer weighed down by the wet fabric. You’re friends don’t even bat an eye, they’re used to you bucking the norms, so thick riding boots under a gown are par the course for you. Cahir however, is fixated on them. More specifically, the laces. He knows those laces; he knows them well. Worn leather, stained almost burgundy from their wear. His laces, in your favorite pair of boots. He’s stunned, touched to the core, and hot all over. You look back at him.

I love you. I love you. I love you.

“Aren’t you going to assist me home?” you ask, a coy smirk on you face.

He pats his chest where the ring sits on its chain, and catches up to you.

[cartoonsaint]

Species swap frenrey? ✨

i'm workin on an AI Gordon AU elsewhere so here's like 5k about how it'd be if in my Not a Game fic Invasive Species Gordon were The Creature instead :D found it a very interesting and fun challenge! rated T and features swearing, major identity issues, major character sort-of-de.ath, some extremely embarrassing interpersonal interactions, ~paranoid person is RIGHT but not believed, and some good old narrative-breaking. unfortunately it is barely Frenrey bc i had so much fun w the rest of it, but thanks for prompting this :)

For every possibility, a universe— and for every universe, a near-infinite number of stories. This one, however, may be somewhat familiar to you, for it begins with a strange, super-adaptive but unintelligent creature falling through a plot hole into a dimension much like your own. It has evolved to consume the DNA of other living beings, which it then incorporates into its own body plan, and its limited but powerful psychic abilities ("sweet voice," as you may know them) ensure that its success and efficiency in this task. In the small forest outside of Seattle in which this creature finds itself, it takes very little time for it to consume plant matter, birds, reptiles, mammals, and more, adding and subtracting traits to its own amorphous form, becoming something new and unique that if left unchecked could eat the whole of this world—

Until the G-Man, tasked as always with the protection of his particular universe and dimension, destroys it. What he fails to notice, though, is that this being created another of its kind, a single cell that it left behind with that same instinctual drive to consume and grow…

But this time, things are different.

The tiny invading creature eats, adapts, becomes multicellular, and then tries its nonexistent hand at being the seed of a plant— specifically, the migratory seed of the dandelion. It is lifted up into the air, where an easterly wind catches it and carries it away from the little woods wherein plays the seven-year-old who will become Gordon Freeman (and whom, eventually, the creature will become as well). It is deposited in a different environment with new things to eat and become, a greater variety of prey and potential adaptations.

Like this, it learns that to travel is beneficial. It keeps up this habit as it grows and develops, heading further east each time it gets bored (which happens often, with the personality it begins to evolve), taking its time enjoying what life has to offer it and coming to love the little planet it calls home, until a year or two down the line it finds itself in the shape of a particularly small, scruffy terrier-mix somewhere along the border between Michigan and Ontario.

In this particular universe, the birth certificate of one Henry LeVrai was scribbled a little too quickly and the "H" was incorrectly notated as a "B." His family found this amusing and accepted that their child had been officially christened "Benry." And one warm spring morning our young Benry, roundabout seven years old now, is out playing in the sandy mud when he and our little creature stumble upon one another.

Benry is a calm, patient little kid who's not so good with people yet but quite fond of animals, with their simple and straightforward feelings and desires. The creature is quite anxious about being killed (it hurts!!) and thus tends to avoid humans, but it's also filled with dog instincts right now. Benry's quiet patience, total disregard for human social rules, and willingness to play fetch draws our creature in, and they end up sticking together and goofing off for the rest of the day. When the time comes for Benry to go home, our little creature acts as though it doesn't care… but it follows after him all the same.

The creature acts as a semi-stray dog for nearly a year. It and Benry goof off together, two children in the sand and the mud, trusting one another completely despite the fact that one of them is human and the other a hyper-carnivorous shapeshifting monster pretending to be a dog. Though gentleness does not come naturally to the creature, it does its best not to hurt Benry, sheathing away its teeth and claws when they wrestle so that its friend is never injured even when it gets to be quite a bit larger and more rambunctious than him. It never gets a taste of Benry's blood, never realizes that in doing so it could have kept track of its best friend when they are inevitably separated.

For indeed, separated they will be. The G-Man is notified of the creature's existence and is made responsible for its destruction. When one day, mid-play, the world around the creature goes teal-still and all time freezes except for itself, the creature's old instincts for survival meet with its building intelligence. It hides. And when the G-Man, the only other moving thing under this time-stop, shows no interest in its human companion, it understands that what the G-Man hunts is itself.

It flees. From Benry’s perspective, he turns away from his friend for just a second— and when he turns back, it’s completely and utterly gone.

And for many years that’s how it goes. The creature hides its nature as best it can, doing its damnedest to look and be normal, but in this universe there are no time travel shenanigans caused by the creature's friendship with young Tommy and thus the G-Man is never introduced to the boy who in other dimensions would be his son. With fewer distractions and less light in his life, the G-Man is ruthless. He tracks down memories, uses Wikipedias Secret, More Secret, and Even More Secret to locate the creature, which in turn realizes that closeness to humans often means being found more quickly. The creature can eke out only a year or two at a time of freedom before it is once more tracked down and once more must flee, further and further away from mankind.

(An aside: in this particular universe Tommy remains in foster care until he ages out. Without the G-Man’s intervention he never receives the support he needs— he’s still brilliant, but his school grades don’t necessarily reflect that. To make his way into the field of biology as he has always wanted, he must look for outside assistance— which the U.S. military is happy to provide, in return for his work, his time, and his promise of acting as liaison to a company they occasionally work with called Black Mesa…)

Which brings us to just a few weeks before the Resonance Cascade.

Gordon Freeman, grown man and single father, shoves his shoulder into one of the many blocked-off side-doors out of Black Mesa, bursting out into the cool February air of the New Mexico desert. He's not supposed to use this door, he knows— security reasons or something, he can't remember, whatever— but he had to stay late today because he accidentally spilled coffee all over the tunnel diode resonator and he got caught and had to disinfect the whole thing even though it wasn’t his fucking fault, okay!! Like, he’s under a lot of stress anyways and then he realized way too late today that he’d failed to properly zip up his pants this morning and so had been just, fucking, packer out for several hours and no one had bothered to fucking tell him because no one fucking likes him and he's supposed to pick Joshie up from daycare in ten minutes but because he had to disinfect all the stupid fiddly bits of the resonator he missed the tram at his normal spot so he's gonna have to leg it over to the next pickup, which is outside and like halfway across the fucking campus that he still doesn't have a good mental map of—

The creature, who had been dozing in the shape of a rust-furred coyote in a cozy little outside corner made by the building's weird architecture, wakes up with a jerk and finds itself suddenly cornered by the open door and the human who has just spotted it.

"Oh shit, a dog!!” Gordon says, delight overriding all sense. He takes an unthinking step closer as the creature, backed into a corner and not yet awake enough to think properly, raises its hackles and opens its mouth wide, wider, wider than should be possible— Gordon has just enough time to say, "Oh, shit, not a dog, what the fuck—"

And then the world goes teal-still.

The creature has no way of knowing that the G-Man is not here to hunt the creature but is instead doing reconnaissance on a new job. It cannot know that his time-stop will be up only long enough for him to exit his train and banish it. Though many years ago it did play with the young human Benry, it never had anyone like Tommy to lovingly teach it intelligence and morality; it has no compunction against killing and consuming a human being. It is simply a wild creature, something alien, and it reacts as best it can with the information it knows.

And what it knows is that its instincts to FLEE-HIDE-DEFENDSELF are triggered all at once and that the frozen, defenseless Gordon is both a threat and in the way. Is it any wonder, then, that this is how Gordon Freeman dies?

Except: this creature has not been gradually fed a diet of the eggs of intelligent animals, allowing it to smarten up while maintaining its own personality, and is instead accustomed to hiding by exactly mimicking the behavior of that which it eats. Except: the creature only has about three seconds between when it consumes Gordon Freeman entirely and when the time-stop drops and Gordon Freeman's brain, perfectly preserved, will kick back into gear. Except: this isn't a very smart alien creature that is attempting to subsume a prey that is bored with his life and has few attachments. This is an alien creature that has spent most of its life running, hiding, and pretending not to be alien, meeting the force of a very strong personality, an admittedly powerhouse brain, and several deep, deep attachments that this particular human will do anything to hang onto.

The time-stop drops. The not-coyote creature is gone; what is left is something human-shaped who was, just moments ago, Gordon Freeman. Whatever it is is also, immediately, having an extremely confusing panic attack.

FIGHT, it instincts demand but there’s nothing to fight, the threat of coyote and human both neutralized. HIDE, its instincts counter, but he’s a big guy, it’s not like he can fit into the tiny corner the creature was in, and anyways what good would that do against the freaky time-stopping human (?) that has been hunting it for nearly twenty years? FLEE, the instincts beg, but what the fuck, he’s not gonna just run out into the fucking desert without provisions like a fucking idiot, especially when he’s supposed to be picking up—

“Josh,” says what remains of Gordon Freeman, and dashes off in the direction of the next tram.

Against all odds, the being not only makes it in time but he’s barely breathing that hard. On the train full of other tired human scientists he holds onto the central pole, telling off the part of his brain that is panicking a bit more strongly than usual about being so close to so many other people, and tries to put together what the fuck just happened.

“There was a coyote,” it mutters under its breath, remembering this time to put a hand over his mouth to block the fact that he’s talking to himself. “Except it wasn’t actually a coyote, it was some kinda… Thing-thing, like from that one movie? And it was scared of the human— of me, and kinda thought he was that spooky g-man-type guy that can stop time which, uh, which… Which Gordon doesn’t know about. Uh, I don’t know about, I mean, so how the fuck do I…?” The train rocks to a stop and the creature gets out, mind racing and overfull with memories from two sides. “Did. Did I try to kill me?”

It remembers standing there, alarmed at the movements of the not-dog-not-coyote, about to back away. But he also remembers the sudden wash of turquoise that meant he was being hunted, his age-old desperation not to be found, how he stretched his form into something like a carnivorous plant and closed it around the human in his way, how he tasted blood and flesh and bone and the precious DNA that he could use to hide himself—

“DADDY,” someone shrieks, and wraps their arms around its legs. Gordon yelps (sounding decidedly more coyote-like than usual) as its instincts shriek DEFEND SELF and then WAIT and then !!!JOSHIE!!! FAMILY KIN KID PUP BABY JOSH JOSH JOSH! and the creature scoops his son up into a tight hug because it hasn’t gotten to be close to anyone or anything in many years and this is Joshie, its kid! Its favorite horrible little person!!! Whose father the creature, like, just killed!

Oh fuck, its instincts whimper as the creature— as Gordon— as whatever the fuck they are apologizes on auto-pilot to the daycare workers for being late (again) and hikes Joshua up onto its hip and brings him home to their shitty little two-person apartment on the edge of Black Mesa’s living quarters, simultaneously trying to stay calm and being just so psyched about what Joshie’s got to say.

It makes dinner for Gordon's kid. It hangs out with him for the rest of the evening, fetching him whatever he asks for (and maybe enjoying doing so a little more than usual), and helps him take a bath to rinse off all the sand he got into today. It cuddles with him on his bed as it reads him a bedtime story and brushes back his hair after he’s fallen asleep in his arms, snoring away like a miniature foghorn.

With utmost care the creature untangles itself from Gordon’s son and sneaks out of the room. It makes sure to close the door behind it very quietly.

Then it spends most of the rest of the night pacing, trying to get a handle on the fact that it isn’t Gordon Freeman, not really, because it’s actually some kind of super-adaptive unknown species that can completely transform its body on a cellular level and literally become other living things and it did so to Gordon by fucking eating him, and also it’s being hunted down by some dude who can stop time?? And it has all of Gordon’s memories and feelings and shit and it really feels like it’s Gordon but logically it also remembers eating him, which means that Gordon Freeman is fucking dead.

“I don’t feel dead, though,” Gordon says aloud, pacing his familiar pattern into the carpet. “And— and the voice just called me Gordon, so— so that means I am him— me— whatever, right?”

The creature tilts its head at the ceiling, dog-like, then scowls. “I— no, not dog-like,” it says loudly to no one. “Not— are, are you saying you’re no one? Cuz I can, I can hear you, I could hear you this whole time, even while I was a dog, I just didn’t underst— NOT that I was those dogs, or, that, they’re— those aren’t, aren’t my memories, Gordon’s, I just—”

It collapses in a chair, groaning and rubbing at the bridge of its nose. “This is so— look, can you, can you not call me ‘it,’ please? I, I already went through the whole gender thing in grad school— uh, or Gordon did, I guess? …Just— I don’t know if you can even hear me, but could we just… can we stick with ‘he’? Please?”

He waits hopefully, then sighs in relief. “Okay! Great. Thank you. And also I— I get that I, uh, I’m not. Really the, the human being that got, uh. Eaten. By me. But can we just— like, I’m not leaving Joshie. Or my job. Or my fucking life, man, so can we just— like, I’m, I’m, I, I’m sort of. I mean, I sort of am him, so can we— could you maybe just call me Gordon?” He bites his lip with dull teeth that look perfectly human. “Please?”

At the confirmation, Gordon’s shoulders loosen. “Okay,” he says, tired and stressed and still pretty darn miserable. “Thank you, mysterious narrating voice that has been following and telling the stories of all the dogs and shit I’ve ever been, that… like, I’m still a fucked up monster thing that ate myself, but. Being called 'he' is… something, at least.”

He leans back in his chair, considering for the first time the scope of the abilities he’s both intimately familiar with and pretty freaked out by. HIDE, his instincts warn, but there’s no humans around who could somehow share the secret with his hunter, and when faced with new scientific discovery Gordon Freeman’s always been… well, like a dog with a bone.

“That’s not funny,” Gordon says to his ceiling, even though it kind of is. “God, you know what, I don’t fucking need this—”

He tests the creature’s— tests his abilities out, little by little. It takes him the better part of several weeks to get re-used to everything as himself, but he has to admit that being able to smooth down the chest he’s been meaning for years to get top surgery on is a pretty cool ability. As is growing just tall enough to actually be a full six foot instead of something like five foot eleven and three quarters. And the mild psychic abilities are neat, too, especially once he figures out that he can tone down the “blue to subdue” to something that merely calms instead of flat-out hypnotizes prey.

“‘Blue to subdue’?” Gordon snorts to himself. “Why does it rhyme?”

Don’t worry about it. Besides that he finds that the instincts and personality of the creature he had been barely clash at all with those of Gordon Freeman. Sure, he feels just about everything more intensely and a bit more simply than Gordon used to, and his ability to packbond with things has kind of gone a little crazy, and if anyone throws anything there’s a 15% chance he’ll embarrass himself, but overall he’s still someone who really wants to be liked and isn’t sure how to make it happen, someone who’s very scared but too stubborn to give up, and someone who is remarkably intelligent in some regions and absolutely idiotic in others.

“Hey,” Gordon mutters, stung. He’s all dressed up for this stupid experiment Black Mesa's having him do and he's a little nervous about it, if only because he's encased in an airtight HEV suit and his instincts from years of needing to be ready to run at any moment are howling TRAPPED TRAPPED TRAPPED. He's trying to calm them down by thinking about literally anything else— like, for instance, the fact that this experiment is going to change the course of his life forever. "...What? Uh, hey, what? Did youuu? Just say?"

"Said you can just go through, don't need your passport," says the guard, and Gordon jumps. He hadn’t even noticed there was another person on this end of the hallway.

"O-oh, right, sorry," he says, and strides past his oldest and best friend. Then he reels to a stop and whips around, staring.

The guard blinks up at him. He looks to be around Gordon's age, his face not quite freshly shaven, with slate gray eyes ringed by long lashes. Gordon's never been very good with faces and it's made worse by the fact that the guy's in the bland security guard uniform but now that he looks there is something familiar about him, even if Gordon's sure he wouldn't have forgotten someone who could be called his "oldest and best friend."

The guard shifts on his feet, his eyes sliding off of the glass of Gordon's helmet until he's frowning at his shoulder. "...you good, man?"

"Yyyeah," Gordon says slowly. FRIEND? say his old instincts with obvious tail-wagging hope, and admittedly Gordon's pretty curious himself. He's late for the test, but… well, late is late, right? "Uh, sorry, you said— did you say I, I don't need my… passport?"

"Yeah," says the guard, nodding at Gordon's chest. "S’new policy. But you’re in the company suit so s’fine. Not like you got pockets."

"Right, yeah. Thanks," Gordon says, brow furrowed, scrutinizing the other man. He’s looked away back down the hallway towards the guard at the other end like he expects that’s that, but Gordon’s not ready to let go of the narrator’s claim just yet. Could he have somehow missed some of the original Gordon Freeman’s memories? “Hey, are you… Do we, like. Know each other, or something?”

“Huh?” says the guard, eyes flitting to Gordon’s glass faceplate and away. “Uh, dunno… like, I work here?”

“Yeah, man, me too,” Gordon says, rolling his eyes. “But— look, I’m Gordon Freeman. I, I’ve got a test I’m supposed to be getting to, but— just, like, could you maybe tell me your name? …Please?”

The man looks at him, gray eyes wary, and something about that has the instincts in Gordon’s head saying :(! FRIEND CONFUSED BAD! MAKE FRIEND HAPPY HOW? Gordon barely resists the urge to growl at them, he’s fucking busy right now, can they not—

“Uh…… m’Benry,” the guard says, and the sound of the name brings back sudden, forceful memories of the creature’s too-short year as a semi-stray dog chasing after its quiet human child, back before the G-Man started hunting it, before it killed Gordon, back when all the creature ever wanted to do was play in the sand and the mud with its best friend.

Gordon has spent the past few weeks of his semi-new life as something inhuman doing his best to be human. But when faced with such strong, fond memories of a time before all that, old instincts shove themselves to the front.

“Oh holy fuckin— BENRY!!!” Gordon cries, nearly bowling the guy over as he pulls his old best friend to him as close as he can, putting his hands all over his face, chest, back, arms, anything he can reach. “Holy shit, man, it’s been forever!! How are you? What the hell are you doing here?? How did— like, what are the fucking odds, seriously, I never thought I’d see you again—” Gordon sets him back on his feet but holds on, petting his gloves in the short hair under the guy’s helmet, trying to sniff at Benry’s neck, see what he’s been up to, how he’s changed, all that, but the stupid HEV helmet is in the way. He whines, over-excited and frustrated and delighted. “Hi, dude, shit, hi! Hi! Fuck, it’s good to see you, hi—”

"Uh," Benry says. Hesitantly, he pats Gordon's back. "...Sup?"

"Hi!!" Gordon agrees. "Benry! Hi! Shit, man! Hey!"

"Yeah," Benrey says. "So, uhhh… You know me?"

"Yea, 'course, you're— oh, holy shit," Gordon says, feeling stupid. "The HEV helmet, right, sorry, hold on—"

He separates from Benry long enough to scrabble at the stupid release function and pull off his glass and metal prison with the shwoomph of released air. He shoves his hair out of his face, hoping it doesn't look too much like he forgot to brush it today, and grins widely at his old friend, expecting to be recognized at any second—

Only to be struck with the sudden realization that all Gordon's memories of bonding with that fun, goofy, patient little kid were from the perspective of an alien creature in the shape of a dog, from the life he had before he ate and killed and chose to replace the real Gordon Freeman. From Benry’s perspective, Gordon is a total stranger.

Which means that for all intents and purposes, Gordon has been acting like a complete and utter nutjob this entire goddamn time.

"Oh fuck I. Uh," Gordon starts, horrified, but against all odds Benry's eyes are widening. They dart between the features of Gordon's face, flickering with recognition, and the dog-creature Gordon had been for so long tenses in excitement. It wants Gordon to play-bow, to bark, to spin in circles, to lick Benry's face, PLEASE FRIEND PLEASE PLAY FRIEND PLEASE?

"Oh yeahhh," Benry says at last, and drops his gaze to Gordon's crotch. "Hot guy with the dick-slip."

"...what?" Gordon says. He looks down, but besides the helmet under his arm the HEV Suit is as sealed off as always. "Hot— dick— what?"

Benry’s shoulders have gone rigid. He's looking at the floor now very, very hard. “...hm?”

“Did you just say—”

“Huh? No,” Benry says, but Gordon’s earlier head-petting put his helmet askew and Gordon can see his ears turning red. “Wha? No, man, dunno what you’re even—”

"You did," Gordon says. "You did, you said— dick-slip? What the fuck are you—"

"No," Benry says, focusing very hard down the hallway now, towards the other guard. "Nuh-uh, you're. Hearing things, I dunno, don't you have uhhh. Test? Youuu, you should go—"

"No, wait, hang on," Gordon says as a memory from the last day of the old Gordon Freeman's life vaguely manifests. "Hang on, you— that day, with m— the guard— you?"

"No, bro, I— I'm on my shift here, this…" Benry fixes his helmet, obscuring his red face, but Gordon's caught scent of a memory and is tracking it down. "I'm jus— just tryna do my job, you got your thing, we don’t hafta—"

"You are! That was you! That day, my pac— my dick was out all day, no one told me, I spilled my fucking coffee everywhere when I realized, I had to stay late and then— but you!! You, you stopped me, that morning, and—" Gordon blinks. Something in his brain shifts. He stares down at Benry, who refuses eye contact. "You… you didn't even tell me."

"Man, I tried," Benry groans. "But you were all, all, ugh— and I was—"

"You let me walk around all day with my dick out," Gordon says, stepping further into Benry’s space. Benry leans back, lifting his head to keep Gordon in his sight, which gives Gordon a clear look at Benrey’s pale throat and wide eyes. Something old and hungry in Gordon’s brain lifts its lips. “Which then made me spill my coffee, which made me late, so I had to take the back way to catch the train on time, and then I fuckin'— then…” A growl rumbles in his throat.

“Woah, you, uh…” Benry’s back hits the wall. He swallows. “Nice— nice teeth, bro.”

“What?” Gordon says, then stiffens. He whips a hand up to cover his mouth, running his tongue along his teeth— and finds that they’re way bigger and sharper than human teeth, than Gordon’s teeth, are supposed to be. “Oh, shit. Uh.”

"Yeah," Benry breathes. His eyes are wide and dark, focused on the hand Gordon's using to cover his mouth.

HIDE! BE HUMAN, Gordon's instincts. Mentally swearing, he wills his stupid teeth back to their normal shape and size,. How the fuck is he gonna explain this? He double-checks his teeth are normal before lowering his hand to speak. “Uh, so—"

"Oh," Benry says, disappointed, and looks away.

Gordon blinks. He glances at the ceiling in astonishment, mind caught on one word. "Disappointed?" he repeats.

"Mh, a little," Benry replies, shrugging. "Kinda a bummer. S'fine."

Gordon blinks again, looking back at his childhood best friend. "Wh. What? Wait, what are you—”

"Hey, we all good over here?"

Gordon strangles a yelp and glances over his shoulder to see the other guard from the far end of the hallway, his expression blandly pleasant, his hands down and unthreatening even as one hovers conveniently over his firearm. What the fuck? Gordon’s trying to have a conversation with his old packmate here— no, he reminds himself, Benry doesn't actually know him, so this… He shakes his full head. "Yeah," he says impatiently. "Yeah, we're—"

"Aren’t you the one in the barrel today, doc?" The random guard tilts his head towards the route Gordon's supposed to be taking to the testing chamber where within the hour the fabric between this world and the alien borderworld Xen will be rent in two.

“Yeah, I—” Gordon jerks his gaze to the ceiling. "Where the— what?"

"The barrel? The test chamber, I mean," says the guard, glancing up at the plain ceiling too, frowning. "You alright, doc?"

"No, it’s— I mean—” Gordon looks between the guard and the ceiling (as if that will help), trying not to be too obvious. “Sorry, yeah, I’m fine, I was just— just, uhhh. Was just saying… saying hey, to my friend here." He gestures at Benry, who hasn't moved at all— maybe because Gordon's still crowding him up against the wall. "Oh, my bad, I—" Gordon takes a step back, unaware that if he continues like this he'll never get this close to Benry again.

D:?! whine Gordon's instincts, and aloud Gordon says, "Wait, what?"

“I didn’t say anything,” Benry says, eyeing Gordon, completely unaware that without Gordon's help he doesn't stand a chance of surviving the coming disaster.

Gordon makes a noise that is mostly whimper, part groan.

“You sure you’re alright, doc? LeVrai, maybe you oughta go call someone—”

“No!” Gordon barks out, putting himself in between Benry and the other guard. "No, no, I mean, he, I, I, I—" Inspiration strikes. "I!! Don't have my passport! He, I, he should, should come with me, shouldn't he? Right? I mean, it's the rules, isn't it?" Gordon looks to Benry for confirmation.

Benry merely blinks at him. "Uh…"

"I think in this case we can make an exception," the other guard says firmly. "Now let's all be calm, rational people about this, alright? We can figure out—"

"I— I'm not fucking— Don't talk to me like I'm crazy," Gordon snaps. "You, you don't understand, there's—" Think things through for a second, Gordon.

He cuts himself off. Then he thinks a carefully worded question very loudly, which does nothing. He huffs.

Benry pokes him in the back of his head, which is unfortunately close enough to being pet that Gordon's stupid instincts want him to lean into it. He wrestles down the urge as Benry speaks.

"Hey. Are you…?"

"No! Yes. Look, I don't want to—" He pinches the bridge of his nose. Gordon Freeman has always been an excellent mathematician, provided there aren't any distractions. Right now he's got himself, a narrator portending doom, old instincts from a life before he was himself, an old friend who doesn't know him, some random meddling guard, what sounds like a potentially apocalyptic disaster on the horizon (and it is. an apocalyptic disaster, I mean), and a social situation he'd be ill-equipped for even if he had never been a reality-breaking mildly psychic shapeshifting mega-predator that has spent most of its time in the family Canidae.

The point is: there’s no way to solve this equation where Gordon won’t end up short. And if he makes even one error, his old best friend is as good as dead.

“Oh for fuck’s sake, fine,” Gordon says, and turns to the guard that isn't his and sings an intensely blue psychic suggestion at him to CALM DOWN.

The creature was never particularly delicate with that ability and Gordon’s under enough stress as it is— he pours it on strong. The second the balls of light hit the guard’s startled face, the man’s eyes shutter close and he drops to the ground, breathing deep and even in sleep.

“Woah,” Benry says quietly. “...Think I used to have a dog who could do sumn like that."

“Yeah, well, I’m human,” Gordon snaps, instincts uneasy in his gut. “Okay? I’m human. Totally, completely, one hundred percent human being. Now let's fucking go."

bc there's no time travel shenanigans w tommy and g-man in this AU, tommy'd actually only be 26 :-) a baby! ANYWAYS a chapter of Invasive Species is next up on my to-write list, which i've been pretty good (if slow) about following for the last couple months, so we'll see! i'm really hopeful <3?

in the meantime if you're interested in a story about gordon being inhuman in the same way as benrey, might i suggest crowned-ladybug's sorrow in idle minds (solace in being heard)?

[fawnandshadows]

Prompt: Would love request a fic that incorporates the language of flowers! Like Elain and Az use flowers or bouquets to communicate while secretly being together in order to not get caught 😏

Like I imagine Az giving Elain a bouquet of lily of the valley as an apology after he does something stupid, or a miscommunication where Az meant to gift her carnations for luck but accidentally gave two-toned ones that mean “I cannot be with you”.

Hi Anon!! Thank you so much for giving me an excuse to look at flowers ☺️. I hope you enjoy this fic 💖

Major shoutout to my friend @thefangirlofhp for her amazing input 💖💖

Word Count: 3k.

Warnings: Language

It started with a rose.

Elain had been having a cup of tea one restless night where nothing felt right. She laid there tossing and turning, willing herself to fall asleep, but everytime she closed her eyes she was assaulted by ugly thoughts creeping into her dreams. She tried the breathing techniques she had learned after almost drowning in the cauldron, but even those did nothing to quiet her mind.

As soon as she sat down she became aware of a shadowy figure in the corner of the kitchen.

“Azriel? You’re back?”

Elain watched as the shadow slowly transformed into a weary, worn, and dusty Azriel. His wings were more limp than she had ever seen them and she tried to ignore how handsome the scruff on his face made him, how rugged he looked, as she jumped up from her seat and exclaimed, “I’ll get you some tea. The water is still warm. Please, sit down.”

She motioned towards the table as she busied herself by preparing the tea for him. She had his favorite tea memorized: No cream, three sugars. She was overcome by the bone-melting, all-consuming feel of nostalgia. One of the first times she had ever felt true peace as a fae was when Azriel had reached out to her; Elain longed for the days where they could sit in the iron chairs of the garden, both of them bathing in the sunlight, and simply enjoy each other's company while sipping tea. Azriel would sun his wings, and Elain would make sure that he was eating the snacks she prepared for him. Occasionally she would be working in the garden and Azriel would come by, tea fully prepared, and ask her if she wanted to join him.

She never said no.

If she tried hard enough, then she could still feel the way her heart would stop and start at the sight of him in broad daylight, carrying a tray while his shadows were nowhere in sight.

As she stirred the sugar into the amber liquid, Elain ignored the last time they were together this late at night.

“Thank you.” Azriel said as Elain placed the steaming cup in front of him.

“You’re welcome,” Elain muttered as she sat down next to him. “How was your mission?”

“Long,” Azriel said, closing his eyes as he took a slow sip of his tea. The gutteral sound he made as the liquid reached his tongue caused Elain to blush — there were only so many reasons why a male would be making those noises, and apparently hot tea after a mission was one of them. Elain bit her lip and found herself wondering when else he would make those sounds. “And muddy. No one ever remembers the mud when they talk about the Autumn Court. They blather on about the leaves for days, but the mud,” A small pop ricocheted through the kitchen as he cracked his neck, and his wings stretched and fluttered before sinking into relaxation. Elain’s eyes devoured every movement. “It’s good to be home.”

“I missed you,” Elain said before she could stop herself. “It’s not the same without you here,” Azriel’s eyes opened and landed on her face. “And I know it was a simple reconnaissance mission, but I was still worried.”

She took a sip of her tea to calm herself, but she knew he was aware of the way her hands were shaking.

“I got you something.” Azriel said, still sprawled in his chair and Elain secretly wondered what would happen if she crawled into his lap. He sat up a little straighter, gathered his shadows around, and then slowly pulled out a single red rose and handed it to her. All of the thorns on the stem had been removed, and Elain was in awe of how effervescent the red petals were in nothing but the dim faelight.

“It’s beautiful,” She said softly and took a deep breath, letting the perfume of the flower wash over her senses. “Thank you so much,” Her eyes met his bashfully. “And thank you for thinking of me.”

“I’m always thinking of you,” Azriel admitted in a low, gruff voice, and for a moment Elain’s brain froze. “It’s thought–'' He cleared his throat. “It’s thought that flowers have a language all their own,” He leaned closer to her, placing one bent arm on the table and bringing the other to the flower. He hesitated for a moment before placing his hand on top of hers, and Elain thought she would combust at the contact. “Roses, for example, are a declaration of… love.”

His voice was thick and warm and full like honey.

It became hard to breathe and Elain found herself gasping for air.

Her hand tightened around the stem of the rose, and she stared at his beautiful hand on hers before lifting her gaze up to his burning eyes.

She leaned closer to him, wet her dry lips, and asked, “Do you remember the bouquet I gifted you of the camellias?” Azriel nodded his head. Somehow they had drifted close enough that their noses touched at the slightest move. “They have a meaning too,” She swallowed as she recalled the memory. Elain had been walking down the streets of Velaris one lazy afternoon, passing by her favorite florist when she saw blooming pink, red, and white camellias — she had always thought them exquisite, like a cross between peonies and roses — and had the overwhelming urge to buy them for Azriel. She was so nervous when she handed them to him, her palms were sweaty and she could barely meet his eyes because she thought that he was going to find her out. “The pink camellias mean ‘I long for you’, and the white are ‘you’re adorable’,” Azriel let out a scoff at that one, but he was. The fearsome shadowsinger and spymaster was nothing short of adorable when he held his nephew and entertained Nyx with his shadows. Elain could feel the echo of her heart pounding in her entire body, her blood was pulsating in her veins, and little stars were forming in the corner of her eyes. “The red,” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “The red camellias mean ‘you’re a flame in my heart’.”

Azriel rested his forehead against hers, and Elain could feel his breath dance across her face. Somehow her eyes had fallen shut, and they stayed closed to savor the feel of his fingers trailing gently over jaw, and almost fell apart at the contact. The hand that laid atop of hers was scorching and anchored her to the fact that this was real, that they were touching, that she had in fact said what she couldn’t when she handed the bouquet to him a month ago.

It wasn’t until something wet splashed against her cheek that she opened her eyes and saw two tears streaming down Azriel’s face. Elain raised her free hand and gently wiped the tears away, but her hand lingered against his jaw and slowly brought his lips to hers.

Elain felt herself sink into the kiss and she felt like how clouds must feel drifting along on a sunny day — light and airy and surrounded in the soft warmth of the sun. That was what Azriel felt like, the sun. The male that had spent his entire childhood in shadows had somehow become the sun.

***

“Do you really have to go?” Elain asked, stepping onto her balcony.

Azriel stood at the far corner of the balcony, the silvery moonlight illuminated his wings while shadows swirled his dark frame. The shadows were his only tell. His face was perfectly impassive, in fact a pleasant smile graced his lips, but the shadows only appeared when he was uneasy.

She wrapped her robe tighter around her as the wind tangled her hair. It felt like she had somehow stumbled into the Winter Court, she tried to suppress her shivers, but Azriel still saw them anyway and pulled her into his arms. Her entire body relaxed as his warmth wrapped around her and seeped into her bones.

“Yes,” Azriel said into her ear, his hands rubbing circles onto her back. Elain resisted for all of one second before melting into his embrace. “I shouldn’t be gone for more than two weeks.”

He slowly pivoted them in a circle so that he was blocking the wind with his body while one of his hands came up to lay against the back of her head, cradling her into his chest.

“That’s two week too long,” Elain grumbled, burrowing deeper into his embrace, she didn’t care about the creases that would appear on her face from his armor, and she didn’t care about the fact that she’d have to bathe yet again to get his scent off of her. All she cared about was getting as close as she possibly could to him. “Why can’t we just go someplace, just the two of us, and have two weeks to ourselves. Away from all this nonsense. You can have your shadows investigate the human lands while we spend all day in bed.”

Azriel groaned deeply into her ear and Elain felt more shivers course through her body, ones that brought warmth and pleasure.

“As tempting as that sounds,” Azriel said, his lips brushing against her ear. “I’m afraid this is actually important. If my reports are accurate, then Koschei is one the move, or at least his pawns are on the move.”

“I don’t like you being in danger.” Elain whispered as if she was afraid of jinxing him. His arms tightened around her. Sniffling, she pulled back slightly, “I have something for you,” She felt the weight of his eyes on her as she pulled out a brilliant purple sprig of phlox from the pocket of her robe. “It means —”

He raised one hand, tenderly cutting her off.

Azriel allowed her to place the flower in the palm of his hand. Last time Elain had gifted him a flower that he grabbed, Azriel had accidentally crushed it and watched in horror as the delicate petals flew away with the wind.

“Let me try,” His hazel eyes stared at the bundle in his hand. A crease appeared between his brows, and Elain couldn’t help but be endeared at his effort. “Pansies?”

She gently shook her head and said, “Phlox. It’s not nearly as common as most flowers, and it took me forever to track it down.”

His eyes narrowed at her slightly, but the smile that tugged at his lips gave him away. His facade always crumbled when she was around. Ever since they had finally admitted to each other how they felt, Azriel allowed her to see every emotion.

“That seems like a trick.” Azriel teased, and Elain felt herself smiling at him.

“Maybe you’ll finally get around to studying that book.”

“I’ve read the entire thing, more than once. It’s not my fault it was illustrated by a two year old.”

Elain couldn’t stop the laughter that ballooned in her throat.

Flowers had become their way of sending messages to each other. Everyday Elain would wake up to a new flower on her vanity: Roses when Azriel was going to spend the night,  lilies appeared when Azriel couldn't get away from work, daisies when he was going to meet her in the garden, and sometimes he would send her flowers with little messages asking what they were and what they meant. Eventually, Elain had gotten him a book that depicted various flowers and their meanings, and slowly they were understanding the language of flowers together.

“It’s not that bad,” Elain said, her laughter slowly fading. “Do you remember what this one represents?”

They looked at each other for a moment and the smallest of smiles graced Azriel’s lips, and though it was small it was enough to cause her heart to tumble in her chest.

“Our souls are united.” Azriel replied, his head dipping towards hers.

“Good job.” Elain said breathlessly. Her lips brushed against his words.

Azriel made a small sound of acknowledgement before their lips met.

***

Elain stared at the flower sitting at her vanity.

A yellow carnation.

Disappointment. Rejection.

The shadow had appeared in front of her this morning and only stuck around long enough to place the flower in front of her while she was brushing her hair. She didn’t even get to say thank you before the shadow disappeared.

Her smile froze on her face as she realized what the flower was.

Rejection

Icicles of dread started poking at her heart and all day she was fighting off the dread that scraped along her spine. She tried to battle her thoughts, her worries, and her anxieties that were screaming at her. Azriel loved her. He’s told her that. He told her that if it wasn’t for Rhysand, then they wouldn’t have to hide… but nothing has changed.

Five months and not a single thing had changed.

Except maybe Azriel’s mind.

His simple mission of two weeks turned into four, and only twice did Azriel send her flowers. The first, three days into his mission, was a tulip — a declaration of love — and the second was the carnation that sat on her vanity, mocking her.

She had told herself that it was just his work keeping him away, but Rhysand had been in almost constant contact with him, and every time he talked of the mission it was with ease. Rhys didn’t mince his words or mind his tongue, and it seemed as if every night at dinner he was updating them about Azriel’s progress and the information he’s obtained.

Logically, Elain knew that Azriel had other more important priorities that didn’t include finding flowers for her. She knew it was a pain to find the exact right flower with the exact right meaning, but this wasn’t the first time that Azriel had been away on a mission while they were together — it was the longest — and every other time he had managed to send her flowers with no issue. I’m longing for you. I’m thinking of you.

Maybe there was another reason Azriel didn’t bother with the flowers.

Maybe he had met someone else.

A female that wasn’t mated and was free to love him. A female that he didn’t have to hide in the shadows with. A female he could talk with opening, one that didn’t make him study books about flowers in order to communicate. A female that didn’t force her interests on him.

And then another nagging thought turned her blood into icy water.

Maybe he did meet someone else, and maybe Azriel had finally met his mate.

A single tear trailed down her cheek as she fingered the waxy, yellow petals.

***

“You’ve been avoiding me all night,” Azriel said, his voice dark and smooth. His footsteps were silent, but Elain knew his long legs were crossing the short distance between them. “Did I do something wrong?”

Her back was still turned towards him, facing the window that overlooked the glittering lights of Velaris. It took everything in Elain not to stare at him the entire night. She tried not to examine and analyze his every word and gesture.

The space between them was nothing more than a couple inches, but it felt like a massive canyon.

She could feel his hesitation, but he still reached a hand to grasp hers.

“Did I?” Elain whispered, trying not to imagine his hands on the skin of another female — running through her hair, caressing her lips, slipping between her-

“Of course not,” Azriel responded in a light voice, one that spoke of a weight lifted off of him. She didn’t protest and he pulled her into his side. “Tell me what’s on your mind, please.”

Her brown eyes never moved from the twinkling lights through the glass.

“The flower you sent a week ago. The yellow —”

“Fuck,” Azriel said, and Elain felt his his body tensed against her. “I knew I shouldn’t have—”

“Who is she?” Elain asked, cutting him off and breaking out of his embrace. “I don’t blame you, but please tell me how long it’s been going on. Is she…” The words were bitter on her tongue. “Is she your mate?”

The horrible irony wasn’t lost on her. She had spent days wondering if Azriel had found his mate while her own unwanted bond had been a dark cloud over their relationship.

Elain watched his expression slackened into nothing but pure surprise. His jaw had dropped and he started blinking furiously. She had never seen him look so gobsmacked before.

“My what?” Azriel asked, his voice high and squeaky.

“Your mate,” Elain said, her own eyes blinking to hold off the tears that were stinging her eyes. “I thought maybe you finally found someone and that’s why you rejected me—”

“Rejected you? I never —” Somehow his voice was squeakier than before.

“You sent me a yellow carnation and —”

“No I didn’t,” Azriel said, rushing to grasp her hands. “I sent you a yellow peony.”

The desperation in his voice caused her to pause.

“Azriel, you sent me a yellow carnation.”

Elain could see the realization set in as a light went off behind his eyes, and slowly his eyes widened in horror. “I didn’t mean — surely you didn’t think — fuck,” Azriel’s eyes screwed shut. “I thought I sent a yellow peony.”

A yellow peony. Azriel thought he sent a yellow peony and that meant,

“Happy marriage,” Elain said, awe dripping from her voice as relief spread through her body. “You sent me a flower that means happy marriage.”

Her hands shook, but his were there to steady them.

“I realize it’s a little early,” Azriel admitted, his thumbs tracing the pale blue veins in her hands. “But I wanted to be honest with how I felt, and I just, I wanted you to know that one day I could see us…” His voice trailed off as he took in Elain’s watery smile. “You thought I was with someone else?”

“I thought that maybe,” Elain said, pausing to swallow the ball of emotions lodged in her throat. “Maybe you found someone that wasn’t so complicated. Maybe you found your mate.”

“Elain,” Azriel said. Her heart stuttered at her name on his lips. “There is no one that I would rather be with, no matter how complicated it gets. I love you. And I’ve already found my mate,” His hand squeezed hers. “One that I got to choose for myself.”

—

Tagging: @thefangirlofhp @tswaney17 @elvery @stars-falling @sakurakittypeach @justheretoreadsposts

[theshelbyclan]

Horse Thieves

Summary: The Shelby siblings are still building their imperium, and they need a horse to do it.

(Gif by @madshelby​)

A/N: I asked around a bit and people wanted to read a lot more about Teddy, so I decided to use this request by one lovely anon: Hello! I've never done a request for a fic before so please excuse me if this isn't the right way to do it 🙈 But I noticed your requests were open and read the prompts list you linked to for Shelby sister prompts - so can I request something that incorporates 7.“car. Now”, 8.“what story do you want tonight” and 14.“your heading the right way for a smacked backside”. Thank you! I decided to base this on this idea I had in the longer Teddy series, where she refers to a time when she stole a horse with Tommy. So see this as a prequel if you will, set before the series. Words: 2773

*** “Whatever you do, you’re not using Finn.” “I won’t…” “I mean it, Thomas,” Aunt Polly warned, “You’ve only been back for five minutes from France and I will not have you endangering my nephew, after I’ve kept him safe for fucking four years.” 

Tommy sighed, “Yes, I understand.” Polly looked at her nephew with a distrustful gaze, “Why do we need the horse?” “Betting’s down,” he slowly lit a cigarette, “We need our own. A horse that looks good. Convinces people to lay a bet.” She had to agree with that, “Where will you go?” “To the place where people most expect a horse to be stolen.” “Why?” “Hide in plain sight,” he pointed, “you taught me that.” “I thought I taught you everything…” Polly mused sternly. Tommy nodded slowly, “Maybe. And now I’m acting on it…” After a short pause, he said, “I’m gonna do it, Pol. I’ll make this family rich. Trust me.” “What about the little ones?” “I’m doing this for them, alright, so that they won’t have to grow up like we did!” Fire was burning in his eyes when he spoke, but Polly had never seen him quite like this. He was different these days. After pondering for a while, she said, “So tell me where.” Tommy took a deep breath, knowing she’d disapprove, “The fair.” “For fuck’s sake, Thomas!” *** “WELCOME TO THE FAIR!” Arthur bellowed, which scared most people in his vicinity away, but it made Teddy, who was used to it, literally jump for joy. Arthur grinned broadly and lifted his little sister up onto his shoulders, shouting, “Now look here, sweet girl, this is where we bloody come from and don’t you forget it!” “Arthur, can I have a candied apple?” Teddy asked him, knowing he wouldn’t refuse her anything when he was in a mood like this. “You can have all the apples, Teddy!” he replied with a grand gesture. John came walking besides them and quietly said to his brother, “They’re here.” “Good,” Arthur said uncharacteristically gently, and he lifted Teddy off his shoulders again, “Tommy’s in place.” “What about Finn, Arthur?” he said, playing with his toothpick. Arthur winked at his suddenly much younger brother, “Don’t worry, brother. He’s off playing with the Boswell kids. He’ll be no bloody trouble.” John grinned down at Teddy, “Unlike this one!” “You know why, John?” Teddy asked cheekily, “Because Finn is like Arthur, but I am like you!” John laughed manically out loud and Arthur bellowed, “She’s fucking right!” “How about that apple, Arthur?” Teddy asked innocently, quickly adding a, “Please?” “Wait here, princess.” As they continued walking, John took Teddy’s hand in his and said to her, “Look at all the horses, Teddy. Maybe one day you could have one of your own.” “But I already have the pony you gave me when you came back,” she looked up with adoring eyes. It was no secret that Teddy had four heroes in life, and those were her brothers. He looked down, “Yeah, but one day you’ll have a horse. Promise.” “John?” she asked, suddenly serious, “You won’t go away again, will you?” “Go where? Why would I leave my favourite little girl!” “You did before…” John stopped and turned to her, “Listen, that was the war… You know I don’t like talking about that…” “I know…” “But the war’s over. No more fucking mud for us, alright?” he said earnestly. He tried desperately to hide the pain he felt. Teddy nodded. “I’m sorry,” John blurted out all of a sudden, “I’m sorry we left you. We didn’t know… what it’d be… we thought it would be…” he simply couldn’t find the words. “I know,” she interrupted him in a high voice, “It’s okay. Just don’t do it again, alright?” “Alright,” he smiled. Then he changed his tone again, happy to switch subjects, “Now, what story do you want tonight?” “One about a horse!” “How about we get you a real one?” John suggested light-heartedly.

Teddy giggled because she thought he was joking, slipped her hand into his again and started skipping. Then she looked over at Arthur, who was just in the process of stealing an apple for her. It was good to have her brothers back again. 

“Teddy?” John asked, “think you could do something for me?” “Like what?” “Tommy needs our help.” “With what?” her eyebrows shot up. John coughed once and waited for Arthur to join them, “Eat your apple. And listen, Tommy needs us to help him with something.” Mouth full of candied apple, “whaff kinf of somefingff?” “Just do as we tell you to,” John explained, “and then Tommy’ll tell you what to do.” Arthur nodded, “He’s already instructed us.” “Arthur,” John became unsure, “Are we really involving our eight-year-old sister in this?” “She’ll be fine, John-boy! She’s fucking smart, she is.” “I am,” Teddy replied proudly. The candied apple was nearly gone already.

“Alright, Teddy-girl, you listen to me, yeah?” John bend down to her level, “I need you to pretend you got lost, or maybe ask for help, or cry! Can you cry?” Teddy sniffled a little, “I’m not sure,” she then said in her normal voice. “Don’t worry if you can’t! Just scream a lot, alright?” “Wait!” she said, “Give me a second….” And she pouted her lips again, scrunched up her nose and suddenly tears were falling down her cheeks. “Bloody hell…” Arthur mumbled, as he turned to John, “you fucking created a monster.” “I’m crying!” Teddy said triumphantly through her tears, “Now what?” John shook her head to banish the emotions he felt over seeing his baby sister cry, “Go to Tommy.” Teddy quickly darted off and went in search of her other brother. When she found him, she announced herself with, “Look, Tommy, real tears!” “What the fuck?” Tommy replied in shock, “What happened, tell me now!” “Nothing!” she quipped, “John made me.”   “I’ll fucking kill him,” her brother said automatically, “Did he throw you up in the air again?” Teddy grinned, “No, and besides that doesn’t make me cry…” “It did when you broke your arm.” She waved a disinterested hand, “Fine. But I mean he told me to cry because you needed a disattraction! “Distraction.” “Yes!” Tommy knelt down and said in a hushed voice, “Alright, first things first, you can never, ever tell Aunt Polly about this, do you hear me?” Teddy nodded obediently. “I mean it Teddy. She’ll have my fucking balls…” A high voice replied, “Which balls?” He sighed deeply again, regretting his words intensely, “Listen to me, eh? Don’t tell Aunt Pol.” “I will,” but a vague twinkle had come into Teddy’s eyes the second she realised her big tough brother was scared of Aunt Polly too.

Tommy lifted up Teddy and she rested on his hip, hugged close by his arm. She could vaguely smell his hair, his cigarette and a whiff of horse on him. This was her brother, who’d been gone for two whole years. She was only little when he’d gone, but Teddy remembered she cried a lot. All she ever wanted at night was for John to play with her and for Arthur to sit with her and for Tommy to tell her stories. She and Finn used to curl up together and cry. But now he was home, not the same, but still home.

“See them?” Tommy pointed, with a smile playing about his lips like he used to have all the time before the war, “See that family?” Teddy followed his hand with her eyes, “Yeah, the ones with the man with the blue scarf?” “That’s the one,” he nodded, “I need you to distract them.” “Why?” “So I can take their horse.” Teddy turned to face Tommy, and as she grinned, his face lit up as well, “Are we going to steal the horse, Tommy?” Teddy whispered excitedly. “Yes.” She lowered her voice even more, “just you and me?” Softly, he planted a kiss on her head, “Can’t do it without you…” Couldn’t do any of this without you here, he thought, but didn’t say it. “Alright,” he continued, “I’m going to talk to the man with the scarf. Meanwhile, John and Arthur are going to pick a fight with some other men, over by the candied apples, you see?” “That’s why I got an apple…” Teddy mused, slightly disappointed. Tommy quickly got her attention back, “I’ll be talking to him about this other family I know,” he waved a hand, “it’ll be something useless, but I’ll get him to walk away. John-boy is itching to punch someone, so he will, don’t get scared, alright?” Teddy frowned, “I’m not scared of John.” “Now, you see that horse, the black one, by the water?” She peered through the crowd of people and finally caught a glimpse of the beauty. Her eyes lit up in a way that only the Shelby’s eyes light up when looking at a horse. “There’s two boys with him. I need you to go to them. Make sure they walk away from the horse.” “Tommy…” Teddy thought out loud, “Won’t they know it was us?” He smirked at his sister’s intellect, “No. They don’t know us. Besides, they’re feuding with another family here. There’s a war coming, but we won’t be involved this time. Don’t worry about it, eh?” “Why are they fighting, Tommy?” she was not letting it go so easily. “Because I made it happen.” Then he walked a few feet so that they were both hidden from sight, “Now, I need you to distract the boys, and maybe some of the women as well. Cry, if you can, and if anything goes wrong, scream. I know you’re good at that…” “Who will take the horse?” “Johnny Dogs will. He’s close by,” Tommy leaned his forehead onto Teddy’s, “Think you can do it?” “Yes!” “Not too scared?” “Never!” Teddy replied enthusiastically, which slightly worried Tommy, but instead he said, “Go on.” So Teddy walked out behind the tent on her own and started thinking sad thoughts, just to make the tears come easily later on. There wasn’t much need for them though, because as soon as she approached the boys who were washing the horse, one called out, “Piss off!” “Fuck you!” Teddy replied in a flash, “This is free land and I’m a free woman!” she heard Aunt Polly say that once, “I’ll go where I fucking please!” One of the boys pushed her and angrily Teddy shoved him back. Then the second one came for her, and Teddy suddenly remembered her mission. So against all of her instincts, she let herself be pushed to the ground and started howling as soon as she landed. Immediately heads turned and Teddy cried like she hadn’t done in two years, “They pushed me!” But somewhere from out the corner of her eye, she saw Arthur arguing with someone and John landing a punch, almost in slow-motion, and she knew everything went according to plan. “Did not!” the boy protested nervously, “she started it!” Teddy curled up a little and held onto her leg like it was hurting, while trying to make herself as small as possible, “It hurts…” “What have you done!” a strange woman called out to one of the boys, who shrunk visibly as soon as he heard her voice, “fighting little girls now, are you?!” “I didn’t, ma! She started it!” but before he could finish his sentence, he’d gotten the first smack around the head. One down, one more to go. So Teddy upped the tears and it worked beautifully: the second boy didn’t wait for his mother to hear, but decided to run instead. Slowly, Teddy started to calm down, because if she just stood up now and showed it was all fake, everything would’ve been for nothing. She made that mistake once with Finn, and she wouldn’t be doing so again. After about a minute, chaos had descended on the fair. Men were fighting, Tommy was making an already nervous man simply anxious and this side of the camp was almost deserted. But where was Johnny? Teddy got up and hid near the beautiful horse. And then she saw him: somehow Johnny had ended up in the middle of the fight as well. This could ruin everything! “Come,” Teddy beckoned, “Come here! I promise I won’t hurt you…” and much to her own surprise, the horse obeyed. She untied the reigns and like he’d always been hers, he followed her down into the river. Teddy swam a little, wondered for only a second what Aunt Polly would say, and then climbed up onto the horse’s back in the water. From there on, she made a quick decision and urged the horse on. The river was low and couldn’t be seen all the way from the camp, so she kept the route of invisibility. After a while, she spurred the horse on and he climbed the riverside, with the tiny load still on his back. From this distance, Teddy could still see the fair, but because of the trees she was certain they couldn’t see her. “Now what?” she asked the horse, because she hadn’t really thought this through. In reply it neighed. “Shh!” Teddy scolded, “you want me to get caught?” So she steered the horse by its manes and made her way to where the family car was parked. With some luck, everyone else would still be too busy fighting. *** “Teddy!” Teddy turned her head and saw her brothers running, with sheer panic in their eyes. “Where the fuck were you?” Tommy demanded. Teddy shrunk a little at the anger in his voice, “I didn’t know where to go so I went here…” “Car. Now!” Tommy fumed. “That was actually smart, Tom,” Arthur defended her. Tommy ran a hand through his hair and sighed, “I thought something happened to you… That’s why I tell you not to leave my fucking side!” “I’m sorry…” she whimpered and tears started forming in her eyes again. “Don’t even try that,” John joked, “We know you can pretend now.” Looking caught, Teddy tried to hide the smile she shared with John. “That’s it, Tom,” Arthur walked back and forth to get rid of the adrenaline still coursing through his body, after they found there little sister was missing, “We’re not using our bloody sister again, for anything!” “Agreed,” Tommy said at once. “I thought you wanted the horse?” Teddy questioned. Again Tommy sighed and he lit another cigarette, “No fucking horse is worth losing you over, Teddy.” And that’s when she realised he wasn’t angry, just worried. “No fucking horse,” Arthur agreed. “But…” she started. John interrupted, “Forget about the horse, Teddy, we’re just glad you’re okay.” “But…” “Besides, we can get a horse some other way, eh?” Tommy continued, “Might even pay for it…” “But…” Tommy held up a hand, “Stop interrupting me, Teddy.” Instead Teddy interrupted him, “But the fucking horse is fucking here!” she pointed beyond the car at the woods, “Look! I rode him here after Johnny didn’t show up!” “I’ll be fucking damned,” Arthur blurted out, “she rode the fucking horse here.” John burst out laughing and simply high-fived Teddy, but Tommy looked as stunned as Arthur did. Anxiously, Teddy waited for Tommy’s reply, occasionally saying things like, “Johnny wasn’t coming,” and “my tears were almost dried up,” and “it wasn’t really my fault, the horse just followed me!” “Teddy Shelby,” Tommy said finally, “you little horse thief…” “You told me to,” Teddy said pointedly, but couldn’t quite hide the pride in her voice. “Oh, so this is our fault, eh?” Teddy shrugged and put on an angelic face, “Well, Arthur taught me how to steal, John taught me how to cry and you told me what to do…”

He pointed at her, “You’re heading the right way for a smacked backside...” Again Tommy looked at the horse and then he coughed a short laugh, “Alright, you win. We’re all horse thieves. Go get your horse.” “Mine?” “Yours.” As Teddy got the horse, the brothers still couldn’t get over the fact that she just did all of that. “Before we go home, there’s just one more thing, Teddy,” Tommy said, “Tell me again what I made you promise.” “Don’t tell Aunt Polly about this.” “Or?” he said menacingly, hoping he still had some authority over her by usually being the one who punished her, when he wasn’t teaching her how to steal that is… “She’ll have your balls.” Tommy eyed his two brothers who doubled over in laugher, but decided to ignore that. “Good girl.”

*** Masterlist

[jackiebrackettt]

[Image ID: The first image is stylised lettering with a yellow to orange gradient that says "DTIYS" and the second image is lettering that says "for writers and artists". End ID]

thank you so much everyone for the 200 followers!! as promised (a while ago) i'm now doing a lil thing where i have you guys send me in a bunch of prompt words and then i'll try and write a fic including all of them somehow. the dtiys bit is an extra bit tbh but it's essentially: anyone who wants to can also take those prompts words and try to create something - either a fic or some art - as well ^_^!

The prompt words are: prediction, chill, daze, underground, forgiveness, mirror, bridge, lily pad, mud, and lantern - try to fit as many as you can ^_^

Putting the Rules + Extra Info under the cut PLEASE read them otherwise i might not reblog what you've made because you might've broken one:

-nothing nsfw

-if ur making it about two ppl/multiple ppl please make sure their relationship is the same as what it is in canon

-it can be about whoever so long as it's dsmp connected!! and it can be whatever genre/vibe/etc just be aware that if ur making it for me i'm not really a fan of heavier angst/no happy ending stuff - but as long as it doesn't violate any rule i'll still reblog it though

-it can be whatever length/whatever level of completion. so if you only want to write a couple hundred words or just do a sketch that's fine ^_^

-and while i'd like to see ppl incorporate as many of the prompt words as possible into their piece - don't worry about it! even just one is fine ^_^ (also sidenote: you don't have to specifically name drop each word since some of them are more abstract concepts)

-this isn't a hard and fast rule but if u make anything that includes any crit or neg for any of the cbenchtrio guys/neg for any characters in general or any pos for cdream i probably will not have much fun (i feel like if ur following me this won't really matter though) but yeah just a heads up depending on how bad it is i might not reblog it. curating my online experience and all that

-and finally: @ me when you post it! and if you post it anywhere else other than tumblr please don't mention my @ lol. since it's not actually based on my work and we're just using the same prompt words i don't mind if it's not attached to me. ppl finding me outside of tumblr just makes me a lil nervous tbh

-you can reblog this if you want but i don't really mind if you don't since it's kinda like a my follower thing i guess (question mark) but at the same time the more the merrier and whatnot so idm if ppl reblog it

-don't worry about taking a while to do this: i'm def going to take like a week or something i bet