#i gotta train with color values more

[empty-dream]

Fate/Samurai Remnant: *is announced* Me: Ok. Fate/Samurai Remnant: *has melancholic maybe-not-really Jalter, Ruler Gilgamesh, and possibly Yoshinaka* Me: HELL YEAAAAHHHH

Jeanne Alter (???)

Tbh I didnt care much about her in FSR at first cuz isn't she only capable of existing in FGO-verse and getting out of it is blatant cash cow exploitation breaking the rule which I'm not interested in the detail.

Until I realized that this Jalter looks exclusively somber while FGO Jalter always has this smug look. And then there is the theory that either this is just Jeanne but corrupted (which breaks the "Jeanne's so holy any attempt to corrupt her will fail" rule so instead it'll create a new version of Jalter instead of FGO Jalter) or this is a different person altogether.

Anw, long live that somber look.

Boss

*Gilgamesh is the shopkeeper in FSR* WHAT

*He is also a Ruler* WHAAATTTTT

Well he considers everything to be his anyway so yeaah he basically never cares about the Grail or who should win it, which technically does qualify him as the ever impartial Ruler.... (I guess the Catholic saint requirement for that class is completely obsolete by now.)

Though ngl I did imagine Ruler Gil at least once after the Caster incarnation was introduced.

Rogue Saber

HOLY SHIT YOSHINAKA-SAMA IS THAT YOU???????

[itsbenedict]

I saw a post recently that was like "I like it when stories are more confusing and ambiguous", and my initial reaction was to go "Yeah, I agree! I love being confused!"

But the thing is- I don't always love being confused. Confusion, in an of itself, is not the experience I'm looking for. What I like is the feeling of becoming more and less confused. What I'm looking for is the... average absolute value of the derivative of confusion.

Let's graph some stuff:

A good story- or at least, the kind of story I enjoy- should be something like... a roller coaster:

Some stories, like, say, your average coffee shop AU fanfic, are never confusing. These are like riding a train- you ride them to get to your destination, and there's some pretty scenery along the way, but you know exactly what you're in for and the whole thing stays at a minimum of confusion.

Other stories, like your average horror story, ramp up the confusion and just stay there, never going down, because the confusion is there to build tension and scare you, not to be resolved or anything like that.

Neither of those are my cup of tea. I want some movement- which is why I like mystery so much.

Many more straightforward mystery stories build up a stock of confusion right up front, and then reduce the confusion gradually over time, occasionally spiking a bit when a strange new clue is discovered, but mainly sloping straight downwards, like biking down a big hill. Exhilarating!

The best mysteries are the ones that are always going up and down in confusingness- introducing new questions and new answers at a pace that ensures you're always at some point becoming less confused about one thing and more confused about another, until it all wraps up at the end. The... rollercoaster analogy breaks down a bit here, since it can't be going up and down simultaneously...

The different colors are different plot threads, I guess. You've always got something resolving and something building.

Sometimes the medium is something like a long-running franchise, a series, a cinematic universe- where you can't tie every piece of confusion up at the end. Gotta have something for the next installment. These sorts of media tend to have slightly less satisfying pacing, because when you chop up a story like that, you're sacrificing satisfying conclusions to maintain an audience's interest over periods of the story not happening. You can try to find places where lots of plot threads have local minima of confusingness to break on, but it's often not going to be natural.

And sometimes you get things like Harrow the Ninth, where it stays at an 8 for most of the book and then rapidly oscillates back and forth:

or Blaseball, which just intends to monotonically increase in confusingness forever:

or… uh, whatever Homestuck thought it was doing.

[assignmentimprobable]

I haven’t subjected anybody to my posting in the last month so it’s time to break my streak with a dose of word salad.

To Start… It really gets my goat that it’s sort of integrated into Wolverine lore on a fandom level now that Stryker was the Weapon X culprit. Not necessarily because ‘oh that’s not how it was in the comics!’, even though that’s part of it. More because I think there is something genuinely interesting in the kind of evil that Stryker presented in God Loves, Man Kills (1982), the story that made up half of the movie’s plot elements and themes.

More below the cut. Warning for discussions of eugenics, racism, mentions of lynching.

Yes. This comic.

There’s a lot to be said about the prevailing relevance of televangelists using religious hypocrisy and white supremacist ideology in mass media to spead bigotry and incite lynchings within their following.

I do actually recognize the value of compositing Stryker’s character with Dr. Thornton from the Weapon X (1991) story. You only get 2 hours to hash out what’s happening, the writers wanted to pick up the threads from the last movie. For the purpose of a movie, a military contractor and scientist is an easy evil to swallow, because duh, and an easier one to clean up. That said, I think it was only ever good for that one outing.

Seeing him again in Origins can be explained as taking us back full circle— But even then, it falls apart because there’s such a Nothingness to his inclusion. He’s a generic CO without anything to add to the overarching dialogue on mutants, or the underpinnings of the original Weapon X story (Which is a problem for another post because I’ve got some fucking WORDS to say about the entirety of… all that. And how the movie undertook it). I KNOW that you’re probably thinking ‘why would you expect intelligence from origins’, and it’s like, I don’t. I watched that shit when it hit bootleg fresh off the DVD guy’s trunk collection. But if you’re gonna make such a big change with these kinds of ramifications on a movie timeline and stand on it, then well. I’m gonna write about it. Especially when he’s in fuckin DOFP and I’ve gotta see his foreshadowed impact getting waved around.

The point of Stryker in GLMK was that he couldn’t be easily handled by sending the X-Men in, he’s a political figure using the cover of free speech, fundamentalist Christian “values��� and gathering enough clout to perpetrate some heinous shit.

Stryker didn’t need to experiment on anybody or invade the X-Mansion to make their lives palpably worse. He was gathering up the already large following of people gung ho as fuck to legislate on mutant rights. I used the word “lynching” earlier with intent, because that’s exactly what he did: the comic starts with two black mutant children being lynched and having a sign with the mutant slur hung on the bodies. Which. Alright. The use of black pain and black death in a story like this inevitably serves the allegory and makes the conclusion inescapable for even the most braindead readers of 1982. Dare I say, inescapable for the braindead readers of 2024. That said, the margin of leeway you can give it (if you even want to) gets smaller when you consider Kitty Pryde dropping the n word to ‘prove a point’ in the same story. How the mutant metaphor constantly assumes the volatility and natural genetic power of the underclass. Or how the team never seemed to have more than one face of color at a time having something vital to do, if even that. Hm.

Anyways, in invoking the imagery for this murder: The story illustrates that Stryker’s ultimate conclusion is 1-to-1 with his real life counterparts. It’s the last stop on the train to annihilation, and it never stops at just one group of arbitrarily picked undesirables. Bigotry never has one layer . You peel it back and you get another. You get down to the root of eugenics, the exclusion it’s all white supremacy. The same fire and brimstone preacher tactics, the same righteous indignation about problems that aren’t even Real. Designations of ‘natural’ that are presupposed by European defaults. The front runners of it have just gotten enough fucking simpletons thinking that they won’t be next, or not even *caring* that they’ll be next, as long as the object of their hate gets to suffer. It all comes down to the fuckin race science with these people. It does stink something fierce that FOX/Marvel were so afraid of pissing off evangelists that they bit the bullet and changed things up. It’s really a disservice to the story it’s adapting, and I LIKE X2! It’s probably my favorite of the movies?

TLDR: Corporations are cowards when it comes to standing on business. The Strykers of the world were real 42 years ago and they’re real now. Oh, and if I never see William Stryker again in an X-Men film, it’ll be too soon.

[gamesception]

Sception Reads Cass Cain #37

Batgirl (2000) #17 - August 2001 Writer: Kelley Puckett Pencils: Damion Scott inks: Robert Campanella Colors: Jason Wright

Cass's book as been pretty downbeat for the last few issues. The tone of Cass's book overall is pretty sad and heavy, and normally I'm all about that angst, but the book can't live on angst alone, so have to have some brighter moments for contrast, you've gotta take the pressure off every once in a while if you want to keep building it or you just burn out the scale. So this issue brings us a refreshing change of pace, if only to give Cass and the reader a bit of a breather.

Sorry if this one goes up late. I'm running behind time wise, but I don't want to take a minimal approach to this issue, it's pretty important and has a lot of great moments. Do pease read it for yourself first, though.

The issue starts with this pretty cool sequence showing Cass's perspective as she gets distracted by the woman running away and lets this random goon land a punch on her. I like how the slideshow effect of the three repeated panels really emphasizes how much time Cass had to dodge this punch.

Followed by this great 'like father like daughter moment after she knocks the guy out where Cass and Bruce both have the same surprised and befuddled "Hmm" reaction to what just happened, with the same expression on their face and everything.

The perfectly synchronized training afterwords is also great, as is Bruce's worried expression. I can't keep copying every page over, we'll be here all day, but this issue really is great. One of my favorites. Again, go read it for yourself if you haven't.

Anyway, on the one hand this is such an indictment of Bruce. We the audience know that 'somethings been wrong' with Cass for a while, basically the entire time. She's consumed by guilt to a near suicidal degree and the loneliness and isolation of her lifestyle - even before she was forced out of Bab's clock tower but especially since - has left her without any companionship beyond her own self destructive thoughts, and the mission she's so dedicated to as her only hope of redemption continuously exposes her to the worst of humanity. So yeah, that Bruce didn't already know something was wrong, that he didn't anticipate how his decisions were making things worse, that he only notices that anything's off at all once Cass's mental state is bad enough that it's affecting her performance on the job? Yeah, that's pretty bad, if also so completely him.

On the other hand, you can see the concern all over his face. He should have seen this coming, he should have noticed it sooner, but now that he has he is very genuinely worried on her behalf, and that does count for something, even if he'll need help figuring out what's wrong or what to do about it.

And that help just so happens to call in the form of Barbara Gordon, who can hack in to delete the government's digital records on Cass's face, but needs her to sneak in and destroy the physical records.

At first Cass and Bruce don't feel like this is worth bothering with, as neither sees any value in her potential future civilian persona worth taking this risk to get it back, but Babs points out how they might yet connect the data they have to Batgirl and that convinces Bruce, which in turn convinces Cassandra because she absolutely does not think for herself these days.

I love this Jab Babs gets in at Bruce as Cass leaves, though I do wish it was made a bit more explicit that the *reason* Bruce has been keeping Cass on such a 'short leash' is that he doesn't fully trust her ever since David sent the video of her killing that man way back in issue number 4. On the surface Bruce is still deep in denial over it, but some part of it has to know, has to doubt at least. As is I'm pretty sure that's intentional subtext but because it's not explicit in the text I could just be reading in something that isn't really there.

In infiltration mission is pretty cool, starting with this sequence where Cass steals a key card off of a guard's bead chain, copies it, and puts it back without him noticing, which has Barbara admitting that the 'short leash' is starting to make sense. Just what exactly would Cass be capable of if she were allowed to run free?

....

The mission is successful, the files and physical evidence destroyed, and Cass's out-of-costume persona is free and clear. She can visit Barbara again, can see the sun again. Can. But will she?

Babs clearly doesn't think she will, at least not on her own, and so she goes to Bruce about it

It's a nice scene. I've missed Bab's presence in Cass's book the last few issues. This 'arguing over what's best for Cass' bit is fun, and also important characterization. I love how Bruce's expression as he says "Mole creature?" makes clear that he recognizes Bab's comment as a criticism of him and his lifestyle.

Of course, Bruce has a different idea of what's been bothering Cass. Not the isolation, not how /he's/ been treating her, but the mission. Everything's the mission for Bruce, and Cass is just like Bruce after all. The thing is, as right as Barbara clearly is here, Bruce probably isn't wrong either. Cass, like Bruce, dwells on her 'failures'. But taking down the villain responsible never actually makes Bruce feel any better.

Barbara still presses him to just order Cass to get some sun. The fact that she shouldn't need Bruce to tell her to do that, that this level of devotion and lack of independent motivation is a bad thing in and of it self, is too big of a problem to tackle today.

And to his credit Bruce relents!

I love these panels. You can feel how overwhelming the light is after so long in the darkness. Also good work from the colorist, showing this transition by going from all dark and cool colors that dominate her book to these warm (but washed out and too bright as her eyes struggle to adjust) colors. I mean, it's a fairly obvious trick, like being wowed when a musician changes chords, but it just works so well here.

And it's not just the sun, it's the people. Not just cass literally going from darkness to light but also going from being surrounded by victims and criminals, by the suffering and the cruel, and emerging into a wider world full of all the breadth and diversity of the human experience, loud happy annoyed worried people walking and running and shouting and living their lives that Scott does such a great job conveying with just a single page full of different and interesting faces.

And afterwards she's so happy, having picked up a rose from, somewhere, we don't see that bit. But of course Bruce needs to interrupt this moment of happiness.

So Cass does go to confront gov't man.

but clearly she doesn't actually feel better about what happened afterwords.

Her symbolism happiness rose, only so recently acquired, is already wilting. It's clearly not the sort of thing she can go to Bruce about. So, for once, now that she can, Cass actually reaches out to Barbara for help. About the rose. About what it means that getting justice for repentant sniper man's death didn't make her feel any better about it.

It's a great little scene to end out the comic. Symbolism's a bit on the nose, but it works. it's sincere.

The angst and darkness of the last few issues has been a lot, but it makes this bit of brightness feel all the more impactful. The underlying issues aren't resolved, it's still a problem that Cass has basically slotted Bruce into exactly the same unhealthy role that David used to occupy in her life. It's still a problem that Bruce let her do that. A real confrontation when Bruce can no longer deny the fact that she killed someone is still looming, as is her death match with Lady Shiva. But she's not quite so isolated now, and she's re-established a connection with someone who might actually be able to help her work through some of this stuff.

This might be the issue that best demonstrates the importance of Barbara Gordon in Cass's story, the key role she plays balancing out Bruce's influence. these interpersonal relationships and how they feed off each other - Cass/Bruce/David, Cass/Bruce/Barbara, they're the core of what makes Cass's book and Cass as a character so compelling.

......

Side note: I've waffled in the past over how much crediting to put at the start of each of these posts in terms whether to include inker and/or colorist even though I rarely comment on those issues. I'm wondering if I should also list the editor each time, as they also potentially have a pretty big say over what does or doesn't end up in the books, and keeping track of changing editors might be informative as to other changes in direction, or might show why some of Cass's side appearances work better than others?

For the Record, at least as far as her solo book goes, the editor as of issue 17 is Michael Wright, who took over from Dennis O'Neil starting in issue 14, the one where Bruce moved Cass out of Barbara's clock tower and into her own cave. Dennis O'Neil had been the editor of the book since issue 3 and co-edited issue 2 with Darren Vincenzo, who was the editor for issue 1. I think Michael Wright stays as editor for the rest of Cass's Batgirl run, save maybe for some one off exceptions here or there? So noting editors would be more for the sake of guest appearances.

There's also the issue of who's in charge at DC. As of issue 17 that's still Jenette Khan as President and Editor in Chief, but eventually Dan DiDio takes over, and it'll be worth noting when that happens. The fandom tends to assign him a lot of the blame for 'ruining' Cass's character, but as mentioned a few times already they also tend to date that downturn purely to the end of her ongoing title and heel turn in 'One Year Later.' I claim the decline started setting in much sooner then that, but I don't remember whether it started before or after DiDio's tenure as EIC began.

That's still a long way off from where this blog currently is, though.

Thankfully.

[elfboyeros]

Family Dinners

Find More Bridgehid Stuff Here

@jj-pines @karaboutmyart @lerenee

Piano music bounced softly off the pearl walls of a distinguished home, the barriers held no sentimental value to anyone, and the off-white walls were devoid of even any art or even family photos.

A grand piano was below a stairwell, this is where Nemo was playing, while in his family home.

"Geronimo!"

He stopped playing, turning at the sound of his given name, seeing his little sister running toward him.

"Hey, Sparrow," he replied, standing up from the piano to hug her. He always enjoyed their hugs.

Sparrow, the youngest of the Hoedemarkers, was often described as her mother's mini-me.

She had the same pearl-white skin as her brother, the pinkish purple eyes of her mother, unique dual white and black hair that no one in the current family holds proudly, and she wore the symbolic pearls around her neck that marked her as a member of the family.

"Sir Geronimo."

Nemo cut his eyes toward the maid watching over his sister while he hugged Sparrow, "I see it's mother's day off once again."

"Lady Wisteria is very busy, sir."

Nemo rolled his eyes, "My mother is a drunk, she is never busy!"

"Geronimo, can we have my piano lesson today?" the young dual-haired girl asked.

He smiled down at his sister, "That's why I'm here," he answered with a small smile before sitting at the piano again, "Have you been practicing?"

Sparrow nodded as she stared at the keys before showing her older brother how much she improved since they had last had a piano lesson.

The middle-aged maid stood not too far from the little miss.

An hour or so passed with Nemo and Sparrow continuing their little piano lesson before Nemo felt someone approaching.

He looked away from his sister, to find that his mother was approaching from the foyer.

"Hello," he scoffed, "mother."

The maid bowed at the lady's presence.

Nemo only resembled her in hair color, her skin was olive colored, her eyes the same color as her youngest daughter, and her pearls hung from her earlobes.

"It is nice to see you, Geronimo," she spoke in a low tone that was very wobbly.

Nemo only let out a grunt, "Sparrow, I think we gotta cut it short today."

Sparrow stopped playing, her smile fading and her lips forming a thin line.

"When will you be back?" she asked as she stared at the piano keys.

"I don't know, Sparrow," he answered.

"Will it be soon?"

Nemo frowned as his little sister looked up at him with a discouraged look on her face, "...I'll try."

"Promise?"

"Promise," he replied sorrowfully.

Nemo stood from the piano and headed for the entrance.

"Geronimo, will you be back for dinner?" Wisteria asked as he passed by her.

"Nope, I have better things to do," he scoffed before leaving the mansion.

He went to the train station, so he could head back to the college.

Early in the morning, the college administration informed the facility and staff that the college lockdown had finally been lifted.

The students and staff were free to travel outside of campus if they happened to be stuck on campus after the attack on the school almost a week prior.

"Hey, Row, you wanna come to dinner with me?" Georgia asked as Rowan sat in her dorm on the bed that hadn't been used since Rowan was made to stay in the last week.

Rowan looked up from their cozy comfort game on their portable gaming console, "...Like in the cafeteria?" they asked.

"No, no, come to my home, have dinner with me and my family," Georgia replied.

Rowan looked at her confused, "Me? Go to a family dinner?" they asked quietly pointing at themself then pointing at her, "With you?"

"Yeah, of course," Georgia giggled, "You're one of my best friends."

Rowan's heart stopped, a best friend to the loveable Georgia, which means a lot more than Georgia will ever realize, "...I-I have to ask Indigo, but yes!"

Georgia squealed, pacing around and getting ready as Rowan waited for a response from Indigo which they didn't get.

"Huh, Indigo isn't responding," they remarked leaving Georgia's dorm.

"We could stop by the infirmary, and you could ask Calvin?" Georgia suggested.

They never really thought of that before, Indigo is "the ruler of the castle", the head of her household, and asking Calvin for permission to do something feels... wrong. As if they were a small child asking Daddy if they can do something because Mommy will get mad.

Although Rowan did agree. So they continued to follow Georgia out of the dorms, running into Nemo in the process.

"Hey, Nemo!" Georgia said cheerfully. He grunted, passing them on the path while heading for the dorms, leaving Rowan and Georgia to shrug at one another before heading for the infirmary.

On the campus, the infirmary sits close to the main building but disconnected, available for the public despite being on the college campus.

They were greeted by Maverick packing up his things, while several healers did their jobs, and Sloan could be spotted in Casper's room sleeping on the window bench.

"Hey, Ricky!" Georgia chimed.

"...Hi," he muttered.

"Is Calvin in his office?" Rowan asked.

The healer in training nodded.

"What's wrong?" the seer girl asked her friend.

"I gotta go see my parents."

"Oh no," Georgia gasped, "Do you need back up?"

"No," he said, shaking his head, "You're going to see your family, that's more important."

Georgia sighed as he passed by her and watched Rowan enter Calvin's office.

They entered while the healer was in the middle of a phone call.

"Hold on, sir – Hey kid, whatcha need?" he asked.

"Indigo isn't answering my text," Calvin sighed at their response, "I was just wondering if I could go to Georgia's for dinner."

He thought for a moment, "Sure, just text me when you get there and on your way back... and if anything concerning happens!"

Rowan nodded, "Is something wrong with Indigo?" they asked.

"You don't have to worry; she's just being her at the moment."

Rowan nodded, again, thinking back to before orientation how she shut herself away while writing her speech. That must be the "being her" that Calvin is talking about.

Rowan and Georgia left with smiles on their faces, while the healer in training they saw earlier was walking towards the dean's office.

"Marisol." a voice said.

Maverick looked up to see two women.

They were standing by Duke's office door looking toward the direction Maverick was coming from, one of the women resembled Duke, with dark hair, moss green eyes, and olive skin, while the other woman was blonde, pale, and had stone-colored eyes.

"That's not my name," he muttered.

"Right, right, sorry," the blonde woman commented apologetically, "It's nice to see you, Maverick."

The three exchanged glances.

"Come on, let's not keep him waiting," the other woman said with a melancholic tone and look on her face.

"Okay, mom."

His mothers entered the office behind him, greeted with the view of Duke standing in front of the window behind his desk.

"Imogene, Maverick. My sweet little girl, Temperance," Duke mused, extending out his arms as he walked towards his desk.

"It's nice to see you, daddy," Temperance muttered.

"Why are we here?" Maverick asked very cross.

"Can I not wish to see my family?" Duke asked, taking a seat at his desk.

"You never want to see us together," Maverick retorted.

"Maverick," Duke sighed, "Your mothers would like you to return home."

"This is it? You cryptically texted me after a disaster to tell me my moms want me to go back home?!"

"Maverick, we miss you," Imogene chirped up.

"You can't even get my name right!"

"You keep changing it," Imogene replied dismissively.

"It's been Maverick since I was 12!"

"Imogene, he is right," Temperance added, "He may have not been home where we could say it, but his name is Maverick."

"This isn't about getting me to come home," Maverik groaned frustratedly before pointing at Duke, "You want something else from me!"

"Temperance, Imogene, can you give us a moment?" Duke asked.

The two women nodded, leaving the two of them alone, "Sit down, Maverick."

Maverick sat in one of the chairs in front of Duke's desk.

Duke's voice was different without Temperance and Imogene in the room, he was more orotund and throatier, not his regular honeyed tone.

"Our plan did not work."

"Your plan didn't work," Maverick retorted, "I had no part of it."

"Oh, dear boy," Duke sighed, "You forget you opened that tower."

Maverick frowned, staring at his hands, "...You made me."

Duke chuckled, "Sure, I did."

"You threatened to mess with Nemo's grades!"

"You have to admit it was thrilling," Duke mused, "The thrill of the rush!"

"No! I feel horrible, I almost killed Casper!"

"Yet, he lives."

"He's in a coma!"

"A healing coma."

"He's still in a coma, granddad!"

Duke rolled his eyes, leaning back in his chair, "Regardless, I need one more thing from you," he sighed.

"No!" Maverick shouted.

"I haven't even asked—"

"It's going to involve Rowan and I want no part of it anymore!"

Maverick stood from his chair abruptly, heading toward the door.

"Maverick!" Duke said firmly, standing once again.

"Don't worry, I'll keep your little secret, like always, but I'm not hurting my friend!"

A few miles away, fresh off the train, in the late afternoon sun, Georgia and Rowan traveled toward the seers' family home.

Passing big expensive houses hidden behind gates and greenery. Georgia pointed at one of the houses as they walked past.

"That's Elias and Nemo's house. My house isn't too far."

It was a lovely large house, pearl white, with contemporary architecture.

"Wow," Rowan muttered before a short pause, "I wonder if they ever had that family dinner."

Within that pearl-white house, Elias sat at the enormous dining room table, with his white haired and blue eyed father at the head of the table, his mother to his right, Sparrow to his left, his oldest sister in front of him, and his middle sister to her right, both of the women had white hair, blue-eyes, and the hereditary two beauty marks under their right eyes.

"Is Geronimo coming, Mom?" his middle sister asked.

"No," Wisteria muttered.

Elias looked over at his eldest sister who held a very irritated look on her face.

"He's always been a disobedient boy," his father remarked.

"Myrtle, please," Wisteria mumbled.

"He's not wrong," his middle sister commented.

"Ammonia, really?" Elias sighed.

"What?" she scoffed, "Geronimo disobeys father whenever he's home!"

"People say I'm a bitch sometimes, maybe I'm disobedient too," his oldest sister stated in a low tone.

"Come on, Dahila," Ammonia sighed, "Geronimo punches trees when he's angry!"

"That was one time, Ammonia, get over it," Dahila noted.

"..Please stop fighting," Wisteria stammered out.

"I was in that tree and his punch shook it!"

Elias rolled his eyes, as his older sisters went back and forth.

"Girls, you're making your mother upset," Myrtle grumbled, "Besides, Geronimo is nothing but a stain on the family and a blemish to this family's legacy. Now, you my boy, Elias, you will do well when you graduate!"

"Are you kidding me?" Elias yelled, slamming his silverware on the table, "What legacy?! You make bullets, Dad, and get pissed off when people don't buy them! You had children just to attempt to have a "proper heir" for your shitty family business. If you don't get what you want you forget about the children you do have, and leave them for maids to take care of! While the woman you forced to marry you drinks herself to exhaustion!"

"Elias," Dahila uttered, concerned.

"Nemo is making a life for himself! Not sitting back while you insult him like you have been doing since he was born. You named him like you named Ammonia, you named them the first thing you could think of because you couldn't be bothered to give your own children decent names," Elias screamed, as he stood from his seat, "And if there one thing I don't give two shits about, it's you and the business! You have never once asked me if I would even like to follow in your footsteps, you just assumed I would. But guess what? I won't! Guns disgust me, and being a small part in someone's death is not something I want on my soul. I want to help people, in my own way, and it will not be alongside you!"

"You've been spending too much time with Geronimo," Myrtle muttered, "You two being roommates at that college was a bad idea."

"HIS NAME IS NEMO!" Elias screamed, "I DON'T CARE THAT IT'S NOT THE YOU GAVE HIM! HIS NAME IS NEMO!"

They heard the sound of a chair scraping across the linoleum floors.

That sound was Sparrow as she got up from her chair and ran out of the dining room.

"Elias, come on. You've said enough," Dahlia noted softly.

Elias huffed, "I never should have come."

He sighed, staring at the ceiling, "I'm just going to grab my stuff and go back to campus."

Elias left the dining room soon after, heading to his room to gather his things.

Meanwhile, Rowan and Georgia had enjoyed a lovely dinner with the seer's large family.

After meeting all of Georgia's family members and helping her parents clean up dinner, Georgia ran upstairs to grab a few things and look at her younger siblings' arts and crafts.

This left Rowan to head for the front door to wait for their friend.

They looked into the living room and saw Georgia's grandmother knitting a blanket.

"It was nice to meet you, Mrs. Nozadze," Rowan spoke as they stood in the archway of the living room.

"Come here, child," the old woman beckoned.

Rowan stepped before the old woman, who had stopped her knitting and stuck out her hand.

"Take it, dear," she cooed.

They hesitantly took her hand, and her eyes opened wide, ultimately gold.

It was quite magical and bright; Rowan was filled with a warm feeling as they could only assume the older woman was using her seeing powers to look at their future.

"Something big is coming," she said, "and you are at the center."

"Huh? Me?"

"Yes, my child, you will face something big, something that will change your being for forever onward," Georgia's grandmother spoke with great confidence.

She knew what she was talking about, given her age and wisdom, "Be safe, dear, I like you," she muttered in a very elderly woman voice.

Rowan nodded as they let go of the woman's hand.

"Hey Rowan, ready to go?" Georgia called.

"Yeah."

The two of them left the large home and traveled back to the train station, running into Elias in the process.

"Hey, Elias!" Georgia cheered.

He turned around, smiling immediately once he saw Georgia and Rowan.

"You had dinner with your family, Georgia?" he asked.

"Yeah, Rowan even came with me."

"It was very nice," they added.

"I glad someone had a good day today."

"Did you go and see your parents?" Rowan asked.

Elias nodded, "I don't think I'll go back in a while."

"Well next time we can go to my house and have dinner together!" Georgia remarked cheerfully, "Our own little family dinner."

Elias and Rowan smiled at each other, "That sounds like a really good idea!"

If only it didn't feel like it may never happen.

[vyeoh]

what is the process you use to make your drawings? and what base do you use for the people, I’m trying to get better at drawing people myself, and I absolute love your style! 😊

Hi! I usually

1) sketch out my compositions

2) do a clean sketch/dirty line work layer

3) do my base colors

4) do a basic shading pass with a multiply layer and a hardvpainting brush

5) do a basic highlight pass with a 30% add layer and a hard inking brush

6) do more multiply and add layers from there until I'm happy

7) merge, and fix any final things by color dropping and painting directly onto the layer

Here's a speedpaint of my process I posted before, its a bit different from the process described, but honestly I'm always playing around with different styles and processes so I mess around with these steps a lot lol

(Similarly i can never tell people what brushes i use because I usually just download a bunch of cool looking free ones and then choose a random one)

As for drawing people, I also can't really give many shortcuts; I'm a biology student who learned art under someone who was classically trained, so I basically did studies until I learned the bones and muscles, and now for better or for worse, I don't really use references. I'd say what really changed the way I thought about drawing people was learning all the joints in the body, and how they functioned.

Like, knowing the range of motion of your body is super helpful, and even if your proportions are weird you won't end up with janky posing.

It's also helpful, when drawing muscles, to think of your body as a piston system. You have an antagonist muscle that pairs with each muscle that essentially reverses it's motion (think: biceps and triceps) and thus whenever you draw a person flexing an arm, for example, keep in mind that if you draw that buff bicep, you gotta also leave room for the triceps. Also remember that fat exists on any healthy person, so limbs should really never be sticks

Last drawing tip for people: learn how to shade things, like just generally. Things are a mix of hard and soft shadows, and don't be scared to really push your values to be very light and dark. I've been told not to shade with black but honestly, the way I layer multiply layers just means I do it anyways and as a not-professional, I like how it looks

tldr: unfortunately, I don't know any tricks or shortcuts, I only can suggest to learn the rules before you break em. Sometimes classical art training techniques are good

[tenaciouschronicler]

November 3 2024 2009

Is it exposing myself if I say Potential Verdancy is my favorite of the tracks? Im not a raver I swear! (not to say thats a bad thing, ive just legit never been to a rave)

This is hilarious. In universe who is writing this I gotta know.

The next pages where we delve into the Midnight Crew are interesting. I almost wanna say that that the title MIDNIGHT CREW: ACT 1031 is a misnomer if you take it at face value. While the page after shows that we saw exactly what Jade did, the animation itself felt more like a trailer for the comic or even like she was reading all those pages and we only got flashes. What I did get though were more names to analyze.

Our four members are named after their respective card suit, which in themselves function similar to strife cards. The second parts of their names are interesting though. Droog and Slick are slang terms for henchman to a gang leader and a clever swindler respectively. Duece and Boxcars have more going for them. Duece can either just be for the second card of a deck or a dice throw of two points. Boxcars, while normally related to trains, can also be slang for a dice throw of two sixes neting 12 points. I kinda wish all the members had names that related to dice.

The only other name we get is of the ruval gang called the Felt. Im very curious of these guys since the ones we see have different colored and numbered hats.

Having passed the time, all of two minutes, Jade gets impatient and decides to pester Dave once again showing us a previous chatlog but with more context surrounding it.

In all we are slowing down just a little which is great for me while I work on the write up about the kids.

[falcor-thee-luck-dragon]

Your Traveling Circus

Geralt x (f) dhampir reader

-a side quest story from my series rewrite Of Monsters And Men

Summary: With the three of you in some small village looking for supplies, a surprising chance meeting with an old acquaintance takes yourself, Geralt and Jaskier on quite the adventure. Also this has nothing to do with an actual Circus, name just sounds right for the context

Warning: adventuring, fluff, smut (it gets steamy), blood, fighting, unexpected happenings we got it all

Masterlist

Walking past a missing persons poster stuck to a wooden plank, you stop a second on your way to the village marketplace. Eyes scanning all around the wording and the drawn image of a young prince. The poster reads as follows,

Missing: Prince Alaric of Althurna last seen September 18th in his home during a banquet. Missing since the morning after. If seen please approach cautiously and return him to the King and Queen of Althurna. He is 17 years of age, blonde hair with brown eyes. 

Reward: 100 crowns, 200 ducats, and a plot of land 

"Missing prince?" You mutter to yourself, scarlet irises grazing over the shittily drawn image of the prince in question, "Not very descriptive either. Oh well, hope someone finds the poor bastard." Tearing your eyes away from the poster you then continue your way into the area filled all around with vendors and people alike.

Eyeing up a new pair of beautiful dark colored traveling boots that are admittedly much nicer then your own. You stand off to the side while the vendor woman most certainly younger then twenty-three speaks to a man looking at more then just the footwear.

She smiles brightly at his tan face and obsidian irises pulling her in like a moth to candlelight. He sweet talks her, words of travel and adventure dropping off of his tongue from many days traveling around. She's eating it up.

He looks down at his own dirt smudged boots and you're able to catch a glimpse of his handsomely stubbled face. He's undoubtedly a diamond in the rough, however he is not even a hair close to that of Geralt's wild beauty. Your handsome white wolf.

"You want a pair of boots?" Asks your sweet man of the hour as he steps next to you, golden eyes trained onto the vendors stand.

"I don't want a pair, however...I do need a pair."

"Hmm."

"I like the ones with the steel plate by the toe, good protection."

"You don't need much protection Y/N, what about the ones on the right with the lacing?"

"They all have lacing."

"Yes, but the ones over there. Those boots with the one tassel end pointed, it’s coated in steel. You'd look good with those." Says Geralt as your eyes lock onto the boots of choice.

"Oh yeah they look pretty good. Little problem with that."

"What?"

"I don't happen to have enough coin. You got a copper? A ducat, a crown, a farthing perhaps?"

Geralt pats himself like he's searching for some hidden coins on his person, "Nothing. Guess I don't have a single coin after all, thought I would have had something hidden around me. Sorry."

"Sorry." You mock with a scoff, "And how do you suppose we're going to eat?"

"I used the last of our coin for food actually."

You raise a brow, "Oh yeah is that right? Maybe we sell Roach and then we'd actually have enough for those boots and a weeks stay in the local inn."

"I'm not selling Roach."

"No." You sigh, "We need her she holds all our shit...hmm, how about the bard?"

"Jaskier could be of value. There's gotta be some lord in the next town over who's got some personal vendetta against him."

You nod, "Most certainly, and if there are wanted posters with his name on them. We start to spread rumors of Jask completing even a worse crime that the lord will have no choice but to increase the flow of gold for his capture. Our reward."

"Perfect. Then you get your boots and a week in an inn, no need to sleep in the woods."

"A fool proof plan ironically at the center of a fool. It's almost poetic."

Geralt smiles, "A good plan indeed."

"What plan are you two beasts talking about?" Asks Jaskier as he finds his way between the two of you. Both yourself and Geralt step roughly to the side when he does this. Geralt gives him a nasty look unseen to the bards bright blues while they stay trained to the shoe vendor.

Who stands behind it.

"Jaskier." You speak in a warning tone.

He looks over at you, "What? I was simply observing the fine craftsmanship of those beautiful boots. I was thinking about getting myself a pair."

Getalt scoffs, "You just bought those a month ago."

"Well yes, and they're already so worn down. Maybe she can find a way to repair them a bit for me....then, no worries my friends we will be well on our way." You and Geralt make a telling face at this, well on our way after Jaskier meets someone of great interest? God's hopefully she doesn't like him.

You tap him on the arm, "What about prince of the woods over there sweet talking her?"

"I'll just charm them both Y/N." Says Jaskier matter-of-factly.

"Will you now?"

"Yes. I do happen to enjoy the company of both parties."

"Didn't realize you are a connoisseur of both tastes. I presumed you only ever liked to fondle ladies breasts from time to time." You add with a chuckle as he gives you an almost offended look. He thought you two knew everything about him, somehow this slipped under the carpet.

"Well Y/N, if you must know I'm actually Bi."

You raise your brows at his informative news before pushing him towards the stand, "How about you Bi me some of those boots then." He glares back at you but doesn't say a word, you hiss, showing off your fangs causing the bard to jump and whip around to get you those boots.

Geralt leans into your side, "If I had any coin I'd bet you he's coming back with anything but the boots."

"If I had any coin I'd decline because I know you're right."

He then rests a hand on your forearm, "Come. Let us look for someone in need of a monster kill."

"I kind of want to see what happens but then again, I don't really care." You reach up to gently tug a piece of his snowy colored hair, "You lead the way."

He holds back a growing smile at your playfulness, no doubt does his heart yearn to kiss you in the marketplace to satisfy his needs. However the eyes of wary vendors and village folk alike prevents him so.

In no time have the two of you found an odd old man sitting on the small wooden porch of an apothecary store. He remains on one of the long broad steps of four to the far right. Back hunched over, body lanky and odd though he keeps under a strangely extravagant blanket with colors of oranges and reds like a setting sun. Looks more like an ancient wizard then anything else.

His thick hair is straight and pitch black, face wrinkly and sunken in with two beady forest green eyes. When you and Geralt approach does he raise his head to look at the pair of uncommon strangers. A crooked finger points to you, "A halfblood..." He points to Geralt, "......a mutant."

You keep still when you reach five feet from him on the steps, "And you're a Fowl wizard."

He chuckles, "Sounds better then bird wizard, gives the name more power."

You kneel down to meet his gaze better, "Yes...and underneath that pretty blanket are most certainly feathers and rough bird skin. Why are you here Hector?"

Geralt's brows furrow at this, he wasn't at all aware you know this mage. He then opens his mouth to speak but is cut off by the raspy voice of Hector, "Y/N it has been too long.."

"Why are you here?"

"Can you not give an old man a single moment to appreciate this chance meeting?" He asks, "I have not seen your familiar face in centuries."

Pursing your lips, you glance away before eyeing him back again, "And this means you've survived your trials in Aretuza, escaped more like."

He smiles, "That place only ever gave me a roof over my head, I needed more."

"So you kill a man to achieve.." You look over his smaller body, "...this?"

He nods, "It was the only way to complete the transformation my dear, the blood of a fellow mage is what gives me my full title.....my gift."

You stand, "Yes, unfortunately. And because we were friends, I refused to hunt you down and murder you for it."

He gives you a lopsided smirk, "Did they hate you?"

"No, that mage you killed was a dick."

"Oh, well that's good I just chose whoever was near my room." He then suddenly gets a very thoughtful expression, "Say, why do you travel with this Witcher by your side? Is he your thrall?"

Geralt raises a brow from behind you at that remark while you shake your head, "No Hector. He's my lover.."

"Your lover?" Questions the bewildered old mage, "You've, you've let him see you as a winged beast?"

"Yes. He's not afraid."

Hector leans forward a little, he whispers, "You've let this killer inside you?"

"Of course." You shrug.

Hector swats the air, "That's sacrilegious Y/N, imagine what your mother would say, Queen of the Vampires in her high castle. She'd be unruly, livid even. Furious."

"She is not of my concern at the moment, and this Witcher here need not fear as she only ever lives in the high northern mountains. She refuses to leave the castle."

"Well.....that's good then."

"It's is. Now, why are you in this little village and not in a castle of your own? What happened to your big fantasies of power and wealth?"

He pouts like an annoyed child, hugging his blanket even tighter, "I met a girl."

"A girl?" You reply, tone teasing and light.

"A girl yes. And that's all I wish to speak on it." He grumbles, "Now I reside here away from that business and the wrath of the mages because of what I have done so long ago."

"I'd say it's for the best then. So, considering I have brought you a Witcher. You know of any beasts in need of slaying?"

He scratches his chin, "Hmm. Well, there's a Minotaur killing farmers in some orchard near Gwent about six days ride to the east. Can't remember the actual orchards name at the moment but the head farmer has sent many ravens out in search of someone to take care of the matter."

"And no one has done anything about it yet?" Asks Geralt.

"Of course no one has, would you like to be the single fool tasked with killing a damn Minotaur?"

"Actually yes, that's why we asked you."

"Oh right."

You roll your eyes, "So a place called Gwent, east of here in an orchard with a Minotaur guarding it." You recite, getting them to focus again.

"Yes, yes that's the place."

"That's it? Not what kind of orchard? The farmers name even?"

"Oh no I have not a damn clue we always just burn the ravens letters after a brief skim through. No idea what the farmers name is either."

You gift Geralt the most what-the-fuck kind of face before focusing back on Hector, "Fine, I've worked with less. So, you giving us the coin now or when it is done?"

"Not me, the farmer."

"The farmer, who we don't know the name of, nor the orchard which he so most certainly owns."

"Precisely." Adds the old mage.

"Very well, so long Fowl wizard and good tidings for a better day then this sad one we have found you in. At least your blanket isn't as dreary." You say before turning around and leading Geralt away to find Jaskier.

"I'm not sad or dreary!" Shouts Hector defensively in the foreground though you ignore him.

Walking back through the market to find your bard, you can't help but catch Geralt's curious gaze causing him to look away before smiling to himself. You pump your shoulder into his, "What do you want to know now?"

"Nothing." He can't stop the smile plastered onto his face.

"No we didn't fuck if that's what you were wondering."

Geralt almost chokes on his own spit, "Y/N that-that's not what I was wondering."

"I know that." You laugh, "He was nothing but a friend in Aretuza with dreams of taking flight and falling in love. He obviously got both, with a little cost for his wares of course. His disguise looks pretty good all things considered."

"His disguise?"

"He doesn't age normally like humans, the old hunchbacked man is a simple front to keep himself unknown and hidden easier. He's actually very beautiful when not using his illusions."

"Hmm." He hadn't even realized the old man was using an illusion until you said something about it. He did smell oddly of magic when you were speaking with him.

When you both round the corner do you find both the lady vendor and the traveling rouge engrossed in a deep conversation with Jaskier as he leans against the market stall counter.

"You want to head back to Roach?"

"Yeah he'll find us when he's ready." —— Seated cross legged on the grass, you eye up Geralt who's busy cleaning Roach's one hoof. He sits on a cut log, sleeves rolled up as he works out the mud with a dull blade. He looks so handsome you can't help but think, hair a grayish white falling around his shoulders. Muscles contracting through his skin as he works.

His heartbeat rises and falls, small grunts escaping from his parted lips while he holds the mares one hoof up. You let your heightened senses drink in the delicious scent of Geralt, your tasty Witcher. He doesn't even know what he's doing to you right now.

In the middle of the woods. Hidden far from people.

You bite your lip, it's been almost a week since the last time either of you have spent some pleasantries with one another. Damn Jaskier is always around since this length of time has been spent traveling and sleeping only outside. Without a tavern, you and Geralt can't find a private moment alone.

Sure, while seated on Roach in front of Geralt has he slipped his hand down your pants, gifting some attention to your breasts when he lets you ride with him. Which is something. Jaskier, none the wiser as he keeps behind on foot strumming that lute as Geralt pleasures you.

But it's not the same as being inside one another, alone. Not even close.

Releasing your lip from between your teeth, you contemplate if getting naked in the woods in the daylight somewhat close to a local village is a good idea. Jaskier is distracted with his two new friends, and even if he started on back while you and Geralt were in the middle of things.

You know he'd book it out of there so fast once he heard what was going on, you and Geralt have already scared the poor idiot too many times to count. So with those thoughts brewing in your head, you decide to indulge yourself in your pent up horniness. You are a woman with needs after all.

Hopefully Geralt's in the mood.

You absentmindedly pick at the grass while watching Geralt clean out Roach's last hoof, "Love. I have something to ask you."

Geralt mutters a simple "hmm" as he focuses on the task at hand. You pull out more grass, "You want to fuck?"

He imminently halts all movements before taking a breath and turning his head to look over at you sitting casually in the grass. He raises a brow, "Right now?" An honest question.

"Yes."

"Right here?"

"I don't mind if you don't."

"Hmm."

"We don’t hav..”

"Y/N I do." Quickly says Geralt, "Let me just uh, let me just go clean off my hands okay? I'll be right back." You then watch as he releases Roach's hoof before standing up and slipping past some trees on his way to a small creek nearby. His heartbeat is starting to pick up.

Well that went better then you could have hoped.

Soon enough does he return. Now you're standing in the grass, leather armored chest piece and gauntlets vacant from your body. Just your boots, dark pants, and flowy red blouse that shows off just the perfect amount of cleavage through the opened lacing.

Geralt's golden eyes trail over your body as he stands there with lack of leather armor. A small brilliant smile begins to form upon his lips when you walk over to him. Your hands now trailing down his forearms until they reach his hands.

Holding them loosely, you move your head to gently place a kiss to his cheek. He breaths a heavy whispered sigh at the contact lasting far too little. "Take off your shirt...we don't have all the time in the world." You speak slyly in his ear like a coy vixen. Geralt's blood heats up in all the right places, he then leans in to capture your lips with his. Large hands quickly finding their way underneath your shirt when his fingers begin to squeeze your breasts.

In no time at all have you now found yourself as naked as your name day with a sweaty Witcher eating you up between your legs like a man starved. You bite your tongue to hold back a moan as his hands dig harder into the flesh of your inner thighs.

He feels unbelievably wonderful, the way that his slick tongue slithers it's way up and down your wet folds has you writhing on the thin blanket. You tighten your closed eyelids, hands gripping the blades of greenery when he rubs around your sensitive clit, he knows you well. And he's found the secret door opening you up into a world of pleasure in an instant.

You moan loudly, voice a now gasped whisper as you cum all over his face. Yet he doesn't relent his delicious assault upon your womanhood until he's certain you're ready to scream. When one of your hands grips his hair tightly on instinct, he smiles against you, you’re about to melt like heated gold.

Geralt pulls his mouth from your dripping entrance as you rest your arms out to either side of you. You're sweating and pulsing with pleasure down below from your recent high. Geralt smiles down at you, lips glistening in the sunlight coming down from between the trees as he stands there. So handsome.

"Have I done well?" He teases, knowing full well he's done fantastic.

You smile softly before reaching out a hand, "You were perfect. Now fill me with that beautiful monster between your legs or I'll die." Geralt laughs beautifully before wiping off his mouth with the back of his hand.

"So dramatic." He whispers, ready to crawl over you.

He then finds himself down on his knees, he strokes himself a couple times, watching you before leaning his whole massive body over you. Lining himself up between your opened legs while your hands find their way onto his muscular back.

He kisses you passionately, golden eyes locked with your scarlet ones a second after when you suddenly feel his tip press slowly into your slick folds. His member slips through, stretching your pink walls as be fills you up to the brim. Your mouth opens as a tiny gasp escapes, your nails digging into his skin.

He smiles, lips pressing sweetly unto yours as his hips thrust ever so gently into you. The new sensation feels like electricity firing off throughout your entire vessel. He rolls his hips, thrusting again and again does Geralt begin to form a pleasurable rhythm with you.

Skin pressed to skin, his cock pulsates and throbs from within your core as his body rocks you gently into the blanket placed over the grassy area. His lips capture yours once more to stop you from releasing a scream when he finds your sweet spot.

You gasp when he hits just right, kisses from your Witcher dance around your face as your brows draw upwards with the high your bodies are building to. He kisses your cheek, sweet dirty nothings whispered in your ear as small praises for your very existence.

Geralt's heart beats fast, he hasn't had a proper moment with you like this in too long and right now you're everything all in one. It's no secret you're his favorite person in the whole entire Continent, and he will do all he can to make you know it. To make you feel so special. To make you feel so good.

He's loved you for more then three decades and has admitted that if destiny truly is real, you both were meant to meet. For there is not a single being alive that Geralt cares about more then yourself. You are the most valued treasure. The brightest star in a sky of black. The most beautiful rose held in a garden of flowers big and small.

You are his most treasured love.

Your nails trail pink lines down his muscular back when his pace quickens, he's getting close, he always fucks you harder when he's close to his inevitable release. This new change in rhythm causing soft moans to reach his ears from your lips.

Geralt smiles blissfully down at you, your eyes are shut tight as you take him for all that he is. Your pleasure undoubtedly building the more his manhood does as it's intended. Making you feel so fucking good you'll have your legs wrapped around his torso.

He leans down to place a quick kiss against your forehead, you smile drunkingly with lust at the brief contact. His golden eyes find your beautiful face once again so he can see your pleasure when you reach your climax soon. He's so in love with you it makes him dizzy sometimes, how can you make him feel such a way?

He was created to be heartless, ruthless even, to not feel emotion when he became a Witcher. Yet after many years as a Witcher, he then found you and well...perhaps he never was as terrible as his masters at Kaer Morhen would have led him to believe.

You've managed to draw out something within him that no tavern maid or common whore could ever accomplish before he met you. Not even close. And for all that you do, all that you are to him. He will always find a way to make you know just how spectacular you are.

Another couple deep thrusts have you an undone moaning mess underneath him, your nails digging in to his flesh as you reach the peak of your climax. It feels as though a thousand butterflies are fluttering all about your body. You writhe and shake when his fucking into you doesn't relent for a second.

Your crimson eyes open to find his gentle gaze on you, he loves watching you unfold before him like a blushing maiden losing her flower for the first time to the love of her life. Though you cannot actually blush, by the way your face shifts to such bliss. He knows he's done his job perfectly.

Yet he's not done, and you know it.

Lips press to yours for one last lingering heated messy kiss before he pulls away to finish himself off inside you. His strokes are heavy and deep, cock sliding in and out of you with ease at how wet you are. Hands placed to either side of your head, you grip his forearms as he fucks you deep. Bottoming out every time.

You begin panting as your voice his swallowed out by his concentrated grunts as he focuses in on his approaching release. Three more hard hip thrusts later does Geralt groan breathlessly before a familiar warmness fills inside of you. You smile at the delicious sensations coursing throughout your entire body, and the way he shakes with pleasure above your opened legs.

You do things to him he cannot even fully describe. Skin hot and shimmering with a thin layer of sweat, you reach up to place a hand against his cheek. He opens his eyes to see you when you then gift him a fangy grin, "Does my lover feel satisfied?"

"Immensely." Rasps Geralt before kissing your breast and slowly pulling out of you to find himself by your side.

You softly groan at the empty feeling and wetness between your legs, not to mention the huge muscular body that was just covering you from the eyes of the world. You miss him already. Soon the feeling of a hand places itself upon your wrist.

"I wish we were in Kaer Morhen," Says Geralt quietly as he locks eyes with you, "..a blanket of snow outside. A fire in the hearth, and you...you're perfect."

Smiling, you move to sit up and push a white strand of hair out of his eyes, "As would I. A cold night to warm you, the two of us laying on soft furs....naked of course."

"Just as we are now."

You run a finger down his stubbled jaw, "I would love that. Curse you for drawing me into that fantasy you silver tongued man."

He chuckles, "It is no fantasy I tease you with Y/N, we could go whenever you want."

"Whenever I want huh? I think we need to find this Minotaur first wouldn't you say?"

"Fuck. You're right." He mutters begrudgingly, "I had forgotten."

"Was my sweet fruit enough to turn your mind to mush?"

He smiles at your teasing, "Perhaps it has that affect on me."

"Oh I had suspected. You can barley form words when deep inside me, can't help that I'm just a seductive temptress corrupting your weak mind. How powerful I am, hmm."

"I am completely vexed."

You lean down to whisper against his lips, "No being can break from my trance, not even a Witcher of the most skilled. You have been so easily won I'm afraid."

You kiss him. He kisses back, "Then if I die by your doing, it would be a death I welcome freely."

"So dramatic." You gift him a chaste kiss before he can say anything else, one that soon leaves him beaming up at you like a lovestruck fool when your lips part.

"I loath to dress." Pouts Geralt, "Must we?"

"Unfortunately yes....now come, let us put our clothing on before we ruin Jaskier's day. Especially you, I doubt he wants to see that beautiful monster hanging between your legs."

"Can't argue with that." —— Lacing up your boot, the scent of Jaskier reaches your nostrils a whole ten seconds before you hear him stumbling through the forest on his way to camp. He smells like the market, wild mint, and farm animals. Quite a combo.

Standing fully now to adjust your cloak, Jaskier finally pushes back some branches to bring himself into complete view. You immediately raise a brow as he smiles brightly, Geralt beating you to your own question by a second, "Why the fuck do you have a goat?"

Jaskier looks from the goat in his arms to Geralt, "He needed a friend."

"No really why do you have a goat?" You ask.

"Because the beautiful boots vendor lady gave me him, that's why. And well, I couldn't refuse her pretty smile."

"The goat or the vendor lady?"

Jaskier rolls his eyes at you, "Obviously the woman selling shoes. She was very nice and so was that traveler standing by the cart, they also weren't too bad looking either if I say so myself."

"Wait. You didn't get me boots?"

Jaskier shrugs, "No."

"You were supposed to charm her and snatch me a pair. I need a new pair, these ones are shit."

"Yes well Y/N, I became preoccupied and she was very generous and loving to me how was I supposed to swindle her and decline accepting this goat?" Protests Jaskier.

Geralt shakes his head, "Jask take it back, we have no use of a goat."

"I can't. It needs me."

"He's right. Roach will get jealous." You snicker as Geralt gives you a look, though a sort of gruff humor flashes over his golden gaze.

"We're not adding anymore people to our traveling party." Grumbles your Witcher, "Just leave him by the village gates then. Someone will certainly take him."

"No. This is Finnick and he is the newest addition to our group. He stays." Adds Jaskier defiantly as the two of you don't say a word of protest. It's not like you're just going to force Jaskier to ditch the little guy.

Geralt makes an incomprehensible grumble under his breath before walking past you to gather Roach's leather reins. He jumps atop her saddle as you eye up the goat who seems very content in Jaskier's arms.

"Bait for the Minotaur." You say, legs bringing you towards the pathway nearby within the woodland.

Geralt can be heard laughing from atop of Roach as Jaskier gasps, "Y/N! You heartless bastard."

"That's actually not a bad idea." Agrees Geralt.

"You two take that back!" The goat bleats as if shouting in protest to his own demise. "Finnick they're just being funny, ha ha yes, these two just have a dark sense of humor is all. Takes a bit getting used to."

"What if he eats your fancy elven lute Filavandrel gave you?"

"Finnick wouldn't do such a thing, he's a well trained goat."

"Well trained in shitting." Mutters Geralt as both yourself and Jaskier follow his lead towards the forest pathway.

"No. Why do you think such little of him. He's a very intelligent creature."

"Because he's a damn goat."

Finnick bleats again.

You swat your lovers leg to gain his attention, "Geralt he just called you a bitch did you hear that? I heard it, Jask you heard that right?"

"Oh yes it was clear as day."

Geralt just glares at the two of you from over his shoulder. The goat bleats again, decently loud this time. "Geralt, Finnick said you're a cunt."

Jaskier nods, "A big cunt. The hugest."

"Enormous."

"Geralt are you just going to take that goats slander towards you?" Asks Jaskier.

"Yes love, Finnick's calling you all sorts of derogatory titles."

"Will you two shut the fuck up."

You and Jaskier glance at one another, "Depends."

"Promise you're not using him as Minotaur bait." Says Jaskier holding Finnick tighter.

"Fine." He mutters, "Now stop talking." ——

5 days from Gwent

Jaskier throws a rock in your direction, stepping to the side, the small chunk of stone misses your head by a foot. Since this trek to find the Minotaur in some orchard is taking a whole lot longer then expected. Yourself and Jaskier have returned to passing the time with a little game you both like to call, Catapult. A traveling activity that involves Jaskier attempting to hit you with anything on the road, and since your reflexes are most superior. Senses heightened to a T. He misses his intended target often though he always tries anyhow.

In fact, he's only ever nicked you once when Geralt happened to have had your full attention. Even then, Jaskier can only pray to be so lucky to hit you with anything at all since then. He tosses another rock, you step to the side near Roach where the rock flies past your shoulder and onto the rocky trail ahead.

"Geralt." Says Jaskier, "Do you even know where we're going?"

"East. Near a town called Gwent."

Jaskier huffs at this blunt reply, "Well this is taking forever." The goat bleats in agreement.

You fall back a couple paces to pick up the little guy, "Oh shush now you two, it's only supposed to be a six days ride."

"Six days on a fast horse or six days at walking speed?" Asks Jaskier.

"We'll get there when we get there, have a better attitude like Y/N." Counters Geralt, "Be grateful you still have that goat."

"Behehehee!" Bleats Finnick.

You open your mouth to speak but are cut off when Geralt holds a finger to the air, "Y/N, I do not wish to know what that goat has said of me."

2 days from Gwent

Poking at a small fire, you sit cross legged on the scratchy grass covered ground of some high field of wheat. The small camp around you is flattened just enough for yourself, Geralt, Jaskier and a center campfire to keep themselves for the night. Roach is tied to an old grumpy looking tree about the length of a banquet hall away.

And Finnick is, well. He's currently head butting your thigh every ten seconds with those little nubs of his. Fortunately this does not hurt in the slightest. Ignoring him, you dig through the coals in search of some hot embers when Jaskier, who's seated across from you, obnoxiously coughs to gain yours and Geralt's attention.

Keeping your gaze to the fire, Geralt looking at nothing but his healing pack that he's rummaging through, Jaskier coughs again. Finnick's soft head runs into your leg.

"Eh hem!" Coughs Jaskier, "Right here."

"We know." Mutters Geralt, golden gaze never once departing from the one healing herb he's now found.

Jaskier gives him an offended look before pointing between the two of you, "I have something I want to say." He pauses for a long moment to gain a response, when not one of you says anything, he picks up a stick from the pile and whips it in the air.

Swish. Swoosh. Swish.

"I have something important I want to speak of."

Swoosh. Swish. Swoosh.

You part your gaze from the flames to find his expectant expression, "Yes Jaskier?" You mutter bluntly.

The stick points from you to Geralt, Jaskier then huffs in frustration before speaking, "I know what you two were doing last night."

Finnick hits you again, you raise a brow at Jaskier, "Which is?"

He swings the stick around like a wizard though it still points to you, "I had to cover Finnick's ears with a cloak. He's just a little guy who absolutely does not need to here you two doing your things together in the darkness. Can you really not wait for everyone else to fall asleep?"

"What things were we doing?" You ask just to further press his buttons.

"You know. And the things I have referred to are not appreciated. It's quite frankly disgusting and a bit wrong with me so near." He swallows thickly, "It's like....dare I say, it's like I'm there. And I don't want to be there. So Geralt, please keep Y/N away from you before I fall asleep because the sounds I was hearing were almost inhuman. Where you even enjoying yourself.."

"Yes. I was making love to Y/N what of it?" Deadpans Geralt as you snatch up the little goat before he can headbutt your leg again.

Jaskier blinks, "What of it? What of it is that I don't particularly enjoy hearing you all..all over each other like two horny drunkerds."

"Well we are definitely horny."

Geralt hums, "I understand your issue with us, but you're a bard following us for stories. I will choose to make love to Y/N whenever she so desires on any given night and Y/N happens to have a very high urgency for my.."

"Okay, okay, okay." Interrupts Jaskier, "Your words are noted."

You can't help but chuckle at this, "Maybe your little beast Finnick will get you a pretty big breasted sucker who can't help but pity your sad big blue eyes."

"I do not have sad eyes."

Geralt snorts, "Maybe a little."

"A tiny bit." You add as the goat bleats as if in agreement.

Jaskier throws his hands up, "Well that settles it then. You're all incredibly rude so goodnight."

Some orchard near Qwent

"Well I'm not seeing shit." Says Jaskier as he stands by an apple tree with his hands on his hips, eyes scanning the horizon.

In a blur are you back from your scouting upon the grounds, "You haven't moved from this spot for twenty minutes."

He huffs, of course you'd hear him complaining even when a good twenty yards away, "Yeah, twenty minutes I'm still breathing. I have no intentions of meeting this so called Minotaur. Also I'd rather not break my lute."

"Should have left it with Roach." Says Geralt.

"I couldn't risk some bastard stealing it. I could never forgive myself for being so careless."

You raise a brow, "Where's the goat?"

Jaskier's brows furrow before he frowns and suddenly looks left and right panicked, "Finnick? Finnick!" He shouts, "Where are you! Finnick! Finn.."

"Will you shut up." Snaps Geralt as he pulls out his silver sword from the sheath attached to his back, "Maybe it's for the best if you've lost him here.."

"What! No he needs me I promised I'd protect him!" Cries Jaskier, holding his lute tighter, "Where could he have gone off to? Finnick! FINNICK PLEASE COME BACK I'M SORRY FOR NOT PAYING ATTENTION I LOVE YOU! FINNIC.."

"Shut the fuck up." You whisper yell while holding the back of his shirt collar like a frustrated mother, "You want the whole orchard to know we're here?"

Jaskier juts out his lip, "No."

You release him, "Good. Now let's all start looking for this fucking goat and maybe we'll find the Minotaur in the process." You add, beginning to walk north towards the tall rows of apple trees, "Yell if you see the goat. Scream if you see the Minotaur."

"Y/N you can't just have us split up like this. I don't have a weapon." Says Jaskier.

You look at him over your shoulder, "Just stay close to Geralt."

"No." Grumbles your Witcher as he opens his mouth to speak but is lost to words when you race to another part of the huge orchard in a speedy blur of reds and blacks. Gone before he can complain about watching over Jaskier while you all search for the goat. Damn you and your vampireyness.

Trees appear to fly past you as your legs carry yourself inhumanly fast across the grass covered grounds. Soon does your hearing catch the sound of a bahh to your right and down a long row of thin trees you go. Causing leaves and branches to move about in the hasty rush of unexpected wind.

Halting your movement in a split second instance, you stand looming over the small goat. It sniffs your boots before raising its furry head to look up at your fangs behind that smile and those two big red eyes of yours. You're such a funny looking human it has begun to think, you and that white haired man. So odd a pair.

Kneeling down, you pet the little guys head, "Now what mischief have you been up to?"

"Bahhh."

"Oh really? Now I don't think Jaskier would like that answer one bit, you know you've made him quite worried about your absence." He snorts in reply as you continue to pet his head, "Come now little one this place is too dangerous no matter how delicious the apples look."

Finnick stomps on the ground with his hooves like he wants to play, the little shit then unexpectedly headbutts your bent leg so hard it cause you to lose your balance and onto your butt you go. Finnick then races off in the direction you came.

"Did I just get bested by a goat?" You mutter to a raven sitting close by in a tree, "Shit, I think I did. Well I'm certainly never telling Geralt that." You swiftly float up to your feet, landing on soil again, you point towards the raven, "Don't ever tell anyone about this." You then take off towards the retreating goat.

Not even ten seconds later do you just narrowly miss slamming right into Geralt when thankfully you stop dead. Faces inches from one another, he raises a brow at you, goat notably in his arms.

You smile a fangy grin, "Come here often?"

He simply hums as you steal a swift kiss upon those beautiful plush lips of his before finding a spot to his left. Licking his lips does Geralt turn to you, "Here." The goat is then handed out for you to quickly accept into your arms.

"Why me?"

"Because."

"I just kissed you does that mean nothing?"

He tilts your chin up with the tips of his fingers, "It means everything to me." Eyes so soft and golden you could have fallen right into his arms until he continues, "However that's a goat and I didn't want it here in the first place."

Hissing at him, he takes a step back as your eyes narrow, "And what if this was the Child Surprise?"

"You don't even want the Child Surprise."

"That is....true." You pause a moment to think of something else to catch him for, when nothing comes to mind you simply walk past him, "I won't forget this tonight."

"Y/N!"

"You made your choice."

"It's just a goat."

"And my cuddles are just free for you whenever you want."

"Y/N."

"Not anymore."

"Y/N."

"Fuck off to a tree."

The goat bleats as you keep your gaze set straight ahead, Geralt silently trailing after you knowing full well that he should have just held the damn goat instead of making you do it. However he can be just as stubborn as you and right now he dare not ask to take the goat back, what's done is done.

And anyways, you're not really mad at him. Just incredibly annoyed.

"Finnick!" Joyously shouts Jaskier as he jogs a short distance past some apple trees.

"Yes. He is alive." You mutter unenthusiastically as Jaskier reaches out to gently take hold of the goat like a newborn.

"Oh how I've missed you my friend. I'm so sorry I lost you, that must have been so frightening no worries it will never happen again I promise you that." Rambles Jaskier as you hear the sounds of rough snorts off to the western area. You then smell the scent of something like that of cow yet a lingering scent of a man who's rolled in vomit and decaying apples.

Oh, shit.

"I don't mean to interrupt this sweet reunion but we have a problem." They all look at you now, "More specifically a big problem that smells rather dreadful too."

"Y/N what is it?" Asks Geralt.

"I think Jaskier's yelling has disturbed the Minotaur we've been looking for." As if on cue does a tremendous roar echo throughout the entire orchard causing some birds to fly from their perches.

"On second thought I'll be heading back to Roach, good luck you two." Says Jaskier as he begins walking away to safety.

"Coward!" You shout as more of an annoyed afterthought then anything truly harmful, Jaskier is well aware how unqualified to kill any monster he most certainly is. You and Geralt on the other hand are practically built for this.

Geralt unsheathes his sword, "You distract it, I'll handle the rest."

"You can distract it. That thing is meant to maim and unalive you Geralt. I'm faster, let me handle this."

He quickly sets a hand on your shoulder, "I want to help you, Y/N. I can't just let you do this alone."

"Fine. Come on let's get our coin." ——

One hour later

The high pitched shriek that emits from deep within Jaskier's throat is enough to have you wincing at the abrupt noise. Paired with the panicked bleats from the goat as you stand out from behind a tree.

Granted you're covered head to toe in splatters of ruby red blood from when Geralt threw his sword in the Minotaur's neck and when you flew up to pull it out. A waterfall of crimson spray danced straight for your body that was too close to the sight of impact. And now here you are.

Geralt steps around you and at this does Jaskier stop screaming in terror, the goat as well. He makes a bewildered face before pointing towards you, "Y/N? Uh, Geralt."

"She had to pull my sword from its neck. I must have hit an artery."

"He most definitely hit a fucking artery." You grumble, body sticky and wet with Minotaur blood. —— Two Weeks Later

Sitting in the grass on the outskirts of a town where a fair is currently being held in the hills. You pop a sweet raspberry into your mouth as Jaskier sips on some wine next to you. Geralt lays in the grass directly behind you, he's so close does he keep his left hand over your lower abdomen to hug you into his side. His eyes are closed, chest rising and falling with soft breaths. You eat another raspberry and listen to the joyous music playing close by. Today couldn't be nicer.

"Okay Finnick, you ever try wine?" The goat bleats in reply to Jaskier’s question. "Hmm, don't no what that means but I can guess you're curious. Here, have a little sip."

You look up from your berry eating to see as Jaskier is pouring wine into the goats mouth like a farmer would nurse a baby cow with a bottle. "Uh, what are you doing?" You question with a raised brow.

"Giving Finnick some wine."

"I payed for that bottle."

"Yes, and we thank you for your generosity."

You blink and shake your head before looking over at Geralt snoozing away without a fuck to give. Your eyes are back on Jaskier, "Does he like it?"

The goat looks over at you and bleats loudly, Jaskier laughs, "It would seem so."

Finnick then jumps, kicking the air happily before running around the three of you. He then headbutts your leg causing you to spill your bag of raspberries all over the grass. He bahhhs and snorts before running around Jaskier in circles. You glare at an apologetic Jaskier while picking up your red berries.

"How much wine did you give him?"

"Not a lot. I swear."

"What the fuck is that sound?" Asks a groggy Witcher.

"Finnick."

"Hmm." He mutters before squeezing your side and sitting upright to lean himself into you. To anyone passing by he looks like a drunken man with his sober lover.

You smile and move a piece of hair out of his eyes as his head lays against your shoulder, "What a sleepy old wolf you are today."

"Yes, until that damn goat woke me."

"Ah, yes there is a reason and he is sorry." Says Jaskier quickly.

You take Geralt's left hand with yours and pat his messy white hair with the other, "He gave Finnick wine."

"Hmm." Geralt closes his eyes. Two boys are heard laughing when Finnick runs past Roach, Jaskier and straight into your lap he goes causing Geralt to wake up with a start. "What the fuck?"

"Finnick why?" You whine as Geralt's body moves away from yours, "What is the problem now?"

The goat bleats as your Witcher quickly stands when two teenage boys no older then thirteen stop a good three yards away, a dull knife in each hand. They look up to no good. Geralt sets a hand out indicating them to stay where they are.

"What do you want?" He asks gruffly.

The dark haired one shrugs, "The goat."

"Yeah, is he yours?" Asks the shorter brunette.

Geralt pauses for a brief second, "Yes."

They look disappointed, "Fine. Stupid fool anyways. Tell your pet idiot to stay out of our flowers!" They shout before running off.

"Flowers?" Asks Geralt who turns around to look at you two.

Jaskier takes a sip of wine, "They're probably flower pickers for some cart.....but why the knives?"

A soft whimpering draws your attention to Finnick who's shaking in your arms. "What is it now? Those imbeciles scare you?" He appears to nod and hold his left leg gingerly. You set him in the grass and kneel to inspect the possible damage.

He flinches back, "Bahh Ahhh ahhhh!"

"I'm just looking. Let me see." Both Geralt and Jaskier watch as you gently lift up the goats leg and check it. "I don't see a cut. And if you were bleeding I would know, believe me." You let him go.

Finnick gingerly tries to step on that foot, when he can't does he bow his head. You purse your lips together, scarlet eyes glancing up between Jaskier and Geralt. You look back at Finnick and reach a hand out, "Here, let me kiss it better."

"Bah."

"Come, I will fix it." The little goat lifts his hoof up, you place a soft kiss upon it. Finnick touches his hoof to the grass and nods his head a couple times.

Suddenly a mist of deep oranges and blues begin to circle around him from seemingly out of nowhere. Finnick looks around frightened and bleats louder when you jump back to stand. "Y/N what is happening?" Urgently asks Jaskier as you stare at the colors hastily thickening and getting brighter and brighter.

"I don't know."

The magnificent colors of a setting sun engulf around the small goat as wind picks up, blowing your hair about. The light is too much and with that do you turn away when a blast of magic throws you three to the grass covered earth. When the air stills do you stand up, turning around do you come face to face with Prince Alaric of Althurna.

A seventeen year old boy with bright brown eyes and golden hair just barely touching his shoulders. The same image you saw on a missing persons poster almost three weeks ago. He holds his fingers close in nervousness, shyly he stands there.

"What the fuck, who the fuck are you?" Says Jaskier as he eyes up the boy who was until recently a goat named Finnick.

"Uh." The prince hugs himself, "I'm uh..."

"Prince Alaric of Althurna." You say confidently as Geralt and Jaskier stand to either side of you. The prince nods.

Jaskier sets a hand on his hip, "You're not...a goat?"

"No." Replies the frightened prince.

"Who did that to you then?" Asks Geralt.

The prince looks to the ground, "A mage." He says softly.

A mage? Fucking mages.

"A mage turned you?

"Yes."

Jaskier throws his hands to the air, "So I finally find something that I like very much and it turns out to be a bewitched prince." He loudly complains, "What are the chances?"

"Apparently pretty high." You add as Alaric gives a shy little smile.

This is going to be very interesting indeed.

-

Tagged: @seninjakitey​ @ashleyforeverareject​ @kmuir1​ @haleypearce @diegos-butt @a-girl-who-loves-disney​ @beck07990​​​​

[capricornwriter5]

OUR SEESAW - Chapter 6

Pairing: Min Yoongi x female OC

Genre: idol au, Suga X female OC, smut, fluff, angst, college romance, friends to lovers, exes to lovers, happy ending. ⚠️Warning: mentions of mental health affections, drugs

Words: 4k

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Chapter 6 - 00:00 (Zero O'Clock)

For the next few weeks, Yoongi worked until his body demanded him to stop. Jin helped him find a temporary job as a food delivery man, it was his second job like that. Moreover, the musician was still working on the radio and at the restaurant. What he had left to sleep and study was insignificant, but there was no time to rest. He had always tried to keep his eyes on his goals, rarely letting emotions of any nature cloud his judgment, but he couldn't help but miss rehearsing at college at night, especially the last times.

Yoongi's mind had been so immersed in work that he was stunned one night on his way to one of his jobs when he noticed the Christmas decorations all over the streets.

"How come...? Shit! I can barely afford a ticket to visit my parents." The pianist took a few minutes to smoke a cigarette, however, he realized that he had no lighter. "You gotta be kidding me..." He thought searching in his pockets, but remembered that he had left it in his room.

After scanning his surroundings, Yoongi spotted a man sweeping. He hated talking to strangers so much that he could claim he had avoided it all his life unless it was utterly necessary. Yet, his longing for a cigarette got the better of him, so Yoongi approached and asked if the man had a lighter. Surprisingly, when the man answered and Yoongi could see his face, the boy thought he was dreaming, he was identical to his father, and he even had the same severe expression. The man, as his father, owned a cabinetmaker's workshop. Melancholy and nostalgia led the boy to go in and see the types of wood that the man had for sale. It was not difficult for him to find the best one, his eyes and hands were more than trained for it. 

The musician walked to a sample that had caught his attention. Yoongi not only touched it, but smelled it and carefully examined its color, paying special attention to its grain. He didn't need to be told which tree it came from, nor its durability, because his father had taught him how to know all that with a simple glance.

“I can tell you know about wood, you chose it first, it's the best I have.” Said the owner showing a grimace, the closest thing to a smile he could offer. 

"My father used to be a cabinetmaker." He explained recalling how it felt to spend hours with his father, there was no need to talk, they both understood each other and accompanied each other while carving together.

"Oh! That explains everything. What are you going to build, boy?”

"I just wanted to see it." He responded by returning the sample.

"Are you sure? A true woodworker wouldn't pass up an opportunity to work on something this good."

The man was right, since Yoongi asked to see it, he had already designed in his head what he wanted to carve. He had even visualized himself using his tools again. He knew exactly what to do. However, Yoongi knew the value of that wood, and unless he planned to not eat for a week, he couldn't buy it.

The musician sighed resignedly, but at the same time, he smiled a little just thinking about what he wanted to do. It had been a long time since he experienced that illusion to carve something.

"I'm nuts" He thought minutes later as he left the store with a heavy bag.

**********

The next day, Jin was studying one of his scripts when someone knocked on the door. Two men delivered Yoongi's piano, it had finally left the workshop. They placed it in the back of the apartment and left instructions for its owner. As soon as Yoongi walked in, his friend told him his piano was back home and a smile spread across the musician's face.

“BUT I have bad news for you. They told me that it'll work, but not for long, the wood inside is very deteriorated. Or was it another thing? I don't remember.”

"What? But it was supposed to be just tuning it up. What happened?"

“Don't ask me so much, I don't even understand where the sound of that device comes from. It's something with the wood and that it's old. They said you could try to restore it, but it's a lot of money and they don't guarantee it'll last much longer."

"Shit…"

Yoongi looked at his instrument and approaching the chair, sat in front of it, they had been through a lot together, and Yoongi had a special attachment for him. He had never had a pet, but his piano could certainly count as one, since Yoongi spent a lot of time with it, took care of it delicately, and even had a habit of every time he finished rehearsing, he patted it before leaving.

"This is the final stroke... now it turns out that YOU decide to stop working..." He thought looking at the piano and gently touching the keys. "Okay, back to work, you're still not rid of me."

**********

"But, kid, will you stop studying?" The concierge asked the next day while he and Yoongi were having breakfast together. 

“I'm not sure... I mean, it's a possibility. At least for a while, mom needs that operation, my studies can wait.”

“What if you apply for a scholarship? You're the best student here, everybody knows it! They'd give it to you.”

“I'm not on good terms with the director for refusing to work as an assistant. He made it very clear to me not to look for him.”

“You brought it on yourself. Maybe if you cut your hair you could…”

That morning they changed places, they used to have breakfast in any empty classroom they could find; nevertheless, the old man had insisted that they stay in the janitors' office. To Yoongi's surprise, the old man took him there because he had something for him. However, he had not given it to the musician yet, as the boy had eaten and was now resting among various items.

"We're not gonna talk about my hair." The boy said closing his eyes. "I still have a little time left, I could sleep for a few minutes."

"Do you see what I'm telling you? There's your problem! You only think about your music, making money, and sleeping. You need to go out, talk, and meet new people.”

“I already met someone new, Emmy, do you remember her?"

“Oh, that's right! Hey, aren't you going to tell me how you became her boyfriend?"

"I'm considering going to the metal shop and asking them to make me an impression that says 'She's not my girlfriend, we're friends.'"

The janitor laughed heartily and joked about it for a long time, but Yoongi was far from upset, he just sighed and peacefully ignored the comments. Briefly and directly, the pianist told his friend about his classes with Emmy, the conversations they had, the dinner they went to together, and even the job offer. While talking about it, the old man noticed how Yoongi smiled more than usual, he even laughed a couple of times telling him things that the girl had done or said.

“And tell me, kid, aren't you bored now that those practices are over? You barely manage to come for a few minutes in the morning.” The old man's question prompted Yoongi to nod.

“Practicing with Emmy was fun. She has a good ear for music, she knew how to identify when I made a mistake before I realized it myself. But she never knew how to tell me, that was when she started to make those weird faces." He said unable to help but smile.

“I've never heard that you had fun making music, you've always said that it's your life, but not that you have a good time. Imagine how delightful will be if you agreed to be her teacher.”

"I've considered calling her, but..."

"Come on, tell me."

“Haraboji, I need the money, mom needs it. But I wouldn't feel comfortable getting money from Emmy, and even if I accepted, I frankly doubt I can help mom with a teacher's salary.”

"So that's why you told her no..." He thought looking at the musician. The old man had always known, Yoongi's heart was much nobler than anyone could suspect.

"So, it's not that you don't trust her." As an answer, Yoongi shook his head. 

"I mean, it's not that I'm dying to teach someone, but if I ever did it, it'd be with her."

The conversation didn't last long, for Yoongi got a call from his bosses on the radio, the other guy who worked there was sick and they needed Yoongi to help them. As soon as he heard about a double payment, he accepted. 

"Won't you go to your class? That's not good, son, you're very talented, but skipping classes…”

“Harabeoji, I have no choice. Do you want me to open these windows for you before I go? Looks like they're stuck."

Just by opening the first one, the musician heard the voices of several people and curiosity led him to look for the origin of such hustle and bustle.

“Oh! It's the singer! I saw him a few days ago on television. He's very handsome and popular! I wonder who his girlfriend is. Do you think he's single? No... he's too attractive."

"You look like his boyfriend," Yoongi said sounding more serious and acid than usual.

“Disrespectful brat! I'm happily married.”

“Why is everyone talking about that guy now? He's one of Emmy's best friends."

“So that's the reason for the jealousy. Well, yes, I'd worry, he's handsome, talented, rich, famous... But you're better, of course you are!"

"I'm leaving." 

Yoongi grabbed his things, the last thing he wished to do was to hear about how amazing Woosung was. However, the pianist couldn't even open the door when the old man stopped him and placing an envelope in his hands, smiled tenderly at him.

“Today's my last day here. I didn't want to tell you before because I didn't want to see you teary. You want everyone to see you as a cold boy so they don't get close to you, but you're not like that." He said messing up his black hair. “In all the years that I've worked here, you're the only student who has spoken to me, the only one who realized that I existed as something more than ´the old man who cleans´.”

"But why?" Yoongi asked, speechless at the news that had undoubtedly shaken his chest.

“I'm old, I want to rest and spend more time with my wife. It's time to quit now that I can do it with a smile on my face, kid. I made my first true friend. Who would've known that after so many years I could have an idea of ​​what it feels like to have not only a friend but a son?"

Yoongi's slanted eyes were glassy, ​​and he had to lower his gaze for a few seconds. He didn't know what to say, that farewell was more painful than the one he had with his own parents when he left home.

“And what about my breakfasts?” The boy asked making the old man laugh.

“Don't you know where I live? Are you that clueless? I've told you many times!"

"I'm sorry…"

“Just because I don't work here doesn't mean we can't see each other, or that you can't visit me. What's more, if you come with short hair, you'll have a room for yourself, or for you and your girlfriend.”

At that point Yoongi didn't sigh, he just smiled sadly and nodded. Next, he looked at the envelope he had in his hands and when he opened it, he saw that it was money, possibly part of his friend's savings. 

Before even protesting, because the old man knew he would, Yoongi fell silent when he saw him raise his hand, asking for a moment.

“It's a gift, please take it. I know it's far from what you need, but at least it'll help you for a few months. Kid, listen to me.” He asked placing both hands on his shoulders. “Take this suggestion not from someone old, but from someone who genuinely wants you to be happy. You love music, it's your life, but until now it has also been your burden, almost your mistress. Don't let it use you, use it to be happy. I know that due to your circumstances you cannot afford it so often, but right now, TODAY, you can do it.” Yoongi looked at him carefully, perfectly understanding what he was trying to tell him. "Just promise me that when you're that wonderful producer that you'll be, you'll take at least one morning to have breakfast with me." He asked with a smile that managed to touch Yoongi's heart and make him shed a tear as he nodded.

"Thank you for everything you did for me and for being with me all this time."

With a hug that expressed much more feeling than the one his father had given him, the old man said goodbye to the young musician that morning.

**********

That day the hours passed slowly, enough that not even seeing Hobi during lunch helped Emmy to bear it with her optimistic spirit. Days ago, she knew that after those long and boring hours listening to laws that she already knew, since she had read about them, she could end her day in the best possible way: listening to Yoongi's music. Yet, it had been some time since the night had dined together. The chat with the pianist was empty, they had never needed to write to each other because their practices were routine, and neither of them was ever absent. Emm had considered several times writing to him, but the truth was that she hadn't risked it, which didn't make sense considering how much fun she had with him.

"Maybe a visit to the Bivouac with Woosung would be a good idea. No... it's only Tuesday..." She thought shaking her head, she must have a little more control.

Emmy spent the rest of the day like that, focusing on things other than her lessons. Already when night had fallen, she thought she would see Hobi, but the dancer sent a voice message changing their plans, he needed to stay practicing for the Christmas presentation. Being the choreographer in charge, he couldn't just disappear; besides, Nara was with him and the girl needed to learn a whole new choreography. 

On the other part, Woosung had invited her to join him in the practice with his group. After that, the singer mentioned something about an activity. Assuming that the 'activity' was probably getting wasted in an opulent penthouse, Emm was about to call him. However, she got a new message. 

"Oh, shit!" She exclaimed reading it. 

It was from Jihoo, the actor she had dated several times. The girl had omitted that he had invited her to a fashion event. The actor had been one of the main models in a new collection of a haute couture house and that night the social elite would gather for the exhibition of the designs.

Possibly, any other person would have had it in mind, even dreamed about attending a gala that would gather from renowned fashion designers to artists. Nevertheless, for Emmy, it was just another night. The girl had received the invitation long before Jihoo mentioned it. Her invitation and Woosung's had come together, but since it was nothing new, they didn't talk about it. Emmy already knew who would go, she already knew practically all of them, in fact, she knew obscure secrets about several of the guests. 

She could already visualize young sons and daughters of politicians smiling innocently and politely in front of the cameras. However, their true nature only appeared in hidden, exclusive, dangerous, and libertine places. Emm herself had an astonishing ability to behave as society expected of her even though those were not her true colors.

Getting back to the present, the girl had only two options: run to be ready on time or think of a good excuse not to attend.

As she thought about what to answer, Emm realized that there was a lot of silence around her, which was strange considering how loud her classmates were. The answer was easy to come by when she turned her gaze to the same place everyone else was looking at. Her breath escaped her lips at the sight of a boy dressed all in black. Even though she could only see his profile, Emm didn't need much to recognize him. She noticed the ear hoops hanging from his left ear and a veiny hand holding a cigarette that he just hadn't lit because he was inside a building and they would possibly expel him if he dared to do it. Yet, Emmy already comprehended that Yoongi's social anxiety was strong enough to force him to hold the cigarette in public. Still shocked that the pianist was there, she walked towards him and greeting him with a smile, Emm hugged him. The spontaneity of that hug caused the pianist to open his eyes and drop the cigarette. First, because he was looking for the girl with his stare in another direction, so he didn't expect her to come by surprise; second, because no one, ABSOLUTELY NO ONE in his life had hugged him like that. Yoongi was already of a reserved nature, and on top of that, he had never been comfortable with physical contact, at least not in a place other than the bed, so that gesture kicked him out of his comfort zone. However, it didn't upset him, after all, if he was there it was because he wanted to see the girl.

"Yoongi! What a surprise to see you here!" Emmy said moving away a little; while she smiled at him from ear to ear and her eyes expressed how happy she was to see him, people around them did not lose track of what was happening.

"I finally find you, freckles, this place's huge." He commented with a shy smile, which was the complete opposite of his heartbeat, as it was out of control.

Emmy's heart reacted immediately when she heard that nickname. Yoongi had called her that a couple of times while practicing. Despite being quite serious, the reserved musician could be very sweet from time to time. 

“Huge and boring. But why are we talking about this building when you're here? I thought you wouldn't come back to class at night. I've missed you so much, grumpy cat." The ease that the girl had to express what she felt was something that Yoongi dreamed of having, at least a little of it. Despite knowing Emm and spending time with her, her spontaneity still left Yoongi dumbstruck. Also, considering her breathtaking smile, it was understandable that anyone would stay speechless in front of her.

Still, so many nights rehearsing by her side and watching her smiling while listening to him had forced Yoongi to learn to react quickly and that was how he was capable of continuing speaking.

“I wanted to talk to you. Can we go somewhere else?”

Emmy nodded and walking together they turned their backs on the comments of those who had seen them. Not every day people saw a socialite like her with a low-profile musician like him.

Once alone, Yoongi felt much more comfortable talking. "Emm, I wanted to know if your offer still stands. You know, the one of..."

“Be my professor? Yoongi, of course!”

"Wait..." He said before the girl started screaming with excitement. He even needed to place his index finger on Emm's lips. "I won't be able to do it for a long time, but at least for a few months, if that's okay for you."

"When do we start?" Emm asked taking his hand from her lips and grabbing it with hers. "Although… I don't have a piano yet; I mean, I do, but it's at my parents' house, I never thought I'd play it again, so I left it at home when I moved. I promise you that tomorrow I'll go buy one so that I can start classes as soon as possible.”

“Are you going to buy a piano tomorrow?” Yoongi asked laughing. "I can be a grumpy cat, you're right, but you're a hyperactive and crazy one. Has someone already told you that you have like sparks of energy? I should call you sparkles instead of freckles"

The handsome musician hadn't realized that he hadn't let go of the girl's hand. He also had no idea that his gummy smile had already appeared and that was the reason why Emmy couldn't stop smiling looking at him.

“I like both, they're cute! But I'm serious, Yoongi, I need to look for one quickly, I don't want to waste more time."

"We won't. Look, I can't teach you here, if the director finds out that I'm instructing someone who isn't even enrolled in one of the music majors, I'll get in trouble. While you get one, we can use mine."

"Will you teach me in your apartment?"

Emmy couldn't help but feel a tingling in her body at the thought of her and Yoongi alone in the apartment.

"I mean, if you don't mind, if you don't..."

"No, I don't mind. It's fine." 

"Then say no more, tomorrow we'll start with your lessons." The boy had to go, and after saying goodbye to Emm, he slightly turned his head. "It's nice to see you again, Emm."

**********

Later that night, Emmy attended the fashion show with the actor. As expected, everyone welcomed them and took some photos. Jihoo was not a bad guy, he treated her nicely and had been more than clear about how interested he was in her. However, every time they were together, Emm believed something was missing. Or maybe it was because she felt like his trophy that she did not enjoy that much being next to him. Or perhaps he was a perfect match and it was her fear of commitment and abandonment the ones that sabotaged any possible relationship? Who knows? 

Anyway... Emm had been honest from the beginning, making it clear that she wasn't looking for a relationship, she had never had one and didn't want to. Despite the loneliness that haunted her, the girl had never really allowed anyone to accompany her. Emmy loved her friends, that was undeniable, but even with them, she hadn't opened up enough. Hoseok and Woosung were the ones who knew a little more about her past, but not enough to fully understand her. 

"I'm sorry, I know talking to each person in this room is boring." Said Jihoo.

"That's fine, don't worry." The girl replied with a smile. "It seems that the designer's looking for you."

"Damn! Can you give me a minute? I don't want to drag you into another tedious conversation."

Emm nodded and turning around, she laughed seeing a man flirting with three different women. 

"How shameless..." The girl walked towards Woosung, who greeted her with a hug. "This is why Hobi keeps calling you Whoresung." She whispered making her friend roar with laughter. 

"I thought you were gonna hear us practicing."

"I was, but something happened." 

"Now I'm intrigued."

The singer apologized to the girls and walked away with his friend, who told him about Yoongi's visit.

"You're telling me that Min Yoongi accepted to teach you? The guy who doesn't talk to anyone and has that bitchy energy will willingly sit hours next to another human being. Emm, you must like him."

"Or perhaps when you tried to get to know him you were an asshole, you can be one when you want it, Woo. For example... tonight! You have a date but you had three girls all over you."

"And you're here, posing with another guy when you're dreaming about those classes and not only for the sake of music." He joked poking Emmy's nose. "You know... I was about to offer you my studio for your lessons, but I think his apartment sounds better, huh?"

"You pervert..."

"What do you expect from Whoresung?" Both of them laughed remembering Hobi calling the singer like that. "Meanwhile, he's waiting for you." Woosung pointed at Jihoo. He looked so... perfect. Indeed the perfect match. "Good enough for your family?"

"Just what they expect. What about your designer? You were flirting with the other girls, but only accepted to be photographed with her."

"What about her?"

"Do you like her?"

"Does it matter? Does it really matter what WE think, Emmy? We just need to perform our role in this fucking play."

"That's not fair."

"Gorgeous, they're doing the same. My designer and your actor, they're just performing. Everyone's doing it, just enjoy the ride." 

Before saying anything else, Woosung gaped at the entrance of the place, he recognized who had arrived but was so shocked that he blinked several times to make sure it wasn't a product of his imagination or the substances he had tasted before.

A stern-looking woman with beautiful platinum hair entered arm in arm with a young politician who looked just as serious. Both wore impeccable clothes, but what stood out the most were the jewels that the woman wore since the black dress contrasted with the diamonds that hung from her neck, ears, and hands. The woman was stunning, no one could deny that, but her attitude and facial expression made it impossible to approach her. Everyone knew who she was, but few dared to greet her. Known not only by her last name and fiancé, but for being one of the best lawyers in all of Korea, the woman cast a quick glance at the rest of the people as a girl came over to help her take off the luxurious fur coat she was wearing.

“Emm…” Woosung said grabbing his friend's arm. "She's here. Seri's here."

Those words were enough for the girl to feel a cold throughout her body and wanted to run away from there. She did no more than turn around and look at the woman so that Emm could feel how her palms were sweating. Suddenly, her lungs shrank, preventing her from breathing properly. Her thoughts clouded and her throat went dry. Emmy began to feel dizzy and suffocated. The precious sapphire necklace that adorned her neck became a strap that hung her. She had to get out of there before that stony gaze found her.

"Oh, fuck..." Woosung cursed once the woman had fixed her eyes on them. 

Unable to stand those eyes for a second, Emmy looked for a way out as soon as possible. However, her clumsy and desperate movements led her to trip on the table, and wearing such high heels, she fell face down on her knees.

"Shit!" Woosung said trying to help her. "Get up, get up!" The boy urged.

Once she was able to get to her feet, Emmy left the room alone, she would write to Jihoo later and apologize properly, but right now, her survival instincts and panic attack demanded that she leave. 

What the hell was she doing there? A fashion show was not something that would interest her. Why of all the social activities of that night she had attended that one? The reason no longer mattered, she had seen Emmy, and while the driver opened the door for her, the platinum-haired woman watched from the entrance stairs as her little sister, as weird and as chaotic as always, fled.

"Always on the floor...pathetic." Seri thought finishing taking off her coat. Then, she shot a sharp look at the girl who was helping her, for she had scratched her wrist a bit.

**********

The driver, who had known Emmy practically since she was a kid, observed in the mirror how the girl was looking for something in her bag while she spread everything on the seat. Sadly, he saw her lighting a cigarette whose smoke covered the girl's freckled face for a few seconds, normally that made her smile and giggle, or at least relax her a bit, but not tonight. That night, it didn't help. 

In silence, the driver offered a handkerchief so she could wipe away the makeup that had run from the tears she hadn't been able to hold back.

Totally different from the indifference and coldness with which her older sister handed over her fur coat, Emmy received the handkerchief, as the girl looked gratefully at her driver, even bowing a little to thank him for the gesture.

"I promise to get you another one, sorry."

Suddenly, in the darkness of the car, the screen of Emmy's cell phone shone, which had been left on the seat among several of her things. Without much motivation, the girl reviewed the notification and found something unexpected.

Yoongi. 11:50 p.m. "I hope this sounds better than the first time and that it meets your expectations."

Along with the written message came an audio and just by playing the first few seconds, a beautiful smile lit up the girl's face. It was her song, her favorite song, Yoongi had played it again and recorded it. The musician rehearsed it tirelessly until it sounded acceptable enough to send it to her.

Another sob escaped Emmy's lips, but this time one filled with warm and calm feelings. Each note that Yoongi recorded for her was a caress for her heart, a pat on the back, the words of comfort she had never heard, and the hug she needed after meeting someone who reminded her why loneliness would haunt her all her life. That night Yoongi's music comforted her and silenced all the traumas she had been carrying for years. That night, Yoongi showed her just a hint of how much he was willing to do to mend every cut her heart had suffered.

Emm. 00:00 a.m. "It exceeded them. Thank you, I'll listen to it all night. No kidding."

Yoongi. 00:00 a.m. “Soon it'll be your recording what we'll listen to. Rest, freckles."

➳ Next Chapter

[shinneth]

hello~!! didja see the journeys ep with paul yet? what did you think of it? 👀

Oh, I sure did! Less than 24 hours after it came out, no less. Which is saying something, since I've not watched any of the Pokémon anime since XY (more had to do with getting rid of cable + general burnout; not to knock on XYZ, but Best Wishes hurt me).

Thoughts on it? Well, a little on the mixed side. Least I can do is go over it in more detail. Without watching Journeys at all outside this episode, I've got the overall gist well enough. So, guess it's time to pick this apart.

Cramming 2-3 plots in one episode was a misstep imo

I heard the last time Ash's reserve group at Oak's lab was featured in Journeys, it did a less-than-stellar job showing them off. Apparently, a good chunk of them weren't even seen in that episode, let alone had a role in it. This episode rectified that and made sure every single one of Ash's currently-owned Pokémon was at the very least visible, as even the ones who only got background/still-shot moments at least got to display an element of their personality. That much I greatly appreciate. Guess it's inevitable that pulling this off well will only become increasingly difficult as the series presses on with Ash as a protagonist, so at the very least I can respect this episode for going out of its way to make the vast majority of these Pokémon relevant in one way or another.

Especially since the Fire-type brigade had a special purpose in helping Ash's Gengar learn Will-o-Wisp. And as someone who values the strategic aspect of Pokémon battling, I'm super happy it was this move that Gengar learned and not something like Fire Punch. I enjoyed seeing this being shown in such detail! It really did feel like stepping back to the older seasons that actually put effort into showing off the importance of training.

However, as I watched the episode, I noticed how much time was being invested in these two plot points and remembered this is supposed to be the episode where Paul returns after a 12-year absence...

And from what I understand, Paul ain't gettin' any more appearances after this. This is it! This is all we get after a decade-plus of nothing!

So, in all honesty, I think at the very least the plot of Ash reuniting with all his Pokémon, Goh properly getting acquainted with them all, and the training for the Masters 8 should have been its own episode. Because I do believe it's very important to honor history and give everybody their due diligence when the anime gives them time to actually show up and matter.

Now, with Gengar learning Will-o-Wisp? That meshes in well with Paul showing up. I'd keep that. But the abundance of nostalgic fluff (that I love, but I gotta tell it like it is) really made this episode feel more than a little truncated in the areas that should have mattered most.

It was a competently written comeback for Paul...

On a superficial note, I am a little bummed that Paul didn't get any tweaks in his design (such as colored irises, which Ash was granted from Best Wishes onward; before then, his eyes were just as dotted and black as Paul's). I certainly didn't expect him to get a new outfit or anything since they didn't give Dawn that much (... from what I recall they DID give that to Serena, buuuut Serena's from the era of customizable PCs so I guess that makes a little more sense? Didn't play Gen IV's remakes, so idk if they offered that in those), but it would've been cool.

Then again, I HAVE heard about the interview in which the logic for never ever letting Ash age for the sake of keeping some "feeling like the first day of summer every day" sentiment... much as I roll my eyes at that, I've pretty much given up on the progression of time EVER being feasible in this series. Up through DP, I could at least pretend Ash was aging a year per major region (minor quests like Orange League and the Battle Frontier didn't warrant full-year lengths to me). At this point, given the design and how many generations we're in now, there's really no other choice than to accept this is basically Anime Simpsons time-wise.

Paul having his own Gyarados, Garchomp, and Metagross was completely believable, of course. He's been doing this Pokémon training thing just as long as Ash has, and there was zero indication that he would have stopped after Ash beat him. Unlike Gary, Paul didn't decide on a career change. He was set on challenging Brandon again (more on that later...). So, yeah. It would be perfectly logical for Paul to have about as many reserves as Ash. Reggie's got a big-ass backyard for that, after all. And all three of these Pokemon are ones I'd totally see have Paul having on his own journey.

Would've liked a longer battle, ngl

I'm not sour that Paul lost to Ash again here. Ash losing to Paul at this stage probably would have damaged his cred significantly (considering what all he's accomplished from XYZ and Sun/Moon) - this is right before the Masters 8 stuff starting up, after all.

But I think I would have at least preferred a tie.

Then again, with a certain other plot element I'll get to in a bit, I suppose that might have weakened that message a tad. Really, though, I would've liked a longer battle. I'm just used to Ash/Paul battles being lengthy affairs, full of twists and turns and crazy-ass strategies being utilized. Like, in all fairness, all 3 of Ash's Pokémon gained significant abilities from this battle alone (Lucario got Bullet Punch, Dragonite got a crazy-ass combo move, and Gengar got Will-o-Wisp). I am bummed we didn't get a resurgence of Counter Shield - THAT would've been cool to see make a comeback! And it's one of Ash's few legitimately clever tactics. Though I guess that technique was more of a Dawn-related thing, ultimately. Still, didn't stop Paul from copying it in the Sinnoh League :P I wanna say Dragonite's made-up technique may have been some kind of loose reference/spiritual successor, but in practice it looks like they serve completely different purposes.

Thanks to so much time being eaten up with Ash's Pokémon reunion, there sadly wasn't much left for there to be an epic fight. What little we got was good enough, and it was very nicely animated.

The real appeal in Paul and Ash's rivalry, though, was in how Paul actually made Ash question himself and his methods/motivations. Paul on the outside came off as someone who should have no business being as good as he is because he isn't all about the "love and friendship" aspect of Pokémon. Naturally we're past that development for both of them, but this extended into their battling as well. Their first full battle was loaded with multiple switch-outs on both ends, Ash being forced to wonder what Paul had planned when something didn't immediately make sense to him, and it was just a glorious display of battling psychology.

I guess switch-outs being forbidden from the off in this battle played a role in how this could have been just a little bit more in-depth. And it'd be foolhardy to just expect this battle to be right up there with both of the full battles that happened in DP. The characters are both in very different places now compared to then.

Still, I couldn't help but roll my eyes a little when Paul actually wondered "Oh shit, is Burn really affecting my Metagross' strength?! The thing that the Burn status effect has always been?!"

ofcoursehefuckingknowshehasafuckingmagmortarwithflamebodyandREALLYfuckedpikachu'sshitwiththeburnstatussowhytheeverlivingfuckisheevenwonderingaboutthistohimselfgoddammit

... a GYM LEADER you say

So. I'm of two minds about this.

It's REALLY COOL the series itself is acknowledging that Paul is far too talented to just be an aimlessly-wandering nobody trainer and gave him something that'll elevate his status and reflect just how his presence positively affected the series.

Bonus points if (and this is SUPER-DELUSIONAL OPTIMISM btw) Paul actually became a Gym Leader for the next series AND was adopted into the game canon by actually being a Gym Leader in the Scarlet/Violet games.

On the other hand...

COME ON, HE IS AT LEAST A FRONTIER BRAIN CANDIDATE

YEAH FUCKING REMEMBER THAT? LAST THING WE KNOW PAUL DID POST-LEAGUE WAS GO OFF TO CHALLENGE BRANDON AGAIN.

WHEN ASH BEAT BRANDON, HE WAS OFFERED A POSITION TO BE A FRONTIER BRAIN.

SO EITHER

PAUL BEAT BRANDON BUT TURNED DOWN THE OFFER BECAUSE WHY BE A FRONTIER BRAIN WHEN YOU COULD BE A GYM LEADER AND IT'S NOT LIKE THE ANIME ESTABLISHED FRONTIER BRAINS > GYM LEADERS OR ANYTHING OH WAIT YES IT HAS

"It’s a group of facilities, somewhat like a Gym, but more intense where you challenge and battle against an amazing group of powerful trainers called Frontier Brains." -Brock

OR

PAUL JUST NEVER DEFEATED BRANDON I GUESS

(also lowkey I really really really would've loved for Paul to meet Cynthia again...)

His behavior in the battle this episode DID have him more in, say, a "gym leader's" mindset, I would say. I'd go as far to argue that Paul wasn't really putting his all into any of those matches with Ash. He really seemed interested in drawing out new powers from his opponent. The few times where he shows something of a reaction during the battles, it's when one of the three new powers/techniques started showing that aura-like flare.

I'm certainly not saying Paul wouldn't make for a good Gym Leader. Given the subtle showings of his growth in the episode, such as Infernape actually following Paul's suggestion; something he wouldn't have done in DP regardless of Paul's prior ownership of him... also, him telling Electivire to play and all that, yeah. That's indicative that he's not as excessively rigid as he was before. Paul has the maturity and discipline to be an excellent Gym Leader; certainly 8th Gym Leader material for sure.

My thing is... this is very much beneath him. If the episode had more time, maybe we would have gotten Paul saying that in his pursuit of gaining power, he realized that wasn't ever going to stop someone out there being more powerful than him no matter what he did.

We could have gotten something like, Paul admitting that his fascination with seeing power really felt the most rewarding when his influence drew power out from his opponents.

Looking at the facts, almost every time Paul and Ash battled in DP, Ash would either get one of his Pokémon evolved or they'd learn a significant new move or ability (or technique). Paul is really good at making Ash dig deep and bring out the best in all of his Pokémon.

It stands to reason that Paul's passion might lie in bringing out the true potential of other trainers; it gives him a better battle to have that improves his own team while simultaneously benefiting his opponent.

With a specific sort of focus like this, added with the fact that Paul has zero type preferences of any sort (all we know is that he really likes powerful 'mons who are as good at tanking hits as they are at dishing them out), that really screams "Frontier Brain" more so than "Gym Leader".

In all fairness, it's never outright said whether or not Paul accepted the offer to become Gym Leader. Which can let me headcanon that while he went to Professor Oak to educate himself, it wasn't necessarily to become Gym Leader. Paul's realizing that he can't rely entirely on self-taught methods to ascend in this way of life. Whatever he becomes in the future, Paul's clearly taking the steps necessary to reach the level he seeks to be.

So while I wasn't really thrilled about Paul being used as the "measuring stick" for Ash's chances against anyone in the Masters 8, at least there's an implication that Paul isn't exactly spinning his wheels, either. Much as I'd love to have him be part of the Masters 8 (no guesses on who I'd have him replacing in that), clearly the powers-that-be did not have that intention from the onset.

Hell, one can argue that Paul becoming Gym Leader is just his stepping stone to reach greater heights. After all, it's not uncommon for Gym Leaders to later challenge, on on rare occasions, defeat and replace members of the Elite Four.

So there's an ounce of hope here. Of course, I don't expect we'll ever actually see Paul in the anime again. Maybe 24 years from now. I'll be lucky to be alive by then!

Paul plz

gawd you're still so tsundere af

BITCH YOU HAVE BEEN IN NO LESS THAN FOUR POKEWORLD EQUIVALENTS OF THE SUPER BOWL

SHUT YO' ASS UP

I'd post more pics/gifs but I ran my limit now

So uh... yeah! Those are my thoughts on the episode. In a vacuum, it's great, had lots of nostalgic potential and at the very least they didn't completely ruin Paul like they EASILY could have. Kudos on the writers for making him show his maturity through his subtle cues rather than making him overtly friendly like the rest of Ash's recurring posse.

I really do enjoy more strategic elements being employed in the battle and the episode overall. I feel like Gengar's Will-O-Wisp especially will be a game-changer for Ash's chances in the Masters 8.

However, I would've really appreciated having more time, maybe not compact this episode with three major events, y'know? I'm sure there's a filler somewhere in Journeys that could've been trimmed out to facilitate this.

Also not thrilled about the prospect of Paul becoming a Gym Leader as it's very much beneath him (unless this is some clever-ass tie in to the games and god is that ever wishful thinking or his stepping stone to reach the top), but I do like that I can infer that Paul's at least found a reason to battle for his own sake now.

Yeah. Remember when Brandon asked Paul why he battles? We never got an answer to that, ever.

So this might be the closest we get: not a Gym Leader aspiration, but a necessary step in Paul's mission to bring power out in others to improve his own style.

Could use some work, but considering I'm almost certain this is all of Paul we're gonna get from here on out, I'm just gonna treasure and headcanon the hell out of it.

[paisley-print]

Near The Water’s Edge:   Chapter Four

After fleeing your abusive husband, you find yourself in the small coastal town of July, North Carolina. Soon you meet Frankie Morales, Air Force Veteran and single dad. As the two of you grow closer, you begin to let go of your past and learn to love again. That is until a strange man shows up in town, and you ’re forced to choose between your safety or the safety of the people that you love.

Inspired by the novel “Safe Haven” written by Nicolas Sparks.

Series Master List

Frankie Morales x Female Reader Rating: 18+ / Heavy adult themes eventual smut. Trigger Warnings: Domestic Abuse, Mentions of death, PTSD, anxiety, mentions of police case, police.  Word Count: 

Note: Another heavy chapter, but things will let lighter as the chapters go on. Enjoy the first half of the beach day. 

Tag List:@qytyy @winter-fox-queen​​​​ @sherala007​​​��@inkededucatednnerdy @quica-quica-quica​​​ @hnt-escape​​​ @giizhkens-cedar​​​@heythere-mel​​​ @toomanystoriessolittletime​​

The ride passed in comfortable silence, the three of you listening to the radio and Lucy looking out the window at the cars in the next lane. All Frankie could think about was how nice it was to have someone else there to spend the day. He knew Lucy must have been feeling the same way, since he hadn’t seen her so excited about a beach trip in a long while. 

He appreciated how patient you were with her; it was something he noticed even on that first day. The way you refused help until you knew she was alright. That moment had stuck with him more than anything else. 

The memory of what Will said earlier surfaced in his mind. He shifted in his seat and glanced at you. Yes, you were beautiful. Strikingly so. A woman who could walk into a room and turn every head in the place; both men and women alike. Of course Frankie had been taken with you. He tried to suppress it, scolding himself whenever he was alone in bed at night and found his thoughts wandering.... 

His only goal right now was to be your friend because he cared for you and knew that you needed help. He wasn’t sure what kind of help, but he sensed that you were alone and at some point in your life something very bad had happened to you. He wouldn’t pry though, he would wait until you were ready to share. 

-

The beach wasn’t too packed; it was still early in the season and  the tourists hadn’t moved into their summer homes yet. The boys had done an oddly efficient job at setting everything up. When Ben and Will got into a little spat about how to sink the umbrella into the sand , Frankie simply rolled his eyes and continued to spray Lucy with sunblock. It made you laugh, they all seemed so comfortable with one another. 

The day was hot and everybody seemed eager to get into the water, everyone except you and Frankie.  You had bought a bathing suit at the store, intending on going in... but somewhere during the car ride you changed your mind. 

“You can go in if you want,” you told Frankie “I don’t mind just watching.”

He shrugged, “I don’t normally go in either.”

Then just like that the two of you were suddenly alone, both woefully unprepared for any sort of conversation.

You thought of something quickly, filling the silence “the marina was packed today.”

“Yeah, It’s always like that on memorial day. Most of the summer too, be prepared for the restaurant to start getting busy.”

“I prefer it that way. It makes the shifts go faster. So I’ve been meaning to ask, what exactly do you do? I assumed you owned the marina?”

He paused for a moment. “Uh, technically I do. It was a wedding gift from my parents. An uncle had died and left it to them. I think they just wanted to get rid of it, but I have an office manager that does all the upfront stuff….. normally I just work on repairs.”

Married. That wasn’t what you were expecting, but still no ring. “Did you go to school for that?”

“Kind of. I had training for planes, but you would be surprised just how similar the two are.” You gave him a look. He glanced at you and laughed sheepishly. “What?”

“I’m sorry, did you say planes?”

“Yeah”

“You fix planes?”

He smiled and crossed his arms, trying to seem much cooler than he actually was. “I fly them too.”

“You fly pl-....do you take constructive criticism?”

He laughed, “Of course.”

“Lead with that next time.”

He looked at you skeptically. “How am I supposed to lead with that, exactly?”

“You say, hi my name is pilot Frankie …..” 

He shook his head, grinning. “Morales,” he informed you. 

“Hi my name is pilot Frankie Morales, nice to meet you.”

He played along, “but how will I know if people actually like me for me, or they just want me to take them for a ride in a plane?”

You shrugged “it's tough being a celebrity, I don’t make the rules.”

“Oh yeah, celebrity, that’s me,” he said sarcastically. 

You kicked at the sand with your foot. “Also I liked you before I knew you had the coolest hobby in the world. So, you know that you can trust me.”

He glanced over at you and immediately noticed your smile. He had seen you smile before, but they would never quite reach your eyes. This one, he could tell, was real. He opened his mouth to speak when, in the distance, a wave crashed and Lucy squealed with laughter. Both of you turned your heads to look.

“Will Lucy be okay out there?” you asked. She had on a life vest and was being supervised in the shallows by the rest of the adults. Santi was holding onto a boogie board Lucy used to keep herself up. 

“Yeah, I know they seem like idiots but they are good men.” Frankie reached into the cooler to grab a bee and popped the cap off with the bottle opener. “Do you want one?”

You shook your head, “No thank you, but I’ll take a water bottle if you have it.” He set his beer down in his cup holder and reached into the cooler again. The bottle was freezing cold when he handed it to you. Perfect for a sunny day.

You wiped the condensation off on your dress. “Can I ask you something? It’s okay if you don’t want to answer.”

“Yeah, sure,” he said, taking a sip of beer. 

“Lucy’s mom is she….? Are you two still….? I don’t mean to pry, I guess I’m just a little confused.”

“You and I both,” he said with a sigh. “I’m married but we are not together anymore, haven’t been for a few years.”

“Oh,” you said simply, not finding any clarification in what he told you. If anything, you had more questions, but you didn’t want to push. Besides, it didn’t matter anyway…. you couldn’t, you were married as well. “Does your family live in the area?”

“Nope, they live up north. Katie never really knew her family. She grew up in the foster system and was bounced around until she enlisted at eighteen. It’s just me and Lulu now, and the guys when they find the time to travel here.”

“I’m sorry,” you said honestly. “It must be hard not having your parents support.”

He shook his head and took another sip. “I expected it, even when I was younger, it seemed as though they were only interested in keeping me alive.” He looked down and started to peel off the sticker on the bottle as he spoke. “They are both doctors, mom is an archaeologist and dad an engineer. He actually helped design parts of the international space station…. I think they valued their careers more than anything else... they still do. The only time they ever came down to see Lucy was right after she was born, aside from that it’s usually a phone call on a holiday and a card with money in the mail.”

Although he tried to play it off as if it were just another part of life, you could see that it still affected him deeply. For a moment you thought about reaching out to take his hand, but you stopped yourself. “It really is their loss, they are missing out on two wonderful people.”

Frankie adjusted the baseball cap on his head, a sheepish little smile playing on his lips at the compliment. “Well, thank you. Lucy and I could say the same thing about you. You’re great with her.”

You glanced back at the little girl. She was smiling happily as Ben pulled her along on the boogie board. “I think little girls need to be protected, but not only that - they need to be seen and heard. She is already so independent and fierce. I can see how you encourage her to be her own person and not fit into any one mold. That’s important for little girls to learn.”

He laughed, “Yeah, she definitely gives me a run for my money, that's for sure. She can already repair an engine better than most men I know.”

A large gust of wind came through and took hold of the multi-colored beach ball beside you. Both you and Frankie sprang from your seats to race after it. The thing was fast, and you could not stop it from crashing into the waves. You noticed just how much cooler it was near the water’s edge. Although the temperature outside was sweltering, the Atlantic still held that winter chill. Both of you stared at the ball as it bobbed up and down with the tide. 

Frankie waved it away with his hand and squinted in the sunlight. “It’s fine, it’ll probably just float down the beach to another family or something.”

You smirked at him “or choke a poor dimwitted sea turtle to death.”

He paused and shot you a pretend glare, then took off his hat, dropped it in the sand and reached for his shirt. 

You giggled “no, no I’m joking. I got it.” You said, starting to strip down to your bathing suit also.

“Well, you gotta be faster than that,” he said, half jogging to the water.

You slipped off your dress easily and ran straight past him into the waves. Frankie was not far behind. You two were pushing against the tide as you reached for the ball. Fingertips just barely brushed against the plastic before it slipped a couple more inches away. This left just enough time for Frankie to swoop in and grab it.

Your stomach hurt from laughing so hard “hey!”

He shrugged, “I’m sorry that I care more about the environment than you.”

You splashed him with water playfully.

-

The two of you swam for another fifteen minutes, chatting about the town and volleying the ball back and forth. Frankie pretended not to see the way the droplets of water clung to your skin and sparkled under the sunlight. When he noticed the little lace pattern on the bottom of your swimsuit, he knew he had been staring for too long and forced himself to look away. The very last thing he wanted to do was scare you away, or make you believe he had some sort of ulterior motives to helping you. 

You both dressed again before walking back up to the chairs. When the two of you returned, the group had already come back from swimming. They were passing around Tupperware full of fruit while Santi was starting up the tiny little grill he had brought. 

“You guys really don’t play around for beach days,” you mentioned to Frankie. 

“I tried to warn you,” he said with a smirk. 

Will had Lucy thrown over his shoulder, carrying her easily with one arm. “Has anyone seen Fry?”

“I’m right here!” Lucy’s little voice drifted out from behind him.

Will started turning, pretending to look for her “Fry! Fry! Where are you!”

Lucy was hardly able to speak through her fit of giggles, “I’m behind you!”

He put her down on the sand, pretending as if he had seen her for the first time. “Jesus Fry! You scared me!”

“Lulu,” Frankie said, “come here so I can put more sunscreen on you.” Frankie took the bottle from the bag and sprayed her again, making sure to get her ears and the tops of her feet as well. He sprayed some in his hands, and Lucy scrunched up her nose as he applied it to her face.

Watching the two of them together made you smile. You were reminded again just how different Frankie was from your husband. David would have felt emasculated by having to take care of a child. If he had attended today, you would be sitting beside him silently the entire time, only getting up to fetch him a beer.

“Do you want some?” Frankie asked, and you were suddenly snapped right back to reality.  

Even though you weren’t threatened by a burn yet, you figured it would be a good idea. “Yeah, thank you.” You offered him your arms, then the front of your legs.

“I used to be terrible with remembering sunblock until I got sun poisoning in Iraq, god never again.”

“Iraq?” you asked, and turned so he could get the backs of your legs.

“Yeah, with the air force” he told you, assuming you already knew. 

Breath hitched in your throat as he brushed your hair over your shoulder. You cringed at the feeling of the warm sunscreen hitting the back of your neck and jerked away. It was enough for the others to notice. You laughed and lied quickly “damn horse flies hurt when they bite. They say you should wash off the bite with soap to get it to stop the swelling. Is there a bathroom here?”

You sounded believable. Becoming an expert liar had been the only thing keeping you alive for so long. 

Frankie felt horrible. He didn’t quite know what he had done to trigger you, but he knew it was something. “It’s pretty far, I can walk with you-”

You shook your head, a wide smile still plastered across your lips. “Nope, I just need a direction.”

Santi jumped in quickly. “That building when we first came in, near the tennis courts.”

You nodded and started forward, tears stinging at the corners of your eyes. Why was this happening right now? You were fine a moment ago and now you felt as though you couldn’t catch your breath. You shivered, remembering the feeling again and putting your hand on the back of your neck to stop it.

A soldier…. it made sense. You were too stupid to have seen it, the nicknames and the holiday...... 

Thankfully, they were single stall restrooms; you pulled the door shut and locked it behind you. The bottom of the floor was disgusting and filled with wet sand. You lifted yourself up onto the counter and sat, trying to calm down. A soldier, a soldier, you kept repeating to yourself. It was too similar. The anger, the potential for violence…. just like your husband. 

You placed your head in your hands, and suddenly you were back in New Jersey. It was a bitter February, snow still on the ground. You were in your bathroom hiding as David raged in the living room and screamed at his coworker on the phone. A little boy had been killed by his father weeks ago. David was assigned to the case. When the trial came, the jury found the man innocent and let him walk free, even though all the evidence pointed to him as the killer. It was an embarrassment to David and the entire homicide unit

“God fucking dammit, y/n! y/n!”

You pulled yourself up on shaking legs, straightened your dress and walked out. David was red in the face waiting for you. “I thought I told you to call Comcast, did I not?”

“They said that they could get someone out here Wednesday because of the snow-”

He took the television remote and threw it at you as hard as he could; he aimed for your face but it hit your shoulder instead. The plastic connected straight with your collarbone. You doubled over in pain, holding it as it throbbed. He stalked up to you and you moved back, the fear evident in your eyes.

His voice was teetering on the edge of lunacy as he screamed at you.

“I give you a simple fucking job to do and you can’t even get it done. You’re a lazy fat fucking bitch.” he shoved you hard but you manged to keep standing. “Spend all day sitting on your fucking ass while I have to go to work for the both of us! I need the television because I need to see the news coverage of the fucking case! You knew this! Or would you like me to get fired and the both of us live on the fucking streets!” He shoved you again, and you fell against the stone fireplace. Your hands came up to shield your face as he picked up the remote and hit you with it repeatedly. It caught your lip, busting it open. 

You didn’t care about the blood, all you could think about was the gun still holstered in his belt. You got the television fixed the next day-

“Summer?” 

You stood quickly and wiped away the tears from your cheeks, pretending like nothing was wrong. “Yeah?”

“Are you alright?” 

It was Frankie. 

You shook your head and smiled in the dingy plastic mirror in front of you. “Yeah, why?”

He could hear that you had been crying. He pushed on the door but it was locked. 

You didn’t like that at all; you slipped off the counter and sat on the floor, against the door. Bracing it closed with your body “I’m fine-”

“You’re crying-”

“No, I’m not I- I get allergies and that horsefly hurt. I am such a baby I’ve always had a low pain tolerance-”

“If it’s something that I did -”

“Nope, it’s nothing that you did. I’m fine, I’m really, really fine I promise. I just got overwhelmed and needed some air. I’ll be back in a few minutes, and you guys can eat without me. Don’t let me hold you up.”

Frankie wasn’t convinced, but he didn’t want to force anything. “Would you like me to save you a plate?”

“Yes, please.”

You could hear his footsteps start to retreat and relaxed a little. 

“Summer?”

“Yeah?”

Frankie was about to say something, but he thought better of it. He figured it was better to let you have your space now.

[romanogers-lyrics]

TFAWS Ep 5: finally some good fucking ✨vindication✨

Scratch that rewind what I said- this is the best episode (maybe in comic book tv history). Closure, growth, and redemption 🙌 just when I was worried they wouldn’t be able to tie things up they fucking give me this 😩🤩👏✊🏽

Holy hell my poor heart died and ascended to the moon to hang out with Steve and Natasha. ✨Goddamn the mastery of storytelling in this episode is why I love the MCU so much ✨

The opening fight between Walker, Bucky, and Sam had me on the edge of my seat. Like in most fights you know the stakes are low because the main heroes always win but this fight... whew it was consequential and more personal than the civil war fight imo. I genuinely was worried about the outcome for Sam and Bucky physically and emotionally. Every beat was character driven! This was cathartic. 🙌 the stunt coordinators knocked it out of the park lovelovelove 💕.

“I am captain America” homie you giving me Gollum vibes. “It’s (the shield) MINE!” Like-

So many creative stunts with the wings!!!

Bucky and Sam working TOGETHER

BUCKY DROPPING THE SHIELD AT SAM’S FEET 😭

The golden light seeping into the frame at the end of the fight 🤌🏼

Sam wiping the blood off the shield. 🥲 I can’t even articulate but it makes me feel-

Sammy’s wings got snapped off and he eventually left them with Torres (passing the mantle?) which symbolizes Sam growing out of his old super hero role. It was cleansing. He’s ready to be more. He’s ready to take action rather than let things happen to him 👏

Baby boy Torres trying to talk to Mr Bucky 🥺. You have both sleeves today Mr Bucky sir 💕

I want no I NEED 😫Torres to fly in with the wings next episode.

How we feeling about Walker?? On the one hand I feel him. Us gov did him dirty but at the same time he made the choices he made. Maybe there is room for redemption? Idk... 🙃 or will he continue to get worse?

I am SO glad that Sam went back to talk to isaiah. He needed to know the full story. He needed closure. I could ramble on and on but the writers made the points so much better than I could but just-

Steve did the exact same thing as Isaiah in the first avenger. He went behind enemy lines to rescue Bucky- without permission! He was a hero for it. And Isaiah was thrown in jail? The double standard is so frustrating

I think Isiah’s point that “no self respecting black man” would use the shield makes sense with his background and story. It makes me sick what was done to him. Things really haven’t changed 😞. At this point I honestly wasn’t sure what Sam was going to do. More later on about this-

Zemo’s theme is so beautiful every time I hear it. 🤌🏼🤌🏼🤌🏼🤌🏼

What a beautiful scene. Cinematography 💯 Such a great moment between Bucky and Zemo. Zemo fully expects to die and then Bucky does the one thing zemo didn’t expect- the one thing he wasn’t “programmed” to do. Fuuuuuckcjfkekxn

“I crossed my name off in your book” 😭. He obviously grew to respect Bucky and wants him to have peace at last with all the civil war stuff.

Ayo back to calling Bucky white wolf 🐺 love to see it.

The kids playing with the shield and tracing the star has me CRYING. Kids are our hope and they still see something special in the shield. They still believe in it. 😭 such a small moment completely floored me.

Wholesome boat fix up 🥺. I feel like this is the montage where SamBucky fall in love 😂

When Sarah and Sam are talking about the boat- how it is their history- I think again of Isaiah. His history was erased. Sam has to preserve his history ✊🏽

Sarah is a goddamn queen and I Stan 🤌🏼✨

The montage was just a sip of cool water in the desert of trauma that is the MCU.

OKEEEE the conversation between Sam and Bucky where they’re tossing the shield is great on so many levels 😍:

Physically the shield matches the dynamic of the convo. Someone makes a point and throws it. Someone accepts what that person said and catches the shield. Bucky physically offers the shield when he says “I’m sorry” and Sam accepts the shield AND the apology.

The difference between avenging and amending. I was surprised they even used that word bc it calls out the avengers for maybe not doing the emotional work involved in being a hero. Healing is part of the hero job now. #phase4

A small detail but as a person of color I valued it; when Bucky said I’m sorry Sam did not say “it’s okay” or “no worries” because he didn’t have to, I feel like as a POC I’m always making white people feel better and for once I’d like to be confident enough to just accept someone’s apology outright and know I deserve it.

Pivotal when Sam said “it doesn’t matter what Steve thought” at first I was like biiiihhh??! 😠 but he had a point. Both Sam and Bucky have been trying to do hold onto another person who is gone. They gotta heal but more importantly they have to find their own reasons to keep fighting.

The training montage 🤌🏼🙌🤩🥲🥺😭✊🏽. Like FEED ME YEs WE ARE EATiNG. Sammy deserves it all

Sam’s cap theme music is similar to Steve’s but still different. Goddamn so beautiful 💕💕😩

Sam has been pretty passive in this show- almost wanting confirmation he did the right thing. Isaiah didn’t give Sam that comfort but neither did Bucky at first. Sam had to make his own choice 😤✊🏽

It’s a heavy burden to be cap knowing all the shit that has come before but Sam is the only one who can make that decision to be or not to be. And he’s seen the alternative now. In life taking action and taking control of our situation is empowering but always harder than doing nothing. He says it best- what’s the point of all that struggle if you’re not going keep on fighting ✊🏽🥺 I love and respect Sam so much 😭 spoken like captain America! 👏

Show me the suit you COWARDS I WANNA SEe

Goddamnit damnit to hell... I need to SEE IT

Is Sharon setting a trap for Karli???

🚨 end credit: I’m not sure if they are making an iron man comparison. What do you guys think?

Ready for the showdown throwdown next week 👀

All in all it was fucking wild ya’ll and I felt catharsis watching this and so fucking hopeful. I cry 😭

Please feel free to share any thoughts you have about this episode💕

there’s so much in this show that is world building within mcu but also in greater conversations about heroism and power. It is a moral re evaluation of the superhero. Malcom Spellman being head writer you know this shit is not happenstance it is intentional. The took the long road and it totally paid off in this episode 😭

🙇🏻‍♀️ I am emotionally manipulated by this show 🙇🏻‍♀️

Huge shout out to all the cast and crew for making something both respectful to the lore but also challenging it to be better 🙌

My ep 4 review:

Tag list: @soliloquy-of-nemo

[gcldfanged]

@heavensfists

Below the top plates, life was far from the idyllic boutiques of Loveless Street. All the pretty cobbled stones, the prim and proper two story houses in candy colors that Shinra so loved to plaster all over their advertisements were only available to the privileged few. The rest of the population had to scrounge around the debris and trash the top-platers discarded, wading through the oil slicks and sewage to try and make ends meet.

It wasn’t much of a life since even basic needs were in short supply, survival alone dominating the choices and options available to the thousands of slum rats living in crappy little communes. To think, he could have been one of them- Once upon a time.

Flanked by four of his biggest and meanest looking coworkers (all longshoremen with muscles so huge, they couldn’t even try to reach a post-it note stuck between their shoulder blades), Yoon purposefully walked down the steps of the Sector 7 train station- His very presence parting the veritable ocean of spare-changers. Any halfwits looking to pick his pockets or band together for a scrap were quickly dealt with, not that many people wanted to mess with a sharply dressed member of General Affairs toting around a heavy bullwhip.

“Gotta love the smell of rotten eggs and desperation...” he mused to himself, coming to a halt before a large signboard for The Seventh Heaven bar. With a nod of his head, his flunkies vacated any customers occupying the tables and the counter, two standing guard at the front door, while the remaining pair covered the back entrance.

While he wasn’t a tall individual by any means, Jae definitely had weight of presence going for him. An expensive and crisply tailored suit made up his protective armor, a small lapel pin bearing the Shinra logo gleamed red and silver in the overheard lighting. Tugging at his fingerless leather driving gloves, the Turk approached Lockhart slowly, striding right up to the bar top with a congenial smile pulling at the corners of his lips.

“My apologies for interrupting a busy night, but I thought it might be pleasant to have some privacy. People around here know the value of information well and I’d just hate for our conversation to be repeated down the grape vine. I trust that my being here won’t be a problem?” he states as implicit fact more than he asks permission, leaning his steel-tipped shoe against one of the lower rungs of a wooden barstool.

He may have trespassed upon enemy turf, but this sad little offshoot of Avalanche held no true power- No resources, or reputation to speak of- much less any actual guerilla soldiers to be afraid of.

[purplerose244]

My thoughts on Seabound!!! 🌊🌊🌊 (4/4)

Here we are! What a journey, and while perhaps this season wasn't at MoM level it was REALLY good, with great new villains/allies, great little throwbacks and an awesome story! 🤩

How to get this was very good to great? Give me a very good ending Seabound!! 💕💕

Alright, here we go!

GENERAL THOUGHTS

I genuinely got too much into this remaining four episodes and forgot to put any general thoughts 😅 So you'll see me rambling at the end, see you there 😉

THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM

This title really summarize my feelings so far, like, I'm seriously wondering how it will move on from now, but I do expect the outcome to be CRAZY 🤯

Aaahhhh, yep, the one in Shintaro is a fake 😅 I wonder when did the change happen? How did Kalmaar pulled that off, wow

I'M SORRY WHY ARE WE PUTTING THE TITLE SCREEN WITHOUT THE INTRO?? THAT'S A FIRST EPISODE STUFF AND IT HONESTLY SCARES ME??? It reminds me of Winds of Change too and that episode was WOW 😭😭😭

Heeeeyyy, it's youuuu... huh... *watch scribble on hand* google snake guy, huh... Glucose... yep, good old Glutine and everything 😅

Are we having a "I may have made a mistake being evil" with this guy?

Jay: ah, Prime Empire! I was in that game you know! I fought for my life and the ones of all of Ninjago and I've seen my best friends and the love of my life die before my eyes... good times 🙂

Jay and Nya having fun at DDR has to be one of my favorite thing, they are so in sync and so lovable ❤💙❤💙

DID THEY ACTUALLY PUT THE JAYA SHIP NAME INTO THE SHOW??? OMG GUYS THE FANDOM IS TAKING OVER THE SHOW AT LAST!!! 🤯🤯🤯 The electric Jaya, heeeyy, niiicee 😎😎😎

HOW CUTE CAN YOU BE

MY SHIP 💙❤💙❤ They even gave each other high gives... this is neat, and it means something awful will happen right 🙂

Commissioner: he's saying something about a giant snake... and the end of the world... didn't we already have something like that?

Okay yep, he did the trick while fighting Nya, dang Kalmaar is sneaky! Not too shabby... but I gotta say, the summoning of the Great Devourer was a lot more dramatic 🤣🤣 Props to the serpentine, still my favorite snakes 💪💪

Wojira seems to be a little smaller than the Devourer maybe? His head way bigger than the bounty, while hers is not that massive even in comparison with Kalmaar

I might be wrong but at first glance, I stand by my opinion and by the superiority of the OG giant snake 🤷‍♀️

Yep Glutine guy did have a change of heart, better late than never 🤷‍♀️

You're telling me that Jay doesn't do engineering anymore, okay... HOW IS KAI A BETTER SOLUTION??? 🤣🤣🤣 Lol look at the messy brothers, love Lloyd and Kai so much I miss them interact 💚❤💚❤

Thank you Kelly for the alert 😗

It makes me wonder if they actually do have simulations of evacuations often, it would be pretty smart considering the city 🤷‍♀️

OKINO IS THERE HI DUDE!!! 😍 I hope he's doing great! 🥰🥰

Gail Gossip! Been a while!

WOW, this is going Deluge like, my first Spinjitzu Master! 😱 How... how do we go with three episodes from here? Like, I'm guessing Nya will have to do what Nyad did before her (which TERRIFIES me), so are they going to struggle trying to find another way? IDK BUT I'M IN LET'S GO!! 🤯

ASSAULT ON NINJAGO CITY

Alright, pretty straightforward title, let's see what we got here!

Tourists?... that actually makes sense, I mean, I would want to visit all the places where history was made on this island 😍 Aww nice to see they remember the battle against Garmy of Hunted, also that it is known that Jay was the one who faced Unagami 👍👍

DARETH!!! 🤎🤎🤎

Where have you been you knucklehead, I've missed you! 💕 I think I've last seen him in a commercial from the Fire Chapter?

This is a terrible guide 😵 Not knowing the brown ninja? Owner of the dojo the Green Ninja had trained in? Brief commander of the Stone Army? Master of makeup and puffy potstickers? Unforgivable, someone fire this woman ASAP 😡😡

LOOK AT DARETH TAKING CHARGE!!! 🤩 He's right, he should get involved every once in a while, come on guys!

Ah okay good, I'm not the only one struggling with that google snake name 😂

Yay Bentho is fully integrated with the team! He is a great addiction, like, I know he'll probably take the throne at the end or something but I do hope we'll need his help again in the future! 💙

Sometimes I forget how much I love Kai and Zane interacting 🤣 The brainiac and the airhead 🤍❤🤍❤

Oh right, Cole came back from Shintaro! So... now in this extremely secret city there is a fake amulet hanging into a highly secured place... how is it always Shintaro the keeper of flukes? 😂😂

A bath as a boat but it has a whole 😂😂 I love this show's randomness

What ears are they supposed to cover 😅

I LOVE THIS ATMOSPHERE!!! 😍😍😍 Between the gray sky of storm and the sea underneath, this is the perfect scenario for Wojira and it's not even forced! I love how they are handling backgrounds for Ninjago recently, I really hope it gets as good as in the finale of Prime Empire 💙💙💙

AAAAAAHHHHHhhhhh okay for a moment I was scared Wojira was going to eat Jay 😅 After The Island this is already the second time Bluebell risks it... STOP

WHY THE CLIFFHANGER!?!?

NUUUUU WHAT NOW??? 😱😱😱 We have two more episodes, how is this going to end? I DON'T KNOW AND I REALLY WANT TO PLEASE GIVE ME A GOOD FINALE SEABOUND!!! 🙇‍♀️🙇‍♀️🙇‍♀️

NYAD

I AM SCARED FOR MY WATER LILY OKAY

Daaaang she can just float on that? She got super good at controlling water! Now I want her and Kai just randomly flying around with their powers 😂😂 Kai got missiles in his hands come on 🔥🔥🔥

JAY CAN YOU LET ME WORRY ABOUT YOU GUYS ONE AT THE TIME??? 😱

What would Kai do? WHAT WOULD KAI DO?? DID YOU DECIDE YOU WANT TO DIE JAY WHY WOULD YOU THINK OF HIM??? ... although technically Kai is the only one with Jay who didn't straight up die before coming back to life in a dramatic moment... huh... Kai might be the most reasonable choice after all 😅

We grew up from Ninja never quit to NINJA AREN'T IDIOTS AND KNOW WHEN TO GET THE HECK OUT 😎😎 Even our motto got a character development 💪

JAY NOOOOOOOO 😱😱😱😱

BENTHO YAAAAAAASSSS 🥳🥳🥳🥳 Did I ever say that I love shark boy? BECAUSE I FREAKING DO!! 💙

Master prankster Wu once again, take that empty ship Calamari head 😎 Although the poor bounty doesn't deserve to get destroyed as many times as it did until now, it's my favorite ship... pun intended 😜

Ah more ninjajan, wait a moment

"Auto Pilot". Fair enough, although I was hoping for a "psych" or something 😂😂

NO WAIT NO WHAT THE HECK!!! I THOUGHT JAY GOT SAVED HE INHALED WATER??!? BLUEBELL NOOOO!!! 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

But Cole running to his best friend immediately? HECK yes 🖤💙🖤💙

NYA CARRYING HER BOYFRIEND BRIDAL STYLE THIS IS THE RIGHTEST THING I'VE EVER SEEN!!! ❤💙❤💙❤💙❤💙 Gosh this season gave me amazing Jaya moments, I've been fed 👌👌

Okay Lloyd pacing back and forth? Kai already mad at their enemies? All the guys eager to help Jay? MY FAVORITE NINJA FAMILY BABY!!! 😎😎

I NEED A MOMENT 😭

Oh... oh gosh I knew Nya doing the Nyad thing was meant to happen, but this way? My heart is melting already 😭

I remember a post that said that Jay told Nya that he loves her many times, while she never did. Tommy reponded that she lets her actions speak... boy do I see it now, I see all of her love 😢😢

I never felt such conflicting emotions for a villain like I do for Kalmaar, like, he caused so much pain to Nya... but he is voiced by Giles... but he is the reason Jay is hurt... but that startle gag 😂😂😂

Okay this? Is adorable?

What the HECK? The police in this city is generally not very helpful, but the Commissioner is very wholesome 💜

Nyaaaaaaa 😭😭😭😭 I didn't think it was possible to love her even more, she was ignored for so long during the show, but now we finally see all of her. She is an amazing warrior, a selfless person, and a real hero 💪💪 And coming from such a mature girl that doesn't like to act irrationally, this means so much more

Jaya grew up so much, it went through some very questionable phases yes, but what they have here? It's the result of all they had lived together 💙❤💙❤

I have chills, this is amazing so far, I'm legit scared of going further 😱

SHE SAID IT!!! 😭😭😭😭😭😭 Okay this moment, everything, EVERYTHING, is absolutely marvelous. Nya said I love you without a voice, alone, showing again that she values the actions more, but still her feelings are 100% truthful. Then the transformation (THERE IT IS HER BEAUTIFUL WATER FORM 😍😍😍), Jay getting saved, the realization of what she just did from everyone... DANG IT IT'S ALL BEAUTIFUL HOW LONG DID IT TAKE TO THINK OF THIS SCENE???

*slow clap for Bragi, Tommy, and the Ninjago crew*

Jay and water Nya with their hands together gives me big The Form of Water vibes... LOVE THAT MOVIE WHO'S READY FOR AN AU??

Jay wants to help her, I had no doubt 💙 They always help each other in these BOUNDs seasons 😍😍😍

Kalmaar: where are the ninja??

Commissioner: I don't know, they are ninja!

FINAL BATTLE INCOMING AAAAHHH I HOPE THIS WILL HAVE A GOOD ENDING OMG BRING IT!!! 🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩

THE TURN OF THE TIDE

Oh, curious title? It feels a little vague, I don't really know what it could be

YES GIRL GO GET HIS CALAMARI BUTT HECK YES!!! Just how cool can you be for walking slowly while the attacks go straight through you? 😂

Hey Nya still recognizes Jay! 😃😃

HEY NYA GOT VAPORIZED WTH 😱😱 It's too early, I don't believe that's it!

WHOA JAY WENT BERSERK JUST NOW!! I don't think I've seen this before, this is the coolest thing! 💙💙💙 I just love when he shows how strong he is, you can be a comic relief AND kick butts 😎

FIGHTING ANIMATIONS MAN I LOVE THESE SCENES!! 😍😍😍

What the- was... was that a cameo of the lightning chicken? Ninjago what the HECK I love your randomness 😂😂

BENTHOMAAR TAGS IN!!! Showing off why he is best boy of the season 💙 These fightings are very cool but I can't help imagining Wojira just chilling while there are midgets getting very angry at each other onto her head 🤣🤣🤣

WHOA, CALAMARI BITE! Kalmaar got the Pythor treatment... might change color by next season if he returns 😅

(Please return I loved having Giles' voice in this season 💙💙💙)

NYA IS A DRAGON!!! I REPEAT NYA IS A DRAGON!!! 😍😍😍😍😍😍 I was wondering where the dragon moment was, this is Ninjago after all 🤷‍♀️

Head empty, just Jay smiling softy at Nya because he loves her 💙💙💙

IT'S RAINING NYA, HALLELUIA IT'S RAINING NYA, HEYE!! ☔☔☔ This fight is MASSIVE! We had finales with big creatures before but now one of the ninja is big enough to face them and that's 🤯

NYA DID IT!!! 🤩🤩🤩 ... now onto the angst that I KNOW it's coming

Kai being unbelieving is tragic, and Jay's "don't leave me" broke my heart. Please end this misery, where is the deus ex machina that solves everything?

Wait she left?

...

WAIT SHE ACTUALLY LEFT??? WHAT THE HECK THEY AREN'T ENDING IT LIKE THIS

...

OH MY GOSH

ARE THEY?!?

AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH 🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯

Omg the grief in this is beautiful, nice to see Jay and Maya so close to each other! Also Kai leaning onto his mom while Cole is comforting his best best friend? Amazing, they really do these scenes great 👌

EVERYONE SHOWED UP I LOVE THIS CITY SO MUCH 😭😭😭 Aww Ed and Edna, wasn't this such a sad situation I would be so much happier to see you guys 🥺

Master Wu even mentioned that she built Samurai X, you really want to make me cry now do you? 🥺🥺

MAYA AND RAY 😢😢😢😢😢😢

Omg look at Cole being there for his best friend, he is amazing 🖤💙🖤💙

I have such Rebooted vibes from this... is it hopeful? That Nya comes back like Zane? She's no nindroid but still... oh my gosh they got her symbol on the vase I just noticed, I need more tissues 😭😭

"In loving memory of Kirby Morrow". Always in our hearts 🖤🖤🖤

...

Wow

WOW

THEY ACTUALLY DID IT I NEED ANOTHER MOMENT 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 WHAT IN THE WORLD THIS IS THE BIGGEST CHANGE THEY DID IN A WHILE!!!

AND NOW WHAT??? 🤯🤯🤯

FINAL THOUGHTS

I'm speechless... like that's true, have A LOT to write over here 😅

This type of plot twist reminds me of our early seasons. Zane sacrificing himself, Garmadon giving up his life, those moments that made me so curious and excited about the following. I have no idea what will be the outcome for this, but I can't wait to find out

With that out of the way, AMAZING SEASON 😍😍😍 I think this finale beats MoM's, just because it was really unexpected and opens up a SEA of possibilities... yeah too soon 😭

I'm still shaken, my world, they did something HUGE and I do hope it will be a good shake to the entire Ninjago plotline. Nya is "gone", we still don't know about the person behind all that vengestone, we haven't heard from Garmy in forever, there are so many good ideas out there now that they've set the ground for more 🤩🤩

Voice acting was *chef's kiss*, not only for the villain which I already stressed enough about, I think Kelly reached a new level of emotional intimacy with Nya and I'm so happy she showed her skills 💜💜

Animation is TOP, there's little to no point into saying anything else since they showed it very clearly in the latest season ☺

This was the emotional, witty and engaging writing I was looking for! Good jokes, meaningful dialogues, emotional scenes, everything was really good and I'm gonna rewatch some scenes especially for that 😍

It turned out having Maya and Ray back was kind of a distraction to fool us all 😅😅 Well played actually, and it was very cool seeing them again in any case 🙋‍♀️

And now? Jay lost his love, I have no idea if the show will work on him getting over her or hold onto her memory (thinking of Jay probably the latter, although I do think that handling the first would be an interesting idea). KAI LOST HIS SISTER 😢😢😢 I have no doubt he's gonna beat himself up for it, like he did when Zane was gone too. Everyone lost their friend, she had become such a vital part of the team and now she is not here anymore it will be hard...

They are back with the four plus one green savior formation, I sincerely don't know how I feel about that 😅 I'm always happy when we get the OGs, but this is about going on without Nya... maybe Skylor will be called? Or Pixal will be more active? That could be interesting to see, who knows 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Gosh, how are they going to handle the next season? It will have to give A LOT of answers to the millions questions we all have right now. Man I can't wait, it could be anything!!! This is a Ninjago revolution!

But if I have to mention a little complain, and I'm a fangirl so I absolutely have to, Kai didn't show much of a reaction to Nya's "departure". Okay, she didn't straight up die like in Skybound (I'm gonna fear all BOUND seasons from now on 😱), but he's her brother and he loves deeply his family. Either we're gonna see him go all out next season, or the writers really did only focus on Jaya. A tiny bit salty... but you got me a fantastic finale so I'll move on 👍

Outstanding, I'm blown away. Whenever I think I'm used to this show they do stuff like this. I'm so glad and sad you guys 😅 But mostly happy that despite everything I still get very strong emotions while I watch this long time favorite show of mine 💜💜💜

What else can I say at this point? ONTO NEXT SEASON!!! 🤩🤩🤩

Thank you for reading me freaking out over LEGO spinning ninja as always! It helps me calm down but this time it might be harder thant the others... *sobs*

I need to lay down and process all of this, I'll be on my way 😂😂 BYE!!! 💜

[epicseptic]

Erseptyl AU

Prologue Part2

So this is part 2/3 to the prologue of my fantasy au? I so apologize if this one doesn’t live up to the first. This one got a little too ambitious for me.... but I am still learning how to word ^^’ And dialogue.. i gotta learn to do that too. I’ll learn tho. I hope.... Criticism is appreciated ^^’

Part one - https://epicseptic.tumblr.com/post/660766644770062336/erseptyl-au

----------

"Ugh, this is so BORING!" Marvin groaned. He slumped in his place on the throne, leaning his elbow on the armrest with his head in his hand.

"Your Highness, please refrain from such inappropriate outbursts...." Anti was highly unamused by the misbehavior and the disapproving look on his face said it all. He stood to the left of the throne with a book as big as an encyclopedia in his arms and a quill in his hand. As Marvin's royal advisor, he stood beside him throughout most of the day charting records and ultimately helping the prince make decisions on social and economical issues in the kingdom. He was typically very calm and passionate about his work, always wanting to get straight to the point and sometimes getting carried away. 

At least, that's how Marvin saw it.

"How many people did you say I would have to meet with today?" He asked, his boredom was evident in the tone of his voice and the way he kicked his foot against the carpet.

"Not many. Several folks from town have requested an audience with you. Afterwards, you are to meet with a group of men from the council to discuss taxes and production within the city. It should only take a couple of hours. Now please sit up straight and be professional." His words were quite stern and he spoke to him as if he was instructing a four year old. It was clear that he didn't have much patience to deal with the prince's nonsense today.

Marvin simply huffed with slight annoyance as he propped himself up and fixed his posture. He was used to behaving "properly" but he wasn't fond of the way the servants would still tell him how to act. It seemed that some of them still treated him like some kind of adolescent child. Maybe they didn't see it the same way, but he thought he was perfectly mature. Inexperienced maybe, but other than that he didn’t need everyone to hold his hand all the time. He wasn’t just some child anymore. He just wasn't at all excited about the boring meetings he would have to sit through today... 

As if right on cue, the captain of the royal guard, Chase, entered through the castle gates and approached the throne along the long, golden colored carpet. "Your Highness" He kneeled in front of the steps when he reached the end of the hall. "The townspeople that are to meet with you are beginning to line up outside. Shall I let them in now?"

Chase was Marvin's most skilled soldier. He was skilled in both sword and bow. In fact, archery was his strongest suit. He was dedicated and disciplined, though you would never know that outside of the sparring halls since that side of himself was reserved only for the training grounds and the battlefield. His authoritative conduct usually stayed buried beneath his friendly and optimistic attitude when he was around the rest of the staff. He was friendly and fun, but focussed when he needed to be. Marvin quite appreciated his companionship as well. He was a good friend and was actually acquainted with the prince on a more personal level, much like JJ was. However, he still treated Marvin with the utmost respect. To this day, he still refused to address him by his first name no matter how many times Marvin told him he could.

With a bit of uncertainty, Marvin looked to Anti who simply stared impatiently back at him, waiting for him to give the command to the knight. He supposed that look meant yes. He sighed, ready to just get the afternoon over with. "Yes. Please send them in...."

Chase wasted no time nodding and getting to his feet to fetch the townspeople waiting outside and it wasn't long before he returned to introduce the first individual; a baker by the name of Ludwig looking to expand his business. He was asking to be given the funds to open a second shop on the other side of town and to provide himself with the proper equipment. A reasonable thing to ask for, right?

"Well…" Marvin thought aloud upon hearing the man’s plea. He knew that his advisor would insist on denying this request - that he would see no significance in the man's plight - but decisions like this really preyed on Marvin's moral values. 

When he didn't come up with a quick enough response, Anti decided to chime in and give his opinion. "Your highness, adding another bakery into the city is not a priority. There is no need to waste tax money on... cake..." He had a look of disgust on his face when he said that last word, his eyes scanning the man up and down. His words were harsh and Marvin cringed seeing the baker’s heartbroken expression. As he suspected, Anti was opposed to the idea. He took his opinion into account but he still didn't know what he should say. It was all so daunting, having everyone's eyes on him while he anxiously tried to come up with something that would make everyone happy... But he knew that no matter what he chose, someone was going to be upset. Whether it was the baker who would leave empty handed and disappointed, or Anti who would disagree with the way he handled money. It was as if he was stood before a tall, delicate structure and, despite his best efforts to keep it standing, his ultimate decision would always send it crashing down. Since being in charge, he quickly learned that there were no compromises. Apparently, it wasn’t about making a choice that made everyone happy, but instead about choosing the one that would cause less destruction…

He knew that he couldn't pass out gold to just anyone but, in the end, he couldn't deny someone the opportunity to follow their dreams. And so, he finally had his verdict. "I think it's great that you want to share your talent with your people. I would be honored to help provide you with the means to do so." He agreed and the man was immediately filled with joy. He thanked the prince again and again, saying that the kingdom was blessed to have such a gracious ruler like him. He had to admit, he felt a bit awkward by his kind words but, aside from that, he was just happy to see the man filled with such happiness. Besides, Marvin knew what it was like to want to be a part of something bigger and achieve a personal level of success. 

It felt good to come to a rewarding conclusion and he was beaming as he watched Chase escort the very joyful man out of the throne room. However, when he looked to Anti, he noticed him looking down with a frown as he scribbled something in his notes. He was shaking his head in disapproval and Marvin's smile promptly faded seeing the sour expression on his face. Suddenly he began wondering if he made the right choice after all. Maybe he should've thought a little harder about his decision but wasn't keeping the people happy the right thing to do? Wasn't that the most important thing about being a ruler?

He just didn't know anymore. He wished someone would tell him... It always seemed like he was doing something wrong. It was never good enough for everyone…

Minutes after the man had left the throne room, the next citizen walked in through the large doors. After all the time he'd spent pondering the first request, he already felt so overwhelmed and began wondering just how long that whole ordeal had taken.

"Umm… Anti?” He leaned over his chair to whisper to him. “How long have we been here?"

He stared vacantly at him for a moment, completely speechless. "Your highness, we just got started… It's only been 10 minutes. Now, please sit properly!" He whispered back but with a far more impatient tone. Truthfully, he was shocked that the prince was already getting restless when they'd only just begun.

Only 10 minutes? He frowned and corrected his posture again, resting his head in his hand while he leaned against the armrest. If that's how long 10 minutes felt, he couldn't imagine how long he was going to have to sit there… Sitting in one spot for hours was boring enough as it was, but the most taxing part of it all would be making proper, sensible decisions in a timely manner. all while trying his best to keep everyone happy. That was the most difficult part about all of this and he knew that all of the stress was going to leave him exhausted. There was no telling how long these meetings were going to last but he just tried to maintain professionalism and push through the next few hours with a smile. All he knew was that it was about to be a long afternoon… 

----------

Later that evening, after all of his meetings were finally over, Marvin had retired to his study. Unfortunately, though his meetings were over, his business was not and he still had yet to finish answering many other requests. His study room consisted of bookshelves on either side of the room, a large arched window in the back with the curtains wide open to let in the sunlight, and his desk in the center which contained paperwork, ink, quills, and books.

He was sitting at his desk with his head resting tiredly in his hand while he leaned his elbow on the wood. Anti was with him and he was listening to him read out more propositions for him to answer to. These ones were different from the meetings he had to sit through earlier since they weren’t just from town, but from all over the kingdom. Each proposition came with a scroll of paper to sign and Anti passed them to him on the table one by one. He had such a hard time focusing on them and found himself staring distantly at the papers in front of him, barely caring enough to listen as Anti read them out.

"Your Highness, the king in the neighboring kingdom is planning to raid Jaskervawl and he is inviting you to join him. He is simply asking for you to provide men and weapons for his cause. This would be a great opportunity for you to-"

"No, thank you." He suddenly interrupted, not wanting to hear any more. He already hated the sound of this selfish request.

Anti didn't appreciate being interrupted but he calmly continued just as before. "My Prince, if I may, this would be a great opportunity to expand your reign and conquer more territory." Anti made an effort to calmly convince him to change his mind and go through with the raid. "As king, it is important that you claim land and supplies for profit, even if that means stealing it. Just think, your leadership could strike fear into your enemies."

He shook his head. "I said no. I will not get involved in a war."

"My liege, I think you should accept this proposal.” He immediately disregarded his refusal and insisted that he go through with the assault on Jaskervawl. “You cannot continue to dodge vital opportunities such as this. A king must show leadership! You represent everything that this kingdom stands for. Whether or not this leads to a war, should not concern you...“ This is what he hated most when it came to working under the prince. He was always trying to 'play it safe' and it was obviously holding him back. His lack of leadership was only hindering the growth of the kingdom's productivity and, therefore, its money. 

And to him, money meant power.

"I said, no." Though he raised his voice a bit, he remained patient with Anti. However, it was starting to bug him that his words seemed to have no effect on the situation. He was in charge and yet it felt like he had no say in this. He wanted nothing more to do with it. "We will speak of this no further."

By this point, Anti was incredibly irked and found that he couldn't hold back his frustration any longer. "You are going to be king one day, and you expect to be as successful as your father? At this rate you’ll never measure up to him! What kind of example do you intend to set if you do not grow up and take some responsibility to provide for your kingdom? When will you accept your role as a ruler and quit avoiding every opportunity to-"

"Enough! That is not your decision to make!" This struck a nerve for him. He could only take so much of Anti patronizing him and he quickly got to his feet, his hands slamming on the table in protest. "I am the prince and I run this kingdom, not you! Do not speak to me like I am some kind of naive child!"

Anti fell silent. Marvin noticed and he brought his voice level down significantly.

He waited a few moments, took a deep breath, then sighed. "I told you, I decline. I will not risk the safety of my people or my army. You would do well to accept that, Anti."

"But-"

"You are my advisor, not my father. You have no authority over me. You are merely here to assist me in my daily affairs. I make the decisions, not you." It seemed he always had to remind him of his place...

He hesitated, swallowing back his agitation. "Yes, my liege...." He bit his tongue, so hard that he could taste a slight tang of blood in his mouth. He had to bite back whatever bitter insult he so longed to spit into the prince's face.

Marvin never noticed anything out of the ordinary and sat back down in his chair once he’d calmed down. He stared down at the paper in front of him with thought before picking it up and crumpling it into a ball in his hand. "Look....” He began. “I will remind you again not to step out of line."

"Yes, of course.... My humblest apologies, my lord. It seems I have allowed myself to lose my composure again...” His words were almost dramatic. The tone he used was excessively apologetic. So much so that any other person would suspect that it was all an act, like a jester putting on a terrible theater play, portraying a character that anyone could see right through. “I hope you will have mercy on me...." He bowed deeply with his left hand over his chest. No matter how many times this happened, he always acted so sincere, and Marvin believed him. He felt that he had no reason to doubt him.

He never looked back at Anti. In fact, he seemed to intentionally avoid looking directly at him. Instead, Marvin breathed a heavy sigh and after a few moments of silence, he offered his answer. "Of course…." He said calmly. Even though Anti tended to lose his cool, he worked efficiently at his job and Marvin couldn't bring himself to punish him. He wanted to be fair but perhaps he wasn't being firm enough. 

It didn't matter right now. His mind was tired and he was at his limit. He just wanted to finally be rid of all of the stress of this day. "Please, Anti, if you don't mind, I think I'm done with my duties for today. I'm exhausted…."

More annoying delays... He wanted to protest again but quickly caught himself and held back before he could make a sound. "Understood... We can continue this matter tomorrow. I will just take my leave then." He bowed to him once again. However, he never once took his cold, harsh glare off of him. The expression on his face was disturbingly calm, but his eyes were like icy daggers. It was like his stare alone could impale you just the same as any sharp blade.

Again, Marvin failed to notice this and laid his forehead directly on his desk, both arms dangling lazily at his sides. He really acted so immature sometimes... It didn't matter anymore though because Anti hastily turned on his heel and exited the room, not wanting to waste another moment he could be spending elsewhere.

Stepping out into the hall, he passed by another servant, JJ to be exact, who was carrying a tray of dessert for the prince in his hands. Anti marched down the corridor, the weight of his boots on the carpet let anyone within earshot know of his presence. JJ felt his shoulders stiffen when he noticed Anti ahead of him. He knew that they would inevitably cross paths so he made a great effort not to accidentally make eye contact with the intimidating man in front of him. Though his head remained facing forward the whole time, as he passed him, JJ swore he caught a glimpse of that same icy stare glancing at him with disgust. The moment was so short but the weight of his stare was almost suffocating. And as he walked away, the wind from his cape trailing behind him carried a bitter chill to it that made Jamie shudder.

As scared as he was of Anti though, he couldn’t help but stop in his tracks and turn back to catch a glimpse of him walking away with a posture so tall and full of pride… He looked so normal from a distance but up close, Anti was terrifying. He tried to just shake it off and pay no mind to his unsettling presence though. He had important matters that needed his attention, and after a few moments of staring, he turned around and continued down the corridor to Marvin's study.

He carefully knocked on the door when he’d reached it. Seconds later, he heard Marvin's muffled voice from the other side, permitting him to enter. He entered the room slowly and closed the door behind him. The first thing he saw was Marvin sitting with his arms folded on the desk and his head buried in his arms. He looked… comfortable... He didn't want to disturb him so he set down the tray on the desk in front of him and gave his shoulder a gentle tap.

When Marvin looked up, he saw a lovely piece of fruit cake on a small plate waiting for him. Then he noticed JJ looking at him with concern written in his expression. He quickly corrected his posture and shook the hair away from his face to quickly fix himself up for his friend and make it seem like nothing was out of the ordinary. Maybe JJ wouldn’t notice his tiredness.

"Oh- Hey, Jamie" he greeted as naturally as he could. However, JJ could see the fatigue on his face, plain as day.

"Is everything alright?" He signed. Seeing as how Anti had just left the room and Marvin being so worn out, he suspected that Anti had lost his temper again. This seemed to be a pattern with Anti and JJ wasn't at all pleased with the way he overstepped his boundaries with the prince.

Anti carried the blood of a dark elf in his veins and, while his kind had been wiped out by humans long ago, it seemed that his temperament matched that of his ancestors. It was a characteristic of his, yet it always made JJ wonder why Anti would take on a role in serving the royal family. Shouldn't he have a grudge on the royal bloodline for the destruction of his kind? As curious as he was, Jamie couldn't bring himself to ask. Anti was terrifying enough as it was. But why on earth would someone with such a short fuse like him work such a tedious job like this one? He should know what to expect by now.

"Did something happen with Anti?" He inquired worriedly, already expecting the answer he dreaded to hear.

He picked up the plate from the tray and placed it in front of himself. He didn't know how to answer him. He knew that if he said yes, JJ would scold him again for letting Anti lose his cool. But he couldn’t lie. Not to Jamie. "Well…" he paused, choosing his words carefully. "He just got a little heated again. It's no big deal though. I took care of it-"

Already he could see JJ's expression harden and his brows furrowing in anger. The mute wasn't usually one to lose his temper but when it came to his best friend, he became quite defensive.

"Marvin, you cannot allow him to disrespect you like that." He signed his name… Now Marvin knew just how serious he was. Even his hands moved more vigorously as he signed.

Marvin raised his shoulders and his cheeks flushed with shame. He knew that JJ was only concerned for him but he still felt as if he was a child who was being verbally chastised over a small mistake. Truthfully, he felt hopeless.

"It's fine, JJ. I have it all under control. It's nothing I can't handle-"

"Don't you see? He's doing more harm than good. He's stressing you out. Why do you continue to employ him?"

Marvin was silent. He stared down at the untouched cake in front of him, trying once again to find his words. "I can't just fire him. He might be impatient sometimes or lose his cool, but I feel like he has potential… You know?" He paused. "I mean… Surely, he's trying to better himself. Right? He deserves a chance at that…" He tried so hard to defend him and justify his cruel actions.

There was more to it than that and JJ could tell that he had more reason to want to trust Anti. He had a feeling he knew what it was too... Anti had been working at the castle for a long time. Longer than himself and many of the other servants. He had previously been under the employment of the king and only continued to serve under the prince. Marvin didn't want to fire him because he felt that he was the closest living person to his father. He certainly trusted him enough to allow him into the royal court… He just couldn't let go of someone who worked so closely with his father. Anti was the only one in the castle who spent all of his time with the king. If anyone knew how the king worked, it was him and Marvin believed him to be the only one who could show him how to be just as good as his father.

JJ had to admit, he felt a small bit offended. It seemed that Marvin saw Anti as more of a figure of guidance than him… In a way, he was disappointed that his best friend didn’t perceive him in that way. Despite all of that though, his reason for keeping the elf in power was personal and so JJ didn't want to press the matter further. Besides, the reasons didn't matter. It was clear that Marvin really trusted Anti as his advisor and didn't have the heart to remove him from his staff.

Marvin could see JJ looking at him intently with a very puzzled stare, as if he was staring into his mind trying to pick apart his very thoughts for trusting such a foul individual. "Look, don't worry about Anti. I know he's a bit… Unorthodox? But he deserves just as much a chance to work here as anyone else… Please, just give him a chance, okay?" 

Hearing those words reminded JJ of how kind Marvin really was as a person. Naive, no doubt, but kind. It was concerning sometimes, especially in this case. He pinched the bridge of his nose, knowing that there was nothing he could say to change the prince's mind. He didn't trust Anti one bit and, the way he saw it, Anti was faking his respect for the prince because when he was anywhere but by the prince's side, his demeanor changed. It was ominous and conniving. All of the servants knew it. There was always something going on behind his mask of loyalty but no one truly knew what he was thinking. It was disturbing to say the least.

JJ sighed in defeat. "I will trust your judgment, my friend." He addressed him more personally. "But please watch your back around him. Don't let him get away with his power..."

It was apparent that JJ didn't trust Anti. In fact, he was aware that multiple people in his staff felt very put off by Anti in general but Marvin still had faith in him. Besides, even if Anti lost his temper from time to time, he always seemed to catch himself and correct his behavior. Why would he punish someone who was just doing their best?

"Don't worry, Jamie. I'll keep an eye on him." He looked at him, giving him a confident, reassuring smile. He’d hoped that JJ could see things the way he did and trust in his judgment and it seemed he did a good job convincing him.

The atmosphere seemed kind of tense now after their conversation but then Marvin suddenly remembered the cake that he still had yet to touch. It had completely slipped his mind and he awkwardly fumbled for the fork that was still resting on the tray that JJ had brought in, eager to change the subject to something else.

"Oh! But this cake sure looks incredible-" He declared with renewed excitement. He scooped a generous helping of cake onto the small fork and took a taste of the beautiful dessert. It tasted just as good as it looked. It was dense and sweet and it was the perfect thing to help him relax after such a long day of meetings. “Hmm… Thank you, Jamie…”

Usually, Marvin would not be allowed to have junk food before dinner since it would spoil his appetite, but JJ decided that he would make an exception for today. It had been a long day and this was the perfect thing to help him relax before his bedtime eventually rolled around. Until then, JJ would let him take his time and enjoy his cake. He was just happy to see him smiling and enjoying himself for the first time all day. It was probably the most rewarding thing about being Marvin’s valet; getting to cheer him up when he needed it most. He smiled sweetly at him and signed once more. “Of course, my friend.”

----------

I hope its still okay to tag you all? ^^’

@jack-and-sammy @geekyfox2 @fanaticallyperfect @cryptid-bwoid 

[reine-du-sourire]

Three Times Teen!Hizashi Stepped in to Annoy Teen!Shouta into Healthy Habits

"I'm not hungry," Shouta says.

"And I," Hizashi huffs, shoving the plate of rice and vegetables closer to his friend, "made this especially for you. You have not eaten anything with more nutritional value than cardboard since Monday and you will eat this or I'm confiscating your phone and you're not looking at kitty pictures for the rest of the night."

Shouta's cheeks color. "Fine."

And so Shouta eats.

---

"You gotta shower, man," Hizashi insists. "I'm not saying you stink, even though you kinda do, and your hair's a huge oily mess and I have this new body wash that smells really nice and we'll braid each other's hair afterward!"

"I'm trying to study," Shouta sighs.

"Study later!" And Hizashi grabs his book. "I want my hair braided and I wanna braid yours and you gotta shower first!"

And so Shouta showers.

---

Hizashi crosses his arms. "True or false. You have not slept more than two hours in the past three days."

Shouta takes another gulp of coffee. "It's fine. I've been busy."

"You're going to keel over any second now," Hizashi threatens, "and then I'm gonna have to take notes for you all day and carry you up to bed and yesterday's training really wiped me out so if you're any kind of friend you'll take a nap now!"

And so Shouta takes a nap.