#i do draw the line at insects though

[why-rock-look-tasty-if-no-eat]

Because I don't care how or what I eat (moldy grapes/bread, paper, uncooked pasta, ants, undercooked foods, stale cereal, freezer burnt foods, pineapples, burnt foods, suspicious meat, raw potatoes, pinecone (only a bite dw), dandelions, expired foods, foods covered with sand/dirt, grass, marrow) I like to traumatize my friends and family with what I'm willing to eat. Now I get an excuse to traumatize tumblr :D

Frozen milk. Thats the weirdest thing I've had and I'm not willing to so that again. It doesn't really freeze like water so it's really similar to a slushie, but the slushie is frozen. If that makes sense.

[bigfatbimbo]

Silly request but imagine helping Bill "groom" his triangle self. Gently wipe him with a cloth. Carefully dip it in the little space between the bricks, can't leave that zone unclean! Alternatively, a classic soapy bubble bath. Silly straws included, what the hell, he's probably drinking the bath water and listing the chemical ingredients back at you while you gently rub him clean. Fun times

The Bug Collector

1.1k words,, Bill Cipher x reader

a/n — Procrastination killed my soul during this, I think it turned out okay, though! Sorry for typos, your girl is tired.

warnings — SFW, post!weirdmaggedon, as ‘fluffy’ as you can get with Bill cipher, he is his own warning, kinda toxic relationships, fluff and bill being pathetic

summary — Reader assists a recently fallen Bill Cipher in self care, despite his general all-mighty asshole-ness.

The exoskeleton of a bug was practical, a water-tight barrier most commonly known for muscle attachments, and its use to shelter and protect the insects gushy insides from its harsh environment. 

The exoskeleton of a triangle was for mostly for aesthetics, as the underneath was far more horrifying than anything in the harsh environment around it. Or so the triangle claims.

You dipped a soapy sponge into the bucket in front of you, as bill propped his feet up on the bathtub. 

“You conquer worlds and destroy planets, but yeah, why not draw the line at cleaning yourself.”

“Please, what better way to make use out of my new human pet— partner, than this?” He corrected loudly and purposefully. Then looking to the side, he mumbled, “And besides, kid, you have no idea how hard it is to clean between the bricks. Euck— So many blind spots.”

The first part was a throwaway reminder that he had far more power than you in this dynamic, something you’d picked up on Bill casually doing in his time with you. 

Being roommates with a butt-hurt demon, given the ending of weirdmaggedon, allowed you the privilege of being more cautious than previous humans were with Bill. For example, you’ve taken to keeping track of his repeated habits and patterns. 

On of which, just so happened to be reminding you how small you were compared to him. 

You jabbed the sponge in-between on of the bricks, “Ow!” He narrowed his eye at you, “Watch it, pal. I’m starting to think you’ve never cleaned a triangle before.”

“I’d hate to give that impression.” You softened your hold on him, “Delicate work, I always say.”

And it was delicate work. After his defeat, he’d been roughed up a surprising bit, powers even weakened. 

Weakened.

“Not too delicate,” he shot you glance. Guess he’d heard that thought process. 

Although, most days he’d seemed to be in a thought process of his own. Weird.

You cleared your throat, “How often does this even need to be done?”

He blinked, “Well, let’s see. Once every—“ he waved his hand around “—few hundred years. Very high maintenance, do not recommend it.”

High maintenance, yeah. At this point, Bill had taken to talking about some other topic, you hadn’t been really listening, something about intergalactic food joints.

Every once and a while he’d bring up something that happened with one of his ‘henchmaniacs’ before getting slightly irritated at the lack of presence in his life now, and changing the subject. 

Bill was interesting to study, you couldn’t lie. His eyelashes curled away from each other, like the mangled legs of a recently dead spider. His hands were very present when he talked, like most people of business. His body flicked side to side slightly at certain moments. 

You became more gentle naturally, taking care of every crevice, and for some reason Bill becomes gradually quieter.

“Something wrong?” You asked, not stopping.

Bill blinked, “Eh, been a minute since i’ve had a human servant. Maybe, I was thinking of other things you can help with!”

You sigh, “Yeah, because i’m your servant. As if.” In your mind, your thinking do the fact he was your roommate, in your house, eating your food. 

“Hey, don’t get all butt-hurt. You’re all ants to me, buddy, nothing to be ashamed of!” His eye flicked back and forth between you and the room.

Then you stop scrubbing, “Bill, I might as well be your landlord.” You know he can read your thoughts, so you make a point to justify yourself. Already weakened from his failed apocalypse, anything other than vague respect for you would land him homeless. Most likely, his response to this would be killing you, but there’s only so much he can do afterwards. 

He’d have a place to stay, but with no electricity or heating, and in his damaged physical form he actively does need those things. And trying to get a new human would be a hassle, and unlike you, no guarantee they’d let him stay there without calling the authorities.

“Yeesh,” Bill remarks, “Buzzkill… You are still a bug compared to me, though—“

You drop the sponge in the bucket, “I think you’re done.”

He looks taken aback when you pull away, “What? Come on, over the bug comment? Jeez, buddy—“

“No I mean you’re actually done,” you gesture to his body, now shining and slick with soap suds. “I got everything, there’s nothing else to do.”

You go to turn around before you feel a small hand grabbing for the back of your shirt. 

“Wait, wait!” He breathes, eye farting from side to side, “… You have to dry me off first.”

He looked slightly panicked, like if you stopped taking care of him now, you’d leave and never come back. Your thought process earlier couldn’t have helped. 

The way he scurried and gasped for you was reminiscent of panicked earwig and a rock is lifted up. The comparison should have grossed you out, but it kinda just made you feel a little bad.

If he was paying attention to your thoughts, he didn’t show it. This would have usually given you the impression he’d wanted you to be thinking the way you were, but he seemed a little wrapped up in his own head. 

“Come on, kid. Don’t tell me you’re gonna kick me out because I asked you to dry me off. One last thing and then you don’t even have to talk to me the rest of the night! Sounds like a good deal, right?” 

His slightly desperate looking sales pitch was met with a sigh, you picked up a dry towel and began to pat the soap suds off of him. His body slowly breathed in, making it look like he was sighing, but no noise came out.

You wondered then if he was actually touch-starved, but cut your thoughts there because this time he had nothing better to do then pay attention to what you were thinking. 

“Ouch, i’m not that desperate, pal.” But he was.

His exoskeleton was dry, but you didn’t stop patting him down. His eyelid shut slowly, and the spider-legs on them curled into each other once more. 

The exoskeleton of a bug was practical, but one of a triangle seemed to simply be for aesthetics. 

However, on some rare occasions, it possesses the same desire for love as human bodies. Only, when very desperate, of course. 

[1864reruns]

ㅤㅤㅤgratefulness (i'm sorry, can this be over now?)ㅤ౨ৎㅤ12.9k

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ2024 ©1864RERUNS

oneㅤ/ㅤtwo synopsis. luffy loves you— you know this with how abundantly clear love is in every ministration of his outstretched hand and a grin— yet your traitorous heart demands more, even though you're in no place to give him your loyalty. you know this so you do not demand his love nor to be saved, even when met with a relentlessly stretched hand.

warning(s). gn! reader, hanahaki disease, but some creatively liberated variation of it, angst, hurt/some comfort, slow burn, but does it really count if nothing happens?, unrequited love, pining and the works, background character death, blood, violent imagery, vague allusion to an unspecified mental disorder that involves eating habits (pls be careful!!!), luffy tries his best to be kind but it's cruel, reader spirals 🙏; minimal editing and proofreading (these are basically my thoughts raw and unadulterated)

from vyon. the card game they play is a vietnamese one also known as smth like thirteen in english and has too many rules to explain but it doesn't really matter :3 i was a beast at that game though i fear; this fanfic has been in my drafts for so long, it also grew into too big of a project than it was meant to be. i also had to split this up into two parts, it was getting too long, i'm sorry ＞︿＜

do not repost / copy / translate.

Once you know Monkey D. Luffy, you'll know his heart not a few minutes after. He's welded the unmoving, burning ingot to his bicep, always on display due to his amassing collection of armless vests; rubber skin melted around the golden gem, oozing past the lines of his beating heart to staple it there, an anomaly on the expanse of skin not otherwise susceptible to bullets or cannons. Your captain is a man that lives with his heart on his tongue, always ready to dictate the lay of your next move with an irregular beat that drums against the skinned men of war and an impulsivity that makes his crew scramble after him exasperatedly; oxygen taken from his cerebral arteries to his brain are stained in the grease and oil that stick to the meat he handles so carelessly. In the same endearing way, he's careless with his heart, allows for the small stuff to momentarily prick his heart, for judgement to cloud into anger before it picks up on the bitter taste of agony.

It's always easy to get a frown onto Luffy's face. Feign disinterest in his stories; make yourself too busy to help him look for strange insects; force him to shower, scold him after he does something he wasn't meant to; keep him away from something he seems interested in; starve him for more than five minutes— he makes it all exceptionally too easy. You're not audacious enough to claim to know Luffy any more than the Strawhats, especially not those that he had met in East Blue; you try not to let it bother you that they managed to meet a younger Luffy who had so many holes in his defence, whose smile threatened through skin more, who had yet to find scars in his palm from how hard he had to clench his fists.

To you, it seems unfair that Luffy had managed to uncover so many of your firsts. His unwavering presence by your side as you learnt how hard it was to live on sea, the intonations of your screaming when a marine canon was pointed at you, to live so freely away from the confines of restrictive justice, how it felt to have a hand in yours to promise forever and then some. Luffy has no preferential treatment when it comes to people he loves; he treats them all the same, no hierarchy could dream to disrupt that.

With the same sandals he uses to stomp on the faces of Marine's, he could demand food from Sanji, money from Nami, Zoro to play with him— instead, you watch him whine Sanji, food and dissolve into a puddle when his cook orders him to wait, he allows Nami's fists to fall onto his head when he makes any financially impulsive decision (or even thinks them), and he idles himself with drawing on Zoro's face with Usopp and Chopper, with the previous two of them taking the psychical brunt of their consequences. (Chopper is let off with a mere promise that he won't join in with their shenanigans again when it involves making Zoro into a fool and a growing bump underneath his hat.)

Luffy, from second to fourth gear, is tender aggression when it is love.

His form is bizarrely respectful when the door opens and light dawns upon your face; you see him through the gaps of Nami and Sanji's legs and towering forms over him, his hands on his thighs and feet tucked underneath his bottom. He slurs out an I'm sorry that lets you know that his face is definitely messed up and then follows up with an I was hungry though!

Then Nami messes him up some more for his shitty justification.

She leaves him— some caricature of her anger— on the floor with her hands on her hips and Sanji trailing after her with hearts in his eyes at her dominant display of power. As she passes Brook, he asks for the colour of her underwear and earns himself the same treatment. It's then that you laugh. Luffy snapped his head up, following after the trembling air of your laughter and then calls out your name, the syllables are all messy around his swollen cheeks and a missing tooth that will come back after a few minutes but you cannot rid yourself of the thought that it's sticky with love that you only remember hearing when you were just a babe, screaming and crying in the arms of a tired and ill mother in a hospital. You were introduced to a group of midwives with same love you hear now, their idle finger catching into both your small hands; Luffy's hand dances across the air, breaking apart your laugh with urgency and catching onto your wrist.

You're not sure if it's you who had been pulled to him or if he'd managed to catapult himself into you but you both end up a mess on the floor regardless. Limbs tangled around each other in a wave as you both fall to the deck, Luffy does not correct the length of his arm and takes to wrapping the limb around you like a vine snaked around the trunk of a tree. You don't know a start nor an end as Luffy nuzzles his beat–up face on your shoulder. "Hey captain," you raise your head to look down on him, trying to wrench a hand through the tight spirals he's coiled around you.

"I'm hungry," he whines in lieu of a response, "and I'm bored, Usopp kicked me out after I ate one of his ketchup stars." He doesn't relent with his hold on you, simply loosening the coil that you're trying to work your hand through before tightening again once your arm makes it past to trap it against your side. You don't question the fact that Usopp's ketchup stars may be laced with gunpowder or what the small dose of gunpowder may have done to Luffy's internal organs.

You guess even Usopp has his limits when it comes to his childish captain. "I can't do a lot about either of those things if you're keeping me hostage here." He looks up at you, his exaggeratedly large lips in a pout that matches the swelling of his cheeks and then says your name again, like you’ve done him wrong. It's a disordered collection of the letters again but you find you can't really do anything to fight against it. Instead, green tendrils sprout from your trapped arm, each vine wrapped in a light of leaves and strain against his extended limb before he gives in and, instead, laughs as he wraps his rubber arm around the spindly, twisted branches splitting open layers of skin on your bicep. His skin coloured against the green runner keeps the bine from wilting down to meet gravity.

You let Luffy do whatever he wants, with an expression that you're not sure you're too familiar with etched out on the lines of your face. Thinking back on it, you could've simply done as Nami had or Usopp, ignore or scold him enough into submission but his fingers catch one of the fronds and it curls between the meat of his fingertips, reaching out to tickle his palm and something soft blooms inside you. You know it must be you, not the work of your devil fruit, because as much as you've tried in your lacklustre pursuit of beauty, you've never been able to sprout any kind of flowers.

When Luffy finally lets you go, you find your way into the kitchen and give Sanji a smile. You apologise for interrupting him and tell him that you know that lunch had been served only an hour ago but, if he wasn't too busy, you were still a little peckish. Sanji shoots up immediately and asks you what you've got a taste for— you assure him any leftovers from lunch will do and he tells you, though this doesn't come as any surprise, that Luffy had worked his way through any grain of leftovers with a laugh. You laugh along with him and well, you seemed to be craving meat right now.

The plate he prepares seem to be more about quality rather than quantity, with sauce underneath the red meat drizzled across the white ceramic, a slab of meat already cut into bite sized pieces for you and a decorative herb stuck between the fatty slices but when the light oozes down into the stretch of meat, you don't think Luffy will complain too much.

You, of course, were right about that.

The shattering grin he greets you (the plate of meat, however small it seemed) with gives you the faint smell of sticky rain drenched in the light of the sun, and you almost give him your hand when he reaches out for the plate. Brook's guitar strums in the background and your heart shakes in time with his strings and Luffy's incessant chewing.

You've really no problems with Usopp asking you to help him with target practice, it's fairly common for you to help the crew with their unique fighting style— save Nami and Franky for fear of losing your life with their less than particular aimed area of damage— it's easy enough really. You don't even have to be mentally present for it; shaking through layers of flesh, vines grow across the deck of the Sunny and rise up straight to tower over Usopp as he fixes his goggles over his eyes. You keep a quarter of your mind instilled in every chloroplast that shivers across the skies so you can keep them moving but the other three quarters are focused on the card game you play with Robin, Chopper, and Franky.

You hear the snapping of elastic and your finger twitches against the back of playing cards as the particular vine shot to the left, glancing curiously at Chopper's hand across from you when he turned to Franky and accuses him of looking at his cards.

"It's not my fault!" Franky frowned, fixing his comedically small glasses to perch on his metal nose. "Your cards just happen to be in my view when I'm looking at the pile 'cause you're tiny!"

Chopper takes to this horribly (you reshape a vine that has fallen to one of Usopp's stones and keep it relentless across the wave of air) and he grows into the much less cute and broader, more human version of himself to hold his hand out of Franky's view. (Two vines snap together and they take the path to slice through air to where Usopp stands, you hear the cracking of wood as Usopp shouts at you, saying he only wanted to focus on offence. An apology is drawn out with the green arm in the air.)

"Ivy," your eyes flicker to Robin and she gestures to the pile of discarded where the two of spades had been placed on top. "It's your turn." You glance down at your hand, eyes flickering over the collection of 7's in your hand. 

"Bomb." (You feel a vine break apart into pieces, think about the fact that it's lucky you've no nerves attached to the tendrils, and keep the one down to give Usopp a little win.) Franky curses your name as Robin chuckles.

Chopper glances at the four 7's with a sense of wonderment that you're sure is too dramatic for the moment. "No wonder I had no sevens!" You give him a sly grin and watch Robin pass her turn, ignoring Franky's levelled glare behind his glasses.

In the end, Robin wins anyways, ridding herself of her hand with her final card being the two of hearts. The loss is taken bitterly by both you and Franky though you think Franky definitely takes it worse than you do as when he stands to sulk away, cards fall out of his speedos, and they leave a trail after him. Robin, in all her morbidity, laughs behind a hand as you and Chopper drop your jaws in disgust.

Chopper collects the cards, hesitating with the ones that had been on Franky until Robin points out that you've all played many rounds and there's a chance that all of them had shared the same fate. (Another vine shutters down to the floor, broken apart and particles flown across the deck.) The cards slowly fall to the floor as Chopper cries out in disgust. Shaking your head with some colourful amusement, you use the two vines fallen to pick up the cards and start shuffling them.

Responding to Chopper's call, Luffy shoots his way from Sunny's figurehead. "What're you guys doin'?" He falls graciously to where Franky had previously been sitting; his eyes are ever so impatient to glance over the cards being shuffled. "Oh," he says with great interest, "are you guys playing 'go fish'?" He leaned towards you— the cards in your possession, actually— and blinks at the shuffling. "Lemme in!"

"We weren't playing 'go fish', Luffy." The little doctor has since calmed down, taking a seat between Luffy and Robin and shaking his head. "We were playing—" he turns his head up to Robin, to which she supplies 'bài tiến lên' with the intricate accents and all, "that!"

A flash of thinking places itself on Luffy's face, crossing his arm and tapping the side of his sandals on the deck, then it's gone. "Let's just play 'go fish' then."

Chopper whines, saying that 'go fish' is boring and that Luffy always snatches more than one card from other people's hands, which is cheating, and that he doesn't want to play.

Luffy turns to you with a pout, eyebrows furrowed at the dip where his nose bridge starts and then straightened out towards the end. The two vines that had been expertly dodging all of Usopp's shots and taunting him by doing silly dances and twisting into words in the air both crumple down to the floor at the same time, they follow the curve of your spine as you double over, a breath stuttering in your throat. You hear Usopp call your name and the deck of cards slip out from the vines that had been shuffling this entire time, your hand wraps around your throat and you hack out a cough you've managed to choke on.

"Are you dying?" Chopper shoots up, frantic as you keep coughing and choking— both violent in temperament, and scampers around, shouting for a doctor.

Footsteps tap closer as a shadow forms over you, Usopp's hand patting your back ferociously comes after the sound of shoes stop.

The blur that came with tears invading your eyes gives you the confidence to look at Luffy again before you're calling Chopper to a stop. "I'm fine, just choked on air."

You don't mention how it felt like you were breathing through a cheesecloth, how your lungs feel so restricted with every inhale as you all compromise on 'chase the ace' and how easier it feels when Usopp pushes his way between you and Luffy, too intimidated to pick from Robin's hand; when you all finish up for dinner, Robin is looking at you in a way that makes you think she's caught onto how you've been struggling.

Dinner is a strange ordeal. It's characterised with its usual events: Luffy sneaking his hands into people's plates though his stands full, Usopp trying to hold his plate out of his way, Zoro tending to his glass bottle of beer, Sanji making some quip about Zoro's show of alcoholism, Nami getting increasingly annoyed by the noise around her, Brook's laughter, Zoro escalating the situation with Sanji, Chopper screaming when Luffy clears Usopp's plate and then goes for the doctor's, Robin watching the scene with the patience of a saint, Franky pretending he was better than the rest, Usopp exacting revenge on Luffy by swapping their plates. It all ends with Nami telling them all to shut up and Luffy taking one final chicken leg from Zoro's plate. You stare down at your plate and count the missing bits, Luffy hasn't really touched any of the potatoes or asparagus, so you finish them up.

Two chicken thighs sit in stark contrast to the plate, thinking about having them anywhere near your mouth makes you a little sick for some reason, the weight of them in your stomach, the taste of caramelised skins, crisped with wells of juice sat next to a tinge of burnt flesh; you push the plate over to Luffy and detest the way he can take the colour of well–done oranges between his teeth and not care about the juice dribbling down his chin.

Luffy says thanks with his mouth full of chicken; Nami glares at him and turns a more concerned face to you (that also makes you sick) and inquires about you not eating. You mumble out some excuse about not being hungry, not feeling well, having a little bit of a headache, feeling tired— something along those faux lines, you don't remember but you remember that you don't tell them the truth exactly. "Sorry Sanji," you fix into your shitty excuse after, running a hand through your hair, to make yourself feel better about the entire ordeal.

He offers to make you a more palatable porridge or soup instead.

You take a cigarette and a red apple, going to bed hungry and angry at some unknown thing that brews on the tip of your tongue.

The next island is of great interest to Luffy.

The entire crew knows that its history nor culture was not either reason behind his excitement, only the mere prospect of digging his sandals into new, uncharted land is why he's running around the deck, filling up the empty spaces with bubbling laughter. Sanji finishes up bentos for those that are leaving, taking unnecessary extra care with Nami’s, and wishing he had it in him to starve Zoro whilst Nami is giving everyone an allowance. You take two bentos, yours and Chopper's, and head out onto the deck. Luffy only seemed momentarily sad that you were going with the doctor but bounced back immediately after when the trees come closer enough to intimidate so you push down the offer to join him instead. Franky joins up with Usopp, Luffy'll run off alone regardless of who he ends up going with, Nami ends up going with Zoro (to Sanji's displeasure), and you and Chopper make plans to find a pharmacy and a library for Robin.

Being around Chopper is easy enough with this unsettling prick of poison that's forced minimal responses, curt words, a flurry of tiredness, a sickening chill through your days recently. The little doctor is a lot more mindful of changes in mood, it's not any imminent injury either so he doesn't press to know why. Out of guilt (for being a brooding asshole lately), you ask him about his rumble balls and all his different forms. He answers cheerily and you can only pick out every other word with a persistent headache as the smell in the air changes from salty skies and bloody fish to sweetened foods and something unfamiliarly clean.

It's a bright island. You hear a faint bell in the distance that is traced over with the sound of children and stall owners; Chopper's hooves rhythmically sound beside you on the pavement and you find yourself counting them in groups of four. "Ah, there." You pick up your head and turn to follow the direction of Chopper's eyes. A sign is hung on the side of the building, the library. "Robin wanted a book of North Blue diseases for some reason," Chopper mumbles to himself as you two push open the door.

It's a small bookstore, walls lined with books and the paths carved with more standalone bookcases. "North Blue diseases?" You repeat, confused, "do they have North Blue exclusive illnesses?"

Your question goes unanswered, though it looks like it opens a vault of new questions for Chopper. Books aren't of great interests to you, so you follow behind Chopper as he walks through each section and grab whichever book he tells you to bring down for him. On the way back, you tell Chopper to keep going and change your course in search of something you're not too sure of.

You stray away from the town centre and head deeper through the small alleys of the town, there's no destination in mind; without the urgency of a fights and with the domesticity of a small knit community, you wander adrift. There's a dampness in the air to the walk around a shadowed hide of the place that loosens up the tension below your ribs, many different eyes follow after your form as the heel of your shoes click against a null path; shadows ooze around the soles of your shoe and lacquer up between the carved maze of black rubber of your soles until you find your way into a dead end.

It's a little bit of a cliché to be met with a ragtag group of delinquents when you turn to go back. Your eyes trace over them. In the hand of the one closest to you sits your wanted poster.

Something blooms inside you again— it's a much more pleasant feeling than the unmoving sap of ire that's been invading lately. Each man before you is physically bigger, towering over you ominously and shadows eating you but they all have swords and guns in their hands and that's why they lose. You, to the detriment of all life around you, are a weapon in and of itself; you choke out the vitality from others and steal their nutrients. They strained against their confines as their skin blossoms through shades of blooms, you are not the merciful rubber of a human, so your constraints don't relent, they squeeze and squeeze until the bark splits apart, until blood is cut off at the source, until they wither, until you are full.

On the way back, you buy a gift for everyone with the money you hadn't used and when they take to it, all in their varying degrees of joy, you feel less bad about the dead end alley full of brothers and sons. You tell yourself, handing Zoro a gift of alcohol, if not them, then it'd have been you.

You end up staying anchored to the island for a week to your displeasure. The longer you're stuck there, the closer you are to exploding; you always keep an eye out on the log pose strapped to Nami's wrist like you could quicken the process if you stare enough. Usopp starts avoiding you out of fear you'll blow like a poorly constructed cannon, Zoro makes you train with him to see if it'll help blow off some steam, Sanji brings you iced drinks at a rate that keeps you dizzy but you always feed it to Luffy or redirect it to Chopper's or Usopp's office with a little note.

On the third day, you follow in Zoro's example and sprawl out on the deck to rest your tireless mind. You've always wondered how sleep was ever a possible option for him when the feet thundering across the deck came with obstructive vibrations, no doubt slapping any chance of sleep away from his mind, but you find that it's almost pleasant. Beats all from familiar loves translates through the groves of wooden planks and etch through the back of your spine, you feel a bone fall back into place after Nami's heels against the floor and the thunderous kick that lands where Zoro was standing manages to work its way up your head to ease a headache.

The sun burns cries into your eyes and the skies move fluidly, they don't ripple as clouds shrivel against a light blue you're unfamiliar with; even as you close your eyes, you continue to feel the burn of the sun. The slapping of weaved straw against a sticky, sweaty sole then the deck comes as you slip into sleep.

Dreams have never been so amicable enough to become a recurrent in your life; more often than not, you're shown memories all blended together into a mess that leaves you sick, the abhorrent now and the nostalgic then bleeding past their confines until you see your mother stood next to that deceitful Marine admiral, both with that same look in their face. You wake up with a start when a loud bang scours its way through a flurry images you're unfamiliar with and then your body escapes you. Your head weighs with the heaviness of the bodies dropped to the floor, arms cold as if dipped into the river Styx, bones locked in place with a restrictive pain, muscles burning, aware of every breath that shivers through your suddenly odd body.

"Owww," three Luffys blur around each other as you pushed a hand to the floor to straighten up, you try blinking away the other two, but they're glued to the captain reflecting in your eyes; he looks down at what he's tripped on and follows it back to you. Your hand is met with something curved in shape when you go to push yourself up and when you look down, you see vines underneath you. You realise then that a burst of them had grown beneath you, splitting through the lawn deck and uplifting some of the planks underneath the greenery and inching upwards towards the guard rails of the ship. They take the form of something you think you met in your most recent sleep.

Luffy has managed to crawl his way towards you in the time you spend wondering why your devil fruit had been acting up— in your sleep no less and he wraps a hand around your ankle to get your attention. "Hey, you're really cold." He pointed out, eyes flickering down to the flesh between his fingers and then trailing his fingers up your thigh as he shifts closer to you on his knees.

The touch makes you violent and tender. "Really?" You managed to puff out, giving too much air back to the world with how much you're panting, "I feel a little warm though."

Luffy hums, clapping his hand over your cheeks with gentleness he only shows to those he loves, and it feels wrong. You get an itch underneath your skin that urges you to move, move, move but you can only push Luffy away with a ferocity he'd never shown you as you tremble under the bursting of violent air hacking up your throat, your shoulders strain as you wrapped your arms around your stomach, trying to heave out something that wasn't there.

Luffy scrambles back immediately, not caring for you shoving him away, and soothes away the rattling of your core with his clammy hands on your arm. "Are you sick?"

No, you think as a retch comes up your mouth; maybe, you correct as the path is marked by drool slipping down your chin and tears streaking across your cheeks. You shake away Luffy again. He's less submissive this time, his legs open over yours to plant his knees by your thighs. You hear him call for Chopper and it's obvious he has something of a frown marked on his face; you keep burning beneath your skin, but Luffy keeps rubbing his palms over your arms like you're cold.

You realise what your vines had drawn underneath you when Chopper comes out, fretting over you as he takes Luffy's place close to you. A grave. The image makes you laugh as the reindeer instructs his captain to haul you up after you'd ignored his inquires on if you could walk; your arm bends around the shape of Luffy's shoulder and your laughter erratically convulses into a collection of coughs from the skin on skin high.

You forced into bed rest after Chopper does a preliminary round of tests on you and declares you've simply gone down with a cold. You take to the diagnosis apprehensively, though in Chopper's defence, how was he meant to accurately diagnose you if you don't tell him all your symptoms? Instead, you sit in his office and spend the minutes, all alone, trying to retch out the feeling of having a piece of hair down your throat; you claw at the blanket and keep hacking until you've got a blanket full of tears and spit. The feeling does not pass.

At lunch, you get a visit from Franky who comes by to complain that you've made unnecessary work for him. "—seriously, how did you manage that in your sleep? Were you having a nightmare?" He ranted, legs crossed and leaned back in the visitor chair in a way that pushes his skinny, hairy legs close to your face.

Scrunching up your face, you sit up. "It was the future." You rebut, in between all his fantastical stories of his nightmares and talking about how he'd never attack Sunny even if Chopper grew a mechanical, giant arm and overthrew Luffy to become their captain. "A future," you correct yourself before turning to Franky with eyes judgemental, "are you scared of Chopper?"

"You weren't there at Enies Lobby," he tells you, which serves as a cruel reminder of sorts. You think about all the scars you've seen littered on the crew's skin and wonder which ones they've collected while they were with Luffy and who knows of which. The faint, protruding marks underneath Nami's tattoo, the stitches around Zoro's ankles, the ones pulled across his chest; you wonder if Sanji's got one hidden underneath his bangs. "The future?" Franky repeats after a moment, "are you a prophet?"

"It's a working theory," you brush off instead. "Though I can see in my mind's eye that Luffy is currently eating all the food and you’ll be left to starve if you don't go back."

Franky scrambled up from the seat not a second after your words.

With him gone, you settle back onto the bed and wonder about too many things to recall.

Between the hours after lunch and before dinner, Luffy comes by. He settles himself on the bed and forces you up as well, the shifting causes another cough to burgeon in your throat and you turn your head the other way to spit it out in an uncontrolled group of four. "You're not feeling better?" He frowns.

You see now that he's holding two pieces of barbequed meat in his hand, he's got the bone in his palm as he holds it upright like a sword, juices from the flesh dripping down to his hand and the smell gives you a headache. "Do you want this?" You move your eyes to Luffy, he's got his eyebrows furrowed together and his lips straightened out in a line when you don't answer. "Both?" He looks over at you, then the meat, and then you. "You," he swallows, "you can have them," his knuckles turn red around the bone, "since you need energy and you're sick." You think he's trying to convince himself to give them up.

You reached out and watch Luffy's face turn sour as his expression squeezes altogether around a midpoint trapped in his nose; you retract your hand and watch his face relax and his body unwind, you think he's moved his hand back a little. You repeat it again a few more times until laughter comes up and dislodges the uncomfortable feel of hair set deep in your throat. "It's fine, Luffy, you can have 'em."

"Really?"

"Mhm, go for it."

He moans around a bite of meat, crying your name as he chews and says thank you. The feeling is back as soon as it left.

No one comes to visit after that. Chopper comes by before he heads off to bed to make sure you're all set for the night and tells you that he expects to be woken up if you feel any symptoms get worse. You agree to his conditions, though can barely make yourself seem like you were taking him seriously with his cute face scolding you, but it seemed to work well enough as he's gone after he leaves a cup of water by your side. Sleep lingers around the corner, shirking away from your twitching fingertips and restless eyes; you give up after a few minutes, thinking about Robin who'd been thrown on watch tonight.

After going back and forth on the details, you bundle up yourself in the blanket (not wanting to have to mimic any semblance of serious guilt to get through Chopper's less than intimidating scolding if you get any sicker in the morning) and wander to the deck. The darkness of the sea would be safe for you, twisting around every limb extended to grope your way through your chosen path and oozing out from strands of hair to empty at your feet if not for the lamp of the moon ahead of you. Its light a forecast of tragedy, reflecting off a blade that would drive through the blood of a man who faced an unlikely love with only disgust and betrayal. "Robin?" The light hangs onto your word with a vehemence to uncover your unjustifiable deeds.

"Ivy," a shudder of surprise rattles your head to duck to your shoulders as you turn around. "Sorry, did I scare you?"

You give Robin a frown, tugging your lips down. "Yeah, my weakened bones nearly fell to the floor." She huffs a laugh. "Please announce yourself before you appear." Robin traces over your palish face and your features soften into a smile when your eyes meet.

"Can't sleep?" She asks once you two settle at the side of the Sunny where you'd napped earlier today, some of your vines still wedged between planks and parts of the floor haphazardly missing. You lean your back against the side of the ship and lower your eyes to the floor.

It's a total void, welcoming you back home. "No," you answer, a little breathless. The moon doesn't shuttle into the hole of the deck and something reaches a hand out for you between the atoms of a black hole. Roots twist out, easing close to your feet and sinking beneath the soles of your shoes. "I napped a little earlier." It's safe.

Robin hummed— I know rattles through her hum— and her elbow falls onto the guard rail of the ship. For the next few moments, you regret coming out. Robin's always been more receptive to the details and fine lines; it's not surprising that she can nitpick through a flurry of fronts and covers to the feelings you want to hide. They beckon out to her, wanting to fill that hole that's grown smaller with every day she wakes up to the open seas and the lively sound of her crew. "Chopper said you were sick?"

"A cold," you sniffle, bringing the blanket closer to you. Finding some semblance of confidence inside you, your eyes flicker over to Robin but she isn't looking at you— only turns when she feels your gaze levelled on her. You hesitate, searching for something to say and land on extending an arm and opening the blanket to invite her into your bundle. "You cold?"

She laughs, "it's fine, you should go back in if you've got a cold though." Her head tilted with a smile, "it'll be bad if the night air makes you worse."

Not wanting to find yourself softened in moonlight nor her eyes, you nod and bid her a goodnight before shivering your way back into your room. The door opens and light from Sunny's hallway is swallowed into the darkness of your room before it's banished out with the slam of your door, you shuffle around odd things thrown on the floor and slip into bed.

Your sleep is broken through with intervals with coughing, curling into yourself, shivering still though you burn in the night like a sibling of a star. When you wake up, sometime in the afternoon, you're heaving and reaching out your arms all around your duvet to haul together the skin that feels like it's melted down. Your palms prick against the leaves of vines that have overtaken your room, they fluoresce around your body and branch outwards to all corners of your room. The mess all blur together as your brain thrashes in your head with every splutter, you shake and twitch, trying to make sense of anything. Skin burned raw as you attempt to kick away the shrubbery that's keeping the blanket contorted around your body.

Your throat skinned and crude with its imminent thoughts of water.

A hand reached back blindly to grope at your bedside table for the cup that Chopper left for you last night. What you find instead is the burning touch of the sun, it seeps through the micro wounds stabbed through lines of your fortune and inflames every nerve straight to your heart. Your hand snaps back towards your body, the bones shivering from the imminent heat. Your entire body twitches at different paces, an invasive and hungry need drowns your senses. You need water, you need not for this to happen, water, you need for your sleep to be calm, you need to stop burning, you want to stop losing control, water first. You want water. Water— you turn your head to find the water, you need— Luffy?

Luffy is sat on a chair that you don't remember being there and when you look a little closer, you see that your vines had granted him a throne to comfortably lay on, other than that, they avoid him like the near plague. His body is leaned forward, his chest laid against the side of your mattress and arms crossed on your bed to sleep on like a pillow. You retch up some acid and, like the bowed head of a priest, a gentle petal disrupts the stream, flowing against the tide. It's a beautiful purple colour that's light against the transition to white towards the middle and an eye-catching yellow streaking against the white; lines of a deeper hue stretch through the petal and it's oddly reminiscent of veins.

The petal sits on the puddle of stomach acid that warms your thighs, your head bowed down to stare at it; you feel your soul unfurl at the sight of it, branches stretched outwards over a riverside, the heavy head of buds pulling weighted branches down to drink from the stream. Everything else blurs with a ripple, the petal is withstanding no matter no much you try blinking away an oncoming headache. The river near dries up in your attempt to wash down this unnerving disgust; you hunger for more.

Little changes when you find out what this 'cold' truly was. The lighting in Sunny's library is several shades warmer than the light of the sun, it draws upon the hunched shoulders down to your back as you tilt your head to hear the bones crack under your ear. Four syllables, that's all your death is. A lot of words are four syllables. Anonymous; unfortunate; hilarious; adventurous; hanahaki. It doesn't mean a lot by itself, so you try giving it some context. You pretend to tell Chopper that you're dying, you have hanahaki and that it's something he can't cure in a way you'll accept and you still feel nothing. You think about Chopper's face. He adamantly tells you that he'll cure you, he'll do it. The you in your imagination tells him no. Faced with your refusal, Chopper cannot do anything. In the end, it is a grave that cures you.

Death, as it stands, was something you had accepted when you stepped onto a pirate ship. Even someone with as stubborn a character as Zoro could be welcomed in by death, even Luffy. For a while, you wonder about death. The air in the room pauses as if to grace you with the silence to ponder on it, all you hear is the sound of your own breathing.

The closest thing to death comes searching for you a few minutes later.

You've always been interested in Brook. A skeleton with nothing but a sword; he has no lungs yet still sings, no heart and still smiles, dead but human in all his actions and behaviours. "There you are." He sneaks up behind you, bones falling onto your shoulder as you think, he smiles down at you. "Luffy asked if I’d seen you earlier.” He looms over you for a moment before he's straightening back up and calling out loudly, "but I'm a skeleton so it's not like I have eyes to see anyone anyways!"

It's the two syllables 'Lu–ffy' that shakes you the most. You stifle a cough in your chest and feel it tear through your ribs instead, searching for a path out. "For what?" The breaths rattle in your chest and shudder through your words.

"He wanted to show you a beetle." He takes the seat next to you, peering down at the picture book that you have open. You wait for him to make a comment about seeing what you were reading before disregarding it all with a lack of eyeballs so he wasn't seeing it really but he doesn't say anything, so you're forced to talk instead.

"Brook."

"Yes?"

It takes a single breath to prepare you to say this, it's warm and evident that you've not yet truly succumbed to your illness. "Do you see yourself as dead?"

Death is the art of those who do not live. It's something that keeps people tethered to the moment; it's the one thing that keeps humans humane. It's evidence you've lived, no matter how full nor how long. She's beautiful in her own right.

"I cannot see myself as anything because I am a skeleton with no eyes!"

Brook does not get to elaborate because Luffy shuttles in moments later, whispering loudly. (He'd learned somewhere that you're meant to be quiet in a library when he was younger but his whispers still manage to shake the room somehow.) "You're here! I found a beetle to show you!" He tip–toes to your side, "what're you reading— oh, hi Brook! The flowers here are pretty!" He points a finger down to a sunflower; his index covers an entire petal and he strokes it upwards to the middle. "Do you think they're edible?"

He turns to you with a smile.

You meet him with the same, "their seeds are." He gasps and picks up the book to scour through the letters in search of a name of these seeds. You take in a shuddering breath and when you feel another urge to cough, you cannot stop it.

When vines splatter around the room, they uproot the place; they've always been disruptive in this way. A wave of them washes various bouts of furniture to the floor, through the pounding of your ears, you hear the sound of books thudding as green appendages snake through bookcases and rattle them at the base; Brook's chair collapses as a vine chokes out one of its legs into splinters, the world blurs into a hue of greens and purples. A hand reaches from down in your throat, you heave around gaps of allowance for air and gag, cough, retch up more acid and some tea that Sanji brewed earlier this morning in lieu of breakfast. It's unpleasant. It's ugly in a way death should not be, though you guess the dead don't get to choose how to live in the same way the living cannot choose their death.

You're hauled off to Chopper again.

Chopper's voice comes as the hollow sounds of keys on an old piano. He does another round of tests on you— this set lasts a little longer than the previous and he takes extra caution with some. He finds that your heart is a little faster than it should be, he nitpicks at the bluish tint around your fingers and notes the concerning amount of weight you've lost in the past few weeks. When he asks you, what's wrong, you tell him that that's what he should be telling you.

Hypoxia; another four syllables for your cause of death. "Some of the symptoms are there," Chopper frowns, mumbling to himself. "It's when your tissues aren't getting enough oxygen, do you have difficulty breathing?"

You placed your cheek into your palm, elbow on Chopper's desk. "You're a pretty good doctor, Chopper."

The effect is immediate, he starts blushing and kicking his legs in his seat, a hoof goes to rub at the back of his head and nervous laughter comes from him. "That isn't distracting me at all, you bastard." You smiled and watched the compliment break any semblance of professionalism in him.

He gets back on track a little while later, placing a stethoscope on your chest and asking you to cough. You're not sure exactly what he's looking for but you give a soft cough into your elbow and you can say for certain— just based off the way he jumps back and looks at you a little quietly for a second, it's nothing good. Chopper spends a few minutes looking at your fingertips, then your lips, then some other parts of skin already exposed and humming to himself, troubled.

For now, he says, he wants you to try not to exert yourself— maybe leave fighting to everyone else and focus on resting until he can figure out a better way to confidently diagnose you. His lips are pulled into a frown, hands in his lap and trying his best to be professional and keep his emotions at bay. Before you know it, your hand is on top of his pink hat and fondly rubbing over the material softly. "Thanks Chopper, I'll keep that in mind."

He nods. You hesitate for a second before you're getting up to leave so that everyone else can see that you're not dying— or maybe you should tell them you are, you're not sure you could take another session of Franky accusing you of destroying the Sunny to create more work for him.

Your hand wraps around the doorknob and twists, stopping when Chopper speaks again. "You're not hiding something from me," he accuses gently, "are you?"

Your hand tightens around the doorknob. A flash of that imaginary Chopper comes back to you— heartbroken and confused at your refusal to be cured— you steal an unnecessarily large breath from the world. "I get sudden cravings for sweet things if that means anything."

Chopper, unbeknownst to you, takes those words and carves them true and raw into himself. His eyes are unwilling to leave you for more than necessary during the times you eat together, he watches you push aside the food on your plate, tearing small bits of meat off the bone to chew on it for a couple minutes too long before swallowing. He makes note of the way you have no problems finishing up everything but any sort of meat, sliding them over to Luffy, or one of his victims.

You're met with another blossom soon after lunch. You've made a bad habit of leaving the table early to escape the smell and resign yourself to the open deck, sprawling out on the grass like Zoro usually does. You're certain you're about to fall asleep shivering but the slap, slap, slapping of your captain's sandals are nearing closer so your brain kicks awake with a start; your eyes twitch, eyelashes shuddering in the wind. The darkness over your eyes morphs into a shadow of Luffy hovering over you, head tilting with a hand on his hat— your mind supplies you with the frown— and then you hear him taking a step back and sitting down next to you.

A troubled melody hums through his lips and when you open an eye to peek at him, you see his hands wrapped around his ankles, legs loosely crossed; he turned back to you and you quickly close your eyes. Here is where you finally learn that when Luffy touches, he's never placated with a simple tap, a light knocking between skin— no, he must stroke, he drags his fingers up the side of your thigh, he shivers from the coldness of your flesh and, even then, crawls closer. Then he's silent for a worrying amount of time and for a moment, curiosity takes you over. You find yourself wanting to draw light upon the disgusted features when he's met with someone he thinks close to him is growing closer and closer to a grave amongst the roots.

He leans his forehead against yours whilst you shuffle through the despicable crawl of your heart through your bones, something shifts in you and when you reach to itch at your side, it dislodges. It takes no more than a simple flip for your entire world to shift; you think you saw Luffy hovering over you momentarily before you had snapped to the side.

A fragment of the world greets its end.

Something strangles you, a hand of a giant pressing two fingers against the sides of your neck until everything in you bursts and splatters against parts that have gone unknown until now. There's nothing new to the tremor of vine that erupts through your skin, bubbling through the surface of flesh like a geyser; the tentacles claw their way your throat until you're choking around them, searching for an allowance for air. Your knees shuffle up to find some balance, head ducked to meet the lawn across the deck and elbows digging deep into the dirt. Your spluttering comes in time with the sound of Luffy calling your name, shouting for Chopper; there's a knot tied inside your mouth, you shake away tremors and tears all the same. You erupt yet there's nothing to be burnt, it's only ash that leaves your mouth— only the colourful petals of the wisteria plant that wash over the green of the open deck, burnt in hues with blood.

The next island is a spring island, known for their sweet peaches and sweeter music.

You watched Luffy devour two peaches in his hands, the ripe skin melting underneath his teeth— pale with a dusted blush until it snapped into a bloody red, melted at the pit. Then he's gone with a rustle of mikan trees as you held out a basket for Nami to delicately place her mikans in; apparently, she'd managed to catch the attention of some peach vendor with her sweet tangerines and swindled the poor man out of his money for a basket.

The streets are lined with lively hums and a strumming of odd instruments, music escapes through every crevice of a worn-down building as Luffy jumps from stall to stall, drooling over the goods before you're beckoning him back with his lunchbox and a promise of meat after you finish this errand for Nami. On your way to the stall, you hear faint chattering that doesn't interest you but Luffy straightened up beside you and turns to stare at the people as they argue on who had managed to grow the biggest peach this year.

You sigh, grabbing hold of Luffy's collar when he stops to stare at them and drag him off to the stall vendor who had fallen victim to Nami's schemes. The exchange is easy enough— give him the basket (ignore the fact that Nami had managed to make it look like it was overflowing by artfully bunching up a cloth on the bottom and filled gaps between the fruits with flowers) and make sure you've got the correct amount of money. It's when Luffy asks the stall vendor who has the biggest peach this year that things begin to go downhill.

Rather than answering Luffy's question, the man goes on a tangent about some kind of festival for a God and how the biggest peach will be the offering to said God this year— apparently, Shumi (the woman who owns the fabrics shops) had managed to get her hands on this, that, or the other to help her husband grow a peach large enough to bring doubt to the fact that Gyupuri had managed to grow the largest peach (again) this year.

Luffy insists on tracking them both down to help the people come to a decision as he wiped away the drool on his chin. Resigned, you managed to find Shumi first with her shop being the only one in town that sold fabrics and she denies you both permission to see the peach; Gyupuri, on the other hand, is more than happy to show you to the peach he grows. He takes you straight out of town, into the forest, and then up the mountain to where there's a clearing full of nothing but flesh coloured peaches.

As you listen to Gyupuri's story on how he was merely taking after his father to grow these strangely sized peaches, you have to keep Luffy in your hold so he doesn't go running to the giant peach and take a bite out of what could be for a God. Somehow though, he manages to get a handful of flat peaches when you weren't looking and when you attempt to apologise to Gyupuri, he doesn't seem to be fazed, shoving a few more peaches into your hand and telling you it's fine.

"So, who is this God anyway?" Luffy asks, his legs wrapped around your waist and chin hooked on your shoulder as he leaned back, satisfied with cheeks full of the peach you were holding in your hand. You turn to give him a look, but he merely stares at you back.

The people here must have made a unanimous decision to answer questions from the left side of the field because Gyupuri only tells you the name of this God when he drags you and Luffy up a hill to stare at a statue of this God carved out of generic stone.

To be polite, you call the statue pretty; Luffy feels no need to be polite, so he says it's not really. When you look at him to furrow your eyebrows at him, he's already looking at you.

When you're back on the ship, money handed to Nami, you think about that moment so much that it grows moss in your mind and vines burst through the crevices of the worn–down artifact you've made out his gaze to be. You throw up everything you manage to eat and feel hollow and worthy when you meet Luffy's eyes in Chopper's office again.

There's a chill that follows your days after that.

It's persistent and stubborn in a way that cruelly reminds you of Luffy. On a brighter side, you've got an excuse to be lazy in bed though it irks your bones not to have the weight of you walking thrumming up your body. You get visits from the Strawhats, get your food delivered to you, some of the crew shuffling into your room to keep you entertained with some card games and the likes— you get Luffy consistently making his way into your room and treating it as any other room on his Sunny. He comes in, always makes himself home on the bed, and talks about what he did today. At some point, it becomes less endearing and more annoying to be treated as though you were actually dying. (You hadn't told them for a reason.)

Four days after Chopper had resolutely punished you with bed rest, Luffy decides that he was going to start sleeping in your room. Apparently, your face had translated over what your head was thinking too quickly because he starts whining, saying that he wouldn't get to see you enough if he doesn't do this and, well, since you've always had a tender, raw, skinned soft spot for the boy, you end up saying yes.

He spends his first night telling you what he was going to spend tomorrow doing and you come to the realisation that every other sentence contains you. (Going to find more beetles to show you... Chopper told Sanji it'd be good to get more meat into your diet... Zoro accidentally cut snakes and ladders in half so Nami is giving me money to see if we can find one for you so we can play... Robin said there's a really pretty flower on this next island… For you… For you...) It’s all there laid bare and you cannot face it. You hide your face into the crook of your elbow and wretch out a cough. Luffy frowns but doesn't mention it. He talks himself into sleep and you lay awake to him, trying to keep yourself from blooming throughout the night so he doesn't wake up, cold and still.

When you're startled awake with misty embrace in a dream, you see that Luffy has gone.

What he has left is his straw hat and a mouthpiece of his greatness. The straw is rough against your fingers, resembling the thorns that grows along roses and you stare at it in your lap until you can feel the roughness in your throat— just when you think you need to get water, Sanji shows up with breakfast. You eye the cigarette in his lips and ignore the settling of the tray on your bedside table, watch the smoke fight the smell of scrambled eggs and bits of bacon to take over your room.

"We're at an island?"

Sanji walks around your bed, finding himself comfortable on the couch across the foot of your bed. "We docked early this morning," you watched his smoke rise, ash falling to the wooden floor of your room, waving and grasping hands up to God. Sanji keeps himself entertained by looking around your room, his foot pushing around odd leaves and petals on the floor before he nods over to the plate. "Eat." Then he's gone.

You stare at the tray, settling Luffy's straw hat aside, you shuffle to the end of your bed and take the fork in your hands— you look at the plate until you swear you can taste the eggs in your mouth and the slight bursts of saltiness that'll come from the bacon and you have to wash it down with the glass of water he's given you. You push it aside and opt to go back to sleep.

You dream of a still life on top of a hill, overlooking a dock as the Sunny pulls back out into the sea; you thrash but find every part of you rooted down to one spot, the wind picks up and you feel tangles of what could be hair or leaves hitting against a part of your body. You're still rooted despairingly in a garden of silks and duvets when you wake, Luffy had found himself unable to keep away from your breakfast but when you sit up and look a little closer, you see a pile of the diced bacon bits shoved off to the side as he shovelled eggs into his mouth.

Shattering free from the earth with a faltering cough broken into four, you shuffled yourself up and spit out a cluster of wisteria. At this point, you do not need to look at Luffy to know what his face looks like; he turned to face you, cheeks full and quickly finishing the eggs to shuffle closer to you on the bed with a book in his hands. "You left your book under the plate."

It's a hardback children's book, pulled out of Sunny's library and coloured a light blue that resembled the sky and broken apart by a sunflower in the middle and petals around it, the title curled around the sunflower. You know that the book was left in the library when you were having your episode. The cover is smooth to the touch as Luffy gives it to you and ends up knocking his shoulders against yours in his attempt to get closer; your eyes moved over to the tray of food and you think of Sanji, who'd grown up in the North Blue where this children's story was more popular amongst the romantic commonwealth. 

He knows, you think, and it fills you with a dread that the wisteria blossoms feast upon delightfully; he knows, and he could tell everyone, the vines throb over your heart as Luffy opens the book over your lap and looks up, expectantly at you.

Myrsa was a pretty girl, enough so that praises sang for her ended up calling upon the scorn of love's Goddess. The depiction of her getting cursed is almost comical, stricken by lightning as she returns from a forest with a basket full of flowers and mushrooms. "What happens next? What happens next?" Luffy pushes his face closer to the book, tangling a rubbery leg with yours as he moves impossibly closer. "How does Myrsa beat up the God?"

It's the certainty he holds that Myrsa will beat up God that makes you laugh, it's the fact that she does not beat anything that makes you tremble, shaking coughs and petals out your throat. Luffy seems to think that the book is too excitable, trying to pry it away from you and saying that he can ask Robin to read it to him later so you should just rest. "Don't you want to know if Myrsa will beat up the God now?" You ask instead, knowing the answer will be yes.

Perhaps they were the wrong words to convince Luffy because when you're on the last page, Myrsa buried in a forgotten land and her love used as fertiliser for a field of sunflowers, he's threatening to beat up a God made up to exact revenge for Myrsa. It's a lot more cheerful than you had expected— all the characters drawn with round faces, small bodies, and black dots as eyes. It makes death seem redeemable. 

After Luffy hauls himself out of your room, in search of the God had turned Myrsa into sunflowers, you force the bacon down your mouth and bring the tray out to Sanji. You linger in the kitchen, eyes watching him as he scrubbed the dishes and danced around the kitchen, no doubt knowing why you were there. He doesn't seem to want to be the one to approach the topic just based on the way he refused to stop even for a moment for the past fifteen minutes you've been there.

You know nothing about Sanji past the fact that he's blond, he's a cook, and he used to be a prince from North Blue's Germa Kingdom.

"You know Myrsa didn't die because she had hanahaki." Your hip meets the edge of an island, arms crossed over your chest as you watched Sanji finally slow to a halt, throwing a glance over at you. He takes his cigarette between two fingers, breathing in for a moment and then takes it out, holding it out to you. "What she was cursed with, wasn't ever meant to be able to kill her."

"I know."

Sanji takes the cigarette back after you shake your head, shrugging a little as he continued. "Myrsa died."

You laugh a little, "I read the book."

There's a point he's trying to make that's as foreign to you as the notion of a love that doesn't hurt but he turns a glance to you that almost reads like he's disappointed in you and it settles nicely against the vines choking you through. You straighten up, uncrossing your arms and his visible eye wanders back over the pots he has boiling on the stove. "You liked the ending?" The ending of the North Blue story was a two–page spread of a sunflower field, a planet of bright yellows and a dull light blue, clouds breaking apart overwhelming tones of sunny golds and drowning diamonds.

A tree split awkwardly in half due to the spine of the book, curved in shape and pinched in the middle until you held the pages at the edges and pulled to straighten in down. "It was pretty," a gentle breeze running through the leaves shedding from the tree, a shiver to the wooden flesh that split apart if looked at the right way by the right man. Myrsa was beautiful, even in a death she didn't pick treated her well.

How could you hope to live when she did not?

You find a lot of things pretty now; you wonder if that's the dead crawling in you that is beginning to appreciate the life around. Robin sat on the deck with a cup of cooling coffee on a table in front of her and a book in her hand, Nami stood between her rows of mikan trees, Zoro straining under the weights of his responsibilities, Brook with a violin to his shoulder. The sky drowned over the ocean as Luffy leaned his head against you on Sunny's figurehead, his voice a soft beat over the water rushing against the hull of the ship. He's talking about Shanks and his dream and your heart aches selfishly; his skin gulps down the orange light of the dawning sun and you resigned yourself to a death loving him.

You wonder if Luffy still thinks of his dead brother, your tongue slips against the bark of your gums, and you open your mouth without thinking. "Luffy," you hear spoken into the wind, "will you tell me about your brother?"

"Sabo?" He's clapping his feet together excitedly, turning from the sky to you with a large grin on his face, "he's a part of the Revelation Army— no, wait revocation? Revenge Army? Renovation Army! Wait— that's not right."

"No, the other one." A whisper haunts the wind, 'the dead one' written in its movement.

There's a certain hesitation to his words that brings you to the realisation that being loved by Luffy is a wonderful thing. He's never been one to be articulate with words, picking the simple ones that come to mind first without a moment's hesitation but strangely the simple–minded way served him well when it came to love. Love is not articulate either— it's one of the simplest things in the world— so when it's met with someone like Luffy, it blossoms into an art form of all things beautiful.

You regret have not meeting Luffy when Ace was around. Dancing around his features is a tender skip of tightness; his shoulders pulled up to his ears, head ducked down, lips awkward and tongue thick as he told you the story of being accepted to be Ace's brother. Hues of embers fluoresce, dripping down on Sunny's figurehead as you reached an arm around him; his words are stained in blood and adoration, strained and slow but Luffy persists, his love persists.

"You should've met him!" He finishes, turning to you with a light chuckle. "You would've loved him."

Your hand falls onto his shoulder, pulling him closer despite the crawl of vomit up your throat and you leaned your head against his straw hat. "Maybe I will."

Death is another thing you think is simple. It's as easy as slipping into Chopper's office to find him hunched over his desk, his hooves holding onto a pestle as he circled the butt around in a mortar. "Ah, you're here?" He glanced over his shoulder as you walked around him and settled onto one of the beds he has in his room. "Give me a second! I nearly have your medicine ready."

"Chopper," you think you've played this out in your head before, "I have hanahaki."

His arms slow down to a halt, his face dropping by several degrees; the previous petals that made up his hopeful and cheerful expression flutter to the floor, guided by the winds you'd altered with those four words.

"Hanahaki?" Chopper's words are slow as he settled the pestle down, "I thought— but it doesn't exist?"

"Funnily enough, it died off." You tell him with a little laugh. "As more people took to the seas and chased after the one piece, less people fell victim to hanahaki." The Chopper you've told this to before in your mind was definitely less devastated and surprised to be greeted by the fact that you have hanahaki.

He's stumbling over his words, trying to pick something to focus on first as his face was scrunched up, eyebrows furrowed, and lips open into disbelief. "How long have you known? Why didn't you tell me? You'll have the surgery, right? You can trust me; I'll definitely save you. When did it first start?" Your head is pounding with the incessant questions he spits at you, unable to answer any of them as any allowance for a response was filled in by another inquiry. Suddenly, he's pulling his mind to a stop as he turned back to you, solemn and sad and asks, "who is it?" 

It's easy to tell how Luffy has touched people, Chopper makes note of the way your head tilts and you smile and it's obvious that there was no one else capable of calling upon your love.

"And the surgery?"

The look on your face, although foreign to you, tells him all he needs to know.

That doesn't stop him though, he keeps himself by your side and urges (pleads) you to have the surgery; his constant presence becomes a problem when he makes a point of forcing Luffy away from you. It's small at first, trying to distract Luffy with other things, claiming to want to be the one to watch over Luffy when you all dock so you're not given the chance, clinging onto your arms and demanding your attention when Luffy threatens to take it away from him. Then, when Luffy notices that he's been holding onto this flower for hours, fingers pinched around a sunflower stem to ask you how you get seeds from the flower to eat, and every time he's seen a speck of your colour from corners, Chopper shows up to drag you away or points a finger somewhere to shout about a meat mountain, he has a problem.

You notice it's about the meat mountain at first though.

He's slamming the door to Chopper's office after the fourth time, shouting, "Chopper! Where's the meat mountain you keep talking about?" He doesn't seem to care about the fact that Chopper is checking up on you as he stomps into the room, plopping himself down right next to you. Chopper pushes him away when your shoulders brush against each other and you're coughing out bloodied petals. His attention diverts when he hears the shaking of your cough, how you knock into him uncontrollably as your torso leans to meet your thighs, hands deep into the foam edge of the mattress. Petals splatter onto your shoes, clinging to the leather with saliva and re–painting the laces in a sickly red. Luffy’s touch is intrusive, a hand tightened on your thigh that burns your skin to ash and forces vines to splutter out your skin. They attack him, you reel yourself away from Luffy in hopes that they don’t reach him but in some disgusting way, they force themselves to new lengths to coil around his limbs. Spindling up and up and up and you can’t see his face anymore as a thick rope of vines in the shape of his hand reaches out for you, they keep moving up until you only see his hat— your back knocks against the wall. You sternly tell yourself this death is acceptable; the vines grow limp.

When you’ve calmed down enough, the first thing Luffy asks you is, “why aren’t you better yet?” And you feel as though you’re being scolded for some reason; your eyes flicker over to Chopper, fingers tangled together in front of your thighs from the corner of the room you’ve forced yourself into. When Luffy catches the wandering glances— as if you’re trying to keep him out of something— he treats you exactly how you’re acting. Like a criminal.

“Chopper?” It’s unnerving how his eyes are still on you, no trace of expression on his face, “out.”

“But—”

“Out.” Chopper throws you an unhelpful glance as he passes you to get to the door.

You’ve always had the wrong impression of Luffy— everyone that doesn’t know him has the same image; he’s a pirate that has taken down warlord after warlord, who has brought horrifying change and shifts the balance of authority wherever his feet take him. Hearing hushed whispers of him and his close affiliates in the lightened haze of booze, to distract from a tooth getting knocked out of place never does much for his image either. Though it wouldn’t be right to say that Luffy is wholly good either— he’s selfish. Selfish and impossibly kind and downright disgusting with the handling of his own needs; the sound of your name fizzing between his teeth has you startled, nodding your head back to him on the bed you’d left him at.

“You’re hiding something.” It’s not a question nor is it an accusation of any kind. It’s an observation. Luffy slides himself off the bed, his sandals comically slap against the floor of Chopper’s office, “tell me.” His hands fall onto your shoulders, one stays there and the other slides down. He treats your skin like an amusement park for his pleasure; his nails drag across the goosebumps of your bicep, pressing down on raised scars and then splashes into the palm of your hand, dragging ripples in the centre.

You hesitate, twisting your fingers together and pulling as if to attempt to dislodge the odd feeling that follows his fingertips. “Are you asking as a captain?” Despite how general expectations of Luffy remain pretty low to those who do know him, it’s also known that Luffy has a nerve in him that’s impossibly receptive to hurt. There’s a certain way to activate it and when it’s on, it doesn't quieten down until its idiot owner is pleased. Luffy scrunches his face up in an odd way, displeasured at your question as if he couldn’t believe you’d ask him something that hurtful, and his head tilts.

“Tell me.” You’re met with an unwavering stare, the hand on your shoulder tightens and there’s a hardness to it that you’ve never associated with your rubber captain— you can feel the bone in his fingers, stern and undeniable. Your eyes trace over the exposed, tanned skin of his bicep and you wish that you could force your vines through his skin to crawl into his chest and listen to the tremors that’ll run up your devil fruit from his beating heart for some kind of answer. There’s a sudden breath that’s available to you that isn’t tainted and clogged, trapped before it even meets your lungs, but it burns in a new way as you stare at Luffy, scared and terrified of a new life that’ll be forced upon you if you tell him what’s wrong with you.

You open your mouth with an excuse, but Luffy huffs and the words shrivel in your mouth, collapsing to a grain on your tongue and when you close your mouth, you taste dirt. “Luffy,” you beg, “I can’t— just, I’ll be fine.”

There’s a hint of some anger in his gaze before it turns into a haunting realisation, “Chopper knows, doesn’t he?” He pushes you aside, “I’ll just ask Chopper.”

There’s a ringing distant in your ears that chimes like the bell of the church from that place two islands ago, maybe three— you haven’t been too good with time recently. Sunny shakes like the earth as a body hits the pavement, you feel disgusting and heavy and an itch claws through your palms where Luffy’s hand has just been. You’re sure it’s Chopper he’s shaking an answer from but you hear Robin’s voice, calling for him to calm down and when that doesn’t work, Sanji cuts in. It all gets further and further away, you think about the planks of Sunny opening to welcome you back into that darkness from nights ago, you think about being choked by one of your vines, you think about the wisteria blooming whole in your lungs— you think and you think and think and suddenly, it’s all nothing. You’re dying, you think, that’s a fact, what else? Luffy is the reason. Or maybe you’re the reason.

“Luffy,” were you the one talking? “Luffy.” The voice comes again, stern and your eyebrows furrow with the same tension that the voice is carrying. “Thank you for being my captain.”

Not that it surprises you, Luffy punches you.

[femalefemur]

Stranger in the Woods.

this is an 18+ fic, minors do not interact!

warnings: dub con, bears, hybrid John Price, please let me know if I missed anything!

word count: 1.6k

synopsis: you take a walk in the woods and get lost, bear shifter John Price finds you and takes what's his.

A/N: finally finished this, this came from a dream I had and desperately needed to write down, I also don't write smut often, it is what it is, reader has a vagina but no pronouns are used.

The day was beautiful, golden sun shining bright in the azure sky, white clouds floating by like soft pillows high in the heavens as you stared wistfully out of your window. It was much too beautiful of a day to be inside despite the pile of housework you had to do so you grabbed your knapsack. You filled your water bottle and packed trail mix, along with a sandwich and the reddest apple you had before heading out. 

You walked past your neighbour’s house, glancing at their windchime as it tinkled on their front porch and the flowers lining the walkway up to their house that were in full bloom, their scent wafting through the warm summer air. You kept walking, past the other houses filled with laughter and people in their yards enjoying the warm sunshine. You passed them with a small wave and smile as you continued on your way. Soon there were no houses lining the path, only the occasional car passing you by as you headed towards the woods. You stopped at the dirt parking lot to take a sip of your water before continuing on and into the woods. 

The woods were calm, the sound of insects trilling and birds occasionally chirping filled your ears as you walked down the path. Your eyes drifted down towards the beautiful, green ferns that grew on the forest floor and covered it like a delicate blanket. There were small flowers that sprouted through the gaps in the ferns, a smattering of colour throughout the endless green of the forest. The sight eased your mind and made you forget about all your responsibilities for a few blissful moments. You felt as though you belonged there in the wild amongst the animals, as if the forest was calling to you, a home that would envelop you in the warm earth and take away your troubles. The thought made you stop for a while, standing there in the middle of the forest as you stared out into the sea of trees, your fingers digging softly into the rough bark of the tree you stood beside as you lost yourself to thought. 

By the time you had realised you’d stepped off the path and wandered deeper into the forest it was too late. Your mind had been elsewhere and your legs had moved on their own until you stood in the middle of nowhere. You had no map and no compass, you had gotten rid of the compass app on your phone when you had first bought it, and there was no reception so that you could redownload it. You felt foolish for having gone into the woods with nothing but food and water, your lower lip caught between your teeth as you glanced around and tried to ascertain a way back to the path. You started walking again in a direction that you hoped was north, picking the route by the position of the sun in the sky, hoping that you remembered enough of your survival training to be right about your choice of direction. 

You hadn’t walked very far when you noticed it, a large brown bear meandering through the forest, seemingly unaware that you were there. It made you freeze where you stood, trying not to make any noise to draw attention to yourself as you watched it carefully and noticing how it had its nose to the ground as it sniffed around. Your heart pounded in your chest as it started walking in your direction, your legs seemingly unwilling to move as you swallowed the lump in your throat before forcing yourself to slowly move to the tree on your left, gently removing your backpack and crouching in an almost laying down position on the ground. You squeezed your eyes shut, not wanting to see if it found you and the horror that would surely follow, your face buried in your hands as you bit your fingers to stop any sound that would leave your mouth. You heard it walk closer, the heavy steps of its paws echoing in your ears as you stayed where you were, now frozen in fear as you waited for whatever your fate may be. 

Then suddenly there was a nose prodding at you, it made you stiffen in surprise as you bit down harder on your fingers. The nose bumped into your arse before prodding at your thighs and pussy before you felt a clawed paw tear at your pants and flip you over. Your eyes met the cornflower blue ones that stared down at you, surprise written all over your face as you looked at the man, not a bear, before you. There were tiny bear ears atop his head that made your brows furrow in confusion before he was nosing at your pussy again, glancing up at you from between your legs as you tried to push him back and squirm away. Your actions only resulted in him throwing an arm over you and pulling you closer, groaning into your cunt as he lapped at you like a starved man, his fingers digging into your flesh and his tail twitching in excitement. Your face felt hot with embarrassment, you don’t know when you’d started to grind up against the stranger’s face but you’d realised when you felt your orgasm building, like a string slowly pulling taut as his eyes keenly watched your every reaction. His tongue ran over your dripping cunt, delving into your warm walls as his nose nudged at your clit and his beard grazed the sensitive skin of your inner thigh, sucking at your clit as he watched you get closer to your peak. His tongue rolled over the swollen bud as the string snapped and you came, slick dribbling from your hole and covering his face.

“Been a long time since I’ve had such a satisfying meal” he spoke, face still buried between your legs as he sucked at your clit and made your hips buck and try to squirm away, still sensitive from your orgasm. 

“Please, no more” You whined, pushing at his head as tears formed in your eyes, the overstimulation becoming too much. 

A gruff chuckle left his mouth, reverberating against your pussy before he lifted his head and crawled over you. His hands ripped your shirt with ease before he was rolling your nipples between his fingers and slotting his mouth against yours. The kiss was anything but gentle, his tongue pushing into your mouth and lapping at the taste of you as if he were devouring your very being, his saliva trickling into your mouth as you kissed and his fat cock grinding against your wet folds. You were panting by the time the kiss broke, a mess of saliva and your own juices smeared across your lips and face while he lapped at your skin with a soft groan. His tongue licked down your cheek and along your jaw, leaving a wet trail behind before he was pulling back to push your legs up to your chest with a feral grin on his face. Your pussy clenched at the thought of his thick cock inside you, slick drooling from your hole as you stared up at him with hazy eyes and his heavy cock tapped against your aching clit. The stretch as he pushed in was delicious, the thickness of him making you feel impossibly full, your eyes rolling back as he bottomed out.

“There you go, so good for me, hm, taking me so well” he praised you, pressing soft kisses to your calves as his fingers rubbed at where you were both connected, marvelling at the way you stretched around him as a soft whimper left your lips. 

All you could do was nod as he thrust into you, punching the air out of your lungs with a smile on his lips and his teeth nipping at your legs. He pushed them closer to you as he loomed over you, the position making his cock feel even deeper inside you as his fingers slipped into your open mouth, hooking into your lower jaw and giving a small tug with each thrust. The feeling of it all made your brain feel hazy and cloudy. The feeling of him so deep inside you, the thatch of dark hair at the base of his cock brushing against your clit with each thrust, his fingers in your mouth, his beard against your skin. It was all too much, too good, too heavenly and it made you cum so hard you were sure you saw God. 

He kept going, fucking you through your second orgasm like an animal in heat as you drooled around his fingers and watched him. He was beautiful, beard glistening with your slick, thick, dark hair covering his chest and trailing down his torso to his pubes, soft ears and tail twitching with each thrust. The hair on his arms was just as dark and thick and a thin sheen of sweat covered him as the sun shone down on him like he was being kissed by it, making him seem ethereal. There was a soft clicking from how wet your cunt was as he fucked into you, the look in his eyes animalistic and hungry as he picked up his pace. The increased pace making you moan and whine, squirming as if you could escape when his thumb found your clit and circled it.

“Come on sweetheart, one more for me, you can do that can’t you?” He cooed down at you, grinning as you nodded and sniffled, tears of pleasure welling in your eyes as he rubbed your clit faster. 

Your third orgasm ripped through you like it was wrenching you from your body, like your very atoms were being ripped apart and put back together by this man above you. He followed shortly after, hot, sticky cum flooding your walls and branding you as his, his to love, to care for, to fuck until his balls were empty, his to keep in this forest that had swallowed you whole.

[moonshinemusings]

Random TF 141 + friends headcanons (Pt.2)

Warnings: none

• Soap makes amazing pancakes. There are many videos of him trying to flip them over and failing, but that's not the point-

• Speaking of, Farah has so many vids that can be used as blackmail. She can never catch Price or Ghost doing something dumb enough for it, but the others are unfortunate victims

• König loves butterflies. Most bugs freak him out, but he finds them beautiful and peaceful. At the same time he loves bees, he really does, but he's really scared of being stung (even though it has never happened before)

• Roach, being true to his name, finds bugs really fascinating. He owns at least one metal pin of a roach that's for sure. The others also often gift him little things resembling insects

• Alejandro and Rodolfo used to sit on the roof and watch the stars together a lot as kids

• Gaz really likes swimming, especially when he can do it in the sea

• The team has UNO nights where the table ends up flipped over regularly (usually by Alejandro)

• Soap shouldn't be taken to the cinema because he talks through the movies. All. The. Time.

• Farah is really clumsy in heels since she never needed to learn how to walk in them. She'd rather die than try though. Meanwhile, Valeria could run and kill a man without ever worrying about falling or breaking her ankles

• And honestly? I think Gaz would rock the heels too, if only after a little practice

• Ghost finds sharks fascinating, especially the aspect of how many people are scared of them when they are mostly harmless

• Soap, Gaz and Alex really enjoy the Deadpool movies, they often quote lines at each other

• Graves is a Backstreet Boys enjoyer (honestly can't blame him)

• Rodolfo adores those little, fluffy white dogs that look like rats whenever they are bathed

• Put Soap in a dance circle and he's going to make a fool out of himself, but somehow slay at the same time

• Alex likes drawing tattoo ideas that he wants to get later, or simply just feel like making. Doodling calms him

• Farah takes zero shit (like Gaz), so when there is a banter with someone it can quickly turn into a heated argument or some firm words from her

• Price is a certified McDonald's hater. Calls it fake food and complains about the quality and taste constantly

• Ghost likes horror movies and laughs at them, but only when they don't have some specific scenes (I don't think I have to elaborate)

• Soap has random shit on him all the time. Once he pulled out a lollipop from his vest and started eating it on the heli towards a mission

• Most of the team plays Hay Day. They are on each other's friend lists, but Rodolfo is the only one who actually helps the others

• Alejandro builds his farm like he would in real life and tries to make it realistic, while Rudy does the same. He cares more about the cute animals though, he probably has like 10 dogs and cats

• Gaz tried to get Price to play, but he cut his whole career short because the Captain started to get obsessed and wouldn't put the phone down

• Soap always brags about how good his farm is, meanwhile Ghost quietly sits in the background with like +30 levels on him. He often plays when he can't sleep so he's ahead of everyone

• Alex and Farah kind of bond over the game, they have one shared account because neither of them spend too much time playing. They often have childish arguments over things like where they should put certain decorations, but always end up finding a compromise (Alex lets her get away with a lot in this sense)

[redslug]

NEUROSLUG NEUROSLUG NEUROSLUG

Ahem. So, I spent the last day force-feeding Stable Diffusion my art to teach it the concept of an anthropomorphic insect. As a result, I have a working LoRA that imitates my coloring style fairly decently and it can kinda do bug anthros. Emphasis on "kinda", it still needs a lot of iterations to be able to maintain proportions on it's own. However, it does quite great when provided with a simple line drawing as a quideline. Here are some examples I whipped up in like 2 hours. Input image:

AI's pure output:

After touchup:

There was quite a bit of touchup on this first attempt with the generation serving mostly as a rough under drawing, but then again I didn't stress the network with details too much. Then I tried squeezing more definition out of it. Attempt 2:

It can be quite competent when I supplement it with styles it knows well. I only used 30 of my own images to teach it, so it might be a little starved for examples at the moment. Adding "Bob Eggleton" seems to knock some sense into it for now. Okay, still images are working, now let's bash Neuroslug against some animation.

For something named Stable Diffusion it's not the most stable, huh. I'm still pleased with the result though, it's pretty cute. And while trying to make it cute I learned a little thing. AI art isn't art. It's a mixture of alchemy, gambling, detective work and demon summoning it seems. And a bit of just art. What I mean by that is that it can attach very unexpected meanings to words. Since I trained the AI on just anthro insects, it follows their defined anatomy quite closely. Specifically, they do not have breasts. As a result, adding "with big boobs" to the prompt changed the shading style and colors but not the actual anatomy. And so, most of my prompts have this lovely phrase just to improve the colors. 'Kay, time for the freak show. At some point during testing the machine decided that my moth isn't decent enough and put panties on her suddenly.

Now that's a booty

Look at those eyes

They have seen things As you can probably tell these have no sketch to guide the result.

It's still bad but it's got the right spirit.

THICC

Surprisingly cute even if janky.

Looks better than it has any right to Now I'll crawl back into my hole to play with settings for an indeterminate amount of time. I'll publish my mini-me for you all to mess with once I deem it stable enough.

[zsakuva]

What would Xanthus, Elias, and Issac think about morality (as they seem to be the more morally ambiguous characters)? Like how do they feel about the concept of ‘doing the right thing’? They have all expressed the willingness to kill if necessary, but what that was a point of conflict with listener? What if morals in general were a point of conflict between the character and listener?

Morality as a shared concept is not universal, and is only derived from values that individuals and societies uphold. All three characters have their own subjective definitions of it, as well as their own standards and limitations they perform within.

Xanthus has lived four lifetimes and has seen things others couldn't dream of. His perception of the world has changed through the centuries, and this knowledge informs him of what actions he takes and how he views others. As a vampire, this surpasses human beliefs and values that may seem trivial to him.

He'll risk more because he's immortal, he'll do what he wants because he can compel people, but he's not unrestrained. Xanthus is calculative with his kills and his prey. He knows to rein in his hunger because missing people and dead bodies drained of blood alerts hunters. He knows who to befriend or compel for his own gain. In ways, Xanthus could be considered one of the most objective characters if faced with a hard situation as his own emotions aren't normally a part of the decision.

Concerning Love's morals, I think they're somewhat thrown out the window because they're dealing with a supernatural being who knows more than they ever could. It's hard enough to wrap your head around a person living for more than 400 years, but it's even harder to sift through all those conflicting morals around the world from societies that have come and gone.

In contrast, Elias, as the youngest carries morals from his parents and those around him. Killing for self-defence. Fighting to show his power. He was taught the way gang members are supposed to act even though he didn't want that life in the first place. He understands the brutality and violence of the life he lives, and twisting his own morals would undoubtedly keep him alive.

I think Barista understands that considering what they've currently been through. But this all depends on what their own morals are.

Isaac is also a product of what he was taught and witnessed. His morals in the beginning were developed from his mother who taught him patience and good virtues. But his life events twisted that, and his morals changed along with it. The 'right thing' does and doesn't exist for him; many of his clients want outcomes that require illegal means to get or do, and he has little problem doing this. It all depends on what will be sacrificed and if he's okay with dealing with that loss, whatever it may be.

Pickle likely has similar morals to Isaac considering what they've been through. But again, it all depends where they draw the line.

Someone's morals won't be tainted with murder if they believe it. Others may think killing an insect goes against their morals. What is right and wrong is a huge topic of discussion and extremely divisive, but I hope I was able to shed some light on these characters for you!

[the-s1lly-corner]

hi ^^ If requests are still open, can I req jax x reader headcanons where reader seems like the most chill, mentally stable, and normal person as well as a bit oblivious out of the whole group but when jax tries pranking them by scaring them w creepy crawlies and insects or other things normally considered scary, reader becomes really happy and endeared by it instead? And starts trying to like befriend him because of it.

And then its revealed reader has the most questionable interests of which they have the most unusually large amount of detailed knowledge on, like say poison, reptiles, the horrific horrors at the bottom of the ocean (think subnautica) And whenever these interests are brought up (which is rare bcs if what they are) they go full infodump mode and have 100% accidentally scared someone with it. They have definitely scared Ragatha half to death at least once after hearing the word “centepede” and going on a rant abt giant centipedes oblivious to her fear.

qeue Jax asking the reader abt one of said interests for a prank and reader gives him way to much info on it, not because they want to help him prank someone, but because they think hes just genuinely interested in their interest and have no idea he wants to use it to prank someone.

sorry if this is too long ^^

Jax x reader w/ odd interests!

dont apologize for it being too long! this just means i have a little more to work with ! probably gonna do this and one more request then go stretch my legs !!

when he first saw you fall victim to his classic fake spider prank, he was surprised to see that you were absolutely thrilled to find the critter; real or not

i mean sure, maybe you just weren't afraid of bugs like a certain red head, but you were excited to find it; scooping it up into your hands without hesitation... i mean he wasnt exactly judging you, but he sure as hell was confused. and now stumped, now that he knows the fake bug prank wont phase you

on top of that he now has a new friend following him around

i think it would definitely take him a second to warm up to you, his pride is a little hurt that his little stunt failed, but before long you guys are on speaking terms

your interest in poison doesnt really come up until someone brings up the topic, prompting you to go on a tangent about all the different kinds, the effects, the sources, how to counter it if possible, things like that

how funny would it be if jax was actually scared of reptiles; specifically snakes or even lizards, and he finds you trying to catch a gecko outside in the grounds

you excitedly try to hand it off to him and begin listing off some facts about the real world counterpart, only to stop when you notice his discomfort

like imagine trying to help him get over this random fear of his, and eventually managing to ease him into holding the little thing

hes fine with centipedes but he draws the line at noodle boys

perhaps the extra time with you and listening to you rattle off about your interests sparks some interest in you? of course if you want this to remain platonic you can ignore this part!

this of course leads to him trying to spend more time with you

to be more specific, to try to rope you into his antics

so he tries to ask you about something, say, bugs... you, of course not knowing what his plans are, go off about a bunch of bugs; insects, spiders, hell you even add in some scorpions

he stops you midway when you segway over to bug-parasites, though

while some of it isnt really his thing, hes at least not a big enough asshole to ignore the look in your eyes you get when you finally get to talk about your interests and not be judged

[gemharvest]

wyd!Boyfriend (Beef) Reference Sheet

Extra info will be under a cut to spare y'alls dashboards, but here the guy is. The Beef Bastard. For anyone who desires to draw him.

-----

Design Notes:

Palette is flexible; can be drawn in this palette, with canon BF's palette, or given a custom palette. Colored lines are not a requisite, but if you do pure black lines while using the ref's palette, please keep everything using that color the same color (ie; his piercing, opt. nail color, sweater on Christmas outfit, etc).

Shirt does not have to be tucked! I mostly drew it like that just to have the belt visible; up to you if you want to draw it half-tucked or untucked. idc

Shading colors are optional, I just have them there because I like using them; I personally still draw the shade in on his hat/ hair, but that's just how I like doing it. His hair base can be either color tbh it doesn't matter much to me, I just have it marked as the lighter color bc that's what feels right to me personally.

Would have a square face shape & brown eyes when not as stylized as the ref. I do not have a specific eye color picked out, as I do not see myself drawing it, but anything works as long as it's a darker brown.

-----

His playlist is at the end of this post (both Spotify and YouTube versions), but if you just want to hear his sample songs, here are links (+ 2 honorable mentions):

(fw + eyestrain) WHOKILLEDXIX - Kismet

Marina - Are You Satisfied?

(fw + insect & xray clips) Will Wood - Cicada Days

Twenty One Pilots - Fake You Out

100 gecs - 745 sticky

-----

Base Info:

Cisgender bisexual (he/him); polyamorous.

Has: ADHD with RSD; anger issues that usually come out to “protect” himself (can be to “protect” others as well, tho); an inferiority complex that makes him highly competitive & masks as a superiority complex.

Astraphobic (fear of thunder & lightning) as well as having a fear of abandonment. Other than that, he’s comically fearless; acting on impulse rather than any sense.

Has a bad acne problem; some on his face, but the worst of it is on his back.

Wears loose clothes, and kinda just throws on whatever he finds first. (Which tends to be his usual outfit.)

Slightly chubby, but his clothes make it harder to tell.

Street-smart, in spite of his general stupidity. Able to hold himself pretty well in a fight, as long as he’s thinking clearly.

Fairly strong as well, though he doesn’t make an active effort to work out. Stupids his way into being able to lift shit, I guess.

Shaves his face (prefers the look) but doesn’t bother with the rest of his body. 👍

-----

Headcanons:

(there is a lot here, I do not blame you if you don't read all of these 🙏)

Stims with a lot of repetitive hand movements (shaking, snapping motion w/o sound, opening and closing); beeps are sometimes vocal stims as well.

Would benefit from chewlery dear god, but would also need high strength ones. Maybe one day someone will get him a chew stim.

Enjoys high energy & loud music. Obviously a rap fan, but would enjoy breakcore/ speedcore/ hyperpop and similar genres, as well as things like YTPMVs or stupid mashups.

His beeping is not a language, as is the same in canon, though it generally has enough of a rhythm to it that people can get the gist of the intended words the longer they're around him.

95% of the time he speaks in beeps, and if he needs to relay info to someone who doesn't understand it, he'll write his words down (as long as it's an option).

Not comfortable speaking regularly, but can do it if the situation calls for it. Takes a lot to get to that point though, and was way less confident in his words when he was younger.

His beeping can also be a vocal stim, as mentioned previously, which can throw conversation off. Beeps will also lose their proper rhythm if he's upset/ super excited and etc., making them harder to understand.

Loves small animals, rats being a particular example, and is also fascinated by insects.

Usually just ignores insects, but picks up a catch & release habit w/ ones that get inside from GF.

When they get a shared apartment, he's the one who spends the most time in it, usually alone and working on music. Sometimes he gets overwhelmed by missing his partners being around, but manages it well knowing they'll be back soon.

Likes involving his partners with his music. Most of his album covers are art by GF, and will ask Pico for input on mixing or just general thoughts on how it sounds. Will sometimes get them to do vocals as well (takes a lot of coaxing for Pico to agree, so GF features more often than he will).

Usually prefers his nails unpainted, but will let GF paint them to match with her and/ or Pico.

Before Pico entered their relationship, he had his nails painted more frequently to match her. Went down in frequency because Pico really likes it & it became something the two do together. BF is not excluded, he’s just more indifferent about it whereas Pico and GF actively like painted nails.

Prefers black above all, then blue, but also enjoys red or green for his partners.

HUGE issue with picking at acne/ scabs. Has tons of little scars from doing it.

Clingy as shiiiittt to those he’s close to. Will not be the first to let go of a hug and will be content to cling to someone for hours; need to take care of his body be damned.

Related; he has issues wanting to stay up to work on projects instead of get proper sleep, but is pretty easily convinced to go to bed if his partners are around. Because cuddle time babyyyyyy.

Can’t cook for shit. Is like a Sim with 0 cooking skill and insanely bad luck. Best dude can do is make a sandwich/ salad/ anything that doesn’t require the oven or stove, and even then he sticks to simple things because he wants to do other shit.

Relied a lot on fast food/ pre-made meals when on his own. Once moved in with his partners, Pico cooks a lot of the meals & eventually is able to teach BF and GF enough of the basics to where they can prep stuff on days he’s gone.

BF is way slower to take to cooking than GF is; ADHD partially at fault (not finding it “worth it” = not going out of his way to cook still = learns way slower, which also makes it more frustrating). He gets it eventually tho it’s Okay.

Can be kinda an ass to those he doesn’t know, though more because he’s not thinking about it than actually being malicious. Though if he realizes he’s coming off rude he doesn’t quiiiiteee care. This behavior bites him in the ass w/ how he thinks about himself but whatever he’s not thinking in the moment.

Can sometimes be hostile when first meeting people, though usually isn’t too bad.

(RGBFverse exclusive, he is super hostile to the other BFs out of confusion, and then lashes out to keep himself from getting close, because he assumes he will be let down if he does. This later feeds into a fear that, after he becomes calm around them, none of them really like him, because why would they, after how he acted?)

Has spirals related to his inferiority complex where he begins lashing out at others to push them away, because he feels they’re going to leave anyways. These don’t happen often, but it’s really hard for him to pull himself out of it when they do. Feels he’s wearing others’ patience thin, but he appreciates those who stick through it nonetheless.

List subject to change, most likely w/ new additions as I remember things I forgot, or just clarifying anything I may have worded poorly.

-----

3 songs didn't make it to the Spotify playlist because they aren't up on there. Otherwise, both have the same songs & are ordered the same.

[carionto]

Nothing is safe from becoming "exciting"

I've read a bunch of HASO stuff and often when I'm writing something I know I'm drawing from a ton of somewheres, to the point where I can't pinpoint anything, it's all a big mush that my brain then spits out here. This one, however, I know was inspired by jpitha's writings, specifically the bit about Gene's High G Gym (I think that's the mostly correct name anyway). Shamelessly shilling their work cuz it's great, go read it!

______________________________

Humanity has begun expanding their hold over their native system. Like an insect hive, ships ferry just about everything to and from Earth, building stations both in planetary orbits and around the Sun. Nearly all experimental of some kind - a lot of ideas they couldn't try built up over the thousand years they were isolated.

They do also have countless small space worthy vehicles, nearly all with varying superficial designs and patterns, but also quite a few rather different underlying mechanical principles.

Soon we noticed a lot of activity throughout the entire system not affiliated with any organization or group. Just... individuals and small family units doing their own thing. We quickly gave up trying to categorize such behavior. When we asked, they said:

"Anyone with a license to pilot their craft can go pretty much wherever that isn't restricted. For some places and activities they do need to get a permission first though."

Worryingly lax on account that many of the larger "civilian" craft are still powered by their "Mini-Suns" as they call them.

One particular individual craft got our attention. It created a spike of thermal activity in one region of their Oort Cloud, so one of us went to ask this Human. Abigail was her name:

"Yo space dudes and dudettes, what's up?" Our translators were still incorporating the various Human linguistic peculiarities, but their liaisons are very helpful. We inquired as to what she was doing here so far out.

"Oh you are gonna love it!" another phrase we are learning to be wary of. "Victor, that's this bad boy right here," she affectionately slaps the armrest of her, now that we are closer, disturbingly modified vessel. Is that a second engine cluster bolted on the back? And a... weird exposed device with a large neon label - Space BBQ. We instinctively fear her and her next words. "He and I are making a race track with these here ice cubes. I got this idea when I was a kid, and it is going to be. So. Awesome!"

All of the red flags triggered. Then, Abigail demonstrates by shooting a harpoon claw... thing... at a nearby object the size of a few skyscrapers and begins pulling it towards a cluster of other planetesimals. Normally, these kind of clouds have stabilized over billions of years and each object is thousands and millions of kilometers from one another.

There were dozens stacked so close to each other that you could barely fit an escape pod between in some places. One in particular was surrounded by a small cloud of its own.

"Ooh, that one right there." She enthusiastically pointed out its somewhat flattened ovoid shape. "Doesn't it just scream to you that it wants to be the ultimate doughnut? Hector thinks so, he's my cat by the way - Say hi Hector! [hiss] (Fine, be that way, ya bum) Love that bastard. Anyway, just gotta finish blasting a hole big enough and it'll be the perfect finish line."

Not wanting to hurt our sanity further, we decided to leave her be, but not before she proudly exclaimed over all open channels:

"Remember to tell your folks if they ever wanna race to come here to Abby's Action Asteroids [quick whisper] (trademark pending)! Soon it'll have laser obstacles!"

[dindjarindiaries]

Fine Line

summary: Din tries his best to comfort you in the aftermath of your torturous capture.

pairing: din djarin (the mandalorian) x reader

warnings/tags: angst, hurt/comfort, canon-typical violence, mentions of torture (physical and psychological), nightmares, fluff

rating: T

word count: 2.822k

main masterlist • din djarin masterlist

“I figured I’d find you out here.” Din’s voice is what pulled my attention from the stars, his silver beskar reflecting their image just as beautifully as they originally appeared. I shifted my position on the stretch of grass to make room for him beside me. My arms stayed wrapped around my legs, hugging them closer to my chest as I shrugged in response to what he’d said.

“It’s hard to resist this view.” I’d pasted on my best smile and set my focus back on the stars. “You were right.”

“That’s why I brought us here.” Din’s arm was close enough to my own for them to brush against each other. I found myself holding my breath. “The stars, they always comfort me.” I saw him glance at me out of the corner of my eye. “I hoped they’d do the same for you.”

I exhaled, my fingers fumbling on my clothed legs. “They’re trying their best.”

Din hesitated, a rare occurrence for the confident man. “Do you… want to talk?”

“No!”

Din had answered the question for me. He was out of breath, kneeling on the dirty floor a few meters in front of me. His body still sought the air that had just been knocked from his lungs by the brutal force of a death trooper’s weapon.

“Don’t.” Din still struggled to catch his breath. My head was pounding from how tightly I was clenching my jaw in panic and rage. “I can take it.”

“Perhaps,” said another death trooper, their ominous voice filtered by their black helmet. “But the question is…” they paused and motioned for a trooper to kick Din’s side before pointing at me, “can they?”

My worst fear had been realized; Din, my former business partner and now my lover, being harmed for my own actions. “I told you before,” I spoke up, my voice hoarse and less confident than I had hoped, “we don’t know where the child is!”

The death trooper scoffed. “If that were true, then Mando,” they spit the name out like an insult, “here wouldn’t care if you spoke.” The trooper motioned again, though this time, the other trooper slammed his weapon upon Din’s beskar cheek before propping its blunt end under the lip of his helmet, an open threat to forcibly breaking his Creed. “I won’t be asking again. Do you want to talk?”

I shook my head. “No.” My voice was quiet, a mere breath whispered upon the peaceful wind.

Silence sat in the small space between the two of us for more seconds than I’d bothered to keep track of. Insects chirped to provide some kind of white noise, though all I could hear was the pounding of my heart as I tried to forget everything that haunted me. It was Din’s voice that once again broke through to me, each word a delicate dose of the sweetest care and concern. “How can I help?”

I said nothing at first, only bringing myself closer to his side and resting my head against his arm. He’d leaned into me just as I did the same to him. “Being here is enough.”

Din lifted his arm to wrap it around my shoulders, drawing me even more into him. “Okay.” I wanted to close my eyes, but didn’t dare lose sight of the stars ahead. They kept me grounded to the galaxy, along with the constant brush of Din’s gloved hand upon my arm. He wanted to say more; I could feel the tension in his muscles and hear the tightened breaths within his lungs. “You did everything right.”

I sighed, unable to stop myself. “Din…”

“Scars fade. Pain stops. Everything I went through was temporary.” The cool metal of Din’s helmet rested against the top of my head. “What you helped to save the kid from is invaluable.” His gloved hand tapped my shoulder three times, one for each word: I love you. “You were very brave.”

I finally turned my head to look at him, watching as his visor returned the gaze and reflected my meager image back at me. “That can’t be true.” Before Din could protest my words, I went on. “I was the reason it happened in the first place.”

Din shook his helmet. “No. Now, that’s not true.” His tone was stern in a tough-love kind of way. “It was only a matter of time until they caught up to us.” He gestured with his helmet to the less-than-useful ship behind him. “Especially with this piece of junk guiding us around.”

I had chuckled at Din’s insult for the vessel. “She’s not too bad,” I countered. “I only need a standard hour or so to get her fixed.”

Din set his hands on his hips and glanced around the seedy hangar. He exhaled a decisive breath. “All right.” He added a confident nod. “I can buy us that time.” Din pointed his gloved finger at the ship. “Only fix what we need to get to another spaceport. We can deal with the rest later.”

I lifted my wrench and returned his nod with a smile. “In that case, give me half a standard hour.”

Din offered a fond tilt of his helmet. It said everything he didn’t have to. That wouldn’t be the first time he watched me work as I often used to on the Crest. His passion was fighting with honor, and mine was fixing things—just as he’d often told me I’d done with him.

My sweet reverie as I worked was broken in just a few minutes by rounds of blaster fire. I cried out in surprise, dropping my tools and covering my head as I turned to face the firefight. Before I could get a good look at it, Din had grabbed me by the arm and was ushering me to the other side of the ship.

“This is all we have for cover!” Din raised his voice to be heard over the sound of blaster bolts pinging off the walls of the hangar. His own blaster pistol was held up by his shoulder. I desperately started reaching for my own while Din lifted his other hand to the side of his helmet. “I’m trying to look for more exits!”

“Who’s out there?” I demanded, my voice unsteady as I tried my best to gather my bearings.

Din’s voice was grim as he responded. “Death troopers!”

I scoffed in utter disbelief. “How? That’s impossible! Gideon’s—!”

“Cyar’ika, we gotta’ move!” Din gestured with his blaster to a stack of crates on the curved wall ahead of us. “There’s a door behind there!”

I knew better than to question him about how we’d get back there in time. Din led the way, pushing off the hull of the ship to charge himself forward. I followed and let my feet fly over the rusted metal floor. I allowed myself one quick look over my shoulder to see what we were up against.

That’s how I missed the blaster shot that knocked a smaller cargo crate right into my path. I fell over it in an ungraceful tumble that sent me rolling across the ground with no oxygen left to breathe. Any attempt I made to stand back up failed as my sides heaved for air, and that was all the time they needed to catch up to me and point a blaster at my face.

“Resist,” the death trooper spoke, his voice a haunting crackle from his modulator, “and we pull the trigger.”

I looked to my side and realized they were addressing not me, but Din, who stood with his blaster raised. I hadn’t seen him so tense and so eager to pull a trigger before, not since the mission on Morak. Din said nothing and let the trooper go on.

“Put down the blaster and keep your hands behind your back.”

It became the first time I saw Din put down his weapon without question. He was forced to his knees and cuffed no later, and I continued to lie where I was, useless and still trying to catch my breath.

“I mean,” Din had continued, though his voice felt thousands of parsecs away, “it’s a miracle we got it to fly again.” He tapped my shoulder once again. “You made that possible.”

I forced out a huff, my best attempt at a chuckle. “Someone had to prove you wrong about the ship.”

Din released his own chuckle, a sweet sound that brought a genuine smile to my face. “There you are.” He released a breath full of relief. “You’re coming back.”

His words, though sweet, struck me with a pang of guilt. It added to all the rest that had brought me out to the stars in the first place. It wasn’t his intention, and I’d be damned if I clued him in to the idea that he had accidentally ushered such a feeling upon me. So, I smiled the best I could and leaned further into him. “Slowly.”

“Any progress is still progress.”

I soaked in the truth of his words. Din never failed in his wisdom, even if his practicality attempted to disguise it sometimes. My reflection was interrupted by a cooler breeze that made me shiver. Din, observant as ever, didn’t miss it either.

“Come, cyar’ika.” Din’s arm wrapped tighter over my shoulders before he slid it back to his side. “Let’s head back to the ship. It’s getting cold out here.”

I let him help me up from the ground and lead me back to the ship. His gloved hand remained on my lower back, another anchor to reality. The ship was surprisingly warmer than I’d expected, and Din had done his best to make our sleeping rack even more comfortable than before. Blankets and old capes I’d never seen before were piled up there, folded neatly and awaiting our arrival. It brought a true smile to my lips. “Is this what you did before you found me?”

Din shifted his weight and nodded. “Yeah.” He offered a hopeful tilt of his helmet. “Do you like it?”

I nodded earnestly and drew myself even closer to him. “I’d like it even more with us in it.”

Din chuckled and helped me to sit upon the rack. “In that case,” he started to reach for his helmet, “I’ll be quick.” My throat tightened as I watched the metal lift higher and higher, revealing more of the man underneath the beskar.

The helmet cluttered unceremoniously to the ground. My gasp was muffled behind the hand that had flown to my mouth as I took in the severity of what had happened. Din remained as strong as ever, his untrimmed jaw tightened and his brown gaze piercing the troopers who surrounded us.

“The truth.”

The death trooper in charge spoke again, the endless void of his visor staring me down even as he motioned to another trooper. Their weapon fell upon Din’s cheek this time, drawing a loud grunt of pain from him. I looked away as the tears began to prickle my eyes. The trooper’s gloved hand grabbed me by the chin and forced me to look upon Din again. There was a blaster against his temple, though all I could see was the rage that burned like a wildfire within his eyes.

The trooper finished his warning. “Or else his beskar fails him.”

I bit my cheek and shook my head. Din’s furrowed brow softened at me. The corners of his mouth twitched, an encouragement for me to do what I thought was best. I gave my head one last aimless shake. “You won’t believe me,” I said, my voice a haunted whisper, “no matter what I tell you.”

The death trooper waited a moment to respond. “You’re right.” He motioned for the troopers to be at ease. “We’ll just have to keep you around for a little while longer.” He nodded and the trooper at Din’s side hit his face one more time. Din growled in pain as he hit the ground, now forced to lie on his side. I gritted my teeth and tightened my hands into fists at my sides. “Consider making yourself more useful when we return.”

The troopers began to flood out of the room they’d brought us to. I waited until they’d secured the door closed behind them to move ahead, tending to Din as best I could. My chest was already heaving as I managed to help Din stand up on his knees in front of me. I observed his face, my trembling hands holding it. A bruise had already started to form on his cheek and his lip was busted and bleeding.

Din observed me right back. His voice scared me as I took the corner of his cape and brought it to his bleeding lip. “Are you okay?” he asked. His words were slightly muffled by the cape. “Did they hurt you when they grabbed you like that?”

I shook my head, an answer to both questions. Rather than speaking more, Din eased his forehead against mine. I closed my eyes as tight as I could and for once I wished it was the cold metal of his beskar I was feeling rather than the warmth of his skin.

The bruise had become more colorful, but smaller. Din’s lip was still healing, but at least the skin had come back together. He raised his brow as I stared in silence. A few steps closed the distance between us, where he bent down to place his lips upon my forehead. I closed my eyes and exhaled, willing the darkness to go with my breath.

“Are you ready to rest?” Din asked. I could hear the exhaustion he held in his own voice. There was no doubt that he’d lost some sleep over his worries for me, a thought that only worsened my burden of guilt.

“Yes.” I wrapped my hands around his arm. “Stay close.”

Din smiled and took his place alongside me. “I will.” He eased us onto the comfortable setup and let my head rest upon the inside of his shoulder. Din kissed my head while I hid my face in the material of his tunic. “As always.”

The temporary peace Din brought me allowed me to sleep, though the slumber remained anything but peaceful. Memories taunted me, all the same I had remembered throughout the night. My insistence on fixing the ship, my blunder that left us vulnerable to capture, Din’s exclamations of pain from my own refusal to comply, the forced removal of his helmet and repeat of his broken Creed; it swirled within my mind as a terrifying storm, one that eventually tore through my subconscious and hurtled me back into reality.

I awoke with heavy breaths, though one look up at Din proved he remained deep in his own sleep. When the tears pricked my eyes, I refused to call upon him for help. I had done enough to him, and he didn’t need another burden to bear. I rolled onto my side to face away from him and curled up the best I could without making too many movements. Each sob was soft and muffled by the material of another spare blanket, my eyes screwed shut and forcing the haunting images back into my mind again.

I thought I’d spend the night alone with these ghosts until I felt the warm embrace that appeared from behind me. It drew my back into Din’s chest and exposed my soft cries into the surrounding air. His face was buried in my head, causing his voice to be muffled when he finally spoke.

“They can’t hurt you anymore,” Din comforted me, his voice a gentle whisper. “They can’t hurt either one of us.”

I gripped for dear life onto his hands and fought the urge to let another cry slip past. “I’m sorry,” I heaved.

“Don’t be. It wasn’t your fault.” Din kissed my head. “You did everything right.”

My lips continued to tremble. “I wish I… could be okay.”

Din shook his head, the movement felt upon my own. “We have all the time in the galaxy, cyar’ika.” He tucked my head underneath his chin. “You take as long as you need to.”

The reassurance in his tone was enough to make me release a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. Each exhale brought me a new wave of peace as my lungs rose and fell in time with Din’s own. He cemented his place as my anchor with a squeeze of my hands and another kiss on my head.

“We’ll be all right.”

main masterlist • din djarin masterlist

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[alexbrunn]

I forgot to show you guys some more of my headcanons for looks. I only have Marcoh and Pav. But maybe if you're interested I'll do the others later.

But on the other hand, my body pictures are pretty clear and easy to see🤔🤔🤔

Pav is very handsome man. He seems designed to seduce everyone around him, but few can get past his obnoxious flirting and frank words. Pav has a sharp, sophisticated, almost smarmy appearance, despite his life. He is a few years older than Marcoh, however, he looks much more youthful, as if he is the youngest in the couple, with only fine lines around his eyes and nasolabial folds. He is very proud of his face, he tries not to let anyone take advantage of this beauty, and whoever damages it will be honored with a cruel death, and the Bremen lieutenant certainly knows what cruelty is. He has a sharp long nose, which does not spoil him in the least, but emphasizes his sarcastic character when you learn about not. If Marcoh has long eyelashes, Pav has incredible eyelashes to flap languidly when flirting. But his eyebrows are thin, sharp, and almost very often drawn down to the bridge of his nose. A smirk almost never leaves his face, and he often bites his thin lower lip when flirting. He has a cold and destructive look gray eyes it is he ruins the whole image of a romantic prince. With this look he rants to devour and sizzle, he is full of hatred, even when the situation is more than positive and he is doing well. He became a long time ago, it's all the consequences of his trauma and pain. Even though Marcoh is sometimes afraid to look Pav in the eye, he still does his best to make sure Pav doesn't feel pain, at least for a while around him.

What about Marcoh... In drawing him, I wanted to distance him as much as possible from the image of Jotaro that he was drawn from. After all, they are two different characters (and they don't look much alike, excluding the coldness and fighting with his fists). His appearance was based more on the sprite while fighting him. He's rather unassuming, and it's hardly a stretch to say he'd make the covers of fashion magazines cry for him. Despite living in one of the major cities in the Vatican, he looks more like a villager. He has a generally broader, more massive face, and his cheekbones, though still present, are less pronounced. His nose was broken several times in battle, so it now has a slight hump and drooping tip. Although he is only 31 years old, it is worth considering that people used to grow up earlier, plus Marcoh has been under a lot of stress in his life, which has also affected the wrinkles around his eyes and just below between his eye and nose. Perhaps the constant banging on the face was also an important factor. He has a wide chin and plump lips with a scar in the corner. Thick thick eyebrows and long eyelashes, as he has a lot of body hair in general. Marcoh expresses his emotions very badly and it's hard to see him smiling or crying, his face almost doesn't change from emotion to emotion, which makes him seem rude and angry, and with such dimensions the image becomes really frightening. But in his bright emerald eyes like a thick forest you can always see his sincere feelings. They shine in a special way when Marcoh is happy or when he is crazy about what is in front of him, with this look he looks at small creatures like frogs, mice, insects. However, when it comes to human interaction, he immediately tries to hide his gaze. Pav is terribly annoyed by this, because he wants to be looked at with admiration at all times, not looked away.

[wazzappp]

So. What if Jaime had chemoreceptors on spots his armor? I have four potential explanations/reasons.

One: the less creepy version: certain types of bugs taste with their feet, etc. Not beetles, but they do. They can land on things and identify whether or not they’re food that way. So, fingertips and or balls of his feet have the ability to taste.

Two: the raptorial version. The forearm blades/upper forelegs are raptorial. If he’s fighting/hunting, he might wanna be able to sense if this is food or not, once he sticks his blades in. So taste receptors on the blades. Possibly little pores like ampullae of lorenzini (detects electrical impulses, so might help with finding muscles to cut to incapacitate prey), or thermal pits like vipers (to help locate large veins to slice.)

Three: antenna version.

The upper forelimbs kinda look like antenna, could give them sensory function (in suit). Maybe sensitive to pressure on the tips, with chemoreceptors clustered on the tip (active investigation, like he’s poking at a thing) and trailing in a rough line down the limb towards his main body (passive investigation, like the wind blows a smell to him)

Four: scout version. The scarab is an infiltrator, part of infiltrating is collecting data, so the armor must have a whole fuck-ton of sensors on it, so the scarab can get lots of data to send to Reach. Khaj isn’t interested in the reach, but that doesn’t change what it was designed for. So lots of sensors everywhere, with taste/smell receptors clustered on the ends of limbs (feet, hands, blades)

Thank you, have a nice day!

Hey. Hi. Not to be dramatic but I’m going to marry you now. This is not a request. Put the ring on

Hoooooooooly fuck I love the Ampullae of Lorenzini idea so much. I know there aren’t really insects that have them (as far as I know) but I don’t fucking care they’re SO COOL. The gel inside ampullengang might need to change because it’s meant to detect electromagnetic fields underwater but that’s like. The only real issue here.

Fuckkkk you could have so much fun with behavioral shit too. Movement might cause his mantis blades to try and lash out to attack whatever’s triggering them. In battle this could help with quick instinctive attacks that might not be possible if he was doing it consciously. BAD news is that means he has to get a grip on them real fucking quick so he doesent hurt anyone on accident. OHHHH MY GOD WHICH WOULD MAKE DUCK-TAPING THEM DOWN IN MY LAST LIL AU BLURB EVEN MORE FUN LETS FUCKING GOOOOOO.

Oh god accidentally hurting a family member. His worst fucking nightmare. Delicious. I am drinking that shit like lemonade.

Yes I added his little clawsies in the diagram you can fit SO many knives on this boy.

THERMAL!! PITS!! Holy fuck I did not know there were beetles that have these but there ARE. They’re called fire chaser beetles and they can sense fires from MILES away and holy fuck I love them. Their sensilla (sorry for spelling it wrong in the drawing lmao) are stored in the thorax and are infrared receptors. These contain liquid which expand in response to the infrared radiation, and touch a nerve, which tells the beetle where heat is coming from.

For Jaime this would be weird as FUCK. It’s more just a sense of 'HEAT WHEREMST’ than infrared vision. It is nice for telling his mom when she forgot to turn off the oven though.

[strawberryxfieldz]

hi hi! I have combed through the Website (and what a webbed site it is!!! absolutely delightful!) so here’s some thoughts about some of the stuff we got:

(WARNING: MAJOR WH SPOILERS AHEAD)

Barnaby’s stamp on the Stickers page (formerly: Links) is no longer clickable! He was the only one you could click on before the update but now no one’s is.

Julie can actually talk to flowers! I’ve seen this theory/headcanon before so it’s nice to have confirmation

THE PURPLE THEORY!!!! In the “Just So” audio, Wally’s voice is distorted when he says purple, lending substance to the theory something is wrong with the color purple—Eddie’s favorite color.

Wally says something like “You’re so still. What are you doing?” and like??? did he kill someone or something and not realize it??? so many questions… (Edit: After listening to all the audios, I don’t think this is the case anymore but it’s still an interesting thing for him to say.)

Eddie mentions cows twice I believe in the audios… makes me think he comes from somewhere with cows given his accent. Perhaps that means cows exist somewhere outside of Home?

There’s an interview with Wally and Barnaby which means there’s evidence they have interacted with humans outside the show. Are all the puppets sentient then???

Frank is the Prince and Julie is Cinderella in the retelling, giving some evidence to the theory they were meant to be a couple but decided to stay best friends.

Whoever the poor guy is dealing with the “nightmares”/phone ringing/thinking it’s a prank on him IS GOING THROUGH IT! I wonder who it is…

ALSO WTF HAPPENED AT THE EXHIBITION??? THE MESSED UP GLOVE??? HELLO???

Edited for more info (7/24/23):

I’m beginning to suspect hearts are a central theme here. There’s a lot of heart drawings (even though Wally can’t draw hearts), there’s heart beating sounds in the audios, etc. There’s also not a heart separating Wally and Home like there is for everyone else on that one art border.

There’s a difference in the “Just So” audio and transcript. In the audio, Wally says, “I don’t mind that you reorder my crayons” but in the transcript he says, “I don’t mind that you steal my crayons.”

Small note but I love that the hidden recordings can be found through bugs, which are both insects and bugs, like glitches!

Also, the 14-14-bh audio is the last audio that ends with Wally being entirely uncommunicative and unmoving, and the bug that leads to it is the only realistic bug.

I’m so glad we got the Wally audio redone (the one from the It’s For You Phone button) because there’s some differences from Clown’s original one. Most importantly, at the end, Wally says, “You have work to do.” It makes me wonder if he’s talking to You OR the person the Restoration Team that’s going crazy and hearing the phone calls and stuff… (or possibly both??? what if this person was You the whole time???)

Another line of Wally dialogue I love is, “I have more eyes than I did before.” Maybe it all the attention that gives Wally “more eyes” but he still “can’t see,” whatever that means. It seems his popularity isn’t helping his power of influence on reality, perhaps specifically over the one person on the Restoration Team.

[just-a-funny-little-brain]

Unmarked Cairn

Critical Role: Bells Hells, Orym, 1.4k words

Summary: The flowered valley just north of Zephrah holds many stone cairns and even more memories. Here are a few of Orym's.

tw: mentioned canonical character death, grief

Read it on ao3

———

There’s an unmarked cairn in the flowered stone garden. 

Orym notices it the third time Alma brings him to visit the garden. 

“Death is simply a piece of life. It’s important to understand both and not be afraid of it.”

The young halfling hadn’t understood the first time, and he’s not sure he understands now, but he’s here in the garden, and the flowers are nice.

“Who was Findal?”

Alma smiles. “They were one of the hardest working farmers down in the Talam area. They had such a way with goats, as soon as anyone had an issue with theirs, Findal was the first they went to. They had a laugh you could hear for miles.”

“Did you deliver them?”

Alma laughs and tussles Orym’s hair. “No, they were around for a long time before I came along.”

Orym ducks from beneath his mother’s hand and skips around stones of different heights to find a name with a new story. 

Soon one catches his eye. It stands away from most of the cairns. While most of the others have names engraved facing the path, the dark stones are blank.

“Mama? Who’s this?”

Alma’s gentle smile fades and she places her hands on his shoulders. “The Tempest created that one recently. Nobody knows for certain who it’s for, though. Someone very special to her.”

“Is it her dad?”

The smile returns. “No, silly, Korrin’s her dad. You know that. Come on, it’s almost lunch,” she says, gently directing the boy back home.

——

The first autumn after Will officially asks Orym on a date, they decide, at Derrig��s encouragement, to attend the Night of Ascension ceremony in the Memory Garden. The Garden is modestly but beautifully decorated, with seasonal flowers and mosses covering the cairns and lining the walkways. 

It had been a long week of training, and Orym’s muscles ache as he matches Will’s stride. Will glances down at him and grins.

“Gotta work on those leg stretches more so you can get taller and keep up,” he teases. 

“I’ll do that once you finally beat me up a tree,” Orym retorts, bumping Will’s hip. “Or maybe once you’re better with the skysails.”

Will laughs. “Okay, okay. Here, how about when either of us wins a spar against Dad?”

Orym smiles and reaches up for his hand. “It’s a deal.”

They find a place among the crowd near Orym’s grandmother’s cairn. It’s worn with loving touches and is currently decorated with a woven circlet of flowers draped over the namestone. Orym places one hand against the smoothed riverstones, a cool contrast to Will’s warm hand in the other.

The gathering quiets respectfully as the Voice of the Tempest steps forward from the crowd to welcome everyone and begin the ceremony.

As the sunlight begins to fade, luminescent insects begin to appear and gather at the flowers on each cairn. It’s a nearly perfect night for the ceremony — calm winds, cool air, and not a cloud to hide the stars that have just begun to blink through the sky. Orym glances up before nudging Will to look to the northeast. 

“It’s us,” he whispers.

Will looks up and smiles at the sight of the two moons. “Yeah,” he says softly, squeezing Orym’s hand.

Soon, the ceremony draws to a close, and Orym and Will kneel by the cairn. Slowly, Orym reaches his hand out towards the stone, and the glowing insects move towards the warmth of his skin. 

“Hi, Granny,” he says softly. “A lot’s happened. A lot’s changed, but... also nothing’s changed.” A smile tugs at his lips. “Will and I are dating now. You always said we were like one big family, and now we really are. Or, will be.” He thinks for a moment. “Mom and Nel are doing well. Leeta keeps trying to make your cookies, but they’re never quite right. We miss you, and we love you.” He looks to Will.

Will, despite his best efforts, has hardly any bugs on his hands. “Come on...” he mutters. 

Orym smirks. “See, even the glowbugs think you have cold hands.”

With a groan, Will lowers his hands, and the few accumulated insects flit over to Orym’s hands.

“You can double my hands,” Orym says with a smile.

Will sighs. “Yeah, all right. You halflings always run so warm, it’s not fair!” he says with a fake huff and a smile. 

Orym laughs softly. “Come on, before the glowbugs start thinking they live here now.”

Gently, Will wraps his hands under Orym’s, and after a quite count to three, they fling their hands into the air. In a burst of light and color, the glowbugs scatter, carrying the love and wishes of Zephrah into the night.

——

The Raven Tree is in full bloom on Orym and Will’s wedding day. The ceremony is beautiful and joyful, full of family and friends, and afterwards the whole of Zephrah joins in celebrating.

As the evening grows, Orym squeezes Will’s hand to get his attention.

“We should visit the rest of the family.”

Will nods, and the pair excuse themselves from the festivities.

The walk to the Memory Garden is quiet, a refreshing break from the chaos they leave behind. Buds and blooms line the path, enveloping the pair in a warm, gentle fragrance as they approach. 

Slowly, methodically, the two weave along well-worn paths, pausing for family and friends to extend the ceremony to each. Finally, they make their way to a fallen tree that had been carved into a bench years ago. 

Orym leans against Will’s side as he sits and lets out a sigh. 

Will laughs softly. “Yeah. It’s a lot.”

Orym smiles. “Yeah. Nobody I’d rather do it with though,” he says, bringing Will’s hand up to kiss the new ring that now decorated a finger.

“Mm.” Will drapes his arm around Orym’s shoulders, pulling him close.

The evening is quiet for a few minutes. Slowly, then faster, stars peak through the darkening sky. Orym points out the large crescent moon dwarfing its smaller red partner, both just skirting the horizon. 

“Moons are rising.”

“They’re just getting started for the night. Just like us,” Will says with a waggle of his eyebrows.

Orym laughs. “Oh gods, not here, Alma might kill me if she finds out.”

“She doesn’t need to find out!” Will protests, his face the picture of innocence. 

Orym rolls his eyes with a smile. “Maybe on a night when we’re not expected back soon. Maybe .”

“It’s a deal,” Will says. “You know, someday? We’ll be old men and just sit out here all day. Watch the Skysailers during the day, and watch the stars at night.”

“And the moons.”

“We can show the moons what’s what.”

Orym laughs. “We’ll do just that.”

——

Orym is half asleep and fully drunk when a dark shadow approaches down a path of the Memory Garden. 

He doesn’t notice it at first, as the tears sting and blur his surroundings. Two new cairns make for drunken pillows, even as the sharp edges of fresh engravings carve into his skin. The stinging stone is a sad mockery of the gaping hole in his chest, threatening, promising to consume him where he lies.

A gentle wind raises his head. The silhouette is tall, a textured dark cloak obscuring the details as it trails behind.

A raven caws at the shadow of Catha, the dark new moon leaving Ruidus alone in its wake.

A hiccup escapes Orym’s chest. “Er… ‘re you here fer me too? I din’t... I couldn’t...” A sob punctuates another hiccup. “I couldn’t stop it... I don’... ‘f you take me too -- hic -- do I go where he is?”

The figure turns towards him and tilts their head. “Orym?”

Orym blinks. The voice itches in the back of his mind… something important…

“Orym, why are you here? It’s the middle of the night!”

The voice… it’s someone he knows? Important…?

“So y’r not the… the Raven… Mater… Queen Raven…?”

The figure lets out a harsh laugh. “I most definitely am not.” The figure sighs. “Gods you’re drunk.” The figure crouches before him with a grunt and begins to mutter quietly.

That voice… “What’re you…?” 

Orym blinks, then groans as a pounding pain hits his head. The voice… The Voice. 

Shit.

Orym reaches for Derrig’s shield and scrambles backwards to try to stand. “Temp— Voi— Key—“ He wipes his face and snot and tears smear across his leathers. “I’m so sorry, I-- I shouldn’t be here, I—“ 

The excuses die in his throat as Keyleth gently pulls Orym into a hug. Orym stiffens, but moments later, the exhaustion of the past week takes over.

Keyleth’s arms tighten around the sobbing halfling. “I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I’m so, so sorry.”

[zirawrites]

What do you think would be each Romanced!Companions + Gage biggest parenting screw up when it comes to raising Synth Shaun? Nothing traumatic, just those funny cringy “Yeah I screwed up” moments.

Cait:

As someone who grew up with severely abusive parents, Cait is an awkward mixture of “fun mom” and overbearing guardian

She spoils Shaun with toys and gadgets she finds on trips

However, she isn’t sure how to discipline him; fearing she’ll come off too much like her own folks, but also afraid if Shaun doesn’t learn any lessons that he’ll become prey in the Commonwealth

Since Cait realizes she doesn’t have it in her to ever punish Shaun, she decides to toughen him up and teach him to fight. Even though he looks ridiculous, Cait pads Shaun up with plenty of protective gear before teaching him to spar.

As she’s explaining how to block, Shaun mishears and thinks Cait asked him to punch. He hits her directly in the eye. She doubles over as he bursts into tears apologizing.

But Cait isn’t upset; she’s laughing. He gave her a black eye that’d make any veteran of the Combat Zone proud.

Cait and Shaun agree to tell Sole that Cait got it in a skirmish with raiders.

Next time Cait and Shaun step in the ring, Shaun suggests she wear protective gear. Cait wasn’t laughing then.

Codsworth (synth):

Shaun falls and scrapes his knee? Codsworth is spooling his entire leg in gauze. Shaun gets stung by an insect? Codsworth is holding him down to administer three stimpacks. Shaun and MacCready have a burping contest? Codsworth is making up a diet plan for Shaun to combat possible indigestion.

He’s the definition of a helicopter mom

“I waited over 200 years for your return, young master. I’m not about to lose you to the common cold!”

Sole finally draws the line when Codsworth wouldn’t let Shaun play in a light drizzle, claiming it was the “gateway to a full-blown radstorm”.

Unless one of Shaun’s limbs are literally hanging off his body, Codsworth is now only allowed to administer light first aid.

Even if he really wants to force Shaun on bedrest after falling off his bike.

Curie:

Curie is constantly assuring Shaun that knowledge is just as important as strength when navigating the Commonwealth

It’s hard for Shaun to believe when he hangs around the likes of Cait and MacCready all day

“Just because Monsieur MacCready lived in a cave does not mean you need to act like you do, too.”

Sometimes she takes his education too seriously. Curie makes up tests and lesson plans on everything from calculus to marine science.

Curie finally admits she is going too far when she unironically asked Shaun to name every pre-war state capitol.

To let him get silly revenge, Curie allows Shaun to make his own pop quiz for her to take. It’s filled with questions like “who was the most popular villain in Grognak the Barbarian?” and “what is my favorite flavor of Nuka Cola?”

She answers them all correctly :)

Danse:

Danse knows the best soldier is one who is prepared. That’s why -- against Sole’s absolute disagreement -- he takes Shaun on a routine patrol with other Brotherhood members.

Danse turned his back for just a moment, and Shaun slipped over debris and slid down a startlingly steep hill.

Danse literally shrieked as he watched Shaun’s little head disappear down the incline.

He went charging after Shaun on instinct, slipping on the same debris and falling flat on his ass.

When he reached the bottom of the hill, he quickly checked Shaun for injuries. When it was clear the boy was unharmed, Danse shook his head, face red with embarrassment.

“Lets head back to the Prydwyn,” he mumbled. “Don’t tell your father/mother about this. Now hurry. Sole packed us a really nice lunch.”

Deacon

Deacon had always wanted to be a father. When he was married to Barbara, he read every pre-war parenting book he could find.

However, the sterile pages of “make sure to speak gently but firmly” and “check your baby has reached certain developmental milestones per year” never covered what to do when you adopt the synth child of an Institute genius.

Shaun was constantly building (and blowing up) contraptions. Wiring strange blinking inventions. Asking Deacon to find textbooks on physiology and number theory.

Deacon’s biggest fault was giving into every whimsical request Shaun made of him. He was the first one to volunteer for Shaun’s whacky science experiments. Filled Shaun’s bookshelves with salvage from pre-war classrooms and hospitals. Let Shaun paint his face with weird ink the kid claimed would turn him invisible.

(The paint didn’t work. Deacon broke out in hives.)

He could just never tell the boy no. And he never would. Shaun was the son he always wanted.

Gage:

“Well shit, boy. Of course you got hurt. What’dya think would happen playing on a scrapheap?”

Gage was a loving parent, but also a blunt one. He was just as quick to point out Shaun’s strengths as he was the kid’s youthful stupidity.

Gage called it “tough love”. Sole said it was “asshole advice”.

He just didn’t want Shaun growing up in a way that wouldn’t teach him to defend himself. Even if that defense was against sarcasm.

Shaun is jumping on the couch when Gage enters his room, startling him. In Shaun’s panic, he falls to the floor and twists his ankle.

“Ya can’t jump on the damn furniture and not expect to --” Gage had barely started his lecture when Shaun burst into tears. The boy started babbling about always being a disappointment and never doing anything right.

Gage fell to his knees next to Shaun, his own face twisted in pain.

“No, no! Shaun, that ain’t what I meant, son. You’re smart and creative and all that wonderful shit. Please don’t cry! Here...” Gage took off the armor over his torso and flexed his arm. “Punch me hard as you can. Then we’re even.”

Shaun’s sobs turned to sniveled giggling. “Are you trying to get me to stop crying before dad/mom finds out? Afraid we’re gonna get grounded?”

Gage laughed heartily. What had he been thinking?! Shaun was his son, not a little brother who needed to feel equal.

“Your damn right,” Gage lied, smiling. “‘Cause if Sole won’t let us read past bedtime after this I’m blame’n you, kiddo.”

Hancock

Don’t judge Hancock’s parenting skills. Not many could raise a boy in a neighborhood known for its lack of goodness. Despite its name.

He was a hands-off parent. Hancock observed Shaun from afar, of course. But he wanted Shaun to make his own mistakes. Find his passions without any authority nudging him in a certain direction.

That all changed when he caught Shaun smoking a cigarette in his room. Hancock acted like the kid was snorting buffout.

“We raised you better than this, Shaun!” Hancock snatched the cigarette from Shaun’s mouth and stomped on it. “This stuff’ll kill you! You think smoking is cool? You wanna impress the ladies? Get a good head on your shoulders. Do something with your life. That’s how you get status. Not...” He gestured exasperatedly around them. “...drugs!”

Shaun bust out laughing. “You gave me a pack last night, Hancock. When you and dad/mom came back from the Third Rail. You were going on about me finally being a man and if I was going to do something reckless might as well do it in the house.”

Hancock was speechless.

“And you were, like, totally high,” Shaun added.

[Hancock disapproves... of himself]

MacCready:

MacCready is a family man. He loves Shaun like his own flesh-and-blood. 

He’d do anything for the kid. Storm the Glowing Sea. Infiltrate an Institute 2.0. Join the damn Brotherhood of Steel if needed.

And MacCready shows it. He is the one who teaches Shaun to shoot his first gun, ride a bike and change the radio station by shooting a rubber band.

Which is why it is shocking every time........ MacCready calls Shaun by the wrong name.

“Hey Duncan! Shoot, I mean Dogmeat! Darn it. Codsworth! Um, no. Shaun!”

It’s a classic dad move to call your kid the dog’s name.

It’s an advanced dad move to call your kid after your partner’s Mr. Handy.

Shaun is always flustered but laughing. “Did you call me every person’s name in this house but my own?”

“Can it. And, um, please bring me a rubber band so I can change the station.”

Preston:

Preston was happy to teach Shaun to shoot a gun or repair a generator. There were plenty of mundane tasks and skills that needed mastered to survive in the Commonwealth.

It was the growing-up talks Preston needed to have with him that were the hardest.

He rather help Shaun scrub the entire Castle with a toothbrush than explain where babies come from.

Preston wasn’t some delicate wallflower. He hadn’t survived so long in the Commonwealth by being overly-sensitive.

But there was something about answering questions about bodily functions and puberty that twisted his stomach.

“Well, you see Shaun...” Preston coughed. “When a mommy and a... you know, when a...”

Shaun blinked. “When a mommy and a who do what?”

“Can’t you just ask Sole?”

Piper

The woman who profits off her kid sister’s labor is not the most ethical of mothers.

Piper lets Shaun get away with far more than he should, and pushes him further than he sometimes wants to go.

She doesn’t understand why Sole won’t let him get a part-time job at the water treatment plant.

“When I was his age I was cleaning chimneys and bartering with caravans!”

Piper encourages Shaun to work hard, and so when Sole deems most jobs in Diamond City too dangerous, she lets him sell papers with Nat.

Unfortunately, Shaun is garbage at it. He’s more occupied with pointing out Piper’s typos than actually advertising.

Piper eventually drops the whole “child labor” thing and allows him to be more of a kid. She knows he deserves a break after all he’s been through.

Nick:

As someone who has encountered many cases of missing children, Nick can be a little overbearing.

He’s adamant about enforcing curfew and knowing exactly which friends Shaun hangs out with.

However, he struggles to understand Shaun’s youthful desire to be “normal”

“One of your parents is a gen-2 synth detective and the other is a pre-war popsicle, Shaun. You were never going to be boring, that’s for sure.”

He really tries to make Shaun feel like a regular kid. Nick introduces him to crime noir comics and a respectable wardrobe. Even if Shaun feels like an outsider, the kid has developed excellent taste.

X6-88

Coursers were designed for killing. Not parenthood.

X6 tries his best to be a sensitive father. He listens to Shaun’s problems and, only when asked, offers solutions.

He even researches games Shaun might like to play, just so they could experience some traditional pre-war father-son bonding. 

However, Sole banned sports in the house. An errant baseball through a window could be blamed for that.

X6′s biggest mistake was trying to impress Shaun. He didn’t realize Shaun loved him unconditionally. Coursers only knew the value of usefulness. If he wasn’t actively showing his worth as a father, he felt like he was failing.

Shaun finally begs X6 to stop his constant posturing. “I don’t love you because you give me toys and take me on cool trips,” Shaun explained. “I love you because you’re my dad.”

X6 felt like Father of Shaun was a better title than even Father of the Institute.