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partycatty · 1 year ago

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DUDE THE DARK JOHNNY FICS ARE KILLING ME you ate them up please write more pookie!! It can be any concept but if you can’t think of one I was thinking, Johnny went to go shoot a film and just wanted you sitting at home being pretty, until you decided to pack everything that was yours and leave like entirely(let’s say to a different state or smth) clothes,shoes,bags, everything gone and he goes bonkers trying to find you or whatever LOVE YOU POOKS😘😘😘😘

OOOOHHHHHHH LOVE U MORE POOKIE BEAR

dark star!johnny cage > i'll find you

you hit your limit with johnny and abandoned the life he trapped you in. to say he isn't happy is a major understatement.

warnings: yandere johnny boy, abusive relationship

notes: i love how collectively mentally ill we are, love you babes

part 1* / part 2* / part 3* / part 5* / part 6*

*parts are one-shots, this is not a consistent series.

masterlist <3

• things were going okay, so johnny thought. gifts were pouring in, the media seemed happy, and you were quiet. quiet was good to johnny. it meant you ran out of energy to protest. what he didn't realize, though, was that you were quiet to avoid raising suspicion.

• "i'm locking the doors, baby, so no parties for you," johnny would tease often about you running away or hosting parties while he was gone, but regardless he always remote locked the doors when you were left on your own. to him, you were like a puppy that was raring to leave at the crack of an open door. "they've got me filming a night scene and i told them i'd rather kill myself than film in a fake night studio, so we're gonna be out late. remember the rules?"

• johnny had rules with you, to make sure you stayed in line. you nodded and recited them. no leaving without permission, call before bed, and to not cover the security cameras. johnny nodded with approval, kissed your cheek, and was gone with a quick "good girl. love you."

• your smile faded away when the door shut. you instantly sprinted into the master bedroom, locking yourself in the joint bathroom. it was the only place without cameras.

• he had a habit of searching through your personal spaces and devices. however, one of the places he didn't check was your sink cabinet. he found feminine products gross. remember when i said he was immature? yeah. this was the best time to take advantage of that.

• behind the wall of pads and tampons was a large duffel bag cramped between the sink pipes. in it was all of your necessities and then some you purchased with his credit card. you'd sneak them into the bag using one of the designer purses he once gave you after cheating on you.

• after removing it from the cabinet, you set it atop the toilet and squeezed in one last shower. lord knows when the next one you'll have will be, or if hotel bathrooms are as luxurious as the mansion. perhaps it'd be the one thing you'd miss truly.

• when you get changed, you put on three layers of clothes and stuff the rest in the empty gaps in the bag. the expensive clothes and absurdly elegant jewelry stays behind. nobody needs that to be happy. freedom would make you happy.

•you had been periodically depositing money from johnny's account into your own secret checking account, one you opened without his approval. he needed to monitor your purchases, so he instead just gave you a credit card in his name. over the last year you'd move small quantities over until you had enough to run away and sustain yourself. sure, it was stealing. but is a multi-millionaire going to miss a few thousand?

• when you were sure everything was packed and ready, you squeezed yourself through the small window in the bathroom and took off as quickly as you could, careful to stay in the blind spots of the cameras you'd studied prior. you then climbed onto a long distance bus, showing the ticket you purchased weeks in advance, and you were off.

• it didn't feel real at first. you watched malibu fade from the bus window, glancing around at the ordinary people sitting alongside you. you were so disheveled and definitely not dolled up, people probably wouldn't recognize you. you purchased the first ticket available, one that was taking you to arkansas. hundreds of miles away, and loads of people to blend in with. nobody would think to find you there, since it had nothing awaiting you. you managed to stabilize yourself and recollect your plan you meticulously planned in your head while the hills rolled with you.

• after a couple hours of shooting, johnny sat in his little diva throne and opened his phone to his surveillance app. tapping through his home, panic set in when you didn't appear on a single camera. maybe you were in the bathroom, he thought. after waiting, you never emerged. the house was empty.

• one new voicemail.

• "hey-y-y," johnny's nervous, gritted laughter played through your phone. "i'm not seeing you on the cameras. call me."

• one new voicemail.

• "seriously, woman. where are you? this isn't funny."

• one new voicemail.

• "i'm coming home. you're making me leave work early. i'm gonna call the fucking cops. you think you're so smart? you've got two hours to come home, and if not, i'll find you, whether you like it or not."

• you snapped your phone in half, discarding it at the bus's front trash can.

• johnny arrives home, slamming doors open and turning every piece of furniture around. chairs fly across the room, your once neatly organized closet is torn to shreds. he finds your belongings short of his usual counting and puts it together. you ran away, you—

• johnny sinks to the ground, gripping his hair so tight he's nearly pulling chunks out. he's laughing so hard from mania that drool is rocketing from his mouth with the Textbook Crazy Eyes.

• he texts and texts, probably well over a couple hundred times. the messages remained undelivered, yet he kept barraging the deactivated number in hopes that the next message would come through. surely he couldn't get the police involved. "hey guys, my girlfriend ran away from me because i controlled her entire life!" yeah. that'd end in handcuffs.

• so instead, he lies. it's his specialty. he dials 911, and channels the mania into a false desperation. he sobs into the phone, claiming that you're extremely mentally unwell and must be returned to him ASAP.

• johnny spends the next week posting your face everywhere on social media. you and him become, yet again, the talk of the country, but for once it seems like a genuine concern. with the way he painted things, you were insane and in danger if you were away from him, and you needed him to protect you. johnny painted himself as the savior, making charity campaigns to raise money for search parties. his home is full of gifts in your honor.

• he'd drink and smoke, something he didn't usually do, just to relieve this insane stress. he felt like his other half became untethered, like his entire world was falling apart. as much as he controlled you, he really did love you in his own fucked up way. he needed you, more than you needed him. you were the one person that would agree with him no matter the situation. he loved how you made him feel.

• meanwhile, you're basking in the sun by the hotel pool as you browse nearby apartments. it felt foreign to make your own decisions, and you had zero concern over whether or not the place would be up to his par. it was up to you now, and you loved it.

• you just had to hope that johnny wouldn't find you himself. lord knows what he'd do to you.

#mortal kombat #mortal kombat x reader #johnny cage #mk1 #johnny cage x reader

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tabularasawithfeeling · 8 months ago

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I just want to discuss something: Angel was 27 when he was turned (confirmed in the pitch tape for ATS), so even with the best possible supernatural vampire age shenanigans he is at least 27 when he falls in love with 16-year-old Buffy... I'm not here to attack anyone's ship (i know in fandoms sometimes you ignore some things about a character to be able to like them), i think Angel is an entertaining character, but let's recognize this bonkers aspect about it at least? Just as spuffy shippers must recognize how fucked up Seeing Red was.

This is completely ignored in the show, while it's rightfully showing how creepy it would be for Spike and Dawn to date, even though it's the same thing.

#i'm not trying to compare angel and spike right now even though i have a lot of opinions #just trying to stay as neutral as possible for the sake of this post and trying to keep it short #btvs #buffy #angel #ats #buffy the vampire slayer #spike #buffy summers #angel btvs #spike btvs

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iwillmicrowavesonicyt · 9 days ago

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deaf au fiction!

Before you start reading I just want to say something really quick!!: this may be inaccurate to inky mystery due to the fact I'm not that far into it yet! This also may have poor grammar! (I'm trying lol) the story may not be interesting due to the fact I'm not very good at making fanfiction yet! And if there are spots where I miss spell something it's because I had to wake up in the middle of the night because of storms and I had to wake up early so I'm a bit sleepy XD if you write and have tips on how to improve it I'd love that! And uhh yeah! That's about it!^^ ON WITH THE SHOW!

Here is the fic :D 👇

Bendy woke up to the glow of the sun on his face. His eyes fluttered open as he looked around the room, he looked at boris's empty bed. Bendy swung his legs over the edge of the bed and got up before walking to the door.

He walked to the kitchen, grabbing an apple and taking a bite into it. Boris walked over and tapped the granite counter top that bendy was leaning on, trying not to scare him.

Bendy looked back at boris and smiled before taking another bite.

"Morning, bro!" Boris said while wagging his tail with a bright smile on his face!

"Good morning, boris." Bendy said softly with a smile.

Boris went to go watch some cartoons, leaving bendy in the kitchen alone. Bendy ate the crisp red apple and threw the core into the trash! He felt a knock against the counter, and turned back to see Cuphead

Cuphead walked past bendy and opened the fridge to grab something to eat. Bendy watched for a few moments before turning to leave. He walked over to the coffee table and grabbed a book and sat down on the couch as he began to read. He jumped as he felt a sudden tap on his shoulder and turned to see mugman.

Mugman gave a sheepish smile "sorry, I didn't mean to spook ya" he said making sure to face bendy.

"It's ok" Bendy replied, a bit quietly, not sure how loud he was being. Mugman peeked over his shoulder to see what he was reading. The cover of the book read "the adventures of felix the cat!" Mugman swore up and down he's seen bendy read this at least 5 times. He tapped bendys shoulder again.

"Golly, how many times have you read this? I knew you liked Felix's books but I didn't know you liked them *this* much" he chuckled.

"Oh, yeah I really like Mr Felix's work. He said he's working on a new one and I'm super excited for it! I'm just re-reading his books to pass the time" Bendy replied, smiling. Stars, he loved talking about Felix's book. He always got giddy when the topic came up and when he starts talking he won't shut up. It drives boris bonkers but he always listens to his brothers rambling (sometimes bendy gets so loud he doesn't have a choice but to listen) because it makes him happy.

"Thats cool! I think you have a bit of a obsession with his books though" he chuckled. He wasn't wrong and he knew it. He knew how much bendy loved those books.

"I just like them" Bendy said before he continued to read. Boris scoffed playfully and mumbled something to himself that mugman didn't catch.

There was a knock at the door! It was likely felix coming around like he normally does. Sure enough Cuphead answered the door and felix stood there with a smile on his face, showing off the sharp teeth he had.

"Hey there Cuphead! How's it going?" Felix asked. Cuphead looked a tad irritated to see felix there. Cuphead isn't known for his kindness..that's for sure.

"It's..fine." he said before letting felix in. Felix walked over to bendy, making sure to sort of stomp whenever he could to get bendys attention. Bendy looked over at him and smiled "Mr Felix!" Bendy said.

"Hiya bendy! How are ya?" Felix asked with a smile. "Im doing good" Bendy replied happily.

"Thats great!" Felix said before ruffling bendys dark hair.

(Note from me lol)

so uhh I don't know how to properly cut this off so if this us weird or wonky IM SORRY!! Also if this isn't interested I'm sorry 3: and this may not be accurate to @ninesillywaffles au! Sorry for yapping so much lol and sorry if this is too short! I waited too long to post this T-T

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italeteller · 8 months ago

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Well, it's officially My Herover

What a god damn bummer

I remember starting the series, feeling not quite satisfied with the MCU at the time and loving Izuku and All Might and the way the series didn't take long to put Bakugo's ego in check

Then the sports festival arc blew everything out the water. Deku's resourcefulness during the obstable race, the cavalry team battle, Bakugo vs Uraraka, my boy Shinso, and the unforgettable Deku vs Todoroki really made me feel like this was a mangaka who could make an excellent story with any character, no matter how little screentime they'd had before

The Stain arc wasn't quite as impactful as the sports festival, but it did wonders for Deku, Iida and Todoroki's growth, and Uraraka's martial arts training was a welcome surprise

The training camp was Deku's finest moment. I don't care what anybody says, "My Hero" is the greatest Izuku chapter and both the manga and anime did magic with it

And then came the peak of the series, though we wouldn't know it for years. All Might vs All for One. I remember being stressed out of my mind that All Might would die, and happy beyond belief when he survived

But then cracks started appearing. The eight precepts arc skipped the all-girls team and gave Izuku a get-out-of-jail-free card to abuse his powers with no consequences whatsoever. The festival arc was great but seeing Nejire in a beauty competition didn't make up for her being skipped in the eight precepts arc

And then Izuku developed a second quirk, and the promise of six more quirks down the line, which was honestly the beginning of the end. I said as much when the chapter dropped and history had proven me right. Because Izuku was already gonna become the strongest hero in history, stronger than All Might, because that's how OfA works. There was no need to give him a swiss army knife of extra superpowers

The villain arc did little to ease my worries. It focused on the three villains that had already had the most screentime and ignored Spinner and Compress who really needed some more background exploration, and it made Shigaraki bonkers levels of powerful

And then there was the war. During the kids' first year of school. Midnight got killed offscreen, because I guess Horikoshi needed someone "important" to die but he didn't want to kill anybody actually important (seriously, go look at the list of casualties of the war. It's a bunch of nobodies and Midnight)

Star and Stripes came and died only to nerf Shigaraki, which wouldn't have been necessary ir Hori could balance his power sets

Nagant came, exposed even more the dark side of hero agencies, got immediately redeemed by Izuku and then blew up

Deku's vigilante arc was. A thing that existed. And it really showed how underdeveloped most of Class 1A were, because the big emotional scene where everybody asks Izuku to remember the good times they shared together was 80% "hey remember this one and only scene we had?". Points for Bakugo and Iida though, they got the good stuff

The traitor reveal arc was also a thing that happened. Woulda been nice if the kids had had some actual time to process their feelings and deal with the fallout of the whole thing

And then the final war. Boy, did that one drag on forever. Bakugo died, then he got better because a hero who never had any screentime with him sacrificed himself to save him except he didn't even die so no biggie

Toga and Spinner could have had something, maybe, but Hori didn't spent enough time to seriously make them impactful. Spinner especially, the whole heteromorph discrimination thing felt way too forced and tacked on at the last minute

All Might busted out a mecha suit to fight on All for One's level, which would've come in pretty handy when they fought against Shigaraki. Then AfO died, but then he wasn't dead and was actually the one who gave Shigaraki his quirk, and he ate Shigaraki's soul and became the big bad, and then he died literally 2 chapters later, and Shigaraki who had enough energy left for one last hit against AfO also died for good. Oh and Izuku lost both arms, which had been built-up to happen since the sports festival, but then he got them back one chapter later so. No biggie

And then the final chapters. Society got better, don't ask for details. Everybody is 8 years older, don't ask for timeskip designs. Izuku is now a teacher, but he gets a new mech suit that shouldn't have taken 8 years to develop considering All Might's took months, and he jumps right back up to be a hero. The end

My Hero feels like the new gen Naruto. A large cast with varied powers that 80% never get properly developed in favor of the big 3, and a very interesting world that barely gets explored

The 1A vs 1B arc really feels like the point where the series becomes something different. Side characters begone, it's the Izuku-Bakugo-Shoto story. Inko, the protagonist's mother, who always had been shown suffering through Izuku's many injuries and even got All Might to admit he hadn't been taking proper care of his protegé, got sidelined and we don't even see her react to the truth of Izuku's quirk. Izuku masters 6 quirks offscreen, whereas before the series made an absolute point of showing the process of him growing and learning and improving

I really loved this series, and I'm damn dissappointed in what it became, in case it wasn't clear. I hope Horikoshi has made enough money to rest for a while. By the end he constantly needed to take breaks because his health was just going down the drain. I hope he gets to kick back and relax, and if he ever writes anything else I'm not gonna read it

Good bye, My Hero Academia. I'll always cherish the first parts and the characters, almost as much as I'll mourn all the wasted potential they all had

#Das OP #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #spoilers #manga spoilers

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booksandabeer · 1 year ago

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Catch up tag

Thank you for tagging me, @somanywords. Always love an excuse to ramble on about things! 💛

Last song I listened to: Weak In Your Light by Nation of Language

Last thing I read: I fell down a Cat Sebastian rabbit hole (all the blame goes to @voylitscope) and read her Cabot Trilogy (mlm romances set in the late 50s to early 70s, mostly in NYC) within a few days. Her books are a little fanfic-y in ways that I find both delightful and frustrating at times, but mostly I'm having a blast. I've now read four of her books and I'm starting to recognize certain recurring patterns when it comes to characterizations and romantic/sexual dynamics, but luckily it's the exact kind of stuff that I like, so I'm not getting bored yet.

Last movie I watched: All of Us Strangers, which worked for me more as an emotional experience rather than a movie, or a coherent story, but I think that was the intended effect. Absolutely phenomenal performance by Andrew Scott.

Last tv show: I'm currently watching Shōgun (excellent in every way) and Fallout (bonkers gory fun), and I finished 3 Body Problem (the good parts were good, the bad parts were almost laughably bad—I'm surprised I made it to the end, tbh). I also tried to watch Manhunt, the limited Apple series about the Lincoln assassination and the hunt for John Wilkes Booth, starring Tobias Menzies. "Tried" being the operative word here. I've made it through 3 episodes and it's just not grabbing me at all. Even worse, some of the narrative choices make me actively angry. I doubt I will continue. Next up: Ripley and yessss, Kings.

Last thing I googled: "iwtv season 2 release date" (It's May 12th!)

Last thing I ate: chocolate cookie

Sweet, salty, or savory: I mean all of them are good but if I have to choose: savory!

Sleep: Would love to get some. Or at least more than 3 hours at a time would be fantastic.

Currently reading: Dreamland by Adam Soboczynski, which I find entertaining as an anecdotal memoir, but I had hoped for more insightful commentary on the cultural tensions between East and West Germany post-reunification as seen through the eyes of a Polish immigrant. But maybe that's just a case of false expectations on my part, rather than a flaw of the book.

And now the awkward part! Honestly, if you read this, consider yourself tagged. I genuinely enjoy hearing about what people read/watch/eat. But ok, I'll play and tag @some-october-in-the-future, @dontcallmebree, @burberrycanary, @thisonesatellite, @latums. No pressure, obviously.

#tag games

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yeahimcal · 2 years ago

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Okay I have been thinking about Jean-Paul and Antonio and their casual acts of intimacy both in the show but also in my mind

Like. When they get the first relic for VILE they take a selfie so casually and hold each other so close? And Antonio says, very brightly, ‘that’s a keeper!’ It’s so clear that this is something they do all the time!!!! They must take pictures after every successful caper and I bet Jean-Paul keeps them all in a folder on his phone. I bet he makes photo books for their anniversaries. I bet Antonio kisses him breathless every time he gets them.

Also when they defect from VILE they start a food truck?’)):!3$-??2 It makes me CRAZY!!!! They must use food as a love language!!! They must cook for each other all the time!!!!! I bet they learned how to make each other’s favorite foods when they were still in the academy and snuck into the kitchen for midnight snacks giggling like fools and sneaking gentle kisses. I bet they made picnics and ate them on the beach.

I bet Antonio dug in the sand to make small pools for them to lay in on their off days (pools just big enough for the two of them, room for Black Sheep if she squeezed in) while the rest of their class played on the beach. I bet Jean-Paul was so good at volleyball. I think Antonio would’ve been a good libero. I bet that’s when they started realizing that they only ever wanted to work together. A team. High and low. They must have had to get special permission from The Faculty. I bet it was terrifying to ask.

I think it would’ve been Shadowsan who allowed it. Cleo and Bellum were all for it (I bet they were the same way in their agent days). Brunt and Maelstrom probably thought the teamwork made them weak. I think when Shadowsan raised his hand to allow them to work together Jean-Paul cried.

Jean-Paul is the only one of the two we see that does drop offs or pickups. I bet it was a compromise- he does solo work or he does it with Antonio.

Also. While I’m talking about them. They love Carmen. They love her so much. She’s like their little sister. She speaks French with Jean-Paul when he’s feeling lonely and she makes food with Antonio when he’s worried. She painted Antonio’s nails all the time and she was the one who helped Jean-Paul with his buzz cut the first time. When he had to buzz it the first time after she left he cried. Antonio had to do it. Then they both cried because they felt like something was just missing. When they learned she had run away they were devastated. They took any assignment as an excuse to look for her. I bet Carmen visits their food truck a lot. I bet she stays to talk until they close and then hugs them so tight and says goodnight, off to her next adventure.

Sorry for being crazy. They make me insane. Drive me bonkers, even

#Jean Paul cs #Antonio cs #el topo #la chèvre #carmen sandeigo 2019 #carmen sandeigo netflix #carmen sandiego #i don’t think you understand #Carmen is their little sister #she is closer with Antonio I think #i would kill for them #I love characters!!!!!!#i fucking love them so much #Villains international league of evil #more like these bitches are forming relationships that drive me crazy #I hate them (I don’t)

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thegeminisage · 1 year ago

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readers i am so thrilled to report that tng this evening absolutely ATE. i thought tng was bad but as it turns out tng is good sometimes??? we did "a matter of honor" and "the measure of a man" which are proof of fucking concept: tng CAN BE GOOD!!!

a matter of honor: this is the first time i've been really, really fond of riker. his go-with-the-flow attitude is fantastic. yeah i'll wear the slut costume on the woman planet. sure i'll eat these worms to please the klingons. absolutely i will fuck two of their women at once. good for him. i get it now. I GET IT NOW. he is not only down to fuck is is down to do any and everything. when it rome. so true, buddy. he would've eaten those worms in the conspiracy episode fr

i was just noting how pleased i was that wesley only basically had secondary lines this season ("aye sir" and the like) when they called him to the transport room, but luckily it was just to be racist to that one guy...like, it was stupid, but obviously they were just explaining why they were re-using the prosthetic which turned it around into being funny

picard turning his nose up at the klingon food. WHAT A LIMP NOODLE OF A MAN. IF RIKER CAN EAT IT YOU CAN EAT IT. kirk would've eaten it. don't worry i'm only ragging on picard for this episode he's gonna get his time

whatever worf and riker had going on in this episode was gay. ok gayboys!

riker on the klingon ship...chefs kiss...he was so good. effortlessly parrying the challenge to his authority. conniving to become captain. the word phrase "who's your daddy now" may have been uttered by one or both parties during these scenes, among incredulous laughter. i can't believe he had it in him.

oh and HOW can we forget the klingon women. i actually forgive them for not only the threesome joke but also the breastfeeding joke because they were: fucking hilarious, actually, and felt more like they were punching down at riker instead of women. also i now 100% believe he is prepared to fuck his way through any given spaceship at any time and GOOD for him.

the measure of a man: FINALLY SOME GOOD FUCKING FOOD

still flying high on the endorphins of riker doing All Of That we got to view the poker game, which is apparently the first of many. it was wonderful. i loved data's little visor

episode started to drag when picard's lawyer ex turned up (toscore) bc i dont (didnt?) care about him or his love life, but when maddox showed up i was on high fucking alert bc i knew the name but couldnt remember why

LISTENNN every time he called data an it i gasped. i did call him a bitch several times in a row sorry to catherine. i knew obviously that data was going to be fine but i went on this ENTIRE journey

where do i even start. data resigning rather than submitting to the procedure, his goodbye party, his goodbye to geordi specifically AND THEY SHOULD HAVE HUGGED, augh augh augh

i think it was dumb to make will be the prosecuter if he wasn't going to more actively convey his regret to the audience. all of his goodwill from the klingon ship episode was used up sooo quickly especially when he used data's off button. data doesn't like that!!!!!

i did LOVE however the conversation picard had with guinan...which is bonkers bc apparently it was a last minute addition. but her like oh yeah they're gonna make more datas. entire generations of disposable people and his lightbulb going on OH YOU MEAN SLAVERY and she's like no thats a little harsh and hes like ACTUALLY NO IT ISN'T. it was so good. for the first time tng excelled at something that tos doesn't - like it wasn't too on the nose or pointed the way grand speeches in tos were. it was JUST subtle enough and coming from a black woman who is on tng because of the black woman in tos legitimized it in a way that it couldn't have been as much if, say, picard had come to it on his own. david cage WISHES

PICARD'S EXAMINATION OF MADDOX AND SPEECH IN THE COURTROOM. DID YOU GUYS KNOW HE COULD ACT? hey. did anyone know patrick stewart can act??? he was so fucking pissed off this whole episode and it was kind of nice but like did you guys KNOW he could ACT. when he got in maddox's fucking face about it. GO the fuck OFF i have been waiting and WAITING for him to do this

i loved data's packing things coming back, esp his hologram of tasha yar...she literally took his virginity lol i miss you queen

"does data have a soul? i don't know. i don't know that i have" I LOVE WHEN STAR TREK IS ATHEIST

data forgiving maddox in a sense at the end and maddox switching to calling him he...EYE certainly don't forgive maddox but his shock was so good. realizing something you thought was an inanimate object was like, alive.

also i really like that he forgave riker...i was so relieved they had a scene at the end together and so moved that data could find compassion for him after everything he did that EYE forgave riker...data is genuinely the most loving soul wtf i'd fucking die for him. anyway that made me well up a little bit. what a great episode 10/10 this is gonna be my first "must see" i think

ok! next i do "the dauphin" on my own and then tomorrow we do "the contagion" together

#personal #star trek blogging #tng lb #literally an alternate dimension where tng is good..........

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firespirited · 1 year ago

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In other news my Dune fixation caused by some amazing tumblr meta writing has not been sated by watching the DUNCs.

I had a long pretty good post typed out after the first one and tumblr ate it:

here goes:

I considered it an alternate timeline (by the time we get the non-Alia and Chani choices of DUNC 2, we're definitely in a different version of this story - I like not knowing if Messiah will be much like the book, I like it if there's no escaping the plots set in motion). I had to repeat Alternate Timeline as a litany when there was no diplomatic party, no tweaking methhead bitchy Piter and Kynes didn't get That Moment with nature.

Was disappointed by the fact Paul isn't already tormented by potential futures at his first major fight wondering if dying might be the best way to avoid mass death and escape the machinations. To me, in that fight, he's chosen a path to the suffering of billions and justifies it and refines it later.

Lynch Dune remains fun because it's bonkers, this is fun too but definitely alternate timeline and neither are at all how I imagine it. Lynch seemed to nail the spirit of some of the characters better despite massive creative liberties with the plot details. It's its own weird and wonderful artefact.

Villeneuve remains the king of ovoid spaceships, mega landscapes and letting the fashion and sound designers get a great budget. I love the Chani additions, not canon and I don't care, it works!

The lack of Arabic complex concepts and more references to eastern religions was sorely lacking: flow has to be more than just a picture of moving sand, i wanted that cells interlinked within cells interlinked: galaxies and molecules and populations easter egg.

I also had a hope for DUNC 2 that it would show the whole universe as deeply religious, as in hardwired to give themselves over to a higher power even if that belief is atheism or eugenics. It didn't and I think that's really important context to properly understand what the story is saying. We've got political devotion bad and religious zealotry bad with both being culturally groomed into people but not the larger context of other "cults" that aren't explicitly about power but self-improvement or belonging or even service.

----------------------

My silly pet theory is that the font is like that because we're probably never getting the two other "ones who bridge everything" of the trinity: sad worm god emperor and our man DUNC potadaho the ultimate renaissance man with a thousand lives. (As much as I'd love DUNC 8 2039: we're putting silver fox Momoa in situations again)

The dream will always be the cartoon/anime adaptation:

52 x 50-minute episodes that teeter wildly between dense political machinations, ecological exposition, that Bakshi LOTR trippy violence and even trippier visions interrupting action scenes, but most of all, near blasphemous levels of religious symbolism top to bottom, the Abramic sure, but the Buddhist, Hindu and Taoist. If they could add Paul getting a big dose of gender WTF: trill-style after being exposed to the water of life that would be amazing.

But yeah I need to get my hands on large print books - yeah yeah, the migraines will murder me regardless. I missed being in everyone's head. Like, the films are great a conveying scale but not how much it's an interpersonal drama first and foremost... for many of the side characters too.

#saf #movie reviews #dune

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late-to-the-magnus-archives · 2 years ago

Text

Fed - a Magnus Archives fanfic

So. This was just what it was, now. Hardly the first time in my life I’d faced challenges, gray morality, and a strange situation in which I wasn’t precisely trapped, but all my other options were worse than the one I was considering.

It was heavy. Too heavy.

“Take a moment,” said Spider Martin. “Looks like you need it.”

I eyed him. “Reading my thoughts?”

“No, your face. It’s quite expressive. Whatever you’re thinking about, it’s clearly a lot?”

I hated his blue eyes.

That wasn’t his fault. Something about him just made me remember how I had watched him die.

(Then is your Martin really your Martin?)

Yes. Shut up. I couldn’t… That was not a box we were opening this afternoon.

Spoilers for the whole show. This is post-MAG 200.

Part four of the Magnus Monsterverse AU.

AO3

--------

The fog took me, and as if I’d spent a thousand years there instead of my own metamorphosis, I immediately succumbed.

It wasn’t even conscious: just a completion, a sense of self and no other, an aching, longing magnificence that hurt like pure joy, flooding through me. I think I cried out. I might have come. I definitely wept.

This place… oh. Oh. I ate it up. It ate it up. We ate it up, together. There was such strange joy in me. It was such a wondrously terrible new thing. It drank it in, and I drank it in, and I may have cried out again, because this time, he answered.

“I’m here. I’ve got you. I’m here.” And Martin pulled me in, shocking in his there-ness, his solidity, his presence, the very miracle of his existence.

He was the only thing that was real, and We loved it that way.

I clung to him and cried. I could not get close enough. I never could, not ever; it would never be enough, and I embraced that, painted my body, rolled my eyes back in my head to bask in its glorious void.

He breathed deeply, slowly, and his heart beat strong. “It was you,” he said. “While I was in the waves, it was you, missing you, thinking of you, grieving you… that’s what did it. That’s what powered everything.”

And suddenly, I saw.

Saw him in strange, wild waves, surfacing to stare at a gray sky that matched his eyes.

Saw that he rarely surfaced. He spent most of his time under, in the broad, booming silence, the current pulling him along, far from everyone and everything. The isolation under pressure; the magnificence of loneliness in a world with other living things—

He rejoiced in his pain, felt he deserved it—but it didn’t last.

“They died,” he whispered, and tears kissed his cheeks, so I kissed them off.

He felt them dying; felt the people—so far away their absence made him ache—winking out like lights.

Martin breathed in the water (and I did with him) and mourned and lost.

And when it happened, and all were gone, his god fed on him.

Because of me.

“It was you,” he whispered. “Missing you was… it became everything. I missed you so much that I…”

He lost himself.

I could look up at him, now, and saw him like burning mist, saw his perfect eyes with limbal rings I could tumble into and drown.

“When they found me…” He swallowed. “When Tim leaned through the door of fire that Maneula somehow got him to make and found me, I didn’t know his name. I knew his face, but it just made me cry.”

I understood that. I knew I’d cry when I met him, too. I was sure he still hadn’t forgiven me.

“When they came, I fought them. I thought that if they took me away from here, I’d lose missing you. That’s bonkers, isn’t it?”

“No,” I said.

He touched my lips. His eyes were wide. “What?”

“No,” I repeated.

He looked stunned. “You’re in my silence. You can’t speak.”

Oh. I felt what he meant; he had this weird, Lonely power, this silence he could enforce, but, I—ah. “Yes, I can.” I knew how to talk.

Martin still stared. He looked spooked. “We… we should go back.”

I’d scared him. That would not do, so I kissed him instead.

He made a sound and responded, clutching me, his blazing eyes sliding shut. Color washed his cheeks, and as it did, we became real.

The fog vanished as if eaten by summer sun. We stood together in our apartment block, in the central courtyard, under blue spring sky, in sight of all the windows.

We both breathed hard, shudders trembling through us like aftershocks.

“What did you do?” he whispered.

“I kissed you,” I said, still dazed. “Was I not supposed to?”

“You… you became the Lonely,” said Martin. “You were the Lonely. You… I don’t understand.”

Eh?

What?

Eh?

“I what?”

“Hey, kiddos,” said Mike, coming out from the same building I lived in. “We’re heading out to get a bite. Want to come?”

We had no time for this. We had to deal with what just happened. We—

Oh. Behind him came a rogue’s gallery.

That was Michael Shelley. Right behind him came Helen Richardson, scowling.

There was Arthur Nolan—an angry, angry man, made worse because there were two of him in a row. They had not bothered to be anything but identical.

Sarah Baldwin came out beside Jane Prentiss, both of them chattering away about something called Brother Love I’d never heard of.

(The Eye dropped three seasons’ worth of this bizarre forbidden-love-among-the-cloisters “reality” show into my head. Thanks. You shouldn’t have.)

(Drama! It happily tremored at me.)

I stared at the lot of them, frozen. So many of them had tried to kill me, or been part of my torment. My actions had led to their deaths, as well—and some of them, I’d never even seen in the light of day.

I made a small noise. I don’t know what it was. Some panicked thing.

“I've got you,” said Martin. “It's okay. They’re not going to hurt you.”

I couldn’t believe that.

They greeted Martin with smiles, though no touches, no personal space invasions (and I could appreciate that). Me, however… no one seemed to know what to do with. They eyed me. Jane stared. Michael tilted his head. Helen rolled her eyes.

“We going, or what?” snapped Nolan One with all the grace of a bulldozer. “I’m fuckin’ hungry,” said Nolan Two.

“I think we should initiate our new friend and make him join,” said Mike Crew.

Sarah Baldwin laughed. It wasn’t a nice sound. “He looks like a scared rabbit.”

“He’s fine,” said Martin.

Was this happening? This was happening. “You’re going?” I said to Martin.

He looked grim. “We should.”

He was trying not to be lonely. Trying so hard.

I would never get in the way of that. “I’ll go, sure,” I said, staring at Jane (whose skin boasted numerous scars, even more than my own, but no sign of worms just yet). “I, uh. I’m Jon. Hi.” So graceful. My face burned.

Jane grinned, stretching her scars. "Hi."

Helen laughed. As she did, her face shifted; she was still Helen, still herself, but she’d changed, like distortion through glass. “Hi, Jon. I’m Helen.”

Michael tilted his head further. Too far. Smiling in an utterly banal manner. "Archivist."

“I… yes. It’s weird to see you both at the same time.”

They just looked at me.

(It was thrilled. If I could have shrunk small enough to hide in Martin’s pocket, I would have, and It loved my misery.)

“Oh, I like this one,” said Michael. “You’re much less human than before.”

“Ah. Well,” I said. “That’s true, I suppose.”

“Still a prick,” said Helen.

“Hey,” I protested.

“From what I recall,” said Martin, “you were the one so obsessed with him that you wanted to keep him in your corridors until everybody else he ever knew died so you could have him all to yourself.”

And everyone turned to stare at her.

Helen’s dark cheeks blushed darker. “Well. Desperate times, and all that.”

Michael cracked up.

Crew followed, and Sarah, and soon everyone was laughing, even the Nolans—and it wasn’t a bad laugh, it really was not, but I felt no better.

“We’ve all come a long way,” said Jane.

“Archivist,” said Michael. “Come to us. Join us. Let us see your skill.”

“My what?”

“We’re, uh. We… can you guys go ahead? We’ll meet you at the curb.”

“Ooh,” said Nolan One, low. “Somebody hasn’t been told about the birds and the bees yet.”

“Be nice,” said Sarah, and swatted his arm.

Nolan Two bared his teeth at her.

“Sure,” said Crew, and gestured to them all. They all walked on, continuing their conversations or lack thereof.

Michael winked at me over his shoulder, then loudly said to Helen, “So what did that feel like, all trapped inside you?”

“Kill me now,” I muttered, covering my face.

Martin kissed my forehead. He’d lost just a shade of the color he’d had, but seemed to be holding steady. “So. Here’s how this works. We go and meet at a pre-set point in the city. Then we, uh. He gives us a list of people.”

I looked up slowly. “To what end?”

He just looked back.

“To what? To… to feed on?”

“It’s that, or we feed the Fears through ourselves—and something about us, about what we were at the ends of our worlds means that if we let them feed on us, we supercharge them. We could end it here all over again. So we don’t do that. Instead, we… Annabelle calls it ‘hummingbirds.’”

Flitting from person to person, sipping the nectar of fear. “So it’s all even less stable than Leitner said. This is horrible.”

“It’s not that bad. The people we see don’t even realize it’s happening, usually—we keep it light. Besides, we don’t do it to nice people.”

My look was dry.

“I mean it, Jon. People who hurt animals. That sort of thing.”

“A lot of those in London, are there?”

“You’d be surprised. There’s less fear in this world in general; it’s less spread out, so it’s potent. We only need a little.”

“This is insane. You know that, right? You must see it. This is lunacy.”

“It’s surviving. Which is a choice.”

Oh, how I hated that, but I understood. I knew. I got it. We could all do the world a favor and die, but none of us truly wanted to. Or at least… knew we should not want that. How did one judge the worth of a life? The risk of that life doing wrong? At what point could I or anyone say, you’re too dangerous to live because of what you might do?

“You’re right,” I whispered.

“It's going to be okay. I promise. Come on and join us today.” His smile was small, but real. “Keeps you from going crazy.”

And I knew that was true for him.

And I knew it was true for them.

And I knew it was not true for me.

Something weird was happening here. Or I was delusional.

Or maybe It was lying to me, wanting me so hungry I would make a mistake.

(I knew, though: It could not lie.)

“I’ll join you,” I said, softly. “But I swear, if I see actual innocent people being… being…”

“You won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do. I trust the people we’re working with.”

“Web.” I clenched my jaw. (Were my teeth made of eyes, too? Calcified, maybe?)

“I don’t expect you to be there right away,” he said, and kissed my forehead again. “I don’t expect you to adjust to all this quickly. But I hope you can at least trust me.”

I stared. “That is a hell of a thing to leverage, Martin.”

“It’s that important. I wouldn’t just say that, you know.”

I did know. “You’re really serious about this.”

“I need you so much.” It was a whisper. “I’ll do anything I have to do in order to keep you from… burning out, or getting devoured by your stupid Eye, or falling afoul of the hunters.”

“Hunters?” I said.

“Later.”

We were growing quite a pile of things to talk about later. “All right. All right. I’ll come with you. Show me, Martin. I trust you.”

So help me, he regained some of his color as we walked out of the courtyard to join the others, who’d waited by the curb.

I had never been good with groups of people.

The theater group in which I met Georgie (and through her, gained at least some social skills) had helped a little.

The Magnus Institute Library employees, of whom I was merely one of many, also helped—I could tag along without pressure, camouflaged by their gregariousness.

The Archives… that group was considerably less comfortable because I felt like it was all on me.

It wasn’t. I know that now, but my promotion went straight to my head, and not in a confident way. I’d felt immediately underqualified and out of place, and wondered daily why the hell I’d accepted the position.

I knew now. I could not have refused. I didn’t know that, then. I’m not sure that understanding would have helped, either.

Still, the social aspect of things had only meant stress. To this day, I did not recall going to Martin’s birthday party and rambling about emulsions while eating rum and raisin ice cream. The Eye did not give me that memory back. I knew it happened only because Tim and Martin and Sasha had never stopped teasing me over it. Very funny, really.

(Tim. Sasha. Oh, gods…)

(Right, Archive, focus, you’re all right, they’re here now—)

(Jon. Dear lord. Focus, Jon.)

So I was obviously in a good head space for something like this.

“So you’re really Jon,” said Jane Prentiss, and something that wasn’t a tongue moved in her mouth as she spoke.

I choked a little. “Y… yeah. Hi.”

“Huh. I killed you in my world,” she said.

“I’m hearing that a lot today,” I muttered.

She smiled, and dear gods, her teeth were squirming. “I’m glad they found you. I wanted to apologize.”

“To… wh… why?”

“Well, it wasn’t really you I was mad at. It was your Eye.”

“Oh.”

Her grin made it more awkward, not less; she stepped closer. “You smell delicious, by the way.”

“Martin,” I said in a tiny, pitiful voice.

“Jane, come on, be nice,” said Martin, pulling me closer.

She laughed and backed away.

“Did everybody here kill me?” I whispered.

“Not all of them, but, uh. Possibly most?”

Fuck.

We walked past the park and into the city. It was clean; the vehicles genuinely were all electric. I saw no one who seemed down on their luck, either, which was bizarre.

What kind of idealized place was this? And what, exactly, was the hidden underside?

They were all talking, and because I have terrible timing, I decided this was the moment to whisper to Martin, “What did you mean by, ‘don’t you try to take my choices and blame yourself for them?’”

He stiffened. “I’m not ready to talk about it.”

“All right. I can wait.”

“Liar.”

I laughed. “I am not lying.”

“You can’t wait to find out,” he teased.

Gods, I wanted to kiss him. “I may have learned a little patience in a thousand years.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” he challenged.

I grinned, but before I could respond, he spoke.

No. Another him spoke.

“Right,” said his voice, but it wasn’t him, and I turned slowly to find the other Martin waiting for us all on the corner.

The moment I saw him in the light of day, I knew: this Martin was Web.

Completely Web, all the way through; his smile was perfect, and his stance, and the way he shifted his weight and barely met other people’s eyes and laughed easily.

It was completely fake, and I could see it, and I felt like my skin was going to crawl right off my bones. Or whatever I had under there. Eye-bones.

He seemed to know, and he stopped to stare at me. For one moment, when I met his eyes, they were dead. Flat. Dull. There in place to hide the spiders behind them, utterly without anything resembling emotion or true life.

Then he was just Martin (so similar to my Martin, or… no. What Martin had been before everything), and smiling at everybody. “I’ve got all kinds of assignments for you today,” he said, handing out Post-It notes.

“Sure, but did you account for our latest acquisition?” said Nolan One.

Sarah Baldwin barked a laugh, and Jane elbowed her.

“I did!” said Spider Martin happily. “Jon? It’s okay if I call you Jon, right? You’re starting out with me today.” He approached me.

Don’t reach for the Eye, I told myself. Don’t. Don’t. Don’t.

On my bright green Post-It was Martin’s flowing script with two addresses and the instructions, 1:30pm Martin B.; 3:00pm Mike C. “What?” I said.

“Why?” said my Martin.

“Because we’ve all got split shifts, and it seems like a good idea to help Jon get along with everybody?” said Spider Martin. “His second will be with Mike.”

“Not fair,” said my Martin, but without anguish.

Spider Martin shrugged. “It’s the best one for this afternoon. Trust me on this.”

Everyone seemed to accept this with ease. Great. They were all drinking the arachnidian Kool-Aid.

“Can I get him next time?” said Michael.

Spider Martin beamed. “Yes! Jane after that.”

“Yipee!” said Michael.

“What is happening right now?” I said.

“I think you’re popular?” said my Martin.

I did not feel popular.

“Shall we?” said Spider Martin.

“I don’t even know what we’re doing. I don’t understand. I don’t—”

My Martin cupped my cheek, turned me to him, and kissed me. Lingering. Slow. A delicate tasting of lips and tongue, a gentle whisper of love and attention, a promise. “You’ll be fine,” he murmured.

“I don’t have a box for any of this,” I murmured back. “And I think my label maker is broken.”

Martin laughed. “Your label maker of doom?”

“Something like that.”

He nuzzled me. “See you in a little bit.”

And he pulled away, paired up with Sarah Baldwin. (Stranger—and if she did anything to him, I would…)

(Would what? Would what? I didn’t know. Something terrible. Something…)

“I don’t bite,” said Spider Martin.

I looked at him.

Martin’s smile. Martin’s face. Martin’s body. No—Martin’s skin. I could feel he was crawling on the inside.

I turned away. Whatever happened to him was done. He wasn’t mine, never had been. I still wanted to react. Violently. As if to his murder.

“I’m not dead, you know,” he said.

“Yes, you are,” I whispered.

“No more than Annabelle. I know—or I’m pretty sure, anyway—that you’ll struggle with this, but I chose this path. I did. I’m happy with it, too.”

“You ended your world.”

“Pot, kettle?”

I swallowed. “Knowing I did wrong hardly exonerates you.”

“We didn’t really get to know you in my world,” said Spider Martin. “You caught up with Darren and took the book back right at Mister Spider’s front door.”

Darren. That’s what the bully’s name was. “Did I?”

“Yeah. You died pretty quickly. Your mind snapped before they could get much fear out of you, so there wasn’t a point to dragging it out.”

I turned to stare at him.

“There you are!” he said cheerily. “Your eyes were brown originally, weren’t they?”

“They were. And yours should be green.”

He beamed. “Naw.”

“Naw?”

“Blue tends to be trusted more easily. It’s racially offensive, and largely due to media influence, but there you go.”

I stared harder.

“Would you rather me pretend to be something I’m not?” he asked, putting genuine curiosity into it.

“No,” I said quietly. “I… it’s a nightmare. This. Is all.”

“Because you think it’s losing someone.”

“It is.”

“No. The Stranger—that’s losing someone. A weird ingestion and rebirth like the Distortion—that’s losing someone. This?” He gestures at himself. “This isn’t losing someone any more than you were lost.”

I wasn’t sure I hadn't been lost.

He smiled so easily. “Come on. Let me show you how this works. You’ll think better when fed,” he said, as harmless and bright as a children’s mascot.

I was already fed. Somehow. But I didn’t want to try to get into it. “Lead the way, I suppose.” Everyone else had already paired off and left. “Do you always assign partners?”

“And areas, yes. We wouldn’t want to cause harm, and the buddy system helps prevent that.”

I snorted.

“It’s true! Your Beholding might lack the ability to consider consequences, but surely you don’t think we do.”

“What, the Web has a stance against overfishing?”

“Yes! Exactly so. We didn’t even mean to end the world when we did. We’re significantly more careful now to avoid it ever happening again.”

“How did it happen, then?”

(The Eye offered to show me. I refused.)

“Get to know me a little bit better, and I’ll tell you.”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to get to know him better, but I also didn’t feel like I had a choice.

In silence, he led me north, past old buildings I sort of knew, past silent cars I’d never imagined, past lovely boutiques and pubs with a distinct lack of loud music or voices coming from them.

I’d never seen a London like this. I had no idea how to feel about it.

Neither did It, and the drive to know why this was so grew in me with anticipatory joy like a child looking forward to their birthday.

I couldn’t blame It. This was absolutely unexpected. The differences in history must have been significant.

“How did your world end, anyway?” said Spider Martin. “You hardly have to tell me, of course, but I rather thought you’d prefer we hear your understanding over Manuela’s.”

I really needed to meet this woman. “And how the hell would she even know anything?”

“Same way she found you.” We turned a corner, and finally there was sound—a busker, just beginning to tune his violin. “She calculates things. Honestly, if she weren’t so firmly entrenched in the Eye, she'd have made a lovely sister.”

I stopped walking. “She’s Eye?”

“That she is. It was her desire to see more and know every world that had her prepared and able to escape when the time came.”

I couldn’t imagine Manuela Dominguez as Eye. “Then she didn’t build a Dark Sun. She didn’t hole up at Ny-Ålesund. She didn’t try to summon Mister Pitch.”

“Not her. Some of her alternates, yes, but they’re secondaries. She’s Prime.”

“Prime?”

“The first one of her kind rescued. In her case, the actual rescuer, too.” Martin produced paper money from his pocket.

It wasn’t a design I’d ever seen. “May I?”

“Of course.” He handed it over.

It was a ten-pound banknote. Julius Caesar glowered on the front of it, stern and uncompromising. The bill itself was cornflower blue; intricate guilloche in a gradient from orange to purple subtly deepened the design, and it bore such phrases as The Bank of Holy England and Toward the Greatest Empire.

Damn. I really needed to get hold of some history books.

(The Eye offered to show me how this banknote existed. How it had been designed. What the phrases meant. Why a long-dead Roman emperor decorated the front. No, I told It, firm and tamping down my need. Let me find out on my own.)

This delighted It. The joy of discovery through me was apparently worth the wait.

“What did money look like where you came from?” said Spider Martin.

“Do you actually care?” I drawled.

“Inasmuch as I’m trying to establish a decent working relationship with you, yes, I absolutely do.”

“Then surely you know telling me things is more valuable than asking.”

“What do you think I've been doing?” said Spider Martin. “We are here to pay that man over there to play ‘The Outlandish Knight,’ which he associates with a past girlfriend, with whom he associates the feeling of being trapped and controlled, and playing it makes him afraid he’ll never get free. Thus, shall I be fed. And you, my dear Archivist, merely need to watch him—because he’ll feel very, very watched, and thus shall you be fed.”

I frowned. “And he deserves this, does he?”

“In revenge against that girlfriend, he poisoned her cat.”

“He what?” Well, now I was furious.

Which (calm down, Jon) was probably on purpose. It was calculated.

“He did,” said Spider Martin. “What happened to him wasn’t nice, but he isn’t very nice, either.”

“Did the cat… die?”

“No, fortunately, though it did go blind.”

I clenched my jaw. Anger against this random man tempted. (Easy, Jon. Easy.) “If you’re lying to me, we’re going to have a problem.”

Spider Martin looked at me. “Jon, I’m not stupid enough to lie to you. You could just see it. If I lie, it’ll undo any attempts to build trust between us. All right?”

That… made sense. “All right. Why do you want to work with me, then?”

“Because we all need to work together. All of us. We’re unique in all the world, and we have a challenging existence. We need each other to keep each other balanced and prevent the world from ending again.”

Damn, but it was all logical. “Why did you call me Archivist a moment ago?”

“Because that’s what you are—and I suspected it would be easier to think of eating a bit of this man’s fear with that reminder.”

This honesty was refreshing. Maybe a little too refreshing. It was all calculated, every bit of it.

But then, it was calculated because it would be effective, and I couldn’t fault him for trying to be effective. Web was just… so disturbing about it, which was the entire point. “Will this mark him?”

“No. We’re getting a taste, caring for ourselves, but not doing enough harm to mark anyone. Most of them don’t even remember it happened after; they just shrug it off.”

I exhaled shakily.

It was heavy. Too heavy.

“Take a moment,” said Spider Martin. “Looks like you need it.”

I eyed him. “Reading my thoughts?”

“No, your face. It’s quite expressive. Whatever you’re thinking about, it’s clearly a lot?”

I hated his blue eyes.

That wasn’t his fault. Something about him just made me remember how I had watched him die.

(Then is your Martin really your Martin?)

Yes. Shut up. I couldn’t… That was not a box we were opening this afternoon. No.

Maybe not ever.

“If you’re really not ready, it’s okay,” said Spider Martin. “Last thing I want to do is upset you.”

“Sure. Because I’m so dangerous compared to the lot of you.”

“You are, actually.” Spider Martin shrugged.

I rolled my eyes. “No, I’m really not. I can hardly damage anyone the way I could at the end of my world, and I was nothing but a punching bag before that.”

He tilted his head. “Really?”

“Really.”

“That’s not what we—oh, pardon.” He took out his phone.

“Not what you what?”

Spider Martin’s eyes went wide. “Shit,” he said. “Keep up!” And he turned and ran.

Spider Martin could move. That was not at all how my Martin ran, not at all his body language or motion or mobility, and the smooth, loping speed of it was freakishly comforting compared to the mask of the one I loved.

I ran after him.

Fun fact: being made of eyes and/or light beams made me better at running than I would have guessed.

I mean. I wasn’t good at it. But I also didn’t run out of breath, or stumble, both of which would have been the case before.

I kept up with Spider Martin, who I swear was running with the use of six extra invisible legs, and that was no small thing.

“What is it?” I called at his back.

“Get ready for a fight!” he said.

“A fight? A fight with wh-”

I saw.

Hunters, Martin had said.

Nolan Two on the ground with smoke pouring out of his chest instead of blood.

Nolan One behind a car flipped onto its side, unable to stick his head around it at all because of—

What was—

What WAS that, that was—

I couldn’t understand what I saw. Purple, green, wisps of things like tentacles, not solid, and yet they were, punching holes into that car, not just reaching around it but building Nolan’s fear, and—

We turned the corner at the same time as Mike Crew and Helen Richardson, and everyone acted at once.

Coordinated? No. They’d just done this before.

Helen distorted into a tall and mutated and terrible thing and dropped straight into the sidewalk—and at the same time, a yellow door opened beneath Nolan Two, and he fell out of sight.

(I couldn’t see the attacker. I needed to see it.)

Mike bared his teeth—a horrifying look, actual anger, which he had not shown with me the day he threw me into the sky—and gestured.

Lightning struck.

Struck… what?

(I couldn’t see it! I needed to see it!)

Mike couldn’t see it, either; he struck where those tendrils were coming from, the central invisible knot of them, but evidently did not hit it, because now, it threw tendril-attacks at him. He moved, guessing as much (he could not see them, I knew he could not), staying out of the way of whatever it was punching holes where he’d been.

Spider Martin picked up another car and threw it.

That one connected; the car hit something, but was not enough to stop it, and more tendrils shot out toward Mike and Spider Martin.

I didn’t move. I couldn’t move. My eyes burned, my head throbbed—I couldn’t see it, I had to see it, I needed to see—

Michael grabbed me and pulled me into a yellow door in a wall just as one of those purple-green tendrils slammed into the sidewalk where I’d been, cracking it, penetrating below the concrete.

The Corridors. So familiar. I knew this well.

“No!” I cried, throwing myself at the door.

“Easy, Archivist,” said Michael, right up behind me, long hands draping over my shoulders to pull me back. “You aren’t ready to deal with them.”

“No! I need to see it! I need to see it!”

“Archivist,” Michael thrummed at me. “You’ll make your Martin cry.”

Martin?

Martin.

I stopped, gripping the door handle. “I… I need to… see it?”

“You will be hurt. Maybe killed. That would be terrible.”

He did not sound like it would be terrible.

I shook. “I couldn’t see it. Michael. Please. I have to see it. I have to try.”

He sighed. “Silly Archivist. As you wish.” He reached past me, all around me, and opened the door.

We were on a nearby roof, and I could look down and see.

I looked.

Looked.

(Use me, It beckoned.)

And I did.

My vision opened as it had not since I arrived here, and I saw.

Connected it was all connected

Powers like the Fears but different

All through this world every living thing everyone was marked or

Not marked something like marked already connected

Connected it was all

The thing

There

A person but not

It was three persons in one

Three of them together standing there strange dark bodysuit a gas mask

No hands

No hands only those tendrils sprouting from their arms, tendrils which now seemed so solid

Each of them moving independently (three person in there, three minds to work them) trying actively to kill us all

To kill the Nolans the Mike the Helen the

I saw, and as I did, I broke the attacker apart.

I didn't even mean to. I just saw it for what it truly was, and made reality real.

One second, it was invisible, impossible to harm, its tendrils unseen by the others. The next it stood there, a person in a weird suit—and it shuddered, and then it was three. They exploded apart, splitting the uniform and popping the gas mask like a hatched egg in rapid-time.

And now, the others could see them. Could see three naked people on the sidewalk, gasping, shuddering, heads down, vomiting.

Nolan, Mike, and Helen surged in without hesitation, all at once.

I looked away, swaying, gasping.

Michael kept me from falling off the roof. He looked amazed. “What did you do?”

Fed.

I was so fed.

I felt rich with it, blissful, drugged. Absolutely relaxed and warm and tingling to the edges of every inch of my form.

Sirens. Coming.

“Time to go!” said Michael, pulling me back through his yellow door.

The Corridors did their thing, and I felt it, and floated in it, and spun and flew and was.

Michael cried out.

So did I. We became colors and swirling paint, flowing out of the drain against gravity in beauty and madness and bliss. And then—

I woke up.

I was back in my little bed in my gray apartment. My hair was wet; I smelled of soap. My heart pounded. (Benign essential blepharospasm, perhaps?)

Martin was next to me, asleep. I stared at my boring popcorn ceiling.

Had that… happened?

Next to me, on the nightstand, was a bright green Post-It note with handwriting I didn’t know. It said, Jon. We need to talk.—JL

Leitner.

Sure. Sure, we could talk. Fuck if I knew about what, though because I had no idea what had occurred.

It was four twenty-two in the morning. Martin slept. Leitner could wait.

I watched Martin, trying to understand (had I slept? If so, it was the first time in a thousand years), trying to parse what I’d seen and what I’d done.

The Eye did not help me because It could not. It didn’t know, either, and that frightened me more than anything else I’d seen.

------

NOTES

He's like a shammy; he's like a towel; he's like a sponge! A regular towel doesn't work wet, but Jon works wet or dry. Holds 12 times his weight in trauma!

#tma #tma fanfic #tma fic #jonathan sims #tma au #magnus monsterverse #martin blackwood #web!martin #mike crew #jane prentiss #arthur nolan #michael distortion #helen distortion

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bisexualhobi · 2 years ago

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btw the blackpink concert was so good this is the only picture i took the entire night. like i genuinely was too hyped to even care about getting my phone out and just lived in the moment!!

some stray thoughts from the whole experience:

lisa runs circles around the rest of them. like for real she's on a whole other level of performance... like niurka said SHE IS A VEDETTE

the setlist was so meh compared to coachella but i didn't expect anything else. we got the hits and the solos and honestly you can tell their discography is so short cause the show was over sooner than you would think 😭

the LIVE BAND..... holy fuck you guys. i don't think i've seen an artist performing so well with a live band in a long time. one thing you gotta give to yg their arrangements for blackpink are fucking BONKERS

the jennie solo was her peak energy during this it was so funny it reminded me of 2018 when she would half ass group performances and bring out the full cunt for solo. props to her idc

i was seated next to a group of what was clearly 13 year olds at their first concert without parents and it somehow was so heartwarming cause it reminded me of how unapologetically cringey tweens are about what they love. honestly i wonder when we all lose that energy but i'm trying to get it back

seriously the live band deserves their ass ate like i was in love with their interludes between costume changes and stuff. there's a specific set they played right before the main thing wrapped up and i think they were freestyling.... it was insane

obviously i ate half a pot brownie before going in and i had what i can only call a religious experience when the rearranged intro to kill this love started playing. holy fucking shit i almost peed myself like whoever made that remix is a genius and i need to find this version online

overall this was not only the best kpop concert i've been to it's easily one of the best concerts i've ever been to period 😭

#blackpink #.txt

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pennyserenade · 2 years ago

Note

Miranda please let us know when you get to “José Chung’s From Outer Space” episode of x-files, genuinely one of the funniest and most bonkers episodes. It could also be watched standalone if you feel like skipping forward (assuming you haven’t seen it yet)

i have seen it! i talked about it a little on here (maybe? i’ve been watching this show quickly to beat my own desire to spoil it for myself, so i never know which episodes i talk abt and which i don’t lol). i loved it! i’m on season 5 now and i still find myself laughing at the mulder’s scream. also the scene where the guy described mulder and scully as the people in black. also also the pie scene!!! and the scene where it was suggested mulder was such a weirdo he’d masturbate to footage of bigfoot. at first i was a bit thrown off by the vibe of the episode, because up until that point the show had only had one other episode that had leaned more into humor than seriousness. once i realized the serious was never coming i had a great time.

also, because i’m watching this show in such a rapid pace, i’ve picked up on little things i probably wouldn’t have if i paced it out more. one of those things was in season 5, episode 10 “chinga,” they kinda make a reference back to “jose chung from outer space.” mulder is sitting at his desk and on the tv is a lot of obscene moaning and then you find out it’s just some morbid shit and i very much laughed at that, because like damn, jose chung wasn’t so far off. fox mulder is a weirdo through and through and i adore him for it. i hope he enjoyed the hell out of the pie he supposedly ate whole, asking a question a piece

#misc.#i love when x-files gets weird !#it’s already such a wonky concept and it’s SO fun and cool when they lean completely into the absurdity of it #i finished bad blood and i loved that one just as much as jose chung #x-files commentary

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seiwas · 1 year ago

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willow this is one of my fave bkg fics 🥺 but also i think all ur bkg fics are some of my fave bkg fics 😭🫶🏻 i am such a sucker for a bsf to lovers trope 🤧

i loooove that you show how they were since they were little & that not a lot changes until That Point 🥺 i think u have such a specific and detailed way of writing that it's so rich in experiences between the characters 🥺 like!! x happened and y happened, and also z happened and i am here just wide-eyed nodding bc it feels so much like am getting a glimpse of their day-to-day lives!! like i know so much abt them alr in just 3k words!! and that is!! absolute bonkers insane willow!!!! so extremely talented!!!! i am in awe every time!!!!!

and the passage of time!! i adore how you portray that willow 🥺 that things are the same but also so different:

even when you're seventeen, eighteen, he still lays on the couch and puts his stinky feet in your lap and in your face, purposely puts things too high up on your shelves, leans against the front door so you can't get out when it's time to leave. <- details like this omg he's insufferable PLS

if he grabs your wrists in one hand — like he's never been able to do — and holds them above your head <- THEN THIS. i am going CRAZY over this... at the fact that he's hugE??? compared to when u were little??? so much stronger noW??? i can't comprehend.......

(bakugou doesn't even look like your scrawny best friend anymore; he looks like the guy that ate your scrawny best friend.) <- this made me giggle dsbadjfasd

you're twenty the first time his touch becomes tight, bruising, purposeful — for new reasons. <- i also love how dragged out it is!!!!! liek!!! 20!! that's a long time!! and i am a sucker for it!!

one of the things i adore about your writing is how easy and smooth it is to read, but then there are lines that just creep onto you, that you go over once and then have to backtrack to read again bc it feels important, like it holds so much more meaning than it lets on:

sometimes it's a little alarming how easily the two of you fall into each other, but you've been doing it for so long that it doesn't take a second thought. <- what this implies!! what this means!! the comfortability!!! UUUUGH

he's — you're — so close. more than it feels like you've ever been, even though you know that's far from true. <- how this feels different!! my GOD!!!!!!

even his jaw falls a little slack and, fuck, you've never seen him like this. you never thought you'd want to, but now — you don't think you'll ever see him any other way again. <- AGAIN!!! THE IMPLICATIONS!!1 OF FEELINGS SIMMERING HJBFHGDSF of seeing him differently i am sooooooooooo

you want to be — maybe — the only one that gets to see him fall apart like this. <- i will cry rn

distantly, you think you wouldn't mind if he pinned you to the ground the way he always does, only this time to peel all your clothes off, right here on his living room floor. but he doesn't. <- HELLO>??!? HELLO?!?!?!?

you also write him soOOo just SOOOO he's so attractive willow idk what about him, or how you write, but i always have my head in my hands SIGHING:

bakugou strolls out of his bathroom with damp hair, in nothing but a loose pair of sweats <- LIKE?!?!?!?!??! HELLLLOOOOUUGHH!?!?!? hoW DARE HE JUST DO THAT. and be insufferable by throwing his wet blanket. LIKE !?!?!?

so you bite him, right in the neck. <- the rouGHHOUSING AT THAT AGE IS INSANE HSBGS but i would bite his neck too...

he buries his face in your neck and bites, too, taking advantage of your shock as his fingers close around your wrists. <- MY MENTAL SCREAM WILLOW DHFAHSDF

bakugou is a man now, much to your horror; there's serious muscle definition in his shoulders and biceps, and you can feel yourself getting lost in the curves and valleys of him like never before <- he's so hot WHYYYYYY

i associate bakugo so much w u willow and it's bc of lines that feel so personal it's like you truly know him, inside out 🥺 and i adore it!! i think it's so sweet!! so cute 🥺:

because bakugou likes trash television more than he lets on <- PLS it's so true....

the tension!!! oh my god willow, the tension!!!! it was insane!!! but the tense in intense lITERALLYUGBGE i was biting my fiST the entiRE TIME EVEN THO I KNEWWWW WHAT WAS GONNA HAPPEN 😭:

you take in the flush of his neck, how it spreads down to his bare chest, crimson and fevered. his tongue darts out to wet his lips, nervous, almost. <- he's sOOOOOO oh my god here icb this

before landing back on you, narrowed and black. <- HELLLLLLOOOOOOOOOUUGHH?!?!?!?!

how subtle he's trying to be about spreading his legs. <- M CRYING AT THIS WILLOW PLEASE

your eyes dart down to his lips; plumper than you ever realized and parted, just a bit, enough that you can feel his breath on your cheeks. <- holding my BREATH reading this

you can feel him twitch, just barely, and the hand he has at your side balls tighter into your shirt, jostling you minutely in the process. <- that liTTLE DETAIL IS EVERYTHING TO ME WILLOW. how his hand balls into your shirt??!?! oh my GOD the restraint in that... the wanT

you wonder what he would do, if you kissed him. what it would feel like. what he would taste like. <- SCREAMING

his lashes flutter gently when you grind against him, tentatively, and then his head thumps back against the couch as the muscle in his jaw sets. half-lidded, his red-hot gaze jumps from your face down to where you're seated against him and back, and it's only after you move again that you realize — he's watching you, too. discovering. <- this was SOOOOOO hot willow. so hot. im. oh my god.

burn your bare skin when they slip under the material to grip your hip. <- i still cant believe he did this

you spread your fingers out and, gently, as if you've never touched him before, run your hands up his chest, watching the bob of his adam's apple when you rest them on the sides of his neck. <- i also cannot believe reader did his hELP

he looks down to resume watching the movement of your hips, the way his sweatpants bunch up and tug, and you feel a little zing up your spine with his every sharp inhale and sharper exhale. <- AGAIN the little details!! the sweatpants bunching up and tugging oh my god that's everyTHING to me

brushing the tip of your nose against his. <- I CANT BELIEVE THIS

quietly, around your own heavy breath, you ask, "does this — feel good?" <- AND THIS . lIKE SUCH AN INNOCENT QUESTION BUT HOW DARE IT FEEL LIKE THIS

but he nods shallowly regardless, and you press your mouth into his throat to bite him again, just lightly. <- then he expoSES MORE OF HIS NECK??? AND READER GOES OVER IT W THEIR TONGUE??? AND HE SHAKES AND SHUDDERS AND GROANS????? IM GONNNNA LOSE IT then he says 'hah fuck' TOO?!?!?!?!?!?!

the friction in his lap isn't doing much for you, realistically, but his reaction is what has you aching, has you drawn tighter than a bow string. <- crying so hard at this

bakugou might not last much longer, if the grip he has on your hips is any indication, but not a single piece of your clothing has been removed and you're hot and getting sort of desperate and you know your underwear are a little more than damp. <- there's smth abt a man....... this way.... when he's this way.... oh......

bakugou bucks up against you, pulling you down hard in his lap; you tighten your fingers in the hair on the crown of his head and — just to see, in a way you've never done before — you quietly whisper, "katsuki" <- oh my god willow when i say this was so hot. oh my goooooooooooood and he absolutely LOSES it i cant TAKE THIS

one of his hands slips up your shirt to splay against your back, forcing you closer to him so he can bury his face in your neck, and his hips become insistent, urgent, rutting up against yours eagerly. "fuck, oh fuck, fuck," <- WHEN HE. WHEN HEEEEEEEEEEE why why whywhwhwyhwwwhwwwhywhywywhy its sooooo hot omfg

the wet spot on his pants <- i criedhsf

the moment after too, how awkward it is omg you capture it soooo well willow and he's trying so hard to just be normal abt it, as if this didn't just potentially throw 20? 15? years of friendship down the drain 😭 it is soooo katsuki of him to avoid talking abt it, to pretend like that didn't just happen 😭

and when he:

"d'you..." bakugou wets his lips before biting them, "need anything?" <- CRYNG idk if u intended it but like i feel like. maybe there's a double meanign?!??! buT I DONT KNOWWW i DONT KNOWWW it juST ACHES i felt sooooo sad for reader having to just brush it off and move on

and that final line: trying to smooth out the wrinkle he's left in the corner of your shirt. <- what that mEAAAANS oh my god. how it's left a mark u can't rlly undo no matter how much u try to unwrinkle it 😭 im crying shbgshd WILLOWWW WAAAAAAAH

mY GOOOOOD i swear jsgsj i can't wait to reread the next part too 😭😭😭

you had only to look at me—

part two.

bakugou x f!reader

wc: 3.3k+

tags: nsfw (18+), childhood best friend bakugou, dry humping, implied virgin bakugou, a tad angsty at the end.

even before i was touched, i belonged to you; you had only to look at me. — the burning heart, louise glück.

this is a repost.

childhood best friend bakugou is probably a wrestler. a lil' rough-houser.

games of tag end with you tackled to the ground, squashed underneath him until you finally agree that he's the king of the world. whenever your hair is long enough to pull back into a pony-tail or little bun, he's yanking on it to get your attention, harsh, especially if you're ignoring him to talk to anyone else. scraped knees and bruised elbows, coming home missing a single shoe, shirt stretched out and wrinkled at the bottom corner: all katsuki's fault.

it makes you a little volatile, too, in turn.

not so much as him, but you grow up defending yourself; the first black eye he gets is from you (if you don't count the time he hit himself in the face by accident, when you'd started a slap-fight because he was trying to hold you down) and you very quickly learn how "unfair" it (apparently) is to kick him in the groin. your parents spend a lot of time separating you, putting you in opposite corners of the room until one of you stops crying and the other is ready to mumble out an apology. you're not allowed to sit next to each other at holiday events. whatsoever. under any circumstances.

he's your best friend. you wouldn't have it any other way.

in middle school, he's just as insufferable, hardly allows you to talk to any of your girl friends without butting in some how, too loud for anyone's own good. he tries to embarrass you in front of other boys, puts you in a headlock even when he's sweaty — which he is a lot at that point, during puberty — and calls you names that make you want to hide in the bathroom.

("why is he such a jerk?" your friends will ask, trying to fix the mess of your hair during lunch. all your butterfly clips are either missing or broken, crunched under bakugou's scrawny arm. "you should tell on him for being such a bully.")

nobody else treats you the way he does, and you don't treat anyone else that way, either; you never make ugly faces at your girl group, never punch them as hard as you can in the arm, aiming to leave a bruise. with all other classmates, you're — normal, trying to discover what that even means in the grand scope of things, who you want to be as the years pass. you avoid bakugou and his little posse of brats like the plague, because detention is what awaits both of you, should your paths ever cross.

things start to change, seriously, in high-school.

bakugou goes to u.a and you — don't; instead you continue on to the shizuoka high-school without him, along with your group of girls. his time at home and in the neighborhood lessens, even moreso when he moves into the dorms on campus, and the only time you see him becomes those few and far in-between family visits he has time to make; some holidays, he doesn't come home at all.

at first you think it's a good thing, because you've never gotten to flourish while trapped in his armpit. yanking at his hair until he finally lets go in the middle of the hallway has always garnered you some weird looks, odd stares, and you finally stop being labeled aggressive, too, with him gone. boys can talk to you without being stalked by your angry, wiry, chihuahua of a best friend, and you go on dates, ride in cars, have your first kiss.

you miss him from time to time, though you'll die before admitting it, and the yearning doesn't last long whenever he does come home. even when you're seventeen, eighteen, he still lays on the couch and puts his stinky feet in your lap and in your face, purposely puts things too high up on your shelves, leans against the front door so you can't get out when it's time to leave.

(he becomes an immovable object, much to your annoyance; in the past, you've always stood somewhat of a chance against him, knowing all his weak spots, like the clump of hair at the crown of his skull and how ticklish he is on his thighs, but now, after all the training he's been doing — he's huge, unfortunately.

if he grabs your wrists in one hand — like he's never been able to do — and holds them above your head, you're useless to defend yourself; there is an absolutely zero-percent chance you'll ever manage to overthrow him if he sits on you; tickling him is impossible, because his thighs have gotten so muscular that it's hard to grab him, and even if you do manage it, he can nearly crush your hand if he closes his legs together.

bakugou doesn't even look like your scrawny best friend anymore; he looks like the guy that ate your scrawny best friend.)

you graduate and go to college. bakugou graduates and goes to work for best jeanist, in the heart of tokyo. seeing each other means planning on it, making an effort neither of you have ever had to, and there's a lot of radio silence for months at a time. somehow it always comes full circle, though, and it always ends in violence, because you two don't know any other way to be.

you're twenty the first time his touch becomes tight, bruising, purposeful — for new reasons.

it's one of the few times he's off, and you haven't seen each other since his mom's dinner party four months ago. you only agree to come over because his patrol route had taken him through your campus and you'd spotted him across the street in the early hours of the morning, after you got out of class.

now you're both tired, lazing around despite planning to get lunch once the heat died down. together doing nothing; sometimes it's a little alarming how easily the two of you fall into each other, but you've been doing it for so long that it doesn't take a second thought.

bakugou strolls out of his bathroom with damp hair, in nothing but a loose pair of sweats, and you're laying on his couch half-asleep and he puts his wet towel over your face and you ball it up and throw it at him and then he tries to whip you with it.

"stop," you groan, serious, "you're so annoying." when he only twists it tighter, you stick your arm and leg out, deflecting against the wet smack he tries to leave against your skin.

his sharp teeth flash with his ugly little grin, and you try to grab the towel twice, ending up with an angry, stinging lick up the inside of your arm, before he gets too close and you can finally yank it from his hands. you sit up to get a better angle, but you're not as quick as he is, as adept at being a brat, and when he yanks on the towel, your whole body nearly comes off the couch, arms almost coming out of their sockets.

"bakugou!" you squeal, and he cackles, evil, and grabs your hands when you try to smack him. your massive, stinking, freight train of a best friend deposits his entire body on yours, crushing your lungs with his back as you cough, "get off!"

he doesn't say anything, choosing to pretend he's watching whatever is on tv and that he can't hear you — which you could believe, because bakugou likes trash television more than he lets on — and your hands are trapped at your sides and you can't breathe and so you bite him, right in the neck.

"ow, fuck!"

when he moves, he moves fast, and you're only hope of retaliating before he flips around and grabs your wrists and holds you down is to roll the both of you off the couch. his body thuds, deep and heavy, against the carpet, and you trap his hands beneath your knees as you straddle his hips, adjusting your full weight so you can at least try and keep him down.

beneath you, bakugou sneers. "you've got five seconds t'get off me before—"

"one!" you shout obnoxiously, rolling your eyes just to hear his annoyed snort. "two! three! f—"

his body snaps up into a sitting position, nose bumping yours as he rips his hands from beneath your legs. a scream tears out of your throat as you wiggle, surprised, trying your best to stretch your arms over your head and around your back so he can't grab them; if he does, it's game over for you.

"stop!" you shout, choking out a shock of laughter when he brings his legs up, trapping you in his lap against his chest. a little grunt leaves him as you jostle, but the tension at your back never lets up, not even when his mouth sets in a firm line and a sharp exhale leaves his nose. "let me go," you tell him, squirming again as he reaches for your hands. "i'm not playin' around."

"too bad, y'shitty nerd." he says, gruff, and when you stick your tongue out at him, he buries his face in your neck and bites, too, taking advantage of your shock as his fingers close around your wrists.

"no!" you scream again, trying in earnest just to get away from him completely, but he holds your hands behind your back and keeps you squished so tightly into him that you can only breathe shallowly, and his free hand goes to ball into your shirt at your side and —

— and his face is red, you realize, delayed. you can almost feel the heat from his cheeks with him so close, and you take in the flush of his neck, how it spreads down to his bare chest, crimson and fevered. his tongue darts out to wet his lips, nervous, almost.

"what?" you breathe, quiet, as if speaking too loud will break your playful bubble, and his eyes jump around his living room before landing back on you, narrowed and black.

"what?" he echoes, voice pitched and mocking. "you lose, dumbass." and even though he closes his eyes and grits his teeth, there isn't any hiding from how hard he's breathing. how subtle he's trying to be about spreading his legs.

all at once, everything kind of — falls apart.

bakugou is a man now, much to your horror; it feels like you've closed your eyes and opened them in the lap of someone else wearing your best friend's face. there's serious muscle definition in his shoulders and biceps, and you can feel yourself getting lost in the curves and valleys of him like never before. he's — you're — so close. more than it feels like you've ever been, even though you know that's far from true.

this boy used to pin you down in the yard and threaten to lick your face, the both of you grass-stained and covered in sweat. you've tackled him face first into the ocean on various vacations, running behind him quietly and plunging his scrawny, shirtless body into the waves as they rushed forward, uncaring of what you were wearing or how it twisted when you both came up for air.

saliva is still drying on your neck from where he bit you and, unthinking, your eyes dart down to his lips; plumper than you ever realized and parted, just a bit, enough that you can feel his breath on your cheeks. and you wonder —

bakugou grunts quietly, shuffling himself so that his back is leaned against the couch, and you half-expect him to just let you go because things have — changed. but he doesn't.

instead the new position has his legs a little wider and you've sunk a little further and you're now very aware of exactly what's changed, and how much. you can feel him twitch, just barely, and the hand he has at your side balls tighter into your shirt, jostling you minutely in the process.

and finally he opens his eyes and stares at you — cheeks burning, eyebrows furrowed — and you stare back — heat lighting up your body to an uncomfortable degree as your stomach flips.

you wonder what he would do, if you kissed him. what it would feel like. what he would taste like.

you move your hips with purpose, stuck on the new and foreign change it does to him; bakugou's always been a tough little brat, and you made him cry a handful of times when you were younger, but this weakness is — different. there's so much you know about him and yet even more for you to learn, and you find yourself consumed with the desire to explore this new, enticing territory.

the fist he has in your shirt loosens and his fingers burn your bare skin when they slip under the material to grip your hip. at any moment, you're half-expecting him to tell you to cut the shit, to shove you off and ask what the hell is wrong with you. why you're being so weird, doing things friends don't do to each other. but he doesn't.

you're almost certain that if you put your hands on his chest, you would be able to feel the mirrored, nervous pace of his heartbeat; it only takes the faintest tug of your hands for him to let you go, his grip falling to the other side of your hips. you can't tell if he means to hold you in place, or keep you going.

bakugou's eyes are nearly black and when you don't stop, he looks down to resume watching the movement of your hips, the way his sweatpants bunch up and tug, and you feel a little zing up your spine with his every sharp inhale and sharper exhale. even his jaw falls a little slack and, fuck, you've never seen him like this.

you never thought you'd want to, but now — you don't think you'll ever see him any other way again.

his eyes go a little wide when you lean into him, brushing the tip of your nose against his. neither of you have said anything and maybe you should keep it that way, lest the bubble burst, but you feel like you're going a little insane.

quietly, around your own heavy breath, you ask, "does this — feel good?"

you can feel the temperature of his cheeks spike, but he nods shallowly regardless, and you press your mouth into his throat to bite him again, just lightly. it should be so that he's a little biter; the feel of your teeth makes him jump, has him angling his head so that more of his neck is exposed to you. when you soothe the barely-there indentation with the flat of your tongue, his breath hitches and his shoulders shake on a shudder and he groans, like he's angry.

"hah, fuck."

the friction in his lap isn't doing much for you, realistically, but his reaction is what has you aching, has you drawn tighter than a bow string. you feel yourself growing antsy for something that you won't name, because friends don't do that, though you can't help but to wonder if he's ever done it before.

you've had a few boyfriends. had a few experiences that ended quickly and left you feeling exposed and uncomfortable and a little in pain, and even though your girl friends insist that's normal — it's nothing like this. bakugou might not last much longer, if the grip he has on your hips is any indication, but not a single piece of your clothing has been removed and you're hot and getting sort of desperate and you know your underwear are a little more than damp.

you want to dismantle his long-standing composure. you want to be — maybe — the only one that gets to see him fall apart like this.

he's been your best friend your whole life, afterall; this experience should be yours. he should be.

the thought has you shivering a little bit and bakugou bucks up against you, pulling you down hard in his lap. dragging across the thick and solid length of him becomes even more clear and another, stronger zing has you letting out a breathy little sound into his ear. it makes him groan again, this one almost whiny, but he closes his mouth to muffle it and you don't want him to do that so you tighten your fingers in the hair on the crown of his head and — just to see, in a way you've never done before — you quietly whisper,

"katsuki,"

and he loses it.

"fuck, oh fuck, fuck," he groans into your skin, fingers gripping you so tightly that you think he might actually leave burns behind, and his shoulders tremble before he goes totally still.

for a little while, you both sit there and let your breathing even out as reality sobers you from whatever lust-drunk haze you'd both been in. distantly, you think you wouldn't mind if he pinned you to the ground the way he always does, only this time to peel all your clothes off, right here on his living room floor. but he doesn't.

doesn't say anything, just shudders every now and again, and you think you're starting to feel the wet spot soaking into the front of his sweatpants.

you pull back just a little to look at him and he lets you, face just as red as he stares back at you, like he's the one waiting for you to freak. a little bit of red has returned to his eyes, though they're still swollen and dark with want.

when you lean in again, to bump your nose against his, bakugou snaps back away from you.

"wh-the fuck are y'doin'?" he shifts his eyes to the ground and they go wide. horrified, maybe. all the blood rushes in your ears and you don't know what to say, so he continues. "i-i don't have time t-to sit around all day, so—" bakugou shakes his head and you think he's going to kick you out, and he must know it, from how stiff you go. "so, you better know what the hell you wanna eat."

your bubble has burst; you nod silently and he glances up at you twice before swallowing.

"well, i can't get dressed with you sitting on me, so get off." when you remain quiet, he finally raises his head to look at you head-on, fisting the edge of your shirt again so that you'll look back. "d'you..." bakugou wets his lips before biting them, "need anything?"

"uh," maybe to shove your head down the drain and drown yourself, so that you can get rid of all the not-so-nice feelings that are creeping up beneath your skin. instead of that, you tell him, "just the bathroom, maybe."

"hurry up then," he mutters and even tries to roll his eyes, though it feels anything but casual. "don't...take for-fuckin'-ever."

and then he's up, quick to stand so that his back is to you as he disappears around the corner to his room, leaving you to yourself, trying to smooth out the wrinkle he's left in the corner of your shirt.

#pls read this #bnha #katsu #omg willow i am so happy u reposted this bc i remember reading this for the first time and loVING IT #i think abt ur childhood bff bkg so fondly i am sniffling sobbing

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cutiefull · 1 year ago

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April Comebacks/Debuts that I Caught!*

*in no particular order, non-exhaustive, and all songs were released between April 1st and April 30th. 🎶 means it was playlisted!

*Locked On by VVUP: This technically came our march c32st my time but whatever, going in april list: I enjoy how this track goes but im unsure ab the chorus. but who knows?

🎶 Deja Vu by TXT: yet ANOTHER Deja Vu kpop song. nah im jk. This song is really banger, i love the guitar riffs. However, TXT (FOR ME) do their best when they're in their pop punk bag so the remix does clear I fear.

Renegade by LUCAS: Man idk NOTHING ab what happened to Lucas and why he was kicked out (I have a vague idea?). Anyways. This is like.... not good. Painfully average at best, boring and snoozefest at worst. The entire release is, Crushing On You is the closest I get to being happy ab this. And I'm still not. This solo shit may not be it king 🙌🏾. I will never get those three minutes back 😭

SHEESH by BABYMONSTER: It is better than Batter Up for sure and the girlies ate up that rap like no tomorrow. But it's just not my cup of tea at the end of the day.... :(. the dance is addictive tho fr

LURE BY I.M: This song is really nice 😭😭 I.M's music always is

🎶 Midas Touch by Kiss of Life: BRITNEY SPEARS' CHILDREN! 10/10 AMAZING SHOW STOPPING NEVER DONE BEFORE ETC ETC ETC WHEN I TOUCH YA

🎶 By My Monster by ONF: Wahhhhh this song is so beautiful the chorus HITS and the post-chorus instrumentation like fawk! GIVE THE BOYS THEIR FLOWERS. i wanted to hatethe rap but i fear the transitions in and out of it are in fact well done

Could It Be by YUQI: This was a cute little jam!

🎶 BLUSH by woo!ah!: take these girls out of nugudom. EXPEDITIOUSLY. THIS SONG IS SO FUCKING GOOD UR JOKING!?!? this is MY SPRING SONG! MINEEEE. I FEEL LIKE MONEYYYY

Beautiful MAZE by DRIPPIN: I heard this song once and it was stuck i my head for the next three weeks.

Girl's Night by LOOSEMBLE: Died 2020, reborn 2024. Welcome Back GFRIEND /j

Flower Rhythm by ARTMS: i do enjoy this genre a lot and I started choreographing something to thus. Guys. Spring is here and the ggs are making sure you know!

Impossible by RIIZE: whoever said this sounds like a SHINee reject is right, but that's how u know they ate 🤭 Again adhering to my belief that every bg should have a club banger. side note: sm been fumbling the bag so bad (see: renegade) so bring that boy BACK

PSYCHIC by LAY: WHEN WE NEEDED HIM MOST HE CAME BACK. I enjoy this song!

Earth, Wind and Fire by BOYNEXTDOOR: this is hella catchy.... they did eat with this one 🙈

Bubble Gum by NewJeans: this is a rly cute song 🫶🏾

SPOT by ZICO ft Jennie: Zico can miss.. Jennie can't miss... and they hit the target with this one 🤷🏾‍♀️

🎶HEYA by IVE: I really loved this sample flip and y'all know i'll alwaysbe tapped into a demjointz joint. that insturmental goes crazyyyy

🎶But I by SOLAR: goddd solar's vocal never fails to move me. This is the exact song I woulda lost my shit to in eighth grade and I'm still losing my shit to it now ngl

MAESTRO by SEVENTEEN: That instrumental section is sooo juicy and bonkers i love it.pots and pans music but good

🎶Little Things by Xdinary Heroes: HELLLL YEAHHHH BROTHER

#x.txt #music yapping 🤓👆

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muffin-ofdoomsday · 2 years ago

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Newbies' Trigun Stampede/98/Maximum Analysis

To start off I was introduced to Trigun by fanart on Pinterest while looking for art inspiration. So thank you to all the fandom artists!! I'm not really into anime too much, so this has been the first anime thats had my attention in a long while.

I began this series by watching up to episode 3 of Stampede and then decided "I can't wait, I must consume".

Immediately watched the high trip that is Tri98 and then came the heart crushing Maximum. Also have to thank @genkooii for the link to the proper translation to Maximum. Here is the link to that post if anyone wants to read as well.

I'm really happy with the way I followed the series and love it so much. Each version having its own charm and still keeping Vash's core at heart. But there are differences and somethings i find that were done better than others. I'll give my feelings for each first and then compare them.

Begining with the first 3 episodes of Stampede The animation was new and interesting. I didn't know about the hate for CGI until later on. I agree that it does look different, but I quite like the potential it has. Its beautiful in its own right. For story, I have to admit even as a newbie, the pacing was rough for me. I realized this after Vash saved Jenora (again) barely had time to breathe and then EG Mine shows up. (I learned later that I stopped just before things ramped up even more) I like tragedy, but subtlety goes a long way. Will come back to Stampede again further down.

Next is the OG Trigun 98 anime. I didn't realize how much I missed the 90s anime aesthetic?? There's just something about it. Even though it is dated in appearance, there are some great frames and angles this anime had that just makes it so intense!! This version did have fillers, but I felt like they weren't out of place. I have to admit here that I have a bias for this version. I grew up as a Fallout New Vegas fan, and this just gives me the same vibes. The questioning of morality with no real defined answer? How people struggled to survive and how fucking wacky they were!??? All while the protag is basically a wandering gunslinger/cowboy. Loved it. Gotta have those spurs that jingle jangle jingle, while having an existential crisis.

And here we are at Maximum.. man, words can't even describe how Stamp and Tri98 didn't prepare me for this at all. It's like that hair-clutching-hysterical-crying that settles into soft calm laugher and happy tears. It was really painful, those tough and tender pages i read... I loved it. This version does have a combination of both the above. And Stamp is more based on this version. But the pacing, while quick, had the subtlety I craved. The action was cool and interesting, but i now understand why it was said as "hard to follow". It can get a bit confusing. Overall, I ate this manga up when I definitely should have been studying, haha!

I actually went back to Tri98 after Max and definitely felt the differences between them. It was a bit surreal. Had to separate the two in my mind, but I still love them both.

Return of the Stamp! Now having finished all prior media, I looked at Stampede with new eyes. I'm glad I waited because I binge watched the episodes. I definitely understand why older fans were concerned, but this was my original, and I am going to stick by Stamp's side for as long as I can. Hmm how to describe how I feel now that season 1 has ended... this Trigun is in neutral for me right now. Though the animation is enough to make me go bonkers over the expressions and lighting, it's not enough for me to say it's outrageously good storytelling wise. But it does convey emotions well when it wants too. And they are definitely setting the stage up for Vash and more trimax story. I'm eager to see the results. I enjoy it overall. Season 2 will truly decide for me.

Okay here is the comparison part and will likely contain SPOILERS

Pacing

Stamp- as I mentioned much too quick but hopefully since this prequel season is over they will have more time to space out the story a bit

98- quite like this pacing. Has world building and mystery towards Vash for the first half. Makes it intriguing. The later half does go by quicker. Plants are hardly mentioned or explained.

Max- always in motion. Only in the first OG(prequel?) Trigun manga is there filler, which is what Tri98 is based more off of. But also this filler still had meaning and made you think.

Character relastionships/Interactions

Stamp- very little, Meryl is basically the only one who develops with Roberto and a tiny bit with Vash at the very end of the season.

I feel like something was lost between Wolfwood and Vash in this version. Woodwold being cold and Vash saying he looks kind, if you haven't seen the other media it's nice. Technically, there's nothing wrong with it. But i now see this is one of the tropes older fans complain about. It lacks the depth the 98 anime, and Trimax WW and Vash had. It gets straight to the point but loses a sort of dynamic. This anime didn't have the luxury of time I suppose. I don't hate wolfwood here. How could I? When he made such a soft expression at Livio. He still has that need to protect and thats what really matters.

98- another reason I like Tri98 is because they actually had the characters interact more. Meryl and Milly came to see Vash more and more and understand, he isn't at all what they or others thought he was. They had more time to be inspired by him. Meryl is definitely more aggressive and very direct. I don't hate this version. It's a straight man to Vashes over exaggerated goofiness. For the anime it works but I hate that for how abservent she is, that she really couldn't see Vash as the stampede?? Kind dumb but it's a wacky show, had to have a sillier vibe.

WW I like how they are actually friendly to each other at first. When the person who made you smile/soften up, has a harshly contrasting moral view to your own, it creates a certain sort of tension. Loved Vashs and WW friendship here. His death was kinda sadder since he died feeling like he didnt acomplish much. Vash's moment of breaking down while eating donuts was heart-wrenching . Also Vash using the Punisher vs Knives, such a good scene!!!

I actually really like Milly and Wolfwood together. It's cute. Millys more capable then I thought. Love her.

Max- Meryl and Milly have much less time with Vash. I do like how they are inspired by him still, but they only come around every so often to say a baller couple of lines than they dip. Don't get me wrong, I understand why, and I love how they are the representation of the good in humans, but they no longer feel as close. Which is saying something because 98 Vash was still a really distant dude. It just feels like the gap between them and Vash is more apparent. But they also had a really big issue at hand, so understandable. When Vash is called out for not letting them help more, he acknowledges that he can't afford to think about it at the moment. These characters were still great on their own.

WW- by far the only real human relationship Vash has ever had. And I don't mean in the romantic sense, but a sense of actually getting to know someone on a personal level despite their tense differences. Learning, inspiring each other while opposing each other. To have faith in someone. Vash is either on a pedestal or on trial when around most humans and I like that WW brings him down to his level. In the worst and best ways, he makes Vash truly human. I thought his death in the anime was painful but this was so much worse.

Livio and Vash bounding over their lost of WW will always get to me. The spaghetti scene. T_T Glad that Vash has another companion that could help in the physical fighting to come. Livio vs Elendria was a great!!. Liked how Livio was a combination of WW and Vash. A surprise break out character for me.

Does it make you think?

Stamp- Kinda spoon feed the tropes to you. I don't expect this to happen in the 2nd season. You could feel the subtle messages in the last few episodes of the season. I feel like they are done being overly flashy, time for the thick sauce of you-gotta-think-about-this-now.

98- despite it being so much like an abridge series, the episodes do make you think. Thats whats so good about it. The unsuspecting "here is haha funny man, now think about the uselessness of being good in this world". Love the episode with the rich girl and her criminal dad. Shows her position like most humas on Gunsmoke/no man's land. Moral grey kinda thing? That the world they live in isn't simply black and white.

Max- better dust off the old noggin and soak it in your tears.

Sadness

Maximum wins. IWANTHIMTOGETAHUGANDATHANKYOUANDAND---'

Stamp close second might surpass Maxs trauma in time. Who knows.

98- Someone mentioned that this Vash isn't suicidal. That is how low the bar is to make him the happiest of all the Vashes. Technically, he also got the best ending, for now, at least.

Knives

Stamp- oh no.. hes hot...and they definitely made him more intimidating than 98. Coming back to episode 4 was a thrill ride, but this version of Knives is very yandere. He does care for Vash but very manipulative and narcissistic. Gaslighting galore. I kinda understand it because of the manga now, but the whole pregnant plants and all that really puts this Knives on the less redeemable scale. His piano theme is amazing tho!!

98- barely there, the ending fight was cool, and I enjoyed it a lot. I did still like him in this version, but it had a lukewarm water kinda feel. The lesser of all the knives.

Max- the great thing about Maximum is that it shows so much depth to the story that i knew before, and to Knives. How sad and alone he really his. How his intentions are really just to save his kind from a threat that broke his mind with their cruelty. I don't disagree with him, actually. What he saw l, what humans do, does go toe to toe with Vash's optimistic. Knives is so human compared to Vash in my opinion. It's kinda odd and so poetic. Also when the plant hivemind was ripped away from him, I felt sad. He was alone again. Still wrong for him to obsorb his siblings tho...

VASH the man the myth the lengend

Stamp - Hmm, this has Trimax Vash attitude, but more on the meek side. My first impression was that he was a cute and kinda like a kicked puppy. I want to pat his head. In this version I wasn't thrown off by him being an all loving protagonist he just had the vibe off the start. Watching him in the later episodes did make me tear up. He's so soft and does have that tenderness that all Vashs' have. A cinnamon roll, too pure to good for this world.

98- he uses his smile as a sheild and plays it off better than the other Vashes, but his pain is still there. He is also pathetic, in a loving way lol. Before getting to know his story, i thought he was crazy. I was like every other character that he met. I didn't understand his struggle. I just saw the crazy man who made things difficult by choosing to avoid killing. Him getting serious and holding fast to his beliefs amazed and stunned me. Had me step back and see his point of view. Highly respect his willpower. However I don't entirely agree with him. Which many have pointed out thats the point of Vash. He is also much more confident and sly than Stamp Vash. Which is weird because it makes him seem more experienced and I think Stamp is older? He manages to use his pervy and over the top silliness to disarm people and get the advantage in most situations. He's smarter than he looks. I enjoyed the ending for this Vash, because it touches on his moral code after having to kill Legato. Him finally looking forward to the future without Rem being the main focus to his life and decisions. There wasn't enough time in Trimax and I would have liked some pages on it. But he was a bit busy saving the planet... He may be louder than the other Vash's but he still strives for a world that is made of ----- LOVE AND PEACE!!

Maximum- this Vash is like an older dad of the other two. He is worn down and you can feel it but he will NOT stop fighting. He is a tad more direct than the other Vashes and I was surprised that he has a tiny mean streak when he's irritated. I like this. He isn't always hiding behind that painted smile. He definitely gives off more of that Angel theme the manga has. An older creature that is indeed different from humans but wants to care and look out for them, but people are so scared of him. Poor dude. Every Vash holds the same core elements, the tenderness, the wit, and the determination. But this Vash really nails it down that he is the OG. And man, some of the lines for Maximum were just chefs' kiss. Had me just staring at the pages pondering. But he is so broken and mostly picks up the pieces alone. I am bitter that he never got any comfort or closure at the end. I am grateful it was a hopeful ending but HE LOST SO MUCH!!

All of them need a hug and therapy

Personal Ranking

I can't choose between Trimax and Tri 98...................................... Fine. Okay, it's Max for the plot, but you'll have to pry 98 Vash from my cold death hands!!!

3rd -Stampede - I really love the look, music, and some of the emotional points, just not enough storytelling for me to appreciate it more. I also feel like it's a bit too early to judge. So much can happen in the 2nd season.

#trigun stampede #trigun maximum #trigun 98 #trigun analysis #vash stampede #trigun vash #vash the stampede #millions knives #nicholas d. wolfwood #meryl trigun #livio the double fang #milly thompson #meryl stryfe #my thoughts

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