#i guess i will never come to terms with the fact i almost died | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

void-of-unparalled-chaos · 8 months ago

Text

The Double-edged Blade of Chance

Not everyone gets to meet their soulmate. It was just a fact of life. There was always a chance, but chance was a double-edged blade.

Jason quite literally runs into his soulmate at the young age of eight.

“Sorry! I thought you were a ghost!”

"Why would I be a ghost?”

@deadonmayn Day 5: Soulmates | Pretend | Jason and Danny were childhood friends | "I never thought I'd see you again."

TW: Major Character Death, Child Neglect, Mentions of Abuse, Mentions of Drug Addiction, Depression

AO3 link

Not everyone gets to meet their soulmate. It was just a fact of life. There was always a chance, though. Maybe it was small, but it was a chance. For those born with black ink scrawled across their wrists, it was a hope. A perfect match who could understand you on every level straight down to your atoms was waiting, and maybe you would meet them today! Or tomorrow. Or a year from now. Or… never.

Sometimes, life is cruel. Sometimes, black letters burn and scar. Sometimes, your soulmate dies before you can ever meet them. Words on your wrist were a chance, but chance was a double-edged blade.

On average, most people didn't meet their soulmates until their twenties or thirties. Jason Todd was not most people.

Jason quite literally runs into his soulmate at the young age of eight. Lungs burning and legs shaking with adrenaline, he sprints with his singular pilfered apple. He's not being chased, but it's better to create distance between him and the scene of his crime. If the past six months as a street kid has taught him anything, it's that caution is a virtue. Caution keeps you alive.

He falls back into muscle memory, allowing his feet to carry him through familiar shortcuts. Jason rounds another corner into a dirty back alley only to ram into something face first. There's a startled yelp and before he knows it Jason is horizontal. The only thing separating him from the ground is a scrawny torso. Jason's about to throw himself away from the poor schmuck when there's a burst of pain in his back. He rolls and lands on the asphalt with a pained groan.

The other kid scrambles away from him with panicked, pale blue eyes. He looks the same age as Jason, skinny like a twig with a loose-fitting NASA shirt and unruly black hair. If Jason had seen him walking down the street, he would never have guessed he knew how to throw a punch.

The kid scans him up and down, suddenly embarrassed, “Sorry! I thought you were a ghost!”

Jason is so busy nursing his kidney that he doesn't register the significance of the words. Instead, he snaps back with incredulity, “Why would I be a ghost?”

The kid stares at Jason with wide eyes. His mouth opens and closes, gaping like a fish out of water. Whatever. Let him have his crisis, it's not Jason's problem. He dusts off his apple and stands to leave.

"Wait!"

Jason yanks his sleeve back out of the other kid's grip, "Don't touch me!"

"Sorry…" he shrinks back and the expression on his face is so heartbroken that Jason almost feels bad, "Please don't go!"

Jason ignores him. He has things to do and places to be. Winter will be coming soon, and his abandoned apartment has very little in terms of blankets or jackets. A cold street kid is a dead street kid.

“Just-” the kid cuts in front of him. Jason stops short. Twig kid rolls up his sleeve, holding his wrist so close to Jason’s face that he couldn’t look away if he tried, “Look!”

Jason freezes. His eyes scan over the words once, twice, and then a third time.

Why would I be a ghost?

Jason can feel the scowl evaporate from his face, replaced by a softness he doesn’t know what to do with. Gently, ever so gently, he brushes over the words with his thumb. He doesn’t need to look at his own wrist to verify. Now that his head isn’t so far up his ass, the words the other boy uttered finally click and he knows that this is his soulmate.

“My name is Danny!”

Jason lifts his eyes to meet his soulmate’s. Danny’s grin is brighter than the sun itself. Something unfurls when he sees that smile. His lips tick upwards.

“I’m Jason.”

And so begins a beautiful friendship.

Danny’s parents were… interesting to say the least. Jason had never met them himself, but he sure heard about them a lot. The two were self-proclaimed ghost hunters, and Mrs. Fenton was a trained martial artist. They had taught Danny from a young age to defend himself and instilled a fear of ghosts while they were at it, hence Jason being floored with a kidney punch.

Other than that, the Fentons were hands-off. They didn’t pay much attention to Danny or his older sister, Jazz, so the two were mostly left to their own devices. Jazz couldn’t entertain Danny all the time, so he had taken to slipping out of the apartment to explore.

Jason may have been young, but even so, he had an inkling that the Fenton parents could have been doing a better job… well… parenting. Then again, it wasn't as if Jason had room to talk. Willis’ form of parenting had been more fists than words, painting out the rules of the house with black and blue bruises. Catherine had been good to Jason, even living under the smog of Willis Todd’s anger. She had taught Jason to cook (recipes he still knew by heart) and would read to him late into the night, fingers skimming old pages (Jason still carried the old, battered copy of The Little Prince with him, one of the few belongings he grabbed before fleeing CPS). Even under the drug-induced haze, his mom had tried her best. When she became too ill to do much of anything, Jason paid it forward as best he could.

There were some benefits to all of this. With the Fentons paying so little attention to anything outside of work, Danny could sneak supplies to Jason no problem! Suddenly issues like food or clean water were no longer as pressing, and Jason had a lot more free time. Naturally, he spent it with Danny. Jason taught Danny how to slip in and out of Gotham’s shadows unnoticed, and Danny taught Jason all of the things he learned in school. Danny would tell Jason stories written in the stars such as Orpheus’ lyre and Orion the hunter. In return, Jason would read his battered copy of The Little Prince to him under the trees in the park.

Like all good things, it had to come to an end.

It happens a little over a year after their fateful meeting. Danny arrives at their spot dragging his feet, eyes watery. Jason abandons his book on the grass beside him in favor of rushing to meet his soulmate, who all but collapses sniffling into his arms. They sit in the shade of their tree, Jason running his hands through Danny’s hair as he cries into his dirty shirt.

“What happened?” Jason asks once the other boy has calmed some.

“We’re moving.”

“What?”

“Mom and Dad want to move someplace in Illinois. Something about ectoplasm readings. They said we’re moving out by the end of the month!”

It feels like the ground drops from underneath Jason, nothing but a yawning chasm beneath his feet. Moving? To Illinois?

The tears return to Danny’s eyes with a vengeance, “I don’t want to move! I don’t want to leave you!”

Jason sets his jaw, tugging Danny back into a hug. He swallows the lump in his throat with false bravado. “It’ll be okay, Danny. You wanna know why?”

Danny makes an inquisitive noise, wiping his face on his shirt as Jason pulls away.

Jason reaches for Danny’s hand, turning his palm up to the sky. He stretches his arm out next to Danny's, their soul marks brushing next to each other.

“We’re soulmates, Danny. The universe decided that we are two halves of a whole. Fate decreed that we are meant to be together,” Jason poured the conviction into his words, “We’re soulmates, and soulmates are magic. Even if you leave for weeks, months, or years, I know we will find each other again. We’ll be together someday.”

Danny gawked at him, wide eyes a pantomime of when they first met. He stared at Jason, and then-

“You read too many books, Jason.”

Jason rolled his eyes good-naturedly, shoving Danny into the grass. Danny giggled as Jason fell beside him with a huff. They stared up at the branches of the trees. The leaves swayed in the breeze. Jason follows them in captivating circles, his soulmate a soothing presence beside him.

“You really mean it though?” Danny asks.

“Mean what?”

“That we’ll be together again?”

“Of course,” Jason easily confirms.

It’s the most sure Jason has been of anything in his life.

With Danny gone, there is no steady supply of food or blankets. Jason quickly finds himself reacquainted with hunger and desperation. After the third consecutive night of dumpster diving with no reward, he decides something has to change. Armed with a tire iron, Jason makes money the only way he can.

Six months after Danny leaves, Jason steals the tires from the batmobile. Batman found this more amusing than aggravating, and the next thing Jason knows, he’s stepping into the role of Robin. Jason! As Robin! Who would have thought?

The new gig comes with some super awesome advanced tech. With all his work for Bruce, Jason figures it's only fair that he gets free reign with the batcomputer, or as Jason likes to call it, his best chance at finding Danny.

The batcomputer is one of the most advanced pieces of technology in the world. It's hooked up to satellites, has access to almost every database, and can run ID checks in seconds. Theoretically, there should be nothing stopping Jason from finding Danny. And yet…

It's like he’s disappeared.

All evidence of the Fenton family only dates to before their move. It doesn’t make any sense! There should be paper trails or social media posts or something! Anything! Jason searches for weeks but it’s as if Danny stopped existing as soon as he moved.

Jason doesn’t give up. There has to be something he’s missing, one little thread poking out of the seams. A single tug is all it takes. He just has to find it. He keeps looking.

He keeps looking for years.

He hangs on to hope.

Jason is fourteen when his hope shatters.

The night starts off normal. Jason dons the Robin suit and joins Bruce on patrol. They run through Gotham, stopping an arms deal and tying up a few muggers. Jason stops to take a breath, looking out over his city.

Jason loves this. He yearns for the whip of the wind in his face as he swings between gargoyles and fire escapes. He likes to help people, to defend others from the scumbags that think they rule the streets. Jason loves being Robin. Danny being here with him is the only thing that could make it better. That’s why Jason stays up high near the stars. It makes him feel closer to Danny, wherever he is.

Burning pain makes Jason stumble in his steps. He clutches his wrist with gasping breath, wondering what he’s been hit with and when. Quickly, he removes his glove, throwing it to the floor.

His stomach fills with icy cool dread.

“No…” Jason mutters, eyes wide as saucers as the black ink on his wrist begins to fade, “No no no no no-”

He digs his fingers hard into the words as if that will stop the color from leaching away.

“No! Don’t do this! Please, Danny, don’t-” his voice cracks with a sob as the black becomes a pale grey, “NO! You're stronger than this, you jerk! Don’t give up! Fight!”

Bruce lands on the roof with him. He says something, but Jason isn’t paying attention.

“Don’t… don’t leave me, Danny. Don’t leave me alone.”

Jason would normally never cry in front of Bruce, but he doesn’t care about Bruce right now.

“You can’t leave yet! I’m supposed to find you! Do you hear me, you asshole?! You're not allowed to leave!”

The words are nothing but pale scars. It’s over. It’s done. The burning fades to a numb nothingness. Jason throws his head into his forearm and screams.

Nothing will ever be the same.

Bruce takes Jason home. He refuses to speak, not even to Alfred when the butler greets him with the offering of a hug. Jason walks right past his open arms to the bathroom and takes off his suit. Jason doesn’t feel like Robin right now. Jason doesn’t feel like anything.

He showers just to be done with it, unfeeling of the ice-cold spray. Like a preprogrammed machine he runs through his routine. Water. Shampoo. Soap. Rinse. Dry. Jason heads straight to his room when he’s done, not even bothering to brush his teeth. Burying himself under his bed covers, he cries until he passes out from exhaustion.

It doesn’t get any easier.

Jason pushes the misery down and gets through the next day one step at a time. Days turn into weeks. Weeks turn into months. He goes to school, forcing himself to pay attention rather than sink into tempting numbness. Danny would have been so excited that Jason was in school. Danny would have wanted him to learn.

He comes home to Wayne Manor feeling, ironically, like a ghost. Alfred’s food tastes like chalk. Dick’s endeavors at movie nights and days out are about as tempting as swimming in the polluted harbor. He still joins Bruce as Robin, but he leaves the batcave feeling angry, hitting harder than he’s ever hit before. As if that will change anything. As if that will bring Danny back.

Sometimes, Jason draws over the scarred words on his wrist with a black marker. He pretends that Danny is still out there somewhere in bumfuck Illinois, waiting for him. It helps.

__________________

Danny Fenton was unlucky. The very first sign was his workaholic parents with their conditional attention and lack of safety precautions, leading to his eventual early demise (Also known as sign one hundred and twenty-six, not that Danny was counting). Then there was the whole Oh Shit I’m a Ghost revelation quickly followed by the Oh Shit My Parents Want to End Me realization. Danny could only assume that he pissed off some ancient deity in a past life.

So yes, Danny was extremely unlucky, but he did have one thing going for him: Jason.

How many people got to meet their soulmate so early in life? Perhaps all of his luck had been invested in Jason. Jason with his vibrant blue eyes and dirty hair. Jason with the soft voice he used for Danny alone. Jason with his stubborn hold on childlike wonder despite being faced with the worst Gotham had to offer.

Danny may be unlucky, but Jason made him feel like the luckiest guy on Earth.

He thought about Jason frequently. Idly tracing the words spread across his wrist, Danny would let his mind drift. Sometimes, he relived old memories. Other times he dreamed of their future together.

He imagined moving out of his parent's house and into one of his own. Jason would move in with him, warm and safe for once in his life. He’d be free to focus on learning like he so obviously wanted. Danny would go to work and Jason would go to school, but they would always come back together at the end of the day. Jason would pull out a book and Danny would curl against his side. Jason would get that adorable scowl on his face when something happened he didn’t like, and Danny would kiss it off of him with so much sweetness that Jason would forget what had annoyed him in the first place.

The honeyed kisses were a new addition to the fantasy, but not an unwelcome one.

Danny also thought about the present. He wondered what Jason was doing now. Was he still holed up in that awful abandoned apartment? Did he have warm enough clothes for the upcoming winter? Did he find enough food to last him the week? Did Jason feel Danny die? He must have been so scared…

Moving away from Jason was the worst thing to ever happen to Danny, including the portal accident. Four states away, there wasn’t much he could do to help his soulmate, and he had no way to contact him, no way to check on him. His parents barely left the lab let alone the house, so a family trip to Gotham was out of the question. He had thought about flying there himself after the whole dying and becoming a halfa thing, but between the ghosts coming through the portal and his parents, he couldn’t leave Amity Park unprotected.

Danny thought he had a solution to the issue when he met Clockwork. While they may have started off on the wrong foot, these days the two were on better terms. Danny would even go so far as to call him a friend. Perhaps Clockwork would be willing to help a guy out and pause time for a bit. Only for a few hours! Just enough time for Danny to return to Gotham, find Jason, and establish some form of contact. Surely that wasn’t too tall of an order!

Evidently, it was. Even after bargaining, pestering, and begging for what felt like hours (it could have been days or it could have been minutes, time was weird in Clockwork’s lair), Clockwork still refused.

Danny tried Nocturn next. It was more out of desperation than anything. His relationship with the ancient was still rocky, and he wasn’t expecting much to come from it. To his surprise, Nocturn agreed to help him but only once. Just one dream. Just one chance.

Danny is so excited he has trouble falling asleep. Eventually, he gives up and knocks back some melatonin. He’s willing to see the ceiling children if it means he also gets to see Jason. Danny closes his eyes.

When he opens them, he is standing in a library. It’s fancy, fancier than Gotham’s library. The shelves are decorative polished wood and filled with books in better condition than any Danny has seen in one before. One wall is bare of any books or shelves. A stone fireplace with glass doors resides against it, exuding a comforting heat that makes Danny’s eyes droop even while asleep. The couches and chairs near the pit are so plush and pristine that Danny is certain this is a private library. No way would any public seating be this clean.

It's all very nice, but not nearly as nice as the sight of the teenager residing on the furniture. The round baby fat that had shaped his face had begun to make way for a chiseled jaw. He's put on weight, no longer as gaunt as Danny remembers with more muscle. The skinny, starving kid Danny had known is no more.

He's older now, almost unrecognizable, but that furrow in his brow as he reads and the slightly crooked nose gives him away. This is Jason. Danny's Jason.

"Jay!"

Jason startles, dropping his book. He scrambles to his feet, tense as he stares uncomprehendingly at Danny. It hurts to not be recognized, but Danny understands. He looks different too.

"...Danny?"

Danny can't find the words to respond so he settles for a smile, opening his arms in invitation.

Jason catapults into them. They clutch onto one another. The embrace is familiar but different, arms lankier than they used to be. Jason shakes like he’s crying. Danny thinks he might be too.

Jason finally pulls away, hands running over Danny’s shoulders and arms, "This… this isn't real. I'm dreaming."

Danny laughs, "Well that depends on your definition of real. It may be a dream, but I'm still here."

Jason’s hands raise to cup Danny’s face, "You died.”

"Yeah,” Danny can’t help but lean into Jason’s palms, fingers rising to brush over his soulmate’s.

"I don't care if it isn't real, I-" Jason swallowed. He closed his eyes, pressing his forehead against Danny’s, "Can we just… pretend it is?"

"Of course, Jay."

Jason plants a kiss on his forehead and drags him over to the couch. They collapse onto the cushions, Jason’s chest breaking Danny’s fall and strong arms wrapping around him.

"I missed you," Danny says into his shirt.

"Not as much as I missed you."

"You look better. You look like you've been taking care of yourself."

"Sometimes."

"Only sometimes?"

Jason laughs.

For the next hour or so, Jason tells him about his life as Batman’s sidekick, Robin. Life in Wayne Manor has been beneficial for him. His smile is fuller and more carefree as he talks about his latest patrol than it ever was when he was living in the apartment. He seems happy in a way that Danny rarely saw.

"I'm so proud of you, Jay."

Jason doesn't say anything in reply, but he doesn't have to. His wet eyes are response enough. He's quiet for so long that Danny's convinced he's broken him.

Then Jason leans in, slowly, oh so slowly. Danny's heart flutters. He closes his eyes, tilting his head forward. He prepares himself to feel the press of lips against his own and then-

His alarm goes off.

Danny's eyes fly open, surveying his room in frustration. He never got Jason's number. Fuck.

There’s nothing to be done except to continue on with life. Between school and ghost fights Danny still finds time to pester Clockwork. It’s the same song and dance each time but Danny is nothing if not persistent. Occasionally, his attempts are rewarded with glimpses into his soulmate's life. Just little everyday things like Jason doing his homework or cooking with an older man in a suit. This of course led to Danny pushing for more, something like an actual conversation or contact information, all of which Clockwork refused to provide. It didn’t stop Danny from asking.

If Clockwork truly wanted Danny to stop then he shouldn’t have rewarded his behavior in the first place.

It's not long after Nocturn’s favor that Danny finally wears the old cog down.

“Come on, Clockwork! Please?” Danny whines, tugging on the ancient’s cloak, “I just want to talk to my soulmate!”

Clockwork ignored him, peering through another screen.

“It’s not like we haven’t already met! How could there possibly be any harm in us talking?”

Clockwork stopped, considering. This had never happened before! Danny waited with bated breath.

“I’ll let you see him-”

Danny cheered, happily doing loop-de-loops in the air.

“I wasn’t finished,”

Danny stopped cheering.

“I’ll let you see him, but you can’t interfere.”

“Interfere? Interfere with what?”

Clockwork frowned, “Some things are destined to be. If I take you to him, you can’t stop what is about to happen. For better or worse. Are you sure this is what you want?”

Danny stilled, considering. This didn’t sound like he was going to talk to Jason. It seemed like this would be a mere passive observance. It wasn't much different from watching Jason through Clockworks’s portals. Whatever. Danny would take what he could get.

“I’m sure.” Anything to see Jason again.

“I foresaw as such.”

Danny barely has time (heh time) to register the sad look Clockwork shoots his way before he’s portaled out of the ghost’s lair. One blink he is staring at the gears and cogs in the walls, then next he is standing in a warehouse. Alone.

“Clockwork?”

There’s no response, so Danny investigates. It's hot. Hot enough that Danny feels like he is sweating despite his intangibility. The warehouse is filled with boxes upon boxes. As he wanders further in, he begins to hear signs of life. He peers between the crates.

A few musclemen are unloading more crates to the floor. Someone out of sight sounds like they’re laughing. No not laughing. Full-blown manic cackling. That’s a villain's laugh if Danny has ever heard one.

He peaks around the corner to get a better view and nearly reels back. That’s a clown. A fully dressed clown. Green hair, white face paint, and all.

Danny hates clowns.

“What? What’s going on here?”

Jason!

Danny looks over his shoulder in the direction of the footsteps.

“Just step over here and you’ll understand everything, Robin.”

A blonde woman rounds the corner, Robin, Jason, following close behind. They walk past Danny and right into the clown.

“What?!” Jason leaps between the woman and the gun lime-flavored Mr.Mime is aiming squarely at her chest, “But you said…”

“I lied.”

The woman is aiming a gun at Jason’s head. Danny growls, but it goes unheard.

“I can’t afford to have you stirring up trouble. I’ve been dipping into the medical funds myself. If you blow the whistle on the Joker, the investigation will certainly uncover my embezzling. Sorry about that, kid. Looks like you picked the wrong person to trust. ”

“Clockwork,” Danny asks the open air, “what is this?”

Jason is surrounded but his eyes are solely focused on the woman. He looks devastated.

“What should we do with him?” the woman asks the clown.

“Something I’ve wanted to do for years,” The clown lets out another one of those awful cackles.

Danny doesn’t think it would be possible to hate this guy more than he already does, but then he pistol whips his soulmate across the chest hard enough that he hits the ground.

Jason gets up again. He’s always been tenacious, Danny thinks as he watches him punch the clown in the gut. He feels a glimmer of satisfaction. Jason will be okay. He’s giving the newest additions to Danny’s shitlist a solid beat down, and Danny gets a front-row seat.

But then one of the gym bros knocks Jason to the floor again. He follows it up with a kick to the ribs. Jason lies there heaving, and suddenly Danny isn’t so certain anymore.

The clown approaches him, dragging a crowbar against the concrete with a harsh scraping sound.

“This is going to hurt you a lot more than it does me.”

Danny tries to rush forward. He wants to tear that crowbar out of the clown’s hand and hit him so hard that he loses his teeth. He wants to grab Jason by the collar of that stupid outfit and fly him far away to safety. Danny wants to, but he can’t. His feet are rooted to the ground. His arms refuse to lift from his sides. His head won’t swivel on his neck. Danny can’t even switch off his invisibility. All he can do is blink as the crowbar careens into Jason’s ribs.

“You can’t interfere, Daniel.”

“Clockwork,” Danny grits out, quiet and desperate, “Clockwork, please.”

He feels a hand squeeze his shoulder, “All is as it should be.”

No no no no no no no no no no no no no-

Danny isn’t sure how long he’s there, frozen uselessly in place as the maniac clown brings the crowbar down on Jason’s body over and over and over again. Eventually, he seems to get bored and decides to leave Jason to the mercy of a bomb. With a grand flourish to the ever-so-helpful timer, he leaves Jason bleeding on the floor. That woman is there too, but Danny doesn’t care about her.

Finally, Danny can move. He collapses next to Jason, cradling his beaten face in his hands and murmuring nonsensical platitudes. Jason’s breath wheezes shallowly, unseeing gaze fixed far away.

The clock ticks down.

Jason doesn’t make it to six minutes.

Danny chokes back a sob as the words on his wrist burn. With utmost care, he brushes Jason’s eyelids shut. Danny presses a kiss to his forehead. It still feels warm against his own ice-cold lips. Taking Jason’s limp hand in his own he leans back. He waits. He hopes.

He doesn’t have to wait long.

Danny almost thinks that Jason’s- no, the body’s eyes have opened once more. The color gives him pause though. Vivid green eyes like his own blink open in place of blue. A pale, wispy figure sits up, legs remaining within the corpse as if superimposed. The domino mask that had covered his face has been replaced by what looks like permanent grease paint. The Robin uniform is a mess even in death. The holes and tears have carried over, but thankfully it's no longer bloodstained. Jason’s wounds are all but gone except for a single glowing ectoplasmic scar running from his hairline down to his cheek.

The newly formed ghost’s chest heaves in a mimicry of desperate breathing. Danny remembers it from when he first died. He had also panicked at the lack of oxygen in his lungs. It's hard to break such an ingrained instinct.

Danny feels his soul mark tingle, and though he doesn't look away from his soulmate he can see the green glow of the words in the corner of his eye.

“Jason?” Danny drops the corpse’s hand in favor of reaching for Jason’s.

Jason’s eyes whip around wildly, landing on Danny. His chest slows to a stop, “Danny?”

“Yeah, Jay,” Danny lets out a broken laugh, tears pooling in his eyes, “It’s me.”

“Danny!” Jason lunges for him wrapping his arms around his waist, “I never thought I’d see you again,” he choked out, voice watery with emotion.

Danny clutches him back, gloved fingers curling into the fabric of his cape, “I wish it were under better circumstances. I’m sorry, Jason,” Danny sniffs, tears soaking into the fabric of Jason’s shoulder, “Fuck, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay! Well, not really,” They pull back to look at each other. Jason tucks a strand of hair behind Danny’s ear, fingers lingering to trace his jaw, “but I get to see your pretty face again so I can’t complain.”

Danny flushes green but still manages to level Jason with a look, “That’s stupid and you know it! You have every right to complain you just-”

Danny cuts himself off with a small, distressed noise. Danny has died before. He knows what it’s like. And now Jason has too. They both know. There are no words.

“Yeah…” Jason trails off, eyes lingering on his body, “Yeah. But you're here, right? You found me!"

Danny smiles, cupping his soulmate's face in both hands, “Always,” he presses a chaste kiss to Jason’s lips. Even after it ends their foreheads remain touching.

“I missed you,” the grin Jason gives him could only be described as dopey.

“Not as much as I missed you,” he teases back.

Jason pulls him into another hug. They hold one another until their tears finally dry up. It reminds Danny of the good old days, running rampant through Gotham’s streets and finding solace from everything awful in each other.

Suddenly Jason starts to giggle. Danny doesn’t know why but his joy is contagious and soon Danny is snickering alongside him.

“Why are you laughing?” Danny asks between unneeded breaths.

Jason slips his tattered glove off, displaying his soulmark with a wiry grin, “I just realized I’m a ghost!” Jason giggles again, “And so are you!”

“Why would I be a ghost?” Danny deadpans, which only causes Jason to laugh harder.

Danny glances at the clock. One minute. “We should leave.”

Jason nods, standing up before Danny can even move and offering his hand. Danny takes it, rising to his feet. Their fingers remain linked together as they phase through the wall of the warehouse. They turn to watch it blow with a sense of finality. The flames licking the sky feel like an end, but also a new beginning.

Danny turns away from the ruins and focuses. His fingers sharpen and tear through the fabric of reality, opening a swirling green portal into the Infinite Realms.

He holds the portal open with one hand, extending the other back out for Jason to take, “Together?”

“Together,” Jason’s fingers clasp his own.

This time, they don’t have to pretend.

#The ceiling children line is a reference to the video “What its REALLY Like to Take Melatonin” by DannyPhantom.exe #my dumbass accidentally posted the draft to ao3 when trying to edit the tags so your getting this a bit early #deadonmayn24 #my writing #dpxdc #dead on main #The Double-edged Blade of Chance #dom24d5

168 notes · View notes

alpaca-clouds · 1 year ago

Text

The Haitian Revolution

Yeah, okay. I guess to properly do the history thing, I also have to talk about the Haitian Revolution, don't I? Given that it is so important for the backstory of both Annette and Edouard.

Why didn't I do that so far? Because the Haitian Revolution is super hard to talk about because of the sources. A bit issue is that for a good part of it we only have French sources, that are not always the most... neutral. Because a lot of the rebelling slaves had never learned to write. As such, we actually do not know a lot about the side of the rebels until some Free Blacks started to take their side and lead the rebellion.

But I know a bit.

So, let me explain what I know.

Haiti (St. Domingue specifically, the French side of the island) was build exclusively on slave work. There were plantation there for indigo, sugar and coffee for the most part. And those plantation were very important for the French economy. And of course it was slaves working those plantations.

On the island there was a three class system (though if we are honest, it was a four class system).

Whites, who were free people and citizens of France. (Though in truth there was a difference between the plantation owning whites and those whites, who were not of the owning class.)

Free Black people. What differed in Haiti from the US for example is that it happened quite often that children of rape (white owners on Black slaves) would be freed and even adopted as children. While not considered citizens, they could own things, including their own plantations. (Yes, there were quite a few of these that owned slaves.)

Slaves, who outnumbered all other people on the island somewhere between seven to one and ten to one.

Now, most slaves did not survive the first three years after getting to the island. Many died in fact in their first year, because the working conditions were so harsh, they often did not receive food, were severely punished (through it receiving infections and such), and of course there was just the general issue of sicknesses.

There were people rebelling a long while and from what we know (again, there is so little in terms of sources) there were some escaped slaves living in the mountains and at times using guirella tactics. But there was not quite the move for a widespread rebellion starting...

That was until the French Revolution started. Once more the gentle reminder: The French Revolution took a long while to brew and originally was not a violent revolution, it only became violent in response to the violent oppression of it. Now, the people on St. Domingue were instructed not to talk about the Revolution, because some folks rightly assumed that it might give people ideas. Especially as among the Revolutionaries there was a big discussion about the abolition of slavery.

But in the end... Well, it did not work out and the freed slaves banded together for a proper uprising in 1791.

It is this uprising that we see in Nocturne. I have seen some people being very shocked in the human on human violence we see there, because folks are really whimpy when it comes to that. So, a little explanation: Originally (in the 1791) uprising the slave uprising was once again not very violent. Almost everyone who got killed was connected to immense abuses of slaves. The rebels tried to spare everyone who treated their slaves kindly. As such within that first uprising only 400 whites got killed, compared to 4000 Black people, as the French were much better armed.

Still, the rebels managed to capture part of the island.

It should be noted: This is probably around the time when Annette and Edouard left. They captured some plantation, and freed quite a few more slaves.

There would follow quite a bit of back and forth then. Especially between Haiti and the French Republic. And I would not be surprised if we were to see that in the coming season(s).

Mostly, because the Revolitionaries went back and forth between whether Free Black people could be citizens who got to vote or not. Making the Free Blacks, who originally were against the revolution, more and more take the side of the rebels.

And yes, it would get more and more violent. Because France and then later Britain, too (who did not agree with France on many things - but on saving slavery) threw thousands upon thousand of soldiers in fighting down the revolution with extreme violence, leading the Haitian Revolutionaries to answer this violence with their own violence.

But for the love of God, do not go there and be like: "Ugh, violence. Violence bad." Like, fuck that. I said that about Isaac before as well: Slaves freeing themselves have the right to use whatever violence necessary for that.

#castlevania #castlevania netflix #castlevania nocturne #haiti revolution #haiti #colonial history #slavery #castlevania annette #castlevania edouard

393 notes · View notes

steddieas-shegoes · 2 years ago

Text

It doesn’t hit Steve until he’s holding Dustin at their small, private funeral for Eddie.

Eddie’s actually gone.

They actually lost someone this time.

They’d toed the line for years, always coming so close to an unbearable loss, but always finding a way out.

Not this time.

As Steve held a sobbing Dustin, he looked at Lucas, Robin, Nancy, Erica, and Mike. They’d been the ones to gather in a circle and say a few words.

The rest of the crew stood behind, not knowing Eddie well enough to contribute.

And now they never would.

********

April 1986

Steve shot up in bed, sweat dripping down his face.

It was the tenth night in a row of the same nightmare: Eddie wandering lost in the Upside Down calling for him. He could never make out exactly what Eddie looked like, like his mind was already forgetting the way his dimples appeared when he gave that mischievous grin or the way his hair frizzed so much because he went to bed with it wet, or so he told Steve when he asked him if he’d ever heard of conditioner.

If this was Steve’s punishment for not being fast enough to save him, he’d just have to suffer through it.

He should’ve done better. He knew it, the Eddie in his dreams knew it, even Dustin had said something that made him think he knew it too.

He didn’t hold it against him. He was right after all.

He did take too long getting to the trailer.

He looked around the room, taking inventory.

Nail bat? Check.

Bathroom light on? Check.

Door and window locked? Check.

Eddie in his bed? Check.

Steve froze.

He turned his head, genuinely believing he’d lost it. The concussions finally caught up to him because…

…Eddie was asleep in his bed.

The same Eddie who died in the Upside Down almost a month ago.

Steve moved slowly, caught between not wanting to wake up Eddie if it was him and not wanting to disrupt his imagination if he wasn’t real.

Just as he managed to get one leg off the bed, Eddie sat up like he’d had a nightmare, gasping for air.

Steve stared. Eddie stared back.

Then Eddie smiled.

Steve fell off the bed.

“Jesus Christ!”

“That’s my line, Stevie.”

Eddie was leaning over the bed, smirking down at Steve’s bewilderment and now physical pain from hitting his elbow on the bedside table.

“You’re dead. You’re a dream. You’re not real. You never had fangs before. This isn’t you.”

Steve stared down at his shaking hands. He’d never had a dream or nightmare this realistic before. He might have to let Robin take him for brain scans when he wakes up.

“Not dead. Definitely not a dream, but it’s nice to know I’ve been in yours. I am, in fact, real.” Eddie sighed as he rested his head on his hands, still smirking down at Steve frozen on the floor. “I did not have fangs before, that’s true. But I’m still me. Just a bit more…vampire-y?”

“I didn’t even smoke last night.”

“I’m not sure what that has to do with anything. And I’m a bit offended that you’re buying from someone else. I know I’ve been gone, but c’mon.”

Steve blinked up at the man who was dead when they had to leave him in the Upside Down.

“You didn’t have a heartbeat.”

“And I still don’t, can you believe that?”

Steve just shook his head. There was no fucking way this was real.

Of all the things he’s seen in the last three years, this was the most unbelievable.

“We. We left you. How are you here?”

“I actually don’t know the answer to that. I’ve been kinda wandering around down there? Up there? In there?” Eddie shrugged. “I guess I just dreamt about being here and now I am.”

“Are you saying you teleported?”

Eddie laughed. “I guess. I didn’t walk here.”

Steve couldn’t hold back the hand reaching out to touch Eddie’s cheek.

It wasn’t as cold as he expected it to be.

Eddie’s eyes searched Steve’s face, his light demeanor dropping into something more serious.

“I don’t know much. I know I’ve been alone for what feels like years. I’ve got a craving for blood, which is a lot to come to terms with. I’m undead but still need sleep? Which is so fucked, like I’m not even fully human anymore and I still have to waste time sleeping?”

Steve just stared blankly.

“And! The heartbeat thing is so weird, man. I still have to breathe but for what? My heart doesn’t beat! There’s no blood circulating, yet I need blood to survive! So many flaws in this system!”

Steve barked out a laugh.

“Holy shit, I missed you.”

If Eddie could blush still, he would be. Steve Harrington telling him he missed him? Never thought he’d live to see the day. Or, in this case, die to see the day.

Steve seemed to realize what he said after a moment of awkward staring.

“Uh. I mean. We all missed you. Like, your…energy?”

It was Eddie’s turn to laugh. He rolled off the bed and joined Steve on the floor, settling as close to the warmth radiating off of Steve as he could.

“It’s okay if you missed me, Stevie. I missed you too.”

Even with minimal light in the room, Eddie could see the blush creeping up Steve’s neck to his cheeks.

“We’ve never lost someone before.”

“And you still haven’t.”

Eddie placed his hand on Steve’s knee, squeezing gently to remind him that he was here. He wasn’t the same, or even completely alive, but he was here.

“I don’t know how to break this to the kids.”

“It’s gotta be easier than telling them I’m dead.”

“Dustin’s been a mess. I mean, they all have, but. Dustin’s barely left his house. He won’t talk to anyone.”

“Can we call him?”

Steve checked the clock on the bedside table. 3:02 wasn’t the most ideal time to call the Henderson home and risk the wrath of a woken up Claudia.

“We can try the walkie, but if he doesn’t answer the first time, we can call in a few hours.”

Eddie nodded excitedly. If time passed differently for him like he said, he’s been alone for a long time. At least Steve had Robin and the kids and even Joyce to cope. Eddie had been led to believe he was trapped forever in the one place that could probably kill even those who weren’t completely alive.

He deserved to be reunited with people who loved him.

Steve pushed away the insecurity of not being enough. It’s not like he’d been close to Eddie anyways.

But when he felt a hand on his cheek, he realized that he’d started crying. The hand wiped away a tear, but didn’t leave his face.

“Steve, sweetheart. What’s wrong?”

Sweetheart.

No one had ever called Steve that. Not even his mom when he was younger. He’d been Steve or The King or The Hair or Mom when Max and Dustin were being little shits.

He was sure that time stood still while he processed the new nickname, but unfortunately, he’d been staring at Eddie with tears falling down his face for god knows how long.

“I’m…I’m just really happy you’re here.”

Eddie relaxed, calm now that he knew nothing was actually wrong.

“I’m glad I’m here with you.”

That last part was important.

Eddie couldn’t imagine how this would have gone with anyone else.

He certainly hadn’t expected Steve to be so accepting so quickly, and he figured at best, he’d be pretty indifferent to him showing up. He could pass him off to Dustin and pretend he didn’t wake up to a dead acquaintance in his bed.

But Steve folded into his lap, head resting against his chest and hands curling into his shirt to hold him in place.

“You’re right.”

“About what?”

Eddie was running his hands up and down Steve’s back, enjoying the moment for what it was before it ended.

“The no heartbeat thing is weird.”

Eddie snorted. “Yeah. Think you could get used to it?”

“I’ve gotten used to stranger things.”

Part 2

#steddie #steve harrington #eddie munson #stranger things #my fic #ao3fic #headcanon #tumblr drabbles #vampire eddie munson #I can’t believe I said the thing at the end there #so cringe of me but I still giggled to myself

772 notes · View notes

kachuusha · 1 year ago

Text

I have reasons to believe that levi may have truly thought of living together with hanji back in ch126, based on his own monologue in ch136:

before hanji said "maybe we should just live here together, right levi?" in ch 126, hanji expressed the feeling of being trapped and that they've reached seemingly reached their limit.

"sounds like our time has come. you might feel like you're doing the right thing, but times change and you find yourself in a cell."

at this moment, I think hanji felt that their time as scouts may have already come to an end. hence, they thought of leaving everything behind to start anew (together with levi)

similarly with levi in ch136, he asks what if their roles had already ended way back then? when they got those brats to the sea?

both hanji and levi had a period of uncertainty regarding their duties as members of the survey corps. which I think is reasonable because while hanji and levi both have a strong sense of duty, they are still humans nonetheless.

I think it may have been possible levi was on the same track as hanji in 126, just that we never saw his direct pov in the forest. I get the impression that he might've thought of agreeing with them, BUT things take another turn after they got summoned in the paths by eren.

they learn that eren has activated the rumbling and this may have served as a sign to levi and hanji that their roles aren't over yet. humanity still needs them.

which leads us to this conversation:

it's not that levi was rejecting hanji (like I've been saying, I believe he might've agreed with them if eren never activated the rumbling), it's just that he knew hanji would never sit back while countless of lives are getting slaughtered. their roles are not done yet. if they let this happen, the sacrifices their comrades had made would be put in pain.

and it does follow the pattern of levi's monologue because he continues with this:

and hanji in 127 says this:

again, basically, both levi and hanji did have a period where they hesitated with their roles, hanji had a direct dialogue addressing it ("I was the one trying to run away"), but it circles back to their duties as scouts, the world getting flattened isn't what their comrades has devoted their lives for so they must protect it. they are going to save humanity or whatever's left of it. they can't just run away and take that brief moment of peace just for themselves.

also as hanji puts it "I feel the eyes of my comrades on me." "almost all of them died without ever knowing that humanity existed outside the wall". hanji likely felt guilty over the fact that they thought of choosing peace for themself when their comrades had devoted their lives over their own personal desires. and I'm guessing it is the same for levi.

(just to add this here, there is actually something even sadder behind levi's monologue. but it's too long to discuss it here.)

also, I think someone might ask, but what about levi fulfilling the promise he made with erwin back in shiganshina? would he still run away when he needs to do that? okay I have this guess that levi had already come into terms that he failed:

in the forest, levi admits to himself that he screwed up. and later during the battle of heaven and earth, he says "I've never bungled one of his orders. not even once. and yet for some reason, his final order is the kne that I just can't."

but you might ask, "he is still looking for zeke tho when he woke up?", and I think that's because of his newfound resolve, which is to stop the rumbling once and for all. it's likely that levi realized that this isn't only about the lives that were sacrificed in shiganshina anymore, the predicament they are facing at the moment is much larger in scale. and I think both knew that to activate the powers of the founding titan, eren would need his brother. so yes it does fall back to zeke, and then there's hanji's hypothesis (that levi himself brought up) that they may have to kill zeke to stop the rumbling.

there's also this detail back in 126 where hanji said "I'm sure you want revenge but right now..." and then levi proceeds with "if we keep running and hiding...what will that get us."

thing is, levi doesn't agree about taking revenge or what not. what he probably just had in mind then was to stop zeke and the rumbling, which is what he also assumes that hanji had in mind hence "I know you, you can't stay out of the action" to which hanji agrees.

and I think all these, adds weight to levi's motivation in attempting to hold hanji back from leaving in 132. it's not the same thing with erwin back in shiganshina where levi ultimately gave the call for him. hanji's decision has been made so why else would levi get in their other than to try and change their mind? and it wasn't likely over something like "we still need your leadership". levi addresses hanji as "four-eyes", therefore dropping any sense of formality (I know levi never stricly complied with using titles and honorifics but he stopped calling hanji with that nickname after RTS), which possibly hints to levi addressing hanji in a personal level. he is not asking hanji as the captain of the survey corps, but rather simply as levi who shares a deep personal bond with hanji. and if we take into account the points made above, the levi who also wanted to share a life with hanji.

but even before levi could draw any words out of him, hanji went ahead to say "you understand.", "just let me go will you?", which sounds to be a reference to levi's "I know you" back in the forest. likely to remind levi that they both made their decision then and this isn't the appropriate time to look back.

as you can tell, levi is obviously against the idea of hanji dying. when hanji parotted the same words erwin did in shiganshina, levi was visibly upset over it. interestingly enough, that was hanji's response to levi's "unrequited love for titans" line that has been thoroughly discussed by japanese fans that may have been holding certain nuances such as levi implying that hanji's feelings are requited by someone (possibly him). we can also connect this to the feelings he may have inwardly thought back in 126 but never got the chance to say out loud. but suddenly asks if levi thinks their comrades are watching them? again, probably in reference to hanji's words to jean and mikasa in 127 when they seem to be expressing guilt over the fact that they had thought of running away (taking their own personal peace), when their comrades died without even knowing about the truth beyond the walls. "I feel the eyes of all of my comrades on me". it's a bit similar to when erwin said this before when he was thinking of his own desire of seeing the basement, above his own duties as commander. so I guess we can say if erwin's personal desire was his childhood dream to uncover the truth found at the basement of eren's house, for hanji it was to live in peace (with levi).

the "live together in peace" trope had been used several times in aot and often with the strongly implied ships. but I think levi and hanji's were meant to directly mirror eren and mikasa's. note that I don't think that their dynamics as a ship are the same, it's different I tell you. but there are narrative points between them that appears to be tied? I think the fate of those two pairs are intertwined in a tragic fate? because as long as eren decides to activate the rumbling, hanji would definitely form the alliance to stop it and it would eventually lead to their death. eren had always meant to leave mikasa and his friends because of his plan to go forth with the rumbling, therefore negating the possibility of that reality of him running away with mikasa. and in turn, hanji (and levi) wouldn't have ran away as well back when they were in the forest because they would stop eren and his plans. (I actually have a separate post for this so I'm not gonna get into details now. )

in the end while levi and hanji's relationship lacked an outright label, I think there were enough hints that strongly imply that it had taken a romantic turn at some point. solidified by their (mutual) wish to stay together. it's a tragic tale between two people who devoted their hearts for others and sacrificed their own personal wishes.

#levihan #aot #mine

177 notes · View notes

skyloftian-nutcase · 9 months ago

Note

Thinking of Ganondorf being from an all female race of Amazonian warriors. Thinking of the sheer environment he grew up in affecting him. How, as a Gerudo, he would naturally be a huge feminist because he looks at his sisters and daughters and KNOWS their strength and endurance. He knows how powerful a woman is. Then he looks at the Hyrule and sees how comparably weaker the women of that country are, how they're expected to stay at home and tend to children while the men fight, how even though it's a matriarchy by nature of the goddess blood that flows through the daughters of the Royal Family, the Kings are looked to with more esteem than the literal goddesses in human flesh that make of the more feminine side of the family. Can you imagine how infuriated that would make Ganondorf???

Get comfortable, lovely, I have a lot of thoughts on this.

First, I think you’re right in that Ganondorf would respect and understand women’s abilities. 100%. I also think growing up in an all female society would have several effects on his behavior, such as making him more physically affectionate and nurturing than most men, because that’s the only example he’s had (assuming, of course, he ever was close enough to anyone to do that - I feel like being the Gerudo king kind of separated him from the others so he might be aloof). But I also think that, given their tradition of crowning the sole male as king, and given their seeming Othering of men (at least in botw/totk time, where they have to take a class to figure out how to deal with men, where girls can’t even look at men, where families are ripped apart because they disapprove of men so much - none of which I find remotely feminist or healthy), he’d have a bit of a superiority complex as well. Not over women specifically so much as everyone, but it would definitely include his own people.

As for how women are treated in Hyrule and his opinion on it… based on his behavior and words in TotK—based on the fact that, at least in most eras that Ganondorf lives in—he comes from a warrior culture, I don’t think he’d be insulted for the Hyrule women so much as insulted by them. Like, his thought would be that if they’re supposedly oppressed why don’t they fight back?? Why are they acting so weak and pathetic and docile?? He might dislike the culture altogether if it prevents women from fighting, but he’d also just… be insulted that they all just think, including the women, that they are incapable of fighting (which I don’t think is ever specifically actually the case. Like yeah, there aren’t tons of female fighters out there but nobody disapproves of it either - there are plenty of women adventuring in botw, Ashei is certainly an exception but isn’t seemingly ostracized, there are female knights aplenty in Skyloft culture, which was the foundation of Hyrule, Zelda herself wields a sword in several games). I don’t think he’d care about the idea that women are nurturers or better suited to care for the home and family, because frankly he has nothing to go on in terms of are men better at this or whatnot. He recognizes his own physical strength is greater than Gerudo women, but, due to the Othering of men anyway in Gerudo culture, it’s hard for him to know if that’s a general thing or if he’s just special. Because dude does have an ego, so he’d definitely think he’s special. But he’d also see that these Hylian women are naturally weaker than Gerudo women and would likely just view all of the Hylians as lesser anyway.

As for the royal family, it’s definitely matriarchal as you said, but I don’t think there’s an emphasis on kings being more important. It’s just that we’ve never seen the queens alive, and that’s a story choice rather than a reflection of the culture. Zelda is almost always underage, and her mother is nowhere to be found. You could assume she just isn’t ruling, I guess, but the only time a queen is specifically mentioned is to say she had died, devastating the whole family. When Zelda is of age, even though the game still calls her princess, she is very much in charge (such as in Twilight Princess and Hyrule Warriors). I think part of the reason Rhoam had such a stick up his butt in botw was because he was serving as king regent, essentially, out of his element, stressed as hell in an upcoming apocalypse, trying to keep his daughter alive, and preparing her to rule once she reached adulthood. His whole rant about her being heir to a throne of nothing would be more poignant (still awful, btw, but more poignant) if he was emphasizing that she was rapidly approaching age of adulthood, about to ascend to the throne, and the kingdom had no faith in her and could likely outright rebel against her as a result.

#you ask skye answers #lovely anon #ganondorf #gerudo #legend of zelda #character analysis

48 notes · View notes

munsoninthedark86 · 1 year ago

Text

Kinktober 2022 Day 2: Vampires(Release The Bats)

warnings: smut, vampires, biting, cheating, mentions of drugs, unprotected sex, creampie, slight mentions of death, AU pairings: Vampire!Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader word count: 1.4k

It’s been weeks since Eddie was left in the upside down. You often wonder if you’ll actually see him again. With the way Dustin had reacted to everything, you were sure that Eddie had actually died. But Dustin told you that he couldn’t really confirm it himself. You think maybe that the young teen is trying to be hopeful just like you, but you both believe that there is a big possibility that Eddie is actually dead. You try all you can do to get over him, but he was the person you loved the most in your life.

You spent most of your days mourning him, until you finally had to come to terms with the fact that you’d never see Eddie Munson again. Slowly, you tried to go out with your friends again. Eddie’s band and most of the hellfire club would still meet up with you and do things with you, and you slowly became the de facto leader in these two groups, and it made you feel a little better. You could take care of these areas of Eddie’s life; the parts which he’d never be able to return to. The thought alone left you feeling hollow. But eventually, things got a little better.

You met someone. Someone who made you feel a little like Eddie used to make you feel. This guy was so charming, he liked all the same bands you and Eddie did, and he just makes you laugh. But still, your heart feels so torn from the heartbreak. You don’t want to move on, but at the same time, you aren’t sure you can keep living your life pretending that Eddie is going to come back.

One night, after going out with your new love interest, you’re coming home and feeling pretty good. It’s been a while since you’ve felt this way. Your heart skips a beat as you make your way into the trailer. Both your parents are asleep in their bedroom, so you sneak past their door and go into your bedroom. You’re smiling so much and you feel like you’re floating on a cloud. This all changes when you see Eddie sitting on your bed.

“E-Eddie?” You ask in disbelief. It looks like him, but there’s so much that’s different about him. Namely that he isn’t dead like you think. Your heart is racing as your brain tries to make logical thoughts.

Eddie chuckles before getting up off the bed, “Cute boyfriend. Does he make you cum like I do?”

Your cheeks burn and you shake your head no. Your new boyfriend doesn’t make you feel good like Eddie used to, but at least he is trying. You don’t want to be sad anymore. All of this must be some stupid hallucination. A guilt-ridden blast from the past trying to fuck you up. Tears blur your vision as you try to make sense of what’s happening.

“I’m not dead, you know.” Eddie begins. He comes a little closer, and you can see the shine in his yellow eyes. They aren’t the chocolate brown eyes you’ve come to love. They shine in the moonlight and they look almost catlike.

“You are dead, Eds. Dustin said so, you should have seen the poor g-guy. Whimperin’ and cryin’ the whole time he came back from the upside down and—”

Eddie presses a finger on your lips. No more is the warmth from your favorite drug dealer and lover. It’s instead replaced with a cold. Inhuman cold. Cold that comes from beyond. Beyond the grave.

“Awhh, was he really that beat up over poor ol’ me?” Eddie asks, a smirk spread on his face. Then when he flashes you a cheeky smile, you can see fangs in place of his eye teeth. This makes you shudder in fear. This is truly Eddie…but it’s not him at the same time.

Eddie pushes you up against the wall, and you really feel like prey now. His nose brushes against yours as he leans in closer. He can feel your body shuddering, and he chuckles darkly. He gets to have you all to himself now. That new boy can’t do what Eddie does to you.

“Guess I need to remind my sweetheart of just how good it can be with me,” Eddie snarls before kissing you roughly.

It feels like time is standing still. You’re frozen in this moment with the love of your life. You can’t help but wrap your arms around him and pull him even closer. You no longer care if this is a dream or it’s something dangerous. You just want to lose yourself to the pleasure that is Eddie Munson. He means everything to you and you thought you had lost him forever. It doesn’t matter if he’s a vampire or something else. All that matters is that you can feel him right now. He’s here with you, kissing you, probably going to fuck you too.

“‘Missed you so fuckin’ much,” you murmur between kisses. Eddie sighs softly and he cups your chin.

“You have no idea how much I missed you too, sweetheart. Seeing you with this new guy, it hurt me bad.”

You whine softly, “I didn’t know you were alive…thought you were fuckin’ dead, you idiot.”

Eddie scoops you up in his arms, making you squeal slightly. He quiets you with a kiss and a warning look. You remember that your parents are just down the hall. If they found you in here with Eddie, they would freak. Not to mention, everyone thinks Eddie Munson is dead. So it would be bad news all around.

He wastes no time getting you naked. Usually, he loves to tease you and take his time stripping you. But now, he can’t hold back. He needs to taste you and to fuck you. He wants to make up for lost time. Once you’re completely exposed to him, that’s when Eddie begins undressing himself as well.

Your skin breaks out in goosebumps when you feel his long nails dragging across your abdomen down to your sopping wet pussy. A quiet whine escapes from your lips as he presses the pads of his fingers to your clit and begins rubbing in sloppy circles. It’s just the way you love it. It drives you crazy at how sloppy Eddie is, despite being in a new form.

“I need you, baby.” He presses a kiss to your lips before slotting himself between your legs.

You barely have time to react before he is teasing your folds and clit with the tip of his cock, and you cry out when he slips it into you. He’s so quick to quiet you with a rough kiss. He really doesn’t want your parents coming in here. But when he listens, he hears no commotion coming from down the hall.

“Gotta be quiet, okay? Can you do that for me, princess?” Eddie asks, and you nod your head.

You already feel so full with him deep inside of you. His balls are plush against your ass. You’re panting as you try to beg him to move, but he’s just enjoying this. Truth be told, your pussy feels even better like this than he imagined. He thinks he might blow his load too soon if he’s not careful.

Slowly, he begins a steady pace. You feel so close to your own orgasm already. You’re not sure if it’s the excitement of seeing him again, or maybe you just missed him so dearly. Your hands soothe down his back, then back up to play with his crazy mane of hair. He leans in to kiss you ever so tenderly, making your walls clench around him.

“Jesus—” Eddie chokes out. “Don’t do that. ‘Gonna make me cum way too quick,”

“It’s your fault. You made me do it.”

Eddie grunts as he picks up his pace. He reaches between the both of you to rub your clit just how you like it. You feel your body tensing in preparation for this intense orgasm. Tears well up in your eyes and you know that you’re in love. You’d gladly never see your new boyfriend ever again if Eddie asked you to. You try to moan out a warning that you’re going to cum, but you tumble off the edge before you can do so.

His eyes watch you as you come undone just for him. He leans in once more, and you feel his fangs on your neck. A strangled cry falls from your lips as he bites into you, moaning at the taste of your blood. You taste so sweet, and this is all it takes for him to cum inside of you. His hips snap as he paints your insides white.

Finally, he pulls out of you and he lays next to you. You roll over to face him and a smile is spread on your face.

“Now, are you ready to accept the gift I have to offer?”

#munsoninthedark.writes #eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x you #stranger things #Eddie Munson smut #kinktober 2022 #stranger things x reader

68 notes · View notes

bunnygirl678 · 11 months ago

Text

it's valentine's day, i'm sick so i didn't go bar hopping like i had planned on doing, this is my first single valentine's day in like 7 years and tbh i was looking forward to drinking like i was 22 again, lmao, so in turn y'all are gonna get a bull tauros riding au, little back story, my father and most of my male relatives were bull riders in their younger years so i grew up around the culture and i'm from Texas (fun fact I have the Texas flag above my bed like i'm a frat boy lmao) Also this is probably more along the lines of gameverse?

-Our tauros riders are red and green

-they're competitive with each other, they've been rivals since their mutton wooloo bustin days, they've both got their fair share of buckles, red is the current world champ

-they have a little secret though, they're mutually in love with each other but neither will admit

-red doesn't speak to most people, won't do interviews, he'll talk to Green though, Green on the other end will take any sponsorship he can get, is constantly doing interviews, loves the attention

-then some new comers pop up on the scene, we've got the mysterious redheaded cowboy with a chip on his shoulder named Silver, and he's itching to take the title from Red

-who is Silver? well turns out he's the son of Giovanni, the previous champion who came out of retirement to go up against red,

-but Giovanni got hurt, bad, like he almost died, Silver blames Red for what happened to his father, but Silver looks nothing like his father and doesn't use his name so no one knows who he is, but he wants revenge

-Silver refuses to make friends with anyone, even though Green keeps reaching out, desperately trying

-then there's Gold, a buckle bunnelby (buckle bunny is a term for "fake" country girls who hang around rodeos trying to date the cowboys) who has a thing for redheads

-Gold takes interest in Silver, who is up and coming winning a bunch, there's more to Gold than meets the eye, Silver ends up letting Gold hang around him a lot and falls for the cutie the more he gets to know the real him

-Green too becomes close with Gold, but not in a romantic way (remember he's hopelessly in love with his rival), problem is Red doesn't know that

-Red gets jealous that Green and Gold hang around together he starts lashing out a bit towards Gold, now Silver already hates Red but watching Red be an ass to Gold pisses him off even more

-they're practicing together, Red is being a super asshole to Gold, and Gold is done. He gets up on a bull before Silver/Green can stop him,

-Guess what, Gold was an up and coming rider before he suddenly quit, after proving himself he jumps off leaving everyone flabbergasted and just keeps walking,

-Silver ends up going after him, because he thought they were friends why would he never tell him, Gold admits crying that his mom passed from an extended illness and he couldn't bring himself to keep going, it had always been their thing, whereas with Silver it was the opposite, he had never been interested until his dad got hurt

-Silver convinces Gold to start riding again, suddenly he's not as interested in revenge but wants to see Gold succeed, late one night after a particularly grueling training Gold leans in and kisses Silver, Silver kisses back, they're together now <3

-Red pushes himself harder, Green announces that he's going to retire at the end of the season, Red is heart broken the best part of riding is competing against Green, and he really won't see Green anymore if he retires, like he knows it's the end of their friendship

-it's finally time for the big finals, red, green, silver, gold are the top contenders, Silver places 4th, he and his father share a nice moment, he's upset he didn't beat Red, but he found love awwww

-green places 3rd, he's happy, says he's looking forward to starting the next chapter of his life (maybe he gets a ranch idk), but there's a sadness in his eyes when he looks at red, regret for things never said or done

-it's down to red vs gold, red hates gold, he thinks green likes him, doesn't know about silver, ect ect

-gold wins 1st, he's the new champion, he points the sky and says 'look mama i did it!' very sweet and emotional, silver runs out kissing his boy, not only did gold do amazing and fulfilled his dream, he beat red effectively getting revenge in silver's eyes

-red is like wait???? gold is with silver???? then he's like oh shit green must be heartbroken, that was why he looked so sad, he goes to find green and tell him how sorry he was, and at first green thinks it's about him placing 3rd and he's kinda pissed about it, like it feels condescending

-but red is like you deserve better than gold anyway, and green is like wait what? you thought i liked gold?? no you big dummy i like you!

-thinking it's his last chance, green kisses red, who immediately kisses back

-leads to 'oh wait i thought this was one-sided'

-red who really cares more about green than his title announces his retirement, he and green settle down on a ranch growing old together

-gold rides a few more seasons then retires as well, he and silver breed tauros and live happily ever after

#namelessshipping #reguri #preciousmetalshipping #this is one of those aus that appeal to me and like maybe one other person

26 notes · View notes

serialadoptersbracket · 9 months ago

Text

Round 3, Match 15: Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu vs. Jack Starbright

Submitted kids:

Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu: Zhang Chengling, Gu Xiang, Liang Jiuxiao, arguably also Cao Weining and Gao Xiaolian

Jack Starbright: Alex Rider, Tom Harris, and as of season 3, Kyra Vaschenko-Chao

Propaganda under the cut!

Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu:

1, Wen Kexing: “Look this man shouldn't be adopting kids because he's kinda evil and also the leader of an army of criminals and outcasts, a position where he killed his way to the top at a young age, BUT when he was still just a kid he found Gu Xiang and knew that if he didn't take care of her that she would die and became her father/brother/master (it's complicated). And then many years later when he's off doing his revenge quest he basically ends up adopting Chengling who is freshly an orphan which was kind of Kexing’s fault (it's complicated), but Chengling doesn't mind that his new dads are a little evil (his other dad is Zhou Zishu who basically created the CIA in fantasy ancient China). And then Gu Xiang falls in love with Cao Weining which puts Kexing into protective father mode and he goes all overbearing father-in-law on Weining, but he comes around when he's sure that Weining will treat her right. And then when Weining's family/sect turns on him, Kexing becomes one of the few people left he could call family (also with the rest of the group).”

2, Zhou Zishu: “former assassin who literally just wanted to drink himself to death in peace but then in the span of like 2 day he suddenly obtained 2 kids and a husband(stalker)???? poor man Did Not want this and proceeds to spend the next few weeks/months in denial about it before finally coming to terms with the fact that he cares about all of them (not that he's gonna tell them that) and then he gets a son-in-law too??? the universe really refused to let him die alone and miserable and decided to drop and entire family on him out of nowhere”

Link to the rest here!

Jack Starbright:

“was about to quit her job of looking after alex but then alex's guardian died and she went "guess he's my kid now" and didn't look back. and alex's best friend is always around so fuck might as well adopt him too while we're here. (to be clear, she does become alex's legal guardian at the end of season two, tom is not legally her kid he's just always at her house even when alex isn't home.) i'm almost certain she's trying to adopt kyra as well. jack is a twenty something year old woman who went from "i just look after this one kid when his uncle is away on business trips" to two "i have two teenage sons" pretty much the minute her boss died and she never looked back. she never asked for these kids, but she loves them more than anything and sacrifices so much to keep them safe.”

#wen kexing #zhou zishu #jack starbright #wkx #faraway wanderers #tyk #alex rider tv #word of honor #woh #alex rider #serial adopters bracket #round 3 #tumblr polls #tumblr tournament

19 notes · View notes

starryoak · 2 years ago

Text

It’s bizarre to hear anyone talk about their experiences with their mortality or whatever, like, when they first conceived of death as a thing that could happen to Them Specifically, or like, when they started thinking about death more, and they mention like, their teen years, or their twenties, or their thirties, and I just… fundamentally cannot relate, because I first started conceiving of my own mortality when I was like 5 and my grandma died of brain cancer. My parents got me a book for children that had entirely developmentally appropriate information on what death was and how to process it, of course it brought up all the important stuff like that everybody dies and death is normal and all that shit, but as we were atheists and the book was also, presumably, for atheists, when it discussed what happens after you die it mentioned that some people believe that nothing happens after you die, IE; you just stop existing. And unfortunately, even at that age, I actually was entirely capable of understanding that “everybody dies eventually” also applied to me, and I put this together with the second bit of information that the book taught me, the concept of cessation of existence, and developed a lifelong crippling trauma.

Admittedly, it didn’t hit me in full force until my OCD got really severe in late elementary early middle school, but the idea of like, not having spent every night for years lying awake in crippling terror so severe it caused me actual physical burning pain over the fact that I have a finite ever decreasing time on Earth that even now is constantly ticking down with no way to stop it and no way to avoid it, and that in full likelihood that there’s nothing after death and there’s no afterlife whatsoever? It’s just hard to imagine for me.

Like, I would literally just sit there counting down seconds thinking about how every second I get closer to death. I still get kind of triggered by counting numbers manually in general, because it so easily ties into a realization I had that I could easily go find a calculator for the average human lifespan in days and just count down the days until I die, and I just can’t imagine how anyone spends their life at least not a little terrified of that fact, the shortness of the human lifespan and how finite and entirely realistically countable that it actually is.

Even now that I’m mostly over it, I’m only mostly over it because I’m able to ignore it and get on with my day, rather than actually have come to terms with it, I just push the thoughts away whenever they come till the next time they come. I guess it’s just entirely baffling to me, to hear people talk about how they never processed their mortality as a kid, or how they just started thinking about it now that they turned 30, or almost anything about how most people talk about it in general, just because the idea of living your life not haunted by the omnipresent spectre of your own mortality is so completely foreign to how I’ve lived my life in complete and utter terror of how finite it is.

#death #thanatophobia #ocd #obsessive compulsive disorder #vent #mortality #potentially triggering #triggering themes #tw thanatophobia #my posts

88 notes · View notes

chocochipjewel · 8 months ago

Text

Okay yall Bad Batch finale aires in just under 12 hours and I have some finale theories to talk about! Hopefully I'll be able to post at least some rough art after the finale where I talk about the show some more but for now final theories!

I think CX-2 is Cody, it's too late for it to be Tech and it would be delightfully tragic if Rex or someone (who I think is definitely showing up for the finale) kills CX-2 and unmasks him after the fact or something

I think Hemlock did retrieve Tech's body and I think he's one of the experimental CX units who have not been released yet. But I don't think it worked. I want his sacrifice to mean something, so I want him to stay dead (even if my heart wants otherwise 😭) maybe his body is found, maybe he's never seen again, but I don't think he's coming back

I'm pretty sure Rex and his group of renegade clones will make an appearance, and I hope Phee gets a final moment to be badass as well. Apart from that, I'm hoping for no more extra characters cluttering the episode cause we already have so many loose ends up tie up here

I wouldn't put it past Disney to end the clone rebellion storyline on a cliffhanger tbh but I so badlyyy wish it won't be that way. Let their story end here. It will be sad but you know what that's better than the finale just being a tease for a future show. Let all the Tantiss prisoners break out and branch out to live new lives and die naturally as they deserve.

Now... for the actual Bad Batch itself

I'm certain someone is going to die. No one they're all making it out, not after all the teases and death flags. This isn't going to be like Mando S3 where the characters retire on some field for the rest of their lives (that's just for my fix it headcanons ❤️)

As for who, I've gone back and forth on this but I'm not sure. Every remaining member of the 4 troopers we have here have enough death flags on them and I've read compelling theories for all possibilities, including ones where they get Rogue One'd and everyone dies 😭

So I guess I don't really have a theory for this. I'm certain someone is going to die and I'm honestly scared for who it will be but I don't have a specific person yet. I'm leaning towards Hunter or Crosshair cause their conflict and relationships with Omega make the heart of the show itself, but I wouldn't be surprised if Wrecker or Echo died instead, or any other combination of the team members

Only thing I'm mildly certain about is Omega surviving. Disney Star Wars doesn't like to kill kids much. She's not 100% clear but least likely from my perspective. Plus it would end the show on too sad a note if the character driving the entire plot so far dies 😭 I can see a possibility in which she dies to delay Project Necromancer indefinitely, and it would honestly be sad as hell, but that's just it, it would be way too sad. I don't think the show likes being that dark, especially for its finale. And frankly, Omega's arc deserves to end with her finally getting to stop running and just live her life on her own terms.

Hemlock is definitely getting eaten by the Zillo beast while it destroys Tantiss and Rampart is almost surely making it out and turning a new leaf in my eyes. He's not any less of an asshole but he might just go live somewhere away from the Empire and away from the Bad Batch too.

Emerie is an interesting case cause I can't tell if she'll get the redemption = death thing or she'll make it out too. I honestly have 0 predictions for her. I can see her dying to save the force sensitive kids, but I can also see her making it out.

The force sensitive kids, clone cadets, Batcher, and Phee are probably gonna make it out and you know what good for them. They'll probably be the emotional support for the remaining members of the Batch (if there are any) to move on after this.

I am hoping and praying for no Boba Fett or Ventress or Vader or Palpatine cameo cause this is the last episode of the Bad Batch show and it should ideally focus on. The Bad Batch. The show already has too many loose threads. No more cameos please.

As for whoever survives in the Batch, my ideal wish would just be for them to retire to Pabu under a new identity or something and live out their lives. After Tantiss is destroyed, there would be no clones left in captivity. They can finally rest then. It would be bittersweet to see the end of their adventures as they knew it, but it's at least a peaceful end.

Anyways, that's all for my theories I think! Whether I end up being right or not, I hope the finale is actually good 😭 and I hope whoever dies doesn't make me TOO sad, just that sweet spot of devastated but in a good way 😭😭😭

I'll be reblogging this after I watch the finale with updates on whether my predictions were true or not, probably with a thank you post to the show, so I suppose this is it.

See you all on the other side, TBB nation!

#star wars #star wars the bad batch #the bad batch #tbb theory #the bad batch theory #tbb discussion #the bad batch discussion #tbb speculation #the bad batch speculation #tbb season 3 #tbb s3 #tbb finale #the bad batch season 3 #the bad batch finale #not tagging all the characters i theorised about cause thats too many tags probably 😭#jewel talks about stuff #speculation

11 notes · View notes

akane-kurokawa · 10 months ago

Text

Chapter 144 thoughts!

So they’re cutting ahead again, and I have mixed feelings about this. On one hand, we’re still building on Ruby’s character arc regarding her feelings for Gorou, so it makes sense.

But on the other hand, the implication that they’re doing the entire movie chronologically means that Hikaru and Ai’s part of the movie together is over, which is ludicrous to me because Aqua’s “ultimate revenge play” fantasy that he’s been coming up with since childhood has ultimately just been “the Uwuification of Hikaru Kamiki”

I’m not too phased because I still think we’re going to return to it, Frill was confident from script alone that Aqua was trying to kill his father, and there was an emphasis placed on Ai denying Hikaru. I’m not sure why it hasn’t happened from a watsonian perspective (maybe hospital availability pushing those scenes up?) but from a doyalist perspective I could see it being the climax of Ruby’s character arc which she isn’t ready for.

It’s another one of those “I can’t really judge it until I’ve seen the rest of the arc” things so I’ll try to just judge it for what is is right now.

Melt looks so good as Gorou! I didn’t think much about the casting when it was announced but he’s really bringing the role to life.

Ruby chiming in to essentially go “no he wouldn’t fucking say that” is both funny and indicative to the entitled perception and attachment she feels to him. It specifically gives me a lighter version of Nino talking about Ai

I like how Melt talks about understanding Gorou here. He really is an understanding and empathic person and it shines through in his acting style. Him calling the role “cool” is cute to me.

Ruby really gets mean here in a way that almost comes off as out of character. It reads to me like her obsession is growing more toxic, or maybe some lingering cruelty from how she was behaving before, but it is a little jarring.

Melt’s interpretation of Gorou is spot on to me, he understands Gorou’s subtly and respect better than even Ruby does. (Though @aihoshiino pointed out to me that Gorou is implied by the anime and the chapter where his corpse is found to have had his keychain out the whole time in front of Ai. Still, in terms of his professionalism and hiding that he’s a fan Melt gets it)

It makes me wonder what his information is. He doesn’t know Gorou’s name (which makes sense since Gorou can’t legally consent to his name being used) but he knows his history with Sarina enough to guess she gave him the pin.

Also this dude! Glad to see him

The pin’s relevance to her turnaround feels very rooted in sentimentality. I really like the concept of it, but it feels a bit dangerously close to Comedy!Ruby from the Hikaru Ai scenes. I think I like it more here though, as it feels more in character and purposeful.

Crow girl in the tree like a creature is healing me tbh. I know a lot of people are skeptical of her and the supernatural element her presence enforces, but I’ve always found her so interesting and fun and I’m happy to see her again.

Thank you for asking about how she gets around, that’s been one of the goofy questions the server has been mulling over for a while now lol

Interesting that this location seems significant to her, considering her first appearance here, as well as the fact that her two reincarnation targets where here when they died. Her implying there may be more special people is interesting. I wonder if any more will come into the story, though part of me doubts it.

This might imply characters we’ve met have god attachments without even knowing it. Simple guess here would be Ai, there’s precedence for her to be connected to the “God of Entertainment.” Though even if she was, I’m sure what kind of relevancy that would have -if any- considering she is dead and confirmed never coming back, but it’s interesting to think about.

See? She’s such a goofball! Between this and Aqua bullying her into being an actor, she’s been a strong comedic pillar in this arc.

All in all, a pretty decent chapter, kinda annoying in its placement, but much better than having the skip week after last chapter.

#Onk 145 #oshi no ko spoilers #manga post #chapter thoughts

19 notes · View notes

aotopmha · 8 months ago

Text

I haven't even started the lvl 89 Endwalker MSQ and I'm thinking about how annoying certain opinions around it are.

It's annoying me and I don't want it to distract me in my playthrough, so I'm just going to air it out via this post.

The story really clearly foreshadows what happens. In fact, it directly tells you.

But it is fairly common for people to call twists that are pretty directly foreshadowed still out of nowhere. (And of course, a text can be read in many different ways.)

And I think regardless of any of this, people still don't have to like what happens!

But I've talked about this a bunch regarding other pieces of media, and at this point, nerd criticism is so obnoxious to me because it's often so much more about telling other people how much smarter you are than the writers or the people who like their writing.

I'm not interested in listening you putting yourself on a pedestal and telling me how smart you are.

It's such a boring way to engage with art/writing to me.

In fact, it isn't even about the art, but a shitbag telling me how they would be above any of this kind of "mistakes" in their writing.

This talking point just reminds me of my most smart alec, know-it-all late teens/early twenties moments that have an air of arrogant ignorance to it. Where the criticism absolutely can have its basis, but there might be elements to the narrative decision that have issues in their own right.

It feels like certain storytelling tropes have become "taboos" regardless of how they're executed because of the perception of storytelling "rules"/"basics" being "broken", when in truth those have always been just "guidelines" and even the best-told stories probably have these "flaws" in there somewhere if you look hard enough.

If a major part of the enjoyment of a story for you depends on how many characters die and you obsessively count on your fingers who lived through impossible odds and who didn't, Final Fantasy 14 was probably never a story for you.

I say all of this as someone who at this point has seen The Endwalk probably dozens and dozens of times via playthroughs and cried at it almost every time.

(It's gonna be great for me when I get to it, I can tell!)

Because I find it incredibly meaningful regardless of any issues I might have with it.

To engage that critical mind for a second, if nothing else, I think the story absolutely does need to drop the fake death trope it likes so much, and firmly decide on the characters it kills and that alone would go a long way to reinstill a stronger sense of base tension.

In fact, I do agree that actually killing any of the long-term main characters might need to happen. (And it might need to be staged in a super unexpected way, at that.)

I just do not think Endwalker was the place to do it considering what it is about.

The obvious "hopeful" framing to everyone dying and you alone surviving would be for you to carry on their legacy/work, and the patches then would be finding new connections, but pulling this off could also send the opposite message and come across as amatuerish shock value.

Hey, life is suffering and a path for you to find the good in the bad, so guess what everyone you ever loved dies after everything they've been through!

But there is hope, though!

It looks "ballsy" to kill everyone on the surface, but actually might just thematically fly in the face of the entire story.

All of these characters that have suffered loss and much pain in their own right, yeah, all they get is death in the end!

But there is hope, though!

It's the second point that gets me the most. It would've felt so hateful to me (and it often wished for in such an hateful manner by those who wanted it to happen), especially for like G'raha who was stuck in a tower for a hundred years.

And just a single or few characters dying would feel wrong in a very specific "shock value" way, too.

Why those characters specifically?

That's not what FF14 ever was to me, not even in HW, the section of the story that had the most major deaths.

I think Thancred dying in ShB would'be been perfect, for example.

Main character, paving the way to another character after making peace with his situation with Minfilia.

Would've pretty automatically fixed the general tension issue, too, I think.

But in EW? I think the losses everyone already experienced and the suffering we saw across the entire game from ARR-EW are enough to make the point.

#Final Fantasy XIV #Final Fantasy 14 #FFXIV #FF14 #FF #Final Fantasy #Endwalker #EW

11 notes · View notes

pudding-parade · 2 years ago

Text

15 questions for 15 mutuals

Seeing @zoeoe-sims post of this reminded me that several people had tagged me with this right around the time that my cat died a few weeks ago, too. I wasn't in a place to do this then, but…better late than never? I guess?

I babbled, as usual, so I cut for your protection.

Are you named after anyone? My paternal grandmother. Which is fortunate because she's the only one of my grandparents that I liked. Also, my mother because her maiden name is one of my middle names. (I have two. Fancy!) No comment on whether or not I like my mother. LOL

When was the last time you cried? I cried unhappily a lot when my cat died recently. I still get teary-eyed when I think of her or see something that reminds me of her. But, I also cry happy tears when babies are born on my little hobby farm, and since it's that time of the year, I've been crying a lot lately. :)

Basically, I'm a tear factory. A syrupy commercial will make me cry. You should've seen me when I was pregnant. Speaking of which…

Do you have kids? I birthed three, one conceived against my will when I was 17, but raised only two of them. I probably shouldn't have raised any, frankly. I'm not a good parent, and I don't like kids until they're about 8 or 10. But, when you're caught up in a Christian cult, there's intense pressure to procreate. I fear I really messed up my son, but at least I had my daughter when I was mostly out of the cult/god-belief in general, so I feel I did better by her.

Do you use sarcasm a lot? Oh, absolutely not. (Yes, that was sarcasm.)

What sports do you play/have you played? Volleyball. Preferably 2-on-2 because it's more energetic and fun. (If you've ever watched beach volleyball on the Olympics, that's what I do. Or did, when I could.) I'm tall, so I'm pretty good at it. (Not good at basketball, though, because I can't for the life of me run and bounce a ball at the same time.) But mostly I prefer solo pursuits, usually of the "extreme" variety. Free climbing was a passion of my younger years, and I also did some BASE jumping back then. (I wish wing suits had been a thing when I did it. That looks amazing.) White-water kayaking. Skiing/snowboarding. Basically, I'm pretty active when I can be. Chronic health conditions limit me now.

What’s the first thing you notice about other people? Whatever I notice. I don't know. I talk to lots of people, and in the longer term I notice whether or not they can hold a coherent conversation, whether or not they have interests beyond professional sports, tv shows/celebrities, or shoes/fashion, and whether or not they are able to use their higher brain functions. When it comes to possible romantic relationships, I'm strongly attracted to intelligence, eloquence, and unabashed nerdiness, so the ability to use one's brain and have conversations is important to me.

That said, I have to admit that the very first thing I noticed about my husband (almost 10 years ago to this day, in fact) was how nice his ass looked in tight black leather pants, so there's that, too. I like a nice ass as much as the next person. And nice tits. (It's great being pansexual.) But, if all a person has is a great ass/pair of tits, then I lose interest very quickly. Looks fade and gravity does its thing and all that.

Scary movies or happy endings? I don't watch a lot of movies because I find just sitting and watching one to be pretty boring. (Which is odd because I spent much of my adult career as a studio musician working on movie soundtracks.) I'm much better off watching TV shows, which are shorter. But, if I'm going to watch a movie at all, it's either going to be sci-fi or a comedy. Sci-fi can be creepy/scary sometimes (i.e., Alien), and comedies usually have a happy ending, so…both? I guess?

Any special talents? I have perfect pitch and am musically gifted, though my instrumental skills are far superior to my singing skills. That's about it, unless you count the fact that I can wiggle my ears to a freakish degree and independently of each other, like a cat. In fact, I have a number of atavisms like that, probably because my family on both sides is pretty damn inbred.

Where were you born? In Amish country in Indiana, USA. I haven't been back there since I was 16, though. (And since I'm 59, that was a long time ago.)

Well, OK, technically I was born in New York City because my parents were visiting my mom's parents, and I wanted out earlier than expected. (Typical of me, really.) I didn't actually live in NYC until I went to music school, however, and I was raised on a dairy farm in Indiana that my parents owned and paid Amish folks to run for them. So, I grew up hanging out with cows and Amish kids, mostly. LOL

What are your hobbies? Aside from playing video games? Too many, because I don't have time to do them all as much as I would like. Belly dancing and pole dancing. (Both are great for your core.) Composing music. The above-mentioned sports, to the extent that I can do them now. Swing dance. Embroidery/cross-stitch/hand-sewing/lace-making. Horseback riding. Painting. (Only paint-by-numbers because I don't have the time/patience to learn otherwise.) Home improvement projects. (I love me a good tiling job. Currently, I'm working with my husband on our Burmese python's future room because he's quickly growing out of the enclosure we have him in.) Reading scientific papers and popular science articles, especially about dinosaurs. Amateur astronomy. I want to get into doing some woodworking, too, though I have to get over my fear of power saws first.

Basically, my problem is that I have too many interests and not enough time.

Do you have any pets? I have a (mostly) hobby farm, so…

Four horses that are used for just casual and trail riding, so they're basically lushes who laze in the sun and drink a lot of beer, so much that a local microbrewery has their hoppy stout named after my hoppy-stout-loving, beer-snob horse.

Small(ish) herds of both llamas and alpacas. We breed alpacas for their fiber, which we sell combed but otherwise raw to people/companies who spin it to make yarn and stuff. I have fun doing artificial selection with them, breeding for color and fiber texture and stuff. We breed llamas as guard animals, which are basically guard dogs for other livestock. They're more effective against large predators like mountain lions (their natural enemy) than dogs are while requiring much less in the way of training, food, water, etc. So, I have fun with artificial selection with them, too, breeding for (bad) temperament.

A flock of chickens, which is nice because, even though I'm vegan, I'll eat their eggs because I have tons and I know these hens live a life of decadent luxury, complete with a heated coop so they are comfortable year-round. All of them are doted-on, get daily attention (they love sitting in laps) and die of old age unless a predator gets them. Honestly, they're probably my favorite of the farm animals. LOL They are so sweet and so low-maintenance.

Two beehives, though I'm not sure they count as pets. They do require maintenance, though. Them's some hard-working ladies!

Indoors, I have four dogs, three cats, two snakes, and three tarantulas. And an aquarium set-up full of dragonfly nymphs.

(And, I have employees to do most of the farm work because I can't do most of it anymore, and my husband has a real job he loves, and my kids are moved out so no more free labor. Because otherwise my life would consist of nothing but farm chores/animal care.)

How tall are you? 6'0"/183cm. Very tall for a woman, and my build is quite man-like. Being a tall woman is sometimes good and sometimes bad. Like, I can reach whatever I want to reach and be good at volleyball, but finding clothes that fit right is a nightmare. Which is why I got decent at hand-sewing, because I have to alter pretty much everything I buy that's meant for women, even stuff in "tall" sizes, and I got tired of paying to have it done. I really should just make my own clothes from scratch, but there's that time issue again. So, I make do by buying mostly men's clothes. But sometimes you just wanna be pretty, y'know? (Plus, lately, if you go to use a women's restroom while not looking sufficiently female, you'll get very suspicious looks -- and sometimes worse -- from certain idiots waiting for their wife/girlfriend/daughter to come out of the restroom. 🙄)

Fave subject in school? Erm…I didn't actually go to school much. I was enrolled in a private school, but I was traveling and performing as a pianist starting when I was 7 but especially once I was 10. So, I was mostly educated by a private tutor who traveled with me, specifically by a Catholic nun who was in her mid-60s when I was a child. She looked scary, but she was the sweetest woman who ever lived while also being fucking brilliant so it's a damned shame she went into a nunnery. I bawled like a baby at her funeral many years ago.

But ANYWAY! Believe it or not, grammar was my favorite subject. Being educated by a nun, grammar was a Big Thing, but I enjoyed diagramming sentences, which is something that I don't think is taught in schools anymore. (But it should be!) I used to do it for fun. Beyond that, I love any history that isn't US history, and science. All of it. Except physics because calculus hates me. My love of dinosaurs came from my tutor, who was also very interested in them. Which is possibly weird, for a nun, but there it is.

Dream job? Being retired. Which I am. Yay!

Eye color? It says hazel on my driver's license, and I guess that's the closest description. They're basically a muddy green with some flecks of yellow.

I'm not going to tag anyone because it's been a while, and I don't know who's done this. But, if you'd like to do it, consider yourself tagged.

#non sims #memes memes glorious memes #i promise i'll get back to posting sims stuff one of these days

27 notes · View notes