#i know we've seen her at the pool and whatever

[skateisawesome]

inexplicably i dont think tori can swim

[corroded-hellfire]

AYW req if you'd like: while Reader is pregnant with Eliza, she starts getting more prominent stretch marks on her stomach & boobs & stops letting Eddie see her naked. Eddie rectifies that situation hehehehe

This was honestly so fun to write! Love featuring the kiddos but these two also need some alone time hehe 💜 @munson-blurbs and I hope you like what we've come up with

Warnings: smut, p in v, unprotected (she's already pregnant but you should still wrap it up), semi-public sex, pregnant!reader, oral, f!receiving, breeding kink, body image issues, older!eddie, dad!eddie

Words: 3.3k

[As You Wish masterlist]

The late June day is sweltering as you step out of the Harrington’s house and into their backyard. The placid blue water of the pool looks refreshing and calm—or it will, until the kids get in. Luke quickly jumps in alongside Theo and Danny, the three rowdy boys immediately splashing each other and then whining about being splashed. Ryan and Natalie are decidedly less hyperactive, taking care to watch baby Amelia where she kicks herself around in her purple mermaid floaties. 

Nancy makes herself comfortable on a lounge chair a few feet away from the one you’re making your way towards. Normally you can keep up with everyone else, still being in your second trimester, but this heat has you moving slower and feeling crankier than usual. 

You can’t help but notice the way Nancy looks in her bathing suit compared to how you feel in yours. Nancy’s had four children and looks stunning as always as she lays back in her black one piece. You feel shoved into your navy suit, like every little stretch mark that mars your skin is on full display for the world to see. 

Trying to shrug it off and enjoy the invitation from the Harrington’s to have a pool day, you make yourself comfortable on your lounge chair and adjust the pale pink coverup you have on. Eddie stands near the foot of your lounge chair, shielding his eyes from the sun as he looks out at the children in the water. Your eyes feel glued to his lithe frame as he strips his shirt off. The pale skin that’s left on display practically has your mouth watering. It doesn’t matter that you’ve seen him naked countless times, your eyes still roam over his torso and the beautiful works of art he has inked on his skin. 

As Eddie rids himself of the Black Sabbath shirt, he notices the way you’re gawking at him. A smirk quirks up his handsome features and he playfully tosses his shirt at your face. Your hormones this second trimester have been no joke. The moment Eddie walks through the door after work you’re jumping on him. Your husband swore you were going to wear him out before this baby was born. Not the last week or so though, now that Eddie thinks about it. Maybe those particular horny hormones have been fading to make room for whatever new batch comes in for the third trimester. 

The sound of little feet kicking too hard beneath the water of the pool approaches you and Eddie, and you look up to see Luke swimming over towards the edge. He grins up at the pair of you, shaking the water from his curls like a dog just out of the bath. Bright blue eyes land on you and they’re doing a pretty damn good impersonation of the puppy dog look that Eddie gives you when he wants something. You know what Luke is going to ask before he even opens his mouth. 

“Wanna plaaaay with us? Please?”

Giving him a frown as you squint beneath the blazing sunlight, you shake your head. “I’m super tired, bud. Growing a baby is hard work,” you tease. You’re not technically lying—when you’re not jumping Eddie’s bones or concocting weird new food combinations, you’re sleeping— but no one needs to know that’s not the reason you don’t want to get in the pool. 

“I can play with you,” Eddie offers his son. He takes a step towards the pool and is ready to dive in when Luke wrinkles his nose up in disgust.

“Nah, I’m good,” the little Munson boy says. 

As you bring your hands up to your mouth to cover up your laughter at your son’s remark, Steve claps a hand on Eddie’s bare back.

“Gonna need some ice for that burn?” Steve whoops. 

“Shut up, Harrington,” your husband grumbles in response. Eddie takes a seat near your legs at the edge of the lounge chair. His hand finds your leg and he rubs up and down your calf, always needing to be touching you in some way. Physical comfort is something you both love to give and receive from one another, which calls for a lot of soft rubbing or absent-mindedly drawing patterns on one another’s skin. Now, Eddie’s touch is having a calming effect on you, though he didn’t even realize there was something you’re uneasy about. Your body language must change as he relaxes you though, because he tilts his head to the side as he gazes at your face.

“You feeling alright, baby?” he asks.

“Yeah, just tired.” 

If Eddie had any follow up for that, he doesn’t get the chance because Amelia kicks her way over towards Luke in the pool and hangs onto his shoulder when she’s close enough. Her hand almost slips from his wet skin, but Luke manages to catch the little girl before she can float too far away. 

“Uncla’ Eddie!” Amelia calls once she’s clinging to Luke again. 

“What’s up, Little Red?” he asks his favorite ginger niece. 

“Come in, come in!” Amelia cheers. 

“At least somebody wants me in the water,” Eddie says with a pointed look at Luke. “Anything for you, my darling Mia.”

A few minutes after Eddie’s joined the kids in the pool—who also convince Steve to come in—Nancy comes over to you, noticing how everyone else is in just their bathing suits and you’re seemingly putting on more articles of clothing. 

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” you answer too quickly, nervously tucking your lips into your mouth. 

“Bullshit,” she counters, crossing her arms over her chest. “I have four kids; I can smell a lie a mile away.”

“Seriously, Nance, I’m fine.” You muster up a small smile, but she sees right through it, and you know it. 

You have your nose buried in a book, unaware that Nancy is reaching over the side of the pool to give Eddie’s ear a tug. 

“Jesus H. Christ!” he yelps, rubbing the affected lobe. “What was that for?”

“Go talk to your wife,” Nancy says through gritted teeth, obviously irritated at having to spell it out for him. “Marco Polo can wait.”

As Eddie attempts to get out of the pool, Amelia grabs his leg and tugs. Your husband lets out a soft chuckle and picks the small girl up.

“I’ll be back, Mia.” He presses a few kisses to the top of her wet, red hair and sets her back in the water. 

Over the top of your book, you see Eddie sauntering towards you. You slip the book back into your bag and tug your cover up tighter across your body. 

“What’s cookin’, good lookin’?” he asks with a smirk. “Besides that bun in the oven.”

“Just relaxing,” you say. 

“If you’re just relaxing, why did Lady Harrington threaten my life to come over here? And why aren’t you in the pool?”

The only answer you have you don’t want to tell him. And you’re not going to make up some lie to get him off your back. Eddie deserves better than that and you would never treat him with anything less than the utmost respect. That doesn’t mean you want to tell him the truth, though. You swallow embarrassment as you mutter, “I gotta pee.”

Eddie doesn’t let you get far without him though, he’s hot on your tail as you walk through the back door into the house.

“Can you please tell me what the problem is so I can at least try to fix it?” he asks once the screen door is securely closed behind him.

Silence is his only reply as you walk up the stairs to the second floor. You’re obviously upset, and your husband can’t relax until he knows what’s bothering you.

“Sweetheart, what’s the problem?” he asks again.

You stop short and spin on your heel to face him. As Eddie tries to read your face, he’s not sure if there’s more sadness or anger there. Either way, he wants to make it go away. He’d do anything. 

“This is the problem!” you say, gesturing towards your boobs and stomach. 

Eddie looks at you for a moment, brain trying to comprehend whatever it is you’re talking about. He shakes his head and gives you his response. “If I keep looking at them, this is gonna be a problem, too.” He motions to his crotch.

“I’m serious!” you yell in frustration. 

“I am, too!” Eddie says, raising his eyebrows. “Don’t forget how I got you pregnant in the first place.”

“Oh, so I can blame you for this mess?”

Eddie wrinkles his brows. “What mess?” He knows you would never refer to your baby that way, so he’s even more confused as to what you could mean.

“The stretch marks, Eds!” you lament, throwing your arms up in exasperation. “They look like an angry toddler drew lines all over my body.”

Understanding clicks inside Eddie’s brain. Why you’re so covered up. Why you didn’t want to go into the pool. But how could you ever think anything about your body wasn’t absolutely beautiful to him?

“That’s why you haven’t been all over me the past few days,” Eddie says as the realization hits him. “I thought maybe it was those horny hormones, or whatever they’re called, fading. But you…you think there’s something wrong with having stretch marks? Baby, no. It’s just your body making more room for our little sweet pea to grow. They’re beautiful, sweetheart.”

Believing him is easier said than done. You want to believe him, but battling the insecurities in your head is not something you’ve conquered yet. Now you just stand there and fiddle with the hem of your coverup, not knowing what else to say or do.

Eddie sighs and gently takes your hand into his. 

“Come with me. I wanna show you something.” 

Eddie leads you into the upstairs bathroom and shuts the door. He positions you directly in front of the mirror above the sink and stands behind you. Slowly, he moves your cover up out of the way to reveal your growing bump, stretch marks dotting the sides. 

“How on earth could you think anything about this is a problem?” he asks, his hands barely grazing your skin as he admires your tummy. “Look at you. Gorgeous bump. Cute little stretch marks from where our baby is making herself comfortable inside of you. It’s incredible, princess. Your body is literally growing a person and you’re mad at it because there are a few lines appearing on your skin?” He gives an incredulous laugh as he turns you around to face him. “Jesus, I mean, see what just talking about it does to me.” One large hand dwarfs your smaller one to press your palm to the hardening bulge in his swim trunks. 

You roll your eyes. “Please. The wind blows the wrong way and you get a boner,” you rebut. 

“Oh, Sweetheart,” Eddie says with a small groan. “Don’t say blows when I’m hard like this.”

“Can you be serious for two seconds?” Your temper is already short from the heat and the pregnancy, and his blasé attitude only makes it worse. 

Eddie cradles your cheeks in his hands. “I love you. And I love your body. I loved it before you were pregnant, and I’ll love it after, but watching you carrying our baby…fuckin’ does it for me.” He bites his lower lip as he drinks in the sight of you. “Goddamn, you look fuckin’ gorgeous like this.”

You think back to when the two of you first got together, when he’d made what you’d assumed was an offhand remark about knocking you up. Maybe it wasn’t as out of left field as you’d thought. 

As if he can read your mind, Eddie’s lips press soft kisses down your neck as he murmurs, “always dreamed about getting you pregnant. Would’ve done it a lot sooner if I’d known you’d be this sexy.” He runs a finger along a stretch mark that curves down your stomach. 

“H-How much sooner?” Curiosity asks the question for you as your back arches slightly from his touch. 

“That night,” he confirms, knowing he doesn’t have to elaborate further on what night he means, “but your stupid birth control pills ruined all my fun,” he adds with a teasing smirk. 

“They were so stupid. Sh-Should’ve stopped taking them the second I saw you.” Your voice is still timid from the emotions coursing through you, but Eddie can tell you’re finally letting him in.

Eddie throws his head back. “Fuck, baby. You got me all worked up.”

“Oh, you poor thing,” you tease, hands sliding up his wet chest and over the sparse hair. “What should we do about that?”

Eddie whines and leans in, nipping at your neck. 

“You know, I wasn’t a big fan of this bathing suit anyway,” you tell him. “The faster you get it on the floor, the faster you can be inside of me.”

Eddie gets your coverup and bathing suit off in record time. It would’ve made you laugh if you weren’t so turned on. His swim trunks go next and then Eddie is lifting you up onto the bathroom counter. There’s not much time to admire his fully naked body before he gets down on his knees in front of you. You wind your fingers through the hair on the top of his head and he looks up at you with wide, hungry eyes. That look alone has you practically dripping for him. 

Eddie keeps that eye contact with you as his hands force your legs further apart and he licks a broad stripe up your folds. You’re the one to end the staring contest when the pleasure overwhelms you and your eyes flutter closed, throwing your head back. It knocks against the mirror, but you’re too caught up to notice if it hurt or not. 

On the next swipe of Eddie’s tongue, he keeps going up so his tongue is trailing the swell of your belly as well. He presses hot kisses against your bump as he works his way back down again. He repeats the motion, next time taking time to either kiss or run his tongue along the stretch marks. The physical sensation feels amazing, but paired with the way Eddie is making you feel emotionally with his tender touch is making your heart thump even faster. 

Every little movement of his makes you feel more cared for, more cherished, and sexy. He’s built you up so high that you have to give a little tug on his curls so he pulls his mouth away from your pussy.

“Need you inside. Now.”

“Anything for the woman carrying my baby.”

You pull his mouth to yours and moan against his tongue as you feel his hands roam your body. His touch soothes over the areas of your breasts where you’ve memorized the stretch marks before moving down and caressing the ones on your stomach again. 

Eddie’s hands slide up to your hips and give a quick squeeze. He gently lifts you down from the counter and spins you around to face the mirror. You brace your hands on the counter as Eddie trails soft kisses up the side of your neck.

“Want you to see how fucking hot is when I fuck you like this,” he whispers in your ear, his hot breath sending a shiver throughout your body. 

You spread your legs, but Eddie wants them farther apart. He nudges them with his knee while he rubs a hand up and down your spine. He fists his cock a few times, making eye contact with you in the mirror as he does so. The way he’s looking at you has you whimpering and whining in anticipation.

Your noises make Eddie smirk, and he lines himself up with your entrance. As he pushes in, one hand snakes around your body and rests firmly on your baby bump. 

“Fuck,” Eddie groans. “I’ll never get over how fucking perfectly we fit together.” He punctuates his statement by tilting your chin slightly upwards so you have no choice but to see yourself in the mirror. You watch as he disappears inside you, your body obeying his every command. 

When you rock your hips back against his, Eddie slips his other hand around you to rub circles on your clit. His middle finger finds it easily, slipping through your soaked folds and pressing against the sensitive bud. The feeling is too much; you have to bite your lip to keep from screaming out—the last thing you need is the Harringtons hearing your pathetic whines. 

“God, I wanna fill you up so bad, baby,” Eddie hisses, snapping into you furiously as he takes in the view of your body; the view of you watching your body. “Shit, I’d make you pregnant twice over right now if I could.” 

“W-Would you always keep me pregnant if you could?” you manage to ask between gasps and whimpers—both yours and Eddie’s. 

“Fuck,” Eddie growls. “Don’t tempt me, sweetheart. “I’ll go buy a damn farm right now to raise all the babies I want to put in you.”

His words make you laugh, which has you squeezing around Eddie’s cock. He moans, drawing you impossibly close against his bare chest. 

“They’re babies, not sheep, Eddie.”

“Still need the space to run around,” he muses, making you laugh again.

“I love you so—-oh! So, so much, Eddie.”

 He’s ridiculously hard inside of you, fucking into you like his life depends on it. “Shit, I love you too, princess.” His middle finger makes more frantic circles around your clit, throwing you over the edge. “You’ve got a fuckin’ vice grip today, holy shit,” he breathes, willing himself not to finish too early while still being acutely aware of his surroundings. 

Your fingers dig into the countertop as each thrust brings you closer to your orgasm. “Right—right there,” you pant, fighting back a moan. “Don’tstopdon’tstopdon’tstop.” You come, aided by his magic fingers and your raging hormones, with a soft whine of his name. 

“‘M right there, shit, you’re the best little fucktoy,” he grunts. The hint of degradation has you clenching around him again; of course, he immediately takes notice of it. “Y’like that? Y’like being my pregnant little fucktoy? Knocked up with my baby and still beggin’ for more?”

“Y-Yes, sir,” you stutter, smiling at the reaction your response brings. 

Eddie’s pistoning his hips into you, whispering directly in your ear, “So good, so fucking good f’me. Gonna come so deep in this little pussy, mkay? Gonna keep you pregnant, just like you want.” 

With a guttural groan, he spills into you. His breath is hot on your shoulder blade as he stays inside, not wanting to withdraw right away. You’re not complaining either, until—

“Are you two finished in there?” Steve’s irritated voice beckons from the other side of the door. Your already sweaty body heats up even more, realizing you’ve been found out. Something about it is also oddly hot, but it’s not the best time to think about that with Eddie still inside of you and Steve on the other side of the door. 

“Just a sec!” Eddie calls back, giving your earlobe a gentle nibble as he pulls out, scooping up the cum that’s dripping down your bare leg and stuffing it back into your pussy. “Had to clean you up,” he murmurs with a salacious grin. 

The two of you put your swimsuits back on and fix yourselves as best as you can before Eddie opens up the bathroom door. 

Steve just rolls his eyes, barreling past you as he mutters, “Dammit Munson; you already got her pregnant. Relax.”

[atinylittlepain]

Chapter Eight

no-outbreak!Joel Miller x f!oc

series masterlist

series playlist

warnings: 18+ heavy angst, references to past injury related to DV, very brief and very vague smut

a/n: we've reached the end of this story. i love these two, very much. thank you for reading.

...........................................

Maybe there's a God above But, all I've ever learned from love Was how to shoot somebody who outdrew you? And it's not a cry, that you hear at night It's not somebody, who's seen the light It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah as performed by Jeff Buckley

...........................................

The car is real. It is parked outside the house now. Sneering a chrome smile at him, taunting him. The sound of its engine in the mornings when she goes to the diner whispers the same thing everytime. Soon. 

One day after the perfect mess he made, he dropped her off at the diner and she informed him with all the warmth of a business associate that he need not come back to pick her up, because Sal would be giving her the keys to the car that is now parked outside the house, the car that is now hers. The car that is going to take her far away from him, any day now. 

They move around each other like ghosts. How fast fission breeds new rhythms and routines, never in the kitchen at the same time, nor the fields, fleeting passings in the evenings. He has taken on more night shifts to keep himself out of the house, to keep himself from doing something stupid, like knocking on her bedroom door and getting down on his knees. Only a few days, though it feels like a yawning beast of time has already blinked by.

She will tell him, won’t she? At least that. Actually, he’s not sure if she will. If he will come home one morning and the sheep will be calling a grievous sound into the thin air because their favorite has left, stuck with him once again. Warning, notice, if not for him, then at least for her flock. 

How quickly things soured, all their jagged pieces tearing and teething at each other. His mean, her mean, and the desolate monster it has made between them. He will let her leave, he must. Care has turned into a cage, and he must leave the door open, must let her step through to something else, something better. Because clearly, whatever this is, plainly no good. 

The mind is a cruel machine. The worst part of all of this, he has been dreaming of her. Scraps of visions, what he can remember. The perfect line of her clavicle, and how breath made the pools of shadows swell and bend against her skin. The way his hand curled around her thigh, the hinge of it. He wakes up wanting, warm and wretched, alone in the night. But the patrol shifts help with that, something about sleeping with the sun trying to pry through the blinds staving off the darkest of his thoughts. 

Sarah called the other day, asked how Dove was doing. Oh, you know, he said. Because he could not lie to his daughter, but he could not offer the truth either. The truth, neither of them are doing very well. Partial, parallel unraveling. The kitchen remains dormant. There are no trips to the grocery, to the library. Only what is needed for another day to pull over into another night and over again. He looks miserable because he is miserable. Glances he has stolen of her, peering out his bedroom window to watch her get into her car in the mornings, he sees that she has turned sharp again, drawn down and in around the edges. This pain, this sickness, is shared. 

He runs through all the ways it could never work while he sits in the slumbering cruiser on the side of the highway. That lull between spring and summer has arrived, all living things bracing and bending beneath inevitable change, quiet in their submission. Life raises its hackles and curls down low to the ground, silent sulk, waiting for new prey, new time. And in the silence, his thoughts grow and gristle.

No, it could not work. He thought that he could, but clearly he couldn’t. Couldn’t be careful enough around all the big and small hurts that trail after her. Because that’s what that was, that night of no, a hurting thing. A wounded, rejected thing. Easier to call it anger. And so was his, the next day, the car, the turn of her shoulder away from him so he could not see the first line of tears fall. 

And now it’s just a meanness, isn’t it? Anger that festers and flumes into something bitter and blistering. Easier to be mean about it. Sorry is so very difficult to swallow, after all. This silence, this sharp shuttering out, mean, the both of them digging their thumbs into the places it hurts the most and pretending to enjoy it with grimacing grins. Good for you, good for me, so there. Good for us.

Always, at some point in his shift, somewhere in the middle of the thick night, his thoughts turn small and young. We are born wanting, and we will always return to wanting. And he does, now, lets himself want all of it. Even the pain she caused him, he would take it happily, standing up and smiling. Something poetic could be said, something beautiful, but there is no need for the fuss or frill of it. Simply, he wants her. Urgently, he wants her to stay. 

Like all things, the wanting passes just as the night does. Eventually, his grip on the steering wheel unfurls and unfists. Eventually, the light begins to spread a pale blue out across all the ink of the plains. Morning starting to suggest itself, mercy. 

He blinks, bleary, a small protest from the engine when he inches the car back onto the road, time to return to the station, want still clearing from the fuzzy periphery of his mind. 

It does not scare or startle him, but it does give him pause. Coyotes, fur dunned and dull, matted tufts sticking up over their slinking bodies. They cross the road with no concern for the car, slow languorous placement of paws, the largest of them turning its jaded eyes into the headlights, perhaps a disillusioned sigh, before it continues on its path. Pups trail and trundle behind, nipping at mother’s tail, new energy, new life, and how dangerous, daunting, daring it can be. 

He does not go back to the station. He goes home. 

Still early, still sleeping, maybe. He does the thing he has been telling himself he shouldn’t. But shouldn’t is what got him here in the first place. Enough of needless shouldn’t. 

She is awake. Her hair still damp from a shower, darkening the blue shoulders of her uniform when she opens the door to her room. Her room, the guest room, whatever it is. Confusion is clear in her frown, the pull of her brow. She keeps the door halfway closed, a quiet understanding of distance needed.

“Are you leaving soon?” Shit, stupid, wrong words that got ahead of what he meant to say. And he just made this so much worse, her whole face pinching tight before slackening into something smaller, something sad. 

“I am. I’m sorry that I haven’t yet.” Sorry that she hasn’t left yet. Sorry that she didn’t get out sooner. And here he is, rubbing all that sorry in her face. 

“No.” All he can think, to quickly slip up his throat to, at the very least, keep her here with half of a closed door between them. Better than the alternative anyways.

“What?” 

“That’s not what I want, not at all.” It is selfish to make this about him, but it is all he can think to say, the only truth that seems to be offering itself up. Dove just looks tired, weary and worn, waiting for the catch. What she said, all those months ago. Always a catch, always waiting for it.

“Joel.” A sigh, but still smarting sweet because he hasn’t heard it from her in too long. 

“This isn’t working.” Going about this all wrong, he has finally realized. While he has been so afraid of no, of unwanted, he has failed to remember that she was taught a long time ago that wanting was not allowed, and that being wanted was an even worse impossibility. Both of them, lashing out against the same thing, though it’s each other that they leave bleeding.

“No, it’s not.”

“I’m going to try to speak plainly.” What he’s going to do is make her late for her shift if he doesn’t kick whatever courage there is whining in his chest up into his throat. But she shows no sign of rush, wide eyes and the smallest frown. 

“Okay.” Okay opens the door fully, though she doesn’t move in invitation, staying separated by the threshold. 

“I don’t want you to leave.” 

“Ever.” Added in the afterthought of silence, because he needs to make himself very clear. Soon, after all. 

“I’m not what you want, Joel.” Said with a scoff, a jerky wave of her hand like no, not even going to entertain it. But it’s enough for something soft to snap in him, hands reaching, but not touching, suspended want as he murmurs, or prays maybe, to her you are, you are, you are, Dove.  

“But I can’t keep you here. Not if you don’t want it.” Me, he meant to say me. But he thinks that she understands all the same, something slipping behind her eyes. 

“I shouldn’t.” Shouldn’t stay, shouldn’t want. A shameful confession that is said to the tips of her shoes more than it is to him. 

“I don’t fucking care.”

“You should.” 

“Just, please, tell me.” 

“I do, okay? Probably more than you do.” 

“That’s not true.”

“How can you just say that?”

“Because I know how much I do. And it’s everything.” And that’s it, he wants to say, that’s all that matters and nothing else and you do and I do. Case closed, finally fixed this thing, this lame, limping thing between them. If only it were that simple. 

“Do you really?” A leap, or more like a lurch, but pure relief when she lets him, two stuttering steps closer and one palm finding the space between her shoulder blades, the other the hilt of her spine, pulling her into him. His and hers, finding the other’s rhythm. Beat like this, body and blood like this. His mouth settles at the crown of her skull. Here, and nowhere else, not ever again, please. 

“Sometimes it makes me sick.” The truth, because there can be nothing else now. Yes, he is sick with it. Sick for her. 

“I want to be normal for you.” Muffled into the fabric of his shirt, and the unsaid after of it. I don’t think I can. Like sorry, like penance, her hands curling closer around his shoulders as she starts to shake. But what he can offer her, something still, something sure, his palms drawing her in even more, him breathing her breathing him.

“I’m not asking you for that, Dove.” No, asking for something much bigger, much more terrifying. Asking for all of it. 

…

Dove is only a little late to her shift. Joel drops her off, waits a few minutes to make sure there is no grief from Sal about it, not that he was expecting there to be. Replays to himself her explanation, what she told him on the way there.

“I didn’t get the car to leave, not really.”

“You didn’t?” 

“Before, I thought it would make things easier.” For him, he realizes, something she had thought of for him. Make things easier for him, not having to pick her up and drop her off and look bored at the library while she browsed. And no, he’s never going to forgive himself for this one. 

He doesn’t go back to the diner for lunch, but it’s not for spite or scorn. Agreed-upon space for both of them to think, offering an out for each other, one last opportunity to decide that this is actually a terrible idea. 

The sheep accept his presence and it feels like he finally got something right, even a laugh when Judy offers her head to him for a brisk rub beneath her chin. 

“She’s coming home, I think. I know you wouldn’t forgive me if she didn’t.” No response, she is a lamb, after all. But he’d like to think that her two hard blinks commend him, already plucking away through the grass toward her mother. 

When he does pick her up after her shift, her lips purse trying to pull back a smile as she walks around the front of the car. Hope lifts, winged and real in his chest. 

The day steals from the night this time of year. It won’t be dark out until much later. For now, the light is starting to bleed a little, orange syrup and haze filling and flooding the cab of the truck. Nothing is said, but staying is understood when she takes his hand in both of hers, and keeps it for herself, tucked in her lap the whole ride home. 

So much of their time together has been spent like this, driving toward and away from town, sometimes silent and sometimes not. A selfish part of him wishes she hadn’t gotten the car, wanting to keep her needing him in this way. But no, he reasons, there will be plenty of other time besides this. No need to be greedy about it. 

There is not much food in the kitchen, but there are always eggs. Two for him and two for her. They eat standing up, propped against the counter. And when he moves to wash the dishes in the sink, she catches his wrist. The dishes can wait until the morning.

The thing about Dove is she has always had a curious way of touching him. Literally curious, like she is surprised she is allowed to trace the pads of his fingertips with her own, spirals fitting together. Like she is testing the boundaries of him, finding all the soft places with her palms, spanning his sides and up along his chest, fingers flirting beneath the collar of his shirt, shivering down with it. But before this continues, he must make sure, must ward off that ghost for good. He takes her face in his hands, thumbs settling along the soft curve beneath her eyes, tracing some constant constellation, her cheeks rounding with it.

“I need to know that this is what you want.” 

“It is.” 

“I need you here. With me.”

“I am, Joel. I am.” This isn’t want, after all. Want isn’t big enough for whatever this is. Something deeper, something threaded in with all the sinew and stretch of bone, ligament, and beating tissue. This is need. Vital and visceral, and so very precarious. 

His need makes a foolish fumble out of the buttons of her dress, a laugh dancing beneath the brush of his knuckles, catching somewhere under her sternum when his eyes flicker up to hers. She rolls her lips back into her mouth, trying to tamp down any mirth or mocking, but a huff still slips out, smile threatening at the edges. How easy, how lovely, fitting the curve of his own against hers. That laugh turns into a sigh that he swallows. 

And it was never about letting or allowing, never about being big or strong enough to scare off all her specters. What has changed, he isn’t sure. But waiting, he has found, is often a solution in itself. Maybe just the mercy of enough time, enough space shared and understood. Brains finally catching up to bodies, deciding yes, now is good. 

Need makes animals stupid. A caught thing, captured and crumpled thing, will gnaw off its own limb in need of escape. A hungry, hungered thing will turn so desperate, so singular and silly in its need. It will take whatever sate it can get. Hands and skin and teeth and tongues. And in the kitchen no less, still hungry, still needing. Jawing up each other, and humming at the taste. Feast and fire and flood all in one. 

Her mouth settles sharp along the tendons in his neck, humming there as he curls over her to shrug her dress down and down into a pool around her feet. A little snarl, a little curl of her lip, preening when his palms squeeze her hips, coaxing her closer into his chest. She is far more schooled in the work she makes of his shirt, and then, missed this. Missed skin against skin and heart straining to press against heart. Missed the run of his fingers down her ribs, the quick catch at her waist. He only got it once before, a blink compared to this, but he has been missing it ever since, a sigh now that he has it again. Has her again. And Dove, still learning how she gets to have him.

“Can I?” A kiss to her brow, a smear of words whatever you want, Dove. Tentative at first, she presses her mouth to the hollow where his throat slips into clavicle, letting her nose run a line out to the edge of bone, to shoulder, enough sense to turn her a little bolder, fingers curling into the waist of his jeans, tugging. And it is not graceful, silly, stupid, needing bodies curling and caving into each other. His legs splay out long as he settles back against the cabinets below the sink, Dove furling into his lap, the perfect spread of her thighs at his hips. 

A lesson in the anatomy of need. Here is how. How a body can give and take everything it needs from another body. So simple, really. Open mouths and muscles slackening sweet and syrupy to make space for more, more, more. She keens when he turns his face into the curve of her breast, fingers curling in his hair, holding him there in the cradle of her heartbeat, his ears rushing with it. 

It is not pretty, it is not about making it perfect, or even right. It is a desperate seeking, it is relief from this need in the way they just manage to shrug his jeans and boxers down over his thighs, in the way she slips the faded cotton of her underwear to the side. Wet for him, wanting for him, he will have to sate the want to see some other time. For now, feeling, all sense and singe, spreading her open until her hips settle down against his. A broken, murmuring sound in the back of her throat, eyes scrunched shut. He brings his hand to her jaw, thumb stroking along the hinge as he calls to her, let me see, Dovey, please. Hello, lashes flutter first, and the slow slip open. Hello, looking at him, her forehead against his, her mouth resting open and panting against his. 

They move ugly, muscles jumping and jolting, sharp breaths that break and swell in their chests. Skin starts to stick, he holds her closer and chases down their pleasure, shared and searing. 

In the kitchen, she crashes with a cry of his name, her face hidden in the curve of his neck, mouth to pulse. 

In the kitchen, she whispers and wills him right over his own edge, her name, more sob than sound. 

In the kitchen, he would feed her his heart if he could. It’s hers anyways. 

…

Want is a child. But need is an animal. Need is base, bruising, battering. There is no escaping need. There is no lying about need. There is only offering it up, and hoping that someone will see it and decide yes, animal, come here, let me do something about your need, and you can do something about mine. 

Later, after they pick their clothes up off the kitchen floor, kind hands setting things back into place for each other, they slink outside to care for the flock, the sun starting to flirt back behind the mountains with a fierce blush. It’s then, surrounded by the low murmurings of sheep, that she whispers her own need to him, tucked into his side, her cheek pressed against his chest. 

He nods, says yes, okay. He can do that for her. And she will do the same for him. 

For now, all that matters is staying. Ghosts yet to be greeted and goaded out of their house. But for now, spring is rolling over to expose its soft, slumbering belly. Soon, summer will sink in, snarling and bright, a new list of chores and duties with every season. They will do it together. 

For now, the lambs are still lambs. Stumbling still around the edges, seeking out their mother even amidst her seeming exasperation, tired of their clinging, their closeness. Time yet to be had, getting older and bigger every day. But for now, they are young and soft, and nipping after each other in the field. 

For now, the feeling of her ribs expanding and contracting against his side is all the goodness he could want, or even need. Pain yet to be understood in all the places that her breath catches. But for now, she is looking at him and smiling, and saying something about the sheep that makes him laugh.

For now, it is enough. 

.............................................

taglist: @casssiopeia @eleganthottubfun @anoverwhelmingdin @sscorpiiio @joeldjarin @casa-boiardi @suzmagine @syakhairi @spookyxsam @northernbluess @hier--soir @joelsgreys @wannab-urs @tieronecrush @trulybetty @softlyspector @noisynightmarepoetry @csarab615 @ratoonstown @harriedandharassed @survivingandenduring @lizzie-cakes @beskarandblasters @motherofagony

[cbrownjc]

You know, I was already feeling kind of apathetic toward Season 2 of HOTD, but I was still trying to remain positive about it.

And then I read the Blood and Cheese leaks . . .

Oh.

I mean, look. I get it. They probably didn't want to traumatize young children by doing the scene directly as-is. But I DO think there is a way you could have done it almost the same way as they appear to be doing it, without it losing any of its bite and horror.

Like, you could still have all three kids in bed together, but awake and scared and crying quietly, completely confused as their mother is being threatened in front of them to choose. And, you know, having Alicent there, gagged and tied, so the kids also see their grandmother in trouble as well.

And, you know, have Maelor there too, so the choice is still between the older and younger boys. With Maelor still hears his mother choose his older brother over him.

Then when Haelena makes her choice, they grab Jaehaerys up out of the bed in a quick cut and you don't actually see his murder, just cut away to guards hearing Haelena screaming. When the guards burst in, Blood and Cheese are gone, Jaehaera and Maelor are still sitting on the bed shellshocked. Haelena, meanwhile, is kneeling in front of the bed on the floor, her back to the door, but obviously cradling a little body that is still mostly hidden but causing a pool of blood to spread around her, still screaming.

This way, you obviously don't have little kid actors being visually threatened with knives and swords and such on screen. And possibly traumatizing such little kid actors in any way by doing it the way it was written. Leaving the kids all on the bed also means you can just show them in isolated cuts, where they don't even have to have been filming while things such as Haelena being threatened -- as well as the threats to the kids themselves -- are happening. You only need one or two establishing wide shots to show everyone in the room, and that's it.

And of course, you don't see one of the kids get their head cut off. Just Jaehaerys being grabbed from the bed instead of Maelor (after Haelena chooses Maelor to die and we get cut over to a close-up of his scared face), and then just smash-cut to the guards hearing Haelena screaming.

There. That's IMO how you do that scene without traumatizing little kid actors as well as still giving the scene its disturbing bite. Not whatever it sounds like we are getting instead. Which not only doesn't have Haelena not even offer up her own life for her kids, which, okay, but apparently makes the choice between the twins while they are asleep, and they don't even hear their mother picking between them. And Maelor is just being cut altogether since there was no time to establish him.

If the show is going for another Red Wedding moment with this -- which it very much could have been -- then they failed, and utterly butchered it. Because the true horror of the moment isn't even Jaehaerys losing his head. It was Haelena having to choose which of her children to die, the kids hearing their mother make that choice between them, and then the one she chose to die having to live with the knowledge that his mother chose for him to die, while the one she chose to live got murdered instead.

It is all supposed to be Sophie's Choice but with a crueler twist. And it sounds like they very much like they executed it all completely wrong. It was already going to be hard to get audiences to care since we've barely seen the twins -- and Maelor not at all (which, given that he's been cut . . .) -- but even then, you could have still had the kids hearing the choice made, which is supposed to be part of the cruelty and shock of it all. And now . . .

I'm really trying not to shit on this without seeing it yet. But just hearing how this was done isn't giving me much confidence -- for this or in enjoying the season on the whole in truth.

[straykids-gives-me-life]

Too Hot To Handle

HWANG HYUNJIN PART II

word count: 5.9k

---

YOU: It's day two in this villa! I was excited but I just now remembered that I can't actually do anything that I had planned so...

-

"Good morning," Lana chimes. "I'm pleased that there were no rule breaks last night. Today is your first full day in the retreat, and the weather will be sunny with highs of 86° Fahrenheit, and there'll be zero chance of sex."

Mason lets out a sarcastic laugh from across the room. "Nice one, Lana, really funny."

"She's got a bit of lip on her today, huh?" Harry chuckles.

"Yeah, you could say that," Mason replies.

Rhia laughs. "Zero chance of sex. She's fucking amazing."

-

HYUNJIN: Obviously last night was a huge cockblock. Me and y/n just had a little bit of pillow talk before we went to sleep and I'm not gonna lie, it was pretty nice. I think I'm starting to really like her already.

-

Getting ready for the day seemed a lot more challenging than it should've been when you're surrounded by hot, horny women.

"So," Layla begins. "Who do we all think is gonna break the rules first out of the boys?"

"Hyunjin. Definitely Hyunjin," Rhia says.

"Rhia!" You shout, a small grin on your face at the thought.

"Oh, come on, y/n. The boy is already hooked on you. He's not gonna be able to leave you alone for more than five minutes."

"You think so?" You ask, a small blush rising up to your cheeks.

"Yes, I do. But that doesn't mean you should go off and prove my point."

"Yes, mother."

You hear a scoff from across the table and immediately know it came from Layla.

"I think Hyunjin has some self-control actually.," she comments, surprising you. "Either that or he just hasn't found the right girl in here."

Rhia laughs. "Whatever helps you sleep at night, hun."

-

Over by the pool, Hyunjin and the other boys are already fixed up for today and are discussing the prices of different actions.

"So, kissing. How much do you reckon that's gonna cost?" Patrick asks.

"Well, I think if I kissed someone and it was like a petty little peck," Hyunjin says. "That would be like ten bucks."

"You never know," Mason says.

Hyunjin continues. "But if it was like a full-on, grabbing them, affectionate make-out kind of kiss, it could be worth a hell of a lot more than that."

"So, we're grading sex too? Like was it- did she moan? Did she scream?" Jack comments.

"Well imagine if it's like, head banging against the wall, legs everywhere. I reckon, ten grand." Harry declares, earning a laugh from the group.

-

JACK: This is a retreat full of the sexiest girls I've ever seen and you expect us not to kiss or touch? So all we've got to do is just keep our pants on. [chuckles] Not happening.

-

"If I'm gonna take a risk, I'm gonna make it worthwhile," Patrick says. "If I'm gonna make a deduction causing us to lose money, I'm gonna kiss, have sex, look, I'm gonna make it worth it. So, definitely-"

He's cut off by Hyunjin. "When I get told I can't do something, I want to do it more, you know? And having y/n next to me in bed does not help my situation." he laughs.

As if it were your queue, you and the girls all walk down to the poolside and join the boys, each of you sitting down next to the partner you shared a bed with the previous night. Well... most of you.

"What are we talking about over here?" You ask. "You all seem very interested."

"Just the prices of different shit," Jack says. "Harry thinks sex is gonna be ten grand."

"Ten!?" Rhia exclaims. "If it is, we're fucked."

"All I'm gonna say is this," Mason begins. "I'm watching you all,. We have a chance to win one hundred grand here and I'm not letting the chance slip away from me. I'm gonna be like the sex police up in here."

"So boring, then?" Layla asks, a disgusted look on her face.

"No," he says. "Just responsible."

-

The next few days at the retreat were a huge struggle for you and Hyunjin. You had people all around you making the prize pot decrease every single day and resisting the urge of one another was a completely different ballpark. As time went on, the tension between the two of you just kept getting tighter and higher. It was ready to snap.

Today was the first workshop of your stay and you were not expecting what you were all faced with.

You walked down the steps, Rhia on your left and Hollie on your right and say Hyunjin and the boys stood around five different what you assumed were mattresses.

"What's up, everybody!?" the woman shouted at you all, you looked up at Hyunjin as his arm slung around your shoulder.

You all cheer.

"I am here to teach a workshop on Shibari. My name is Shan and I hope you guys have a great time," she begins. "Have you guys ever played with bondage, with handcuffs, with restraints?"

The majority of the group raised their hands, you included. It shocked you, however, to see that Hyunjin had never done anything like that before. Oh well, there's a first time for everything.

"You ready for this?" Hyunjin asks you, a small smirk on his face.

"No," you chuckle.

Hyunjin picks up the rope. "Do you wanna tie me up or is it my turn to have some control here?"

You giggle at him; you have been a little more on the dominant side with him lately, stopping him whenever he came in for a kiss because of the rules, telling him what to do. Hyunjin did kind of like it, but he wanted his way with you too.

"I suppose I could let you take over from here," you smile, biting your lower lip and staring up at him.

"Don't look at me like that," he whines.

You both laugh at how easy it was to rile each other up.

"Now," he says. "Turn around and put your hands behind your back.

"Yes, sir."

Hyunjin works the rope around your hands before pulling it around his waist and therefore pulling you close to him. Your hands rested just above his package and a small part of you wished he had put your hands just a tiny bit lower.

"Is this okay?" Hyunjin whispers in your ear, wrapping the rope around the two of you, connecting you in any way possible.

"Yeah," you reply, staring at his hands as they work.

Unfortunately, the fun you two were having was cut short when Shan announced that you needed to untie each other and head back to the retreat.

"Before you guys leave," she says. "I hope you all trust each other and can now start developing a deeper connection now that you have this tryst. This was obviously your first-ever workshop so, did you enjoy it?"

"Yes!" You shouted, along with Hyunjin, Rhia, Patrick, Layla and Harry.

"Well, I'm glad to hear that so many of you did. It was really nice meeting you all and I hope you have fun during the rest of your stay here!"

You say goodbye to her and follow Hyunjin back up the steps and to the pool to cool off, Rhia following closely behind you along with Patrick.

"So, guys," Rhia says. "How did we find the workshop?"

"It was great, you smile.

"You could say that again," Hyunjin laughs.

"Yeah, I saw you too, getting freaky," Patrick jokes, making you cringe a little at his choice of words.

"It was really fun, to be fair," Rhia laughs. "You two looked like you were having a nice time."

"I mean I couldn't feel my fingers after a while but apart from that it was definitely something that I wouldn't mind doing again," you hint, looking over at Hyunjin.

He chuckles at you. "Just you wait."

"Hold your horses guys, we're still here," Rhia jokes.

"Or not, I wouldn't mind," Patrick laughs, not getting the reaction he was hoping for from you though.

"I'm fine thanks, Pat."

-

HYUNJIN: I can't believe this guy. I mean, I know he's only joking but sometimes he just takes it a little too far.

-

"Hey Hyunjin," you say, walking over to him and sitting down at the bar beside him.

"Hey," he smiles.

"Whatcha doing?" You ask, dragging the 'o' out.

"I was about to get up and have some strawberries if you wanted to help me eat them?" He asks. "You know how I struggle."

You laugh at him. "I would love to help with this oh-so-difficult task."

Hyunjin gets up and walks over to the outdoor fridge, grabs a small portion of strawberries and places them in a bowl in front of you. He picks on up and removes the green from the top, putting it in the trash and then placing the strawberry halfway past his lips.

"I see where you're going with this," you chuckle.

You both lean closer towards one another as you take a bit out of the part of the strawberry that wasn't in his mouth, the juices spilling down your chin and towards your chest.

Hyunjin licks his lips as he pulls away from you, his eyes landing on the droplet of strawberry juice that is slowly rolling down your bare skin.

"I'll get that for you."

Expecting him to just take a piece of tissue and wipe it off, you were surprised to see him stick out his tongue and lick the sweetness off of your body, following it from just above your tits to the very top of your neck.

That should not have turned you on as much as it should have.

"You guys finished over there?" A voice calls from behind you.

You turn around to see Layla, Hollie, Brooke and Jack sitting on the sun loungers, their eyes all on you.

-

YOU: Oh my God that was so embarrassing but it was also kind of hot at the same time. I wonder what else Hyunjin can do with his tongue if you know what I mean [winks]

-

It was the time of day for you to all gather at the cabana to see what damage had been done to the money yet again. Nobody ever wants to lose money, especially when it is a life changing sum such as one hundred grand.

"What does Lana have in store for us tonight, I wonder," Rhia says, adjusting herself as she sits down beside you.

"Hopefully nothing, her voice is giving me a headache," Hyunjin laughs.

"Hyunjin!" You laugh. "That's not very nice."

The dreaded chime rings out.

"Hello."

"Hey, Lana, sweetheart," you speak.

"There has been a breach of the rules and money has been deducted from the prize fund."

"What?" Harry says.

"Again?" You ask. "Seriously?"

"For fuck sake, man," Mason says. "Whoever has broken the rules, you know what you've done so it's honestly just best to confess now before Lana outs you."

"You have lost $3000," Lana announces.

"Alright, so someone's kissed!" Hollie yells.

"I don't mean this in like a bad way, but, you know y/n and Hyunjin, you guys were eating strawberries before, like, do you think Lana took that-?"

"No," Hyunjin says. "Our lips didn't even touch."

"They didn't touch?" Layla confirms.

"Not at all," you say.

"Patrick, was it you?" Hyunjin asks.

"It wasn't me," he says. "You can't look at me. I actually promise it wasn't me this time."

"Maybe it was you two," Jack says, leaning over and looking at Harry and Hollie.

"I hate to be accused," Harry says. "I think that's probably one of the things I hate the most."

"I think you guys are holding something back," Layla comments.

"Girl, what?" Hollie says.

"Harry, when you pulled her into the dressing room late last night, you're telling me that no rules were broken?"

"I don't need to do anything sexual to validate a relationship," Harry says.

"Why are you so defensive? If you honestly didn't do anything?" Layla continues.

Harry rolls his eyes. "Believe what you wanna believe, we didn't do anything. I came here with my guard up. I don't think I'm gonna leave here in a relationship. I don't think I'm gonna leave with love."

-

YOU: Someone needs to take this shovel away from Harry because he's digging himself a big ass hole here and if he's not careful, Hollie is gonna push him into it and leave him there for good.

-

"The prize fund now stands at $91,000," Lana says.

"Better than zero, better than zero," Patrick says.

"It's better than zero but if we don't know who's done it then how do we know who to watch and keep an eye out for?" Rhia adds.

"The most important thing here is being honest and to admit and own up to when we fuck up," you say. "If it isn't Harry and Hollie, it isn't me and Hyunjin and it's not Patrick and Rhia then who is it?"

"I'm fucking over this. I can't," Layla says.

"Yeah, Brooke says.

"Do you wanna go?"

Brooke giggles. "Yeah, let's go."

"What if they fucking kissed or some shit?" Patrick asks himself as Layla and Brooke stand up with their drinks.

-

MASON: I legitimately think that if there's anyone I can't trust, it's Layla and Brooke. The most manipulative person in this retreat is hanging out with the most mindless human on Earth. What could possibly go wrong?

-

You and Rhia are sitting on the beach with glasses of what you think is white wine, Hyunjin and Patrick chilling in the water not too far away from the two of you, and you're talking about what has happened so far.

"I'm glad that Patrick fixed the little rivalry he had going with Hyunjin. I'm loving the group we've got going on here." You say, looking over at Rhia.

"Me too, it just gets a little frustrating being around them with all these rule breaks going on. There's been three in what, four days?" Rhia replies.

"It's not the people breaking the rules that annoys me. It's the fact that I am being so careful with Hyunjin and trying my best to make sure that we don't break a rule for the benefit of everyone else but nobody notices that. I want nothing more than to be able to kiss Hyunjin all day and get down and dirty with him but I want this money just as much as everyone else here and it's just so frustrating that my effort isn't taking me anywhere."

Rhia nods along as you admit your feelings to her. "I understand how you feel y/n. I know how much you like him, we all do. I think you need to take matters into your own hands from here on out, though. If nobody else is going to follow these rules, then why should you?"

"I like your thinking," you smirk.

Before you can say anything more on the matter, Hyunjin sneaks up behind you and shakes his wet hair all over your body, shocking you with how cold the droplets are.

"Oh my God, Hyunjin!"

You try and push him away from you but as his arms are caging you against him, there's no way you can fight him off.

"Stop! Stop! It's so cold!" you shriek, laughing at the same time.

Hyunjin's laugh echoes through your ears and he finally stops, the sound making you feel like you've just entered Heaven.

"Okay I'm done now," he says, calming down a a little and sitting next to you on the sand.

"What were you two talking about anyways?" Patrick asks, drying his hair on a towel.

"Oh nothing special, just trying to figure out who kissed last night," Rhia says, covering up what your actual conversation was about.

"We should rule out who we think it definitely isn't," Hyunjin suggests.

"I can promise you, it wasn't us," Patrick says.

"Right. So you two didn't do anything and neither did me and Hyunjin."

"Yeah," Rhia says.

"Harry," you say.

"Look, I want to believe him so bad but, I mean, they went in the middle of the night," Hyunjin says. "I'm not gonna rule them out."

"Who else is there?" You ask.

"Don't put anything past Layla," Rhia says.

"She was sitting at that fire pit last night and she was smirking and whispering to Brooke the whole time," you explain.

"Yeah, Patrick says. "You know what I find most interesting is that Brooke was so , like, vocal."

"But who would she kiss?" Hyunjin asks.

"Dude, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Brooke and Layla made out."

"Oh, I didn't think of that," you say.

"I don't see anyone here lying except for those two," Patrick finishes.

-

The day was slowly coming to a close and it was getting later and later and you still had to talk to Hyunjin about what you and Rhia had discussed earlier.

You were walking around, scanning the retreat and looking for him when you spotted him sitting with Layla having what seemed to be a very serious conversation.

"Look, Layla, you're a sweet girl and all but I'm just really not interested in having you as more than a friend, I'm sorry."

"But why, Hyunjin? Y/n surely can't be as good as you're making her out to be. You two haven't broken a single rule in almost a week, you're just gonna get bored of her soon enough anyways," Layla replies, trying to convince him to choose her.

A tear rolled down your cheek. What was happening?

"You have no business in what I do with her. Maybe if you actually tried to connect with Mason you would understand," Hyunjin snaps. "I'm done having this conversation with you."

You watch him as he stands up from the chair and walks away to the bar, opening a bottle of beer and taking a long swig.

Slowly, you approached him and placed your arms around his waist. You could tell he was annoyed.

"You okay, Jinnie?"

"What?" he asks.

"I asked if you were okay."

"No," he says. "What did you call me?"

"Jinnie?" you say.

He smiles softly. "I like that."

" I'm glad you do. Now answer my question," you say.

"I'm fine," he says. "Just a little annoyed with some people in here."

"So am I," you say, looking up at him. "I actually came over to talk to you about something but I'll leave it until you're a little calmer if you want."

"No, it's okay, you can talk to me now," he says.

"Alright," you say, taking a deep breath. "I just wanted to make sure that you were happy with what we've got going on right now, especially since we haven't broken any rules yet."

Hyunjin furrows his eyebrows at your question. "Why wouldn't I be happy, y/n? I have the most beautiful girl in the retreat right here with me, I have nothing to complain about."

You smile. "I know you say that but I know there are other girls not just in here, but out of the retreat too that would be able to provide you with so much more stability than me. I haven't kissed you in almost a week and it's not like I don't want to, because I do, I'm just scared of disappointing everyone else."

"Look," Hyunjin begins. "I understand that you're worrying about us but I don't blame you for wanting to save as much of the money as you possibly can. I would do the same thing if I didn't have so much of it already."

"That's the thing, though. I don't want to save the money anymore," you say, confusing Hyunjin.

"Huh?"

"You know how me and Rhia were talking at the beach while you and Patrick were messing around in the water?" You ask.

"Yeah..." Hyunjin replies.

"Well, Rhia made me realise that there's no point in avoiding a good kiss or two with you out of respect for the others if they have no respect for anybody else anyway," you explain. "I'm not saying that we should just go around and break every single rule in the book but I want to be able to share something g with you before I regret it and-"

Hyunjin cuts off your rambling by pressing his lips against yours, his hands wrapping themselves around your waist and pulling you closer to his body. You melted into him as your lips worked against his, the two of you completely lost in the moment. Unfortunately, Hyunjin broke the kiss and rested his forehead against yours.

"I forgot how good of a kisser you are," he chuckles, catching his breath.

You laughed at his words and buried your head in his chest, your cheeks reddening.

"Don't go hiding yourself now," Hyunjin jokes, pulling your head up with his fingers. "You're too pretty for that."

"Stop it!" You say, attempting to hide your blushing face.

-

YOU: I can't even begin to explain how good it felt to finally kiss him again. I know this isn't going to go down very well with some of the others but I hope most of them can recognise how much we both needed that.

-

It was time to gather at the cabana once more and this was the first time you felt genuinely nervous in a very long time.

"Okay, we all know why we're here again," Mason says. "I have to get to the bottom of this. It's all just about openness, honestly. Whoever did it, this is your opportunity now to have just an inkling of honesty because otherwise it's gonna come out in a much different way, which is only gonna make you look bad.

-

YOU: Preach, Mason, preach girl!

-

"Unless I slept-walked and fell into someone's vagina, I know it's not me."

You laugh at his wording of the situation.

"Patrick has spoken to me open-heartedly so I know it's not him. I know it isn't Hyunjin either."

"Damn straight, " Patrick says, fist-bumping Hyunjin.

"To be honest with you two," he points at Harry and Hollie. "I would never have guessed you went in the middle of the night alone. Like, to me, that's like jumping into a flame and hoping you don't get burnt. I did question what decisions you two made in there but I'm choosing to believe you."

"Thank you," Harry says.

"The only other two people that I don't know at all, who have openly admitted to more than enough alone time-"

Mason is cut off by Brooke. "This is ridiculous. Do not fucking talk to me like that. This is ridiculous."

Everyone gives each other strange looks, trying to figure out what the hell is going on.

"I feel like I'm the easiest person to come at," Brooke continues.

"Brooke," Patrick says. "Did you do anything that would cause a $3000 reduction with Layla?"

"No, I did not kiss Layla," Brooke says, strangely defensively.

"Alright," Patrick leans back, gesturing over to Mason.

"Should we ask Lana," Mason says.

"Yeah, we should," you say, excited to see the result of who it actually was.

"That's the fairest thing to do," Hollie says, sitting up from being against Harry the whole time.

"See what Lana has to say," Hyunjin says. "She knows."

Lana chimes.

"Lana!" Harry cheers. "What you gonna tell us?"

"Hello. How are we all feeling today?"

"On edge," you laugh.

"Lana, we have a question for you," Mason says.

"Yes, how can I help?" She says.

"Was it Harry and Hollie who broke the rule yesterday?"

A small amount of time passes and we are all sat in silence. How typical of Lana to add some tension to the already present tension.

"Negative."

Some of us clap for the two of them and Patrick leans over to high-five Harry.

"Well done, dude."

"Lana," Mason begins yet again. "Was it Jack and Layla?"

The same silence passes by.

"Negative."

"Yes!" Jack exclaims. "I'm off the hook for once."

"You are not the father," Hyunjin jokes, earning a chuckle from you.

For the final time, Mason asks the question.

"Lana... was it Brooke and Layla who broke the rules and kissed last night?"

"Negative," Layla says, trying to get some of the pressure off her shoulders.

The suspense drags on and on.

"God, this is killing me," Rhia says, leaning her head back on the sofa to regain some strength.

"Affirmative."

Everybody gasps and stands up from their seats, pacing around the room in shock.

"Oh my God!" Rhia yells. "I didn't think it was true!"

"So you lied about it and then you denied it," you say, scoffing at their behaviour.

"You lied to our faces," Patrick says. "And how are you laughing right now, Brooke?"

"I don't understand why you'd lie," you say.

"Oh my God, you blow my mind," Mason scoffs. "You actually blow my mind."

"Alright, that's enough," Brooke says, standing up and looking over at Layla. "Come with me?"

"It's the walk-off!" Harry shouts. "It's the walk-off!"

"See you later, girls!" you shout as they walk away.

"They're off to the showers!" Hyunjin laughs.

-

BROOKE: I'm glad this all happened, I still don't like these people. If anything, I'm glad I fucked them over so hopefully they'll stop talking to me and stop bothering me.

-

As if the night couldn't get any worse, Lana has another announcement.

"I am not finished here yet," she says. " There will be two new arrivals coming to the retreat tomorrow and they have both picked one of you to take away on a date."

We all gasp.

"What? No," you say, praying that Hyunjin hasn't been picked.

"The new girl in town, Sonya, had chosen..."

"Sonya? That sounds very foreign, I like it," Patrick says, earning a slap on the arm from Rhia.

"Watch it," she snaps.

"Hyunjin." Lana finishes.

-

YOU: Are you fucking kidding me? I literally just managed to get Layla out of my way and steer clear and now this Sonya girl wants to fuck with my man too

-

HYUNJIN: I really do not want to go on this date at all. I'm perfectly happy with y/n thank you very much.

-

"Come the fuck on, Lana," you groan, throwing your arms up in the air. "Give me a break."

"The second newcomer is Malcolm and he has chosen..."

-

YOU: Please don't be me. please don't be me. Please don't be me.

-

"Y/n."

"Oh my God it's like the ultimate couple test," Rhia says, shocked out of her mind.

"You will have to be ready and at the beach at 12:00, no later. Goodnight and good luck."

With that, Lana leaves with her melodic chime and nerves set into your body right away.

Hyunjin looks down at you and sighs, pulling you up by your hand and walking away with you, not uttering a word to the group. He takes you into the bedroom, sits you down on the bed and stands in front of you.

"Look at me, y/n." He says.

You stay glaring at the floor beneath you, ignoring him.

"Y/n," he says. "Come on, sweetheart look at me."

You give in to his pleas and slowly lift your head up and meet his eyes.

"I know you're scared but trust me when I say this, I am not gonna go behind your back. I appreciate what we have so much already and I'm not gonna give that up for some girl I've never met before." Hyunjin speaks, comforting you. "I promise that nothing will happen between me and her as long as you can do the same."

"I promise," you say, grabbing his hands.

"Good," he says, "Now stop crying and give me a hug."

-

The next morning was a huge struggle for not only you but for Hyunjin as well. He had never managed to commit to a full relationship and as much as he wanted to convince himself that he could stay loyal, he knew that if this Sonya girl was his type, he might have to break the promise he made to you.

You applied a light layer of makeup, not wanting to put in too much effort for someone who you weren't going to pursue anything with. Rhia decided to choose your outfit to avoid your overthinking and to be honest, you don't think she could've chosen a better thing.

You wore a yellow sundress that hugged the top half of your body but flew out at the bottom past your waist. It was really pretty. You just wished you were wearing it for somebody else.

It felt like only seconds had passed before Lana chimed in.

"Hello, y/n."

"Hey, Lana," you reply, sounding sorrowful for yourself.

"You do not sound very excited about your fast-approaching date with Malcolm," she says.

"To be honest," you say. "I don't want to do it."

"Well, either way, you have no choice. Malcolm has already arrived and is waiting for you. you must head to the beach immediately."

With that, Lana deactivates and stops talking.

-

YOU: Well she was fucking helpful, wasn't she?

-

"Hey there, beautiful," the man who you suspect was Malcolm says as you approach him, a glass of champagne already poured for you.

"Hi," you reply, painting a fake smile on your face.

"I'm Malcolm, nice to meet you," he says, standing up and kissing your cheek, a hand placing itself on your waist before he sits back down and you follow suit.

"So, tell me about yourself," he says.

"Uh, well, my name is y/n and I've been at the retreat now for about a week, I'm 21 and I currently live in Seoul."

"Cool," he says. "What do you do for work?"

"Uh, I help choreograph an upcoming K-pop girl group," you answer.

"You into that shit?" He asks, a frown coming upon his face.

"I mean, I don't listen to it all the time but I do have a fair few songs on my playlist, yeah," you say, confused as to why he made that out to be an issue if you did.

"I really hate that kind of music," Malcolm says. "I just don't understand why people would want to listen to a language that they don't speak."

"Well I do speak Korean so..." you say, making it a little awkward.

This wasn't going well.

"Uh, anyways," Malcolm says. "What do you think of me? Because I must say, you are gorgeous."

"Thank you," you reply. "I'm actually already seeing someone in the retreat and I'm really happy with him so I don't want to ruin that."

"Oh come on. What he doesn't know can't hurt him, right?" Malcolm asks, trying to push you for a kiss.

"There's also another reason that nothing physical can happen between us," you say.

"What?"

"In this retreat," you being. "There's no sexual activities allowed: no kissing, no hands, no sex, nothing."

"You're kissing," he says. "So I've been put on a date with the hottest girl I've ever seen and I can't even touch?"

"Exactly that, yes," you say.

"Fuck that."

-

YOU: I already don't like this guy. I just get a weird vibe from him and I can tell he isn't going to leave me alone until he gets what he wants. I just hope Hyunjin's date is going just as disastrous as mine.

-

Hyunjin and Sonya were both sitting next to each other on the picnic blanket, their glasses both empty and the strawberries half eaten.

"So, in this forbidden retreat," Sonya begins. "Do you happen to have a partner in there yet?"

Hyunjin pauses for a little. "I do."

"How serious are you guys?"

"We've kissed a good few times and she does make me happy," Hyunjin says.

"I could make you happier, you know," she says. "Just one kiss and you'll find out."

"I'm not going to risk a stable relationship for one kiss, Sonya. I'm sorry."

-

When you arrived back at the retreat, you were walking beside Malcolm, his arm around your shoulders. The two of you had talked a little more and had agreed to remain friends (you had forced him to back off).

"Hey girl!" rhia shouts over all the cheers as you leave Malcolm to find his own way and sit over with the girls.

"Hey," you say, sitting next to Hollie. "Has Hyunjin come back yet?"

"No, you're the first here," Layla says.

You waited impatiently for Hyunjin to return which felt like hours when, in reality, it had only been about ten minutes before he and Sonya walked over the sand dune and into the retreat.

You stared at them as Sonya had her arm interlinked with his. Your heart dropped. Had he realised that she was much prettier than you? You didn't realise how close the two of them had gotten before you snapped out of your trance.

"Hi girls, I'm Sonya, it's really lovely to meet you all," she says, finally parting her arm from around your man.

All you could do was grin at her slightly, your eyes still locked onto Hyunjin. He eventually looks at you and takes your hand, excusing the two of you and walks you over to a private area, where you could talk.

"So," he says. "How did it go for you?"

"Awful," you replied, your voice monotone as you thought he would be leaving you.

"Mine too," Hyunjin says, shocking you. "She kept trying to get me to be with her but I told her about you and eventually she gave up."

"So how come she had her arms practically wrapped around you," you say.

"I couldn't just be an asshole because she wants me and I don't want her," Hyunjin says. "And I'm sure Malcolm had his arm around you at some point, did he not?"

You sat in silence for a moment. "He did. "

"Exactly."

"Look, I'm sorry," you say. "I just thought that you would leave me for her."

"Why would I ever do that, love?" Hyunjin asks, making a small heat rise to your cheeks.

"She's a lot prettier than me."

Hyunjin scoffs. "Nobody could ever be prettier than you, y/n. You are honestly the most beautiful girl I have ever laid eyes upon. I never thought I could feel this way towards someone but you make me so happy and I would never leave you for someone like her."

You smiled at his words. You had never felt this way about someone before either and you wanted to feel this way forever.

"Hyunjin," you begin. "I think it's time we did some rule-breaking."

-

A/N: This isn't as long as I hoped it would be but I didn't want to leave you guys hanging... again.

Taglist: @velvetmoonlght

@hyunjiinnnn

[totallyjustabunchofhocuspocus]

Fic Preview

A sneak peek of the next chapter of Come Away, O Human Child, featuring a POV we've not yet seen in the story (care to guess who?)

The room is beautifully appointed, always furnished for whatever purpose was desired in the moment, dripping in fine art and tasteful decoration. One moment it is the most sinfully comfortable bedroom, a huge bed piled high with the softest pillows taking up most of the space. The next it is a pleasant living room, across which sprawled seating for intimate gatherings or gigantic parties. A kitchen outfitted with every possible gadget and utensil, pantries, shelves, and multiple refrigerators stocked with every imaginable food, snack, spirit, and liquor. A game room that would be the envy of any player of any persuasion in the world. Cozy. Opulent. Plain. Elaborate. Minimalist. Overflowing.

All versions of the room exist at all times, in all places. It is everywhere and nowhere, existing in the places in between the magic and the mundane. There are no doors to enter or leave. The only way to get to the room is to already be there.

Beneath the enormous windows that take up one whole wall of the room, the whole of Los Angeles stretches, so far below that the lights of the city blur together in a carpet of glittering color. It is one of his favorite views (when he is in this form, anyway), and he can and has spent countless hours just lounging before the windows, drinking it in.

Tonight, though, the vision in front of him is far more interesting.

They usually choose to manifest as a human man and woman, when they take a physical form. The faces he uses tend to change depending on where he is in the world at the time, but she is more creative. Like the room around them, though, she is always changing. From one moment to the next, her face and body are different. A statuesque Black woman with locs that fell to her waist, braided with dozens of charms and beads. An elderly Asian woman whose severe expression is belied by the deep laugh lines around her eyes and mouth. A middle-aged Latina whose eyes glittered with intelligence and humor. A tall, Indigenous woman with midnight-dark hair and elegant features. A plump, curly-haired white woman with a kind smile. Representations of all the people that have called her home for as long as she has existed.

The magic of the world tends to run deeper and stronger in the largest cities, power pooling in places where there are many people and creatures. He loves listening to people debate over whether high populations cause the collection of power, or if the collection of power draws high populations. He loves traveling through the cities, though. Interacting with so many of his children—even if only a handful of them ever recognize who and what he is—spending time with them. Not every city’s leylines have grown powerful enough to manifest a conscious spirit, but oh how he loves the ones who have. Los Angeles is one of his favorites.

There’s a reason he’s always trusted her with his most treasured children, since the day she first woke up; always tried to guide the ones in need of a safe home to her borders.

“You’re being awfully quiet tonight,” she remarks, studying the elegant, crystal chessboard on the table between them. She taps one finger against the table briefly, before moving her knight.

“Am I?” he says, all faux innocence. The look she levels him is thoroughly unimpressed. He ignores it, examining the board—damn it, his rook’s wide open and he’s sacrificed all the pawns he can afford to. One would think that as often as they play, he’d learn her tricks, but she always manages to surprise him. He makes his move, shaking his head. “You could at least pretend to follow normal strategies, you know.”

She smiles at him, not believing the grumpy tone of his voice for a moment. “Would that make you feel better or worse about walking into my traps every time?” She props her chin in one hand, tilting her head to stare at him with eyes that shift through a dizzying array of colors every few seconds. “You’ve been very on edge…and not that I don’t enjoy your company, but it’s been ages since you stayed in one place for so long.” He hums, staring fixedly at the chess board and waiting for her to make her next move. Instead, she reaches across the table and gently takes his hand. “You did everything you possibly could. Even if my solution doesn’t work, you’ve put the dear thing in the best position possible.”

“I know,” he sighs. “I’m just…concerned. That Fae’s anger was very outsized. I’m afraid he’s past the point of his own magic recovering if he stops stealing from changeling children. It’s bound to make him desperate.”

“Are you angry I did what I did?” she asks softly. Immediately, he shakes his head, turning their joined hands over to lay his other one on top of hers.

“A price had to be paid for the power to cut off that possibility. You chose a price that also gave my boy a solution that has a better chance of succeeding than I could. How could I be angry?”

She lifts her chin, regarding him steadily. “Ours,” she corrects. “He belongs to me, too.” Her face drops, after a moment, sadness flickering in her eyes. “I do wish I could have taken a less permanent sacrifice.”

“I’ll miss the connection,” he admits, thinking of the changeling child who has so thoroughly captured both their attention and care.

He always feels a bond with changelings. Their power draws his notice…and their circumstances get them his pity. He tries to nudge their paths through life into directions that will at least be a little gentle, a little merciful, casting through all the possibilities surrounding them to find the best chances for them to escape their curse. He so rarely succeeds…most changelings don’t even make it out of childhood, and he hates that it is their magic that kills them. What should be a gift twisted into a weapon. His interest in Evan Buckley had started like that—pity for yet another changeling child that would likely die before he ever got to experience even half of what life had to offer. Then it had been shock at just how powerful the changeling was growing—not many things shock him.

But it was the way the boy loved magic that eventually won his favor. The way he took such joy in all the lesser fae and creatures around him, the way the boy had every right to let his loneliness turn him bitter and he instead chose to be kind. Chose to try and use his power to do good in the world, chose to be gentle and protective, even of creatures that humans tended to dismiss or even fear. He loves all his children, all the people and creatures that are connected to magic. But he does have his favorites.

“I’ll miss the connection,” he says again. “It’s sad to think he won’t be a part of us anymore. But I’d be sadder if he never had the chance to really make a life for himself. Find some happiness, finally.”

Her eyes flare with a gentle, violet glow that quickly changes, flickering through a spectrum of green, blue, and gold light of the wisps, no doubt checking in with the little network of spies she’s had following their boy practically since he sent the changeling to her. Not that many creatures have to be asked to follow him around. Her lips tilt into a serene, beautiful smile.

“I don’t think he’ll have to look far for that,” she says. “Is it always the werewolf?” she asks curiously.

“They’re always important to each other, in any possibility where they meet,” he replies. “There’s a reason I pushed the werewolf here so hard. More often than not, they end up together—and it’s the best possibility for both of them. There are others, of course—there’s actually another werewolf in a few, someone who used to work at the fire station. Decent man, treats my boy good. But they don’t fit together as well and it’s not always the kind of love he needs. Deserves.”

Her smile turns knowing. “You’re such a romantic,” she laughs. He joins in, shrugging his acceptance of her teasing. It’s true, after all. “But you still haven’t explained what you’re still doing here…you’re not planning to stay here the whole two years until your favored is completely safe?”

He frowns at that, turning to look out the window at the city. “There’s…there’s one more possibility I’m worried about. It happens so rarely. The chances are—they’re astronomically small. So many things would have to fall just a certain way for it to be a problem. I’m probably worrying for nothing. But keep me company a little longer?”

He turns back to her in time to see a worried frown flash across her face. But then she smiles and redirects her attention to the chessboard. Her fingers hover over one of her pawns. “As long as you like,” she says graciously.

[mercurygray]

Introducing an OC prompt. Cordelia + 20. As someone whose name precedes them, please?

There were a couple of directions I could have gone with this, but I was re-watching the party scene for Dye today and decided to do something a little different, and, hopefully, funny.

They had only been in England for a matter of minutes, and Nash was already being Nash.

"God, I think I could listen to her voice all day," the pilot was saying with a million watt grin on his lips. "Why yes, I will do whatever you say, baby."

"You're just saying that 'cause it was a long flight, Herb," Speas offered with a roll of his eyes, hefting his equipment bag down from the belly of the plane. "Get a square meal in you and I'm sure you'll be saying something different."

Everyone else in the plane sighed or rolled their eyes. For as long as any of them had known him, Nash was out for two things, and two things only - being the best at gunnery practice, and getting a girl to like him. The first was something that could (and had) been done with long hours of practice - and the second, too, took practice, as well, though it helped that Herb also had a wide and easy smile and blue eyes it was easy to get lost in. It did not help his friends that this usually also got him in to trouble. Still, it seemed like a record, even for him - falling in love with a girl without even having seen her first.

The ground crew was already swarming over the plane like an army of efficient ants, green and grease-stained in their flight suits, following the lead of a curly-haired fellow in a knitted watch cap. "Welcome to England, gentleman. Your transport's waiting, if you want to load up. Take all your gear with you - barracks is that way, too." He paused. "Get you fellows something, while you're waiting? It's a long haul from Greenland."

"Whoever you got directing us in from the tower," Nash said with a smile, glancing across the field at the squat concrete block where the woman herself was doubtless sitting. "She got a name?"

The mechanic raised his eyebrows, still busy with his clipboard, and checked his watch. "Morning shift is still on, so that's Callaway, but I'm 'fraid you'll have to keep looking, Lieutenant. She's seeing someone." He looked up at Nash and guessed, correctly, that he was undeterred. "Big fellow - kind of a jealous type."

Nash only grinned, climbing up into the back of the truck and adjusting the angle of his cap to its usual rakish slant. "That's only 'cause she hasn't seen me yet."

"Now come on, Nash, we only just got here," Pappy complained aloud, having very much heard 'big' and jealous' and knowing from past experience what that might mean. "Can't you keep it together until we've at least met everyone?"

There were, it seemed, plenty of women on base - the Clubmobile women with their mobile canteen and coffee urns, smiling and waving from the window of their truck, the local women who worked in the kitchen, on their way home after the lunch shift, the land girls shifting a group of wayward cows, and the WACs of the typing pool and the intelligence room, headed up by a captain named Brennan who greeted them all with the CO when they got off the truck. But Nash, it seemed, would not be deterred - he still had his eyes on his prize, and he meant to get her, it seemed, come hell or high water.

There was a party this evening, they'd been informed - a celebration for Captain Glenn Dye, who'd finished his twenty five mission tour and was headed home with all due pomp and circumstance. "Is everyone going to be there, ma'am?" Nash asked Brennan, when she gave them the news. "Just seems like a good way to meet people, is all."

Brennan gave him a searching look, her answer given with caution as she tried to figure out his true intention for the question. "I'm sure it'll be well attended, Lieutenant. Captain Dye's well liked."

Nash nodded, and said no more, and Brennan turned them over to a couple of orderlies to make sure they made it to their barracks and had time for a change of clothes and a shave before the party got started.

"I'm telling you, Herb, if you so much as think -"

But Nash was no longer listening, either to Pappy or to reason, and the only thing for it was to let him leave for the officer's club alone, and hope that all the shouting had finished by the time they got there.

----

Bucky still didn't know what to think about the party.

Twenty five missions was a hell of a thing, and Glenn deserved the noise, no matter what else Bucky might have thought about the guy. (The matter of Lil still stung, a little, though that had all worked itself out in the end.) But it seemed…to be tempting fate, somehow, to have put up the streamers and gotten the beer on ice before the plane had even made it back to base, and he'd found himself, all afternoon, trying to touch wood or his Saint Christopher medal, or the thin wafer of Cord's lucky silver dollar, praying that everyone made it home in one piece. He liked the silver dollar - he didn't think he would, but she'd tucked into his pocket after Regensburg and would not take back for all the urging in the world. He'd told her he had all the luck he needed, but there was still something comfortable about the coin under his thumb, and the woman's face, with its crown and streaming hair, sometimes reminded him of Cord, blazing in her glory.

Buck was at 21 missions, and he himself at 17. Would there be parties then, when they finished? Or was it only because Glenn had been the first and, so far, the only? (And there was the question, too, of even making it at all - but he liked their odds. If there were two forts left in sky, it'll be me and it'll be you, Buck.

"So, which one's Callaway?"

Bucky turned in his seat to survey the newcomer, a pilot maybe four or five years younger than himself who must have just come in this afternoon. His uniform had the unmistakable air of having recently been stateside. "Who's asking?"

"Just a fellow who wants to get to know her better," the man offered, looking around the room with hope in his eyes. "Girl with a voice like that's got to be a looker."

Bucky quickly realized what was going on here and settled himself on to his bar stool, pushing his glass a little further away. If someone was going to make a move on his girl, that was something he wanted to be sober for - if only to make sure all the punches landed where they should. "Most everyone knows Callaway. You must be new here."

"Herbert Nash - just got in this afternoon."

"Well, a word to the wise, Lieutenant - you're gonna want to keep moving," Bucky said, calmly. "She's spoken for."

Nash grinned. "A lady's allowed to change her mind, isn't she?"

Bucky sized the fellow up and decided he liked his odds where changing minds was concerned. Cord had just walked in with some of the other WACs, Mae and Phoebe, and had only just caught his eye across the room. (No streaming Lady Liberty hair today - she was 1A in every aspect, and he loved her for it.) "Fair enough. Here, I'll introduce you." He waved and gestured her over, rising from his seat as he did so. "Lieutenant Callaway," he said, slowing her up a bit as she realized he was making an introduction. "This is Lieutenant Herbert Nash, who just came in today on one of our replacement crews."

Cord offered her hand to shake, leaning on a lifetime of practice meeting new airmen at Wright-Patterson but still glancing at Bucky to wonder, silently, just what this was about. "Very nice to meet you, Lieutenant."

"Has anyone told you you've got a lovely voice?" No sooner had their hands touched then the younger man had turned on the charm, the full effect of his baby blue eyes coming in to full focus on Cord.

"The Lieutenant's just saying he was hoping he might have a chance at a date," Bucky announced, after he'd let Nash feel like he'd gotten a hit in.

The dime dropped behind Cord's eyes, and her smile curved up a fraction. "Did you tell him I'm seeing someone?" she asked patiently, glancing at Nash with an apology in her smile.

"I tried," Bucky offered, with a shrug.

"So, just who is this fellow you're seeing?" Nash asked, looking ready to bat his eye lashes and go straight for the fences, a fellow who was used to winning. But not today.

"Major John Egan," Cord said, trying to restrain a smile as she reached over and patted Bucky's chest for emphasis. "Whom you've just met."

Nash's mental calculus all suddenly totaled up, and he took one look at the broad-shouldered man in front of him and mumbled something about a drink or friends or both and beat a quick retreat to the other side of the room, finally having realized the obvious stupidity in trying to steal his new squadron commander's girlfriend.

It was too good, watching him leave - though when he turned to look at Cord, she looked a little disappointed in him. "That was mean, Bucky. He's new."

"Fellow's got to have a little fun once in a while," he cajoled, putting his arms around her waist to pull her a little closer. "Gotta show the new guys what's what."

"Are you trying to make someone jealous?"

"…No." But the pause said everything it needed to. He pulled her in a little closer, their noses almost touching and his knees pressing in on her legs. "Don't girls like to get fought over, or something?" Because I'll tell everyone you're mine until the stars go out - and fight someone for you, too, if I have to. A fellow's got to have something to come home to - that's what gets him to twenty five. That and silver dollars and St. Christophers.

"Oh, get over here." She pulled him in to kiss him, her hand gentle on the belt of his jacket, and he did not say no, merely accepted her ministrations with all the pleasure they intended.

"Quit rubbing it in, John."

"Rubbing what in?" Bucky asked with a grin, knowing full well what Gale meant when he said it - rubbing in having a girl who was here in England to be held and kissed and shown off to advantage. But his arm remained around Cord's waist, one more good luck charm he shouldn't have gambled with and would not like to be without.

[five-rivers]

Flitter

AO3

For @echoghost1 and @kawaiijohn

(Also, I would love to have a better name for this fic if anyone can think of one.)

It sounded ridiculous in retrospect, but the shoes were the first sign.  

"Danny, please, we've been here for over an hour.  Pick a pair."

"I'm trying," said Danny, staring across his empire of discarded shoe boxes (he was thinking about calling it Shoelandia).  "None of them feel right."

"Of course none of them feel right," said Maddie.  "They're brand new.  You'll break them in as you wear them.  Just get the pair that feels the least off."

Danny grumbled to himself as he tried to remember which one that was.  There had been a wide one near the beginning, before the salespeople gave up on them…  There!  He lunged across a heap of boxes to secure the sadly orange shoes.  

"Great," said Maddie, clearly relieved.  "Let's go check out and you can put them on before we go out to the car."

"But–"

"If I let you wear those any longer, people will wonder if I'm neglecting you."

Danny followed her pointed finger to his reliable red shoes, which weren't that bad.

Okay, they were that bad.  Ghost hunting plus teenage growth spurts were not friendly to footwear, it seemed.  

Fine.  

.

The next sign was his skin.  As in, there was something wrong with it.  Danny didn’t like to brag, but he had pretty good skin.  It wasn’t perfect - whose was? - but he didn’t get a lot of acne and he definitely didn’t get chapped hands or whatever this was.  

Disgusted and fascinated all at once, he peeled off another thin layer of skin from the back of his hand.  

“What is this?”

“I don’t know, man,” said Tucker.  “Did you get sunburned or something?”

“No,” grumbled Danny, peeling more skin from his arm.  “I haven’t even seen the sun this week.”

“A ghost sunburn?”

“I don’t even know what that’s supposed to mean,” whined Danny, rubbing the back of his hand.  The skin there felt weird.  

“No, it’s probably normal,” said Sam. “Stuff like that sometimes happens to me if I, like, get really sweaty in the pool.”  She wrinkled her nose.  “Not quite that much, though.  Please tell me you aren’t going to just leave that on the floor.”

“You know, most household dust is dead skin cells, so it’s not like-”

Sam snatched the tissue box from Danny’s bedside table and threw it at him.  “You’re disgusting.”

Danny sighed and stood up, mincing his way to the corner of the room his dustpan lived in.  

“You know, most people take their shoes off inside,” said Tucker.  

“Most people don’t live with two mad scientists.  Going barefoot is dangerous.”

“Three,” corrected Sam.  “Jazz is going into STEM, too, right?”

“My point is, if your shoes are bothering you that much, you don’t have to wear them.”

“I know, I know, but I’m trying to break them in.”  He swept up the sheets of peeled skin.  “Happy?”

“Never.”

Danny threw the tissue box back at her.  

.

The third sign… Well.  It wasn’t so much a sign as an avalanche of signs.  

.

Danny woke up sore.  Not unusual, considering his extracurriculars, but annoying.  Had he even fought a ghost yesterday?  Things had been calming down, lately.  He’d even been able to keep up with homework…  

There had been Boxy… Boxy didn't count unless he showed up more than three times.  So.  No.  He was just aching for no reason.  

Ugh.  

Puberty sucked.  

Why couldn’t he have gotten it over with in middle school like Dash and the other meatheads?

He untangled himself from his bedsheets and forced his aching feet into his house slippers.  Not the safest choice, but he didn’t want to deal with his still-new, still-orange shoes.  Eyes still half closed (it was too early to be this bright) he made his way down to the kitchen.  

"Danny!  Your hand!"

“Hwuh?  Wha?”

“Did you break a pen or something?” asked Maddie, pulling his hand up and turning it over.  

“No?” said Danny, deciding he should try to be at least slightly more awake.  He forced his eyes open and looked at his hand.  

The tips of his fingers, from his first knuckle halfway down to his second, were black, the color shading to blue and then peach before it reached his palms.  It was hard to tell with the color change, but the shape of his nails was also subtly off.  

He pulled his hand back, then raised his other one.  It was the same.  

This was some crazy ghost thing, wasn’t it?  And he’d just walked straight to his trigger-happy ghost hunting parents like someone with a death wish–

“Danny,” said Maddie, “Danny, don’t panic.  Jack, dear, can you go down to the lab and get the quarantine protocol ready?  Okay.  Danny, have you noticed any other changes?  Do you feel anything else strange?”

Danny shook his head.  He’d just woken up.  He hadn’t even noticed this.

“Really?  Nothing?  Not even body pains, soreness, that kind of thing?”

“Maybe a little,” admitted Danny.  “I thought it was just growing pains…  I don’t know what this is.”

“We might,” said Maddie, lowering her goggles.  

“Really?  You know what this is?” asked Jazz.  Danny hadn’t even noticed her in the room.  “Please tell me this isn’t because of one of your inventions.”

"Well, not exactly, but… last week, we were working with an ecto-irritant in the lab," explained Maddie.

"A what?" asked Jazz, suspicion still lacing her tone.  

"It's supposed to cause transformations in ghosts," said Maddie.  "Unexpected ones.  Hijack their shapeshifting abilities.  But it does have some impact on highly ectocontaminated people as well…"

"Ectocontaminated people?" repeated Jazz.  "Should I be worried?"

"No, you aren't nearly contaminated enough."

"Isn't that what you thought about Danny, too?"

Maddie rubbed her face.  "We'll run some tests."

"Where did you even get this, anyway?" asked Danny, hoping that would explain at least some of… everything.  

"Vladdie!" said Jack, coming back up the stairs.  “We were testing it for him!”

Wow.  That really did explain everything.  Screw Vlad.  

"Well, one of his R&D labs developed it.  They wanted to use it as a ghost repellant.  He asked us to do some independent tests, first, but if it does this to regular people like Danny…"

Yes, that was totally what Danny was.  Absolutely regular.  No ghost powers here.  

Maddie shook her head and turned to Jack.  “Do you have the quarantine set up?”

“Sure do!” said Jack.  “Come on down, Danno, we’ll get you fixed up in a jiffy!”

“It… might be a little longer than that,” said Maddie, putting her hand on Danny’s back and steering him towards the door down into the lab.  

“But you do know how to undo this, right?” asked Danny.  

“Well, in theory,” said Maddie.  “It wasn’t something we were really interested in when we were testing it on ghosts.”

Of course it wasn’t.

“Do you at least know what it’s transforming him into?” asked Jazz, following them down into the lab, her breakfast thoroughly abandoned.  

“That’d be the other reason we were going to advise Vladdie against it!”

“What, you don’t know?” asked Jazz, aghast.

“Nope!  Seemed pretty random!  Half the time, we got these fluffy little blobs, and the rest of the time they turned into real monsters!  Not good for a repellant at all!”

“Great,” said Danny.  “Love knowing that I’ll either turn into a blob or a monster.  Really love that for me.”

Maddie squeezed Danny’s shoulder.  “Don’t worry, we’ll figure it out before then.”

Danny had doubts.

.

Beyond the persistent ache, whatever was happening to Danny didn’t really hurt.  Which was good!  Don’t get him wrong, he didn’t want it to hurt.  But if it did hurt, it might have been easier to tell what was changing.  

Right now, it was mostly his family members noticing things, not him.  Jack had gotten the full length mirror from the master bathroom, so he could, in theory, help that way.  Just staring at himself in a mirror looking for problems seemed kind of messed up, though, and he was, maybe just a little, still in denial.  

The stain on his fingers was also on his toes, creeping halfway up his foot.  His parents were still looking at x-rays of them, arguing about whether or not their structure had been changed.  Danny wasn’t sure, but he felt like both his fingers and toes were longer.  

The blackened skin was also hardening into something almost chitinous and fusing to his nails at the tips.  It made him feel like he should put a toothpick under his nails to clean them out.  

But it also felt weirdly satisfying to drum his newly-hardened fingers against things.  

“Time for the blood test!” exclaimed Jack, making Danny flinch.  “Gotta see how much of the irritant is in you!”

“Right,” said Danny, smiling nervously.  “Gotta see that.”

Jack faltered.  “Oh, Danno, your teeth…”

Danny raised his hand to his mouth.  Yep.  He had teeth.  Specifically, he had canines that were almost twice as long as usual and felt sharp even through his toughened skin.  

“Let’s… let’s get that blood draw done, okay, sport?”

“Yeah,” said Danny, also shaken.  He hadn’t noticed. That was in his mouth and he hadn’t noticed.  

Jack carefully cleaned a spot inside Danne’s elbow with an alcohol wipe and slid in the slender needle.  “Don’t feel lightheaded or anything, do you?”

“Nope,” said Danny.  It would take a lot more than that to make him feel lightheaded.  

“That’s good.”  He withdrew the needle.  “Okay!  Half for the centrifuge, half for the microscope!”

“Don’t forget the test strips!” said Maddie.  

“Oh, yeah!”

Danny returned to angstily zoning out, this time tapping his fingers against his teeth.  Then the centrifuge started up.  

It sounded like an ice pick driven through his brain.  He shrieked and covered his ears.  

“Danny?!”

“It’s too loud!”

Someone shut off the centrifuge.  Cautiously, he removed his hands from his ears.  

“Okay,” said Maddie.  “Okay.  Let’s… take a look at your ears.  Jazz, can you get the noise canceling headphones?  The ones you got me for Christmas last year?”

“Sure,” said Jazz.  

As Maddie went through a number of hearing tests that Danny did his best to cooperate with, the brightness of the lab’s overhead lights rapidly climbed to ‘unbearable.’

“Your eyes, too?” asked Maddie.  

Danny moaned in response.  

“Oh, sweetie,” she said, brushing some of his hair back behind his ear.  It tickled.  His ear flicked.  He decided not to think too deeply about that.  “Here, Jazz has the headphones… Why don’t you take a nap for now?  We’ll wake you up if anything else big changes, or if we find anything out, okay?”

“Okay,” said Danny.  “Not much else to do if I’m sitting with my eyes closed and my ears plugged, I guess.”

“It’s going to be alright,” said Maddie.  “We’ll probably have everything worked out before you know it.”

.

Danny woke up to the vague sense of someone moving around near him.  

“Hm?” he said, sleepily.

“Don’t worry, Danno!” said Jack in an exaggerated whisper.  “I’m just bunking down here with you tonight!  Jazzy thought that, eh, we needed a break.”

“Mm,” said Danny, opening his eyes just a sliver to see Jack setting up one of the Fenton Folda-Cots nearby.  He sat up and stretched.  His spine felt… different.  Good.  Like it fit together different, better.  

“Oh, you don’t need to get up, Danny, I’ve got this handled,” said Jack, rearranging his bedding.  

“Mm,” said Danny again.  He opened his mouth to ask what had happened while he’d been asleep and got distracted by how long his canines felt now.  

Concerned, he raised his hands to feel out his face.  There were two hard little bumps right at his hairline that curved upward.  Was he growing horns?  He put the question to the side and brought his hands sideways to his ears, questing under the noise canceling headphones.  They were long, droopy, pointed and fuzzy.  

Somehow, Danny didn’t think this was what Tucker meant when he said that someday he’d turn Danny into a furry.  

He started patting himself down.  Were those scales on his shoulders?  No, no, don’t think about it.  Further…

That was a tail.  A long tail.  It was fluffy.  It was… the change he had felt with his spine, darn it.  

So much for waking him up for big changes.  

“Danny?  Are you okay?”

“No, I’m not,” Danny said.  Tried to say.  His mouth went through the motions, but all that came out of his throat was a series of chirps.  He started to shake, but before he could work himself up too much, Jack pulled him into a hug.  

“It’s going to be okay, Danno,” he said, patting Danny’s back.  “Just take a deep breath.  Everything will be better in the morning.”

Danny snuggled closer, taking in the warmth.  Something in his chest that had not been there that morning began to purr.  

If this ecto-irritant thing was turning him into some kind of messed up cat, Danny was going to murder Vlad.  

.

Things were not better in the morning.  In fact, they were worse.  Not in that his body had changed more in the night (which it had.  He’d woken up with patchy black and white markings all over his body, ears too large to fit under the noise canceling headphones, and the beginnings of extra limbs growing under his arms), but in that Vlad had decided to show up.  After Jazz had already gone to school, too.  

“When I heard what had happened to young Daniel I just had to come,” said Vlad.  “I’ve brought all the research from the development team, of course, and I want to offer my own expertise.”

“Great!” said Jack.  “With your help, we should fix this in record time!”

Somehow, Danny doubted that.  He was tempted to flip Vlad off while Jack’s back was turned and Maddie was focused on the research, but that would require moving and growing extra limbs was exhausting.

“I certainly hope so.  I would hate to have this progress any further.”

Translation: Vlad would love to have it progress further and he knew exactly what it was progressing to.  

“But I believe that between the three of us and Daniel’s cooperation, we can overcome this.”

Translation: Vlad wanted something from Danny.  

A siren went off upstairs.

“Oh, my,” said Vlad.  “Is that the mayoral ghost alert hotline?  You’d better go answer it.”

What the heck?  They still had that?

“But Danny–”

“I can keep an eye on him and compare my research to what you’ve already done,” said Vlad.  “You should go.  There may be lives at stake with an evil ghost running loose.”

“This is the first time they’ve called, Mads,” said Jack.  “We should at least see what kind of ghost it is.”

“Oh, alright,” said Maddie.  “But call us if anything - and I do mean anything! - changes.”

“Of course, Maddie,” said Vlad, smoothly.

Danny watched nervously as his parents both ran upstairs, leaving him alone with his archnemesis.  

“So,” said Vlad, “you’re probably wondering what I want.”

Danny turned away.  

“I understand that you think your parents will find a solution,” said Vlad, conversationally.  “So.  You could listen to me… or I could stage a ghost attack that will destroy every last bit of research they have on your transformation and the ‘ecto-irritant.’”

Danny jumped to his feet - and was immediately knocked down by one of Vlad’s duplicates and held there, too weak to do anything else.  He tried to call up his ghost form, but he just didn’t have the energy.  

“It would be easy.  So you could listen.  Or not.”

Danny glared up at him.  

“Good.  It seems like you’re listening.  As you might imagine, I know how to fix your little problem.  In exchange, I only want one thing.”

Danny made the best questioning sound he could, under the circumstances.  Vlad smirked.  

“I wish for you to accompany me to an event I’ve been invited to, as an attendant.”

He could not be serious.  

“Oh, I’m quite serious.  This isn’t a human event, after all, and your appearance is part of the dress code.”  Vlad hummed.  “You’re confused.  I can see it on your face.”

No duh.  Because everything Vlad said was mental.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of the Fey?  Fairies?  The Fair Folk?  Hm?  Don’t give me that look.  I know that you’ve personally fought unicorns.”

Yeah, and they were bloodthirsty monsters.  What was Vlad’s point?

“The Infinite Realms are infinite, Daniel.  I would quote the Shakespere, but you’re no Horatio, and I know you’re failing English.”

Screw him.  Danny had met Shakespere, and he’d seen Hamlet performed by ghosts.

“The Fey are quite real, in any case, and they have certain social standards.  Persons of high rank are expected to have appropriate garb, weaponry, servants…”  He trailed off, looking significantly at Danny.  

He had to be kidding.  

But Vlad wasn’t looking at him, and therefore was not given the benefit of the full force of the most incredulous expression he could muster.  Instead, Vlad was opening his briefcase and pulling out a tablet.  He turned it on and showed it to Danny.  

There was a picture on the screen of a roughly humanoid creature with bright pink skin, large dark eyes, four arms, a furry, fluffy tail longer than it was tall, fuzzy moth-like wings, fern-shaped antennae, and long, soft-looking ears.  The image didn’t give any scale, but it felt small, with disproportionately large head, feet, and hands.  Their hands and feet were covered in black.  

“This is what the higher-class servants look like.  Look familiar?” 

Vlad’s stupid face was so smug Danny would bet that there was a smugness shortage somewhere else in the world.  

“You wouldn’t have to do much beyond follow my instructions and remain at my side while there.  The event is only a few nights long.  I’ll be back in a few days to pick you up - in a way that will keep your parents from guessing anything, of course - once you’re done getting ready.”  Another, smugger, grin spread over Vlad’s face.  “You can decide whether or not to cooperate then, but I urge you to do so.  After all, I doubt you want to be stuck like this forever.”  He stood up and two more duplicates materialized behind him.  “Now, I have a ghost attack to stage.”

.

Danny’s parents completely bought Vlad’s ghost attack story because, well, it had been a ghost attack.  Technically.  The ghost was just Vlad.  And they were terrible at charades.  

Okay, maybe Danny was terrible at charades, too, but come on.  He deserved a break.  It wasn’t like he was getting one in anything else.  

The scales on his shoulders were developing into wings.  His tail was getting longer and fluffier.  The hard, black, nail-like substance on his fingers and feet was creeping upward to his wrists and ankles.  His second set of arms was getting bigger, longer.  His teeth were getting sharper.  What was left of his voice was gone, replaced by something that quietly chirped and purred deep in his chest.  The ‘horns’ on his head were growing into fuzzy antennae.  His hearing and sight were so oversensitive he wanted to just burrow into a pile of blankets and stay there.  He was shrinking.  

His parents were beside themselves.  And they kept having to go take care of minor ghost attacks.  

He wrapped his tail around him and curled deeper into his blankets.  This transformation business was exhausting.  Or maybe it was just that what he was getting turned into that was exhausting.  

He looked at the mirror.  He looked awful.  Sick.  The domino-mask black streak across his eyes didn’t help with that impression.

He was going to have to take Vlad up on his offer.

.

“It’s really quite remarkable, the system the Fey have,” pontificated Vlad after he had ‘extracted’ Danny from the lab.  “Their various castes are perfectly suited for their assigned tasks.  They’re designed that way.  Born that way, usually.  For example, the form that you yourself are taking at the moment?  A perfect servant for the High Fey.  Many hands to work and hold and serve, wings, to ensure they can follow everywhere, sharp eyes the better to see things that need to be cleaned or repaired, sharp ears the better to hear orders, attractive enough to be decorative, but not distracting.”

First off: Ew.  Secondly: Vlad really liked to hear the sound of his own voice, didn’t he?

“Antennae,” continued Vlad, “to ensure harmonious movement with other servants.  Now, the High Fey, who I most resemble…”

Danny tuned him out, instead choosing to watch the green clouds of the Ghost Zone roll by.  The way they were traveling was actually pretty interesting.  Vlad had gotten a chariot somewhere and hooked it up to his flying goon squad, AKA the inexplicably yiddish vultures.  

They were flying in a direction Danny had never been in before.  The islands and doors they were passing were new, strange.  Floating trees and strange stone circles dominated the ecto-scape.  As they continued, they tended to floating forests and island-hills with formations of standing stones.  

Vlad, meanwhile, continued talking.  

“... of course, animal servants are considered gauche - too human, too mortal.  And the farmer caste is entirely different…”

Danny tuned him out again.  

A great mountain was rising up out of the trees around them, its sides gray and silvery.  There was a circular hole in its face, the edges of it studded with slabs like the ones he’d seen earlier in the standing-stone circles.

They looked like teeth.

The chariot flew right through them.  

On the other side was light - but this light didn’t hurt his eyes.  There was no sun in the sky, only a moon floating over a twilight purple-blue backdrop.  Green lawns stretched in all directions, stopping against tall, green trees and the glittering walls of a literal fairy-tale castle.  

Other chariots were sweeping down to the drive of the castle, tall, colorful beings fluttering out of them, escorted by shorter fluttering beings.  

Like Danny.  

There was a buzzing– No, not quite a buzzing, but what else could he call it? – in… in Danny’s antennae.  He rubbed their bases, wary of directly touching the delicate fronds.  

“Don’t fight it,” said Vlad, jovially.  “After all, you aren’t trained as a servant.  You’ll need all the help you can get.”

Danny glared at him, but the expression was unusually hard to form.  

“See?  At this point, you would usually be calling me names.  Lovely, isn’t it, that you can’t?  No way for careless servants to make unwise deals or spread secrets with loose lips - their loyalty is reserved for their High Fey lords.”

Vlad really, really liked the sound of his own voice.  

If this worked on fairytale rules like Vlad was suggesting, he was screwed.  

His head felt really weird.  

The chariot landed, and Danny jumped out, not even quite thinking about what he was doing, and swung around to Vlad’s door, opening it so Vlad could step out, his even-flashier-than-usual cape billowing behind him.  

“Very good, Daniel.  See?  Keep things up, and I’ll make sure you get back to your… admittedly less-useful regular body.”

.

Danny padded behind Vlad, hating how tall everything here was and how short he himself was like this.  He’d earned his five-foot-five stature with a lot of hard work!  Right now, he wasn’t sure how tall he was, but he felt that it was closer to four feet than five.  

It was not a great feeling.  

He really didn’t like this.  

He stayed close.  Rather, he stayed at the distance the little itch in the back of his head told him was appropriate.  Meanwhile, Vlad smarmed about with literally sparkling people.  They were all so tall, with inhumanly sharp features and wings far more colorful and varied than Danny’s or those of his fellow servants.  

Fellow servants.  

He folded his hands behind him as well as he could, given his wings.  This was temporary.  It was.  

And then one of the tall people was right in front of him, fingers under his chin, tipping his head up, examining him with many-colored eyes, tilting his head back and forth.  He took a step back.  

The person - the fey? - turned to say something to Vlad.  Their voice sounded like it was underwater.  Meanwhile, a small servant with the same coloration as the person talking to Vlad stepped forward and regarded Danny curiously.  

They were a solid two inches taller than Danny right now.  He turned his head away.  The other servant stepped into his field of view again, and the feeling of being observed redoubled.  

“Daniel,” said Vlad sharply.  

Danny hurried to follow him.  

“Now, you see,” said Vlad, to the small group of fey he had gathered around himself, “I am more than capable, and I can serve as your link to the human world.  We can bring in materials, performers, art, artists… anything you can think of.”

Some of the fey nodded.  Others looked dubious.  

“And at whose discretion would you direct these imports?” asked one.  

Danny blinked, somehow surprised he could understand this fey when he… when he couldn’t understand any of the others.  

He really didn’t like this.  

He liked it even less when the fey made eye contact with him.  

“At the discretion of whoever secured my services,” said Vlad, “and the high king, of course.  With, perhaps, a few scruples for myself.”  He raised his glass.  

“Very well,” said the fey.  “I shall sponsor you, as you say.  But one gift must be exchanged for another.”

“Anything in my possession that I can– Daniel, stop that at once!”  Danny dropped Vlad’s cape and shook his head vehemently.  That was a bad kind of promise to make.  Especially when it could be argued that Danny was in his possession.  

“Perhaps I could take that unruly servant off your hands.”

“Ah,” said Vlad, getting a clue.  “Perhaps not.  Might the gift be your first delivery instead?”

The fey hummed.  “Perhaps.  We have much to discuss.”  

.

“I suppose you were not a terrible servant tonight,” said Vlad as they flew away in the chariot.  “Are you sure you don’t want to practice a little longer?”

Danny tried to scowl at him, but it was becoming harder and harder to make any expression that wasn’t neutral and pleasant.  Apparently, his transformation hadn’t quite been finished yet.  

“I suppose I should tell you how to reverse your transformation,” said Vlad.  “But it will be so much more fun to show you.”

What did that mean?

A duplicate appeared behind Danny, grabbed the wings he was only just beginning to get used to, and severed them with a sharp-edged ecto-construct.  

Danny shrieked.  

Because he could shriek.  The transformation that had taken days, gone in a moment.

“See?” said Vlad.  “Easy.”

“What the heck, you jerk!”

“Tut tut tut–”

“Who even says that–”

“If you want to get home safely, you should reconsider attacking me.  I am the one who knows how to get back.”

Danny sat down in a huff.  

“Now, let’s start discussing the cover story we will tell your parents about our adventures, hm?”

[thatfreshi]

"You Better Tell Me" (Uni AU P. 5)

You get invited to the rooftop for a smoke sesh with Shadowheart and Gale

tw - weed (reader does not partake), athletic injuries, hints at grooming

@justporo

Soon after, the group fizzles out, starting with Shadowheart saying she doesn't want to be late to church. You weren't really expecting the whole religious thing with her, but hey, if it floats her boat. Gale says he has to meet with Mystra about his thesis project, and Lae'zel heads back to the room, leaving you free to do whatever you want.

So, you spend the day walking around looking for your classes, getting used to campus, finding the cozy places to study. The library is extravagant, filled with books from the past century, with a full online database. You even stop by the pool, which is full of swim team athletes preparing for the upcoming season.

After walking around all day, you come back to the dorm room, exhausted. Shadowheart however, is leaving.

"Oh, Tav! You should come with me! Gale and I are having our weekly smoke sesh. You don't have to smoke, but we like to chill out and talk about all the shit we've heard recently."

Without even really thinking about it, you put down your bags from the bookstore and follow her out the door.

"I thought we couldn't smoke on campus?"

She smirks, leading you to the staircase.

"Well, that's the nice part of being best friends with one of the RAs, their master keys work on the roof door."

As if on cue, Gale shows up behind the two of you.

"Good evening."

Fumbling with his key ring, he opens the door for the two of you to get onto the roof. It's a little chilly this high up. The lights of the city are apparent over the edge of the roof.

"You got Tav to join us?"

"I guess so. We're just cool Gale, we have to accept it."

The two laugh as Shadowheart takes a small plastic baggie out of her tote bag. Like clockwork, the two get to work rolling.

"You want one?"

You shake your head at him.

"No thanks. Honestly just hear to listen to all the gossip."

"See, I knew I liked you."

Shadowheart smiles, taking out her lighter.

"So, what do you want to know?"

You're all sitting on top of one of those electrical boxes, one that clearly isn't in use anymore. You hesitate, knowing you probably will get weird looks for your question.

"Lae'zel... what happened to her leg?"

Gale sighs, and Shadow goes to pull up a video somewhere in her camera roll. The two don't speak, instead showing you a video of a track meet from the previous year. You watch as Lae steps the wrong way, taking a nasty fall, the video picks up the scream she lets out on the track. Gale is the first to speak up.

"She fucked up her entire leg. Started as a sprained ankle, but she tried to keep going. Ended up tearing up her hamstring, and eventually tore the connection between her leg and her foot. Couldn't walk for months."

"Lae'zel doesn't like to talk about it though. She was supposed to be in the Olympics next year, but no amount of physical therapy has worked. As much as she pisses me off, I feel bad talking about it sometimes. Her whole family is full of famous athletes, and now she can't even play her sport anymore."

You weren't expecting the conversation to get so sad so fast, but it is tragic. The idea that you spend your whole life working towards something, and you can lose it all so fast.

"That fucking sucks."

Almost immediately changing the mood, Shadowheart lets out a gasp.

"Wait. Okay before I show you all this: Gale, Tav and Astarion fucked."

His eyes immediately fill with shock.

"I'm sorry. You, and that man, had sex? When?!"

"Ugh, last night. It was stupid and complicated, and then this morning I screamed at him."

"Yeah, and then he left crying. I don't think I've ever seen him cry."

The guilt bubbles back up again, unsure if you did the right thing. Before you can ask the group why they all hate him so much, Shadowheart shows you a paparazzi picture.

"Apparently this was taken earlier today. Looks like somebody's mad at Daddy, boohoo."

You almost ignore her mocking tone. It's Astarion and Szarr in the photos, having what looks like an intense argument at an outdoor shoot.

"You think he'd figure out how to stop complaining by now."

Gale takes another puff, coughing a little.

"Why are you guys so mean to him?"

Shadow almost doesn't know how to answer you.

"I mean, you've met him. He's just some rich kid piece of shit Tav."

"You should've seen him, at the party."

Gale perks up.

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know, the whole thing just makes me feel sick. Like something isn't right, but I don't know what. I met one of the other models, Aurelia, and she was being super cryptic and scary."

The two are fully staring at you now.

"And I met Szarr. He's a full-on creep, gave me this weird kiss on the hand. It was gross, but Astarion? He was like tense. I don't know, it just felt wrong."

"Yeah, but Astarion's been modeling for like six years now. I'm sure he knows the industry well enough to avoid people if they're truly bad people."

It's clear Shadow has made up her mind, but you're still not so sure. Before you can say anything else, she's trying to look at Gale's phone.

"Who are you blushing at?! Is there some lover I don't know about?"

He snatches his phone from her.

"Okay, I'll tell you if you stop trying to take my shit. I may or may not be seeing someone, as of today. BUT, she wants to keep it private for now, so no you can know!"

"Come on, please! I'm your best friend."

"As soon as I can, I'll tell you. But for now, please respect her privacy."

Shadow dramatically rolls her eyes, taking another hit.

"Fine, but as soon as I can know, you better tell me!"

The three of you talk about some other random stuff for the next hour or so. Within that hour, the photos of Astarion and Szarr are wiped from the internet, much to Shadowheart's disappointment. You tune out for a lot of the conversation, thinking about just how much shit you've already gotten yourself into. Although, you'll most definitely be back for next week's smoke sesh. Besides, you need all the help you can get with just how wild this place seems to be.

[herejusttosufferalong]

people are freaking out about these pics because I think most hoped that L had broken it off with A since she wasn't seen in France with him and none of those pap walk pics from Milan were released. I think they were hoping that it was over at this point and are shocked to see that it's not. I don't understand though why some in the fandom are acting like Bebe's kids when we've been known of their association with one another. does anyone even know when the pool pics were taken? cuz it's not even noon here in Cali so when were these pics taken?

I doubt they were from today and from what I have seen going around on Twitter a couple accounts had them for "awhile" whatever that may mean.

We don't have a source for the pics from what I can tell but if someone has found it please let me know.

I get that everyone was hoping he had dropped her but it just wasn't realistic.

She is being kept around for a reason but it sure ain't for love.

[leahnardo-da-veggie]

Convenience Store Vampire, part 8

Part 1, Part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7

“Hush, Dave,” she said, in a most un-Vaceni-like tone. “Don't worry about him. His diplomatic pass will let him get through any situation. I've seen ‘im literally talk down an army with that pass.”

Wait, what? I turned to her and peered closer. Mrs Vaceni smiled at me innocently, a glint of gold in her eyes, and it dawned on me. “Hash! Oh, you wicked, deceitful, clever girl! Gods above, I didn't even suspect a thing!”

‘Mrs Vaceni' giggled, and her skin melted to become Hash, two heads shorter and half as wide. “Ah know, it's almost like I'm a godsdamn ‘shifter, Davie,” she said, grinning slyly. “Now, let's go check on our ghostie, neh?”

I nodded, and we both turned to the closet. It really was a miracle that nobody had spotted the ever-increasing pool of dark liquid around it. “You know… I could have sworn that ghost ectoplasm was transparent, not… Whatever the hells this thing is,” I said, peering at inky puddle.

Hash shrugged. “Who cares? We rescue the little bugger, we get ‘im on ‘is feet, and we go ‘bout our day,” she said matter-of-factly, and opened the door.

A miniature flood of that black fluid came gushing out of the closet, and I jumped aside to avoid staining my shoes. Hash poked her head inside, uncaring of the filth on her clothes, and hauled the ghostly exorcist out.

He was drenched in that liquid, a giant glob of goo and blackness that only vaguely resembled a man. “Somefin' went wrong,” Hash announced, her brows furrowed. 

“Yeah, I see that,” I muttered. The broom closet seemed fine, apart from a toppled bottle of cleaning fluid. “Say, what happens when chemicals touch a ghost?”

Hash gave me a horrified look. “How the hells should ah know? Dinnae tell me- Ah, shite,” she said, shaking her hand free of the goop. “Get me a tissue, Davie. A lotta tissue.”

“Mrs Vaceni is gonna kill me for this,” I mumbled as I pulled out a roll of kitchen towels. “Speaking of which, what happened to her? The real Mrs Vaceni ought to be here by now.”

“Oh, about that…” Hash made an apologetic face. “I mighta hit her with a sleepin’ spell. No biggie, tho; She'll be fine in six hours or so.”

Hopefully that would give me enough time to clean up this mess. I handed the roll of paper to Hash and extracted the mop from the closet. Much like everything else, it was coated in a layer of liquid, and I wiped it down quickly. “Wait, let me put the ghost in a container, so he does not mess this place up,” I said, hauling out our largest carrier box and placing it behind the counter. Hash placed the ghost in it and continued wiping him with tissue.

“Davie, I think we need some water,” Hash reported, as I finished mopping up the floor. The stains had mostly washed away with the remnants of the cleaning fluid, and I found myself eternally grateful for the fact that hardly anyone visited my store. Hash and the ghost could probably hide behind the counter, but it would be hard to explain the pile of black-stained tissues and the mop-bucket of goo. I supposed I could have claimed it was barbecue sauce.

“Ugh, alright,” I grumbled, emptying the bucket into the sink and refilling it with clean water. Hopefully the goo would not harden and clog up the pipes, or I was going to spend a very uncomfortable afternoon with the plunger. I brought the full bucket to her (without breaking a sweat or struggling, perks of being a vampire,) and poured the whole thing on the ghost.

The effect was instant. Black slime flowed off, and a translucent boy, perhaps ten years of age, was revealed. He opened his eyes and spluttered for air he did not need, batting the bucket aside and gasping. “You! Mo-Monsters!”

Hash and I exchanged an irritated glance. Both of us had dealt with enough speciesist exorcists for the week. “Listen here, exorcist,” Hash said, her voice stern, no trace of an accent. “We've just worked our asses off to rescue you from your own people. So kindly refrain from insulting us. Besides, you're a monster too, now.”

The ghost blinked, and looked down at his hands. The spluttering immediately started back up again. “What the hells?! I'm- this- This can't be happening! I'm alive, I swear! I can't be- Oh, hells no!” He batted at himself as though he could smack the ghostliness away, and burst into tears.

“Hey, kid,” I said, feeling sorry for him, “It's alright. Being dead isn't all that bad. You can dive underwater as long as you want, and nobody ever asks for your ID.”

The ghost glared at me. "Bring me a mirror,” he demanded. Hash pulled out a compact and passed it to him.

He gasped at the face in the mirror. “Why- Oh no, no, no! I'm twenty-seven, not seven! And my hair. Why is Ina punishing me like this?!”

Oh, yes. Did I mention his hair was pink? Not a neon pink, either. It was the colour of little girls' dresses, the shade of pink that peonies so often were. Baby pink, fit for a man who looked like one. 

You know, whenever I feel bad about my miserable existence, I think of him. I might be an ancient vampire working a dead end job, but at least I was not a pink-haired exorcist ghost.

Taglist:

@coffeeangelinabox, @dorky-pals, @calliecwrites, @kaylinalexanderbooks, @shukei-jiwa

@thewingedbaron, @pluppsauthor, @cowboybrunch, @wylloblr, @possiblyeldritch @ramwritblr, @urnumber1star, @fortunatetragedy, @bigwipscholar, @ratedn

@vampirelover890, @possiblylisle, @illarian-rambling, @the-ellia-west

@finicky-felix, @evilgabe29, @glitched-dawn, @rivenantiqnerd, @dragonhoardesfandoms

@drchenquill, @everythingismadeofchaos, @owldwagitoutofyou, @dimitrakies, @beloveddawn-blog

@riveriafalll, @the-golden-comet,

CSV: @wifeblade, @trippingpossum (Anyone else who wants to get added can tell me in the comments, pm me, or send me an ask about it!)

[thecameronchronicles]

Rules

TW: Severe angst (eating disorder), smut, daddy kink

SUMMARY: Trevor notes how you’ve been different lately and softly teaches you a lesson to love yourself as he loves you. 

WORD COUNT: 1300

*Requested*

Rules

"No, don't touch that!" He scolded, throwing his bag off of his shoulder and quickly moving across his studio apartment until taking the golden box from your hands and returning it to the desk in which you'd found it. 

"Is it hers?" You asked coldly, turning away and throwing yourself into the couch with a pillow set over your stomach for comfort as this seemed to act like a security blanket of sorts. 

"She's just part of the job, baby...Just a mark…" He spoke in exasperation as you could almost recite the following words from memory alone with just how often he'd spoken them to you. 

'Just this last job and we'll be set for life. No more shitty side jobs and I can give you the life we've always talked about." 

You sighed as it was all you wanted. A life with him. But she seemed to complicate things. Not because you really had any reason to worry, but because of how you couldn't help but compare yourself to her. She was pretty with a Nirvana's grunge aesthetic and a size or two smaller than you as you held this in your curves. Yet, if placed beside one another, this difference was hardly noticeable, but for you, it blared in repetition against your already present insecurities. It is why you stopped eating those three meals a day and optioned for salad-IF you ate anything at all. 

"Whatever...I'm going to bed..." He allowed you this, offering a kiss that you'd appease just for your own spark of sanity, before slipping beneath those covers wrapped in the coldness of your insecurities. 

As always, you'd awaken after he'd left for work and allowed yourself whatever breakfast you wanted. But it came with the price of two fingers down your throat after guilt had consumed you for the calorie intake in opposition to the body you wanted. Her body. The girl he was going to see...again... 

But where you would usually find success in this, you were only met with the familiar voice of Trevor booming behind you. 

"What the fuck are you doing?" He was at your side as tears streamed down your face, as he pulled you up by your wrist and into him, as if a groom pulling his bride over the threshold. 

"Why are you home?" You asked as he set you on the edge of the bed before taking a change of his clothes and setting them beside you. 

"Because I was fucking worried about you. You are sleeping so much and...and then I saw the plate when I came in..." He bowed his head. "Why do you feel you have to do this?" 

You pulled your knees to your chest, just wanting to shrink into yourself as you didn't want to be seen as weak, and maybe you weren't, just too consumed with the 'what-ifs'. 

"What are my rules?" You sniffles before looking off to the side. 

"Babe?" His voice was more tense, almost as if offering some kind of warning as you let out a sigh. 

"Honesty. Communication-" He would interrupt you. 

"Nuh uh...you don't want to follow them...so you're gonna tell me on your knees." You swallowed hard as he motioned in validation of his words. 

You obeyed, excitement pooling between your thighs as you nodded. 

"Keep going." 

"Honesty. Communication. Obedience. And monogamy-" 

"And let's add a few more." He spoke while circling you. 

"You have to eat three meals a day...I don't care what it is, but three times." He paused. "You will stay hydrated because I need you to have energy for me..." He now moved onto his knees before you, taking two fingers beneath your chin until you looked up to face him. 

"And lastly, which is one of those I thought we already covered, you have to tell me when you feel this way..." You slowly nodded. 

"How do I know my good girl understands me?" 

"Yes..." 

He tightened his jaw as you quickly made the correction. 

"Yes, daddy." 

"Good girl. Now I don't want to punish you because I think you've done that enough for both of us...so I want you to go tsie a shower for me...get relaxed-" 

"Trevor-" 

"While I make us some lunch." Your eyes narrowed, not usually one for such delayed gratification. 

"Go on..." He motioned as you collected the clothes he had offered before retiring into the shower. But as you looked over to the toilet, you watched him narrow his eyes from the stationary rest he made in the frame of the door. 

"Don't even fucking think about it." He warned before drawing your focus to his suddenly bare chest as he disposed of his clothes and stood at your side, forcing the water a bit hotter, before pulling you inside. 

"Trevor-" 

"Nmm-mmm" He shook his head in disagreement. 

"You wanna disobey me, there are consequences. I let it slide because you were hurting...but seeing you like this hurts me...so you're gonna make ME feel better now..." To this, he brought you to your knees in more guidance than dominance, but still with a tight hold to your hair as the water nearly scorched your already enlivened skin. 

"Be a good girl for daddy...show me you understand my rules...our rules, baby..." 

You swallowed hard before taking him as you had had many times before. And yet this seemed so different as all truth seemed to now be before you. Nothing hidden but his cock between your cheeks. You hollowed out quickly, taking him in swift succession as he moaned over you, the symphony of swelled breathing shorted by your actions acting as a symphony above you. 

"Oh fuck, good girl...making daddy want to reward you, yeah?" 

You nodded as he pulled you back to your feet, lifting you effortlessly around him and against the shower wall. 

"And how do daddy reward you?" 

"By coming inside me." 

"That's right. Because now we understand that the only thing you gag on is my dick, you got me, baby?" 

"Yes-" 

He pulled at the back of your neck. 

"Yes what?!" He scolded once more as you took in a sharp breath. 

"Yes daddy!" And to this, you sank down onto him. Immediately, your back arched and your body tightened to the sensations forced through you with such vigor. He was quick to set his pace, battering into you as always, but doing so with the reminder of how you belonged to one another. His lips soft where his hands were at a frenzy and his thrusts rough but deep with care. He was the perfect contradiction of broken and gathered that collected your pieces within his own and made a beautiful mosaic of fractured pasts molded into your love. 

"Fuck!" He belted behind clenched teeth as you continued to slide against the shower wall, the slip having allowed him to pull you faster until you called out to him in desperation. 

"Come for daddy baby...give me my reward, come on...good FUCKING girl!" He expressed, nails digging deep enough to draw blood, before you found your own release against him as well. 

"You break my rules next time baby, and I'll have to actually punish you..." You nodded as he carried you out of the shower and onto the sink. 

"Trevor? What are you-" You were silenced by the wrap he made of the towel as he led you back to be in his arms. This time, straddling straddling as you had in the shower before taking you to the dining room table, a small one with only enough seating for the two of you, but perfect all the same. 

"Now you're gonna eat for me...or so help me, I'll tie you to that fucking bed and make you-" You nodded, slightly intrigued by the latter, but not wanting to anger him. You loved him, and in his own ways he had shown the same to you...

Taglist: @hopebaker @iovdrew @penny4yourthoughts @magnificantmermaid @pickingviolets @lovedetlost @trikigirl271 @my-baexht-ls @slut4starkey @slvtherinseeker @obxiskewl @obxxrxfes @bluesongbird @slut-era @ailee-celeste @rafesbae

Made for @steveharringtonswifey09

[jackienautism]

The fact if Nick was a yt girl and Emma was a guy y’all would lose your minds at the truth or dare scene, hate Emma and sympathize with Nick

(Not saying you have to like Nick it’s fine if you don’t) but the whole logic of “he could have gotten out of the situation but he didn’t” is kind of gross and giving victim blaming vibes??

Emma was there to see him express he was uncomfortable with kissing her but she still initiated it. He probably got awkward and too nervous to stop her. He’s also characterized as someone who “falls in line with others around him” so he most likely lacked the confidence to tell her to stop. Even shot of his face after Emma pulls away, he looks nervous and upset rather than pleased with the kiss.

And your whole logic of “he wants tits and ass” is so inaccurate it’s not even funny lol. He told Jacob to “don’t be gross” when Jacob implied something sexual between Nick and Abi. And the whole pool scene where Nick was saying weird stuff? Him saying “you smell so good” and “I want to taste you” means he LITERALLY wants to taste her. He’s a WEREWOLF. Not defending him in that scene and Abi had the right to be freaked out but I’m saying it’s not sexual. Even Evan Evagora, Nick’s actor, confirmed that he acted the way he did due to the infection and it’s not truly him (there are screenshots of an Instagram story he said that in that are floating around on tumble) so I have no idea where you got the idea that he wanted sex from Abi

what thje FUCK ar eyou even saying right now? ppl fucking HATE EMMA OVER THE TRUTH OR DARE SCENE???????? PPL BARELY SYMPATHIZE W/ HER??????????????? thats just in fucking accurate my guy. NO ONE EVER BRINGS UP NICK'S INVOLVEMENT THATS ALL IM FUCKING SAYING LMAO. PPL ALREADY HATE EMMA OVER IT LIKE I DONT KNOW WHAT THE FUCK YOURE TALKING ABOUT

victim blaming for WHAT? please TELL ME.

then why the hell was he there w/ his tongue down emma's throat?????? he didnt have to go all in and yet he did! and also, my friend, his arms / hands were wide fucking open ready for emma? and he also leaned in just as much as her????? ALL IM GODDAMN SAYING IS IT ANNOYS ME THAT PPL ALWAYS BLAME EMMA FOR WHAT HAPPENED. WHEN NICK WAS JUST AS INVOLVED. I DONT CARE WHAT YOU THINK HAPPENED. and i took the shot of his face being nervous or fucking whatever due to jacob literally screaming at them to stopl. and the fucking fact that he just kissed his "crush's" best fucking friend.

mauybe im wrong w/ that, i dont rly fucking care though. i dont care. i jsut took the infected nick as exposing hsi innermost desires. similar to what we've seen w/ the other characters, it makes them super vulnerable and whatever. and i just took some fo what infected nick was saying as him exposing himself! "easy pickins, right off the bone" yeah maybe that was just him being hungry bc hes a werewolf or whatevr but i took it that he was just going after abi bc shes an "easy" target. i dont rly care what the actor has to say sorry. i moreso care abt the writers but like sure i get it. since i like ace laura and ryan and i know both justice and siobhan talked abt it and i take their word for it. i hahd a better explanation as to why i thought nick wanted tits and ass butits been awhile since ive played and i forgot most of my thought process. anyway im gonna go kill myself now i guess.

[rimeiii]

Just watched the gameplay trailer and...

Well, it's a lot like Path to Nowhere. Can't say I'm surprised, considering the unit placement and map layouts from all the trailers we've seen.

(More under the cut because we all know I'm the bitch who's more interested in the gameplay compared to other things-)

Some corrections regarding the symbols:

Angel wings are enemies remaining, paw prints are movement opportunities remaining.

Whatever that last icon is, it's supposed to be is your HP.

Two tilesets is real, but it's only used to indicate pathing.

There doesn't seem to be a distinction between low ground and high ground tiles - it's just the lighter tiles are the enemy paths, and you place units on lighter tiles if you want to block enemies.

The limits of the battlefield are the black picket fences along the edges!

But holy shit some of these abilities sound so fucking broken on paper, but the applications...

Marbas's skill, if handled properly, can act like Bard Supporters in Arknights. However, the healing seems to be very limited, at 1 HP per tick? How would it scale based on skill level and stats? Is 1 HP a lot for friendlies? At least it seems to be an infinite duration skill, so...

Paimon's slow is manual targeting. Personally I'm not a fan, or maybe it's because I think in the realm of tower defense, Suzuran is a slower done right. Or Snow Peas. These sorts of units, in essence, slow enemies down so our units can burst them down easily. Which might be uh...let's just say, underutilized based on the DPS options we have down the line.

At this point, Paimon seems to play a lot like May, and even then May is more effective in slowing down enemies with her first skill.

Anyways, what in the fuck is going on here?

That 'Miss' in blue text. Is that a damage instance miss, an ailment miss, or something else? If it's a damage instance miss (which is what I think it is) then mygod I think I'm actually going to rage while playing this game. That is, unless it's due to a unit's passive - then for my own sanity I won't be using them, ever. Because hey, fellow Arknights players, remember these fuckers?

Yeah. Silence and freeze came in clutch, honestly. There's a reason why a lot of players would rather not deal with dodge enemies and just want to nuke them out of existence with true damage and status effects. Though to be fair it's the Nethersea Brand that makes Stultifera Navis a hard event/Intermezzi...

ANYWAYS! The next skill I'll be looking at is Eligos's skill.

That's a unique skill, honestly! Mechanically, it's most similar to Mlynar's second talent, which gives him innate Taunt (makes enemy ranged attacks target him when he's in their range) - except Mlynar is Broken Like That and has damage reflect while maintaining that the Talent is always active, all with respectable defenses and a sizable HP pool. Like Mlynar, depending on how much damage the enemy does on average and how strong Eligos's shield is, the skill can easily turn into a double-edged sword, however - in a much more dangerous way compared to Mlynar.

Think of it this way. It doesn't seem like WHB has a redeployment mechanic, as a similar "style" of tower defense with Path to Nowhere. Which means, if an ally is dead, then they stay dead for the entirety of the stage.

Compare that with Arknights, which allows retreating and redeployment.

Losing Texas the Omertosa on the battlefield wouldn't matter as much as losing Eligos, because I know I can still use Texas down the line. Plus, the Executor subclass is built around redeployment, making that mechanic necessary to use her properly. Same thing with me retreating Chen - her positioning wasn't the most optimal after clearing the treasure chest, and if the stage went on any longer I'd redeploy her in a more strategic position/direction. But I know this stage's mobs aren't particularly tanky, and Mountain with Sweeping Stance (S2) would be more than enough to hold that lane, with his 2-block + DPS + self-sustain.

These are the words of a chronic IS player.

Meanwhile, if I lost Eligos, then I'd lose a valuable blocker unit. He's a defender in WHB, and he definitely has more tanking capabilities. But that means you'll have to consider adding either a healer to keep him healed up or more DPS to kill off enemies before you lose said defender to continuous attacks.

The final three skills shown in the trailer all fall under the same category: burst damage over an area.

This is where I can say slowers might eventually be underutilized in WHB on launch. They work the best with consistent, large damage sources over a period of time. What do I mean by that? Well, let's take a look at Suzuran - specifically, her second passive.

Suzuran, in my opinion, reflects the most effective way a slower is used in tower defense. Not only does she slow enemies down, she inflicts them with a debuff that makes them take more damage (Fragile). This effect is doubled with her third skill Foxfire Haze, where she stops attacking - but her slow turns into an area of effect deal, heals allies, and has an increased range. She is oftentimes used in conjunction with damage dealers and an extra debuffer (optional, but typically Saria S3) with steady burst damage over a set period of time - SilverAsh, Surtr, Mlynar, Eyjafjalla, Mostima, and Exusiai, just to name a few.

Granted, she is a 6* unit (L rarity in WHB terms would likely be the closest approximation), but even then other Decel Binders (slowers like Suzuran) without the debuff application still has the 80% Slow on all enemies they attack, and has ways to increase their slowing and damage capabilities.

It's hard to see with how the battle is presented, but if Paimon's slow is only on skill proc, then him in conjunction with these DPS options would be the equivalent of using Decel Binders with Chiave/Pinecone - which isn't bad per se (unless you managed to stack charges - then it becomes good) but less effective compared to using, say, Pozëmka/Schwarz. And let's not forget that some of these characters have huge attack ranges (Satan and Gabriel specifically) - making the entire point of slowers more or less moot.

Also, it would seem that skills may inflict status ailments! Stun seems to work like in Arknights (enemy stops attacking and moving for a set period of time), but Bleed I will assume is a damage over time deal. Kinda like Blue Poison and Thorns's passives.

The final and arguably biggest gripe I have with what I see in the trailer, though?

Little to no potential for AFK gaming- //SHOT

[poelya]

Okay, I want to talk about something today. Last week, I was skimming through the tlj novelization, and came across a passage that made me frown, and I mentally added it to a growing pile of canon quotes that give me the ick.

It's absolutely no secret that Poe gets objectified to hell and back in this fandom, and has ever since tfa. The popular fanon at the time was that he was the best fuck on base and had probably fucked everyone (except Snap. Important distinction there no one ever assumed he'd fuck Snap. Can't imagine why the fat man was the single exclusion but that's a separate issue), and even today, there's still a lot of gross latin lover tropes swimming around in fics, and Certain Popular Pairings certainly have no issues fetishizing him.

But it's become a thing in canon also, and the more I uncover of it, the more uncomfortable I get. Screenshots under the cut. TW: discussions of sexual harassment, objectification, suicide, and allegorical rape.

The first time I really noticed it was reading Resistance Reborn by Rebecca Roanhorse; this book is foul for about a fazillion different reasons (racism, sexism, ableism), and I've only read it once because of how upset and sick it made me feel to read, but essentially, the writer is quite clear in that she dislikes Poe Dameron deeply — calling him supremely arrogant in every other interview for tbe story — and you can tell that her thoughts towards him in this book is "i hate him, but he is attractive".

Poe goes through the meat grinder, she instills in him a nearly uncharacteristic amount of self loathing, and uncharitably has Maz Kanata physically assault him because he doesn't want to talk about his issues, and pin him down and compare his "arrogance" to the arrogance of Neo-Nazis. Yeah. And then later, a man named Stronghammer informs the Resistance that Poe should be killed, by being thrown out of an airlock, for his mutiny. Horrifically, Roanhorse has most of the Resistance agree (this ruined my feelings towards post tlj era for a long time), and has Poe point blank admit he'd commit suicide in a heartbeat if it'd stop the First Order, which no one except Finn shows any concern towards (and...pot meet the kettle baby you've tried killing yourself every movie).

The context for this is important, because after Maz physically assaults him, and Stronghammer announces he wants Poe killed, this happens:

And certainly, Resistance Reborn has an ongoing problem of objectifying Poe (a running gag about his hair, a joke about the size of his cock, a convoluted as hell excuse to get him to jump into a pool in a tux), but this one feels especially the worst because the two people who have recently physically assaulted/threatened him are now coming onto him, which Poe is clearly made uncomfortable by — enough so that Leia swoops in and changes the subject.

It's harassment, played off for laughs, because we all know Poe is handsome so of course, Maz and Stronghammer would admit that it's one of his strong points, right? And it wouldn't fly if it was someone else in Poe's place, like a white woman, but because he's a man of color, it's just a funny gag because we've all seen Poe Dameron's face, and we agree it's handsome.

But it's far from the last time Poe being reduced to his looks happens, and nor is it the only time that it goes from "objectified by the narrative" and into the realm of "hey that's sexual violence/harassment".

The most benevolent example is in Spark of the Resistance, when Poe is recognized by a stormtrooper specifically because "who else has that hair". And then the origins of Maz believing Poe is handsome, is evidently the Last Jedi novelization by Jason Fry:

and that's not even an accurate statement he's in charge of an entire flight wing and is a capable field agent but whatever.

I haven't read all the way through that novel to see if there's more of that attitude prevalent in it, but at this point it wouldn't surprise me, because it also pops up, at its absolute worst, in the Force Awakens novelization:

The implied threat of sexual violence is shocking (it definitely threw me for a loop when I was rereading) and it's especially awful when you consider one of the first incidents to happen in the trilogy is Poe being mind-raped by Ren; he's violated horribly and painfully (it's described as silent agony in the novelization), and it certainly makes an already gross habit of reducing Poe to his attractiveness, even more awful when you remember he is a victim of allegorical rape — and we, the audience, are expected to laugh along, at least in the case of Resistance Reborn, because Poe Dameron is hot, remember? It's his best quality, that makes us able to stand his other less than ideal character traits, so of course it's okay if we objectify him or have characters in-universe harass him after attacking him (this is sarcasm, for the record. Extremely bitter sarcasm).

It says a lot that instead of ever getting any meaningful acknowledgement of what Poe underwent with Ren, the way he was horribly violated, authors time and time again just heave a sigh and start waxing poetry about how sexy Poe is, and now it's canonical he's been subject to repetitive sexual harassment/threats (Maz and Stronghammer, then Naka, respectively) after being violated by Ren in the worst possible way.

But am I surprised when even the torture scene gets grossly sexualized by folks? Or watered down? Or people expect Poe to have to swallow his trauma and move on from it, for every other character's benefit? When everyone agrees Poe Dameron can be so annoying, but hey... he's easy on the eyes.

[melancholycatastrophe]

Only Friends Ep. 5 Thoughts

spoilers

not even two minutes in and someone is trying to kill ray, its not looking good out here

nick interrupting the raysand handjob is so wild because sandnick knows that top cheated on mew and they know mew and ray are friends and theyre just not gonna say anything to ray, thats crazy

the raysand and topmew dates are so cute i just know this isn't gonna last

sidenote: that wasn't actually topmew being cute, it was forcebook. the only way i can keep myself sane is by pretending its just forcebook

sand dressed the way i want to dress im going insane he's my favorite kind of boy: guitar player, rock and indie fan, leather jackets, anger issues, homoerotic tension with men - if ray doesn't want him I'll keep him

NOOOO MEW NOT THE GLASSES

top fixing mew's glasses 😭 he's too fine to be such a scumbag

mew's prescription is -5.00, he's just like me fr

am i tripping or is mew now hyperaware of every time top talks to another man because he thinks that they're all ex-hookups or top might hook up with them after? like what was that look when the server gave top the bill?

IS THIS BITCH--? IS NICK CHANGING THE WAY HE DRESSES AND GOING TO THE GYM IN ORDER TO LOOK MORE LIKE TOP AND GET BOSTON'S ATTENTION????? BOY STAND UP PLEASE DONT BE LIKE TOP PLEASE

bostonnick in the pool just reminded me of that one kinnporsche pool scene im sorry i was hoping they would have sex in the pool

also -- diversity win! the lying backstabbing guy who is playing with your feelings and ruining his friendgroup believes in safe sex!

another thing that intrigues me: does boston even like his friends? cuz we've seen all four of them together and having fun, and they look to get along well if you ignore everything happening in the background, but individually? has boston hung out with or just simply had a normal convo with anyone? mew has with ray and cheum, and im starting to believe that boston hates mew for something that happened in the past or is really jealous, but does he hang out ray and cheum just one on one? because at this point it feels like the only person boston talks to is nick, which is.... idk I'm just so curious as to how the raymewbostoncheum friend group came to be

also the fact that he's not even interested in the hostel. the only people we've seen truly working on it are mew and cheum, mew possibly because if it fails he loses his place as top student, idk why but cheum is a business major so she probably has some vested interest in this project. i'm assuming ray is a buisness major because of his dad and even tho it's technically his project - as boston points out - i doubt he wants to work in that field

"I don't want to sleep around anymore. I want to have sex with someone I can talk to and be affectionate with" boston the word you are looking for is boyfriend. you want a boyfriend, and nick is right there (for some reason)

instead of being called only friends, this show should be called "getting cockblocked by all your friends" because this is getting ridiculous. first raysand, then raysand again, then bostonnick, and then raysand again

the way mew wants his friends to be in serious relationships is soo......cute, but also funny that he's over here rooting for his friends meanwhile he keeps top in a situationship like bestie look in the mirror

also i will chew on concrete if boston only dislikes mew because of top oh my god its never that serious over dick

ray please stop talking to that girl omg summer is too pretty to be involved in whatever the fuck you and your friends have going on, give her to me

that concert scene makes me miss brightwin idk

atp I'm gonna assume that every guy who looks at top has fucked him unless proven otherwise cuz this is getting ridiculous

ah fuck....mew has fallen for top..... but anyway this confirms mew is probs demiromantic and demisexual

not the debt collectors 😭 is it really a rich x poor storyline if there's no debt collectors?

sand's mom owns....the go go club....i'm.....oh my god thats why he was there in episode like 2

ray singing sand a love song for his birthday oh be still my beating heart

not mew calling boston to tell him that he's ready to have sex with top 😭 bestie i get that he's your friend with the most sexual experience and you dont want to tell ray cuz he had feelings for you but oh my god why did you tell ton??????

but also "I'm afraid if I don't have sex with Top he'll get bored of me" after seeing so many people check out Top that day.....Mew is finally at a point where he has romantic feelings for Top and its probably for the first time ever and he doesn't want to let him go so he'll have sex with him, he's so real honestly I relate to him a stupid amount

also...okay wait....so is the friendship between bostonmew one-sided or is top truly the reason why their friendship will crumble in the future? cuz mew calls boston about top for reassurance and boston reassures him for some reason....

out of context topmew is cute.....oh their break up is gonna be awful

their first time having sex was so sweet and tender but i know damn well this wont last

ray and his mommy issues back at it again

sand distracting ray from drinking more by sharing personal details about his life....oh......oh....

sand was named after the place his mom and dad had sex oh my god....

ray's mom 🤝 ray

suicidal and alcohol addicts

"Only Cockblocked By Your Friends" the series strikes again!!!

it just hit me that they're eating weed cookies.....

also... "sand, this isnt your usual stuff?" does this mean sand sold ton drugs before or....?

ray keeps saying he and sand aren't dating and its breaking both mine and sand's heart

bostonnick and raysand drinking and partying together doesnt sit right in my heart....somehow someone is gonna say something bad while high

"even if you really like ray, i doubt it would work out between you two" whelp there it is

boston for the love of god shut the fuck up so we can have happy raysand and topmew please stop telling everyone and their mother that ray is in love with mew so that he can move on oh my god please its only episode 5 i need some happy moments between the two couples a little longer please

why is ton airing out all of ray's dirty laundry why is he doing the things that he does he's so messy i love it

well......ray and boston are probably not friends anymore

boston is too fine to be acting like this

now that I'm thinking about it....were boston and ray ever friends or were they just in the same friend group? cuz back in like episode one he was the one who was supposed to take care of ray when he was drunk and didn't so, like....

that last scene with sandray is sad and all but I'm too distracted over the fact that they're sleeping without blankets covering them

WAS THAT RAYMEW FIGHTING IN THE PREVIEW NO I CAN TAKE EVERYTHING BUT RAYMEW FIGHTING STOP DONT DO THIS TO ME