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justanotherblogger · 7 months ago

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A World Without Him

Chapter 10

Oh my goodness, what was I thinking?!

Tang had gotten over his shock when he finally walked far enough to actually think about what just happened. But in his haste, he had already walked a couple of blocks when he had been lost in the moment.

Now, though, he's stopped at that bakery with the make-it-yourself type deal that he remembered opening a couple of days ago. The only reason he could recognize it was because he was currently pacing past its window.

He had been freaking out ever since he got over his grogginess from the previous haze. He hasn't been out since last night, he doesn't have any supplies with him (including his dead phone left on the bedside table) other than a nearly empty backpack, and now he's walking aimlessly towards something he doesn't even know exists or not because of a random dream!

I should just go home. I dont know what to look for or what I'm doing. Tang thought, stopping his continuous pacing.

Now he was right in front of the store window, seeing his tired reflection looking right back at him with the sun highlighting his face from behind. He could only sigh before sitting on one of the outside tables in front of said window. Then he took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, releasing the tension from between them. The colors around blended together as his vision distorted and stretched.

It was only after he opened and refocussed his eyes agin, that he noticed the deathly silence around him. His surroundings now seemed blurry without his glasses, but he could still feel the lifelessness his surroundings now held.

The street looked dark and colorless, almost as if the color had been faded out of a photograph. The blurry shapes around him never moved, never made a sound. The only thing in his ears was his heartbeat, which steadily kept rising against his will.

He hastily grabbed his glasses, his eyes widening when the surroundings seemed to warp with his vision.

The street was now in full gray-scale, with the shadows being pitch black against the light gray buildings. Everything seemed frozen in time, with the people around him gaining soft, colorful outlines while frozen in place.

Tang didn't know what was going on, and didn't want to know what was going on. Maybe he finally snapped. Maybe he's full on hallucinating now. All he could think about now was getting back home.

So he violently stood up from the table and started to speed walk back home. The still, almost completely colorless figures of the civillians unnerved him to no end.

From closer inspection, they seemed to be in slow motion; it was just enough to where they seems like statues at a first glance. Tang didn't notice this until he saw one guy's drink slowly spread onto the sidewalk from a supposedly clumsy passerby.

I'm going insane.

He side-stepped another civillian on the street with their bright purple hue overpowering the soft sky blue of the person beside them. He tried not to pay too much attention to these strange details.

The one time I try to find some answers about my recent episodes and now I'm back into a worse version of one!

With an irritated grunt, Tang kicks a stray can on the street, now a block away from the start of this limbo type place. The can only went up about a foot before slowing down to the speed of its surroundings.

A small breeze pucks up through his street, not affected by the slowing time. Yet he didn't acknowledge the change, only focused on putting one foot in front of the other.

Why am I so unlucky to have this happen right after yesterday?

He yet again speeds up his pace, now almost a complete sprint past all the still moments around him. He needs to get home. He needs to be sane to actually know what's going on.

Is any of this even happening? I'm an idiot: of course this isn't real. I'm just having another episode, after another horrible dream, after another person died in my arms-

...Why can't I just get over it already. I can't change anything.

The breeze picked up suddenly, whipping past Tang's grimaced face. The intense force of the wind didn't seem to affect him, though, as it swerved around him and through his hair.

Wisps of messy hair flowed in front of his face as he continued on his way home.

Why do I always let something like this happen? When can this finally just stop? I can't keep helplessly watching from the sidelines as people like Allan risk their lives for cowards like me.

He could feel wet tears roll down his face. They dropped to the still ground in waves as he continued to walk. He couldn't waste any more time in this nightmare world unless he wanted his brain to snap.

He walked past many construction sites over the next couple of blocks. He didn't remember walking this far out, but he didn't want to think about the connotations of what that could mean.

He could see the foundations crushed to bits from the empty sidewalk; the concrete walls and floor were all cracked or completely torn through by what Tang could only assume was one of Mk's many battles.

His thoughts carried on to the library, with the sunken roof and the crumblibg walls, but he quickly shut down whatever he was about to think next. Mk was always reckless; it's just who he is. A bad feeling always seemed to overwhelm his stomach when he thought about Mk after yesterday.

Oh please, it's not like you would be any better in his position.

The wind kicks up again, slightly pushing him forward.

Do you think you're any different from the demons he fights every day? How you've probably done worse things than what those bastards could ever dream of?

The tears continue down his face as he walks by the many windows of the street. The shop fronts seem just as lifeless as the rest of the street. He stares as his feet when he walks, avoiding looking at the shops while creating a trail behind him as the waterworks don't seem to stop.

Harina would've left you there to die if she knew what you would become.

Tang's breathes were heavy as he slowed down his steps, almost stopping entirely in front of a stores window. He noticed it had sunflower motifs as he raised his head up to look in the window.

He could only see himself looking back. His hair messy and unkempt, his body highlited in a soft orange glow, his eyes puffy from sobbing all the way here, and his suddenly pale face as he noticed the figure standing beside him.

A tall, young woman stood behind him, staring into his eyes over his shoulder. Her eyes were hollow and blood dripped slowly from her mouth and he long black hair swayed with the breeze.

You were, and still are a pathetic, worthless piece of shit that doesn't even try to live on in her memory as you just lounge over their hundreds of sacrifices-

"JUST LEAVE, ME, ALONE." Tang had shouted, grabbing his own head and crouching down onto the ground. The wind howled in his ears and started to harshly whip the street, shattering every window as far as the eye could see.

Glass rained down over him and the street as he looked up, not caring if he was struck with the shimmering downpour. The glass slowly fell onto the surrounding area, and eventually slowing to a stop like the rest of this hellish place.

He could only stare at the moment frozen in time. The reflections in them proved irksome as they seemed to drown in the orange glow from behind him.

He was yet again tired of this place. How many times does he have to go through this? Enough to please whatever God he had pissed off probably. He laughed bitterly to himself.

He didn't turn around. He closed his eyes. He didn't want to give whatever those monsters wanted out of him; he just wanted to go home.

So only when the whispers from behind finally faded, and the piercing eyes slowly disappeared, was when Tang opened his eyes again.

Now everything was truly quiet. No buzzing, no whispers in the back of his mind, just silence.

He slowly tilted his head up from his perch on the sidewalk, taking everything in slowly. A tall building was in front of him. He could already feel how it was steril, blank, and full of mixed emotions.

The doors in front of him show many different signs, but one caught his eyes immeadietly, "Metrapolis Springs Hospital: First Responder volunteers needed!"

The golden lettering was all it took for his eyes to widen from the initial numbness. Those letters important, he knew. It's just that he didn't know why.

And he would never find out at this moment, as looking too hard at the building caused his vision to blur once again, causing him to lean on a nearby electrical pole for balance.

It getting hard to keep his eyes open as his eyelids became heavy and the whispers started up again. However, there was only one this time. It talked smoothly through his head as his conscious slipped away from his grasp, leaving him up against the pole.

When he woke up again, the world suddenly gained more colors than before, causing Tang's eyes to hurt from the brightness. When he refocussed again, he could tell that the sky had darkened and the sun was about to set.

Where am I?...

He slowly looked around in his grogginess, coming to realize he was right outside of his apartment. He had been sat down on the outside electrical pole with all the posters. He could even see the one for the Metrapolis Library still up with some new tears...

He needed to go back home. Getting inside where it was safe was his top priority. He grabbed the side of the splintered pole to pull himself up and steady his unstable stance, letting him stand up after some struggle.

His mind knew he needed to do something today, something that was important enough to make him feel uneasy, yet his body didn't cooperate as it lead him through the double doors of his apartment building.

The golden letters repeated over and over in his mind as he walked up the steps. They were ingrained into his brain as he reached his final floor.

And then, yet again, Tang could only open the door and slam it behind him as he slid down on the other side. He put his head between his knees as he closed his eyes once again.

I can't keep living like this: these, these horrible trances everyday just kept getting worse and worse as I continue to stay here. I need to leave. I just need to... get away from it all...

And finally, he could only succumb to sleep at the end of it all. His body went limp, and he passed out even before his body hit the floor.

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#lmk tang #lmk au #lmk #a world without him #lego monkie kid #tang #tang monkie kid #finally something other than a dream sequence!#technically #im so excited to get into this mans backstory you dont even know

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love-and-books320 · 5 months ago

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I see what you are saying but I feel like you aren’t taking actual decolonization initiatives into accounts.

I want to preface this by saying, I am against violence. I always believe there is a peaceful solution, but I am not in the shoes of the Palestinians and therefore have no right to comment on how they fight their violent oppressors. I think that is a really important thing to note here, which you do to some degree, is that they are oppressed and this is how they are trying to get out of that oppression. Hamas has done horrible things but things like the beheaded baby’s have been proven false, unlike Israel actually doing that. Also, and this is the most important, most Palestinian civilians aren’t Hamas. Yet they still fight for their land everyday. Notice the March of Return.

Now to decolonization initiatives. Indigenous Americans have actually been really vocal about what we can do for decolonization efforts and what they want. They don’t want to kick everyone out but instead want to become stewards of the land. Which is why it’s called Land Back. It returning the land to the native people. This along with reparations will go a long way for indigenous American. Notice it doesn’t involve just kicking everyone out.

Which is what most decolonization initiatives say. For example a lot of Palestinian Activists I talk to over in the states, many of whom want to return to a free Palestine, say they want Palestine to get its Land back and Self-Govern. Not kick out all of the Jewish people/ Non-Palestinians. Giving Palestine its land back doesn’t mean Jewish people have to leave. It just means the oppressive Israeli state is abolished. Would this take work? Yes. Is it worth it to return people to their homes and create a better world for EVERYONE? Yes.

So is it really that you want the state of Israel to continue existing (because you would believe Jewish people deserve an Ethnostate. Which many Orthodox Jews believe goes against the Jewish religion) Or do you just believe the Jewish people shouldn’t be displaced? Because you can have one without the other and I think that’s important to note when you discuss Palestinian freedom.

I don’t want the Jewish people kicked out either but also, and I say this so kindly, no theocratic ethnostate is ethical and especially not the one that hinges on taking the homes of the indigenous people. If Jewish people decide to leave after Palestinian liberation that would be their choice (which does happen after most liberation movements. The oppressive class leaves of their own free will. Take India, or even South Africa had a large number of white citizens leave after apartheid ended)

Anyway I highly suggest you talk to your local activists. ❤️ (Also, I don’t hate people. At least not over the internet. I think most people believe they are doing the right thing. Kindness, clearly cause it started this convo, usually works better. At this point I think you are a bit naive, which is fine. You seem young. Maybe I’m off the mark though. Naivety can be a blessing. I would argue Naivety is what drives revolutionary thought. If you are young though I want to give you advice: Talk to your community about these issues. Not your family or friends but your community. You meet people who have been there first hand. I met a Jewish Pro-Palestine activist that was in Israel when Hamas attacked, their thoughts on the war changed my perspective. You meet people who know more than you. You also build community and have more conversations like this one. That’s just two cents from an old fudy dudy)

Hi anon! Sorry I didn’t respond right away I’ve been crazy busy and wanted to take time to give this the response it deserves bc you clearly put a lot of work into it. I appreciate that so much bc I feel that discussions like these, with everyone striving for the best possible outcome for everyone, are the most productive. There’s too much hate in the world already lmao

I want to thank you for informing me about a lot of this stuff because I don’t know all of it before. We all have something to learn, another reason to have informative discussions!

I 100% agree with that Palestinian people are good people and Hamas is NOT them. Personally I do condone. Hamas for what they have done, as they have also committed war crimes and violated human rights. That’s not okay no matter what the justification is. The White House did confirm that Hamas beheaded babies, though the numbers given for that as well as all Israeli deaths weren’t as high as rumored.

as for decolonization efforts, I do support them but not if it means tearing down existing governments because I don’t see how that could be peaceful. But, I’m happy to learn more about it and possibly have my opinion changed.

in this case, like I said before, true decolonization would return land to the Jews, similarly to Indigenous people. But I believe that no one group should have control of the land. However, if a Palestinian state took over the land and let everyone stay peacefully, as you suggested, I would be fine with that. But right now Jews aren’t allowed there at all, they have long been targeted for just existing in some Arab countries. And right now Palestine has no government. Hamas is a terrorist group that wants the death of ALL Jews, especially Israeli’s killed. That’s not peaceful. That’s also genocide. I’m not going to go into more in this post, but I want to thank you again for reaching out and being so kind. We all have something to learn and love to share. Your advice about community was really good and I plan to take it. Learning from others and sharing experiences is so so crucial. Thank you again ❤️

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letsthinkdigital · 7 months ago

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Lecture Diary 2

So for this week, we talked about different ways people have reinvented old tech to make better and more sustainable tech. From using VR to create 3D Models to Hydroelectric power reinventing already existing tech is one of the best ways for us to progress while also reducing and recycling products so we can use less and be better for our planet. Something we talked about was 3D printers and the filaments that are used for them now there’s no sure-fire way to deal with the the plastic issue since once you make something with a 3D printer you really can’t recycle it at all after that. But, there is a way to turn bottles marked with a 1; PET bottles (Polyethylene Terephthalate plastic bottles) into 3D printer Filament. It’s one of the best materials for 3D prints that you need to be really strong. How the process works is that you first need to find PET plastic, It’s the one that’s marked with the number one and it’s also one of the most recyclable plastics out there. Then you cut it into a strip now first you want to start with scissors but then you can put it through a special type of cutting tool that will cut the bottle for you as you simply pull it through and wind it onto a spool.

After you have it on a spool you can start pulling it through the filament machine with pliers till it is long enough to reach the larger filament spool. Then you simply attach it to the spool and let the machine run.

I really like the thought of reusing plastic since it is one of the main contributors to the pollution problem facing our world. It’s in our best interest to try and reduce the amount of plastics used and to recycle the ones currently being used. And I think this is a step in the right direction!

Also, one other thing we talked about in class that I wanna go off on before the other parts of this post, Kniterate; is a machine that you can use to make your own fabrics. I would love to use this machine and get to know its full potential.

BUT AIN’T NO WAY I AM GONNA PAY £15,999.00 FOR SOMETHING LIKE THIS.

It’s a great product but, I am a poor college student T^T so no experimenting with fabric printers and PET bottles in the near future that’s for sure.

In other news

We also had homework to read and take notes on an essay called “Anatomy of AI System”. I think this was an interesting read and that it was a bit eye-opening on the process of how things like Alexa’s and Google Home systems are made. I also really like that it mentioned the folk tales of the place of origin for Lithium that was pretty cool. Something else of note is that in the essay it is pointed out that we are still training AI with stereotypical actions such as men kicking and being violent and women caring for children. So it’s safe to say that AI is still pretty biased in its view of the world but that’s only because we as humans and creators have yet to teach the opposite of that.

I think when it comes down to it my argument on AI is this, as it stands AI is a tool that we as humans can use to better not only our understanding of the world but of ourselves. We can sit there and get mad about AI all we want.

I have heard people say time and time again tirelessly that AI is going to take over creative jobs and ruin the art world. And while yes things are going to change and the art world will never be the same now that AI is around we aren’t going to lose our jobs to it. If anything AI can be used to make our jobs simpler and faster. The thing that I think of constantly is just how long it takes for me to get a reference image for a position I am trying to draw a character in. By myself with my talent, years of practice, years of studying human anatomy/forms, a four-year art degree under my belt, and the understanding of proper sketching techniques; all of this and I still at times just can’t get the pose the way I see it in my mind. So I use the other tools at my disposal, I try to mimic the pose myself, I go online for hours and try to find a reference image of a pose that is even slightly similar, and I even commission models hoping they can give me the reference that I need. But that’s if you can commission people that’s IF they can even produce the pose you’re looking for. Sometimes you’re S.O.L. and have no other choice at your disposal. Do you know what would have helped from the very beginning? Having a reference image

Close enough to the pose and an AI to make the person slightly in whatever direction you need to get exactly what you’re looking for. Yes AI is very good at making its OWN art and YES people are going to use it for nefarious reasons but, it will be much more useful to us if we let it progress with our art forms. I think AI is going to be a very useful thing as we continue on. I mean it’s already here after all… what other choice do we have other than complain about it?

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centrally-unplanned · 1 year ago

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Finally, character tier list - solely based on hotness! Ordered in tiers:

S Tier: Faith, Spike

A Tier: Giles, Buffy, Willow

B Tier: Xander, Oz, Tara, Joyce

C tier: Angel, Cordelia, Anya

Problematic Tier: Dawn

Obviously Spike is hotter than Faith but I am alas a mainly-straight guy, Faith is not only very hot but is my kind of self-destructively damaged and abusive. She is like a hyper-violent Mamimi, okay? Spike is Spike, nothing needs to be said, sex with him is better than a soul.

Giles is of course everything a man should be in blending punk rock and a library sciences degree; its great reading early interviews where they wanted Giles to be just an exposition fairy, then Anthony Head read for the role and they went "oh wait nevermind, this is way better". In the past I would have put Willow over Buffy, but now I can both respect more SMG's model-tier looks and how attractive the depth of her arc into self-agency & leadership is (#girlboss). Willow of course is the ur-nerd wiccan GF, has great hair, and she has the gap moe of how awful her outfits start as vs how great they end up being.

Xander is a total hottie and I like his character a lot, its just his character doesn't gel with his hotness so he can't lean into it. Oz is great but just never gets enough screen time, Tara is obviously adorable but is sometimes a fashion disaster (her hair, by the gods) and isn't my type.

Joyce fucks Giles twice on the hood of a police car. She makes it onto the list of two living people on earth Spike respects. She pulls a guy so hard he is sending bouquets to her door while recovering from brain surgery the same week she literally dies. Joyce is a certified Milf, don't even try.

Angel is just way too much, man. Like calm down, get a job or something. Hey, he does that in his spin-off, and calms down! Glad he took my advice. Cordelia is ofc attractive, and definitely has depth - but the intensity of her hostility is just annoying at times, its hard to imagine a relationship with her. Anya is hilarious but her style of hilarity is anti-attractive for me, it friend-zones her, and she isn't my type to boot.

Look. You saw season 7. I saw season 7. We all saw Eurotrip in 2004 in the basement of our neighbor's rented summer home at the Jersey Shore at 2 am because American Pie was funny, right, and this film might have someone just as hot as that Russian chick in that one so why not, and its two months after your best friend just had sex for the first time and told you and now women, romance, are becoming real to you in a way they weren't before, and then Michelle Trachtenberg sways on screen with that effortless girl-next-door sensuality, a touch of the ethereal in the flow of her hair and the shine of her eyes, and the entire movie is a dumbass bro comedy but it changes you all the same, lodging in your brain a kind of sexuality that is, for the first time, as obtainable as it is intimidating. And then you watch Buffy for the first time four years later, late nights spent on bootleg streaming sites with Chinese subtitles recovering from a mind-numbing internship at Law Corp Incorporated, and Season 5 roles around and you don't even recognize her; she's a kid, a whiny teen, an object for Buffy to arc around. And she stays that way until Season 7 opens and suddenly you see her again, in this liminal space dancing with adulthood; she exists now in two forms in your mind. And you really can't say it.

But you know. We know. I know. And that is all there is to say.

Buffy Seasons Tier List, hm...ordered in tiers:

S Tier: Season 6, Season 3

A Tier: Season 5

B Tier: Season 7, Season 4, Season 2

C Tier: Season 1

Back in the day I would have put Season 1 in D tier, and often would recommend skipping it to newcomers. I don't think that anymore - if you don't want high school campy antics why are you watching early Buffy at all? Cringe is dead, get vored by a Praying Mantis Milf and love every second of it.

Season 6 is always going to be my favorite - its the depression season, its the Spike season, its the season with the musical episode. Its just so thematically bold in its choices that it justifies all its missteps. Season 3 is more consistent, the best of the high school themes, and it has some real directorially audacious episodes. And also Faith <3. But it lacks the maturity compared to Season 6.

Season 5 is like this hyper-deep Buffy character study which no season matches. And also Spike <3. But has some listlessness in the plot and Dawn isn't well done. Season 7 is thematically amazing, like such a great conceptual twist to the structure of the show, but the execution is haphazard. I discussed Season 4, and Season 2 is very similar to Season 3 but just worse, less creative, and suffers in the comparison.

#buffy the vampire slayer

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c-is-for-circinate · 4 years ago

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Wait, isn't "anti" stuff more like "anti-pedophilia" and stuff? Like, you have a point about anti-porn attitudes, but from what I've heard just "anti" on its own means against stuff like kid porn and incest porn and legitimately f*cked up sh*t like that.

Okay! So this, I think, is actually a great example of what I was talking about, and a really useful thing to understand. (CW rape, child abuse, etc)

Smarter people than me have written much better essays about why policing thoughtcrimes is a bad road to go down, and I will probably reblog some of them next time they cross my dash for more context. What I want to talk about is the trigger mechanism, the ‘oh, this looks like danger!!!’ immune response in how we look at different kinds of porn, and how that applies to anti culture.

Here’s the thing: I am anti-pedophilia. I think that, for most people, that’s a stance that largely goes without saying! Adults who prey on children are bad. I’m also against incest; relatives who prey on their family members are bad. Above all I oppose rape. Sexual predation of any kind is bad. In fact, I’d say that’s the most important item on the list. There is plenty of room to argue about where the lines are between ‘adult’ and ‘child’ and how teenagers fit in the middle, and there’s plenty of room to get historical about the lines between ethically terrible incest, distasteful-but-bearable “aristocratic inbreeding” between distant cousins, and the kind of consanguinity that tends to develop in a small town where everyone’s vaguely related to everyone else by now anyway. The core of the issue is consent, and it has always been consent. Pedophilia and incest are horrific because they are rape scenarios where the abuser has far more power and their victim far fewer resources to cope, both practically and emotionally; because harm to children is, to us as a culture, worse than harm to adults, for a lot of very valid reasons; and because they constitute betrayal of trust the victim should have been able to put in their abuser as well as rape--but they are all rape scenarios, and that’s why they’re awful.

These things are bad. It is good for us to have a social immune response system that recognizes these things when they’re happening and insists we step in. That is a good thing to develop! It helps us, as a society. It can help the people being victimized. It’s the same reason educators and childcare workers in the US are all mandated reporters, why we do background checks on people working near kids. These things happen, and they’re terrible, and it’s good that we try to be aware and prepared for them. (Though obviously studies show we’re a lot less good at protecting the vulnerable than we’d like to pretend we are.)

The question is: why does that same social immune response trigger, and trigger so angrily, in response to fiction?

Anti culture is fundamentally an expression of that social immune response. Specifically, it’s that social immune response when it is set off by a situation that, while it has some similarities to the very bad real-life crime of sexual predation including pedophilia and incest, is in and of itself harmless.

If you’re instinct is to flare up in anger or dismissiveness because I’m calling these things harmless, I want to ask you to just take a deep breath and bear with me for a bit longer. What you’re feeling right now is an allergic reaction.

Humans tell and read and listen to stories about “legitimately fucked up shit” all the time. It’s part of the human condition. It’s part of how we process those things happening, not just to use, but to other people in the world around us. It’s part of how we process completely unrelated fucked-up shit, playing with fears and furies and insecurities that we all have, through so may layers of fiction that we don’t even recognize them any more, playing with power dynamics in metaphor and making characters suffer for fun. Aside from the fact that literally all stories do this to some extent or another; aside from the fact that drawing lines between ‘ok that’s good storytelling’ and ‘that’s too fucked-up to write about’ is arbitrary, subjective, and dangerous in its own right; aside from all of that, these stories are stories. All of them.

Even the ones about rape, about incest, about pedophilia. They’re words on a page. No real children were harmed, touched, or even glanced at in the making of this work of fiction. This story, pornographic though it may be, is part of a conversation between consenting adults. (And if a teenager lies about their age to consent, that is a different problem altogether.)

Stories in and of themselves, no matter what they’re about, are no more dangerous than a crate full of oranges. Which is to say: utterly harmless, unless all you have to eat is oranges, all day every day, and you find yourself dying slowly of nutrient deficiency--which is why representation matters. Or unless someone wields one deliberately, violently, as a tool to cause harm, and someone gets acid in their eye--which is the fault of the person holding the orange. And unless you happen to be allergic to citrus.

The key here is this twofold understanding: First, the thing that hurts you can also have value to others. Real, legitimate value. Whether you’ve undergone trauma and certain story elements are straight-up PTSD triggers or you just don’t like orange juice, that story, those tropes, that crate of oranges may be somewhere between icky and fundamentally abhorrent--but we understand that that is still your reaction. Even if you don’t understand how anybody could ever enjoy it; even if every single person you surround yourself with is as sensitive and disgusted and itchy about this thing that makes your eyes hurt and your throat stop working as you; that doesn’t make it true for everyone. That doesn’t make oranges poisonous. No real children were involved in the writing of this story. It is words on a page.

But, secondly: the thing that has value to others can also hurt you. Just because a story isn’t inherently poison doesn’t mean it can’t cause you, personally, pain. That’s what a PTSD trigger is: an allergic reaction, psychological anaphylaxis, a brain that’s trying so hard to protect its own from a threat that isn’t actually present (but was once, and the brain is trained to respond) that it causes far more harm and misery than the trigger itself possibly could. And no, it’s not just people with PTSD who sometimes get hurt by stories. There are many, many ways a story can poke the part of your brain that says, this is Bad, I don’t like this, I don’t want to be here. The story is still, always, every time, pixels on a screen and ink on paper. The story causes no physical harm. But it can poke your brain into misery, it can stir up your emotions, it can make you want to cringe and run away. It can make you want to scream and fight and go after the author who brought this thing into existence. It can make you hurt.

This is an allergic reaction. This is your brain and body, your reflexes and instincts, trying to protect you from something that isn’t really happening. And just like a literal allergic reaction, it can do actual harm to you if it gets set off. This is real. The fact that stories can upset you to the point of pain and mental/emotional injury is real, even though it’s coming from your own brain and not the story itself. There are stories you shouldn’t read. There are stories I shouldn’t read, regret reading, will never read, because they hurt me. That doesn’t mean they’re the same stories that would hurt you. That doesn’t mean they don’t have value.

And, finally:

If getting upset about stories is fundamentally an individual person’s allergic reaction, their brain freaking out and firing off painful survival instincts in the face of a thing that isn’t, in and of itself, a threat? Then the anti movement is a cultural allergic reaction.

Fandom as a whole has a pretty active immune system, which doesn’t mean we have a good immune system. We try very hard to be aware of all the viruses and -isms and abuse and manipulation and cruelty, both systematic and individual, that exists around and within our community. We’re primed and ready to shout about things at all times. The anti movement is that system, that culture, screaming and shouting and fighting at a harmless thing on a grand scale. It wants to stop that thing, that scary awful thing that trips all of its well-primed danger sensors, at all costs. It’ll swell up and block off our airways (our archives) if it has to. It’ll turn on the body it came from. It’s scared and protective and trying to fight, and it’s ready to fight and destroy itself.

Luckily, fans and fanfic and fandom and fan culture are a lot bigger and older than they often get credit for, and it’s not like these cultural allergies are anything new. We could talk about shippers and slashers in the X-Files fandom in the 90s. We could talk about the birth of fandom in the days of Star Trek. We could talk about censorship and book burning going back centuries. We survived that and we’ll survive this, too.

But god, does the anti movement my throat and eyes itch. Man is it irritating, and sometimes a little suffocating, to realize how many stories just aren’t getting told out of fear of what the antis will say. And that’s the real danger, I think. What are we losing that would have so much value to someone? What are we missing out?

#fandom #anti culture #anti-anti #I guess?#asked and answered #you are not WRONG or BAD or BROKEN if a story hurt you #but neither is the story #Anonymous #anti discourse day

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greenix · 3 years ago

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Ficlet warning AHOY!!!

The short summary of this one is "Ingo instilling in Kamado the fear God" (deserved)

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Ingo was a weird man, in Commander Kamado's opinion.

He never felt a certain need for violence, it seems, preferring to decide who's right and who's wrong with both sides in mind. He never pressed for the truth in its purest form, and never seeked constants. He also almost seemed… disgusted, by the way some people of Jubilife village lost their dreams in the world of harsh reality.

The way he handled pokémons, the way he presented himself; it all was strange. Alien, almost, to this time and world.

A man of Ideals, really. If not for his skills, Kamado thought, this man would've died in the nearest ditch, eaten alive by Zoruas or burned to crisps in Rapidash's fire. That was just the truth.

Kamado sighed, massaging his temples with vigor. If Ingo wasn't special, he would have not survived.

He didn't dwelled on it for long. He had a business to attend to, after all, he had to sort his paperwork, scan some details, and determine all pros and cons. Put people here and there, check his troops.

He did exile Akari not too long ago; his, sadly, most trusted member. The most experienced too, so that made rifts in the ceduce and plans, a hole.

Kamado didn't anticipate visitors. Much less, the one he got.

"Warden Ingo," He began, feeling the hair on his neck rise, for some reason. Was it always so hard to breathe in this room? "I wasn't expecting you."

"You should have." Ingo said, and Kamado saw how the fingers of his interlocutor twitched.

"Why so?"

The gaze this statement was met with made Kamado pause.

"You disembarked a passenger." He said. "You promised a safe trip, but dropped the child off as soon as breaks were hit."

"I don't know what are you trying to say, but if it's about Akari you don't have anything to say in this matter-"

A pair of hands was planted loudly against his table. "It might be self proclaimed, but I am her uncle." He hissed, a sound so close in likeness to an ominous clap of thunder. "I think I have everything to say."

Kamado didn't even see when the man got close to his desk.

Ingo's breath smelled of ozone, his silver eyes tinting to electric blue. It sent lightning down Kamado's spine.

He pushed through it. "My desire-"

"Do not paint me as stupid, Commander, because you'd be disappointed to know that I am not. I know of your desire, I hear and see, and feel it, loud and clear." Ingo had replied, awfully soft. "Your Ideal is to protect your passengers, the people of this village. To always ensure they will be at their home station, without rust and cracked paint."

He leaned forward. "I can respect that. You are conducting this train to the best of your abilities, but." A strange pressure, that Kamado swears up and down wasn't there before, threatens to break his spine. "You have no right to decide when the passenger leaves. You have no damn right to break someone else's Belief."

Ingo's eyes shone in the sudden semi-darkness of the room. He reeked with energy, raw and violent and hateful, and all Kamado could think of was:

Danger.

One wrong move, or word, or glance and a man once called "Kamado" will exist no longer. Killed, shredded, buried alive — no matter, because there wouldn't be Him to complain.

He truthfully believed in this thought.

And suddenly, Ingo reeled back. He stood, full height, hands behind his back. His trusted cap darkened his eyes, still illuminated by lone sparks, as his gaze tore into Kamado's soul. His usual nonchalance frown now felt as menacing as it did the first day.

It felt like a warning.

"I end my announcement here." Ingo said, bowing his head. He still sounded too soft, too flat for the statement to feel normal. "Let us depart on this, Commander."

He turned, still eyeing him from being his shoulder and continued:

"Have a nice day."

And promptly shut the door with a loud bang.

Kamado wasn't able to move for the next five minutes. He didn't want to think about what happened for another ten. When it finally fully hit him, an hour had already passed.

Ingo was long gone from the Jubilife village.

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I also wanted to put in a phrase "If Kamado believes Ingo is dangerous, then he will become the embodiment of Danger" from Ingo's pov but couldn't find a place for it to fit :(

ooOOOOOH HOLY ARCEUS OP THIS IS SO GOOD I LOVE IT VERRRY MUCH BRAVO!!!! SUPER BRAVO!!!!!! the subtle thunder and lightning imagery with Ingo is exxxxcelllllent oh my goodness and I love the pressure and danger he gives off without even really doing anything perceived as dangerous !!! thank you so much op!!!

#submas twin dragons au #submas #YEEAAAH #ficlet #not my writing #fuck kamado up #get his ass #etc #profanity tw for my tags #aspect au

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thesunicarusfellfor · 4 years ago

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hello!!can you do a part two of your Yandere!Tommy x Reader x Yandere!Tubbo Headcanons/Fic ?! i loved it!!

It amazes me how this became a fan favourite OVERNIGHT like daaaaamn!

This one is gonna be split into parts around the end, so like what happens if you choose Tubbo/Tommy/Neither/Both

(f/l) = first letter of your name

(N/n) = nickname

(f/f) = Favourite flowers

Eggpire does not exist

ALSO. The last Route (Neither) I wrote is shorter because apparently, Tumblr wants to crash after you surpass 10k words, but I could write a continuation fic of Neither that might turn into another x reader? Just platonic? Not sure. Remember, I will always write a continuation of a fic if ever asked.

TW: Yandere, Explosions, Burns, Scars, Manipulation, Mention of Painkillers and being drowsy on them, brief mention of collapsing

Part one

Yandere!Tommy x GN!Reader x Yandere!Tubbo Headcanon/Fic Part 2

Tommy was furious to see you spending time with anyone that wasn’t him.

But seeing you having an early morning coffee with Ranboo??? Tubbo’s husband???

He was about to light the damn house on fire he was so pissed! That’s not even exaggerating, he would’ve and had you live with him! Although he wouldn’t let you know he did it.

Poor Ranboo was trembling so bad, genuinely fearing for his canon lives.

You quickly got up and stood in Tommy’s sight, prevent him from glaring at your tall friend, although he still didn’t look happy.

Before anyone could say anything else, Tubbo stormed through the door with his sword in his hand and teeth violently grit together.

“So... You weren’t trying to throw me off by writing about going to see them in your memory book,” Tubbo growled softly at his husband causing Ranboo to desperately pull his memory book closer to his chest, tears brimming his eyes. You could understand why, his best friend went through his memory book without his knowledge and possibly went through his other things in an attempt to figure out what he was doing.

“I guess neither of you are loyal...” Tommy grumbled with a roll of his eyes, causing Tubbo to give him a hard jab in the ribs, “Ow! Bloody hell, mate! I’m just saying both of you are going for them without even breaking up first!”

“It’s platonic!” Both Tubbo and Ranboo stated although Ranboo’s voice came out as a tiny and meek protest, rather than Tubbo’s annoyed growl. Clearing his throat awkwardly, Ranboo put his crown back on his head, “I’m-I’m not interested in chasing them, so no... I was just talking to them...” He visibly shrank in on himself as the two boys glared darkly at him, “I... Should go...”

“Hold up.” You pointed at him, making the tall and lanky male stay seated in his spot while you turned back to Tubbo and Tommy, “I know why Ranboo is here. I know why he,” You pointed to Tommy, “Is here. He always kicks down my door early in the morning to do some crazy things. But why are you here?” Moving your finger to point at Tubbo, you noticed his look immediately softened upon you turning your attention towards him.

His cheeks became a light pink and his goat ears fluttered slightly as he put his sword away, “Am I not allowed to visit?” There. There was one of the mood switches and manipulation Ranboo warned you about. “Tommy invited me to L’Manberg, and I heard my beloved platonic husband was in the area as well. Plus Tommy left the door open.”

You blinked a bit, caught off guard by the fact that Tubbo completely brushed over the fact that he was here because he had read Ranboo’s memory book, “Oh, I see... Then shall we all go mining today? We’d be able to get a lot more ores than before!” You smiled, pretending that your two friends didn’t kick down your door and threaten the man who was just trying to protect you.

“With Tubbo and Ranboo?” Tommy growled out in disgust at the thought of you spending time with them, “But (Y/n)! We always go mining on Thursday mornings! It’s our thing. Between just US! Aka, not Tubbo and Ranboo...”

“I- uh, have a meeting with Techno and Phil later today, so I can’t go. Sorry, (Y/n)...” Ranboo murmured, although you could tell by the shakiness of his voice that he wanted nothing more than to run and hide in his panic room.

“I’d love to go!” Tubbo chirped softly, ignoring the audible noise of disgust and annoyance that Tommy made, “Let me just get my stuff from my enderchest.” He walked over to your enderchest and opened it. You didn’t mind too much as you gave everyone full permission to make themselves at home in your house, but you were just a bit shaken up at the moment.

Ranboo quickly got up and scurried out the door, giving you an odd look as he passed by. He looked... Guilty, but his smile was sad and soft, but seemingly affectionate. You knew he would help if these two were scaring you too much.

The two boys brought you to an unpopular mine in the DreamSMP that was filled to the brim with ores.

They were quick to take down any and all mobs that came within any sort of distance to you, recklessly charging without a second thought in attempts to protect you.

While there was intense amounts of fear and tension circling through your veins because of this morning, you did quickly grow to have fun with the banter between these two.

Even Tommy and Tubbo were having fun bickering, almost seeming to forget the fact that they were in a war with each other. Almost.

The constant fluttering of their hearts and warmth on their cheeks was an easy reminder of what they were fighting for.

Every single ore, gemstone and pretty rock that you looked at, the boys would immediately pick up and put in their bags so you didn’t have to carry it.

When Tommy began to whine about being hungry, you wanted to go back to the surface to eat the food you had packed, but they both thought that was too far.

So, you suggested sitting down in the abandoned mineshaft you had discovered.

“Ooh!” Tubbo squeaked, his ears wiggling as he turned the corner of the mineshaft, “There’s a ravine over here! Let’s eat by the light of the lava so we don’t waste all our torches!”

“Finally! I’m starving!” Tommy tossed his ore-filled bag off of his shoulder and set it against the wall. Once you spread out the thick blanket you had brought on the ground, he plopped himself down and set down his shield and sword, “What do you have for food today, Big/Little (F/l)?”

You hummed as Tubbo sat himself down on the other side of you with a yawn, likely not used to getting up early, “I have... Sandwiches, some fruit slices, berries, y’know, the usual. You tired, Tubbo?” Glancing over at the brunet, you saw him rubbing his eyes with the long sleeve of his brown and yellow striped sweater that you had made him when he first travelled to Snowchester.

“Little bit, yeah. Can I lay against you? Just for a little bit?” He asked softly as you handed Tommy a sandwich, which he practically inhaled in seconds. Once you gave a nod of approval, the smaller boy laid down and curled up with his head against your lap.

Tommy grumbled in annoyance and without thinking much, laid down as well with his head against your leg too. When you gave him a small questioning look as this was highly out character for him, but he simply just mumbled about how you were definitely more comfortable than the rocks.

You weren’t sure how long you sat there, unconsciously playing with their hair as you glanced around the stone walls for any untouched ores, but by now both boys were asleep and you didn’t feel like waking them up. Taking your time, you began to consider your situation now that you knew both boys were smitten with you and practically willing to hurt anyone who came in contact with you.

Tubbo’s mood switches scared you, a lot, and you were worried that him being the nice and blushing boy you had met a few years ago was nothing but an act and that all the gifts were an attempt to lure you in or distract you from his violent tendencies. You had watched him walk into your house, eyes blank and filled with rage towards his platonic soulmate for talking to you without his knowledge, and you were worried that soon that rage would be directed at you for doing something he didn’t like.

Tommy’s violent tendencies were just as scary though, so he wasn’t in the clear in your eyes either. While he did shape up a lot from when you first met, he still had a tendency to bark insults at you and hurt your feelings, which you hope is unintentional. He also often tried to threaten people and keep them away from you, like Eret or Niki who got yelled at and a tad bit injured after they had given you gifts or offered to bring you somewhere cool... They didn’t really spend time with you anymore after that... You missed them and didn’t want the same thing to happen to Ranboo.

But, this couldn’t go on forever. You couldn’t just run... and you knew very well that rejecting either of the two would cause the other to lash out severely, to the point where the one you chose, you, and your friends were in major trouble. It’s not like you could choose both right? ...Right? Then again... Choosing both would potentially cause tension to stir up again between the two best friends.

Your train of thought was violently derailed when you heard a hard thud a few meters in front of you. With a small gasp, you looked up and saw a creature of varying different shades of green slowly looking around before a few more thuds followed behind it. Before you could even think of waking the two boys, the green creature began to run at you quickly with its four legs.

A creeper.

A terrified cry left your lips and suddenly the weight on your lap vanished. Now awake, Tommy immediately grabbed his shield and used it alongside his body weight to slam into the creeper backwards into a small horde of zombies that had dropped down with it. “Get up you dumbass! Are you tryin’ to die?!” The blond yelled at you as Tubbo, who had also sprung up at the sound of your fear, began firing arrows at the group of mobs.

Once you got over your shock, you grabbed your axe and shield before quickly jumping to your feet and charging into battle. The zombie you had chosen to fight gurgled and swiped and gnashed its teeth together at you as you used your shield to block its hits. Backing up a few steps, you slashed your axe at the undead mob and took out its bottom jaw with the black blade, gleaming with an enchantment that set the creature on fire. The smell of burning rotten flesh caused you to gag and scrunch up your nose before you used your shield to shove it into the pit of lava at the bottom of the ravine.

Laughing softly in triumph, you turn around to help Tubbo and Tommy, only to let out another gasp of shock as you saw the very creeper that had been shoved away earlier had now returned with a vengeance. And it was mere inches away from your face.

There wasn’t much you could do except barely raise your shield in time to block a good majority of the explosion from damaging your body, launching chunks of stone outwards and off the edge of the ravine.

And you as well.

“(Y/n)!!!” Tubbo’s voice echoed through the stone cavern as you felt yourself get launched backwards before beginning to fall, gravity quickly beginning to grasp onto you and drag you down towards the lava below.

Reaching out, to grab onto anything that would stop you from falling, but to no avail. Your mind barely registered Tommy and Tubbo running towards you before you shut your eyes tightly, silently praying to whatever or whoever to save you.

Then you stopped dead in the air, something wrapped around your arms and hands.

Taking a deep breath, you opened your eyes and looked up to see the human and a goat hybrid that had been laying with their heads in your lap just minutes ago, were now desperately grasping one arm each, preventing you from falling to the end of one of your canon lives. Both of their blue eyes were filled with tears that were dripping down their faces and hitting the molten rock at the bottom of the ravine as they struggled to pull you up.

Once you felt the solid ground below you, you finally managed to take a few breaths to calm yourself down as you felt tight arms wrap around you on either side, barely able to comprehend the sobs of terror from your savours. The dull burning and throbbing pain on your cheek were enough to bring you down to reality and carefully wrap your arms around the two wailing teens as they desperately clung to you, almost as if you were going to vanish right below their fingertips.

Tommy was the first to gather himself and pull himself away from your good shoulder and rub his eyes free of tears to look at the new injuries covering your body and your busted armour, “F-fuck... We’re gonna have to get you to Phil to get those burns patched up...” He sniffled, trying to act like he wasn’t just bawling his eyes out over you nearly losing a canon life. For once, he didn’t seem to mind Tubbo clinging onto you and wailing into your side as you pet his hair, trying to calm him down.

Tubbo refused to let go of you for the next hour as you travelled out of the mine, his arms desperately wrapped around your waist/shoulders. (Depending on your height)

Tommy also held onto your non-burnt hand, that once held your shield, as he carried yours and his bag, leading you both back the way you came

If another mob came out to fight, it was almost a guarantee that one of them would run forward and the other would lightly push you into a corner, then proceed to block you from view via a shield and their body,

Even if you thought that you were in a decent enough condition to fight, the one shielding you would only look at you sadly and shake their head, saying something about the explosion burns along your (s/t) skin.

Once you had gotten out of the mine, it was around 6pm, and the sun was going down, but luckily Tommy had sent a message to Philza, his father, about the situation, so he was prepared and already at Tommy’s house, which was the closest to the mine.

It wasn’t a long walk, but god you were so exhausted..

It got to the point where Tommy and Tubbo were on either side of you, preventing you from collapsing before you got to the home.

Let’s just say, when they opened the door, Philza was already there and immediately panicked upon seeing the injuries covering the one side of you and the state of your armour. (No you were not wearing the god armour Tubbo gave you.)

One of your cheeks and lower jaw were burnt and bleeding, along with your dominant arm and leg that weren’t behind the shield when the explosion went off.

Tommy Route - Mellohi

Because your home still being near L’Manberg and the Prime Path (In this route), it was easier for Tommy to check up on you while you were healing from your injuries.

While you were bedridden, Tommy was a lot, a lot, quieter when he came into your house, never sure whether or not you were sleeping.

If you weren’t, he would eagerly show you something he found, tell you some drama he heard around the area, or tell you about his day. Or just play Mellohi on constant repeat.

If you were asleep, he would silently walk over and check on your bandages or potion supply, (updating Phil if you were low or bleeding from moving too much), or even sit beside you for a little bit to make sure you wouldn’t just stop breathing out of nowhere.

To say he was scared your entire recovery process would be an understatement.

He would rarely let anyone but Phil check on you, definitely nearly blowing his nerve when Ranboo or Tubbo would walk into your house.

If it was Ranboo, we would definitely get picked up and thrown,

If it was Tubbo, he would try and push him out because he knew that threats wouldn’t work on him.

In the situation that he did push Tubbo out, Tommy would immediately lock the door and stay in there for the next few days

For the more likely situation, because we all know how stubborn that goat is, and he wasn’t able to push Tubbo out, Tommy would subtly put a few drops of the sleeping potion Phil made you, into your drink.

When you began to doze off, Tommy would mention it to Tubbo in the most serious voice he could muster. It always worked, because Tubbo wanted what was best for your health.

The absolute minute that Philza deems you stable enough to get off of bed rest, Tommy is by your side in seconds and trying to encourage you to stand up.

When you do get the nerve to try and stand again, he would immediately be holding your good arm, preventing you from falling if your bad leg suddenly gave out.

In the case that you do collapse from your injuries, he would at first be extremely panicked, but then he’d start calling you insulting names and calling you an idiot.

He would bring you on walks all around the DreamSMP to get you used to walking again but would have no problems sitting down again.

That’s a lie.

He would complain a little bit, but if he saw you were genuinely in a lot of pain, he would just shut up and awkwardly ask what he could do.

If you needed anything for pain, he would straight up run to your home and get it, if they already didn’t have it.

The fact that you’re spending so much time with Tommy absolutely infuriates Tubbo, and he tries to guilt-trip you into spending more time with him.

But then Ranboo tells him that you can barely walk down the Prime Path without wanting to cry from the pain of the burns, and he offers to move back to L’Manberg. Or at least what’s left of it.

This sparks an argument between Ranboo and Tubbo almost immediately, but you’re much too tired to try and stop it, instead quietly asking Tommy if he can help go back to your home or to get them out so you could sleep.

He would be glad to.

Like he would do it, with an absolute goofy smile on his face because he basically gets your permission to have your attention all to himself!

When you’re all healed, your relationship between you and Tommy has practically tripled from what it was.

You’re much closer to him than he was to Tubbo, to the point where he has told you everything.

Even about his exile...

Because of your closeness to him, he somehow got even more protective but also calmed down his threats.

Like, now you could talk to Niki and Eret again, but you were not allowed to leave your house at night alone, especially after mobs have spawned.

Hell sometimes if he’s really paranoid, he’ll go to your house and spend the night just to make sure mobs don’t bang on your door or ruin anything.

He straight up took the time out of his life to fence the property around your house off and fill it with torches so things didn’t spawn in.

Sure he’ll call you slightly insulting names, but he makes sure that they wouldn’t be too painful for you before saying them aloud.

Tubbo still tries to be nice and manipulative, which Ranboo tries to stop, but it’s pretty much worthless at this point.

He’s lost.

He knows it, Ranboo knows it, and Tommy damn well brags about it.

Tubbo does end up crying to you quite a bit about it, but you can understand, he’s heartbroken at this point and can’t do anything about it. Tommy and you know about his manipulation tactics, he couldn’t take Tommy’s last life because it would show up on your communicator, and then you would never love him!

Unfortunately, this does cause him to lash out at Ranboo quite a lot which led to their third divorce. Although this one seems quite a bit more permanent, you never know. (Ranboo took Michael)

One evening, Tommy invited you out of the house oddly enough. Even though mobs would be spawning soon? It greatly confused you.

He even asked you to wear nicer clothing? Like a tux or a dress? Either one or both worked in his eyes.

Honestly, you weren’t sure how you were supposed to fight mobs in a fancy outfit, but you trusted him.

“Tommy?” You asked, opening the door as you smoothed out your clothing with your hands and adjusted your hair a tad bit to your liking. It was shocking to see the tall blond nicely cleaned up and wearing a suit, but it was quite a welcome sight!

He nervously adjusted his red tie before holding out a bouquet of perfect (f/f), and cleared his throat, “You... Uh... Clean up nice. I- uh... No- wait... What did Sam say again?” He murmured to himself, “Ah fuck it... You look nice, (Y/n).”

You chuckled as your cheeks flushed a light pink, happily taking the bouquet filled with your favourite flowers, “I’ll put these in a vase and then we can go where you wanna bring me.” With a smile, you quickly placed the flowers in a glass vase filled with water before going back out with Tommy.

“Sh-shall we? Is that a common phrase to say?” He asked as he held out his arm for you to link with his, a habit he picked up from walking you around while you were healing.

“I suppose we shall. Calm down Tommy, no need to be all fancy and stuff around me.” You chirped with a small smiled as you took his arm, linking it with his, “Now, are you going to tell me where we’re going? Or is this supposed to remain a mystery?”

Tomathy visibly relaxed once you told him he didn’t have to be all professional and fancy, beginning to lead you down the Prime Path, “It’s a secret! I worked hard on it too! So you better be grateful or I’ll kick your ass.” He jokingly threatened, smiling a bit as you laughed at his typical attitude.

He led you down the wooden path, the two of you joking the entire way with a goofy smile across your faces. Tommy then took a sudden turn onto a newly made pathway and lead you down it, never answering any questions about it the entire way, even when the buildings turned into a forest. The pathway was lined with fences, and the trees were filled with small hanging lanterns, not only preventing mobs from spawning but also creating a beautiful fairy forest effect.

Seeing your look of awe, he gave a small sheepish laugh, “You like it? Puffy and Sam helped me out with it for the past few days, but this was my idea! And this isn’t even the best part!” He grinned widely before quickly pulling you along again.

The walk wasn’t very long, but it was extremely beautiful. Eventually, he brought you up to a large hill with a massive oak tree where a beautiful picnic was set up, surrounded by lantern light. Even with the lanterns, you were still able to get a clear view of the starry sky above without a single cloud in sight! “Oh my god... Tommy... This is incredible...”

“Innit? Puffy helped me make all the food, but this was my idea. Unless you don’t like it. Then it was Puffy’s idea.” He joked in an attempt to hide his nervousness as he went to ruffle his hair, but then remembered that he had spent a few hours taming it down, so he decided against it.

“I love it! This is so beautiful!” You looked up at him with a bright and happy smile, making him return it with a soft smile of his own, “Come on, oh! There’s a jukebox!” You eagerly pulled him over to the blanket and sat down, taking a look at all the food that had been set out.

The tall male happily took a disc, Mellohi to be precise, out of the enderchest that had been set beside the jukebox, neatly placing it in and pressing the button to make the music play before he sat down beside you. The two of you began to eat the meal that he helped make, joking, laughing and smiling the entire time, having the time of your life. You leaned your head against his shoulder and smiled up at him as you gently held his hand, making him realize even more how important you were to him.

Mellohi, the same song he lost his friend to, was the same song he was listening to while gaining a new important person in his life. You.

The entire night went on with you two eventually falling asleep at the top of the hill, completely unaware of the brown-haired male leaning against a tree. He desperately grasped his shirt where his heart was as tears poured down his shirt.

Tubbo always liked Cat more than Mellohi...

Tubbo Route - Don’t Let Me Fall

Tubbo was so so glad that he had managed to convince (manipulate) you to live in Snowchester when he did. (In this route)

Somehow managed to convince you to live in the mansion, although it was probably done when you were drowsy on the pain killer potion Phil gave you.

This man would completely ignore his own country to make sure you were well taken care of. Like Ranboo literally had to step into power and start working on things and taking care of Michael.

Speaking of the baby zombie piglin, because you were now bedridden and bored out of your mind, Tubbo frequently brought the child in if Ranboo absolutely demanded that he take over for a bit.

The baby absolutely adored you! The injuries on your body reminded you of the ones he got when he travelled to the overworld, so he didn’t feel alone.

Unfortunately because of your constant pain and drowsiness, Tubbo thought it was best that he stayed in his room. Or maybe that was because he didn’t want him getting close to you too?

It was actually extremely rare for Tubbo to let anyone in to visit you. He actually even got incredibly annoyed when even Phil would come over to restock the potions for you or make sure your wounds were healing.

On a normal day, if you were awake, Tubbo would be blabbering on about some story without a care whether or not you were listening. He would most likely be acting the story out as if it were a play, determined to provide you with as much entertainment by himself as he could.

If you were sleeping, he would also be sleeping, although on a few chairs pushed together in your room. There’s a rare time where he will stay up and watch you to make sure you’re breathing still, but that’s only if he’s really scared and paranoid.

Tommy absolutely REFUSES to even look at Snowchester, so you never really got a chance to thank him for saving you.

Although... Tubbo very actively tries to convince you that Tommy didn’t even come to help you when you had fallen and that you had been in shock so that’s why you didn’t remember correctly.

At first, you didn’t believe him, but eventually, with constant repetition, you slowly saw it as the truth. You genuinely began to believe that Tommy hadn’t pulled you up and that it was only Tubbo that did.

After quite a few weeks, Phil told Tubbo that you could finally get out of bed, but Tubbo asked him if he was 100% sure MANY times.

The goat hybrid actually didn’t want you to get out of bed and start walking again, worried that you get up would leave him, so he wasn’t going to tell you.

But Ranboo was the one who told you.

This led to quite a violent argument between Ranboo and Tubbo, but there was nothing Tubbo could do since you already knew the information he tried to keep from you.

Tubbo started ignoring you, so Ranboo was the one to try and get you used to walking around again, but this lead to the shorter male getting extremely jealous and helping you instead.

He frequently walks you around Snowchester on a strict set schedule, when he knows no one will be out and no mobs will be spawning.

One time, he didn’t expect Tommy to be walking around the snowy forests when he was walking with you, holding your hand to make sure you didn’t lose your balance. At least that’s what he told you.

Tommy looked... Empty, when he saw you both walking together. But his eyes darkened a bit when his blue eyes landed on your hands twinned together.

Tubbo looked a little hostile in your eyes, but he simply just gave Tommy a sharp smile before trying to pull you along as if he didn’t notice the tears beginning to pool in his ex-best friend’s eyes.

Tommy knew he lost right then and there, so he decided to say fuck it and start screaming degrading names at the two of you, catching you greatly off guard, hurting you badly enough to the point where your feelings were more than a little hurt.

When the founder of Snowchester realized that the blond hurt your feelings, he was quick to lash out back at the other man in your defence, but by then you were already walking away, back to the manor.

It took about ten minutes for him to realize that you went back to the mansion, but when he did, he sprinted through the door in an absolute panic before practically pouncing on you the second his eyes caught sight of you.

He protectively wrapped himself around you and whispered sweet nothings into your ear as you quietly rested your head against his shoulder.

After that, You and Tubbo became a lot closer emotionally. To the point where he called you his platonic wife jokingly, although you both knew he didn’t want to add platonic at the beginning.

He began to tell you about everything that weighed heavy on his shoulders, like his death from Technoblade’s fireworks, even to being threatened by Dream during the disc war.

When he noticed that you were genuinely beginning to care about him, his manipulation and jealousy actually began to calm down quite a lot.

You could actually spend time with Michael and Ranboo without anyone getting yelled at by Tubbo and causing him to get ridiculously jealous.

He began to take over his job as the founder of Snowchester, now actually trusting Ranboo to keep you company and even letting him take you outside during the day. But he refused to let you out during the night.

He’s just worried about mobs. Creepers especially.

Everything seems relatively like it was before that one day before Tommy and Tubbo completely lashed out at each other.

Tommy does often try and talk to you when Tubbo isn’t around, but both you and Ranboo try and put a stop to it as quickly as possible,

He’s lost.

He hurt you, and Ranboo couldn’t help but miss how Tubbo used to be, so if keeping Tommy away from you makes Tubbo act normal, he will damn well make sure that Tommy stays countries away from you.

This does cause Wilbur’s younger brother to break down a little bit, which you can genuinely understand, even if you hold a grudge against him for not saving you and yelling at you, you knew he did have feelings for you at one point even if he refused to admit it.

Unfortunately, this does cause quite a bit of pranks and explosions to stir up around Snowchester and the L’Manberg crater, but they stop within a few weeks. Tommy probably got scolded by either Sam, Phil or Puffy,

One morning, Tubbo invited you to spend a day outside of the mansion with him after a heavy snowfall.

He spent almost all morning outside, doing something he refused to tell you about, and when he came in to wake you up, his face was already cherry red from the cold.

How could he even want to go back into the freezing cold without any sort of warm drink or even sitting in front of the fire for a bit!?

“How are you so... Full of energy?” You murmured from behind the bathroom door as you got changed into your warmer clothing for when you do go outside. The door was cracked open a small bit so you could hear Tubbo rambling on and on about how he had a great surprise for you.

“Come on! It’ll be fun!” He was obviously grinning with excitement. When you walked out of the bathroom in your thick clothing and jacket, he bounced up from his spot on the edge of your bed, “Finally! Let’s go! Hurry, before it snows or gets warmer.”

You only nodded curiously and he grabbed your hand, eagerly pulling you out of your room and down the large stairs that lead towards the door. He pushed the large doors open with a bit of difficulty due to the snow piled up, but with your help, you both managed to slip out the door. Tubbo happily grabbed your hand again and began leading you down towards the docks where the water was covered with a thick sheet of ice, “Oh it must’ve got really cold last night... What are you showing me?”

“Over here!” He pulled you over to a large half-sphere made out of snow. He led you over to a hole in the side of it before dropping down to his knees and crawling through the entrance, “Come on!”

Blinking in surprise, you hesitantly followed him inside of the handmade snow building and gave a small gasp of glee as you saw that it was an igloo! The inside had a few blankets on the ground, preventing you from sitting on the icy snow-covered ground, there were a few lanterns placed on small snow hills preventing the small room from being dark, plus there was a small basket of what looked like two thermoses and a bit of food, “Tubbo! Did you build this?”

“I did! I also spent last night building it too!” He grinned widely, his ears wiggling with glee, “But this isn’t even the best part! Check over here!” The brunet shuffled over to another basket before pulling out a pair of white boots with silver blades bolted to the bottoms.

“Ice skates?” You tilted your head a bit as you crawled over and pulled out the pair that looked to be your size, “But I can’t skate...”/”How did you even know I could skate?”

Tubbo only turned his happy grin towards you, “I’ll show you how! Don’t worry, I won’t let you fall!”/”You briefly mentioned that you missed skating once or twice when you were all dopey on painkillers a few months ago!” He pulled out his pair of skates and began to take off his boots. (After getting his skates on he helped you with yours if you didn’t know how to lace them up.)

Once your new footwear was all tied up, he helped you up and carefully lead you outside with his arms tightly wrapped around you to help you keep your balance. (Even if you did know how to skate, he was still worried about you falling.) Tubbo carefully led you towards the ice and helped you stand up straight on the frozen water, making sure that you wouldn’t fall.

“See?” He smiled softly and held your hands tightly as he began to skate backwards, pulling you along with him until you slowly got a hold of what you were doing. “You (still) got it!”

You two slid and slipped around on the ice, laughing, smiling and spinning around with the other, but suddenly out of nowhere, your blade got caught in a groove of the ice that likely got chipped out when you two were skating around. With a small cry, you felt your legs slip out from under you and you immediately shut your eyes, awaiting the inevitable impact as a result of gravity.

Thankfully, two arms wrapped around your frame before you hit the ground. You slowly cracked open your eyes and saw your best friend holding you tightly against him. Your (e/c) eyes stared into his blue ones for a few moments before your face broke into a smile. “You caught me...”

“I would never let you fall...”

There two of you continued to skate around, having fun in the other's presence, completely unaware of the blond hidden behind a snowbank with his hand clasped tightly over his mouth and tears beginning to freeze to his reddened cheeks.

Tommy often found himself wishing he had let you fall...

Tommy & Tubbo Route - Rhythm of the Storm

Because your original housing was set between Snowchester and the Prime Path, it was surprisingly an equal distance between Tubbo’s mansion and Tommy’s house.

In the beginning, Tommy would go to your house first in the mornings, then leave around noon when Tubbo would come, but the constant social interaction left you always sleeping through either one of their visits.

It got to the point where you asked both of them to come by at the same time so you could talk with them both at the same time.

This caught them both off guard that you wanted both of their attention at the same time, but then only began to see benefits from them meeting with you together.

Now you weren’t out cold during the mornings when Tommy opened the door, and now you weren’t asleep by 2pm when Tubbo was over. Plus they could both take care of you at the same time!

There were a few times when either of the boys’ yandere tendencies peaked out, but you or the other would scold them out of it. Or Tommy would give Tubbo a small smack upside the head which would make him scream dramatically like a baby goat.

While they did take your injuries relatively seriously, they also were joking with you and cheered you up with their antics, preventing you from falling into a depression from staying inside all day and every day.

On a normal day, if you were awake and had more energy than normal, Tommy would be telling you incredible stories of his travels and Tubbo would be either making food or potions. Tommy isn’t allowed near the brewing stands or the stove anymore if you’re wondering.

On a bad day, if you barely had any energy and could barely stay awake, the two boys would be much quieter and let you sleep. On those days, they would ask Phil if you were actually okay, or they would go back to their respective homes.

If your burns are causing you immense amounts of pain one day, Tommy will refuse to even be in the same room as you and will genuinely beg Tubbo, Ranboo or Philza to stop your pain. Even if he doesn’t like others being around you, he’s beginning to accept Tubbo’s care towards you but he’s still wary about his father and Tubbo’s husband.

Speaking of, Ranboo and Michael had seemingly disappeared from Snowchester, but Phil assured you that they were both in the Tundra, (And to keep it a secret from Tubbo.)

On Phil’s latest visit, he told you that you could get up and out of bed without irritating the burns on your legs, although you might have trouble at first.

Upon hearing the news, Tubbo and Tommy were at your sides in seconds, asking if you wanted to get up and encouraging you to try. If you didn’t want to, they (mostly Tubbo) would understand about it and leave you to sit on the fact for a bit.

If you did, Tubbo would be at your injured side to make sure your bandages stayed together when you got up, while Tommy would be on your good side and mostly holding you up if your balance was bad enough.

Tubbo wanted to help you walk around at night, just in case you were self-conscious of your burns, but Tommy was too worried about any sort of mob approaching you. While they knew they could protect you, they just didn’t want to take any risks.

Tubbo will burst out crying after he hears an explosion, meanwhile, Tommy will freeze completely still. Which is also what happened during the mining incident that caused you to get injured, which is why Tubbo was the one to scream and continue to cry long after they had saved you.

Because of this, they don’t want to face a creeper with you around to see them panic and be in danger while they struggled to get themselves together.

When you’re out walking around, Tubbo is extremely patient and Tommy at least tries to hold his complaints.

If someone even looks at you wrong, they’ll have an angry raccoon boy yelling threats at them and Tubbo drawing his sword. They usually run with their tails between their legs afterwards.

If you collapsed on the walk from the pain, the amount of panic that would happen would be enough to have every single parental figure in the SMP running to help you. Luckily when it did happen, Badboyhalo was there and was strong enough to carry you without irritating your burns, and even gave a few pointers on how to help with burns. He had to raise Sapnap. He would know.

When you woke up at your home, you saw Tubbo and Tommy actually having a civil conversation with the large 9ft demon rather than threatening him to get away from you. That could've been because he was a demon though. But you were still proud!

You guessed that they still thought you were asleep when Bad left because you heard them murmuring and trying to keep quiet as they most likely made lunch.

Because of their conversation with Bad, and proving to you that they can actually behave themselves, you began to realize that their Yandere tendencies were calming down a lot. Meaning you weren't scared of them that much anymore, and you were beginning to accept their feelings towards you.

Unfortunately... You couldn't pick between them... And didn't know how open they would be to polyamory, but seeing as they weren't ripping each other's throats out, maybe their reactions wouldn't be too terrible?

Tubbo began to tell you about everything that bothered him, currently and formerly, like his death from Technoblade’s fireworks, even to being threatened by Dream during the disc war, or the nukes disappearing and his worry about whether or not Tommy cares about him.

Tommy also began to open up as well. Telling you about his brothers and father, his exile, his fear that Tubbo doesn't care about him anymore, and his third canon death.

After the two began to open up more, you began to realize they weren't being as clingy and desperate for your attention, most likely now trusting you to spend time with people other than them.

Maybe because they were catching on to you slowly beginning to return their feelings...

Everything seems relatively like it was before that one day before Tommy and Tubbo completely lashed out at each other.

A few weeks after your body became completely healed, the two boys spent a few days away from you, which you were curious about but never really commented on it.

One day when they both arrived at your house at their usual time, they were dressed up for an adventure and their bags were filled with everything that anyone would need.

They eagerly pulled you out of bed at some ungodly hour in the morning, although Tubbo thankfully had breakfast (and coffee) ready which you ate before going to get dressed into appropriate clothing and your god armour that Tubbo made, that was equipped with a new god sword that Tommy made you!

This was your first adventure since the explosion in the mine, and you damn well wanted to have fun.

"Okay, okay! Damn, Big Man, calm down!" You groaned as you threw the bag over your shoulders and tightened the straps accordingly. Once you tied up the laces on your boots, you straightened up and without fail, you felt both of your hands being grabbed before you got dragged out the door.

"We've been planning this for a few days! Nothing will stop us now!" Tubbo cheered, hopping along beside you as he held your scarred hand, "We have everything we could ever need for the next week!"

Your surprised reaction was ignored as Tommy continued dragging you down the Prime Path with a map in his free hand, "A whole week? That's quite a long adventure! Are you sure we'll be able to handle it?"

"Relax (N/n)! We were both raised by Philza Minecraft! Y'know, Survivalist extraordinaire? We know how to ration, build a shelter if needed, and everything in between!" Tubbo gave you a wide and cheesy grin as he spoke about the man who raised him, despite not actually being related to him. (Dadschlatt AU if you're wondering)

The three of you ventured off through many acres of forests and other biomes, holding hands and chatting away the entire time. Tommy let it slip that you were going to find buried treasure and maybe a woodland mansion if you were feeling brave enough, which is why he was always holding the map.

"Tommy, (Y/n)! Look!" Tubbo squeaked out happily as he saw a field of dozens of different flowers with bees hurriedly buzzing about to pollinate the plants around. The sight of the yellow and black bugs caused Tubbo to make happy little bleating sounds as his ears wiggled.

You and Tommy exchanged glances with a small smile, knowing very well you wouldn't be able to pull the hybrid away from them. "I suppose it is about time for a break..." You murmured as you were dragged off by the smaller brunet, thus pulling Tommy along as well.

The three of you sat down in the flower field, placing out a blanket to prevent yourselves from getting covered in dirt, despite knowing that it'll happen anyway. You set out the food Tubbo had packed while the two teenage boys ran around, having fun and, well just being teenagers.

Yes, Tommy got chased by bees.

Tubbo made you, himself and Tommy a flower crown, which you proudly wore, but Tommy was a bit more hesitant which you eventually made him get over by giving him a begging look. Yours was a bunch of (f/f) varying with colours, Tubbo's was a variety of yellows and white flowers, while Tommy's was mostly red and white.

While you three enjoyed your small picnic, you were all completely unaware of the fleeting bees, closing flowers and scattering animals. It was only when Tubbo's ears began to flick oddly did he lift his head, "I think there's a storm quickly approaching..."

You lifted your head and rose your arm to block the sun from your eyes to look at the quickly darkening clouds, "Oh damn, yeah we gotta go find shelter. Like now." You hurriedly grabbed your bag and began shoving the foot containers in it while Tommy and Tubbo packed everything else up too.

Despite your best efforts, you three quickly got caught in the downpour of rain and became absolutely drenched in rain by the time you found a small and shallow cave to hide in. "Aw fuck... Absolutely perfect! Sam said it wasn't gonna rain todaaaaay!" Tommy whined dramatically as he slumped against the stone wall.

You sighed and began pulling out the blanket again, knowing very well that you'd all be here for a while. When Tommy stopped whining about how he thought it was gonna be perfect weather, he helped Tubbo with starting a fire so you could all dry your sweaters that you had been wearing.

The two boys plopped down on the blanket on either side of you, Tommy hiding his head on your shoulder while Tubbo was curled up with his head against your lap, (After asking for permission of course) trying their best to drown out the sound of the sounds of the booming thunder.

After a few moments, you used the consistent pattern in the rain to keep beat before beginning to hum a soft tune while you ran your fingers through their damp hair.

Slowly, Tommy and Tubbo fell asleep, leaning against you while you hummed along to the rhythm of the storm...

Neither Route - Left the Game

Your house was quite out of the way from the Prime Path and Snowchester, in fact, quite possibly even closer to the Tundra. (In this route.)

Meaning that you were pretty far out of the way from everyone except for Ranboo, Phil and Techno. Which prevented both Tubbo and Tommy from coming around often, meaning Ranboo and Phil had to help you with a lot.

You felt bad because you didn't know either of them too, too well, but at least you knew you would definitely be getting better.

Ranboo actually had no problem helping you with your injuries, although he had to carefully write down what he gave you and when.

During your road to recovery, Ranboo and Tubbo's relationship became incredibly worse as the goat hybrid became even more manipulative and violent.

You became a personal therapist and babysitter for him and Michael, in return for him helping take care of you.

Speaking of Michael, the reason Ranboo hadn't joined you on the mining trip was because Phil had finished making a potion that would allow Michael to survive in the Tundra.

Tubbo and Tommy's violent habits had quickly doubled over the time when they couldn't see you, but luckily for you, the one time they did try to visit, Techno had come with Phil to meet you.

They ran out immediately.

Yes, Techno asked you about how you felt about anarchy.

Whether or not you joined the Syndicate is up to you.

Ranboo then told Techno and Phil about how Tubbo and Tommy were obsessed with you, and that your life was possibly in danger.

Technoblade only said that he had no way to help you, but Philza's fatherly instincts kicked in and he wanted to protect you both from the two boys he raised.

Once you got all healed up your burns scarred over, Phil and Ranboo already had an idea of how to keep you both and Michael safe.

It was highly risky and would leave you with only one life until you come back to the DreamSMP.

Phil was going to give you access to his Hardcore server.

Both you and Ranboo had a long and serious talk about it, but then remembered he was literally rich. He had dozens of totems!

Techno made you three totem pendants for you to wear around your necks, so you wouldn't always have to hold the totems.

(Philza asked his wife, Kristen the Goddess of Void and Death, to keep an extra close eye on you three and make sure if any of you do die, it's incredibly quick and painless.)

Standing in front of Phil, your bags filled with everything you would need to survive in the hardcore world, you watched as the centuries-old avian scanned you three up and down.

"I'll ask you both one final time." He sighed after he deemed all of your equipment and armour worthy. The blond fatherly figure stood in front of you and Ranboo as you held Michael with a glowing green orb in his hand, "Are you sure? There are no respawns when you run out of totems."

"Yes. It'll be much safer than the DreamSMP..." Ranboo murmured quietly, quickly scrawling as much as he could fit into his memory book before he forgot anything, "Even if it isn't permanent... We just need to run."

When Phil turned to you, you couldn't help but take a deep breath, "Yeah," You murmured, shifting the young piglin child on your hip, "I'm sure. Thanks again Philza... We really needed to be somewhere where they wouldn't find us..."

"I'll check up on you both once a week. Remember, travelling through servers will disorient you for quite a while and you quite probably won't understand where you are at first-"

"(Y/n)!!!" An angry yell came from the forest, and you turned your head just in time to see Tommy and Tubbo running in your direction.

You and Ranboo hurriedly whipped your head to face Phil again, but he seemed to have caught on before you both as there was a portal swirling with greens and golds beside him, "Go! Now! I'll see you both tomorrow! Remember, you can take anything you need to increase the chances of your survival!"

Ranboo got over his shock much quicker than you did because he grabbed your arm and leapt through the portal, bringing you and Michael along.

Ranboo Beloved left the game.

(Y/n) (L/n) left the game.

Michael Underscore-Beloved left the game.

#tommyinnit #tommyinnit x reader #dream smp x reader #yandere tommyinnit #yandere tommyinnit x reader #yandere tubbo x reader #yandere tubbo #ranboo #ranboolive #dsmp #tommyinnit dreamsmp #tubbo dreamsmp #ranboo dream smp #tommyinnit dream smp #tubbo dream smp #c!tommyinnit #c!tommy #c!tubbo #c!ranboo

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butchviking · 2 years ago

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bless u i wasnt even really talking abt practical applications right here - more just lamenting that ppl get too caught up in the squabble to ever actually move on to that conversation - so thank u for dragging my ass out of the squabble and onto the practical applications conversation!!

first off i will say i totally agree on the addition of a third option for bathrooms/locker rooms/etc. however i would cut u short on ‘if that’s not possible-’ yes it is! it absolutely very simply is. if there’s space for two locker rooms but no space for a third, then both of those locker rooms can be turned into closed-off lockable stalls (with the lockers themselves just outside so people can get what they need from their locker, go change, and then put anything they need to back in their locker). i get why you’d say women are more vulnerable and thus need the protection more - and i get that women are your priority as a feminist. but for trans activists, trans people are the priority, and to repurpose the men’s space and have a women’s and a unisex, would do absolutely nothing to protect trans ppl. any vulnerable transwomen would still be sharing with violent men, passing transmen would be sharing with violent men, and women would still have the same single-sex space they would have had in the first place - no-one would be any safer at all.

for your second point - ok let me just first say that idk where this idea came from that its soooooo insanely rare that transwomen pass. i think either some ppl are seeing very biased snippets of what trans ppl in the real world tend to look like or are just. idk, underestimating how unobservant a lot of people are? i’ve hung out in group settings w transwomen and seen how absolutely shocked some ppl are to find out that they’re trans. like even when it’s seemed kinda obvious to me - and it isn’t always even obvious to me, even when i was around trans ppl like all the time & considered myself very good at noticing other trans ppl. it’s really not as rare as u think! i think this misconception might hve smthn to do with that old addage of “oh, you don’t know any trans people? yes you do. you just don’t know they’re trans.”

hmm u posted this like at the very same instant i responded to an anon & it’s funny, we both brought up the concept of “misdirected x”. but i brought it up to mention that i’m glad we dropped that framework, because it never really held up to scrutiny for me. if a straight guy is beating on another straight guy bc the second guy was too effeminate and came off as gay, i would actually argue that that’s just plain ol’ homophobia. i’d say that in this way, straight people can experience homophobia and males can experience misogyny. because if you tell that first guy, ‘oh, no, this man you’re beating up IS actually a heterosexual!’ it’s not like he’s gonna say, ‘oh shit, my bad! never mind!’. he’s still gonna be like well he seems faggy to me. and the same is often tru of transwomen - the guy isn’t always going to stop just bc he finds out that person is actually male. maybe if it’s a catcall, he might get freaked about gay implications and try nd take it back, probably switch from misogynistic agression to transphobic instead. but especially if it was smthn non-sexual, he really might not. some people actually are still sexist to transwomen even when they know they’re trans.

it’s a very messy subject & that’s why i do think, as i was saying in my response to that anon i mentioned, we can’t necessarily pack it all up in neat little terms that cover everything. i don’t think we can say misogyny is entirely sex-based in practice, even if it is in theory and even if the reason for the existence of patriarchy in the first place is to control women as a sex for their reproductive abilities. idk. perhps i need to think this one out more, figure exactly how i’d describe these situations. perhaps i’ll just remain content to describe things exactly how i am now: long-windedly and a little confusingly. but, ultimately, whatever you want to call it, as long as we can acknowledge it happens we can move forward.

but yeah, i’m completely with you in your conclusions. feminism would absolutely help trans ppl - transmen for obvious reasons, and transwomen in that no-one would be directing any misogyny at them if there was no misogyny. hell, in my imaginary gender-abolitionist feminist utopia i think all of trans ppls problems would be more or less completely solved anyway. i’m also absolutely with u that it’s not women’s/feminist’s job to solve trans ppls problems for them. u know i’m always going on abt how bad i want trans activists & feminists to work together on common goals, and i do want that so so badly, but not all of our goals are common goals and each group has their own respective fights too. i would never ask a feminist to prioritise solving transphobia above her fight for women’s lib, and i would never ask transmen to abandon their fight for trans rights because women’s lib should be enough for them or something.

i think it is quite stupid when someone says 'if oppression is entirely sex-based then what about trans people who pass as the opposite sex' and people say 'well that doesn't happen very much especially not for transwomen'. answer the question buddy

#thank u for ur response u are always so thoughtful we have such good discussions abt this i lov u <3 <3 <3 #never apologise for writing novels on my post i love it u are so smart and u always get me thinking <3

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writingwithcolor · 3 years ago

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Arab Character Joining Corrupt Superheroes, Police Parallels

Anonymous asked:

I’m writing a story with a Arabian diaspora main character. The story is about corrupt superheroes, and how they affect an oppressed superpowered minority. The main character is one of these superheroes, naively joining them in his teens believing he’s going to help people. Doesn’t help that his parents are having money trouble. Eventually he ends up fighting a superpowered crook, and gets a bystander killed.

1)I know portraying an Arabian character committing violence is a pretty touchy subject, even if accidental. Is there any way I can write this that makes it clear to the reader that the action itself is messed up without the unfortunate implication that Arabs are violent?

2)A large part of the story is the MC’s parents reaction. They are loving parents, however after this incident happens, they are confused and ashamed. While they still love him, they temporarily cut ties with him. Eventually they reconcile and start to be a family again. In my research (they are diaspora Saudi Arabians), Family is very important and tight-nit. Shame towards the family is to be avoided at all costs. However I’ve also read that disowning a family member rarely ever happens. Is there a way to write this kind of narrative with respect to this aspect of Arabian culture?

Let us begin with some terminology.

- If a person is from Saudi Arabia, they are Saudi Arabian, or more commonly, Saudi. This is their nationality.

- They may or may not be Arab. Arab is an ethnicity. Not all Saudis are Arab. Not all Arabs are Saudi.

- Arabic is a language. Lots of people across the world who are neither Saudi nor Arab speak Arabic.

- Arabian on its own is a word used to refer to a specific breed of horses.

If you are referring to humans, you want to either say "Saudi Arabian" (both words) or “Saudi” to indicate nationality, or "Arab" to indicate ethnicity. If you’re looking to describe your character’s culture, you probably want to call it Saudi culture. (While grammatically correct, talking about “Arab culture” doesn’t make much sense because Arabs are an incredibly diverse ethnic group and there is no such thing as a single monolithic Arab culture).

Now for the first question. In my mind, the issue is less about the character committing violence, and more about the premise of the story and how it mirrors real-life oppressive structures. You have an organized group of superheroes who think they are doing good by fighting “crooks” but in reality are enacting systemic oppression upon a marginalized group. This immediately brings to mind police violence, racial profiling, and the way that policing in North America is used as a tool of white supremacy while glorified in propaganda as a force for good. Essentially, you are telling a story about a character who joins an oppressive policing force, enacts violence upon a marginalized group as a result, and (I’m assuming) eventually realizes that they are not, in fact, the good guys. This is very close to being a “bigoted character learns not to be bigoted” story. I recommend re-examining your premise in light of the real-life parallels and asking yourself whether this is the story you want to tell.

The issue is compounded by the fact that your character is an Arab teen, who in real life is more likely to be the one facing racial profiling from the police. Taking this character and making him the oppressor in your story makes the already flawed premise even more problematic, especially if the characters in the oppressed group are white.

As for your second question, it seems believable to me that a teen’s parents might reject him if they learned that he committed a crime. However, when the family in question is Arab, you are suddenly feeding into harmful tropes about oppressive and violent Arab parents. You are asking if there is a way to write this respectfully. I believe that there is, but it requires a great deal of care, nuance, and cultural awareness. While it is possible to write a Saudi Arab character grappling with the consequences of violence and familial estrangement in a compelling way, the way your ask is phrased leads me to believe you are not equipped to do it justice.

- Mod Niki

Think about why Arab people committing violence is a touchy subject, and then think about the general propaganda narrative that came about from the act that made things so touchy.

It’s going to sound one hell of a lot like what you have here.

Military and police use buckets and buckets of propaganda to continue hooking in young, impressionable teens to commit state-sanctioned colonialism and oppression. That propaganda looks suspiciously like “we have health insurance, we will pay for your education, you just have to do what we tell you even if that means hurting or killing others, but it’s okay because you get to be the hero in the situation.”

Now, propaganda is a very powerful tool. I was taught, in my media classes, that controlling the message means shaping reality. The media is built as a propaganda machine, and when you start to see who owns what media properties you start to see some really disturbing patterns (Rubert Murdoch owns a lot of right-wing sources across America, the UK, and Australia, and he’s too rich to investigate his culpability in spinning terrible narratives found in right-wing publications. He owns the big names).

As Niki said, this situation mirrors police violence and police-sanctioned terrorism. And the very, very unfortunate implications of making the target of police violence be in that wheel. But I want you to look at the media situation that has made the plot happen.

Because even if you swapped out ethnicities, you’d still have a reckoning to do with the American culture that their primary social safety nets involve killing people.

I am not kidding.

Some of the most well-funded unions in the country are police unions. These people have pensions. They have health insurance. It’s damn near impossible to fire them. They get overtime very well mandated, and it’s a known thing among defence lawyers that arrests happen right before a cop’s shift will end so they get the overtime of filing the paperwork. They absolutely go into poor neighbourhoods and recruit based off people needing an escape, and them having the money to provide it.

A similar sentiment is true for the military, except they push for college education a bit more and don’t really have overtime, but they do have deployment bonuses. So the way to get extra pay for yourself is to go out and do colonialism outside the borders. The military doesn’t necessarily like it when the economy is doing well, and don’t like the idea of college being affordable, because they rely so heavily on poverty and fear of college debt to recruit.

The story you’re telling here goes so far beyond an individual’s actions and instead taps into America’s single biggest cultural investment: that oppressing others makes you a hero.

The Pentagon funds most military media out there as a propaganda tool, including most superhero movies and a large number of video games. This is in their budget. They will also go so far as to literally commission the games to exist. Part of getting that funding is you cannot critique America’s military, basically at all (the only exception I’ve seen is Ms Marvel, but that’s set in the 90s). This turns any sort of military-using media into a potential propaganda tool.

And the thing is? Even if you fall for that propaganda and were part of the military or the police, you still have to reckon with the fact you put whatever your own desires were above a huge track record of those groups being terrible. You still have to reckon with the fact you didn’t realize they were wrong, and were complicit in a lot of crimes.

This goes very far beyond “the action is terrible” and goes into “the system is rotten to its core, and you chose not to believe it, or to believe you could change what was built with blood.”

“Good” police officers get fired. If you try to question anything, if you try to say this action is wrong, you will absolutely get destroyed. Military’s much the same. You need some degree of buy-in to the concept of white supremacy to sign up for the military or the police, because you need to see their actions as not deal breakers instead of actions that violate multiple international laws.

In short: you need to see the people being oppressed as deserving of being oppressed to some degree in order to participate with police and the military.

Marginalized people can hold this belief, it happens. But that is a very sticky situation that outsiders shouldn’t touch.

It’s possible but difficult for you to write a white person having this sort of arc, but it would be extremely challenging to have it not come across as a white guilt story. To not have a socially aware audience roll their eyes at how long it took. You’d definitely not be writing a story with a diverse audience in mind, because you’d mostly appeal to those who saw the propaganda as just fine and not that bad.

This isn’t even getting into the oft-cited adage that boys who bully others become cops, while girls who bully become nurses. And the more police atrocities become mainstream news, the less and less people can convince themselves that becoming a police officer is a good thing.

Which brings me to the point of: how well-documented is this oppression? Is this character walking around in an oppressive situation like, say, pre-social-media where there was no direct access to the oppressed groups and you could close your eyes and look away even if it made national news? Or is this in a media connected world where these oppressed populations have a voice in the narrative?

The former has an angle of the character slowly realizing the horror and it’s slightly more forgivable for their early ignorance. But in any sort of world where there’s access to the people getting hurt? Things get more and more “ignorance is indistinguishable from maliciousness.” And keep in mind, these stories are read in the real world, where police brutality and war crimes go viral, and a lack of knowledge is getting harder and harder to defend as a position.

Media plays a huge role in shaping our perception of what’s happening. Cameras on a situation makes different activism tactics work, as we can see with how activism changed in the 60s and 70s as tv reached the masses. Social media has made it possible for you to look up firsthand accounts of discrimination within seconds.

This is a factor you are absolutely going to have to consider, when you want to look at how nice your hero is seen by marginalized or otherwise socially-aware people. If there is a way to find out how bad this superhero organization is before you sign a contract with them? Then that doesn’t look particularly good on the “hero”. You’d really have to establish them as super idealistic, super sheltered, super desperate, and/or just swallow the knowledge that they really don’t see anything that happens “over there to those people” as that bad.

All of the above is more than possible. And they’d still be seen as complicit no matter what justification you gave, because they are.

Does this mean all corrupt organization stories are off limits? No. The reason these stories have such deep cultural resonance right now is because of the propaganda I outlined above.

But you as the author are going to have to examine your own engagement with the propaganda narrative and do your own private reckoning so your own sense of guilt and compliance doesn’t bleed through the narrative too strongly, so you can tell a good story instead of an overt message story that’s you working out your own feelings.

By all means, write a story where police and the military are taken down, where propaganda is weaponized and the media is controlled (because that’s sure as hell the modern world).

But know that stories where the hero discovers the corruption already have a ticking clock because we, in the real world, are slowly being faced with a mountain of apathy instead of ignorance. The knowledge of oppression is out there so much that marginalized people are tired of the ignorance defence.

As the saying goes, “privilege is the ability to ignore the oppression of others.”

Propaganda, centralized media, and strategic cultural investment made it possible for police and the military to have a chokehold on their public perception. But that’s changing. The chokehold is starting to fade, people are starting to question their beliefs.

The past year has shown that knowledge isn’t the issue; it’s white supremacy. People don’t want to believe that any of this is that bad. People want to believe that oppression is justified, that if people just followed the law they’d be fine. They don’t want to question themselves. And marginalized people are tired of these narratives where, suddenly, people snap out of it. Because there was so much evidence to show it was bad, but it was only when you do one of the worst crimes imaginable that you realize this is bad? It’s only when it becomes personal that things are worth looking at critically?

No. And you need to examine where you are in processing your own complicity before writing a story where you’ve swapped around the ethnicities to try and distance yourself from the problem, where in the end you made the target the oppressor.

~Mod Lesya

#police brutality #oppression #arab #saudi arabia #military #superhero #superheroes #asks #violence #propaganda

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zintranslations · 4 years ago

Text

Kaleidoscope of Death, Ch. 120

Kaleidoscope of Death by Xi Zixu Link to Chinese / Novel Updates

Chapter 120: The Thirteenth Door

Right after the new year, it came about time for Gu Longming to enter his door.

Ruan Nanzhu selected a sixth door hint slip, and on it was a name familiar to all—Minotaur. A monster from ancient Greek mythology with a bull's head and a human's body that guarded a maze.

In the myth, it was a creature of an extremely violent temperament born of a human and a white bull. Shut away in the Labyrinth on the island of Crete, it ate seven pairs of boys and girls each year. Then it was killed by a bastard son of Athens, Theseus. Point was, there wasn't much intel to gain about the door from a hint like this. Only once they went in and encountered the actual situation could they connect it to the hint on the paper slip.

Lin Qiushi also showed this hint to Gu Longming ahead of time. After Gu Longming received it, he expressed his thorough gratitude for Lin Qiushi, and Lin Qiushi too was forthright with a vaccination—he said that in this door, he could not be responsible for Gu Longming's life, and Gu Longming ought to prepare himself accordingly.

Gu Longming agreed to every stipulation, and said he had already prepared himself for never coming out.

Their time of entry was roughly the tenth of the lunar new year, when celebrations were trailing off, leisurely vacations were coming to an end, and everybody grew busy again.

Lin Qiushi readied everything and began to wait for the door.

The tenth quickly came. It was a bright, sunny afternoon, and few people were in the mansion. There was only Lin Qiushi sitting in the living room eating Lu Yanxue's freshly cooked pumpkin seeds. Lu Yanxue's culinary skills were, as usual, the best; the pumpkin seeds she fried up were flavored with the five spices and fragrant as all hell. Lin Qiushi could pass an entire afternoon with just a handful of the stuff.

Ruan Nanzhu had already gotten changed and was waiting upstairs. Lin Qiushi saw that it was about time, and so hoisted his hefty backpack and headed upstairs to go look for him.

Due to their last door, Lin Qiushi intentionally stuffed his bag with a great number of food items. Daily necessities from outside could be brought inside, but weapons that were more against the spirit of the doors were not. Guns and other firearms, for example, could not be brought inside.

Once you'd entered the doors, of course, there might exist some special limitations, like in the sanitarium door when the NPC told them the rule where they could not eat food brought in from the outside. The reality was that these kinds of limitations were rare, but all Lin Qiushi wanted to achieve was the principle of Better Safe Than Sorry. At any rate, the condition from the tenth door where they had to open a chest if they wanted to eat had left quite the shadow on his psyche.

Lin Qiushi entered Ruan Nanzhu's bedroom and sat with him on the bed for a while. Then he felt the atmosphere around him change. It took only the time of a blink for Ruan Nanzhu, who had been sitting right beside him, to disappear without a trace. Lin Qiushi pushed open the bedroom door in front of him and saw that what had originally been the hallway was now a series of twelve black metal doors. What a familiar sight.

He walked to the sixth door and gave it a tug. The next moment, Lin Qiushi was sucked in by an immense force. The scenery around him was also altering dramatically, and by the time he opened his eyes again, he could feel a faint rocking beneath his feet.

Lin Qiushi took a closer look, and discovered that he'd appeared on a large old ship. It was just about sunset, and there were black clouds frighteningly low in the sky, as if they were going to smother the horizon at any moment. Inky seawater tossed before him, blown into violent waves by the winds.

Lin Qiushi smelled the gamy salt of the ocean, and because of the excessive waves, the ancient deck beneath his feet was ceaseless in its swaying. He saw that on the floorboards, there were seaweed-clung creatures clutching at the wood, making for an immensely uncomfortable sight.

Lin Qiushi took a few steps forward and saw in the ship cabin a dim-glowing light. He followed the corridor to the interior, and heard miserable wailing coming from inside.

"Uwaaaa, why am I here? What the hell did you all do to me?!" It had been a while since he last heard these cries of a newbie—Lin Qiushi was actually a bit surprised. He spotted the crying person immediately. It was a young woman, wiping at her tears with her hands. "You goddamn perverts, you guys must have kidnapped me. I'm going to call the cops and have you all arrested!!"

Most people were listening to her sob in silence. Newbies, after all, only ever reacted in so many ways: most cried; some tried to run; and some, of the truly psychologically frail sort, came in and pretty much had an immediate meltdown.

Lin Qiushi stood where he was. He noticed that around this girl were a few people who didn't look so good, who also seemed in various degrees of panic. They clearly weren't prepared to enter a door, and were likely newbies like the girl. But at least they weren't wailing endlessly like the young woman, and were still calm in comparison.

Lin Qiushi's gaze searched through the crowd and very quickly found its target—a woman seated in a corner and smiling at him.

The woman wore a long dress—the same outfit Ruan Nanzhu wore before they came in.

Lin Qiushi had the script in his head, and he took his time approaching the woman and holding out his hand: "Yu Linlin."

"Zhu Meng." The woman took his hand and smiled. "The red thread of destiny found us inside this door, let's cherish this meeting."

Lin Qiushi couldn't help but laugh.

"Indeed. Let's cherish this meeting."

Really, this little drama queen of his—putting on a show even when there was no stage to be had.

Just as the two were talking, a young man came tumbling in through the door. Though his face was unfamiliar, his clothes told Lin Qiushi his identity—it was Gu Longming, who'd agreed to meet with Lin Qiushi over the internet.

Gu Longming was entirely soaked. Once he came in he began to curse under his breath: "fuckers, throwing me on a lifeboat—why don't you just throw me into the ocean huh? Goddamn jealous of my beauty or what—"

Though he kept his voice down, Lin Qiushi's hearing was superb, and so could easily hear all the crap he was spewing. For a moment, Lin Qiushi himself didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Of course, he didn't laugh. He only cleared his throat once and covered his mouth with his hand, swallowing down the urge to smile. Gu Longming's eyes lapped the gathered people and very quickly fell upon Lin Qiushi and Ruan Nanzhu. He came over with a bright grin, greeting the two as if they'd just met completely by coincidence.

As a matter of act, this little trick where they faked a chance encounter was only useful for the earlier doors. Once in the later doors, that old fox-spirit manifested in everyone, and not having a partner actually made you the odd one out.

As for whether or not somebody would identify them as part of the same crew, Lin Qiushi used to worry about that. Now though, not so much.

The cabin of the old ship wasn't big, nor was it bright. The only lighting equipment was a handful of tiny kerosene lamps overhead, flickering periodically with the sway of the ship.

The sky grew darker outside, and the number of people kept increasing. Finally, it stopped at the count of fourteen.

Everybody assessed their surroundings as they met up with their own teammates. The crowd seemed to be very quickly divided up into teams, with the handful of newbies left out. Without much choice, they had to make up their own team.

Just as the crowd grew noisy with discussion, a middle-aged man came in from the outside. His get-up looked a bit like a medieval pirate, and he carried a swaying kerosene lamp in his hand.

"Welcome to the Black Skerry," the man spoke. His voice sounded quite raspy, like the effects of long-term drinking or smoking had brought about irreversible damage to his throat. "I hope you all have a good time here."

After he finished saying this, he laughed like a maniac, and his high-pitched laughter, like fingernails scoring a chalkboard, sent goosebumps rising along the skin.

"In ten days, the Black Skerry will reach harbor," the man said. "Our voyage will end then, so please enjoy our wonderful time together."

Just as he finished speaking, somebody rushed out of the cabin. Lin Qiushi first thought that this person had gotten scared, but not long after, there came from outside the sound of violent vomiting—it seemed that some unlucky bastard was seasick.

"Where in the world are we?" The sobbing young girl had also been scared by the man before her, and she spoke: "are we filming a show? I'm really, really scared, can I please quit? I don't want to play anymore, I'm begging you…"

The man completely ignored her. He merely went on watching the crowd with a cool gaze.

The girl seemed to want to go up and take hold of him, but when she got to his side she suddenly stopped, face draining of all color. She then backed up a few steps, as if she'd seen something truly terrifying.

Lin Qiushi's eyesight wasn't as good as Ruan Nanzhu's, and due to the dim lights he didn't see a thing. It was Ruan Nanzhu who quietly explained the situation to him:

"That person's covered in some sort of black insect."

Gu Longming shivered.

"Is he dead or alive then?"

"I don't know," Ruan Nanzhu said. "Doesn't look too good either way."

Under typical circumstances, only the NPC who provided them with the key information was somewhat normal. If even that NPC wasn't normal, then there really weren't any normal people to speak of.

Lin Qiushi hadn't imagined that their door this time would be an ancient ship. And by the looks of things, the time limit was ten days.

"Come along, I'll take to to where you'll sleep," the man said. "It'll be dark soon…and it'll rain."

After this, he began that manic laugh again, and the group was even more disturbed.

The man brought them to the guest cabins and began divvying up the rooms.

Most of the rooms here were doubles, with a rare triple here and there. At first, Lin Qiushi was assigned a double, but Gu Longming brazenly went and found a man to switch room numbers with, strong-arming them into a triple.

"You'll bargain for even this sort of thing?" Lin Qiushi shot Gu Longming a look of admiration.

"Well I'm scared of dying, aren't I…" Gu Longming said. He didn't want to sleep alone, and though it wasn't quite right to be a third wheel, being a third wheel was much better than being dead.

Ruan Nanzhu’s smile was inscrutable.

"That's fair."

They'd planned to inspect the entire ship, but because the night was already so dark, moving about outside would be too dangerous. They would rest first, and wait until tomorrow to make plans.

And so the three got their key and went to their room, getting into bed after quickly washing up.

When Ruan Nanzhu went to change, Gu Longming took the opportunity to poke at Lin Qiushi, whispering, "yo, not cool man, how come you didn't tell me you had such a pretty girlfriend?"

Lin Qiushi answered a vague: "…mh."

"Oh she's stunning," Gu Longming said with a sigh. "If I had a girlfriend like that I'd want to stick around her every day too."

As he spoke, he looked to Lin Qiushi with an expression that was both envy and admiration.

Lin Qiushi watched him back and wondered how he would react if he knew Ruan Nanzhu was drag queen. Of course, it wasn't something he could tell Gu Longming now. Gu Longming was not yet part of Obsidian, and the fact that Ruan Nanzhu wore drag was Obsidian's biggest most vital secret…

After Ruan Nanzhu got changed, he came back inside.

"What are you two talking about?"

"Nothing," Lin Qiushi answered in brief. "He said you were pretty."

Ruan Nanzhu replied with a meaningful oh.

Gu Longming: "…" Why did a chill suddenly go down his back?

The beds on the ship all emanated a damp smell—very uncomfortable for the people lying on top. At this point, the waves and wind were getting bigger, and even the sleeping quarters were beginning to rock. Lin Qiushi remembered that ridiculously seasick, endlessly vomiting pal of theirs from earlier and thought that that guy was pretty much done for.

The sky outside gradually darkened in entirety, leaving only the bellowing winds and the sound of waves beating against each other. With his eyes shut, Lin Qiushi grew drowsy—but before he could fall asleep, he was woken by a sudden crack of thunder. It was like lightning had struck right above their heads. With the loud boom, all three of them awoke in an instant.

After that, it was the pattering pour of rain. The rushing rain and the howling wind—they seemed on the verge of destroying everything.

Their quarters rocked even harder. Lin Qiushi sat up in his bed.

Through the window, he looked to the black evening outside. He saw, however, two illuminated lights. It seemed like the only light sources on deck were kerosene lamps, but how did these lamps stay so bright in the middle of a thunderstorm…? Just as Lin Qiushi wondered this, he suddenly felt that there was something off about those two lights, and Ruan Nanzhu, sitting behind him, spoke up quietly:

"Don't look anymore."

Lin Qiushi, "hm?"

"Those aren't lights," Ruan Nanzhu said. "Those are eyes."

A pair of yellow, inhuman eyes. The owner of the eyes spied through the darkness with malicious intent, as if a beast looking for its prey.

Lin Qiushi instantly looked away, and asked, "what is that thing?"

"I don't know, I can't tell," Ruan Nanzhu said. "The shape is humanoid, but it doesn't seem to be human."

Lin Qiushi's brows lightly furrowed, but by the time he looked out the window once more, the eyes were gone.

Thunder rumbled on and on, and that stench of ocean salt grew thicker and more cloying.

Ruan Nanzhu climbed into Lin Qiushi's bed, and holding each other, the two very quickly returned to sleep. However, the only bachelor present Gu Longming didn't have such luck. Lying beside Lin Qiushi, he stared with plaintive eyes, thinking that in the following days, he'd be fed enough dog food to bloat.

The rainstorm lasted until dawn, and though the rain let up, the weather did not turn any sunnier. Black storm clouds still hovered over the ship, and when the alarm rang, Lin Qiushi actually thought it was not yet morning. He checked the time, however, and saw that it was 8AM. It was just still dark outside.

"Good morning," Ruan Nanzhu greeted Lin Qiushi.

"Good morning. It's so dark outside today."

"It's probably going to keep raining," Ruan Nanzhu said. He walked out onto deck with Lin Qiushi and watched the black waters roil underneath the ship.

Looking up, they couldn't see any land, only the endless swath of sea. Only the old ship beneath their feet felt like any sort of reality.

This sort of isolating environment was easily taxing on the psyche. Even for Lin Qiushi, the scene before them was discomforting.

"Come on, let's go get breakfast," Gu Longming called to the two.

"He's pretty thick-skinned," Ruan Nanzhu commented after hearing Gu Longming's call.

"Yeah," Lin Qiushi said. "His nerves are petty good."

Inside the doors, you didn't have to be too smart, but you definitely had to be brave enough. Before terrifying situations, fright could make a person abandon a large part of their cognitive abilities. The smartest person could lack a strong heart and still do worse inside the door than the obtuse, oblivious Cheng Qianli.

The three went to the dining area and found there an atmosphere that could very well be called lifeless.

Lin Qiushi didn't know why at first. After he saw the menu, however, he couldn't help but also feel a touch of depression.

All the ship offered was fish. And it wasn't even fresh fish—Gu Longming poked at a dead-eyed staring head with his chopsticks and said, "is this thing even edible?"

It was disgusting just to look at.

"It looks gross," Lin Qiushi said. "Try a bit?"

Gu Longming took a bit of meat from the gills and gave it a taste. His expression twisted.

"Fuck, did they deduct the food budget for this door or what? It's disgusting. It's like they’ve had it outside for three days. You try it?"

Lin Qiushi, "oh no, no thank you."

Gu Longming: "…"

The breakfast served in the dining room was, for the most part, stale fish. Aside from that there was only flavorless noddles and peas. The environment had already been vicious enough, but the food in front of them now was salt on top of the wound.

But Lin Qiushi and Ruan Nanzhu didn't care at all. After seeing the inedible breakfast they snuck back to their room and fetched from their bags the food they'd prepared.

Gu Longming watched as they pulled out a bottle of chili sauce, eyes bulging out.

"You guys even brought Lao Gan Ma? Did you come here to picnic?"

"Want some?" Lin Qiushi drizzled the Lao Gan Ma over some noodles they'd brought out of the dining hall.

"Yeah yeah yeah. More please." Gu Longming's expression was shameless.

With breakfast finally done, they got ready to search the ship.

There were a total of three decks in the ship, constructed a bit like the sailing vessels of the great nautical era of the Middle Ages. It was extremely old, was all, covered in the marks and traces of times past.

Beside that NPC, they didn't see any other crew members on deck; there was likely only the one NPC on the entire ship. Wait for the ship's return was the mission the NPC left for them this time, but Lin Qiushi had thorough reason to believe that if they couldn't find the door in ten day's time, this voyage of theirs would cycle back and repeat—and they'd experience the ten days all over again.

When Lin Qiushi climbed onto the second deck, he heard a sort of thumping sound, and was uncertain if Ruan Nanzhu and Gu Longming had heard it as well. So he asked, "did you guys hear that?"

"What?" Gu Longming didn't seem to have heard.

Ruan Nanzhu said, "I think I did, but not very clearly."

"I think it came from the corner…" Lin Qiushi followed the sound forward. "Let's go see."

But before they could get close, Lin Qiushi was hit with a thick, fishy stench. It was disgusting and nauseating to smell; fortunately Cheng Yixie wasn't here, or he might have passed out immediately upon smelling it.

The source of the sound and smell was the same room, and they were close enough now that both Gu Longming and Ruan Nanzhu could hear the thumping noise as well.

The three of them slowed their steps, and through the window, looked into the room.

It was a kitchen with knives and other tools hanging inside. The most eye-catching thing, however, was the dense masses of dead fish hung up on hooks all over the sides.

A person in an apron stood in the center of the room with their back towards them and head down. They were chopping something. After some observation, Gu Longming almost gagged, and said, "don't tell me he's making our breakfast—"

Ruan Nanzhu was very calm.

"It's possible."

Gu Longming did gag. He'd even had a bite of that fish that morning.

Lin Qiushi gave Gu Longming a sympathetic pat on the shoulder.

This person in the kitchen, however, was the second living NPC they'd found on the ship.

The three of them stood watching in the kitchen doorway for a while, and saw that besides chopping fish, this person didn't do much of anything else. And so they decided to go see elsewhere first.

Very soon, they discovered a more peculiar room. This room was locked, and curtains were drawn over the window. It was quiet inside, but they could still smell that thick waft of stale fish. Lin Qiushi initially thought the smell had clung to them from the kitchen, but after a careful sniff, found that it was coming from inside the room.

"Do we go in?" Gu Longming was pressed against the window trying to look in, but he could see nothing.

Ruan Nanzhu gave this some thought, before saying, "let's try," and getting out a hairpin to pick the lock.

Watching his adept motions, Gu Longming's eyes widened. Then Gu Longming glanced at Lin Qiushi.

"Is this…is this a basic skillset that y'all come with?"

Lin Qiushi grinned as he joked, "yeah. You have to learn to pick locks if you want to join us."

As he said this, there was a click. Ruan Nanzhu really got the lock open. But oddly enough, after he unlocked the door and gave it a push, he found that though the door lock was undone, there was another lock hanging on the inside. The chain on that lock held the door closed, and they could at most manage a crack—it couldn't be opened at all.

"Wait," Lin Qiushi suddenly said, stopping Ruan Nanzhu from going up and pushing the door. "Stop for a second. There's movement inside."

Ruan Nanzhu halted, and just as he stopped mid-step, a hand, sharp-nailed and covered in scales, reached out of the door. And through that crack in the door, a pair of yellow eyes looked out, peering at the world outside with malicious intent.

Translator’s Note:

The name of the ship could more simply be translated as “Black Reef,” but “Black Skerry” sounds more like a ship name? Let me know if you think otherwise (or know if it’s a specific reference to something).

Lao Gan Ma is a brand of **hot sauce (edited: 7/26), as you can probably tell from context. The original next never uses “hot sauce” though, and just call it Lao Gan Ma in both the prose and the dialogue.

[Ch. 119] | [Ch. 121]

#kaleidoscope of death #xi zixu #cnovel #chinese translation #死亡萬花筒 #NEW ARC #i like ships where the people take on characteristics they like about each other #and this is the peak 'rnz is a horrible influence on lqs' arc #but also rnz is a great influence on lqs #honeymoon door baby

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6blackfilin9 · 3 years ago

Note

I love your Anko fanart! Tell me, what are your views/headcannons on Anko X Kazuku?

hThank you so much for the ask, finally I can answer it

here is my big thank you for the waitng

In a nutshell, the shipp was created by accident while me and my buddy were working on our first Naruto AU in 2019, where Kakuzu and Deidara survived their shitty plotholes end eventually ended up in Konoha

Yeah

so, the shipp’s birth date is july the 1, 2019

anything like classy, aristocracy kind of tension-filled passionate gothic romance with playful, psychological games & hurt/comfort vibes with slight scent of rivalry is KakuAnko

Basically, they are: a very, very old man with absolutely horrendous background who’s trying to finally have his mother*cking 10 or 30 years of peace, and a rather young lady with a rocky youth who’s being good & noble yet has very strong antihero tendencies

You know, I think they do have potential, since, in fact, they seem to be very similar, at the core

They are both very pragmatic realists, the people of logic and reason, yet if Kakuzu’s irritability doesn’t affect him a tiny bit due to his ideal self-control, Anko’s can lead her to quite bad places, sometimes. They put their interests in the first place, and even though she tries to attach them to Konoha’s, she still has ‘personal’ things (I’ll write ‘bout it lower*). Their mindsets are so complicatedly organized that, at some point & way, it prevents them from having many close people, and makes them very hard to see through and predict

Both of them are very flexible & adaptive, independent individuals with similar outlooks on plenty of things and high intellectual level. They clearly can find plenty of traits that they would highly respect and adore in each other

Here I will speak mostly for “why and how” kind of things, bc both of them are terribly tricky to accurately figure out. But there will be some headcanons too

So, there are still some odds about them, due to the strong difference in their occupation, like, in plenty of cases they are really tricky to be brought together, because:

- Of the job

In original, Anko is a Konoha’s special jounin, and she is very dedicated to serving the country. Independently of whether she likes her job or not (depends on the plot), she orienteers at the people, at society’s gain from her work. So, accordingly, in any other AU her job is somehow connected to civil service, whether it’s something police-like, connected to science, or something like CCG in Tokyo Ghoul

Kakuzu, on the other hand, is a hitman and a persona non grata in literally all the five big countries, Konoha too (which makes it barely possible to bring them together in the original universe without hard complications or heavy drama. But still possible). He orienteers on his own gain alone, but, depending on the job, it can include others’ gain, too.

This detail makes him a saint once he holds supervising position in some company or any high position in the government (the better the working conditions of the staff now- the more money in the prospective), and the sheer nightmare once he has it on the opposite side of the law. Him as a mob boss is a complete different topic for discussion, but to get the point, in this case, the trouble isn’t him increasing the level of criminality (its rather vice-versa), but taking hold of too much control in the high and underground structures. Even as an ordinary hitman he’s rather tricky, since everything depends on the case

In most of the stories, they come to some sort of compromise, and how hard it is to reach it depends on how shitty his job is and how attached they are to each other at the moment

Like, in the above mentioned Shippuden AU and Harry Potter AU (which I also wrote with my buddy) everything went like clockwork, because there they are both more or less on this side of the law, in Tokyo Ghoul AU (which I also wrote with my buddy) it is a bit more complicated, with her being in-law and him being very much outlaw, in the Avatar AU (which I also figured out with my buddy, but we never happened to write it) it is also pretty smooth, with both of them being outlaws and then jumping out to the glory after all the shit is done, but in another Shippuden AU of mine, this all would be just a motherfucking bloody disaster

- Kakuzu is actually a hard nut to get attached to anyone

He lived too long to be truly afraid of anything, though. Its mostly because he doesn’t really need to get attached to or become close with someone to satisfy his need for communication. The man can get along with anyone once he wishes to, he can have countless acquaintances and plenty of buddies, but he doesn’t have many comrades and barely can call anyone a friend. Because he is used to lose everything and everyone he ever had or happened to have, because of his inhumanly lengthened lifespan.

It requires time for him to get used to the person, and then, eventually, in some cases, spend plenty of it to get attached

Plus, for him, due to his profession, each close connection is a really great responsibility for him. In most cases, he’d think twice of weather he is ready to take it or not

Though it of course has the personal factor, too

In Anko’s case, she has a grand privilege by being a very intelligent and keen woman, not just in cognitive plane, but in emotional, too. High emotional intellect is actually a rare trait, so she automatically stands out of the crowd for him. Even though it won’t guarantee his alliance, it will grant her his high respect and some sort of sympathy

- Kakuzu is, technically, an asshole

He does have his moral compass, which includes a great amount of common social morality, but he also has that “I am working” state

Even though Kakusu has a set of professional principles, and he still acts accordingly to what he thinks is right, one and the very same situation can be solved diametrically different once the context changes from working to casual and vice versa

This, and him being very independent and quite antisocial, makes the degree of assholeness depend on various factors

This can lead to major conflicts of interests, and if they are possible to have any compromise or not is strongly attached to the circumstances. After all, both are very, very prideful and dignified people

- In other words, the only major issue for them would be morality questions. It’s possible to make the case acceptable for Anko, since both of them ain’t truly squeaky clean, along with Kakuzu being willing enough to watch his borders

- She is provident and doesn’t really need a lot of money on a daily basis, which is much of a joy to him lol

- *they both seek for the stable ground, first of all

Taking in consideration the life conditions Kakuzu had in his youth (despite war state, he still stably had family, friends, grand respect from everyone, home, warmth and food) and how terribly he was torn out of his secured social environment, I believe what he seeks through all his bounty hunt and other money-connected manipulations is stability. Sustainability he had back then. The only way to have it in the conditions of our existent world order is to have money (and a very good mind and luck)

Anko has indeed much more altruistic motives, yet it’s still not that simple. It seems to be, on the first sight, yet considering the “Orochimaru related cases” and her very wayward behavior toward them, it’s clear she keeps her own motives and needs in mind oh so well. The service she has is very well payed, it allows her to do what she likes or believes is right, and to have the living conditions she finds comfortable. And only here, relying on the made sustainable basis, she does what she does

- Thus, they both illustrate the principle “first help yourself, next help the other” just right

- She knows she can keep an eye on him, yet it’s clear for her that her influence isn’t borderless, as well as telling him off some stuff is kind of a not wise thing to do. So in the majority of cases, she never interferes

- This is not common, yet he can actually change some plans if the situation is serious and the compromise can’t be found. He is that kind of person who works on a further prospective, and in this context, this would be the relationship with his loved one

- While Kakuzu is quite conflicted and has very reserved controversial persona, Anko is both controversial, conflicted, and sort of two-faced, on top of that

She is a very sincere, cheerful and humbly honest human being, yet she has some darker natural traits of her character that became rather strong with age and traumatic experience. Cunningness, guile, ways-depend-on-the-case and a bit of ruthlessness, that is. Moreover, she has some unsolved personal issues, which makes her even more twisted.

Like, remember the time when she confronted Orochimaru during the exam? And Kabuto, on the war? Getting rid of them is indeed beneficial for Konoha, but it’s clear that for her it is personal vendetta in the first place. She wouldn’t have tried to do this alone, otherwise, because these two are rather dangerous ones, to say the least.

She uses greater good to cover her real motives (even though it is not truly complete bullshit), and seems to have a terrible habit to keep silence about really important things, which makes her quite prone to lying, in some cases

And sometimes it very badly pisses Kakuzu off, since it makes her prone to doing useless but dangerous shit too

Yet this not any kind of separate hidden side, it is integrated into her personality, and coexists with her bright one. That’s where her violent humour comes from, for example.

But Kakuzu, on the other side, is completely monolith individual, yet sometimes his mindset can create contradictions when it comes to something important to him. but it's another topic

And seeing these layered constructions, and motives, they can pretty finely predict each other’s behavior. Not super-neatly, but they for sure see the basis. This is what helps Kakuzu to prevent Anko from doing some stupid shit, sometimes

- Anko has a role of an indicator for the people who don’t understand and see the changes in Kakuzu’s mood sometimes, since she usually reacts quite openly. Yet, when she has the same unreadable mask of cold, or one of guile, it’s a nightmare for them

- They prefer the non-verbal way to show their feelings, even though Anko is obviously the more chatty one

- They don’t say things such as “I love you”, or other sensual stuff like that really often, believing it to be some sort of cherished words that shall not be spelled mindlessly

- Anko isn’t majorly into PDA, but she fancies it much more than Kakuzu does. She has her whole moments of studying something with her hands, whether it’s a hand, scar or face. He’s more into passive display of affection, like wrapping an arm over her waist or leaning to her or something of this kind; they can allow themselves to (not sexually) kiss in public though

- She knows he doesn’t like to walk hand in hand due to considering it a youthful thing, so there are times when she intentionally walks holding on to his sleeve; generally they walk separately in order not to bother each other, but sometimes they walk arm in arm (like an old Victorian couple lol)

- Being older and wiser, Kakuzu eventually upholds some kind of mentoring position, yet he never considers himself any kind of a teacher or master to Anko, believing her to have a good head of her own. He is just insightful enough to break something through to her or give a word of advise

- This, combined with his highly powerful demeanor, also makes him have the leading position in their relationship

- Anko respects him much enough to fortify this, entrusting with plenty of life questions (like organizing the family budget), even though they make the majority of decisions together. Mostly because he is truly wise and highly experienced individual.

- This makes him one of the very few people Anko would actually listen to and take their opinion in consideration

- So basically they have equal relationship with some tendency to patriarchal order

- And it is, really, mostly economically-based disbalance, with him earning much more than she does

- Yet they never have any financial-based issues, since both of them keep in mind and respect the contributions of each

- There is major power play here, too. He has the absolute might, she has seduction. Anko loves how he makes her want to submit to him, let him have all the power, so she likes provoking him. And she knows he adores it, loves the subtle control she has over him

- They don’t have conflicts in their everyday life. Each knows how to avoid pissing one another off

- He cherishes her playful demeanor, her intellect. Combined with her cunningness, it allows her to rival him, in social sphere. The way she constructs her phrases, the way she speaks, mimics, moves, how bewitchingly it suits her feminine snaky features makes his blood boil and heart melt

- Both of them, actually, have rather specific kind of dry, dark humour. Kakuzu’s is very cynical, satirical, quite often menacing and subtly demeaning; Anko’s is very sarcastic and quite dirty, even gruesome and rather violent

- Sometimes they “fight” verbally as a form of a play. In some circumstances they may sound pretty vile, so some unobservant people mistake this for display of hate

- In general, Anko is the one to heat things up with her playful demeanor, which can include provocation and rivalry, and Kakuzu is the one to keep this energy in borders, accumulating it up to much more intense states

- They both put the comfort in the first place when it comes to household. Everything must be cozy, useful, silent and super clean

- Yet they are both very unpretentious and modest, really

- She absolutely adores when he is showing his serious, severe side, or powerful demeanor. She finds it incredibly suitable for him. She also likes how his real age is sliding out in this or that way. Like, even though he has rather young face (that of 37-40 y.o.), his eyes give away that he’ve seen oh so much more than it seems; the grumpy noises and grunts he makes, the lazy attitude in movements and the way how rapidly he finds a comfy pose once he has a chance to take a seat

- They are both rather patriotic, yet while in the most stories Anko’s feelings mostly lay towards the country she lives in, Kakuzu’s more often lay towards some places, so called small motherland.

- Kakuzu actually could be a source of deep, strong admiration and delight for her, despite all of his bullshit. The unbreakable will he has, mighty burning heart, all the wisdom, talents and mind. Being sent to fight god damn Hashirama, clearly a genius of his times, financial & management genius at the least. And, still, after all the hard times he’ve been through, he maintained the very strong sense of dignity and nobility, even though slightly twisted due to the profession and abnormal lifespan

- And the very same things can serve as the source for her chagrin: with all those traits, he could have been so much more rather than a criminal. With all the gifts he’ve got, he could have been of great use to society. He’s much easier about this, since his prospective is much wider and embraces decades (and in some universes even centuries) instead of months & years, and he knows that he’d be switching sides throughout his life, being on this and that side of the law, yet he still is a bit uncomfortable once it’s brought up

- They are deeply into science, which makes them atheists. He’s into medicine and human biology, she’s into chemistry and reptilian biology; both of them are nuts for physics, history and psychology

- They solve complicated physical and mathematical problems together time to time. She is the first one to have tea-breaks due to losing her temper over it, he tries to figure things out right until you can sense the smoke coming off his head

- Actually, they do have a stumbling stone aside from job & morality complications. And this is Anko’s attitude towards Orochimaru

What she does is basically ruins her life very-very slowly, maintaining the issues she has and planning to make him pay for all he’s done

Kakuzu knows exactly what is really going on with this attitude and why, but he can’t really do anything about it. Like, he knows he can’t make her change her mind or put something into her head

All he can do is really nothing but try to explain how those things are working, and even this option is basically a landmine field for him. At some level she does understand that he could probably be right, yet she just refuses to go back on her mind. And this is actually really dangerous, so at some moments they can fight quite badly about it

- He’s scared shitless to lose her, though; especially like that, even though he knows clearly that he will, anyway, sooner or later

- he knows that losing loved ones ends up with sheer disaster for him, yet he isn’t afraid to pay such a high price for those six, five or four decades of being with her. Because these decades are that of a paradise ones for him. Wife and family, as well as stable job, incomes and life conditions, are some sort of physical definitions of sustainability he craves. Especially family, yet it’s far ahead to plan

- The fact that he will have to bury her one day makes her rather depressed, as well as the knowledge that the only thing she can really do about it is to try to bring him as much happiness and comfort as possible before she dies

thank you, i'd say more, but it's too much already

#my art #naruto #naruto shipuden #akatsuki #naruto akatsuki #akatsuki kakuzu #kakuzu #naruto anko #mitarashi anko #kakuanko #they are very entertaining disaster

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cloud9in · 3 years ago

Text

Promises (Poppy x MC) Part (2/?)

Read Part ONE (summary for fic is there)

ITS BEEN A MINUTE. @iamsimpforpoppy I hope you’re still around to read :P I love this story lol. Hope you guys do too!!!

Word Count (2.8k)

Bea and Poppy’s relationship became official a month after their initial meeting. One would say they moved quickly, too quickly. But every love story is different. This one in particular seemed to have little to none flaws, if you ignored the fact that Bea was promoted to Carter’s right hand woman in the Southside Spades.

They did end up having that conversation after all.

“…Are you sure Carter? I mean this is a huge deal and a special role-“

“If I didn’t think you were capable you wouldn’t be here right now Goldilocks.”

Carter winked and clinked his half empty beer bottle against Bea’s, who surprisingly had a nearly full bottle. He took note of the abnormality.

The blonde instinctively rolled her eyes at the nickname, “Okay but that name has to go. We need codenames……ooooh how about bimbo and himbo.”

“I’m guessing…..no, hoping I’m the himbo?!” Carter comments as he promptly tries to stop the laugh escaping from his lips.

“Mmmmmmm, I’ll get back to you on that.”

They share a laugh and Bea feels Carter’s gaze latch onto her in her peripherals. She could sense the shift of energy in the space between them, it almost felt uncomfortable, and that was something she never felt with Carter. “I never asked you if you were okay with such a role. If you aren't, I understand completely, I just want the best for you.”

The blonde eyes soften at his comment and she looks at him, “never doubted that, where is this going though because you never express your feelings like a normal human being.”

He pulls on the strings of her hoodie until it completely caves around her face, burying her whole.

“Hey asshole!”

“That’s for talking too much.”

Bea yanks her hoodie open and sticks her tongue out in a mock expression. “Oh boohoo. Poppy literally says the same thing, I don’t get it. I talk, it’s a problem. I don’t talk, it’s an even BIGGER problem. Damn a girl can’t ever exist in peace.”

Carter places his bottle flat on the table and studies the blonde’s face.

She kept rambling on about her new girlfriend and the gang leader didn’t know it was possible to feel happy yet anxious at the same time. He was aware of when they entered the talking stage, went on their first date, and finally became official, because Bea told him everything. As much as the experience of being in a real relationship was new to her, Bea looked up to him and somehow she knew Carter would give her the best guidance possible.

It didn’t stop him from worrying. Like an older brother would. He feared the two would mix, and everyone knows that love and crime will eventually combust. He is no stranger to it.

“Bea.”

“Did you know she stole one of my hoodies and actually won’t give it back?? What am I supposed to do, just take it? No she’d murder me.”

“Jackson.”

Her voice slowly dies down after sensing the seriousness in his tone. She takes a sip of her beer to ease the silence that sat in the air, and Carter responds shortly after.

“You know I trust you with my life right? You’re very important to me, kid.”

“I know.”

Guilt was a feeling he chose to lock away in an unbreakable box and bury six feet deep. There couldn’t be guilt in a lifestyle like this. But Bea was his only exception. And she was slowly bringing that box back up to the surface.

“I need you to promise me that you won’t let these two worlds collide.”

“Carter….”

“One of you will get hurt. And I won’t forgive myself if it’s you.”

He leaves Bea at the table, the remnants of his comment still replaying in her head. She pulls out her phone and sees a text from Poppy on her lockscreen.

Other Half 💗❤️‍🔥- Can’t wait to see you tomorrow 😘

The blonde smiles unconsciously and opens the message to respond.

I’m missing you like crazy. I have a special surprise for you.

Other Half 💗❤️‍🔥- You know I highly dislike surprises, just tell me.

And ruin the surprise? You must be crazier than I thought.

Other Half 💗❤️‍🔥- Jackson.

Patience babe…tomorrow it is.

Bea clicks her phone shut and slips it back into her pocket before downing the rest of the beer.

***

“You know your hand on my ass only makes them stare even more Jackson?”

Bea bites her lips and gropes the blonde’s plump backside shamelessly while slowly whispering into her ear.

“That’s the point, princess.”

Poppy shivers almost instantly at the boldness. “Is this the surprise you were talking about?” Bea doesn’t answer, instead trailing her hand up Poppy’s skirt. This was definitely not the time and place for such behavior but she was clearly still learning everything about her girlfriend.

And it definitely felt good to call her that.

“Since when did you get so brazen? You know you’re exactly the type of person my daddy told me to stay away from.”

Bea laughs at that statement and wraps her arm around the blonde’s waist, “yeah? And why’s that?”

“Well I can’t ask him now, he might rough you up and that’s my job.”

Poppy could feel the stares of everyone burning into them, but she could only focus on the blonde cuddled up against her. The shorter girl wouldn’t call herself an attention whore, but she sure loved the PDA that Bea projected without a care. It felt nice to be genuinely admired in public rather than putting on a mask everyday.

But it’s safe to say that Poppy preferred all the handsy stuff to happen in private.

“Do you want to grab dinner with me tonight Pops?”

“Am I picking the place?”

“…Yes.”

“Then yes.”

Bea rolls her eyes at the blonde’s downright shady self but smiles nevertheless.

“Now don’t cancel on me out of the blue. I will not be thrilled about it.”

“Shouldn’t I be telling you this? Your dad always has something going on in his business that somehow has to involve you too.”

Poppy sighs and glances over at Bea, “well you know I’ll have to take over eventually. Especially since I’m legally allowed to handle deals now.”

“I hate that word. Legal. Ugh.”

The shorter girl scoffs and plants her hands on her hips, “yeah I bet you do.”

***

Bea dragged open her closet in search of clothes for dinner tonight but the dinging noise of a text distracts her.

C-Dog🖤- Need you tonight. Something came up, meet us at the garage.

Bea wanted to thank the gods up above that she didn’t promise Poppy that she’d show up for dinner. But that wasn’t going to save her from the fury of the blonde. Good thing it can’t get worse than that, right….?

Only it was. And Poppy will probably beat her up herself, if she wasn’t dead by the next day.

Bea’s mind and heart races as she digs her brain for a proper excuse to tell her girlfriend, but is very unsuccessful. She’s good at drug dealing though.

Going with the good ole truth never really hurt right?

Baby I’m so sorry I won’t be able to make it tonight. Got held up with the gang. I know I’m an asshole, I’ll keep in touch I swear.

Other Half 💗❤️‍🔥- What else could I expect from my gang banger girlfriend 🙄 please stay safe..

You know I always do.

Other Half 💗❤️‍🔥- Do I? We need to talk about this tomorrow.

Of course Pops.

Other Half 💗❤️‍🔥- Call me every chance you get or I swear I’ll track you and trust me you do not want me to do that.

Yeah she definitely doesn’t. Especially since Carter sounded frantic over the phone. The last thing Bea needed was a paranoid girlfriend, so she played it cool like always.

Just simple stuff baby girl, talk soon.

***

“…What do you mean it’s gone?! So where is it? Do you know what this means Carter??”

The gang leader sighs frustratingly, rubbing his eyes in efforts to gain some stability. “The product was here, and now it is not. Which can only mean it was stolen. And when I find out which son of a bitch did it, they’re dead.”

“In the meantime, we are dead”, Bea emphasizes wildly. “This is the Red Raven gang we’re talking about. If they get any inclination that we lost their drugs, they’ll kill and replace us. No mercy. None.”

The blonde paces back and forth trying not to think about buying a plane ticket to Timbuktu.

Carter approaches Bea and plants his hands on her shoulder, “breathe Jackson. You are my partner. The leader of this gang. So get it out of your system and start being rational.”

The blonde lets her shoulders sag as she inhales and exhales in place for a while. The minute she’s grounded she catches Carter’s gaze and her eyes light up. “List. I need a list of whoever went in the room with all of the product. We need to narrow it down.”

***

“Jackson you’re a fucking genius.”

“It’s called having common sense but I’ll take the praise. It’s the only one I’m getting from you anyways.”

Carter resisted the urge to pick a fight with the younger girl, because finding stolen drugs and not getting killed seemed like a much better idea.

Bea figured out that Henry, one of the newly recruited members of SS was a thief, or maybe just a crackhead. Same thing. He was the last to be in that room so all eyes were on him, and guns.

“Heyyy buddy. Henry right?”

The shorter man trembled at the sight of a gun lodged right into his mouth. “Mmmm!”

“Oh I’m sorry, did you want to say something? Here let me just”, Bea clicks the gun which only causes the thief to panic even more. It was almost pitiful.

“Alright lay off the poor sucker.”

Bea pulls the gun out of his mouth and sits down on a stool in front of Henry with a grin. “So…where is the stash darling?”

He points almost immediately to a built in storage locker with a shaky finger.

“Ohhh well that was so easy Henry! Glad you could comply. You should tell your friends to be more like you. But…between me and you, they might already be dead”, Bea whispers that last part slowly, smirking when Henry’s lip quivers violently.

“Please just do it already! Why are you guys waiting?”

Bea raised an eyebrow in surprise and glanced over at Carter who scanned the man’s face intensely. “I guess he wants to die? Talk about kinks I mean come on”

“No.”

Carter reaches his arm out towards Bea but never takes his eyes off Henry. The blonde watches in confusion until she realizes the thief is looking behind her, and so is Carter.

“It’s a setup Bea, duck!”

She dived for the ground quicker than lightning as a bullet flies through the air, leaving a trail of dust behind. Carter ducks for cover as well and starts firing rounds towards the men who snuck up on them. He managed to hit three of them but one grabs Bea by the leg and drags her against the rough concrete.

“Son of a- get your dirty hands off of my Dr. Martens. My girlfriend bought me these!”

A swift kick to the face shut the blonde up real quick but she manages to recoil and send the man sprawling backwards into a row of barrels.

Carter guns him down and Bea finds her footing, pistol in hand and a thirst for revenge. But they never stopped coming.

Her and Carter were left battered and bruised, but alive. Their product was gone again though. But atleast they were alive. Carter told her that it was a theft mission primarily and neither of them were meant to die. But it only made Bea wonder who those people were.

And why were they kept alive?

***

“Beatriz Naomi Jackson what the actual fuck?!”

“Oh not the middle name…”

Bea tries to avoid Poppy’s killer gaze as she surveys the damage that had been done to her girlfriend’s torso, legs, and face.

The strawberry blonde could barely mutter a word. Her mouth opened and closed in brief shock before collapsing next to the injured girl.

Bea could see the tears flowing down her rosy cheeks, which contrasted her porcelain skin. “Poppy…are you crying? I..please don’t..”

“What do you expect me to do Bea? It kills me to see you hurt like this. Who did it? Tell me!” The blonde chokes on her own words as her hands hovers cautiously over Bea’s wounds, afraid to make her feel pain.

“No I can’t tell you. I mean…I didn’t expect this to happen. It was a setup and we were outnumbered-“

“We need to get you to a hospital Bea oh my god.”

The blonde knew that she couldn’t go there. Not with the cops on the scene of the shootout, and actively looking for the people involved. Aka her and Carter. He told her to lay low and heal up, but she didn’t expect Poppy to be sitting on her bed waiting for her when she got home. The initial look on her face made Bea regret ever choosing this life.

She regrets it ever since being with Poppy. But it’s like a drug, once you start it’s hard to stop.

“I’ll call my father, he has the best doctors available and we’re gonna get your the right treatment and-��

Poppy immediately cuts off, her eyebrows scrunching up until she realizes something. “Wait…what do you mean you were outnumbered Bea?”

Bea swallows heavily, praying that this conversation couldn’t escalate further, but that isn’t the case.

“Bea, answer me”

“It..it was just me and Carter. We didn’t think there would be an ambush. We had just gone there to get goods we lost.”

“And where is Carter? Does he know you’re like this right now? Did he leave you, I swear to god Bea if he left you…” Poppy’s voice cracks as her whole body shivers in violent waves.

Bea pulls her girlfriend in for a hug even though it causes every inch of her body to sting harshly. It was the comfort that she needed though. Watching Poppy breakdown over the sight of her was too much, and she began to contemplate everything.

“Pops listen to me, I cannot go to the hospital right now. There are cops looking for us.” The strawberry blonde stares at her until she understands the velocity of Bea’s words.

“Fine. But there will be a doctor that will come to treat you at my house. And you’re coming, I don’t want to hear it.”

Bea knew not to protest that. It was quite obvious this whole incident has left both parties distraught and she didn’t want to try and tell Poppy how to feel.

“Just tell me something. Are you in immediate danger? Is someone trying to harm you right now.”

The blonde chose her words carefully. Because even after coming home beaten to a pulp, she still couldn’t tell the love of her life the full truth.

“No Poppy, they just wanted the drugs. They got what they wanted. I’m not in danger.”

For now.

“I will be okay.”

I hope.

“Don’t lie to me Jackson. I can’t do this if you lie. You promised me you wouldn’t get to the point where you’d have to choose between me and the gang.”

“I know Poppy…I-“

“You promised.”

“And I’m going to keep that promise-“

“Yeah the hell you are. And you’re going to promise me that you won’t ever come home like this again. You’re going to get yourself killed before we even start our life together. Our future.”

Bea sucks in a breath which punctures her chest. She couldn’t tell if the injuries or Poppy’s words had caused that terrible ache. “Our…Wait I..”

“I love you Jackson. I…don’t care if you think it’s too early to say that. I don’t care if I sound too cheesy for a mean girl. I love kissing you and feeling the laughter run through your body when we hug. I love being the reason you smile. I love you. And you don’t have to say it back. I just..I needed you to know-“

“I love you too. Probably maybe from the moment I met you.”

Poppy’s eyes seemed to glisten once again and this time there was no sadness etched into the shape. She smiled a pure smile and wrapped her arms around Bea in a tight hug.

She captures her lips in a searing kiss that leads to a trail of kisses down the strawberry blonde’s neck, dip of her collarbone, and chest. Bea kisses her until her chest gives out from exhaustion and pain.

“Then you have to promise that this won’t happen again.”

“I promise.”

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NOTES: They’re gonna be fineeeee, right guys??? Graduation next chapter woooo.

Tags: @samanthadalton @somewillwin @clowneryme @baexpoppy @poppysmc @doey-eyes8 @veenast @straightlikewetspaghetti @phoennixxsblog

#i came up with that middle name on the spot lmaooo #no bug motivation this time just pepsi #poppy min sinclair #queen b #playchoices #mc x poppy

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dialovers-translations · 4 years ago

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Diabolik Lovers Lunatic Parade Special Pamphlet Short Story: The 12 Vampires and the Magic Lamp [ENG Translation]

Original title: １２人のヴァンパイアと魔人のランプ

Source: Diabolik Lovers Lunatic Parade Limited Edition Special Pamphlet

Summary: After the Parade has come to an end, Yui receives a special ‘Magic Lamp’ from Count Walter’s butler which can be used to grant a single wish. As she tries to refuse the gift, the Sakamaki, Mukami and Tsukinami brothers promptly stop her and begin to fight over who has the right to use this valuable treasure. She escapes, but the boys chase her around the city, each of them determined to have their own wish granted. ーー And so, their game of tag begins.

“Chichinashi! Where are you hidin’!?”

“Oooi~ Bitch-chan~! Be a good girl and show yourself?”

With the Parade having come to an end, Ayato-kun and Laito-kun’s voices echo through a now quiet and nearly deserted Glimmer Street. While hiding in the shadow of the buildings, a sof sigh fell from my lips.

“...What to do? I have to hurry and go to Bernstein Castle...”

Right now, I am on the run not only from Ayato-kun and Laito-kun, but from a total of 12 different Vampires.

All of this happened because I obtained the golden, shimmering ‘magic lamp’ I’m currently holding in my hands.

ーー It happened after I managed to regain my heart with everyone’s help.

As I was about to leave this city to return to the Human World, I was approached by a butler working for Count Walter. He handed me this ‘Magic Lamp’ as an apology for the trouble his Master had caused me. According to what I was told, it is an extremely valuable treasure which will grant any one wish.

Furthermore...The Sakamaki, Mukami and Tsukinami brothers were there to witness the whole ordeal.

“I just can’t accept something so valuable. ...I’ll give this back to you, okay?”

As I said that in hope of returning to Bernstein castle afterwards, they stopped me in disbelief.

And then claimed that if I did not want it, they would use it instead. ...This resulted into a fight and before they knew it, I had made a run for it, taking the lamp with me.

ーー And that is how our game of tag started.

I am not quite sure what everyone would wish for, but I believe we don’t need this thing if it can fulfill one person’s wish only.

“Heeh...So that’s your reasoning. Well, I’m pretty sure it’s useless though...”

“ーー S-Shuu-san...!?”

“Not just Shuu. I’m here too. Geez, you really made us go through the trouble of lookin’ for you.”

When I raised my head, Subaru-kun was standing next to me as well. ...No, it wasn’t just the two of them. All of the Sakamaki brothers had gathered, from Ayato-kun and Laito-kun whom I believed had walked past me earlier, to Kanato-kun and even Reiji-san.

“Hehe...You’re pretty desperate, Subaru.”

“I mean, Subaru-kun’s going to wish for Bitch-chan to fall head over heels in love with him, right~? No wonder he’s so desperate, nfu~”

“D-Don’t be makin’ up lies! My wish is a new coffin!”

“All I want...is to live surrounded by an endless amount of sweets!”

“In that case, I’m gonna wish for a huge load of takoyaーー No, actually, might not be bad to have Chichinashi turned into a Chichiari*.”

--> チチアリ or ‘Chichiari’ would be the opposite of ‘Chichinashi’, literally meaning ‘to have boobs’.

“Eh!? M-Me...!?”

“You can’t, Ayato-kun. I’ll be one turning Bitch-chan into a voluptuous, young woman after all~*”

--> He literally describes it as a ナイスバディのオネーサン or ‘Nice body no Onee-san’. Onee-san is used to refer to women who are older than you are but since Laito-kun is only 17 in human years, it would apply to a girl in her early 20s as well.

“G-Geez! Cut it out, you two...!”

“...You guys really came up with some bullshit. If it can grant any wish, I’d make it so the Old Man never bothers me again...Pwaah...”

And so, they began to slowly close in on me. The very moment they reached for the lamp, Reiji-san - who had been the only one remaining quiet so far - suddenly raised his voice.

“Would you care explain this to me? ...Because you kept touching the lamp with those sweaty palms, there are now fingerprints all over it! Come on, it is not too late yet! Put these on at once!”

While frantically shouting at me, he threw a pair of white gloves my way. Surprised by his menacing look, I put them on as asked, and Reiji-san finally nodded his head in agreement.

“I am disappointed...Do none of you grasp the true value of this lamp?”

“Haah? Are we really not allowed to touch it with our bare hands...?”

“It looks pretty normal from the outside though~ I’m pretty sure I’ve seen a similar example in Kanato-kun’s room...?”

“Yes. ...Well, that one isn’t capable of granting wishes though.”

Reiji-san sighed deeply at Ayato-kun, Latio-kun and Kanato-kun’s consecutive comments.

“...Only two of these ‘magic lamps’ exist in this world, making them very valuable from a historic point of view. Furthermore, the lamp may disappear once it has granted one’s wish, therefore it revolts me you lot are even considering putting it to use...”

While the other guys seemed little interested in Reiji-san’s emotion-laden speech, he once again spoke up.

“Well, I doubt you will ever understand. ーー Especially you, whom I did not expect to even join us in the first place...”

“...Shut up. Who cares?”

Shuu-san calmly brushed off Reiji-san’s taunt as if it was nothing.

“Hehe...Seems like he doesn’t give a shit ‘bout what you say.”

“Fufu, take a look at that frustrated expression on Reiji’s face. ...This might be the most interesting thing I’ve seen in quite some time.”

“Geez, cut it out you two~ Don’t you feel bad for Reiji~?”

“Feel bad? ...Hehe. Pretty sure your words hurt even more.”

The other four brothers who had been listening in on their conversation continued to chuckle...Which eventually caused Shuu-san to burst out laughing as well.

Seems like this sight dealt a pretty hefty blow to Reiji-san’s pride, as he stood there shaking violently from sheer anger.

I better make a run for it before things take a turn for the worse...

I used the fact they had suddenly completely forgotten about me to my advantage, and left the place at once.

“...Phew. Thank god. Seems like they didn’t notice.”

I eventually found myself on Aizen Alley, one of the streets located in the very back of Glimmer street. To be honest, I wasn’t too thrilled about having to pass through there, but if I wanted to head to the castle while avoiding Ayato-kun and the others, I had no other choice.

“Hehe...Too bad. You can’t escape us First Bloods.”

“Hand over that lamp you are holding at once.”

I gasp at the voices resounding from the darkness. Those who appeared were Shin-kun and Carla-san.

“I-I can’t do that...! I believe it is wrong to use the lamp for one’s own selfish pursuits...”

“If we give it back, it’ll just get thrown into some old, dusty storage room, right? In that case, I’m pretty sure the lamp would be happier to have someone use it as well?”

“B-But...”

“Come on, don’t hesitate. You’re keeping Nii-san waiting as well. Can’t you hurry up?”

“...T-Then, what would you wish for, Shin-kun?”

While snorting at my desperate question, he answered with a smile.

“That should be obvious. I’d make sure those filthy Vampires disappear off the face of the Demon World at onーー”

“ーー No. We want cured ham.”

“N-Nii-san...?”

“We shall change all food in this world to cured ham. That is my...No, the dearest wish of all First Bloods.”

“R-Right...”

Carla-san would blurt that out with a straight face. It is the very definition of a selfish wish but I wonder if Shin-kun is truly okay with it? ...I look over at Shin-kun while wondering that, seeing him look at Carla-san in utter defeat.

“...Well then, woman. Hand it over right now.”

“You’re actually hoping to fulfill that wish...!?”

“Yes, of course.”

All food in this world will turn into cured ham...That is just simply pushing it one step too far. It pains me to have to deceive him...But I decided to tell a certain lie.

“H-Have you already had the chance to try the cured ham galette which is said to be this city’s speciality...?”

“...Pardon?”

“It’s a limited edition galette which is available at stores only after the Parade has ended. While passing by the shops earlier, I noticed that only very few were left, so I figured I would inform you just in case...”

While there was no guaranteeing he would believe me, I wanted to make Carla-san forget about the lamp, even if just for a few minutes. With that sole purpose in mind, I continued my act.

“...Let us go, Shin. Just leave this woman be.”

“W-Wait, Nii-san! You’re just going to believe her on her word!?”

“We will know whether she was speaking the truth or not once we get to the shop. Even if she had been lying, capturing a human woman is child’s play to me. However, if she has been speaking the truth...”

“If we don’t hurry, they’ll run out of cured ham galettes, right? ...Right, I understand.”

Realizing there was no point in trying to reason with him, Shin-kun reluctantly trailed behind Carla-san as they left.

I truly am sorry...While internally apologizing to both of them, I headed towards my desitation.

“Haah...I can finally see it in the distance...”

Some time after I bid farewell with the Tsukinami brothers, I finally got close to Bernstein castle.

“Oh no...I can’t approach the castle like this...”

After all, four familiar figures were standing lined up by the castle’s gate. Those are the Mukami brothers...Of course, with Ruki-kun standing in the middle. As to be expected of a strategist like him. If I wanted to return the lamp to its owner, I would have to make it back here eventually. They were one step ahead of me.

“Eve...Found you...”

“...!! A-Azusa-kun!?”

When I timidly turned around at the voice suddenly calling for me from behind, Azusa-kun - who was talking to Ruki-kun and the others up until seconds ago - suddenly stood right in front of me.

“Ahー M-neko-chan! So this is where you’ve been~!”

“Che...Ya sure took yer sweet time. You’re damn late, Sow!”

“...Calm down, you guys. If we make too much of a ruckus, we’ll attract the attention of the others.”

When I raised my voice, it caught everyone’s attention and without a chance to slip away, I was soon surrounded by the four Mukami brothers.

“I’m sorry, guys. But I won’t hand over this lamp to anyone...!”

After jumping the gun like that, Ruki-kun let out a disappointed sigh.

“...Seems like you have got the wrong idea. I simply want to look after the lamp for you.”

“Eh...? You don’t want to use it to grant your own wish?”

“Of course not. If a Vampire such as myself holds on to the lamp, it will decrease the chances of one of the other guys stealing it.”

“You say that buuuut~ ...Ruki-kun, aren’t you actually hoping to use that lamp to renovate our manor~?”

“Your own exclusive study room off-limits for anyone else, and a play room filled with nothing but chess boards...Hehe, as to be expected of Mr. Eldest son.”

“Kuh...! Don’t assume such things. All I want to do is to make the home we have received from that man the most comfortable for you all to live in...!”

While Ruki-kun chuckles sarcastically after his true intentions are exposed by his siblings, Azusa-kun reached out for me.

“Listen, Eve...The four of us talked it out and...We’ve decided to use the lamp together with Ruki as our representative...”

“Ruki-kun’s so mean, you know~! I was actually going to wish for a hundred year’s worth of Vongole Bianco.”

“I was gonna ask for the power to manipulate the weather...But my idea got shot down at once. ...Haah...And here I thought I could make field work a lil’ easier on myself...”

“I just want to be with Eve so...I didn’t really have any particular wishes...”

“Is that so...? It’s really admirable of you all to hold back on your own desires.”

Even though the younger brothers were voicing their complaints, it didn’t seem like they were going to force their own wishes through. I’m sure it is because Ruki-kun intends to make a wish which benefits the whole family, as the deep bond of trust between the four brothers somehow made me feel warm inside.

However...That still does not mean I will give them the lamp.

“Uhm, you see...It just doesn’t sit right with me to only have one person’s wish granteーー!?”

The second I felt as if something was closing on me, a large sound resounded from the nearby buildings before they collapsed.

“...!? This magic...”

“The Tsukinami’s...perhaps? Look, over there...!”

“Ugeh! They look hella pissed off! Did ya do somethin’!?”

“Uu...W-Well...”

I could feel my heart drop at Yuma-kun’s words. Carla-san and Shin-kun must be upset about the lie I ended up telling them back then...

“Say, what should we do!? At this rate, we’ll all be turned to dust...!”

Kou-kun’s exclamation made me panic as I rushed towards the two brothers. Either way, I just had to apologize as quickly as possible...However, I was stopped by the Sakamaki brothers before I could reach them.

“You’ve got nowhere to run now...Oi, hand me the lamp already!”

“What are you saying, Subaru? I will be using the lamp. You’re in the way!”

“Hell no! I’m gonna have my wish granted!”

“Ehー Let me have the honor for once~ We can only use it once and my wish is obviously the best.”

Shuu-san joins in a little late as well and before I know it, the Sakamaki, Mukami and Tsukinami brothers are all gathered just like when we started off.

Glares were being exchanged here and there as a hostile atmosphere fills the air. I can no longer stop them all by myself. In that case, I will have to rely on an outer source to back me up. I didn’t want to use the lamp to have a wish granted but...This is the only way to stop their fight.

While rubbing the side of the lamp, I spoke up with a loud voice.

“Release lanterns into the sky once more!”

White smoke emitted from the lamp and soon after ー Poof! The lamp disappeared with a popping sound.

When I look up at the sky, I once again witness the same magical sight of countless lanterns floating through the sky, just like they did a few hours ago. ...At some point, their quarreling voices had gone quiet as well.

“You...Haah. You really are a foolish woman.”

“Ya really think we’re happy with this crap? Geez. Ya really used the lamp for some useless shit...”

“...Eh...?”

Shuu-san and Yuma-kun’s remarks catch me off guard as I froze on the spot.

“...Livestock, seems like you did not grasp the true value of that lamp.”

“Exactly...To think a great hidden treasure of the Demon World has been lost over such a ridiculous wish...!”

Ruki-kun and Reiji-san voiced their complaints as well.

“B-But...! All of you were moved by the lanterns, no...?”

I frantically reached out for the others, hoping that at least one of them would agree with me. ...That was all I wished for, yet...

“I mean, sure? But to be honest, I didn’t need to see it a second time...”

“...I’d hate to have to agree with a mere Vampire...But I’ll admit that Kou is right this one time. You feel the same, don’t you, Nii-san?”

“...My cured ham...”

“Too bad, Shin-san...Seems like Carla-san can’t hear you right now...”

“Ah-aah...I was looking forward to seeing a sexy Bitch-chan as well~”

“Me too. I was already making plans for which sweet I would try first...!”

“Fuck! There goes my plan of gettin’ a coffin in which nobody can bother me...!”

All I got in return were negative responses and sighs.

“...Guess I’ve got no other choice then! Oi, Chichinashi! Let me suck your blood to make up for it!”

“W-Wait! That’s way too sudden...!”

“Shut up! That’s the only thing which can calm this anger inside of me!”

While Ayato-kun closed in, I looked around me in search of someone to save me, but all I could see were a bunch of eyes glaring at me from the darkness. At this rate, they will all take my blood. ...There is no way I would come out of that alive. Realizing I had to make a run for it...I dashed away at full-speed.

“Ah! Wait, M-neko-chan!!”

“Geez, Bitch-chan! I’m not scary though~!”

The many lanterns floating through the night sky was a sight to behold, but unfortunately, I did not have the leaway to enjoy that right now. After all, I had to flee from their approaching footsteps and voices calling out for me as soon as possible.

I didn’t want them to fight and while I never expected them to become friends, I wished they would at least try and be on neutral terms with each other.

That wish was most definitely granted. Right now, they had put the strained relationship between the different families aside to join forces.

However, knowing their shared goal is my blood...doesn’t make me happy at all.

ーー The Demon World’s Parade safely came to an end, but my night had only just begun.

ーー END ーー

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