#i didn't have a whole lot saved i had to go hunting and almost all of them have this filter lol

[graciereadshannigram]

hey fam, welcome to the October round up of all my favorite fics i read this month!!

as a reminder: the ingredients for a five star rating typically (but not always!!) include some combination of a.) believable characterizations of both Hannibal and Will, b.) compelling plot and/or character arcs, and c.) high quality smut.

that being said, my judgment of the aforementioned ingredients is powered almost exclusively by vibes and as such, is incredibly subjective.

you can find past recs below:

February March April May June July August September

and if you have any recs of your own for me, PLEASE SHARE.

without further ado, let's go!

Mine to Touch by piginapoketuesday

Word Count: 14193 Summary: "You respond so well to hand feeding," Hannibal said, watching Will's hips squirm. "I'm considering binding you for every meal."Will's neck flushed with fear. Never being allowed to feed himself again. Learning to associate food with a swollen, untouched cock. Swallowing prettily and on command. His body betrayed him, and he moaned around the fork in his mouth.~Lots of constant stimulation, feeding kink, and orgasm denial. Also lots of love and care.

So I might have a handfeeding kink. Possibly. Who's to say?

A Game for Two by sourweather

Word Count: 7710 Summary: One Long Game. That's what their relationship has always been. And the game never seems to end, which suits them just fine.Some unhinged murder husband content for the soul

Pretty much anything from this author ends up getting a five star rating, and this one was no exception.

Focus and Curiosity by hesterbyrde

Word Count: 7029 Summary: If someone had told Will two months ago that he would wind up regularly sleeping with his psychiatrist, he would have laughed in their face. Not just once, but twice. First for the absurdity of the idea in general. Just the thought of someone carrying on a sexual relationship with their therapist was ridiculous. Never mind that it would also be wildly unethical and illegal. But then he would also laugh at the sheer thought of having a psychiatrist in the first place. He'd avoided them like the plague all his adult life, and largely succeeded save the required eval after he'd been stabbed in the line of duty back when he was a cop. Needless to say that hadn't gone well.But this arrangement with Hannibal Lecter was going very well, strangely enough. Hannibal seemed content to let Will steer the course of his therapy. When Will didn't feel like talking, Hannibal would keep the conversation superficial. Or they would talk about whatever case Will was currently working on for Jack. And when Will did feel like talking, he had to admit some of Hannibal's insights into the quandary of his personality were actually enlightening. And it didn't hurt that the sex was amazing.

THIS BETTER NOT AWAKEN ANYTHING IN ME. Deadass, this inspired me to upgrade my own nipple clamps, so. Do with that information what you will.

Quiet Asphodel by FKAHerSweetness

Word Count: 174475 Summary: Once upon a time, there was a great and just king. This king, long ago, adopted a son and groomed the young prince to hunt monsters that roamed the kingdom. One day, the prince comes upon a monster of wild proportions, both fierce and courteous. The prince vows to the monster: 'I will capture you, as my father bids me.' The monster makes his own vow to the prince: 'I will wed you, as my heart bids me.'

Holy fucking shit. Once again, a deeply uncomfortable and awesome read. Again, nobody is good in this fic. But with my whole chest, FUCK Jack Crawford.

Much Ado About Knotting by l3moncoffee

Word Count: 3352 Summary: “We have a warrant to search the premises!”“Surely you could have knocked,” Hannibal Lecter said, wrapping a protective arm around his Omega.—————————————————— The FBI & Baltimore City Homicide have their sights on the Lecters, a bonded Alpha-Omega pair suspected of torturing and cannibalizing their victims.A strike team is assembled to catch them red-handed, but they run into some unexpected knots along the way.

I need more of this. STAT.

Heart's Desire by Celinesits

Word Count: 34514 Summary: COMPLETEWhat if Hannibal Lecter was given a Love Potion that led him straight to Will Graham? Spending two weeks with your Heart’s Desire is a dream come true.Meanwhile, Will Graham is fulfilling his public duty by staying with Hannibal, but being smothered in affection forces Will to confront his increasingly confused feelings for Doctor Lecter. Thank you if you have supported this story- kudos and comments/bookmarks are so kind x ❤️Based on the characters created by Thomas Harris, and Hannibal TV show creator Bryan Fuller.

I loved how well this was executed, enough that I can forgive the very brief overlap with HP/FBWTFT. Also, very in character Hannibal.

double by YouAreMyDesign

Word Count: 3961 Summary: It took a long time before Will grew from actively fighting these gifts, to resigned acceptance, to eager anticipation. It's just one of those things that comes with dating Hannibal Lecter; gifts are a given. And Hannibal, he soon realized, loves seeing Will in things he's bought.

We see dom Will Graham and we black out.

Patience and Precision by hesterbyrde

Word Count: 6253 Summary: Will drove himself straight from the crime scene to Hannibal's house. He wasn't even halfway up the porch steps when the door cracked open to reveal Hannibal's chiseled face, his features all the sharper with lines of confusion and concern."Will, I wasn't expecting you. Is everything alright?" he asked, pulling the door open to allow Will inside.Will took in the sight for a moment, making a slow fuss of taking off his coat and brushing his shoes on the mat. Hannibal was not in a suit. Not even in casual wear. Rather he was wearing a pair of soft grey lounge pants and a cable knit red sweater. Will had the sudden urge to press his face into the fabric and see if the crimson yarn was as soft as it looked.

Nipple clamps are my kryptonite.

pick up your phone by abbymyg

Word Count: 1404 Summary: Alana calls Will at an inopportune time.

A reread!! I love this one so much.

Recognition by StratsWrote

Word Count: 3910 Summary: The video was simple, a man sat in a high-back chair with his legs spread and his hand between them. He had a magnificent cock, uncut, red, thick. Will loved that cock. He worshipped it in his mind. And watching it now, Will groaned in pleasure, sinking deeper into the bed with his own hand stroking himself.  Will has a certain porn actor he's a fan of. He's never seen his face, but he knows every breath and groan and whimper he makes. When he meets Dr. Lecter, a consultant on the Shrike case, Will doesn't find him particularly interesting until in the midst of saving a life, he hears the same sighs and hums he's pleasured himself to coming from the doctor next to him.

Oh ideal. This was so hot.

Housekeeping by FKAHerSweetness

Word Count: 96562 Summary: Marriage is a creature living separate from its components. Yet it requires attention, tolerance and care. Have you seen it? Could you recognize its deep wounds - and which one of you inflicted them? And are they ready to heal? What do you really know about this illusory animal?

Holy shit. When I say this fic got under my skin in the best way possible, I truly mean that. Will is terrible. Honestly, so is Chilton. Hannibal is also not great. This is a story about not great people, but like a car crash, I simply couldn't look away. I love erotic psychological horror and this was ticking all of the boxes for me.

The Accident by TigerPrawn

Word Count: 1369 Summary: Sharing a bed results in unexpected intimacy.

And there was only one bed!!! I love.

Moth to the Flame by hannibae

Word Count: 4324 Summary: Will breathes out a laugh, arching his back in surprise when Hannibal presses the dry pad of a finger over his hole. “Nah,” he lets out, shaky and unsure, “I’ve been high before, but I’ve never—God, everything you do is perfect, isn’t it? Are you bad at anything?” It all feels too nice, Hannibal’s body solid and perfect against his own, his hands squeezing and kneading his flesh, his hips working up against Will’s own. It’s exactly how it shouldn’t be with Hannibal.

stoned Hannigram is absolutely delightful, this was so fucking HOT.

The Strangest Thing by foggys_cupcake_girl

Word Count: 3562 Summary: Will Graham is used to coming home and seeing his husband doing odd things, but he's never come home to find him with his head in a bag of Cheetos, with his hand down the toilet, or lying bare-naked in the living room after a shower.Or, that one where Hannibal tries to do a nice thing and ends up in way, WAY over his head.

STONED HANNIGRAM IS ABSOLUTELY DELIGHTFUL.

Remember Me, I Ask by HigherMagic

Word Count: 10795 Summary: "Part of me was worried you were dead."It's not what he expected to hear, and Will's throat goes tight. The sheath of it is slicked with honey and afterburn, and his fingers flex on the arms of the chair. "You didn't used to let fear of consequences affect you," he replies."Until you."Settled into his life with Duncan, Will is ready to leave everything behind. Until Hannibal breaks out of prison. Will knows his time is limited.

This felt very in character, and was also hot as fuck.

Healthy Curiosity by orphan_account

Word Count: 1267 Summary: Restless, Abigail sneaks off to her fathers' bedroom in the middle of the night seeking comfort. She instead puts some of her curiosities to rest.

Fuck me, I do love voyeurism.

Teach Me a Lesson (Already Learned) by whenitstarted

Word Count: 3142 Summary: Will being married to Molly and cheating on her with Hannibal.

A reread that is still fabulous.

the leather runs smooth by drpeaceandlove

Word Count: 4960 Summary: "Are you... encouraging me to sleep with Molly?" Will kept his intent gaze trained upon Hannibal's face, finding that - even through his abilities to empathise with others - he could not discern anything wrong about Hannibal's current demeanour.A feline grin unfurled upon Hannibal's lips and he let out a faint exhalation of amusement, capturing Will's lips in yet another kiss."I am merely advising you, my dear." Hannibal insisted - something Will did not at all believe - and brought his hand back, much to Will's dismay. That disappointment was short-lived, however, when Hannibal began unbuckling the leather belt looped through Will's jeans. "Now, shall we begin our session?"----Or, Hannibal and Will are interrupted by a call during one of their therapy sessions.

Anything involving being railed while on a phone call is gonna make me INCREDIBLY happy.

All the Things that Make a Sound by sourweather

Word Count: 3330 Summary: Hannibal gets an unexpected call from Will while he's in prison. They don't speak, Will just wants Hannibal to listen.

Will calling Hannibal while Hanni's in prison to make him listen while Will fucks Molly? Amazing. Wish I could give this more than one star.

I Hope You'll Feed Me by DorianThey

Word Count: 3473 Summary: Trans!Will Graham hates getting his period, but Hannibal loves taking care of him while he’s bleeding. Especially when Will needs an endorphin boost…

This was hot. That's all.

Cuisine Euphonique by thecountessolivia

Word Count: 35321 Summary: Nightmares brought on by a gruesome case lead Will to some unorthodox therapy in the form of a YouTube cooking channel.[Completed]

So this was a reread and I'm still obsessed with it.

Instinct by solarteacup

Word Count: 5329 Summary: Hannibal took another sip of wine, then reached out with both hands to cup Will’s face. He moved slowly, intentionally. His fingers caressed from the point of Will’s chin through the coarse dark hair of his beard, fanning out to his cheeks. When his fingertips reached Will’s ears, he stopped, cradling Will’s jaw in his palms while his thumbs brushed against old scars. He smiled, eyes moving from Will’s reflective gaze down to his slightly parted lips. “Instinct is nothing more than lessons learned and skills acquired over millions of years of self-preservation. Genetic patterns built to keep us alive without thinking. Legs to run or kick, arms to climb or scratch…” “And mouths to bite?” Will spoke low, eyes darting across Hannibal’s, unsure where to settle his gaze. Hannibal hummed. “The mouth serves many, many purposes." ______________ aka Hannibal gives Will anatomy lessons on what he and his mouth were built for.

Oh dear. I fear this has awoken something in me.

it’s only a matter of time before we all burn by madeofbees

Word Count: 11963 Summary: help, please voice cracking 2:13am blinking the world on and off. The flashing he couldn’t trust the time a power outage a will outage he needed to check his phone couldn’t tolerate hannibal away from his ear  what do you need will heavy with sleep composed and solid propping will up keeping him from flying apart, shattering like a fragile teacupi need you to make it stop—will has a panic attack, hannibal fixes it

THIS WAS SO FUCKING GOOD AND SO FREAKIN' HOT.

you are the shower of light i devour by madeofbees

Word Count: 26255 Summary: Will has spent his life on suppressants, living as a beta, repressing as much of his sexuality as he can. It’s easier, raises fewer questions. But suppressants only work so well for so long, and chronic overuse only makes the eventual heat worse. Still, he rests easy knowing that he’s perceived as a beta, and therefore is safe.Until his psychiatrist casually mentions it’s been a while since his last heat, and does he require any assistance?Yes, actually. He does.—Almost exclusively smut, with a dash of trauma!angst, heavily seasoned with obliviously and incorrectly assumed one-sided feels.

I do adore a good chronic overuse of suppressants leads to an intense heat trope.

looked up at the sky and it was maroon by madeofbees

Word Count: 15852 Summary: Will accidentally sends Hannibal a dick pic and Hannibal loses his shit. That’s it that’s the story.eta: now with edits!

i LOVE Hannibal nearly setting his home on fire because of a dick pic from Will. absolutely amazing, 10/10.

Doctor Lecter’s Fabulously Buff Investigator by TheSilverQueen

Word Count: 5625 Summary: Online conferences due to the quarantine are how Doctor Lecter's colleagues learn that: 1) Doctor Lecter has a beautiful home; 2) Doctor Lecter is married; and 3) Doctor Lecter's husband is fabulously buff.

This was very silly and I loved it.

I Only Have Eyes For You by sourweather

Word Count: 3827 Summary: Will gets so, so bored at Hannibal's dinner parties. But they're dating, so he can't exactly say no. So one night, he decides to have some fun, and tries to make Hannibal jealous by flirting with one of the guests. It doesn't go how Will expected.

Another re-read, another one that's still incredible.

Caught in the Act by UndeadRobby

Word Count: 2829 Summary: A collection of oneshots where Hannibal and Will get caught in... compromising positions.

Amazing.

Will Graham's Unconventional Health Care Proxy by UndeadRobby

Word Count: 3383 Summary: "It appears our dear friend Will Graham was in an accident, and is currently unconscious at Johns Hopkins. They needed someone to consent to continued treatment on his behalf, now that they have completed the actively life-saving treatment.”Frederick blinks. “And… he listed you as his healthcare proxy? Not, oh, I don’t know, his wife? Jack Crawford? Alana Bloom? A dog?”

Hannibal being Will's healthcare proxy and rubbing it in everyone else's face is hysterical and I loved it.

Like a Room Without a Roof by halotolerant

Word Count: 52881 Summary: Will is an awkward, single Submissive who has to get a temporary partner so he can pass an Alignment Health Assessment for his job. Hannibal is a Dom agreeable to low-level ‘sessions’ in which no sex or feelings will get involved.None of that works out quite to plan.

This was such a fun take on a BDSM AU!!

Make the world go quiet - sensory deprivation by Incidentsofunknownorigins

Word Count: 6071 Summary: Back in America 4th of July weekend,Will is triggered by fireworks and past trauma, Hannibal finds a way to distract him.

Trauma response mitigated by sex? Say less. Also written by a friend!

Hummingbird by sourweather

Word Count: 5416 Summary: Will and Hannibal have been seeing each other for a few months. They're keeping things pretty casual, sneaking around behind closed doors. Until Will finds out he's pregnant with Hannibal's baby.

This was fluffy goodness.

Pupping Season. by TheDarkestMindWithin

Word Count: 2377 Summary: Will's ready for pups, Hannibal remains adamant he is not.

This is exactly what I want out of a non-con scenario, holy SHIT. This was also a reread.

Captive by sixtieshairdo

Word Count: 1436 Summary: “What would Franklyn do if he saw you like this?” He relishes the way he can feel Hannibal’s cock twitch inside him whenever he clenches around him just a little tighter. “What would Jack do if he saw you like this?” The thought that Jack would disapprove of his relationship with Hannibal only makes Will spread his thighs wider, fucking down onto Hannibal’s cock faster, mind-drunk on how he can hear the sounds of his ass cheeks clapping. He’s fully naked, the way Hannibal likes him to be, and Hannibal’s mostly dressed – except for his pants around his knees – the way Will likes him to be. He can’t imagine what his sweaty knees are doing to the leather under him, but he knows Hannibal wouldn’t hesitate to keep the desecrated furniture in his office as evidence of their sordid affairs.

Fake relationship? Featuring a jealous Franklyn?? Catnip.

Hanni's Boy by Ishxallxgood

Word Count: 4648 Summary: Franklyn Froideveaux falls in love at first sight with none other than our friendly neighborhood empath. The only problem is, the object of his affections already has a partner. What is a man to do? Stalk the shit out of and emulate said partner of course. And it doesn't hurt that the man's partner just so happens to be Franklyn's very own psychiatrist Doctor Hannibal Lecter.Pure crack inspired by Jessie's Girl

This was so perfect, everything I wanted.

Savor You by Murder_Cupcake

Word Count: 585 Summary: Hannibal wants to pleasure Will, who's pregnant, heavy and embarrassed.

This was so so so hot.

in the truly gruesome do we trust by sidnihoudini

Word Count: 9473 Summary: Hannibal and Will have murder husbands mind palace sex, and Alana watches obsessively. A slow, sneaky grin slides its way across Will’s face as he looks up at Hannibal and teases, “You enjoy being watched.” “Does a lion eat its prey while it is still alive?” Hannibal asks rhetorically, an amused quirk to his lips. He drags his elbows against the silk sheets, letting himself rest his weight on them so he can comfortably brush his fingers through Will’s curls. After a pause, he drops his head, and presses his open mouth to Will’s. He pulls back a fraction, and breathes, “Yes.” Fully smiling now, sharp and uncontrolled, Will arches up against Hannibal’s body, and asks, “Does that make me the lion, or the prey?” “You are simply part of the pride,” Hannibal murmurs.

This. Was. So. Hot.

aaaand that's a wrap for October!! have fun babes!!

[em-ontv]

Get a room.

Pairing: Dean Winchester x lover!fem!reader

Summary: After a particularly bad hunt, you were patching Dean up in the motel room, but he said he needed to be healed up the right way.

Content: fluff(?), kisses, Sam kind of being the third-wheel, no use of y/n, mentions of injury

English isn’t my first language, mistakes should be present, sorry!

Word count: 698

You and Dean had just stumbled back to the bunker after a long, exhausting hunt. It was one of those hunts where everything that could go wrong, did. Dean had taken a hit from some nasty vamp, even after you told him to be careful, but Dean? Nah, that word wasn't in his vocabulary. And while he made no big deal of the gash, you knew it was serious enough to need a little patching up.

He was sitting on the edge of the bed, shirt off, grimacing slightly as you cleaned up the deep cut on his shoulder.

"Ow—! Careful," Dean grimaced, shooting you a mocking glare. "You trying to finish me off, sweetheart?"

"Quit being a baby," you shook your head. "You're lucky this didn't go deeper."

“I’m always lucky,” Dean responded, a smirk spreading across his face despite his slight wince when you dabbed the cloth on his wound again.

"Uh-huh. I should just leave you to bleed out next time, it would save me a whole lot of trouble." you muttered, beginning to bandage him up, nodding in approval of your work once you secured it.

Dean shifted, sighed, then flashed you a lopsided grin. "I think you missed a step, sweetheart."

"What step?" you raised an eyebrow, confused.

“For me to fully heal… there’s only one thing that’ll work.”

“What?" you almost rolled your eyes. "Lemme guess, whiskey and pie?”

He grinned wider. “Nope. Kisses. Specifically, from you. On my face. All over. Only way this wound’s gonna close up right.”

You snorted. “Right. Because that's definitely how medical science works.”

Dean winced dramatically. “You don’t believe me? It’s a foolproof healing method. I swear it.”

"C'mon, don't leave me hanging here—this is life or death." He added for good measure, tapping a finger to his cheek.

Despite yourself, you laughed. “You are so full of it, Winchester.”

“One kiss. Or like… fifty. But who's counting?” He shrugged.

You sighed, fully aware you were playing into his game but too tired to fight it. You leaned down and pressed a light kiss to his cheek, where his finger tapped relentlessly until you gave in.

“There you go,” Dean said, clearly pleased. “But you missed a spot—” He pointed to another area, so you kissed it too. “And there—” Another kiss. “And the forehead—” You kissed his forehead. “And—”

“Okay, Dean, that’s enough."

"Not enough. I can still feel the pain." He let out an over-the-top groan.

You sighed in exasperation, considering to either just punch him across the face or keep giving into him—you chose the latter.

Just as you were placing more kisses onto his face—the grin on his lips made him look like a love-drunk idiot—the door swung open.

Sam walked in with some takeout bags, he froze in the doorway, eyes widening as he took in the scene: you, practically sitting on Dean’s lap, showering his face with kisses, while Dean looked way too proud of himself.

“What did I just walk into?” Sam groaned, immediately making a beeline to the table to avoid getting another glance at the two of you.

"Hey, it's a part of the healing process, Sammy." Dean smirked, looking over to his brother.

Sam blinked, then made a face like he just swallowed something sour. “Gross. Seriously, guys, get a room.”

“We’re technically in a room, you know.” you said, getting off of Dean who seemed too reluctant to let you go.

"A room that you walked into." Dean added, a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

Sam set the food down, still shaking his head in disbelief. "Yeah, well, next time, maybe give me a warning first so I know not to come in while you guys are having a whole smooch-fest."

"You're just jealous."

"You two are impossible."

"Buzzkill."

Sam just groaned in annoyance again, starting to unpack the food.

You couldn't help but let out a soft laugh, feeling a bit guilty—though not that guilty. You glanced at Dean, who tugged on your hand with a happy expression.

"Next time, we're giving you painkillers." you said, lifting your hand up and running your finger through his hair.

"Not a chance." Dean smiled.

[g1rld1ary]

chilli margaritas - spencer reid x bartender!reader

prev

wc: 852

cw: alcohol, one kinda rude man

you didn't expect to see reid back at the bar so soon. granted it wasn't the next time you saw the bau, but it was close. it must've been a long case since the team were all looking worse for wear, but you imagined they'd caught whoever they were hunting since they were in good enough spirits.

derek got the first round, as was tradition, but you counted more bau members than drinks ordered. you didn't even get to ask, morgan explaining preemptively.

"pretty boy says he wants another drink recommendation," he said with a smile, "i think he just likes you."

"tell him he's welcome over any time, i think he's cute." it was bold, even for you, but doctor spencer reid was fascinating and you really wanted to talk to him more. derek made a face that you hoped meant he was impressed with your forwardness and headed back to his table with the beers.

later in the night, spencer was finally back. you'd been completely in the zone for a while, giving drinks and taking payments as if you didn't even need to think about it. you did, however, almost spill some man's drink all over you when you caught sight of reid standing awkwardly at the bar, watching you work. you all but threw the drink at whoever had ordered it, racing over to where the special agent stood.

"hey," you tried to sound smooth, "back so soon?" spencer smiled softly, endearingly uncomfortable.

"last time wasn't as bad as i anticipated." he shrugged the non-answer.

"and yet i'm getting the feeling that i'm not getting a repeat order?"

"actually the drink wasn't bad! i like really sweet things, my coffee needs a lot of sugar too -- otherwise it's too bitter. so, um, yeah, sex on the beach was pretty good. but i was thinking that maybe you could show me some other drinks too? i never go out drinking and while I've researched different drinks i assume it would be more useful to taste them by someone who can make them properly. I'm twenty four and i've had one cocktail, i need to catch up." you vaguely wondered how he could get so many words out in one breath, but stopped to consider them.

"let's start with the fact that it's okay to not have drunk a whole heap of alcohol. i'm a bartender and i only really drink one or two. but i am more than happy to be your guide into the dazzling world of alcohol." spencer smiled at you again, earnest and trusting and you felt immense responsibility to make him happy. you moved to say something, continue the conversation, but a gruff man's voice interrupted your train of thought.

certain patrons had evidently lost their patience despite there being two of you behind the bar, and your supreme efficiency all night.

"save the flirting for after there's a beer in my hand," he called with a laugh. you turned to face him, dangerously slow, the night's exertion catching up in a moment.

"if you speak to me that way again, i will never serve you another drink for as long as i work here. understood?" your tone was icy, intentionally resisting a peacemaking smile that evidently threw the man off, used to being served hand and foot by women twenty years younger than him. he had the decency to look mildly ashamed, pushing away from the bar to go take a lap of the room.

you turned back to spencer with your good mood reinstated.

"i was thinking we could maybe take a different flavour profile to last time -- a chilli margarita?" spencer was staring at you, eyes wide and dazed.

"that was amazing... um, yeah, that sounds great." you laugh loudly, getting to work on his drink.

"hey," you say as you hand him the glass, "didn't you say you were twenty-four before? last time morgan said you were twenty-three." spencer blushed, avoiding eye contact.

"yeah, it was my birthday."

"and you didn't tell me? i thought we were friends -- i'm your alcohol guide! your drink is on the house then."

"what! no, that's okay i can pay!" you almost groaned at his obliviousness. you were trying to make a move! you argued with him until he surrendered, smiling graciously, though with that already familiar awkwardness.

you watched him go fondly. as your eyes passed the bar counter on the move to get back to work you caught some cash. spencer had tipped the entire cost of his margarita. you rolled your eyes, putting the cash in your apron with a smile you were trying to bite back.

the rest of your night consisted of you watching spencer try and surreptitiously lick the spicy chilli rim off his glass while his teammates were in conversation, and one of them inevitably catching him and teasing him for it. it was a good shift.

[honeymvnt]

I want it all [18+]

Ethan Hunt x !fem!reader

Words count: 3.4k

A/N: After hearing about the death of every member of his team, Ethan realizes that he’s the only one left alive, or at least this is what he thought before you found him again.

Warnings: Ethan in Mission Impossible 1 is a warning…. Jk, again this is a smut so you know what you’re doing.

This is for my Mav, girl I love you @mqverick 🎀

It was early in the morning when you came back to the apartment where you and the rest of the team settled down to organize the whole mission.

A lot have happened since the beginning of the operation and you couldn't come to think that everyone was dead.

The sequence of events went so fast that you found yourself roaming through the cold streets in the hope that no one was following you, with your thoughts glued on how everything went terribly wrong. The annoying taste of them was leading your mind to think about the only person you knew could've saved himself, Ethan.

It was around four in the morning when you quietly climbed the stairs of the building and the suspense was devouring you and you didn't even want to think about what you had to tell to Kittridge, how to deal with him and what have happened and why you were the only one left alive.

You were so focused on your own reflections, on your fears and preoccupations that you didn't even notice that there were two light bulbs missing from the lamp walls hanging at the end of the hallway.

You approached the room, making sure to be quiet enough not to make any noise but broken glasses echoed through the whole building when you stepped in front of the door.

The glass kept cracking under your feet and you hurried yourself inside to lock the door behind you as fast as you could.

The big room was still, weirdly still like never before. You looked on your left as you caught your reflection on the tall windows that were showing the beautiful Prague in front of them.

Your eyes scanned the area until when you noticed that somebody have been there before you.

"Ethan?" You called him, walking towards the table where his computer was open on some website you've never seen before. You tried to recall where you've seen the logo before but once again your eyes made their way down the book next to it. When you tried to reach for it a hand grabbed your wrist and within a second your back was pressed against the wall and your breath stopped in your throat before your eyes shot open to meet his.

He was alive. You knew it. With a gun pointed right in front of your face and his arm locking you againts the wall as if you were the enemy. He was different from when you've seen him a couple of hours earlier: his eyes were a bit red with such rage that you didn't even recognize yourself. Your heart started to pound against your chest when you noticed that he wasn't letting go of you as you thought he would've.

"Ethan... what are you doing?" Your voice was shaky, your eyes fixated into his while you tried to get rid of his grip but the muscles of his arms tensed even more, his eyes darkened and the gun followed you.

"Turn around" your lips parted, ready to protest but you couldn't believe at what was happening right there. As complicated as the situation was already, you didn't want to upset him even more and so, you did as he ordered you to.

Ethan quickly grabbed your wrists and held them behind your back while the gun was slolwy moved down your back and remained there.

"Who sent you?" His whole body was now against yours, pressing against your back, trying to get an answer out of you, an aswer you didn't even have since that all you did was coming back like the rules say.

"No one..." you replied, trying to understand his position in all of this.

"Bullshit" Ethan said and spun you around to face you again.

"Who the fuck sent you?" You shook your head almost with desperation as you heard the sound of the bullet loading the gun, ready to shoot if needed and you knew you had to make him reason and break whatever defense he was trying to build against you.

"No one, no one sent me" His eyebrows were frowned and his hands were putting even more pressure around your wrists as he dragged you into the bedroom.

"Ethan? I don't understand..." you confessed as he put the gun into his pants and started to move his hands all over you.

"Where have you been?" His voice was against your neck and his hands were having no mercy on your body as they moved from your legs, up to your stomach and under your breasts, looking for something.

"Ethan stop this..." you tried to move away but he didn't let you.

He did not care how far this was going and besides how scared you were and how in disbelief you were about the way he was acting with you, you found it almost arousing.

"Where have you been mm?" He asked you again, turning your body around so you were facing him once again. He held you in place, letting his intense gaze devour you whole, and waited for the answer as if everything in the world depended on it.

"I... I was- looking for you" you said trying to make him reason but he didn't seem open to that and held you with both of his big hands and pinned you down on the bed.

You were almost in tears but the excitement that you were still trying to deny from yourself was even worse. How could you even find something like this attractive? Yet, there you were, almost begging for more but hiding it with tears of fake terror.

"You were looking for me" he said quickly, while his hands moved down your waist and squeezed your hips.

You unconsciously let out a whimper when he did that and his eyes immedialtly looked up towards yours. He tilted his head and a smirk made the corner of his lips curl like you've never seen before. All of this was new to you and you were still trying to process the previous hours you've spent roaming through the streets, hoping to find him alive, safe.

"You were looking for me?" Ethan asked while his hands forcefully spread your legs in front of him and his body was once again pressed against yours.

He was staring down at you, studying every single emotion you were letting out, the slightest noises you were making because of him and you haven't even noticed how hot you felt when he hovered above you in such way.

You swallowed hard and your lips parted to speak, to at least try to ptotest but as humiliating as it was right now, you wanted it, you wanted it real badly and he knew it.

Maybe he knew it all along, before all of this mess, before the whole mission. Maybe he wanted you for so long that the shock of losing you made him so scared and mad that he needed to be like this to have you.

Or maybe he knew something that you didn't and it was hard for him to trust you.

"Not speaking again?" Ethan grabbed your cheeks with a hand and forced you to stare at him "who sent you?" He asked once again but you gave him no answer.

He let go of your face and moved his hands roughly down on you again until when he found the end of your sweater and took it off of your body.

He looked at you and devoured you with those eyes of his as you noticed how his breathing fastened and his hands were desperately trying to touch all of you.

"You like this..." he said frowning when his attention focused on the way your body was responding.

He wasn't happy about it, obviously because he knew there was something wrong going on but you were not talking, you were simply not giving him what he wanted from you.

Ethan held your chin and spoke again with that tone that was making you dripping wet "you like being treated like this" his jaw clenched and your lips parted looking at his.

His hand slowly moved up your cheek and your eyes were not leaving his, not even for a second before he crashed his lips on yours. Never in your life you had such a kiss and only god knows for how long you've been waiting to be kissed by him like that.

He was so fast that without even realizing his hands were holding your thighs around his waist and his lips were roughly kissing all of your body.

You weren't able to form a single sentence nor a single thought besides embracing what he was doing to you.

When his hands reached for your trousers he quickly pulled them down your legs, until your ankles before tossing them away.

His mouth was consuming you in the most lustful way a human can even imagine and you couldn't help yourself but moan his name, bite your lips and wrap your legs around him even tighter.

You both didn't know how desperate you were for each other until now. You didn't know what the hell was going on in this room and how many people were looking for the both of you by now and you didn't care about it, just like you didn't care about how wrong this was, considering the circumstances.

He kissed your lips over and over again, forcing his tongue into your mouth and you weren't hesitanting to let him have you.

"I saw you dying" he said panting, between a kiss and another while your hands moved down his, still clothed, chest.

"It doesn't matter" you kissed him back and took off his shirt before he held your waist and pulled you even closer to his body.

You wrapped your arms around his neck and with a swift move you were now on top of him with one of his arms was holding you in place.

"It does matter..." he said after you, looking up at you waiting for an answer but instead, you moved on his lap and spread your legs while your hands undid the buckle of his belt.

"It does..." he continued but a moan escaped from his lips when you kissed his lips again.

"Does it?" You asked confidently now, but when his hands run up your back and his mouth moved down your neck, until your chest, you lost it.

He felt the tension in your muscles and smirked against your skin.

"Yeah...it does" he whispered and his fingers moved along your sides, making their way down your thighs as you shivered and arched you back towards him. You bit your lips at the feeling and your eyes fell shut when he reached the waistband of your underwear and slowly pulled them down your thighs.

The anticipation was killing you, making your lungs suffer from the heavy breathing and your mouth wet at the thought of kissing him again. You didn't even want to confess how sensitive you already were just because of all that happened, how quickly it was happening and how insanely attractive he was.

When his cold fingers touched you right where you were needing him the most, without even a warning, your hands suddenly tightened on his shoulders and the moan that you let out made him bite his lips to kill his own.

He spread your wetness all over your folds and you tried your best not to let out a sound , just to prove him that you could've resisted if you really wanted to.

Ethan was watching you, your every expression of pleasure he was causing you, your every movement and sound and you knew he wanted you more, he needed more.

"Let me hear you" he demanded, pinning you down on the bed again, making a moan escape from your lips while his his fingers started to stretch you out and his eyes were locked into yours.

"Fuck-" you said before taking a deep and quick breath

"Yes just like that" he smirked down at you and started to kiss your lips, going lower and lower.

You were struggling beneath him but it was the kind of struggle that turned him on, the kind of effort he liked from you and he was just as good as you imagined at making you sweat for it. Yes you've been imagining this all along and you were craving for it. You were dying to feel all of this, to feel him and the more you thought about how many fantasies you had with him the more you felt turned on by them.

His hands were caressing your skin, gripping on it to make sure to leave a mark afterwards so you had no other choice than stick with him.

"Ethan-" you gasped when he started to slide his fingers in and out of you, curling them to hit the right spot and make your eyes roll back. Your hips started to move along with his pace until when you didn't even realize that he had stopped moving and you were just riding them yourself.

He watched you with amusement and excitement, feeling his cock throb just at the thought of how tightly you were gripping his fingers inside of you and how wet you were getting after each pump of them.

His hand moved down to remove his boxers and free himself from the struggle.

You kept rolling your hips forward before he wrapped his huge arm around your waist and quickly switched position so you were on top of him again.

He looked up at you with eyes full of thrist for you and all you did was wrapping your arms around his neck and kiss him, bringing your body even closer to his so your chest was pressed against his.

Your hands slowly moved down his torso before you glanced down at him and he captured your lips in his again.

You adjusted yourself on his lap, biting your lips even harder than before, feeling his hard cock right against your stomach.

"Ride it" he said looking up at you and only then you noticed how bright they were, how much desperation he was holding back since the first moment he met you. He would've begged you if needed but as excited and ready as you were, you preferred to save it for another occasion.

You slowly stood up from him and placed both of your hands on his shoulders while his moved up your back, to bring you closer. He gently helped you down on his cock as you bit your lips to kill another desperate moan, trying to let your mind ignore how big he was and just take it as deeper as you could.

"fuck-" he groaned holding your hips in place, breathing heavily against your skin as you whined at how well he was stretching you out, feeling it throb in anticipation when your wet walls started to grip onto him for dear life.

The pleasure was taking over you as your mind was taken away by his images scrolling right in front of your closed eyes before you suddenly felt his hand moving up your stomach to cup one of your breasts and squeeze it lightly.

"Ethan-" you moaned feeling how hot his skin was against yours and how his lips parted when you looked back at him. Your movements became sloppier when he kissed your mouth and moved down to nibble on the skin of your chest while his hand slowly made its way up to the back of your neck.

"C'mon babe" Ethan said breathless as he noticed how much you were struggling to take it but you were so close to the edge, so close to let it go but holding back to make it last longer.

"I can't-" you cried out as your head fell backwards and  your nails dug into his skin before he held you down on the bed once again.

He was still inside of you but he was staring at you, at how beautiful you looked right beneath him, with your cheeks changing shades of pink and your long dark lashes touching the top of your eyes.

"You're so... beautiful" he whispered, bending down to kiss your cheek but moving down your neck to kiss you as if he knew this would've been the first and last time you were doing this.

Your eyes fell shut and all you felt was your body melting within his, the hotness of his skin and the tension in his muscles as he held himself right above you.

"Please Ethan..." you whispered as your hands moved down his arms and his eyes returned to yours and sparkled at your words.

You were trying to read him, to understand what was going on through his mind while he was looking at you like this, if he was even aware of what was going on but his lips were too tempting and you found yourself putting your thoughts aside and kissing him before he started to move back and forth.

"Please?" Ethan asked against your lips as he felt how your grip tightened around his arms and you nodded in response, keeping your eyes closed to savor the moment.

His thrusts were slow and torturous, making yourself wetter and his movements smoother inside you.

“Faster” you moaned and he didn’t hesitate to give you what you asked for.

Ethan sped up his pace, holding you down and hitting the same spot repeatedly to make you arch your back for and more, making your eyes wet with tears and your body burn beneath his.

One of his hands was holding your thigh around him and the other was still holding you in pace as yours were tightening even more around the skin of his arms.

Your chest was rising and falling quickly and the noises he was making were only driving you insane and dangerously close to your break point.

“I wanted you for so long” Ethan said closer to your ear before kissing your jaw and moving down your neck.

His words filled your heart, wrapped around it and squeezed it between your lungs as you felt his love embracing you. You gave in even more.

Your walls clenching over and over again around him, making Ethan’s eyes fall shut and his grasp on you even tighter.

“Me too…” you confessed and watched him move above you as if it was the most beautiful sight you’ve ever seen in your life and it really was.

You felt the knot in your stomach growing uncontrollably as he keep sliding in and out of you, kissing your lips, trying to be as quiet as possible but it was impossible.

“I’m- going to…” you managed to say between a gasp and another but Ethan kissed you and spoke up again before you could.

“Let go for me” the way he made you shiver just with those words was all you needed to reach the peak.

Your lips parted again and tears steamed down your cheeks before he buried his face in the crook of neck and moaned your name.

“Oh god-“ Your walls clenched painfully as you came all over him and he emptied himself inside of you, groaning against your skin and breathing heavily as pleasure washed over the two of you.

He didn’t move away yet and his eyes slowly met yours once again and you really couldn’t help yourself anymore but smile at how they sparkled at you.

Ethan smiled back at you and hugged you as tight as he could.

All the tension that the night had built, all the losses that you both went through, the fear you experienced when you knew everyone didn’t survive and the joy that hit you when you saw that he was still alive, waiting for you with terror in his eyes as if you were a ghost coming back to take him with you or even an enemy… it was all gone.

You held him with all the strength left in your body and his hand stroked your hair, his lips trailed kissed down your neck as he spoke to you.

“I thought I’d lost you” you smiled at his words and tears fell down your cheeks once again.

“You will never lose me” you met his eyes as you cleft your heart talk to him “never”.

He smiled back at you and kissed your whole face, making sure not to leave any spot unkissed before he laid down with you and held you close to him, to make sure nothing could’ve separated the two of you.

“Never”

[ladykailitha]

Sweet Home Indiana

You guys are getting an absolute feast this week. Two chapters on regular posting days, the twenty snippets you got on WIP Wednesday, this, and of course more Across a Crowded Room tomorrow.

Enjoy!

Based off a post I saw on here (and didn't save for some reason) about the legal tangles gay people had to go through when gay marriage was federally legalized because a lot of them married different people in different states because their marriage in California wasn't legal in the other states and just never bother to get a divorce.

And my brain let's Steddify this shit Sweet Home Alabama style!

So here we go:

Eddie and Steve got married in Boston when Massachusetts made gay marriage legal. But they broke up when Eddie went to California with his band.

Cue Eddie going around and having a couple of really short marriages in different states. Tommy in New York for three months when the band was in New York recording an album. Billy in Hawaii for two weeks while Eddie was there on vacation.

Neither of them really mattered or were serious. Because they were only legal in the state they were performed in so Eddie didn't think anything about it.

Fast forward to a decade later, gay marriage is legalized across the country. Corroded Coffin has broken up and Eddie has a job as a tattoo artist.

Eddie goes to get a marriage license in Seattle where he's been living for the past five years. And is denied on the account he's a polygamist. He's still married to three different men in three different states.

Fuck.

His fiancee Chrissy is a legal assistant at a law firm so she has her bosses draw up annulments for Eddie's three marriages and has them sent out to all three of Eddie's exes.

Including Steve.

When Steve gets his papers, he's pissed. He hunts down Eddie's number and calls. Tells him that he can do the proper thing and tell him to his face he wants a divorce. None of this annulment bullshit like their relationship didn't matter. But until then he can fuck off.

Now Eddie's frantic. Because the reason why he and Chrissy were getting married in the first place is that her student visa ended in May and her work visa has been delayed three times. They have to get married otherwise she'll be deported. And no just a little across the border to Canada either, she's from Barbados.

He tells her the truth about Steve and how they were actually married for almost two years before Eddie left. They had been living in their home town of Hawkins where their marriage wasn't legal any way, but meant something to them.

Chrissy is upset he didn't tell her this sooner, because yeah, that's whole other kettle of fish. So she has her bosses draft a divorce decree and words it a whole lot nicer than the legalese of the annulment.

Eddie packs his bags heads to back to Hawkins and back to Steve. He has one week to convince Steve to sign the divorce papers.

He gets into to town and finds that Steve is the proud owner of the best bakery in town. And the best selling item is the chunky mint brownies Steve made just for Eddie when they first got together. Eddie gets a little sentimental about it, and Steve stubbornly refuses to sign the papers.

They go back and forth for a few days. They tumble into bed and Eddie wakes up, he finds Steve gone and the papers signed.

Only now that Steve has signed them, he doesn't want that anymore. So he breaks down crying and sobbing. He calls Chrissy and now Chrissy is as distraught as he is.

After they hang up Chrissy calls the bakery and Robin answers. Chrissy really needs to speak to Steve.

Robin tells her Steve can't come to the phone because he is covered in flour and can't because he'll get it messy. Chrissy asks if she calls his cell phone if Robin could hold it up to his ear, because she really needs to talk to him. But Robin refuses to budge. She banned Steve from having a cell phone around their giant stand mixer because he has lost three of them to the beast.

Robin offers to pass long the message, though. And Chrissy has to be content with that. She explains who she is and why Eddie needed the divorce. She tells Robin about Eddie's breakdown that morning and how he really didn't want to divorce Steve.

Robin and her get to talking about their best friends, missed connections and themselves.

While the girls are talking Eddie is having another freak out because he put the envelope containing the divorce papers in the mail box but realized he forgot to sign them himself. He needs to get them back so he can sign them, but he's afraid of getting arrested for tampering a federal post box trying to get the papers back.

He's near hysterics when Nancy finds him. She's in town visiting her family. And she helps him get the papers back by talking to the post office and they open the box and he gets them back.

She takes him to lunch to calm his clearly frazzled nerves. He tells her everything. And she tells him that while Eddie was in New York, Steve had gone to see him and when he saw how much bigger and better the big city was, Steve decided if he was going to win Eddie back, he had to make something of himself. And thus began the bakery. He almost had enough to fly to Seattle and woo Eddie. But then this happened.

Now Eddie is really stricken. He wants Steve so bad, but Chrissy is out of options.

Nancy gives his arm a squeeze and Eddie heads back to the hotel he'd been staying at.

He finally looks at his phone and sees a lot of messages and texts from Chrissy begging him not mail the divorce papers yet, she has a plan. Cue Eddie having a final breakdown in his hotel room, sobbing and wrung out.

There is a knock on his door and Eddie is confused the only person who knew his hotel and room number was Chrissy and she's in Seattle. But he gets up to answer and suddenly has an armful of Steve Harrington. Who is also a sobbing wreck.

After both of them calm down, Steve tells him he only signed the papers because he wanted Eddie to be happy. And if that meant being divorced from him, he'd do it.

But Eddie's isn't happy. He's sad and hurt and lonely. Steve is too.

They fall asleep in each other's arms, placing their trust in their best friends.

The next morning they are woken up by Robin and surprise surprise, Chrissy.

They explained that since gay marriage is legal everywhere now, Robin is going to marry Chrissy. And she'll swap places with Eddie. She'll go back to Seattle with Chrissy and Eddie can stay here with Steve.

It's perfect.

They get a marriage license and walked down the courthouse where Eddie and Steve are their witnesses. While the judge is talking, Steve pulls out Eddie's old ring. The one he returned to Steve when he moved out to be with his band.

He slips it back on Eddie's ring finger where it belongs. They kiss at the same time Chrissy and Robin do.

A couple years later Chrissy becomes a lawyer and her and Robin move back to Hawkins where Eddie has opened his own tattoo parlor, right next to Steve's bakery.

And they all live happily ever after.

ETA: Full Story here.

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[shirecorn]

Your reindeer designs give me such childish joy I can't wait to see the rest. What's your process (aka any advice) for designing from scratch with something like just a name or concept?

Redbubble (buy reindeer swag) || Patreon (see all early!) || Ko-fi

See more free tutorials!

You can see my process unfold in real time by joining any tier of my patreon discord. Which doesn't even have to go through patreon! If you want, you can just pay me $20 and let you in for a year (and then lose track and probably keep you anyway)

Here's a preview using comet! (nevermind the preview thing I wrote you a whole lecture lol)

initial sketches in 2021:

Revisited in 2022 and 2023

I was constantly asking which design was the weakest, why, and how to fix it. Whenever I tested without the magical comet behind it, people could only guess who comet was by process of elimination.

I didn't want to rely on throwing icons into the design. I wanted each one to communicate through shape and silhouette alone. It would be like drawing a little cherub with a bow and arrow floating along with cupid. If you have to include a nametag to communicate, your design can be improved.

So I tried a few different strategies to say "comet" before I realized I could twist the antlers into any shape I wanted. I was worried I would have to discard the drawing and restart from scratch! Which is what I did for rudolph about 6 times before I had a breakthrough.

Then I gave my patrons a brief lesson in antlers to explain where and why I was placing the tines. When I stray from the caribou structure, I do so knowingly in order to achieve something that cannot be achieved within the caribou shape, like dancer's tutu. Know the rules before you break them. My goal is to make animal nerds (myself chief among them) happy when they see species-specific anatomy instead of cop outs.

I tried a few things before figuring out antlers could become comet

Another thing that often caribou have is an unsymmetrical "spork" that comes forward off only one antler. I figured this out by looking at hundreds of reindeer pictures and saving them to my reference folder. A few of my designs have this, that's what the little spiral is in the final comet antler design.

When I put comet in my lineup, I realized that the antlers I drew were way more stylized, chunky, and "tribal" than the others. I had already changed the proportions on one of my designs to match, so then I had to hack away at the basic comet rack to make it look natural.

I already knew that comet's colors would be easy because a basic reindeer already Has the big comet on the shoulder. But here's a peak at all the reindeer images I posted for my patrons to look at.

As you can see below, I chose reindeer markings for all my designs instead of other deer or animals. Even vixen is tied to actually possible reindeer patterns rather than copy-pasting a fox. Almost all of my designs have light-colored anklets on dark colored legs, which is very common with caribou of any color. This is the sort of thing no one tells you; you have to observe it yourself.

Ft cupid's early design! I was continually testing out my reindeer silhouettes and colors on new people, taking their feedback, and fixing what wasn't clicking.

I know I could have made vixen sexy and curvy to play into a recognizable trope, but I really wanted them to be scary and fox-like. Sometimes you gotta do what you want and not what you think will appeal to audiences. Reindeer Days is a purposeful exercise in audience resonance. Most of my art is 100% me and what I feel like doing with no regards to anyone else. So it was a fun challenge!

My patrons also got to see me making fun of corporate designs for recognizably/cliches at the expense of literally anything good

One of these is going to get a lot more "that must be vixen!" results from people who aren't constantly thinking about animal colors, markings, hunting strategies, and teeth.

And one rocks.

Vixen changed the least from the initial 2021 concept!

A Vixen is a female fox. In english slang, it means a cunning, fierce human woman, and sometimes sexually attractive or promiscuous. Quite often an insult to someone because she won't date you!

But to me, a vixen is an animal. A predator.

When designing to reference something, I like to hit it at multiple angles, referencing obscure trivia about something to delight and educate. This is done by researching a topic deeply, far below surface level and beyond what you think you need to make your design. Or in my case its just knowing a bunch of animal trivia already.

After researching/dredging your knowledge, sit there and Think. Don't draw anything. Come up with several ideas and then throw them all in at once for the ultimate trivia design.

Trivia about red foxes:

They have Long bushy tails

They have teeth that include large sharp canines, flat incisors, triangular premolars, and chunky molars with points on them that slide scissor-like with the molars above to cut meat via chewing

They hunt rodents in burrows under the snow by jumping into the air, arcing, and slamming down with their face through the snow

They are orange

They have a dark vertical stripe on their snout

They have black legs, with the backs and bottoms being orange

Translated into the design:

Pose based on a fox jumping, about to land in the snow

Antlers twisted to resemble teeth

Long (for a reindeer) bushy tail

black mark on snout

Some adjustment to the pose to be at the top of the arc and flow better.

Tinkering with the design to make it recognizable but not 100% copypasta fox

I was finally happy with a design that absolutely showed "fox" while still being creative and plausibly caribou shaped. This would absolutely communicate who it is! I thought!

The most obvious one of the bunch! After all, everyone knows what a vixen is!

Nope! No they do not

Want to be part of the design process, help me with WIPs months before everyone else, see exclusive doodles every day, and join a funky little community?

(you also get to see photos of my dog)

Connect your discord to your patreon and join any tier to automatically get added to the server. Not a fan of patreon or monthly subscriptions? message me here, on ko-fi, or via email (shirecorn.art@ gmail.com) and ask if you can pay $20 to get put in the server for at least a year and longer if we work it out later!

This was supposed to be a preview to get you to pay me but instead I wrote an entire lecture for free because I can't help myself.

Want to thank me for the free info? Tag me when you use what you learned! Comment and give feedback! If I could pay rent with attention I would never need anything else in life.

You can also thank me by tipping my ko-fi! I use it to buy pens since I die if I have caffeine. But could you imagine??

[baldurs-gape]

Silence

There was a lot Cazador had done over two hudred years. A lot he had taken away, beaten out of or simply tainted to the point that Astarion no longer took pleasure in something. But the one thing he never could fully extinguish was Astarion's tendency to be vocal about anything and everything, usually in the form of complaining.

The tadpole and the sudden freedom was difficult to trust so Astarion kept to safe habits. He didn't miss the appreciative looks his newfound companions sent his way. As little as he was worth, Astarion knew that his value lay in his looks. Cazador had been kind enough to teach him that, had made sure he was well-built, always looked appealing to as many as possible. The price for failing was high enough that Astarion also put a lot of care into learning how to look his best.

"We're not seriously having onion, cheese and the red swill you call wine again, are we?" Astarion sighed as the group settled around the campfire.

"Don't like it, don't eat it." Lae'zel shrugged and glared at him. "Good luck foraging in the forest in the dark for something better."

Seizing the permission, Astarion sneered back as he stood up. "Fine. I'm sure I can do better." He did. Drained a whole boar and spent half the night on his back, so full that his stomach actually hurt as it stretched around so much blood.

It was the start of something. Insidious and slow in a way Cazador never had the patience for, not when it came to Astarion. The phrase "shut up, Astarion" became a daily motto to the point the others were beginning to chuckle about it. He'd heard it plenty enough before, Cazador often told him to quit his whinging. The other spawn were also prone to ignoring him. But that had been a different situation. Despite living through it for so long, Astarion knew, deep down, that it wasn't right. Cazador was just one man, one tyrant who controlled Astarion like a puppet, while the other spawn were all bitter, scared and trying to survive. To be told to shut up by them was like being stung by a wasp and being surprised about it. With his newfound allies though? Astarion had no such excuses to hide behind.

"All I'm saying is that we could go back to camp for a nice rest," he grumbled.

"Shut up and keep moving." There was a growl to Wyll's voice as he marched on at a relentless pace. It was all very well that he could continue but Astarion was tired, hungry and not in the mood to play pretend being a hero. Alas, outnumbered as he was because the others didn't slow down either, Astarion had to keep walking or risk being left behind. As it was, he didn't dare leave the safety of the group, fear of Cazador finding him was still too high.

The longer he spent at camp, the more chances he had to feed, especially as the others stopped paying him so much attention.

"Freedom suits you," Shadowheart called as he washed his shirt. "Made you softer."

Glancing down, Astarion had to think very quickly to hide his true feelings. "Darling, are you calling me fat?"

It was true though, there was a bit of give to his stomach, no longer flat and the muscles clrealy visible under his skin. Cazador would have called him fat for that, undesirable and worthless. Maybe the rest of the group were less interested in him because he wasn't appealing anymore and Astarion grit his teeth in resolve so hard that he almost missed Shadowheart's reply.

"Oh do be quiet. You know what I mean."

He didn't though. Or rather, he did but wished he didn't. That night Astarion didn't go out to hunt. He went hungry the next day. And the next.

By the time his true nature came to light, Astarion was back to his usual self. It was probably what had saved him. As Cazador used to say, it would have been such a shame to rid the world of such beauty, even if it couldn't keep quiet. Part of Astarion hated that Cazador was right, people really were less likely to murder the beautiful.

In the Underdark Shadowheart had turned to him with a lewd smile. "This place suits you. Perhaps it's part of being a creature of the night. It's always night here."

And it was desolate as fuck, devoid of any living creature. So was the Shadowcursed Lands. Astarion was hungry. So very hungry.

"I just want a small nibble," he sighed. "Not even enough for anyone to notice."

"We all need to be on top form, soldier," Karlach muttered. "And it's not like any of us are feeling satiated by any sense of the word. You're not that special."

No, of course Astarion wasn't special. They were all hungry, tired and scared. It was nothing out of the ordinary compared to the last two hunderd years.

Coated in grotesque slime wasn't Astarion's idea of a pleasant time. He wipes ineffectively at his face and flicked what he could to the ground.

"Ruined my shirt. Ruined my hair."

"And you're ruining what little I have left of good will," Gale spat angrily. "Can't you just be quiet for once. I get it, you're a special little vampire who lived in a castle and now has to slum it with the rest of us. But Mystra have mercy, you're making the rest of us feel even worse."

"At least I'm making you feel something. Better than being a forgotten, burnt out waste of talent." Hurt had Astarion lashing out. He hadn't even been talking to Gale, just muttering to himself about his own misfortune. But Gale made a very good point. If he wasn't having a positive impact on the group then he risked being left behind. The more he saw of the world, the more Astarion knew for sure that he wouldn't last long out there on his own. Cazador's spies were everywhere and it was just a matter of time before he was dragged back and punished. It was better to stay quiet and appease his protectors than risk such a thing.

Lifting the curse meant Halsin joined them in their camp. Even stranger, he offered himself up as a meal for Astarion. Hunger outweighed the worry of cost. Astarion knew what he had to offer and acted accordingly. After only a few sips he licked the wound clean and shut before kneeling back.

"You can take more," Halsin offered with heavy lidded eyes. "Don't go hungry."

"I've taken all I need." The lie rolled off Astarion's lips as he patted his flat stomach. Under his shirt his muscles were outlined once again, exactly as they should be. "You've done me a great favour, I haven't had anything as delicious as you in a long time, if ever. How could I ever repay you?"

Halsin smiled up at him. This was it, this was where Astarion traded his body for survival again. Despite knowing this was the outcome when he accepted Halsin's blood, he still dreaded it.

"I was hoping to hear more about your adventures."

The absurdness of the request had a laugh burst from Astarion before he could cover it with something more airy and appealing. "Darling, if you want bedtime stories then Wyll's your man. My talents involve my mouth but a lot less talking."

Still smiling, Halsin shook his head. "Maybe another night then, when you're more comfortable to share some memories."

Such words lingered on Astarion's mind. He hadn't ever been wanted for conversational company. Usually as long as he had one hole stuffed, him companion(s) didn't want anything coherent out of him. Still, it made him hope which Astarion hated so much. But if Halsin was interested then maybe he could try it. Settling by the fire as everyone ate, Astarion listened, waited for his opportunity.

"That ended my attempts at learning to keep the shape of a rat," Gale finished his story and the whole group laughed. "Tara was mortified and I couldn't get the whiskers to retract for a week!"

"Rats were one of the constants in Cazador's castle, no matter how hard he tried to eradicate them." It was a smooth transition, at least Astarion thought so.

"Urgh, spare us the woe and misery," Karlach groaned. "Can't we have just one night where we don't talk about the shit things in life? Let us have a bit of fun!"

Looking around the fire, Astarion saw various nods and heard murmurs of agreement. He knew when he was beaten and Cazador had taught him well. Averting his eyes, he slouched a little, nonchalant yet deferential. "My apologies, I didn't realise my stories about training rats to do circus tricks would be so depressing." Standing up, he gave the group a hollow smile. "Please, enjoy your evening of careless fun away from reality."

As he walked away he heard mutters of "didn't have to take it so personally" and "what a little bitch". The rest of the words he tuned out, not needing to etch into his brain yet more derogatory comments to harmonise with Cazador's words. Walking past his tent, Astarion made his way away from camp, into the dark wilderness. Plopping down on a mound at the edge of a small clearing, he closed his eyes. This was fine. He had changed to suit Cazador's tastes, he could do it again. Not overnight, he needed to learn exactly what was needed of him.

The fact a bear lumbered up next to him should have been a shock. Instead, Astarion stared at it and wondered what he'd taste like to a bear. However, rather than attack, the bear shifted and Halsin stood there.

"Apologies if I startled you, it's easier to find people in the dark as a bear."

"Nothing to apologise for, I should have been paying more attention. Did you need something."

Settling at the base of the mound, Halsin gazed up at the stars. "I was intrigued by rats and circus tricks."

A bitter laugh trickled out of Astarion. "Darling, I did no such thing." Leaning forward, he teased as if imparting some great secret. "Karlach was right, I was going to say how rats all tasted different based on what they'd last eaten. And how Gale likely still tasted just as vile in rat form as in human form. That orb of his certainly sours his appeal."

He didn't expect Halsin to laugh brightly. "I would have loved to have seen his face at hearing that. Do you think Karlach would taste like a fiery pepper?"

Something like delight briefly flitted over Astarion's face as Halsin so easily picked up the thread.

"Well, you're earthy and rich. I think she would certainly have a kick but more like a prank candy. Shadowheart would be a fine aged brandy that has started to turn so it just ever so slightly bitter."

"Lae'zel would taste like pickles!" Halsin blurted out with a wide smile. "And Wyll would be water." It had Astarion actually grinning even as Halsin continued, "My apologies, I do not have the poetic skills you harbour. Leather shoes or wooden clogs are about as creative as I can get with descriptors."

"And yet you're all the more compelling for your upfront honesty. Like a cool breeze on a hot summer night, refreshing yet also mysterious."

The way Halsin flushed was a delight. Without thinking too much, Astarion gave up his perch in favour of scooching down to sit next to Halsin. Their shoulders bumped together and Astarion stayed quiet. He could learn what Halsin wanted him to be. But something told him that all Halsin wanted him to be was himself. A terrifying prospect yet Astarion found himself looking forward to finding out who he really was.

[gaslightgatekeepgirlbosscombat]

Quarterfinals, Poll 4

Propaganda under the cut

John Gaius, The Emperor Undying, God

Gaslight: When he resurrected his best friends he took away all their memories and gave them new names. He never reveals to them that he was the one who killed everyone on earth in the first place. He really plays up the "benevolent God" act Gatekeep: As a God, everyone is vying for his Favour and he is the one who gets to decide who gets it. He also doesnt share his knowledge of how to become immortal without killing your best friend. Girlboss: Literally made himself God. Never strayed from his ten thousand year old plan of Revenge. Rules an entire solar system and is colonizing more.

Jod is a frequent gaslight and gatekeep, however he falls more under the girlflop the girlboss. All of his plans go wrong but goddamn if he's not trying. Horrible ideas from an even worse person. Whent above gasligting and just straight up wiped his friends memories. Gatekeeping the knowledge of the universe. Had a child he didn't know about for 18 years and only found out cause she showed up dead(she's fine now(mostly)), girlboss move. Had a threesome with two of the gaslit friends, this would be less gross if he wasn't middle-aged. Gatekeeping the planets(I cannot explain this one). Ressurected humanity but also killed a lot of cows(girlboss). Put the soul of the earth in a woman and then put her in prison(but not before killing half of the amigos). Anticaptalist, bisexual, father. He has babygirl energy

Killed entirety of humanity and the whole solar system save a handful of billionaires and their victims, then resurrected the sun and a select handful of humans, wiped their memories, and established a religion in which he is god for over ten thousand years. Also an ex-tumblrina (probably) and goth twitch streamer (definitely).

Killed almost all of humanity, the sun and the solar system and then resurrected some of them deliberately without their memories and didn’t tell them that he killed them in the first place, and also told them that he was god. Renamed his friends after killing and resurrecting them. Set up imbalanced and toxic power dynamics among his inner circle that led to half of them either killing themselves or being killed by the other in each pair in order for half the group to become immortal saints, something he didn’t tell them wasn’t actually necessary to reach that sort of state. Lied to the surviving friends about why the ghosts of the planets in the solar system were hunting them, he told them they were after all of them because of the way they’d become saints which meant they could never go home, but they were actually only ever after him. Also because of this lie he was able to manipulate them into fighting the ghosts and dying in the process, saying that they would kill him which would destroy the sun, when actually they couldn’t kill him and also the ghosts were after just him so everybody would be fine if they just stopped hanging out with him (this is true in a LOT of senses actually). When he decided to get new immortal saints he specifically asked for the heirs of the houses, who were mostly younger in the 16-22 range and therefore easy to manipulate especially after killing their best friend (again, he knows that isn’t necessary and is asking it of a group of teens/young adults). When one of the people who was successful appears to have done it wrong, he pretends to be a mentor or father figure to her face (knowing that that is something extremely important to her) while having one of his surviving original friends try to kill her without her knowing he was behind that. On the girlboss front, I think he kinda thinks he’s a girlboss more than he actually is one, but he’s so good at the gaslight bit he’ll have you believing that too.

Ianthe Tridentarius

She is trying so hard to be the main character by lying and manipulating her sister, her cavalier, her mentor, her ?love interests? (Spoiler???) And also god. Not sure how it's working out for her but she does love to lie and manipulate

Worstie Ianthe is the DEFINITION of gaslight, gatekeep, girlboss. She is one of a set of necromancer twins that are the heirs to their houses rule. Except wait, only she is a necromancer and she has spent their entire lives doing necromancy for the both of them. She is constantly mean to their cavalier, Naberius, who she occasionally nibbles on like a chew toy, before eventually killing and eating him to ascend to sainthood. She goes to gods spaceship with another woman who ascended to sainthood who she has a crush on, this other woman is like…. Both incredibly mentally unwell and also haunted by at least 211 ghosts. Ianthes method of flirting with her? Gaslighting her about the corpse that keeps moving around and hiding under her bed. For no real reason tbh. She is clearly plotting to overthrow god, and at the moment that consists of her manipulating him while he’s too sad about his long term partners betraying him and subsequently exploding to really care. She dresses in terrible outfits and makes soup by burning onions to the bottom of a pot, putting meat in and some vegetables and then it doesn’t taste like anything so she puts in a few teaspoons of salt so it tastes like a few teaspoons of salt. She had her crush amputate her arm and regrow her a new one out of bone and it’s one of the horniest things I’ve read in my life.

"Gaslight = told her lobotomized (she helped), schizophrenic girlobsession that there was no corpse under their bed, even tho there totally was. Gatekeep = girl did NOT share the secret to god-like ascension. She kept that shit to herself until it was time to eat her boytoy, and by then everyone knew already. Girlboss = she has a non-necromancer twin sister, and literally Everyone thinks they r both necromancers because Ianthe is so good at it. She reverse engineered ascending to the aforementioned ascension without even completing any of the supplementary tasks. She held her own in a fight against a 10k year old lyctor. She becomes the figurehead of her entire empire. "

She uses a man as a chewtoy in the first book, literally gaslights the protagonist of the second book about a corpse, and elder-abuses God when he gets depressed in the third book. Nobody is doing it like her.

Dives headfirst with no regrets while basically laughing and covered in blood into murdering her cavalier once she realizes what the gothic locked room mystery/competition leads to while everyone else is questioning it, helps perform lobotomy on harrow so she doesn't remember the person she loves, manipulates everyone to get to the top

idk just everything about her

her relationship with her sister is incredibly Bad, she fosters codependency and views Corona(the sister) as an extension of herself. This does not stop her from keeping up the con that Corona actually has magic (She doesn't, it was always just Ianthe) for 22ish years and every single person who interacts with them falls for it. She killed a man against his will (most dying for this purpose specifically go willingly) and she consumed him and she will be burning his soul for eternity. She's completely repulsive and still somehow incredibly hot.

she takes advantage of the fact that the main character is prone to hallucinations. at one point she gaslights the mc into believing that the corpse under her bed isn't real just because she can. she reverse engineered a set of very complex trials on her own without anyone realizing she had the skills to complete them normally. she's also babysat god through his drunk and pathetic era.

Artist: @midnightcrows

[prentissluvr]

omgg i completely forgot to ask but what were some of your sammy thoughts you had while you were on vacay?? 🤭

oh ngl i think i posted most of them lol

aCTUALLY WAIT NO I FORGOT i think i might turn this into a full set of headcanons but i'll give a little sneak peak hehehe

so basically i was on vacay and thinking about him the whole time because i have an unhealthy obsession with him and tendency to daydream about my muses 24/7 !!

basically i was at this shared family cabin up in canada! and it's super isolated and quiet and remote and surrounded by water! like you have to take a boat to get there etc etc hehe and i was just thinking all about what it would be like to go up there with sam and dean on a break from hunting!!

tw: lowkey mention of drowning lol

mostly you just swim in the lake that you're surrounded by and it's just so relaxing and lovely. if they don't already know, you teach them both how to drive a boat, and they're both quite good since it's not too hard.

and i imagined lots of swimming with both of them!! they'd both love it so much and spend just about all day in the water!! dean would refuse sunscreen and get burnt to a crisp LOL he also can't stop complaining about the bugs lmao.

i'm also thinking about night swimming with sammy aaaaa. it's like 99% soooo so so romantic. the water feels extra nice because the cooler air makes the water feel warmer by contrast. then you've got the stars, clear and bright in the night sky and the gorgeously big moon, dappling white light across the dark water. and of course there's sammy, keeping you close to him at all times, hands slipping over your body under the water, lips pressing to your forehead and mouth over and over again. if you're lucky you'll hear a loon too!! and it's the most hauntingly beautiful sounds that accompanies the light splash of water against the shore, the boat rocking against the dock, and the water swishing around you each time you move. AAAAA I NEED THIS SO BAD NOW and also the 1% is docked because there are so many fucking mosquitos at night so it's like :/// sucks so bad unless they're magically not bothering you lol.

and also! more swimming stuff! this would be cute for if you're not dating yet because like. hehe romantic tension. but the last day i was swimming i got a cramp in my foot KJSDFHS it hurt so bad and i would've literally (not literally i'm being dramatic) died if i didn't have that pool noodle on me LOL. anyways but like!! swimming out kind of far from the dock and then you get a foot cramp and are having trouble treading enough water to stay comfortably afloat. maybe you try to swim back but foot cramps hurt like a bitch! and sam and dean are just getting into the water and you're like "dean! please come save me i have a foot cramp lmao" because you have the hugest crush on sam and you feel to embarrassed to have SHIRTLESS HIM COME AND SWIM YOU TO SHORE LIKE ??????? anywaysss dean literally doesn't hear you because he's playing music from a speaker on the dock. but sam does and he's swims over to you in like two seconds flat and loops an arm around your waist and tells you to hang onto him and then brings you back to the dock, helps you out, and then makes you sit on the edge while he massaged the cramp away ??? and i'm dead??? because you were pulled flush up against him and his BARE CHEST ??? and you looped your arms around his BARE, WET NECK??? and he's holding your waist with his big big arm and big big hand and singlehandedly swimming the both of you back to shore?? and he's all worried for you and he's flustered from having you so close to him but he's more concerned about you. and you're flustered of course and he takes it as a little bit of fear from almost maybe drowning so he's being sooo gentle and caring and i'm going to throw up about him

anywayyyssss hahahahahhaha yeah! just other cute stuff like them being impressed by your boating skills or your yummy yummy cabin meals. sharing experiences with them from your childhood and other things that you only get there that they didn't know were so special to you before. but now they now, and they experienced it with you <33 and it's overall just really great bonding time, especially because there's no internet LOL (there technically is now sometimes but we ignore that unless necessary lol) anyways! and it's just so relaxing

it's also definitely an amazing place to be drunk, never done it myself but it seems so amazing and relaxing tbh so they would also really enjoy that!

other things would be early mornings with sam! waking up with the sun and sitting on the porch together, curled up with a blanket and hot cocoa to ward against the morning chill. you'd listen to bird calls and catch sight of beavers. you'd take him kayaking one morning and he's so big he might tip over the boat and fall in if he's not balanced enough LOL but it's the best time to see wildlife so he wants to go! you might see beavers and turtles or otters if you're really lucky! and ducks and loons and you can point out the eagle nest and tell him stories from past years. you prove to them that you can roast the best marshmallows when you build a fire a night and they both love coming to understand how the place works and seeing how comfortable you are in this little piece of home from your past.

OKAY YEAH MORE THAN I WAS TRYING TO WRITE BUT I HAD SOOO MANY THOUGHTS like i said i'll probably turn this into at least an official headcanon post someday because i love it too much!!! eNJOY BESTIE ILYSMMMM

[alexjcrowley]

So, I watched Casino Royale (2006), in my quest to rewatch all of the Daniel Craig's James Bond movies and answer the question: "Do I really hate James Bond movies? Or was I just a kid when some of them came out and I didn't care for spy movies?"

I'll start by saying that I liked Casino Royale much, much more than I had expected. It's 2 hours and a half long, which today is the standard running time for any blockbuster, but lately I had managed to convince myself that, during my childhood, blockbusters were shorter and didn't kidnap an audience in a movie theatre for almost 3 hours. I was wrong.

(Now, SPOILERS ahead)

Starting with what I liked.

First thing first: James Bond. I was never fond of Bond's character, I have always thought him boring instead of serious, slimy instead of charming, and generally very annoying with the whole "I'm the man" demeneanor. I was also wrong. I really liked Daniel Craig in this first movie. We see Bond at the very start of his career, he has just been promoted 00 status and he has a lot to learn. He takes almost as many punches as he gives, he is too instinctive and his ego often gets his own way. He is far from perfect and many people give him shit for that, especially women. Casino Royale holds his main character accountable for most of the bullshit he does and that was a welcome surprise.

The plot. I am proud to say I think I understood the entire plot of the movie. I know it might not seem much a of a brag and I swear I can usually understand the plot of a movie- but James Bond's ones are often too convoluted for me. I feel like Casino Royale, partly thanks to chunk of explaination given by M, was fairly easy to follow. There were also many predictable twists- not necesserily a bad thing though, because they did make sense. I really liked how Mads Mikkelsen- brilliant as always in the role of the main villain Le Chiffre- was being hunted both by Bond and by far more dangerous people he owed money to. I think the movie lost itself a little bit in a the last part, but I'll discuss that later.

Vesper Lynd. I have no idea what the press conferences around Casino Royale were like, but I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of them focused on a better treatment of female characters in the Bond's franchise. I was expecting to be bored to death by the umpeteenth only apparently hard-to-get woman falling for Bond's charms, and I am happy to say it was nothing like that. First of all, and I mean it as a compliment, the Bond and Vesper banter is ao3-tier. The chemistry is there, there's equal teasing on both sides, which makes it looks they just work very well as a couple. But the scene I liked the most is right after James Bond loses a really important game of poker. He goes out on the balcony, Vesper follows him and James asks her to give him more money, because he thinks he can win the next game. Vesper says no. James insists, in what you could call the classical "all or nothing" scene of a movie. The one in which the protagonist is like "you have to believe in me, I can do this, look into my eyes, trust me one more time and I'll prove it to you", sprinkled with a little more "If you don't do this, all that money" that he lost "will be in the villain's hands" and grasping Vesper's arm very tightly. And Vesper's response is not "Okay, I will give you the money to save the world, but don't let me regret this, James". The first thing Vesper tells him is get his hand off of her. The second is that she is not going to give him more money, because he lost that game due to his ego (a motif that had already been introduced at the beginning of the movie) and if he keeps playing now, he is going to keep losing. And then she leaves. This, and the dialogue in which she basically asks if she has to worry about Bond's breaking into her room and trying to force himself on her with Bond reassuring her he won't, were moments I really appreciated. The James Bond saga is not exactly well known to be fair to female characters and, especially, James Bond's love interests are often poorly written. They could have gone the easy route, they could have had Vesper trusting James blindly because he is the main character, but, instead, she stood up to him. I really, really like this decision. As James Bond has been cemented as an icon of masculinity, it is shown that not only even he can be wrong, but also that this is rightly pointed out by a woman. In this occasion, he's being emotional and illogical, while she is being the reasonable one. And I feel this is as relevant today as it was in 2006.

Favourite scene: the torture. I am not really crazy about torture scenes usually, but I really loved the one between James Bond and Le Chiffre. It's not just that the acting- especially on Daniel Craig's part- is phenomenal, it's what that scene means. According to my interpretation, based purely on how Craig played the character, that seems to be the first time James Bond has ever been tortured and you can see he's fucking terrified. And you see him going from terrified back to that mask of neutrality, even though it is now dented. There are moments in which pain slowly morphs into an exasperated laughter and James is turning to crude humour to deal with the situation because he has already made his decision- he won't give up the code, so he's gonna die there, if he is lucky. If he's not, many hours, if not days, of torture await him. It's a momumental test of an actor for Craig.

So, yeah, lots to love. Let's now move to what I didn't like.

The action. Not all the action in Casino Royale is bad, on the contrary, but a couple of things were simply goofy. Like the first bomber being a parkour God, especially compared to James Bond's clusmy ass? Top-tier comedy, maybe intentionally, maybe not. I know for a fact the dramatic zooms were not intentionally comedic, but alas. And I gotta ask, other than being the easiest way to kill off Vesper, what was the point of that last Venice action sequence? To me, that was really overdrawn and forgetful.

The wife of the first villain. Her dialogue about liking bad guys is very cringe and I don't know who directed Daniel Craig in the scene in which reacts to her death, but holy shit that's one of the worst sequence of the movie. At first he seems indifferent to her being tortured and killed, then M goes on her whole tirade about Le Chiffre, and then, suddenly, when she asks if James Bond can handle the mission, Daniel Craig is looking at dead body of the villain's wife doing the most exaggrated heavy breathing since the stuff you could find of Looney Tunes. And then says "no" in a completely neutral, and accidentally comedic, tone. Jesus Christ. What a shit show.

James Bond's character arc, a.k.a. the romcom act. Yeah, I know, I said I liked James Bond before. But I have beef with the way the character evolved. I would say I pretty much like what we see in 2/3 of the movie. The problem for me arrives post torture, when we are made believe we have finally reached a happy ending. Vesper and Bond declare their love to each other, great, it was to be expected. But the fact that a few days after that- at least it looks like a few days- James Bond is like "Yeah, no, I'm in love with you, I wanna quit my job and spend the rest of my life with you" feels very rushed to me. Sure, near death experiences really bond people together, but let's recap the events of this movie. At the beginning of the movie, James Bond has just become 007. If I am not wrong, Casino Royale is James Bond's first mission as a 00 agent. We don't know how much time he has spent hunting down the parkour-bomber of the beginning of the movie, but we know that something like 2 days later he is sent to the Bahamas, then goes to Miami, all in the span of 2 days, and then he gets sent to Montenegro for something like 3 or 4 days. At the end of the Montenegro section, there's the torture scene, so all we know is that he ends up in a hospital and stays there for an unspecified while (which he spends mostly unconscious) and it's at that point, after declaring his love to Vesper, that he goes "Yeah I don't want to be a spy anymore". Bitch, you have been a spy for less than a month and you have known this woman for 2 weeks at best, and I am counting the time you were unconscious. Am I the only one who feels this is rushed? Especially because, during a game of deduction he and Vesper played, Vesper seemed to rightly deduce James wanted to be a spy because he had a chip on his shoulder about proving is worth- did that just go away? Wow, James, you gotta teach me how to solve self-worth related issues that fast. And the canonical reason why James wants to leave the job is because it's "eating his soul away" or some shit like that, and he wants to leave with that little bit of soul he still got. Once again, bitch, please. You have not been on the job for one month, what the fuck are you talking about. Maybe it's because you're not used to have a job, Mr Bond, but every single job eats your soul away and you live with that, because otherwise you won't be able to pay the bills. Just to be clear, I'm not mad at the idea that James Bond wants to leave his job. I think it feels rushed and I think it's a little bit too obvious something will happen to Vesper at this point because there's no way James Bond is quitting the job in his first movie, but I would have accepted this change of heart from Bond if I had been given a good reason for it. For example, the fact that he has been tortured. To me, it would have made much more sense if James Bond would have been like "You know what? Being tortured is fucking terrifying, much more than I thought during my spy training, I don't think I can handle that again", I would have believed that. But instead, we got some bullshit on the soul. James Bond screenwriters, being afraid of torture doesn't make you any less of a man, I swear. All in all, James Bond deciding to change his entire life goals just because he fell in love seems the kind of shit writing the female lead would get in a shitty romance movie, not the one of the main (male) character of a spy movie. Maybe it's poetic justice, but I think James Bond somehow found himself a victim of what is usually regarded as misogynistic writing. He then regresses to the emotional maturity of a teenage boy who spends too much time on reddit when he feels betrayed by Vesper, while M has to explain as you would to a 5-year-old that Vesper, if anything, tried to save Bond. A very undignified main character arc, if you ask me.

Vesper's death. Why did Vesper basically kill herself? I genuinely thought her death was a Jack and Rose situation- they both could fit on the door! I think James would have been able to save Vesper if she only didn't lock herself in the elevator. The only explaination that I can give myself to that decision is that Vesper didn't want to live with the guilt of condemning her past lover to death in saving James.

I am not good at giving grades to movies, instead I will say this: it's definitely worth a watch if you're into spy movies and the bisexual panic induced by Eva Green and Daniel Craig will not leave you for a good while. If you're willing to be forgiving of a few sequences, it's a very enjoyable action flick.

Onto the last part: my quest to prove James Bond is aro and/or ace.

Why do I want to prove that? I guess if there were more aromantic characters I could just turn to them for representation, but I have to do everything by myself around here.

My reasons to believe James Bond is aro: as someone who, for the moment, identifies as aroallo, I really sympathise with characters that indulge in a lot of sex, but keep romance at an arm's lenght. I don't think they're shallow, I think maybe romance is simply not their thing, just like it's not mine.

My reasons to believe James Bond is ace: I think James Bond may have a pretty fucked up relationship with sex because of his job. His entire body basically belongs to the governemnt: it's a weapon to kill, a disposable dummy to be tortured and, in some occasions, an object of desire, used to seduce, possess and be possessed. You could pretty much say that a fraction of his job is similar to that of a sex worker. Far from implying that being a sex worker automatically fucks up your relationship with sex, I think being forced to have sex with people who you sometimes despise and who might want to hurt you or even kill you is not, like, the best thing ever. And also, while a sex worker can theoretically pick their clients, James can't. He has to seduce who is useful to seduce for the mission, regardless of how he feels about them. And, to top it all off, I like the idea of James Bond being ace because I am tired of the whole "James Bond is so cool because he fucks a lot and which man wouldn't want to fuck a lot". Maybe James Bond doesn't want to fuck a lot, or maybe he doesn't derive as much pleasure from it as people believe he does.

Okay, so. Starting with aro spectrum, even though James falls for Vesper, I think we still have good chances of him being aro, either fully aro or something like greyromantic. After all, aromantics can still, even if rarely, fall in love and I think, for the way the character of James Bond has been presented, him falling for Vesper was quite an unexpected/out of character thing for him. Him deciding ti quit his entire past life to be with Vesper...is truly just bad writing for me, but even accepting it, I don't think it makes him any less aro, because as I explained he could have had much better reasons to want to quite his job and, personally, if I fell in love with somebody after years of that just not happening for me, I wouldn't know how I would react. Maybe I would also call it a miracle and just roll with it.

About the ace spectrum, we see him seducing a villain's wife at some point, but I will be honest. That shit don't count. There is this moment in which the woman is like "I always fall for bad men😏" and James Bond immediately gets out of the sexy mood and goes "So would you say your husband is a bad man? Why? Because of his job?". He does a 180 and goes from wet dream to interrogator in less than a second. Plus, he seems to leave her without having sex with her to go chase her villain husband. Very professional of him, but also makes me think he was never that much into her as he made her believe. The whole thing felt too calculated on his part, I would definitely say he was faking the whole time. James does have very enthusiatic sex with Vesper, though. If I want to stick to what the movie implies, without going off the tracks with something like "he pretended to be enthusiatic during the whole thing but he was faking for Vesper's happiness", I may still go with the fact that he is for sure sex positive and maybe demi-sexual.

Well, if you have read until this point, I am genuinely surprised. You don't have that much to do, I guess, good for you.

Onto Quantum of Solace next, and I am already shaking: I know that movie is bad. I know about the writers strike. God help me.

[problemstarchild]

This last chapter was really amazing ! I think it did a good job of communicating that laios is scared kabru might hate him or even worse might be obliged to be with him 'for the sake of the country' and that kabru feels horrible for knowing laios inside out by just being a spectator of his nightmares

I liked the flash back with his father I think it expanded on stuff from the manga nicely💥💥

I also liked the part where laios is avoiding saying what is bothering him and kabru calling him out on it, usually it's the other way around !!!

When he asked the hypothetical "would you kiss me?" question my reaction was literally NOO LAIOS HES NOT READYYY‼️‼️

Very excited to see where it goes and yeah the slow burn is slow-burning

I'm not sure when you sent this -- I didn't get a notification, my apologies!!

I love love love writing stuff about Laios' childhood; it's something he thinks about deeply (his nightmares are about childhood bullies and his parents, his dying thoughts when the ghosts are chilling him to death in the Sorbet chapter are about Falin and the way she saved his life and he failed her) but when he talks about it, it's super clipped.

Like, the version of his history he gives to Senshi is like "Yeah, I left home for school, dropped out, went into the army, deserted, worked in a caravan, and then my sister followed me here and got eaten," and it's so clear that he considers himself a huge failure and not just like... the end result of a wide-ranging societal cruelty toward Strange People, that the superstition and cruelty of the people in his hometown drove him to run away from the only home he had ever known.

And he just doesn't talk about it!

He'll tell people if they ask, but nobody ever asks. People GOSSIP about him, say they think he might be a prince or something (apparently), and that's at least a widely-enough circulated rumor that Asivia is able to pick up the fact that he's supposed to inherit leadership over a village in the North -- but she doesn't know enough about him to know that he basically ran away from home. Nobody really knows that. Has anyone ever bothered to ask? Like, we almost know more about Laios' childhood dogs than his dad. They're deeply imperfect people living a simultaneously interdependent and independent lifestyle -- they have their own homesteading and hunting they need to do to sustain their livelihood, but then Laios' father is also responsible for maintaining important goings-on in the village...

SIGH. I think it's totally valid if people want to depict Laios' parents as total monsters in their fics, we have very bare-bones personalities and neither Falin nor Laios can be fully impartial narrators... but I think it's all the more tragic that they did the best they knew how to do and still managed to fail.

A lot of the things our parents do to hurt us are things they did on accident, things that they never knew bothered us. Isn't it worse in a way, that they didn't mean to? At least if they did it on purpose, we could hate them for it. I enjoy having the context of memories and nightmares and sudden, aggressive flashbacks to force these sorts of maladaptive life lessons and formative experiences into the spotlight -- I sort of just write characters in a way that suits them without trying to write up a whole psychological profile in advance or anything, but the more I write Laios the more I feel like I wouldn't be surprised if he just straight up has CPTSD, on top of whatever else is going on. Between his village, school, and the army, the amount of alienation and violence and cruelty he's endured, along with a long-term lack of any level of meaningful parental support... like, no wonder he's so, terribly dependent on Falin. He's a social creature, he loves to be with his animals and he loves to be with his sister, and he's in a world that doesn't want him!!!!!!! And it makes me insane!!!!!!!

One of the things I really really love about Laios is that he's TERRIBLE at lying, but really good at omission. Like, he can't hide the man-eating plant seeds or changeling-changed Kensuke from Marcille, his lies to the Canaries when they arrive at Thistle's house are TERRIBLE and Kabru is even like "oh my goddddd he is so bad at this???" but when it comes to just not mentioning stuff. Chilchuck being like "BY THE WAY, you didn't know Marcille was into black magic, right??" like he's looking for an alibi and Laios just being like "I mean kinda, but I just sort of didn't ask her about it because it's her business." His backstory basically gives nothing. In the side comic about the dog names, he says kind of distantly that he never know his dad's dogs were named after elven gods of the hunt because his father never told him anything -- but he ALSO never tells anyone anything. Like, he just straight up hid the fact that he was plain ol' obsessed with monsters for years. That's the part that makes me the craziest. He was surrounded by the thing he loved and he just was being so normal about it all of the time. Because he can just chop about 90% of himself off and hide it inside of the other 10% and just puppet that little bit around.

The big thing for me was... he knew Falin's resurrection might not work. The demon basically implied several times that if it was vanquished, Falin couldn't be revived. "You want to destroy magic itself, even though you desire to revive your sister with a magic you want to deny to others... hypocrite." Threatening him with the looming knowledge that his "greatest desire would never be fulfilled" and him obviously assuming that would be Falin's resurrection.

And then he still asked all of those people to help him cannibalize his sister.

And didn't tell his friends that it might not work until they were almost done eating her, nearly a week later.

Like, he's not a good LIAR but Laios Touden is a master of just not saying things. Essentially, he strong-armed a good hundred people or so into eating Falin knowing full well it might not work, and didn't tell anyone -- including his closest friends -- that it might not work until it was too late to back out because they'd already done everything he wanted. Like. I'm not sure if he was trying to brace them for disappointment or if he genuinely felt like he had somehow been tricking them by not mentioning it... but to me, that's HUGE. Lying to the whole big group of people eating -- sure, whatever, but these people went through so much already, the fact that he still just quietly hid the fact that everything they did might still be for nothing is just. Oof. Ouch. My bones.

SO. IN A ROUNDABOUT RESPONSE.

Laios is good at hiding things, but a bad liar! He just usually is very straightforward with Kabru about things in private, I think, so even though Kabru has a hard time reading his FACE, he's already clued in that Something Is Wrong and he's not going to drop it until he gets his answers. Big tells would be Laios using more diplomatic or careful language despite being alone (taking care not to be misunderstood, which means he's hiding something in his words, or worried that the thing he's talking about is just inherently bad), misdirection, unwillingness to address the topic...

It's really fun to flip their usual dynamics on their head. I had Laios gently reminding Kabru of a kobold's name in the Karkadann chapter, I believe, and then Kabru trying to get Laios to be straightforward and honest in this last chapter... it always feels super rewarding when I find an opportunity to do something like that. Like, situations are always changing, they're never going to be exactly the same from one moment to the next... one minute you think Laios fumbled the whole situation with the kobolds, the next minute Kabru and Laios are performing a flawless combo social attack finisher. It's so much fun.

Kabru is!!! Doing his best!!! I've been focusing on Laios mostly in this ask mostly because next chapter is going to be Kabru POV and I don't want to get TOO far ahead of myself... but he's definitely having A Time!!!!!

Thank you for reading, and thanks for the message! I'm so glad you enjoyed!

[popculturebuffet]

Batmarch: The Secret Origin of Batman's Trophys (Comission for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy people and welcome back to Batmarch, or celebrations of all things that go bump in the dark knight

Today we've got a special treat... and i'm not just talking the nice art Kev had comissioned! Looks really good and I really appcirated it. Thank you KEv and thank you Alan Patreon. It was a nice suprise gift.

As for what this is about, this was a fantastic idea Kev cooked up: the batcave is one of the coolest hero bases in all of fiction. The layout is never 100% consitant across media but your usually guaranteed a batmobile, a big ass computer at the center, water falls, and over time a display for various costumes from past sidekicks, alternate outfits etc.

What really spruces the place up are three distinct decorations that we almost always see in the comics and ocasionally in other media, if not live action since these bitches would be expensive to make: A giant dinosaur, a big ole penny, and a giant playing card of a joker. These three are staples of the bat cave, to the point when the original was caved in during the earthquakes that ravaged gotham in the build up to no man's land, Bruce made a point of fishing them out for the new cave he built after that traumatic year.

Yet most of us.... have no idea where he got these wonderful toys. Even I didn't. The Joker Card comes from an obvious grinning source, but what CASE did it come from? Where did he get that dinosaur? What was someone using that giant Penny for? It's a question i've asked once or twice but never looked into. Kevin did though, and while the through and lovely DC wiki helped him find each one, he went the extra mile, asking for a review. And I was entirely on board with this comission as I just.. never had those answers and I doubt i'm the only one whose wondered what the context for these things were. So today we're looking at three disntinct golden age batman stories, at a time when goofy nonsense reigned supreme, logic was optional, and weird shit like this was just another day in the batcave. IN other words, this is going to be a LOT of fun so join me under the cut as we look at gambling themed death traps, penny obessed gangsters and batman being hunted by the most dangerous game: mechanical dinosaurs.

The Giant Joker Playing Card:

(from Batman #44)

I love these old titles, such flair and cheese. It's incredible.

Anyways this one starts because Joker decides to hit an off the books casnio after his win. Luckily for them, he just wants to play which feels entirely like a joker move: instead of robbing an easy target that can't call the cops and that the mafia presumibly running it would be stupid to retaliate on, he decides "fuck it let's try this whole gambling thing men, sounds like a hoot and a half".

And sure enough.. it goes really well. He spends what's implied to be the whole night just winning and winning until he cleans house. This being the joker this gambling bug can only end one way

I just.. love everything about this. Joker just had fun at a casnio and turned it into a death trap. It's such a brilliant setup.. and one that while nicely goofy, is also well done: it fits the joker's unpredictablity to just go a gamblin and it fits him just as much to turn a new hobby into a death trap. I also love Lewis' reaction calling it SUPERGAMBLING., like he's some gambling expert and most dangerous game shit is a type of gambling.. which given we're in the dc universe, you probably DO need a name for this kind of thing in the crime world.

So he set shte perfect trap: he has a random balding middle aged man tell the two he has info on a recent raidum theft, raidum a hospital badly needs. To save the presumed orphans about to die without eating their radium, Batman and Robin go to a sketchy island with one house perched on a hill

The World's Greatest Detective.. sees NOTHING wrong with this and goes ahead and gets caught in the most devious trap imaginable.

Several head injuries later, our heroes wake and joker reveals the radium theives, who he captured for this scheme but have kept the radium's location to themselves. This is by deisgn: the joker wants the two and their "radium screts" as the ante here, along with Robin to make sure Batman does this. Batman repedately states "I don't gamble' as if logic suddenly works on the clown man who set up a gambling death trap, so Joker reveals if Batman won't play his three supergambling games, he'll just kill the hostages. Batman reluctantly agrees,

Game 1 is super pinball.

But when Batman proves to be an expert at the snes Joker goes with plan b.. his giant pinball table of death. Sorry his giant SUPER pinball table of death.

As you can see the same joker face from the card is here and you see it all over his lable. it seemed to be Joker's logo back the. I love this whole setup and mostly show it not only because it' sdope but because those pins must've been what bumpers were. I also had no idea PInball used to be a gambling thing. Makes sense, it's just fun to find out.

The game goes well mostly though one of the guys nearly slams into a pin. Thankfully Robin is an expert gymnist and batman smartly saved laucnhing robin till the last minute and Dick's able to save the goon.

Game two is super rolling some dice, which apparently used to land on numbers. This yugioh style death game involves our bait being tied to polls on three of the numbers. If Batman guesses wrong, someone dies. Or maybe not since the board is pretty damn big. Not every death trap can be super murder pinball. Batman spots some mud on the dice though and correctly guesses they'll pivot. This is the weakest of the death traps here, a bit convolunted, not really guranteed to be as deadly. I know the chance of nothing happening is part of it.. but with pinball there's really almost no chance you won't hit the bumpers. Here it feels like pure luck or simple cheating that both dice flew at the joker.

Next game and the one that introduces our prop, though the dice apparently are also in the cave sometimes which I love. The game is a game of cards.. batman has to correctly guess which face matches the door Robin and the hostage goons are in or they'll choke to death on the deadly gas released inside.. and naturally he figures out it's the Joker card. It's too joker not to work.

Turns out though, naturally the joker isn't playing fair both having a final one on one game ofr him and Batman and having his goon go to get robin behind the joker card door... and Robin dispatches him hilaroiusly and awesomely

With that the hostages are free and the final death game begins. A giant super roulette wheel with both batman and joker getting in a slot. looser gets crushed alive. It's an awesome finale, and it fits joker to put himself at risk: after all he risks his life all the time why wouldn't he for such a fun gag?

Batman's able to get the wheel to turn fairly and then escape it, leading to a chase. THe Radium Theives agree to give themselves and the radium up but there's still the matter of the joker and we get a short but neat final chase as Joker uses the dice against the heroes then jumps off a cliff, gambling his life one last time.. and rightfully batman isn't betting on the joker having died.

Gamble With Doom is an excellent story. While the trophy we get out of it is only in it briefly the story itself is pure fun. It has some fun dated elements like Bruce's opinon gambling is EVILLLL and the old fashioned designs on the traps, but it's pure fun. The traps are clever, the tension palpable and the climax great. The gambling motif's really fit the joker and it adds up to an all time great joker story with a suprise impact. The Trophy Itslef. is barely in it but Robin DID break a guy's face with it so i'll say it was still cave worthy.

(From World's Finest #30)

The Penny Plunderer is a name I had heard but had no real context for. I assumed he was some goofy silver age villian with pennies for eyes who drove around chucking pennies at everyone.

I am an artiste.

Instead it's just a guy in a suit. He has the backstory of any good golden or silver age villian to justify his gimmick

I love.. everything about this backstory. It reads like if a writer was given the thought exercise "Make the pettiest batman villian origin you can find.". I mean other villians gimmicks make sense: Poison Ivy was a botonist, Mr Freeze had a horrible accident, the penguin was born looking like a penguin with a lot of money, the Joker fell into a vat of chemicals and came out a clwon, the riddler liked puzzles.

Here Joe just... got screwed over by pennies a lot. Even funnier is that the last one has nothing to do with pennies. Like.. even if it'd had nickels he'd still be arrested.

So Joe vows since pennies runied his life, he'l lbecome the penny! Sadly this does not mean him dressing up like a giant penny with a cane and top hat.. nad now I can't show you it that last drawing put me too far behind and... oh fuck it.

Instead he just wears a suit but makes his gimmick pennies. Commit to the bit man. I do get it as some golden age villians were just guy in a suit, even Joker and Penguin technically counts but one is a clown and the other is a rich penguin man. They have mor ethan just "suit and a vendetta against pennies that somehowturns into stockholm syndrome.

So the penny plunderer begins his reign of terror, setting up a penny arcade as a front, and cashing in a roll of pennies in the most diabolical scheme ever devised by man.

A true criminal mastermind.

Batman picks up on this pattern because it's what he does and finds his next case, a coin and stamp exibiton with a rare one cent stamp. It's here we meet the reason we're here: the giant penny!

Yeah to my shock the penny had NOTHING to do with the penny plunderer other than being at the site of one of his robberies. He prefered just.. chucking pennies at people.. which is awesome and a truly great tactic only topped by Batman's use of said giant penny

I adore the fact that this iconic artifact is there not because it was seized from the villians or a police options.. but because, presumibly, Bruce thought this penny he found was kick ass and bought it off it's actual owner.

Most of the theives escape but they find one willing to squeal. Unfortunatley he dies for his hubris

Yup bet you weren't expecting the penny guy to kill someone and to see his corpse weren't you but here you are. Also batman is apparently a cop now. George Lopez tried to warn us...

But we didn't listen! We didn't listen!

A fight breaks out at the gambling parlour and we get two of the best moments in batman history that much like the blue beetle film, ar ehighly underated.

I just.. I get the sense that is how batman ALWAYS plays pinball. Just judo kicks it every time even as bruce wayne. Both bruce wayne and batman have been banned from so many arcades.. often the same ones. Perks of having a secret identity. We then get coyne once again THROWING pennies at someone and it working. I don't know why he hasn't been brought back with the telkeentic ability to contorl pennies. Give him a copper helmet and a proper costume and oh dammit..

Then Joe knocks batman out iwth his one weakness: a roll of pennies. He's trapped them in the parlor for your standard batman death trap, having removed their belts and ripped out the phone lines as usual. He then throws them a few pennies when then prove to be a mistake as it's time for SCIENCE WITH DR. BATMAN, who uses one old penny, copper, and one new penny, zinc to make a battery. Good thing jimmy didn't wish it away THIS week.

The cops arrive to free one of hteir own and batman finds a clue once the parlor is cleared of gas. Turns out Coyne was catering a penny slot party for a rich billinoare's houseboat, and naturally their filled with gas. I swear it's always gas with these golden age villians. Get another knockout device fellas.

With that our final chase enses as Batman and robin chase Coyne and while he nearly bests them with a good game of 1940's donkey kong

He's foiled by his own gimmick: he has only pennies but the pay telephone.. dosen't.. take 5 seperate pennies for some reason? the hell? I get payphones not taking pennies once they went up to a quarter but come the fuck on 1940's payed telephones. he's foiled.. and sentenced to death.

Yes folks that's the cannoical till some lucky fellow brings him back fate of the penny plunderer: PUT TO DEATH.

This story is as you can tell nonsense that's only gotten more hilarious with the passage of time and I loved every page on it and on getting the panels for this review, I only found MORE hilaroius nonsense to laugh at. We have a story where a guy with a penny gimmick smacks batman with a roll of pennies, trips robin with more, kills a man without pennies, is foiled by pennies yet somehow dosen't actually use the giant penny that's the only reason people know he exists. It's beautiful bollocks and worth your time.

(From Batman #35)

As I hope you are, this issue had me hooked from the first panel: Batman vs dinosaurs being forced to fashion a bow and arrow for some reason. Yes... fuck. Yes. Also nice of bruce to eat Ollie's lunch.

Okay so this story starts, as many real life stories do, with a billionare having a zany idea; Mr. Hart is a man who puts on shows: ice follies, aqua carnival, 40's razzle dazzle type stuff. For his latest idea though he's going above and beyond: a DINOSAUR ISLAND. With mechancail dinosaurs and cavemen who throw giant sponges at you. Thankfully spongebob wasn't born yet but his great great grandpappys quarepants did the honors. Honorable old fool.

To ramp up the insanity, Mr Hart is inviting a club of big game hunters to eat mammoth steak with batman.

If that weren't enough, and in any other golden age story it might be... our heroes get CHALLENGED at dinner by one of the rich assholes. Yeah turns out rich assholes who hunt innocent animals for sport and eat reheated mammoth aren't the most stable indviduals and Mr. Breech scoofs at the fact Mr. Hart says Man is the most dangerous game. He's hunted man, they went down like cowards. COWARDS. He feels Batman couldn't hut a dinosaur without his gadgets, and certainly not his bare hands... even though as this issue with prove and has already shown early man had tools.

To prove his point he challenges batman to a fucking challenge: survive on Dinosaur Island: no utility belt, no vehicles. If the dinosaurs touch him he looses. Mr Breech will man the controls. Honestly i'm convinced Breech knew hart well enough to know he'd both agree to this for the publiclity and why he'd invite batman and robin and just wants to play iwth giant mechanical dinosaurs and also batman. Which granted if I were invited to this sort of thing i'd also want to chase batman with mechanical dinosaurs for fun, who wouldn't, so I totally get it and respect the game.

Hart is on board, offering 5000 to the winner's charity and Batman is like "Why the bat-fuck not. Let's go".

Now you might suspect Breech's real motive is trying to kill batman. I mean you have a setup where batman will be without his weapons, the plausable deniablity of a machine malfunction and a secluded island with 24 hours to kill the batman. And you'd shockingly be wrong. Breech really just wants to prove dinosaurs are the most dangerous game so when that Jurassic Park he's working on opens no one will object to him hunting them for sport.

But his plans are foiled by Chase, anothe rich knob who wants to kill batman and robin to, as he says later form a "crime combine". So he wants a bunch of middle aged guys drinking beers to yell at him for not training the joker on tackling well enough. I see.. well played.

So the game is afoot and our heroes take a bit to catch up, first brushing off a real rock among the sponge rocks as a mistake. Theis ends when a Triceratops to trismash them into a tree. Batman calls for a war council on a nearbye island but naturally THAT'S NO ISLAND

Batman fought a mechanical fucking seamonster. That.. that's cannon. To almost every batman timeline. God bless you Golden Age, god, bless, youuuu. Also i'd be stupid if I didn't say that Tally Ho, Batman! is one of the greatest phrases in batman history up there with "I Am the night" , "I'm batman" and "Something something joker's boner".

So now the games for their lives, Batman and Robin don't have to play fair and start fashioning bows, arrows and knives out of mechanical dinosaur bones. You know.. sometimes this job can be draining: 2-3 reviews a week, many a plan having to be delayed due to a review taking longer than expected.. but then you get a review where Batman and robin have to outrun a manical billinoare who hyjacked dinosaurs from a diffrnet billionare who was having a charity dinosaur hunt with batman and robin using a third billionare's dinosaur, while fashoining weapons from mechanical dinosaur corpses and fashion a kite from a mechanical ptreadon and remember why you love reviewing stuff so mucH: sharinng a good story with the world and finding a good one or two yourself while your at it. And thanks to Kev i've found three truly wonderful, truly bonkers batman stories, with this one being the easy winner. It's both a decent enough concept for the time and hilariously insane.

And I ddin't make up the kite thing: when, after a night of survivial, Robin brings up the batplane, Batman has an idea: since the flying dinosaurs are on a programmed pattren rather than directly controled, they can use them to make themselves a kite yor style.

So to win the day Batman has a plan: he uses himself as bait since Robin's the more agile of the two, and has robin CATAPULT HIMSELF into the air after chase, who is riding on t-rex back with an army of dinosaurs.. and how does he defeat chase' smighty dino army?

It's both genuinely clever and wonderfully bonkers: Robin defeats an evil billionare RIDING a mechanical t-rex.. with water balloons.

Also props to this story: in the previous two the trophy was impressive.. but it was taken from what felt like a minor point in the story: the card flip game was fun as was batman slammin ga door on a guy, but it's sandwitched between far more elaborate death traps, while the penny, again awesome, wasn't even something the penny plunderer used. Batman just bought it off some offscreen character to relive fond memoreies of crushign some crimianls alive with it. Here the main villian ROAD IN on the thing. Granted he still had to likely buy it off his actual owner, but this time at least a criminal actually used it as a murder weapon. I can see Batman wanting this thing for his cave.

Batman chases chase over the now still dinosaurs and punches the guy out. With this Batman's saved the day AND won the bet. 5000 for batmobiles for kids, donate your batmobile today!

As for chase...

With that our story and this trilogy comes to an end.. and as I said, it's great. check out all three of these issues their a lot of fun. Next time dc puts some up for sale I may have to get some 40's batman, this stuff is golden.

Thanks for reading

To conclude batman month: Wait'll you get a load of this

[silent-stories]

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐀𝐇𝐔𝐈𝐙𝐎𝐓𝐋 - 𝐏𝐀𝐑𝐓 𝟒

Summary: When Y/N needs help on a hunt, she doesn't expect Bobby to send Dean Winchester to her. Now the two must work together to solve the case and Dean has to deal with Y/N's sarcastic and biting personality, that maybe he likes a little too much.

Pairing: Dean × F!Reader

Warnings: nightmares, a bit of angst and fluff, swearing

Word count: 2274

Series

They found Bobby eating a sandwich and Sam idly leafing through a book when they opened the door of the house.

"Hey Sam. Have you grown up since I last saw you?" Y/N asked wryly as Dean closed the door behind them.

Sam rolled his eyes but smiled at her, he knew it was her way of saying she missed him.

During the trip Y/N had well thought of calling Bobby to warn him and, after several complaints and protests, she'd ended the call with the belief that she had bribed him with some jokes and her usual tone that she used when she wanted something.

Sitting around the kitchen table, Dean and Y/N gave a quick summary of the whole case, talking over each other like ten-year-olds.

Each time Sam ran his hand free from the cast over his face, already tired of their behavior but also a little amused.

“If you maybe gave them the tissue with the blood instead of bragging so much about saving my ass, you'd be a lot more professional, idiot!” She exclaimed.

"I would have when you shut your mouth!"

"Stop it and tell me more about that creature!" Bobby snapped and the bickering stopped.

“We brought this one for a reason." Y/N said pointing to Michael.

"I am a person, I have a name!" He exclaimed, tired of being treated like a package.

But Bobby gave him a nod of his head that meant it would be better for him to stay quiet: going against Y/N could be very dangerous sometimes.

"We, on the other hand, will rest for a few hours before setting off again for Toledo." She added glancing at Dean.

He knew immediately that her look visibly insisted on following her upstairs.

"What?"

“Dean, you need to sleep!” she scolded, looking for support in Sam and Bobby's eyes. "He hasn't slept in like two days!"

The two men gave him a sort of reproachful look.

Dean snorted, got up from his chair and turned to Michael, pointing a finger at him. «If you run away you're dead, remember that» he told him before going upstairs followed by Y/N.

Dean walked into the room he usually occupied whenever he stayed there and flung himself on the bed like a sack of potatoes, bouncing on impact with the springs. Eyes closed and that feeling of peace that came only when he slept in a real house and not in a cheap motel.

"And you didn't want to rest!" Y/N teased him, entering the room after him.

"Shut up," he said lazily, his face pressed into the pillow.

“Can you breathe, or are you going to grow some gills out to keep your face against that pillow?” Yes, she found it a little wrong to insult him when he didn't have the strength to defend himself but she just couldn't help it. She quickly realized that when Dean wasn't fighting back it wasn't all that funny.

"I'll come back to wake you up in a few hours, so fall asleep quickly." She said finally, before heading for the door.

But then she retraced her steps, reaching the bed again. She grabbed the blanket crumpled at the bottom of it and unfolded it to spread over Dean's body.

He didn't move, his back rose and fell at a regular pace and she hoped he was already asleep or he would tease her forever for such a sweet gesture.

It had been a good four hours, it was almost evening and Y/N was going to the room where she had left Dean to wake him up. The others had suggested doing it about an hour before but she had found all the excuses in the world to postpone that moment, maybe because she didn't want to disturb his sleep.

As she walked down the hallway thinking about whether to enter the room with a "good morning princess" or "good morning sunshine" she heard a kind of muffled noise coming from the other side of the door.

Y/N slowly turned the handle, entering the dark room due to the window with the shutter down which did not let in the slightest thread of light.

"Dean?" she asked without raising her voice too much.

All she heard was a grunt, but not because Dean heard her come in and that was his response, but because he was having a nightmare.

His body twisted on the bed as his hand gripped the sheet in a tight fist.

Y/N thought that even that morning when she had woken up Dean at the motel after she had seen him tossing and turning and muttering words she couldn't understand he had also had a nightmare but he hadn't mentioned it again and she had done the same.

"Hey." She said reaching the bed and placing a hand on Dean's shoulder, shaking him slightly.

Dean suddenly opened his eyes and grabbed the girl's wrist in a quick movement, sitting up.

"Dean." She tried to say it in a calm voice, but he just stared at her as he breathed fast and kept squeezing her wrist a little too tight. She would probably get a bruise after that.

"Dean, it's me. It's okay. You're fine. You had a nightmare." She whispered in a calm, reassuring tone that she wasn't used to using often.

He was gripping her arm so tightly that Y/N feared she would hear a loud "crack" and end up with her arm in a cast like Sam.

"Dean, you're hurting me. Please."

Sure, she could have punched him in the face and he probably would have finally let her go but she didn't feel like doing it a moment like that.

"Oh God" Dean muttered as he finally let her arm go "God, I-I'm so sorry."

Y/N thanked the darkness of the room making it impossible to see her wrist, but she knew there was already a red mark.

"It's okay, really. Don't worry."

She said at that bewildered and vulnerable version of Dean.

"Y/N" He mumbled "Y/N I'm sorry."

"Dean, stop it, I told you it's okay and-"

"It's not okay. I hurt you."

"Hey" she said as she cupped Dean's face with her hands causing a slightly surprised look from him "I'm fine, you're fine and what you had was just a nightmare. That's the important thing."

She slowly ran her thumb over his cheek. "It's okay, Dean."

Dean stared at her in silence, his face just a few inches from hers, and for a moment she thought he was going to kiss her, instead when he got even closer to her, he buried his face in the crook of her neck and hugged her back with his arms.

Y/N brought her hand to his hair, running her fingers through his brown locks and Dean just let out a sigh against her skin as if the gesture brought him relief or eased some kind of pain.

Her other hand was slowly drawing imaginary circles on Dean's back and after a few minutes his tense muscles relaxed.

"Hey" she said "do you want to talk about it?"

He stayed silent for an indefinite amount of time and when Y/N thought that meant he didn't want to talk about it, Dean's hoarse voice reached her ear and his lips tickled her neck as he talked.

"Usually I don't really understand what's happening, I only see flames and lots of smoke. Sometimes creatures. I'm in that house, in what was once my house, and my father tells me to take the others out, that I have to save them but I can't find anyone.

And I'm only four years old.

I only hear their voices screaming and begging for help. Voices of people I love. This time yours was there too." Dean murmured in a broken voice without taking his face off the girl's neck so without looking at her. And that was good because she certainly wouldn't want him to see her teary eyes shine in the dark.

"It's okay." That was all she could say as she ran her hand through Dean's hair again.

"Can we stay like this a little longer?" Dean asked and he really sounded like a scared kid.

The logical answer would have been a resounding no, they still had a case to solve.

"Yes. Yes, of course we can."

“So that this is angry about the dam?”

It was the first thing Y/N and Dean heard when they came back in the living room .

"You really are a perceptive man!" Bobby muttered at Michael before shifting his gaze to the two.

"It took you a long time!" he exclaimed.

Dean glanced at Y/N. Did he really think she was going to say anything about what just happened?

“Dean is a heavy sleeper, he didn't want to wake up. So what made me ask for help?” Y/N asked approaching Sam who was holding an open book on his lap.

"Its name is Ahuizotl," he explained.

"I think at this point I'll keep calling it Dogotter" The girl replied, throwing a knowing look at Dean who held back a smile.

"It's a legendary creature of the Aztec culture an—" Sam tried to continue before being interrupted.

"How do I kill it?" She asked.

"The light stuns them and slows them down, which will make you gain some time."

"Time for?" Impatience, her middle name.

"Cut off his head and tail," he turned the book upside down to let them see the image better.

"And what do we do after that?"

"If I were you, I'd grill it up, just to be safe." Bobby intervened.

“Great, now we just need to get back there and… well, give him what he deserves.” Dean said.

“Do you really think that thing is going to come out just to get itself killed?” Sam asked sceptically.

"What do you mean?"  Y/N asked.

"That creature lives in the lake and knows you're hunting it, just as it knows you've secured its meal," Sam explained patiently. “So going there and waiting for it to come to you is a stupid move, unless…"

Silence. Dean, Y/N, Bobby and Sam shifted their gaze to Michael, who, at first, looked at them without understanding what was going on. His eyes widened soon after as he sensed the nature of their stares.

"No," he said categorically. "Forget it, I'm not going be your fucking bait!"

"It's the only way we can kill him" Dean began, nodding with conviction at his own words "Sam's right. It won't show up until it gets what it wants."

"And that's supposed to make me feel better?!" the man snapped, seized by a sudden panic attack.

"Calm down," the hunter hushed him quickly “everything's gonna be fine, okay? We will be there, ready to attack. Trust us."

"Trust you?!" Michael asked in panic, eyebrows raised in disbelief. He burst into a hysterical laugh and then went serious again. "Trust you?! You gotta be kidding me! You talk to your car!" he added, shouting at him that little detail as if it were the salient point for which it was better not to trust him. "You are crazy. All of you."

"Okay, then you can start saying goodbye to your family," Sam replied.

“My…my family? Why?"

"Well, it's obvious. If you don't do the bait, the monster won't be killed and so you won't be able to go back to your city again because as soon as you decide to do so, that thing will eat you alive."

"Listen." Y/N said slowly approaching the man, almost like a lion to its prey.

"Do you want to know what will happen to you if you don't do what you've just been told?" She said it in an unnervingly rhetorical tone, an almost sadistic grin on her face. "I'll throw you into the lake. I'll wait for the monster to surface to get you and then I'll drag it out to tear it apart. And believe me, you won't be still alive to enjoy the scene when I roast it." Her seriousness was almost chilling, the soft tone she had used with Dean was completely gone.

“Now I'm gonna get ready to leave. It's late." she concluded before going up the stairs and leaving the room.

Bobby laughted out loud "I love that girl!" he said before disappearing into the kitchen while Sam went to arrange the books he'd been using on their shelves, leaving Dean and Michael alone.

"Come on, get your stuff, man, we have to go." Dean said turning to the other man, giving him a comforting pat on the shoulder.

"W-wait" he muttered "do you really think she would do such a thing?"

Dean let out a short laugh. "She loves to threaten people and has a really temper sometimes but she's not a bad person. She likes to help others and she really cares about her family, she would give her life for someone she loves even if she would never admit it. And she's always there when you need it."

"Mh, are you sure?" Michael asked reluctantly.

"I am. She doesn't show her... softer side often but she has one, she just hides it. And I'm sure she would never throw you in the lake."

"Okay, I'm ready" announced Y/N interrupting the two as she went down the stairs again. Dean glanced at her to see if she'd heard anything he'd just said but he couldn't tell from her expression.

Dean and Y/N grabbed their bags and said goodbye to Bobby and Sam, who told them to be careful.

Finally the three left the house.

Tags: @eevvvaa @spn730015 @supernatural111222 @youcancallmelily @clairenovakanddeanwinchester @dads-on-a-hunting-trip @3amstillawake @supernaturalmess @marvelandsupernatural @agirlwatchingalotoftvshows @candy-coated-misery0731 @impalaslytherin @rudy-the-winged-wolf @dean-winchester-6767 @samanddeansannoyingsis @roseblue373 @waynes-multiverse @random-spn-fan @xoxokiaraaxoxo

Series: @stitchintimefan @foxxymunson @sagexcandles @deans-spinster-witch

[snorkling-in-sodasea]

Establishing Couples in Hazbin: Stolitz Season 1

Finally got around to this. I decided to make this post just season one and save the post for season two until January, when season two should be over, if that schedule's right. But it's just amazing how much material I got to work with in just one season in how much of a mismatched pair they are. I think I'll split this topic up in a post per season, in fact, because of the sheer amount of what I got to work with. Also, I'll be bringing up at some points of my post the whole 'Stolas is autistic' thing that plenty of fans like to go with; I'd like to say that I don't mean any insults to anyone when I mention it. And I don't know if this will amount to anything but it might be important to inform you all that I myself actually am autistic. Also, I'll probably derail a little bit here and there because I'm a spontaneous typer here. Now for anyone and everyone okay with a Stolitz/Stolas roasting, let's get started.

I might as well go in order of appearances that Stolas and Blitz make together, including phone calls. That's probably good because the only interaction that they have in the pilot (maybe the pilot's non-canon but, as far as I know and feel, it's selective which parts of a pilot are canon and which ones aren't) The phone call was funny to me at the time but that was probably before Stolas's woobifying process or whatever it's called. (Yeah, there's bound to be people who don't like that type of humor but at least it was for sure a joke instead of a back and forth double standard kind of bullshit). Still, Blitzo showed how much he didn't like it, even getting Loona's help for it

2. Starting up the series proper, there's Murder Family. Specifically, the scene when Blitzo is being hunted down by Martha and a little detail when he's talking to Mayberry.

First up, Blitzo has an alarm system for his employees to intervene when something gets too much for him. One of the buttons is for Stolas. For. STOLAS. As in, Blitzo would press that button if Stolas was there and made him feel too uncomfortable and/or unsafe thanks to this damn owl.

Then there's the bigger scene with being chased down by Martha. Stolas is watching Blitzo through the bubbles. He can see what's happening. His arm wound is even visible to Stolas. Even if not, it can't be that hard to figure out something's wrong when the person you're calling is whispering 'now's not a good time'. This damn owl decides none of that matters and makes a phone call. This is the biggest damning moment that all those claims that Stolas didn't realize what he was doing really does become impossible, or at the very, very, very least, get so improbable that it's almost impossible. (Although for the second thing, I still don't get how so I'm probably giving this too much credit by even entertaining the thought)

Anyways, I'll get into more detail about this specific moment because it's relevant for Apology Tour but, should I watch the bathtub scene, I can't see how Stolas is completely oblivious to what he's doing. Especially if Stolas initially let Blitzo just have the book at first and would still have ensured contact if Stolas bothered to just flex his social position and go wherever he wants, whenever he wants. It's not like Viv gives Stolas a lot of responsibilities in the show anyways. (Seriously, the Full Moon Festival in episode 5 and the paperwork in a fucking music video, which people can easily miss if they're not compelled to watch it, is literally the only two times we ever see Stolas do anything resembling a job). I can't see any reason whatsoever as to why this just had to be sexual

There's also the part that Stolas managed to talk for hours without Blitzo ever responding back to him. I would have expected someone who loved me to eventually want to know if I'm listening to him and ever say something to them sometimes, especially over a fucking phone call. Yet Stolas just went on and on and, considering he purposely picked when Blitzo was being shot at to propose the sex deal. That says to me that Stolas is so focused how horny Stolas himself is that he can't even be bothered to see if Blitzo made it out the whole 'being-shot-at' thing alive so that Blitzo can fuck him at a later date

3. Next is Loo Loo Land. To be honest, I loved this episode when it came out but, just like the phone call in the pilot, this was before the woobifying and this was the first time Stolas has done his disgusting shit. As a result, I didn't think about it that hard and I didn't expect Stolas to keep repeating his mistakes since you normally expect fictional characters to mess up in a certain way once and never again. If it is going to happen again, then it either needs to build up to something or be executed differently than the first time.

Anyways, Stolas was being yelled at by Stella, looking like it was for the cheating. Eventually, that specific fight comes to pass and Stolas tries to talk to Octavia. He gets the idea to go to an amusement park she used to love but makes it obvious that she has no desire to go now that she's a teenager. I heard that someone made the argument that, believing Stolas to be autistic, it meant that he couldn't tell that Octavia didn't want to go because she's a sarcastic teenager and sarcasm is hard to tell apart from sincerity and Stolas rarely interacts with anyone. I'm not buying that. I'm not saying it's impossible but it's highly improbable. It's incredibly rare for anything to truly be impossible so things are just improbable depending on what you're talking about. So I find it highly improbable that a thirty-something year old man would still not recognize that Octavia isn't excited to go, autism or not. Even if you can't tell by words, you can at least tell by attitude and demeanor so Stolas still should've been able to tell, especially by the time he reaches adult age. (Sorry, ended up going off on a tangent but the next paragraph shows that I felt the need for extra context and I provided that to some degree)

Besides, autism or not, it's still a damn stupid plan that Stolas has. He seems to want to have Blitzo there to flirt with at any moment he pleases and to have a happily distracted daughter that he can sometimes give attention to, because at least the first time ends up happening. Thing is, considering what has made Octavia so upset in the damn first place, then Stolas wasn't going to accomplish or obtain both things that he wanted, especially in the way that he tried. It's obvious in how it failed for Octavia but it failed with Blitzo, too. Stolas simply didn't have to deal with that like he had to deal with Octavia because it's her who reached her limit, not him. Still, how it failed with Blitzo is that he was not receptive to the the touches and he didn't look happy at any point of time. What's more, it's a bit of evidence that goes into Blitzo's ultimate feelings as revealed in Full Moon

4. Next is Harvest Moon Festival, starting with Blitzo and Stolas having sex in his palace, mansion, whatever. The point is - and this is another tangent about something else entirely so feel free to skip this paragraph if you want - it's Octavia's home, not just Stolas's, and Stolas is still having sex with the guy she's afraid would leave him behind. Maybe Stolas thinks that Octavia is fine with him having sex with Blitzo because she's reassured that he won't abandon her. Except it comes off as disrespectful towards her if Stolas is continuing his affair in their shared home because he thinks everything's hunky-dory now that they had all that crap in Loo Loo Land sorted out and it'll never be a problem again. (Considering how little Octavia shows up in the series, only ever showing up for extra angst on Stolas's part, then maybe it somehow really isn't a problem. It's not like the characters are typically written like how people logically react to specific shit, anyways.)

Anyways, Blitz only ever looked happy talking to Stolas when thinking about going to the Harvest Moon Festival, something that he easily could've heard from Millie or even Moxxie. So it's not like Stolas was all that special in this instance of anything resembling happiness in Stolas's presence. Not to mention, Blitzo immediately gets to a more agitated state when he feels the need to tell Stolas to not get kinky with him. It's kind of telling that Blitzo legit feels the need to tell him that. Like he can't trust Stolas to restrain himself otherwise

After all, Stolas is already so fucking horny just by watching Blitzo. Blatantly sending flirtations to him in the audience, announcing him the winner with the not preferred name which pretty much embarrassed him, and it got to the point where Blitzo didn't want to stick around much longer if there's gonna be nothing but a thirsty-ass owl on stage. Blitzo couldn't make his discomfort any more obvious throughout the entire time he's at the games, should it come up, so Stolas has to be willfully ignoring all of it or is the stupidest fucker in all of their universe to not notice anything wrong

5. After this is Truth Seekers, when Stolas came in to rescue I.M.P. He started it off with 'impish, little plaything'. No matter what the reason he had for saying it, it's a demeaning phrase specifically pointing out race so how else is Blitzo supposed to see it? Does Stolas genuinely think it's a cute, little pet name?

Then there's Stolas actually chewing out Blitzo for getting in trouble with D.H.O.R.K.S. Stolas is the one who has been watching for who knows how long and just let them handle it until they couldn't. If Stolas is gonna let I.M.P. deal with the against the agents and take his time helping, if he's gonna do it at all, then it feels like he's in the wrong for chastising them. Even though I probably can't explain that very well, Stolas definitely doesn't have the right to lecture Blitzo about carelessness when he's the one who just lends the all important grimoire for sex. If anything, Stolas is a hypocrite for getting upset about carelessness when lending out the book for sex to an imp is its own brand of carelessness. After all, the damn book is supposed to be Stolas's responsibility and no one else's. The point is, Stolas is basically blaming Blitzo for something that's more Stolas's fault than anyone else's and it's not good for their 'relationship' if Stolas's go to thoughts for anything wrong is that it's all entirely Blitzo's fault and that Stolas himself never contributed to any of it. Let's not forget how Stolas just touches Blitzo however he wanted and Blitzo just glares. I also read or heard a good point somewhere that Blitzo doesn't protest but still looks unhappy, highly likely because he gave up trying to establish boundaries. He knows that Stolas won't listen. I thought initially that Blitzo knew that he's in trouble with Stolas so he just takes whatever Stolas wants to do to him because protesting against it just makes him more upset. What I thought was sad but giving up establishing boundaries because you know they won't be respected is even sadder

Finally, Stolas asks for a reward for saving Blitz. That's so as fuck not a thing that 'kind' people do. Kind people don't even think about an award for what they do. At best, they just wish to not be given an attitude by the people they attempt to help. People who genuinely love another person also don't expect anything from the person they love to give any awards; it's already award enough to see them happy and well. Stolas doesn't refuse the offer for sex, either, so that's another thing against him for that 'relationship' he wants later down the line

Oh, and I guess there's the trip that Blitzo ended up going on thanks to the truth serum. Particularly the part where he sees Stolas being on his fancy-ass throne and pulling Blitzo by the chains and collar. Wouldn't be surprised if he feels trapped. Really, the only 'romance' that be detected as if you had kink or a fetish for, at best, dubiously consensual situations. But for an actual relationship, I doubt it's normal for someone to feel trapped and needing to serve the other. Stolas's actual actions after the trip is bound to not have helped that perception in the slightest, either

6. Finally, there's Ozzie's. Blitz first thinks of using Stolas to get into Ozzie's to spy on Millie and Moxxie. (So weird how no one ever brings this up when holding Blitzo accountable for what he did to Stolas. Other than seducing him for the book and stealing it, this is the only other thing that comes to mind on the actual shitty things Blitzo did to Stolas). Blitzo never worded it like he wanted to go on a date, though. He just asked to go to a club. It was Stolas who decided to interpret it that way. It is douchey for Blitzo to never correct it because it's apparently that important for him to not even give Millie and Moxxie a single night to themselves (I really hate that this never amounts to anything)

Things get bad, though, when the heat is on Blitzo and, by extension, Stolas when Blitzo tried defending Moxxie. Not only did Stolas never do a single, solitary thing to defend Blitzo when he was being harassed like how Millie did for Moxxie but there was a point where Stolas legitimately tried to run away. Then, of course, the well-known menu scene.

You see, everyone brings up the menu scene, and it is important, but it's also important to point out how Stolas hid his face behind the menu because Ozzie pulled him back in his seat and didn't let him run. Yeah, Blitzo never saw the 'trying-to-run-away' part but, considering Apology Tour and the crap Stolas says in the beginning, that whole thing here is important. Seriously, Stolas may be said that he's a pacifist, but the writing obviously goes too far and makes Helluva's Stolas seem like a coward who will undoubtedly make his 'loved ones' suffer just for the sake of taking the path of least resistance. Because this Stolas only ever cares about taking the easy way out in any given crisis

Finally, when Blitzo drops Stolas off at his mansion. Stolas has the freaking sheer stupidity to try inviting Blitzo in after Blitzo's obviously in a bad mood. Again, Stolas has to be socially braindead to witness how the evening went for Blitzo and still think it's appropriate to spend time with him, especially after mentioning that Octavia's with her mom. Really, Stolas already seems socially inept to not pick up that Blitzo's struggling not to cry and at least stop trying to invite him in. God, it's annoying to recall how shocked Stolas looked when Blitzo called him out for their relations with each other because it's like, 'how is this a surprise to you? It's not like Blitzo was ever not direct about how things are'. But yeah, even when Stolas is 'kinder', he's still not considerate, what with witnessing his loved ones being bullied right in front of him and still trying to carry on like things can still be fun in the end

The cherry on top is when Blitzo is looking at the pictures in his phone. He's so much happier with Fizzarolli, Verosika, and Barbie and Tilla. Stolas, though? Blitzo may be smiling but he also looks tired. What's more, Stolas is asleep.

As in, literally the only time in the entire show that I can think of that Blitzo is smiling in Stolas's presence is when Stolas himself is asleep.

And yeah, I'm going up all the way to Apology Tour. The photo that Blitzo secretly took of himself and Stolas is literally the only time I know of where Blitzo is actually happy when Stolas is nearby and he's fucking sleeping.

Seriously, how sad is that? That the only time your partner is even remotely happy around you is when you're not talking to each other or interacting with each other in any shape or form or when you're not even awake to look at them? And again, Blitzo looks tired as he smiles so that means, even at the height of happiness that Stolas brings him, Blitzo will just be too drained to properly enjoy it

*

And that's all the interactions that Stolas and Blitzo had together in the first season, including the pilot. At least, what comes to memory, because I'm already rewatching episodes for rewrite fanfics and I don't want to do it for more than I already do.

Anyways, just by the first season and even the pilot alone, there's no grounds for even a decent relationship, let alone a good one. For the most part, Stolas keeps doing whatever the fuck he wants and Blitzo looks pissed off by all of it. In turn, Blitzo only cares about what he can get from Stolas, he never shows any interest in Stolas himself. I guess to Stolas's credit, as little as he can be given and as undeserved it might be, Stolas did try some small talk to really get to know Blitzo, even if it's extremely surface-level. (Although it's probably not good that it took seven episodes for Stolas to ever even try surface-level learning about Blitzo, given that the first season is eight episodes)

Even with just that, it's already shitty for a relationship because one party really is just being treated like a plaything by the other. And to think, season 2 manages to make everything worse... until next time, when that season's finished

[gaslightgatekeepgirlbosscombat]

Group F, Round 5

Propaganda under the cut

John Gaius, The Emperor Undying, God

Gaslight: When he resurrected his best friends he took away all their memories and gave them new names. He never reveals to them that he was the one who killed everyone on earth in the first place. He really plays up the "benevolent God" act Gatekeep: As a God, everyone is vying for his Favour and he is the one who gets to decide who gets it. He also doesnt share his knowledge of how to become immortal without killing your best friend. Girlboss: Literally made himself God. Never strayed from his ten thousand year old plan of Revenge. Rules an entire solar system and is colonizing more.

Jod is a frequent gaslight and gatekeep, however he falls more under the girlflop the girlboss. All of his plans go wrong but goddamn if he's not trying. Horrible ideas from an even worse person. Whent above gasligting and just straight up wiped his friends memories. Gatekeeping the knowledge of the universe. Had a child he didn't know about for 18 years and only found out cause she showed up dead(she's fine now(mostly)), girlboss move. Had a threesome with two of the gaslit friends, this would be less gross if he wasn't middle-aged. Gatekeeping the planets(I cannot explain this one). Ressurected humanity but also killed a lot of cows(girlboss). Put the soul of the earth in a woman and then put her in prison(but not before killing half of the amigos). Anticaptalist, bisexual, father. He has babygirl energy

Killed entirety of humanity and the whole solar system save a handful of billionaires and their victims, then resurrected the sun and a select handful of humans, wiped their memories, and established a religion in which he is god for over ten thousand years. Also an ex-tumblrina (probably) and goth twitch streamer (definitely).

Killed almost all of humanity, the sun and the solar system and then resurrected some of them deliberately without their memories and didn’t tell them that he killed them in the first place, and also told them that he was god. Renamed his friends after killing and resurrecting them. Set up imbalanced and toxic power dynamics among his inner circle that led to half of them either killing themselves or being killed by the other in each pair in order for half the group to become immortal saints, something he didn’t tell them wasn’t actually necessary to reach that sort of state. Lied to the surviving friends about why the ghosts of the planets in the solar system were hunting them, he told them they were after all of them because of the way they’d become saints which meant they could never go home, but they were actually only ever after him. Also because of this lie he was able to manipulate them into fighting the ghosts and dying in the process, saying that they would kill him which would destroy the sun, when actually they couldn’t kill him and also the ghosts were after just him so everybody would be fine if they just stopped hanging out with him (this is true in a LOT of senses actually). When he decided to get new immortal saints he specifically asked for the heirs of the houses, who were mostly younger in the 16-22 range and therefore easy to manipulate especially after killing their best friend (again, he knows that isn’t necessary and is asking it of a group of teens/young adults). When one of the people who was successful appears to have done it wrong, he pretends to be a mentor or father figure to her face (knowing that that is something extremely important to her) while having one of his surviving original friends try to kill her without her knowing he was behind that. On the girlboss front, I think he kinda thinks he’s a girlboss more than he actually is one, but he’s so good at the gaslight bit he’ll have you believing that too.

Goncharov

He spends the entire film lying to and manipulating as many people as possible to achieve his ultimate goal (Katya is an obvious example; her having enough of that is a driving force behind their breaking relationship), and also including himself (insisting that he doesn't like Andrey when they're basically about to kiss anytime they're on screen). Also Gaslight Gatekeep Goncharov amiright

[geniuscomediae]

GUESS WHAT: A FOLLOW-UP FIC FOR MY LAST ONE :)

AO3

(beware: bit angsty, whole lot gay, Michael the Distortion is less of an entity and more of a human because Michael Shelley was already too trans to be transed by the Spiral had someone to live for, I won't take any criticism on my wish to fix-it Michael's fate)

Why would Gerry object anything Gertrude proposed?

Well, not actually "proposed". Gertrude just informed him that she will take off for some time with Michael – she still didn't call him that, even though he managed to build up courage and ask her – and proceeded to disappear for almost a month, returning alone. Any questions about her assistant went unanswered regardless of the name Gerry used, and he was starting to feel sick, wondering what happened to the only person he let himself to care for in a long, long time. A streak of one night stands, wich stopped after their first date (awkward jokes, vanilla ice cream, park bench and first brief lesson of Dread Powers 101) and resumed approximately a month after Gertrude's comeback and Michael's absence, didn't bring him even remotely enough human interaction to fill the void Michael left. Well, not him. He wasn't to blame, but who was, really? As much as Gerry hated himself for this, before he on multiple occasions agreed with Gertrude that a death of one person is a good price to pay to save the world, he just didn't expect this one person to be Michael – his Michael. Michael he decided to protect and failed miserably.

Gerry was starting to regret not going off with Gertrude himself.

Days passed, then weeks, then six months since Gertrude returned, and Gerry didn't stop to feel pain thinking about Michael, but he did – and he shivered in horror every time he noticed it – make peace with him being dead. He couldn't afford such luxury as spending all his time mourning a lost loved one, he had books to burn and monsters to hunt, and besides, his migraines were getting really violent lately. He was meaning to schedule an appointment for some time but never had enough time to do it.

This morning wasn't any different from all the prior ones. Wake up, look at the sticky note with a little heart Michael left on his bedroom mirror, take a shower, get to the kitchen, stare at Michael's favorite mug for five to fifteen minutes, make some coffee, remember he left a (normal) book he was reading in the bedroom, open a door...

Remember, that his bedroom doesn't have a door.

Gerry instinctively jumped back in his flat, falling on the floor and feeling around himself for something to use for a weapon – stupid, really, what would any weapon do against... whatever he encountered here? – but nothing happened next. Well, the door slowly creaked wider open and kinda stayed like that.

Gerry wiggled further away from it, hastily getting up and grabbing a knife from the kitchen table. The butter one, with a rounded tip of the blade, but better that nothing. Nothing seemed to continue happening, until it suddenly didn't. The matter of the seemingly endless hallway on the other side of the door started to melt like a wax candle, forming first a sphere, then a humanoid figure, and finally something that resembled a human was barely standing in the doorway. Gerry cautiously approached it, fighting the urge to just trust his eyes and let himself believe in what he was seeing, and then Michael lifted his head, looking fair parts terrified and amused.

– Hi, Gerry, – he smiled, showing off more teeth than there should've been. – Did you miss me?

***

After this, supposedly still part Michael, creature fell on his floor senseless and slightly glitching instead of breathing, Gerry decided not to go to the Institute today. He wasn't needed there regardless and just preferred to spend time not used to hunt down Leitners in the archive, one on one with the mass of information stored on dusty old shelves. Finding anything of use without Michael was a slow and ungrateful process, but it kept him busy and didn't allow to think too much.

Body on his floor continued blurring on the edges and shifting ever so slightly, still looking like Michael. Gerry carefully approached it, ready to run as fast as he can ot the first sign of danger, and reached out to touch it, the closest to him part of the body being the head with familiar curls of blond hair.

"Michael" made a noise of pain, shivering and blurring even more, and tried to get back up, but failed, falling back on the floor.

– Gerry... – it managed to mutter again, reaching out with a hand too long to be human and trying to touch him. Gerry made an awful, no good, very bad decision and took its hand in his, petting its palm and trying to bite back a cry.

– Michael? – he asked, getting down on his knees and gazing into shifting mass of spiraling colors until his eyes started to feel like they were about to pop. – What..? What happened, Michael?

– That's definitely a real name, – Michael-esque creature giggled weakly, still unmoving. – And probably mine, isn't it?.. Ask your Archivist, she knows exactly what happened, what she did to me... did to me, to him, to it, to us...

– You're not making sense, Curls, – Gerry petted its – his? their? – head, feeling the previously silky-soft hair resemble glass-wool, and cotton candy, and a stream of water, all at once.

– Get used to it, I won't anymore, – it giggled again, turning on its back and looking at Gerry from under trembling lashes. – You really don't know what happened to poor Michael, do you?

– I don't, – admitted Gerry, moving its head in his lap. – Tell me, what happened to you. And wether or not you are Michael I know.

– Well, – it started, making itself comfortable, – first of all yes and no. I'm Michael. I don't like being Michael, and I don't like being whatever I am now – the Spiral, if I'm not mistaken. But also I'm not... completely Michael. Like, a little more than a half is definitely Michael, but the other less than a half is the Spiral, but also I'm both and neither... It's hard, I'm not used to talking about myself, and even less used to analysing myself... And regarding what the Archivist, Gertrude, did to us: that's quite simple actually. She has given Michael a map and sent him through the door, and told him to find the heart of this particular segment of the Spiral, and he found, and here I am... To be honest, there's been a lot of time between Michael and this Spiral part becoming me and me arriving at your doorstep, but it was mostly spent trying to figure out how I am supposed to exist now. But... yeah, that's it.

Gerry continued stroking its hair, trying to fight the anger slowly rising in his chest and the tears that started to blur his vision. Michael shifted a little closer to him, closing its eyes and smiling weakly.

– You know, – it started quietly, – when Michael Shelley was in the hallways, he was thinking about you. And while we were merging he continued to think about you, about how he loves you and misses you, and how you will take the news. And even now, when he is me and I am not human at all and shouldn't be capable of emotions, or feelings, or love at all – even now I regret I haven't told you I love you before. And I think I'm sorry for not being what you wanted me to be.

– You were everything I could ask for. You still are, if I'm being honest. I won't just give up on you because of this.

– You should still mourn Michael Shelley though, – it sighed. – Poor little boy was too soft and trusting for this world. And he's gone. And I am not him. And simultaneously I am him, I am just as much Michael Shelley as the Archivist is Gertrude Robinson and the Boneturner is Jared Hopeworth. But less than you, Bookburner, are Gerard Keay.

Gerry sighed and bowed down, pressing his forehead against Michael's and squinting.

– I missed him, – he breathed out.

– I'm sorry, – it murmured gently. – I'm sorry I'm not him.

– You're not entirely, – Gerry agreed, – but I'll still love you.