#i realize there are only like three people on the planet who care about the sisters more than the shipping

[limegreenbunny]

I love timebomb as much as the next person but like....... are they ever gonna throw us Zaun Sisters stans a bone???

[help-itrappedmyself]

Crimes and Punishments Part 1: Ra's

Masterpost

There’s a phone on a special shelf in the Batcave near the Batcomputer. This particular phone has been set aside as Emergency Only since an incident involving Bruce’s sons a few months ago. No one has touched it since. 

The entire situation was full of way too many unknown variables for Bruce’s liking. He spent a lot of time unnecessarily stressed about that phone. But it never rang, and they never used it. Until one day, when a loud ringing could be heard throughout the Batcave.

Everyone stopped what they were doing and started looking around. There was a specific moment, when everyone realized which phone was ringing. A moment of stillness. Then they all rushed for it at once. None of the boys wanted someone the caller had never met to pick up, but Bruce was curious, and he was fast. Nightwing however, was also fast and a lot closer. 

“Hello?” Nightwing asked as he answered the call. Everyone else quickly gathered around him, and as upset that Bruce was that he wasn’t on the phone, everyone understood not to interrupt.

“Bats?” Danny responded carefully.

“This is Nightwing.”

“Oh, Nightwing. Good to hear from you, hope you’re doing well. Unfortunately, this is a business call regarding the information I was given by Red Robin and Robin when you were here. Are they available for follow up?”

“I’ll put you on speaker.” Nightwing gave Bruce a look, trying to ward off any interrogations and put the call on speaker. “Everyone is here.”

“Hi, everyone!” Danny called out cheerfully. "Red Robin and Robin, you remember when you were in my realm you gave me some information about illegal activity that I had to follow up on, as well as the locations to check out?”

They both responded in the affirmative.

“Wonderful, I wanted to let you know that the situation has been taken care of.” Danny’s voice turns very official. “As of now, my teams have cleared all known locations of the illegal substance to avoid any more contamination. In the matter of one Ra’s Al Ghul, on the basis of knowingly, purposefully, and repeatedly storing and using the illegal contraband, he has been sentenced to imprisonment in the Nightmare Dimension. Once his sentence has been served, he will be released and will be able to make a home in one of my realms if he so chooses. However, we have determined that he will be unable to return to his original dimension, as the damage he has made to your world has already been too great. Now, speaking of the damage to your world."

“As it turns out, your dimension has had a great many interdimensional leaks, the amount of which I also had to look into.” Danny sounds tired and annoyed now. “A specialist of mine, Clockwork, has informed me of a great many breaches made by a small group of people. He is pushing for a very harsh sentence, your citizens have caused him a great deal of trouble and repeatedly broken the law in regards to his domain. I need to look into this further and was hoping to receive some assistance in organizing a meeting with these people, in order to determine fault, and possible repercussions or sentencing depending on the severity of their crimes.”

There is a pause, and no one says anything for a short moment as they hear Danny take a breath.

“I am unsure of the necessary authorities I should speak to regarding people of your world breaking the laws of mine.” Danny sounds so tired.

“We can help.” Red Robin spoke. “Do you know who these people are and where they are located?”

“Not exactly. They are in America, a few different places, but they can and do travel. Are you familiar with the speedsters on your planet? There should be three of them.”

They exchange looks. “Yes we are familiar. We can set up a meeting with them.”

[reiderwriter]

The Us That Could Have Been

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Female BAU Reader

Requested: yes - role reversal of the player!Spencer fic I posted here!

W/C: 5.7k

Summary: They say if you want to get over one man, you have to get under another. Spencer isn't so sure why he dislikes the idea of you doing that quite so much.

Warnings: Mentions of Maeve, spoilers for S8, mentions of minor character deaths, smut, unprotected sex, creampie, angst.

A/N: I'm not going to apologise for this one... Have fun.

Find the rest of my masterlist here.

If you were a genius, you’d know that it took you three hours, twenty-three minutes, and six seconds to fall in love with Spencer Reid. If you were a genius, you’d also know that it took him five years, seven months, twenty-seven days, and two hours to the second for him to break your heart. The thing you were learning about geniuses though, is that they were the most oblivious people on the planet. 

Her name was Maeve, he had told all of you. And he needed your help to save her because he was in love with her. And of course, you went along with it, you tried your best even while your heart was cracked in two because at this point, you couldn’t stand the desperation on his face. The day he told you about her, only days before he died, you cried in the arms of Penelope Garcia for hours, letting her console you as you felt your world get flipped upside down. 

“I don’t know why I’m feeling like this, god, Penelope. Five years, and I knew, I knew that if he liked me like that something would have happened already, but I just…” She rubbed your back as you laid your head on her shoulder, letting your tears fall freely as the sobs wracked through your body. 

“I’ve been in love with him for five years and he never even noticed, and… Penelope he hasn’t seen this girl before and he’s desperate for her. What about me is so unlovable?” Your voice cracked as you broke down again, burying your head in your friend's arms as you let all the emotions hit you at once. 

“Y/N you listen to me right now. You are not unlovable, you have never been unlovable. If Spencer cannot see what is right in front of him, then he is an idiot. You are the most amazing thing that has happened to him, you’re a great friend, you’re smart, you’re beautiful-” 

“I’m not her. Penelope, I… I want to be her-” She held you as you emptied yourself for hours, crying until you were so physically exhausted that you just couldn’t anymore. You couldn’t say that you stopped crying per se, just that your body ran out of emotions to sustain you. 

“Okay, Y/N, here’s what you’re going to do now,” Penelope said. She’d heard you out for long enough, but she wasn’t going to let you be miserable for long. 

“You’re going to pick yourself up, take care of yourself. Get a haircut, dye your hair, whatever you need to do to get some change. And then you’re going to do your goddamn best to forget him, because if he’s too stupid to realize how special and amazing you are then he really doesn’t deserve you.” You sniffled a bit and nodded at her words. 

“And then, you’re going to get back out there. Y/N, when was the last time you went on a date?” 

“I don’t know it’s been… The last one I can remember was before I entered the BAU. I’ve just been so busy-” 

“Bullshit. You’re going to put yourself back out there and find a man, or multiple men, who actually value you and want you. A wise scholar once said the best way to get over a man is to get under another.” 

–X–

A year later and you’d probably taken Penelope’s words to heart a little bit too much. Maeve had died at the hands of her stalker not even a day later, and you felt terrible for Spencer, but he’d pushed you away, he’d pushed everyone away, so you’d decided she was right. 

Your first date had been a few weeks later, and you’d have liked the fact that you’d taken him back to your place and then immediately kicked him out and never seen him again after that to stay a secret. But the BAU copycat didn’t let any of your business stay within the team for long. He had pictures of you with the first guy, the guy from a week later, and the guy after him as well. By the time you’d figured out who the copycat murderer who’d sent you all Zugzwang-themed threats was, he’d got pictures of you locking lips with five separate one-night stands.

The team had said nothing about it, of course, except Hotch’s private aside asking if any of the men in the pictures needed informing about the situation. You’d had to admit to them that you’d not seen any of them since, and, with no reaction from Spencer, you’d felt almost vindicated in taking this step. 

If he didn’t care then, in those tense months where you were all leaning on each other for support, reeling from the death of Erin Strauss and the attacks on the team, closer than you’d really ever been before, then he wouldn’t ever care. 

The thought was freeing. So you’d kept up with your constant stream of men, not letting them get close enough to hurt you in the way that Spencer had, using them and discarding them like broken toys, ignoring that maybe it was you that was the broken one. 

It took a year for him to notice it. A year of you coming in with suspicious bruises on your neck that you laughed off, a year of your newfound confidence, a year of your conscious distance for him to notice that he missed you. It was slow at first. In those first few months, he just accepted that of course, you’d been seeing people. He’d assumed from the photographs everyone had seen that you’d been dating the entire time he’d known you, the feeling unsettling him a little, but he thought that was only because he’d never noticed. 

Now it was all he could notice. The way you’d walk in sometimes smelling unfamiliar, having showered at a hookup's place before taking off, the way you were suddenly open to the flirting by the local PDs on your cases. The way a sadness seeped into his chest every time he saw you with someone else. Envy wasn’t a feeling he was familiar with, so it took him stupidly long to name the emotion. 

You were back at O’Keefe’s after a local case successfully closed, and if you were drinking a lot, no one mentioned it. No one except Spencer, who’d made it his objective to keep you safe and by his side the entire night, for reasons he couldn’t even name. It was stifling, having him constantly hovering over you. 

“Spencer, lighten up a bit, have a drink.” You smiled up at him, trying to get him to loosen up so you could escape the way his sudden care was making you feel. The bartender was eyeing you up from his place behind the bar, and while you were usually careful not to get involved with men whom you’d likely run across again, you were throwing caution to the wind that day. 

“I’ll have a drink if you drink some water and slow down a bit, Y/N.” He handed you the glass he’d retrieved earlier and you sipped it slowly, squirming under the care in his gaze. He ordered a drink, and you eyed up the bartender as he did so, pushing Spencer’s hand off your hip as he approached, offering him a smile. He looked between you and the unfamiliar man, and felt a cold flash in his veins, waiting for his drink and then pulling you away back to the table with the rest of your friends, tangling your hand with his. 

You pulled out of his grip but followed him dutifully. He guided you into your seat quickly, brushing your hair out of your eyes before falling back into conversation with the rest of the team. You hated the way he could still make your heart stutter, still have you feeling hot all over from a single touch, and you felt trapped in the booth, screaming for a way out. 

Your chance came an hour later, when he excused himself to the bathroom, and you excused yourself as well, running back up to the bar. When he came back, you were gone.

“Where is Y/N?” He asked with a scowl, cursing himself for letting his eyes off you for even a second when you’d drank so much that night, having come back to suggest you turn in for the night, getting ready to offer you a ride home. 

“Y/N? By now, she’s either in the back room with the bartender or she’s convinced him to get off early and head back to hers,” Morgan chuckled, taking a swig of his drink. “Took her only two minutes of conversation to have him inviting her out the back entrance, she’s been gone for like five minutes now. 

The constricted feeling settled in his chest again, as his scowl deepened. Not knowing why he was feeling so goddamn destroyed by that statement, he let his head hang and left the bar himself, taking himself outside to get in his car and go home. Unbeknownst to him, you watched him leave from the alley behind the bar, the bartender placing open-mouthed kisses on your exposed neck as you buried your worryingly consistent feelings in the scent of bourbon and lust. 

The next week is rough for both of you. You laugh and play along with Morgan’s jokes about your game, keeping an eye out for him the entire time and ending all the conversations as you feel him enter the room or step closer. It doesn’t stop him from hearing it all, though, all the details about your sex life tormenting him, as he boils with anger at how wreckless you’re being with your constant stream of guys. 

“Mama, you were on fire last week. Took you only two minutes to disappear with that guy, you’re going to have to let me in on your secrets,” Morgan laughed from his perch on your desk. 

“Sorry, a magician never reveals her secrets, and what I do is definitely magic.” Your tone was suggestive and set the man off in a booming laugh, but with your back to the door, you hadn’t heard Spencer’s entrance. 

“The secret is that men are more accepting of casual hook-ups with strangers than women,” he snapped at you both, beginning to ramble as you both looked up at him in shock. 

“Okay, kid, I was just joking-”

“When surveyed over 75% of men said they would be willing to have sex with a complete stranger, vs. 0% of women, and while that’s just one study, there are multiple others that I could quote that have similar results.” 

“Spencer,” you chastised him, but he didn’t stop.

“What? Did you want to know when posing the question of an affair to people in a relationship that 18% of men reacted positively to having casual sex with a stranger, and surprisingly 4% of women also reacted in the affirmative? Did you ask that guy if he had a girlfriend before you fell into his bed, Y/N?” 

“Okay, that’s enough, Spencer, take a walk. I don’t know what’s up with you today, but that was out of line. Hotch is looking for you in his office.” The words came from Morgan, but he kept his eyes locked with yours as he was scolded, memorizing the look of pain in your eyes as he finally backed away. 

He didn’t know why he did it. He knew it would hurt you, and yet he continued anyway, even after you’d begged him to stop. He was hurt, and he didn’t know why, and he didn’t think he had any reason to be hurt, and somehow it was all because you’d been in the back of his mind constantly for as long as he could remember. 

–X– 

“Okay, girl’s night, my place, tomorrow night. There are no cases, and I managed to get Hotch to agree to let us put our phones on silent for the night, so it’s just me, you, JJ, and Blake, a bottle of wine and some good old-fashioned girl talk, what do you say?” Penelope asked you gleefully in the break room one day as you both prepared your drinks for a busy day of paperwork ahead. 

“I’m sorry, Pen, I have plans already.” You grinned up at her as she pouted, promising to make it up to her another time. You didn’t offer an explanation though, just excusing yourself back to your desk and letting her know that you’d make it up to her another time. 

Reid took your place as soon as you vacated it. Almost obsessively, he’d been following you around like a lost puppy since he’d exploded on you the other day. 

“I know you said girls’ night but… Could... Could I come? I think I need some uh, girl talk?” He asked Penelope, an awkward, embarrassed look on his face as he smiled tensely. If anyone knew what was wrong with him, recently, it would be them. 

Last year, he’d have said it was you, but the distance he’d felt recently, combined with the fact that he was almost 90% sure you were the root of his problems had him desperate for other opinions. 

“Oh. Are you sure, Spencer, we’ll be talking about all kinds of gross women stuff?” 

“I was raised by a single mother. I’m sure nothing you say could gross me out. Please?” She nodded her approval telling him what time to get there and to bring his beverage of choice, knowing he didn’t really drink wine all that much if he could help it. 

He turned up twenty minutes late, after spending a great deal of time pacing outside of Penelope’s apartment building wondering if he had any right to unburden himself on them like this. Pacing he wondered whether you’d actually showed up despite your mysterious plans and whether this had been all for naught anyway. 

When he eventually knocked on the door, Penelope opened it and greeted him with a warm hug. “We were wondering when you were going to knock on the door, one more minute and we were going to come out to get you.” 

JJ stood up to hug him, wine glass in her hand, and Blake offered him a wave from her perch on the couch. He took off his scarf and coat and accepted the glass of water Penelope offered him, settling into a chair opposite the three women. 

“Penelope said you wanted advice about something?” Blake was the first to enquire, the three of them getting straight into it, not letting him chicken out of it. 

“Yeah, I think so. Lately, I’ve been having these, I don’t know, weird feelings…” 

“Oh god, I thought I was a few years out from having the talk with someone,” JJ joked, but Penelope shushed her quickly after a quick snicker, letting him continue. 

“I’ve been… I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but I’ve been acting really weird around Y/N, and I can’t figure out why.” He finally pushed the words out, feeling a weight off his chest at the confession. 

“You can’t?” The room was silent for a minute as they looked at each other, and he looked at them looking at each other, wondering what it was exactly that he’d missed. 

“Yeah? I don’t know, every time I see her I just want to, I don’t know, have her attention on me, even if I have to say something a little mean to get it. And in the bar that time, I was so, I don’t know hurt, I guess, when she disappeared without saying goodbye.” 

They just listened to him go on, not stopping to interrupt him, so he continued. 

“And there’s been this weird distance between us lately, and I guess it’s been there for a while, but I miss her, but she’s still there. I can still talk to her, and I can still spend time with her but I miss her all the time.”

“Spencer,” Blake said with a soft voice. “Since when have you been feeling like this?” 

“I don’t know, I guess it started after everything happened with Strauss and the copycat in New York. But she’s always been… I don’t know, closer than most people? But every time I think we’re getting back to normal recently, she pulls away again and there’s this… void where she should be.”

JJ put her drink down and leaned a little closer to him, putting a hand on his shoulder. 

“Spencer, I think you might be in love with her.” He considered the words for a moment, before getting ready to dismiss them. 

“No, love is a good emotion, this doesn’t feel good, it feels… ugly.” Blake stared at him sympathetically, calmly talking him around. 

“Spencer, think about it. You’re protective over her, you don’t like seeing her with other people, this all started right around the time the copycat sent those pictures of her with other people. It is love, and it’s jealousy, too.” 

The words hit him like a tonne of bricks as he suddenly felt the full force of his words. He was in love with you. 

“Oh god, what do I do?” He held his head in his hands, and Penelope scoffed a little from her seat, the rest of them turning to look at him.  

“I’m sorry, you’re going to have to figure this one out on your own genius.” She said with a slightly sharp tone, and even the girls sent her questioning stares as she continued. 

“You don’t just get to decide that you want her after all this time, not after how you’ve been treating her these last few months.” She turns her head away a little bit and sips her drink, her tough-love approach leaving him slightly defeated.  

“Penelope, do you know something?” Blake asks firmly, trying to coax some answers out of her. 

“If I did, I’d be under a strict oath not to tell anyone. And I wouldn’t want to considering how much pain she was in when she made me swear never to tell anyone.” It was clear from the tone of her voice that she really wanted to say something though, the words desperate to spill out. 

“Penelope, your loyalty is commendable, but don’t you think what you have to say could help both of them?” JJ quietly coaxed out of her, and she finally gave in. 

“Okay, but if you hurt her, Spencer Reid, I will never forgive you ever again.” He nodded quickly, hanging onto her every word. 

“Think about what else happened a year ago.” She encouraged him, and for a moment, he was coming up blank.  

“A year ago? We were in the middle of the copycat case. Strauss had just been killed. We were close to being pulled off the case-” 

“You got a girlfriend, Spencer. You came in one day out of the blue and just announced that you were in love with someone you hadn’t met, and you didn’t realize that you were torturing her.” Penelope tried really hard not to snap at him, but his ignorance of your feelings was frustrating, to say the least.  

“What Penelope is trying to say, Spencer, is that we think Y/N was in love with you, too,” JJ added, softening the blow. “And finding out you didn’t feel the same way so suddenly was, well it was a shock to all of us really.”

“What Penelope is trying to say is that she spent six hours with me crying into this couch, and then picked herself up and helped you try to save the woman you had chosen over her. So yeah, she’s been a bit distant, but can you really blame her?” 

“She… She was in love with me?” His heart stopped for a second, dropping to the pit of his stomach as he thought back to those days, how you’d acted around him, the smiles that hadn’t reached your eyes, the reassurances that he’d brushed off, so desperate to help Maeve. 

“Honestly, until you told us about Maeve, I thought you two had something going on,” Blake added. 

“We used to have an office bet when Emily was around about which of the two of you would confess first,” JJ admitted shyly. 

“Oh, god.” He let his head hang a little in shame. “Do you… do you think she still feels the same?” 

They shared another glance at each other again, and he panicked trying desperately to decode whatever it was that had just passed between them. 

“Look, we shouldn’t profile each other but… It’s not a coincidence that all of her hookups tend to happen after you pay her some attention.” Blake observed, letting Reid fill in the blanks of her statement.

“That might be my fault actually, I told her the best way to get over you is to get under someone else.” 

“I don’t want her under someone else,” he stated then, cutting himself off before he could say anything else too damning.  

“She’s not here tonight, why isn’t she here?” He panicked looking frantically around the room for answers, but none of them knew really.  

“She said she had plans, but she didn’t tell me what they are.” 

“Do you think she’s… do you think she’s with…” He couldn’t finish the thought, instead bolting upright and gathering his things. 

“I need to go.” He let out, as the women cheered behind him, finally happy that he was taking action. Penelope shouted your address at him as he left as if he didn’t already have it memorized, running out in the rain, his feet carrying him to your apartment.  

He saw the light on when he approached, thankful that you were still there, and bounded up the stairs to your floor, not giving himself time to second guess this before he pounded on your door.  

You pulled the door open, a confused look on your face as you greeted him, his chest heaving, water dripping down his face. He looked like a mess. 

“Are you alone?” He gasped out, having to pause between each word to catch his breath.  

“Spencer, what are you doing-” The breath left your body as he leaned into you, catching you around the hips and walking you back into your apartment, your back hitting the wall behind you as he rested his forehead against your own, chest still desperately drawing in oxygen. 

“Please, please tell me right now if there’s someone here with you. If there is, I’ll leave, if there isn’t…” His gaze fell to your lips and your entire body lit up, the haze of your confusion finally lifting as you took in each of his words. His lips moved forward, seconds from connecting with your own when his question was finally answered.  

“Y/N? Who is it?” The voice was male, and it was coming from your living room, but it was all Spencer needed to know as he detangled himself from you, pushing his wet hair out of his face and putting some distance between you two, muttering apologies as he backed out of the door again. 

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t… I’m sorry,” he said, quickly turning away from you and leaving your apartment quickly. 

“Spencer, wait-” You tried to yell after him, but it was too late. He had disappeared into the night, as quickly as he came. 

You returned to the living room, cursing yourself for not answering quickly enough as you crawled back into the seat you’d just left. 

“What was all that?” Your brother asked from his perch, shoveling popcorn into his mouth in a way that had you somehow even more pissed at him for the simple fact of his existence.  

“That was Spencer. He… God, I think he thinks I’m in here with a guy.” 

–X– 

The next few days at work were tense, as you desperately tried everything to catch his eye. But you weren’t sure why you were putting in so much effort. He was the one who had burst into your apartment and practically begged you for your attention, why were you now the one chasing him?

Needless to say, you took your frustrations straight to Penelope Monday morning. 

“And then he left without letting me explain that it was my brother, and he hasn’t talked to me once this morning, he keeps running away from me and I don’t even know what the fuck it was he was trying to gain from all that and- ughh he is so dense.”

Penelope had sensed the oncoming disaster the moment she’d seen your social media post about your brother’s visit Saturday morning, and you only confirmed all her fears as you unloaded onto her. She silently cursed Spencer as well, and once she’d given you some reassurance and reminded you that you had some case files on your desk that were urgent and distracting enough to calm you down, she practically lept from her seat to hunt Reid down.  

“Spencer Reid, you get your ass in my office right this second,” she whisper screamed at him in the breakroom, his sunken eyes showing that his jump to conclusions had left him in a poor emotional state. He jolted at her words, as she watched to see if you noticed the two of them before practically frog-marching him off down the hall.  

“What the hell happened? We sent you off to confess your feelings, and you what? Pin her to the wall and breathe down her neck before running off with your tail between your legs?” 

He looked down guiltily before replying. “She had a guy there, Penelope, I didn’t want to… I didn’t want to get rejected like that.” 

“She did not have a guy there, Spencer, she had her brother there.” She pulled up your post on her phone and thrust it in his face as she watched his eyes go wide at his own stupidity, clutching the phone as he read your words.  

“And if you weren’t a coward, you’d have stayed and told her even if she did actually have someone over.” 

He’d since tuned out her words though, the crushing weight of his almost-confession that had been stuck to him since the weekend dissipating slowly. 

“This is her brother?” He looked up at you again, desperate to confirm the words she’d already said. 

“Yes. You’d know that if you weren’t such a technophobic freak. I love you but this is the 21st Century and you’re an idiot.” 

“Yeah, I am.” He handed her the phone back and slunk out of the office, and back to his desk. He had a chance to try again, and he wasn’t going to fuck it up this time. 

–X– 

You didn’t know how you knew that night, but when you heard the knock at your door, you knew it was him. 

You hesitated before reaching for the door handle, pulling it open, and confirming your suspicions. 

“Hi.” You said, and he returned the greeting with a mumble of his own before the two of you fell into silence again. He opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something else, but couldn’t, instead letting his gaze fall to your lips. You heard the hidden question in his look and opened the door a little wider. 

It took only a moment for him to come crashing into you, hands holding your face as his lips met yours in a passionate embrace, drinking you in as again walked you back into your apartment, not even breaking away as he closed the door behind you.  

You wrapped your arms up and around his neck, as you let his hands fall to your hips, your chest, your ass, exploring every part of your body he could reach as you stood caught up in each other. In your desperation for each other, you hit walls, and bumped into tables, finally stopping at your kitchen island as he lifted you up, wrapping your legs around his waist as he started pressing kisses down the hollow of your neck. 

“I’m sorry,” he muttered between kisses. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was your brother and I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner, and I’m sorry I’ve been so weird recently.” You pulled his face back up to your own claiming his lips in yours once again, swallowing each of his other apologies. 

He pulled away again, looking at you tenderly as he lifted you into his arms and gently carried you into your room, laying you down on your bed. 

“I love you,” he whispered, and the words broke you. You’d spent five years practically begging him to say them, and another year since trying to bury even the very idea of him feeling the same way deep inside you. Tears fell from your eyes and he kissed each one of them away, muttering confessions into your skin. 

“I love you, please don’t cry.” 

“I love you, you’re so beautiful.” 

“I love you and I’m so so sorry.” You pushed him away again slightly, regaining enough of your composure to finally talk again. 

“I need to know that you’re serious, Spencer. I can’t… I can’t do this if you’re not totally sure, because it will destroy me.” Your voice broke as the words stumbled over the knot in your throat, your hands balled into his shirt, legs still wrapped around him. 

“I’m serious. I don’t want to hurt you ever again.” He pressed his lips back into yours again, and you let the kiss deepen, lips slanting over each other in desperation as the need to be joined overtook your body. 

He lifted your skirt, trailing a hand between the two of you as he checked your arousal. You could feel his cock pressing into your thigh, desperate to be freed from it’s restraints. He began kissing his way down your naval, but you pulled him back up.  

“No, I need you now. There will be time for that later, but if you don’t do this now I think I’ll drive myself mad with wanting.” His lips reconnected with yours again as you began divesting yourselves of clothing, and within another two minutes, he was pressing into you, muttering more adoring serenades into your skin as he began catching the tears escaping your eyes again. 

“Yes, Spencer, more please,” you moaned underneath him, legs tight around him as he began thrusting into you with a ferocity you hadn’t felt from him before. It was tender, but you were both desperate, after months of separation, to come back into one another. 

Your lips and teeth clashed together as you let the room echo with your moans, his moans, and the sound of your skin slapping against each other. His forehead came to rest against your own as he grew closer to his release, lips disconnecting as you just stared into each other's eyes in that moment, seeing each other truly for the very first time. 

“Y/N, I’m gonna… I’m gonna cum.” He pressed down into you harder, looking down to the place where you were joined and letting out a whispered curse as he watched you take every inch of him. His hips stuttered then, and you felt your own climax reach you as you felt him release into you, his lips softly tracing your own as you breathed each other in again. 

He pulled out and immediately went to work making sure you were comfortable, propping you up on the bed, making sure the pillows behind you were plump and soft, and running off to find something to clean yourself up with. You watched him silently, again brushing some of the tears from your eyes. 

“How do you feel?” He said shyly as he returned, having pulled his pants back on at least as he bought you a glass of water. You offered him a small smile and a thank you as you replied. 

“I think… I think we need to talk, Spencer.” You said, not meeting his eyes as he looked down at you attentively. 

“Why did you come tonight, Spencer?” You asked, voice so quiet you resisted the urge to repeat the question, knowing that he heard you perfectly clearly, 

“I needed to tell you how I feel. It’s been staring me in the face for six years, and I somehow didn’t know, but once I did I just… I needed you to know.” You nodded at his words, standing still in front of you on the bed as you swung your legs off and asked him to pass you your nightdress back. You pulled it on over your head as you asked him your next question. 

“Why did you run away the other day?” 

“I didn’t know it was your brother, Y/N, I should’ve-”

“It shouldn’t have mattered who it was. If you love me, you should fight for me, right? The way you fought for Maeve.” Your tears start falling again as you open the wound that brought you this far. 

“Y/N, that was… That was different-” You can hear the panic in his voice as he tries to come up with the words to explain himself. 

“Spencer, if.. If it’s different then I think you should leave. If you don’t love me the same way you loved her, then there’s no point starting something.” 

“Y/N, please.” 

“No, Spencer. I have spent six years of my life filled with nothing but love for you. I wake up and think about you, I go to bed and you’re still there in the back of my mind. My every action is informed by your presence and I am so, so tired. So if you do not feel the same way, you need to turn around and leave this apartment.” 

The silence between you is thick, as you stare up at him through your tears, face stern as you push him away. 

He gathers his things. Moves towards the door and doesn’t say anything, and just as you’re about to break down, to let the sob burst from your chest in an agonized wail, you hear your front door close behind him, and you’re left alone in the empty apartment, stuck in the purgatory of your love for him, unable to move an inch. 

[coco-loco-nut]

Down Bad

pairing: carlos sainz x reader

summary: a heartbreak like no other

a/n: it’s super short, sorry

masterlist ttpd masterlist

________

You should've known better. Really. You aren't the kind of girl that a hot, 29-year-old, Spanish Formula One driver would like. Of course, you are beautiful, but apparently not enough for him. His attention was fleeting, leaving you just another one of his conquests in a long string of girls like you.

You met Carlos while interning in Madrid during the Winter. At the time you didn't realize he was love-bombing you, only to drop you cold once your internship ended a month later and you went home, practically shipped away by him. For a moment you knew, or thought you knew, extraordinary love, but it wasn't real. Was anything real anymore?

“Sweetheart, you need to stop moping,” your mom says from the doorway of your bedroom. “You know I love you, but if I didn’t know you better, I’d think you are a moody teenager,” you know your mom means well, but the last bit struck hard.

“Fine, I’m going for a run,” you groan, rolling out of bed. She leaves your room, seemingly appeased. It doesn’t take you long to get dressed, lace up your trainers, and play your angsty playlist through your headphones.

You take the path you know by heart, the one you take when you need to be away from people. When you are sufficiently alone, you let it all out.

Crying and running may not be the wisest idea, but it’s cathartic to you. You stop when you get to the meadow and lay down, staring at the cloudy sky. As the music plays, you yell the lines that hit too close to home. I might just die, it would make no difference. Fuck you if I can’t have us.

Fuck. You need to get over him. Everything just feels so hollow now, like you were stripped of everything you are and ever were. You just want to talk to your friends about it, but you know them. They will call you nuts, saying that it never really happened, that Carlos Sainz would never date you.

So instead, you lay in this field, thinking about when you were heaven struck. You might just not get up, stay down while you are down bad for someone who doesn’t even care about your existence anymore.

Maybe you were abducted by an alien to another, then returned back to this spot. That could explain it. Explain why you are feeling the angst of a scorned teenage girl, when you have more emotional maturity than that. You are 22 after all.

It’s how you imagine it feels like to lose the touch of a twin flame. I guess being love bombed then abandoned would do that to you.

The more you think about it, the more the alien analogy seems to fit. It’s like he beamed down from a ship, did a hostile takeover on your heart, the alien encounters closer and closed as each day passed. And you let them happen, willingly.

It started with a hello, then coffee, then a stroll, then a lunch, then a drive, then a dinner, then a night spent together, two, three, four, it spiraled. He did everything he could to worm his way into your heart, only for him to say it’s over.

Maybe you will take the ship, go to some planet and find an alien who can understand all of it. How dare he do everything he could to make you fall in love, only to leave you stranded. How is that romantic? You were in love, and fuck him if you can’t have him because of his actions.

You stare at the sky, music pumping through your headphones, willing the sky to part and reveal the alien spaceship that will beam you up to it in a cloud of dust and take you away.

Minutes pass until you realize your efforts are worthless, you mentally wave goodbye to the ship that carries him (and his pet names and his perfect dates) with it. Shedding a few tears on your run home, you start rebuilding yourself with each step. The hurt and pain slowly being chipped away.

No man with EVER make you feel this down bad again.

[coffeegnomee]

Writing this because I don’t see anyone analyzing the Kab lore and I’m genuinely intrigued as to how people are viewing it.

It’s just such an interesting and all over the place story atm. I have a huge amount of faith that she will make an amazing story by the end of the season. I’m willing to let her cook. She has to get practice in this somehow.

But also she’s just so all over the place. And not really embracing the depth of mcrp, but that's a different story.

This started from having a hard time drawing the line between lore and not lore because I refuse to just say “Kab in the box was lore and everything else is not” even though I’m pretty sure that is like exactly how she views it. 

Because the moment Red killed her she went to chat and said something like “chat it only took me three weeks to get lore on the server!” Like girl it’s been lore. All of it is lore. 

And then the box arc was just like, enter the box angry at Red because he’s forcing you to hide, go through your friends and realize you care about them, go through the rest of the team and remember you f-ing hate all of them, including the friends at the start. Leave the box angry at Red, using pacifism as a cover to get close to Woogie to destroy Red. 

Like am I crazy to say that she didn’t change in the slightest because of the box and you could take that whole arc away and nothing would be different? 

But what IS interesting about that is how she never got over Red killing her. Never. I think she hoped that the box would soothe her out of that hate and come to a different conclusion, but by the end the (almost too real) rage about him killing her, especially after she made him that armor, pervades to this day. 

Now THAT’S lifesteal, holding the hurt until it has a real resolution, not trying to get yourself over it quicker. As Red said last season “we make our best content when we actually hate each other” (not a direct quote, Zam said it) and as uncomfortable as that is to blend real hate into the ability to tell a story, there is real truth to that, that unless you, You the Writer, actually Care about the stakes of the story, you’re not going to write a good story. And nothing makes you care more than actually caring.

But Kab puts up these walls around herself to delineate character vs streamer. She is, to her credit, quite good at being in character, to the point where when she drops the character it is so jarring to be told none of it is real, this is just lore. It’s wildly jarring. And makes it quite difficult to find her character to be endearing? At least for me. Because she consistently does little things to break the fourth wall like clearly having left the box to get materials. Girl PLEASE why did you not just include getting materials and being paranoid about being caught as a PART of that story?? Sigh. 

So she, in her mind, has a very clear distinction for what is her character. And a distinction for what she herself is willing to do. And that separation makes basically everything she says “in character” a lie; like she can say what she wants, be dramatic and make a cool tragic character, but that will not have a real meaning on who she is as a character on Lifesteal as a whole.

And what I find fascinating is that despite that, she is a mirror to whoever is in front of her. She absolutely becomes whatever the person in front of her is. 

She comes out of the box saying she will use pacifism to get to Woogie. But then Flame blows up spawn and she feels bad, so she talks to Zam and within 5 seconds you can tell she’s fully dedicated to that task. She fully embraces being pacifist. Because Zam is pacifist. 

But then Zam leaves to practice MCCR and next thing you know she’s talking to Wemmbu and within 5 seconds he convinces her to kill Planet publicly and with everyone online, breaking her away from pacifism. 

This also despite the fact that Wemmbu is Shit at instigating people like Zam and Pangi. He tried SO HARD to get them to kill him or change their views. But one devil on the shoulder to Flame got him to blow up spawn and one second with Kab got her to cave and kill Planet (TWICE! And get Mid’s heart!). SOOOO interesting how his approach works so wildly differently on new members vs old. 

So she mirrors whoever is around her. What a fascinating character trait out of the master manipulator. Is it manipulation? Or does she really fully and truly emotionally believe what she says in those moments? Does she come back with manipulation ideas after to fit whatever impulse she had in the moment? 

And then there’s the Mapicc castle. I 100% believe she was the one to blow it up. Maybe I’m just projecting. Maybe it was wemmbu during the window he had his pc and when he didn’t. Maybe it was someone else.

But she just declared herself evil. It’s only natural to try and instigate chaos and get the members blaming each other for things that you did. 

But she was SO GOOD during that conversation. Brainstorming and giving ideas for who else it could be, pinning the wemmbu heads on Mid but also pulling back and saying it couldn’t be her for the explosions, trying to work out the timeline. Like in so many ways she sounded like Spoke making up a story and being Unhelpful(TM). And she went out of her way to drive to her office just to have this conversation.

But also she seemed so helpful, so genuinely trying to brainstorm and pick apart this juicy puzzle in front of her. And therefore just curious, not manipulative. 

GAH I just can’t decide! She’s either completely brilliant or completely incompetent and succeeding by accident!

And it’s even more interesting given the thought that she came into Lifesteal riding the high of MoneySMP and how she pulled off a betrayal arc super well. But that was Kab vs rando content creators in the mcyt space. 

Now she’s Kab vs the very people who defined betrayal in mcyt. Everyone on lifesteal shares her ability to lie and manipulate. The thing that once made her unique is the very fabric of the server she is on. She thinks she’s got a leg up on everyone, but she’s merely on the same playing field. And that’s so dang interesting. Because she still doesn’t consider herself to merely be on the same playing field. She still thinks she’s better at this than anyone else. 

She said during the stream where Mane destroyed the Mice base (7/23/24) that she likes playing cocky characters because it makes the fall all the greater. But she just IS that cocky at times. Every time she’s jumped she’s giggly and cocky about being slick and avoiding being killed again because she sits on the respawn screen. 

So she’s cocky and willing to cause chaos, but she’s not the progenitor of chaos. She is not a worldender. She only causes chaos when someone nudges her towards it, not out of an internal desire to be chaotic and an understanding of the need for chaos on lifesteal.

And perhaps it’s because deep down, she cares about the people on the server. Not in the way Zam cares where he feels awful about everything he does that is evil and repents and has remorse over his actions. 

But she is affected by her caring. One of the most interesting moment of Kab lore was when she saw the photo of Mane standing in the blown up Mice base. 

KAB: “wow […] I knew he would blow it up, but like seeing the image is still like, fuck”

CLOWN: “really?” 

KAB: “THIS HASN’T HAPPENED TO ME BEFORE” 

CLOWN: “hasn't it happened to you like twice?” 

KAB: “he didn’t blow it up last time [...] I think, I think I have to leave. I think I should leave. I’m putting like hannah and red and leo at risk right now” 

It’s an involuntary reaction, something that is intrinsic to her core. She immediately went to: I should stop being on this team so I can save Hannah and Leo. I don’t want to see them get hurt. 

And this is before she knew Woogie was wanting to leave the Mice because he thought she was a threat!

This was before Red killed her! 

She came to this conclusion that she was dangerous to her friends outside of them agreeing with it. 

And she never brought this back up when she was in the box. She to this day thinks she did nothing intrinsically wrong (ie dangerous to others) by antagonizing Mane. At least as a character she refuses to accept this. But for a second there Kab Kaboodle came through and knew that to be an intrinsic fact. And then she didn’t expand on it. Missed opportunity tbh. 

And then I’ll end with an analysis of the Mane conversation after he blew up the base. Because it’s so interesting to see Kab banter in lore (though I suppose from her pov it wasn’t lore yet because this was before Red killed her) and see her say Way Too Much. She says she’s a master manipulator but girl you leak freaking everything. 

So, she says what she said above, then a few minutes later gets in vc with Mane.

MANE: “you didn’t think I had the guts.. To blow up the base of [unintelligible]” 

KAB: “[talking over him] you didn’t blow up the other one”

This whole conversation Kab interrupts Mane so much. She has to say things, to prove herself. Even when staying silent would give her so much more information.

MANE: “I’m gonna be honest, I was just looking for a reason” 

Every pvper on lifesteal ONLY acts evil when they have a reason. It’s so consistent. It’s never “just because”.

Kab says she put posters up of him bc she thought it was funny. 

 MANE: “yeeaa I find it funny too um. You said you're not scared which, I- I find pretty amusing” 

KAB: “ok!” 

MANE: “because you're obviously pretty scared” 

KAB: “you’re not scary. Dude. like your strength of the sword doesn’t fucking scare me dude. When you actually get smart and shit then then come talk to me” 

Super cocky. Super dismissive. Just looking for a power dynamic to make her regain control over the situation. That’s not manipulation that’s just a power grab.

MANE: “Ok. I’ll talk to you when I get smart I guess but I mean, I dunno, according to these dogs here you've been at, at the deepest level of the cave for for a while, almost like you’re hiding. [pause, Kab freezes and pulls up coords] am I right about that? That seems pretty scared to me. I dunno. But um” 

Mane absolutely cooks in this conversation but Kab just refuses to be affected by his lines and instead mocks him for being stereotypically tough guy. And yet she got scared there. She brought up her coords. 

KAB: “[scoff] alright buddy” 

MANE: “I dunno the way that you’re like, you're like interacting and the way that you’re like going about this is not the way that I would go about it personally”

KAB: “well, we’re very different people” 

MANE: “I mean. Okay. how do I rephrase this. The way that you’re going about this is not the way any other person has gone about this before” 

KAB: “thank you!” 

MANE: “it’s not a complement.” 

KAB: “I think it’s a complement. I appreciate that” 

MANE: “I’m calling you stupid.” 

KAB: “I try to be original” 

MANE: “you’re being stupid” 

KAB: “maybe in your eyes yea” 

MANE: “cause you’re gonna make a new base, I mean, you haven't even stopped to question how I found this one, which is quite interesting.” 

He’s calling her stupid for not asking more questions. Especially after she just called HIM the stupid one. He’s clearly smarter than he looks

KAB: “oh I know how you found it” 

MANE: “how did I find it” 

KAB: “my team already told me, I’m not telling you” 

Instead of fishing for more information, playing dumb, Kab instead goes for posturing that she is far smarter than him. She could’ve used this to make him think she’s stupid or to actually learn how he found the base so she can be safer in the future (later she tells chat the she has no idea how he found the base). And interesting move out of someone who wants to manipulate people. Usually you would want to play dumb, not play cocky.

MANE: “[scoff] you don’t know how I found that base” 

KAB: “okay! You can believe that” 

MANE: “yea, because if you did, there’s no secret to keep from me. Like the way I found the base myself”

KAB: “[interrupting] girl you know I don’t use that base right?” 

MANE: “okay. That’s your teammate’s base” 

KAB: “that’s fair. That is my teammate’s base. I more feel bad for them rather than me.” 

MANE: “yea. Yea. I feel bad for them too. It would suck to like, like, if I had a teammate, you know, especially considering like the fact that you, you- overall you’re team’s isn’t like the most skilled um if I was always suffering the consequences of my teammate’s actions who obviously doesn’t care about what they say” 

He’s using the info Woogie gave him to make her feel bad/see if she does feel bad AND SHE DOESN’T HIDE A SINGLE THING!

KAB: “girl if you’re trying to guilt me it’s not gonna work” 

MANE: “I’m not trying to guilt you, I I’m just saying like, if I was your teammate I- I would feel horrible, you know? You’re like” [.... devolves as mane is like if you want to loose teammates you can, and kab goes don’t mansplain to me (again, being cocky. refusing to be scared)] 

MANE: “even if you’re not scared, you’re putting your teammates in jeopardy, which you clearly already know, which is very interesting, very interesting trait for someone who cares about her team. So. I just wanted talk to you and get your consensus on the situation” 

He was fully going to stop the conversation there. But she just missed the cue and started to willingly gave him more information because her adhd ass thought that was a question not a statement /pos

KAB: “yea.. I’m I’m not overly fussed. It’s inconvenient. and that’s about it. It’s inconvenient” 

MANE: “for who?” 

KAB: “me” 

She’s revealing that her motivations on lifesteal revolve around herself. She cares more about herself than teammates in the long run. Like I said earlier, she intrinsically does care about people, but on lifesteal in particular she will first care about herself. 

MANE: “oooooh. See but you just said you care about your teammates and [unintelligible]”

KAB: “I do, but let’s be real two of them don’t log on very often and Leo’s been doing his own thing anyway. So” 

MANE: “oh. I guess you’re team’s already disbanded so” Mane brings back up how he just wanted to see what she thought about it. Again she just keeps talking.

KAB: “I think you’re being predictable and I think that’s helpful” 

MANE: “aw yea bro, glad I could help out”

[…more chatting] 

MANE: “If hiding doesn’t mean that you’re scared, I don’t know what hiding means” 

KAB: “I mean not everything has to have and emotional reaction” 

MANE: “I mean it’s not really an emotional reaction: if you’re hiding you’re scared of something” 

KAB: “scared is an emotion” 

MANE: “nah, fear is an emotion” DAMN SON. he really can just drop the dramatic bars bro. 

KAB: “fear is an emotion. I say being fearful and being scared is the same thing.” 

MANE: “if you weren’t fearful you wouldn’t be hiding” 

KAB: “that's not necessarily true” 

MANE: “how” 

KAB:” okay-” 

MANE: “hold on hold on hold on. [wanting direct clarification] Before we get into that, you’re saying that you’re not scared.” 

KAB: “no. [laughing at him]” 

MANE:” You’re not scared at all”

KAB: “no. I’m not scared at all” 

MANE: “Okay. as long as we get that out of the way” 

KAB: “I’m just not an idiot. But I’m not scared at all, no.” 

MANE: “okay. Ooooh, so you’re saying like the smart thing to do is hide” 

(/genuinely realizing this in real time. He did not understand this until this very moment)

KAB: “I mean, yea. Let’s be realistic. You are much better at pvp than I am and you have more hearts than me [ect] I’m doing it because it’s the right thing to keep my survival. HOLY SHIT I JUST REALIZED A PARALLEL. You’re a lion and I’m a rabbit” [derailed, mane says he got what he wanted, thinks she got something out of it too] 

KAB: “can I ask you one thing quickly?” 

This, I think, is the only thing Kab actually cared to ask this whole conversation. She was not being purposeful in anything else, just responding to what Mane was saying and saying things. But she wasn’t really listening to what was happening, she was too focused on looking tough and explaining herself. Until this moment.

MANE: “mmmhm?” 

KAB: “why did you go after my base and try and kill me? Was it the posters? Is that why?” 

MANE: “well, the posters were just a good reason” 

KAB: “you just want to do it?” 

MANE: “I’m gonna be honest. It’s just fun” 

KAB: “oooh. So I did categorize you correctly. Ok cool!” 

MANE: “[sad] ooh. okay.“ 

Leaves call KAB: “yea Mane is just as predictable as I thought he was”

Clown comes back in vc KAB: “[explaining the convo] he just wants to. He just thinks it’s fun. He’s just a crazy villain. I told you!” 

But like, I don’t think it’s that. I think we learned that you can get Mane to hunt someone very very easily, just give him a small excuse and he’ll gladly do it. Which is useful if you want a villain or want someone to hunt you. So in that way he is super predictable. But he isn’t “a crazy villain” the posters were just an excuse, an excuse he had been looking for. Because he wants an excuse. That is very different than pure “it was for the fun”. 

The fact that she comes to the conclusion that he’s just a crazy villain after that conversation is crazy. I feel like she just was looking for confirmation for a hypothesis she had rather than really looking for research to see who Mane is. 

Which is a huge flaw for someone who wants to figure out why people are the way they are so you can manipulate them. 

I feel like Mane, if he is smart, learned far far more information about her than she did from him.

The tension for the Kab lore here lies in how this will all blow up in her face. I think she will cling to things and copium her way into believing she won no matter what. But she will have been absolutely destroyed. 

And I keep getting hit with her being incompetent because she like, wildly, and I mean WILDLY, makes wrong assumptions about the older Lifestealer’s motivations.

Which is crazy to me because she WAS a viewer! She, in theory, (but probably not in practice because no cc has enough time to watch another smp with as much attention to detail and analysis that we do) should have a really solid understanding of the crew, and she self reports that she does but she’s been wrong so many times. 

Like not only does she get Mane completely wrong here, but when Spoke logged on one night and said he was betraying the empire because of jepex she flat out believed him??? And like brought it up again later like it was true. 

She thinks Zam has a huge plan of becoming evil. She had this whole moment in the box where she mansplained to chat that we are being fooled by him. We were being gaslit by him into thinking he isn’t planning on being evil at the end. And it was just so painful to watch because she’s just so wrong. 

Because Zam has never ever thought of his lore like that. He’s reactionary to the extreme, believing he will take the current lore to the end of the season regardless of how early it is in the season. He becomes evil by the end more often than he doesn’t, but it’s not premeditated. And she should know that. 

And she assumed that Red wouldn’t kill her. Like, no, I didn’t see it coming either, but it was a very Reddoons move. To take it personal when someone causes him anxiety. There were other small assumptions she made on older life stealer motivations that I can’t remember now. 

But to clear it out, what motivates Kab Kaboodle?? She hates not being believed. That’s what I took from all this. This is her trigger, the thing that will motivate her forward. 

Because she does lie and manipulate. And that relies upon being believed. So when someone believes something that isn’t true about her (like Red’s assumptions that she was leaking info to Clown) it hurts a hell of a lot more. 

But because she lies, nobody will ever believe her when she desperately tries to get them to believe the truth.

So yea. What do you guys think about Kab and her lore? 

[pastel-peach-writes]

Face Paints | Aloy x Reader

╰┈➤ PLOT: With someone who wears intricate face paints such as Aloy, she needs someone to assist her, right?

╰┈➤ WARNINGS: Cursing, Not Proofread

⍣ ೋ Enjoy!⍣ ೋ

"Aloy," you breathed out. Your girlfriend had sat herself in front of a mirror with an absurd amount of paints and dyes scattered around her. She had a big white blob on her face and scribbled on her arms. What she was doing looked messy like an accident or like she used her body as a cloth between brushes.

With a shaky hand and her face even closer to the mirror, she huffed. "It's fine. I'm fine." The redhead used her other hand to stabilize the hand painting her face. Her jaw relaxed and her eyes grew wide in concentration.

You walked over, shaking your head as you saw how much of a mess she made on her skin. "You are anything but. Here." Sat in front of her, you pry the brush out of her hands and grab her paints.

"Hey, I was using that!"

"Yeah. Poorly." You cleaned the small brush with some water and wiped the remains on the cloth. Aloy huffed again, watching as you primed and prepared the brush for a more accurate painting session.

The girl was fine doing the paints herself. She was taught by Rost when she was younger and has done her own since then. She didn't need her partner to do it for her. Although, she did like the thought of being face-to-face with you. Or watching your face of concentration when you did the intricate designs on her arm.

Maybe you painting her wouldn't be all bad.

With the brush properly loaded with paint and water, you smiled up at her. You used the pad of your thumb to wipe away her previous attempts before resting the side of your pinky on her cheek. "It's gonna be cold so I'll need you to be still, okay?"

Aloy deadpanned, though a soft smile peeked through the corners of her mouth. "I know how to be still. This isn't my first face paint."

You shrugged, smiling wider due to her expression. "Oh, I know. I still need to preface you because what I'm going to do is so detailed and refined that it's going to take some time. So," you pressed the brush to the bridge of her nose. "Stay. Still."

Stay still, she did. For the most part, Aloy is pretty behaved. She only breaks the rules, what? Like, two to three times a day? And she only does it because she's trying to help people. Not for the hell of it. Aloy likes to call herself a rebel with a cause.

As you painted her face, Aloy stared into your eyes with her bright green eyes. Through the sparkle in your eye, Aloy could also see how concentrated you were. She didn't understand why you were adamant about doing her face paint. She's capable of doing it on her own and has done more complicated paint on her lonesome.

However, the more she stared and the more you painted, she started to realize this was less about the paint. You wanted to paint her face because you wanted to do an act of service for her.

You didn't care if she'd done her own before or didn't need your help, you wanted to help her. Take something off her shoulders and spend time with her. Plus, who in the hell passes up time to be face-to-face with your partner?

"How's it going?" Aloy's rasped voice spoke in a whisper. A slight smile crept onto your lips as you heard her voice. You were so immersed in the face paints that you forgot to speak and forgot you could speak. Aloy's voice was soft enough to pull you out of deep concentration but was quiet enough to not startle or mess you up.

"Good," you whispered back. You carefully used two fingers to tilt her head to the other side. With the left side of her cheek done, it was time to do the right. In white paint, you painted rectangular scales. The scales mimicked a futuristic dinosaur's as if the machines that ruled the planet wore some silicone skin to protect their wires and inner workings.

If they had skin, Aloy wouldn't be able to override them as easily. Oh well. Sucks for them.

"I'm almost done with this side," you whispered, your words slow as you concentrated on painting your girlfriend's face.

Aloy almost shook her head in protest but remembered that any movement would fuck your painting up. "No," she blurted in a whisper. She reminded herself to take a breath, an embarrassed smile on her lips. "I mean, take your time. I like being here with you."

You pulled away, your brows furrowed in puzzlement. With a head tilt, you removed the brush on her face. "But I thought you had to meet a village woman to help her find her adult son."

Aloy shrugged, her embarrassed smile growing into a smug one as she looked at your knowing face. "If I had enough time to get my face painted, I could spend a little more time staring into my partner's eyes while they paint me. Right?"

Aloy's smirk only grew when the subtle hint of being flustered peaked through your smile.

Twirling the skinny paintbrush in your fingers, you leaned back in your spot, your gaze piqued an interest in the things next to you. "I mean, I guess so," your sentence ended on a particularly high note.

Laughter filled the air. Aloy grabbed your wrists, pulling her closer to you. "Okay, so resume!" she continued to laugh. "Stop being all cute and finish what you started."

"Stop!" You playfully swatted her shoulder. She faked a wince and held the spot you hit.

"Ow!"

"Oh, please. You ate plants stronger than that hit." Aloy eye-rolled as you leaned back to resume her painting.

Aloy was right. Taking your time as you painted her face felt different than rushing to paint her face. You could seriously examine every textured bit of her skin, perfect your lines, and take shameless gawks at how beautiful she was; little freckles on her face, red cheeks from the sun, and baby hairs on the side of her face, right by her ear.

When you were done, you pecked Aloy on her lips. Much to her surprise.

"What...? What was that for?" she asked, her shy smile revealing her teeth. You shrugged. You swished the paintbrush in the cup of water before taking it out to dry off.

You grabbed a damp cloth to wipe your hands. "I don't know. A prize for sitting so well."

The girl scoffed, her arms crossed across her chest in playful defense. "I always sit well."

It was your turn to roll your eyes. You grabbed a shard of glass, its edges carefully protected with twine and decorated with leaves and pieces of gold that were found in rivers. "Aloy, you can barely last when people go on tangents. Here."

Aloy took the makeshift mirror from you, going to scoff again but when she caught a glimpse of her appearance, her jaw dropped. "Wow, I..." Aloy's voice trailed off as she brought a careful hand to her face.

"Careful," you warned as you stood. "It's still wet. It'll dry on your way."

Aloy matched your stance, her attention still on herself in the mirror. You did this in what, ten minutes? And her face has never been as skillfully painted before. Between the rectangular scales, there were dots and sometimes squiggles.

On the bridge of her nose was a thick white line and a circle of paint on the bulbous part of her nose. You also painted a "V" between her brows with two dots, inside and on either side.

"This is amazing." Aloy finally met your gaze, smiles both resting on each other's lips. "Thank you." She engulfed you in a hug, some of her armor and clothes poking at your own but you've gotten used to the feeling.

"You're welcome." You melted into her touch. Your eyes closed as your hands squeezed around her back and waist. "Just be careful when you're out there, okay?" Your whisper lingered on her earlobe as you pulled away to meet her eye.

Aloy gave you a smile. She shimmed her shoulders, playfulness oozing from her. "Oh, please. When am I ever not careful?" You laughed and shoved her shoulders although there was no malicious intent behind your actions.

"Go before I wipe that smirk off your face."

"Oh," Aloy grinned as she gathered her items from the nearby table. "You promise?"

You laughed louder. "Go!"

"Okay, okay. I'm going! Love you!"

With the quick motion of a kiss, Aloy left with her face freshly painted and her heart warm from the brief, yet intimate moment she had with her partner.

WC: 1,464

[wolfjackle-creates]

Bring Me Home Arc 2 Part 20: FINAL

So guess what I realized this morning. Today, November 13, 2023 is the one year anniversary of me posting my first DPxDC fic to tumblr. It was the original fill for this very fic. (Which you can find here.)

So I decided I just had to finish this arc and get it posted. This year has been amazing and so much fun. I've become a much better writer and joined a community that has brought me so much joy. I'm glad to be here and I'm glad so many of you like to read what I'm sharing.

I noticed I got a few new readers over the past week or so, so welcome to all of you! Hope you enjoy this early update!

In personal news, my nephew was born and he's adorable and I'll be meeting him tomorrow! (As soon as I'm done posting this, I'm off to make food for his mom.)

Story Summary: Tim and Danny are both neglected by parents who care more about their work than their families. They deal with this by spending too much time online and find each other playing MMORPGs. They keep up their friendship as Tim becomes Robin and Danny becomes Phantom and don't bother keeping secrets from each other.

Arc 1

Arc 2: Part 1, Previous

Word Count: 1.2k

-----

In the end, it ended up taking several hours for Danny, Sam, and Tucker to escape their families and converge on the park. In that time, Tim had called Bruce to let him know he’d be back in Gotham by tomorrow and finished most of his homework.

While he worked, Wulf and Bart were having an animated conversation in Esperanto.

Tim was pretty sure Wulf would be bringing Bart to the Ghost Zone for a tour sometime and started making plans to learn Esperanto himself and bribe Bart to get in on them.

Cassie was helping Conner sort through some of the music Sam had given him. Tim was jealous as he solved more banal trig questions. Why did school have to be so boring? He tapped his pencil on the paper in time to the beat of whatever music Conner had playing.

Tucker was the first to arrive. “Danny and Sam not here yet?” he asked as he plopped down next to Bart and Wulf.

“Nope. Haven’t heard from them, either,” said Tim. He opened his phone notifications again just to be sure, but there was nothing new.

Tucker shrugged and pulled out a stick of jerkey to munch on. “Not surprising. The Fentons will be all overprotective after the mayor was kidnapped by a ghost on live TV. And Sam’s parents are just as bad. Only they smother rather than check the weaponry.” He turned to greet Wulf in Esperanto.

An email came through on Tim’s phone and he groaned. “Our evening interview was canceled. No one wants to hear us try to defend Phantom anymore.”

Cassie cursed. “Course not. Bet the paper won’t publish our editorials either.”

Conner looked over, confused. “Won’t they? Clark works for the Daily Planet. They publish stuff like that all the time.”

Tim didn’t look up from his math as he answered, “That’s the difference between a big, Pulitzer winning publication and a small-town op-ed.”

Tucker sighed. “Well maybe someone will remember your interviews from this morning in a positive light.”

Bart rolled his eyes. “Come on, we can’t change it. So let’s move forward. Next step, make friends with more ghosts! Wulf says there’s a bunch of cool people in the Realms.”

“Realms?” asked Tim.

“It’s what he says the Ghost Zone is actually called. The Infinite Realms.”

“Huh. I’ll have to check JL databases, see if they have any information on them.”

Tucker asked something in Esperanto and Bart burst out laughing as Wulf looked on in confusion.

With Bart’s help, though, he rephrased until Wulf was able to reply. And then the three kept to Esperanto. Tim really had to find time to learn it.

Sam was the next to arrive. She grinned and sat down next to Conner. “How you liking the music?”

Conner grinned and showed her the sheets where he ranked the bands so far based on which songs he’d listened to. She then took over the speakers and searched for specific tracks to try and change his mind about some of the bands he liked the least.

Tim let his eyes close as his friends’ voices washed over him.

After some indeterminate time where he dozed between sleeping and awareness, a foot nudged his hip. Tim grumbled out what was supposed to be a, “What?” but was too mumbled to really be understood.

“Come on, Secrets. You can do better than that.”

Tim cracked an eye open to see Danny grinning down at him. He pushed himself up slightly and blinked heavily in the sunlight.

“Finally got away from your parents?” asked Tim.

Danny collapsed on the ground next to him. “Ugh, don’t remind me. They’re freaking out over everything that’s happened the last few days. Jazz and I are basically going to be on lock down until they feel confident the ghosts are gone.”

“Did you have to sneak out to get here?” asked Cassie.

Danny shook his head. “No, I told them I was going to find you guys to make sure you were all safe. You’re welcome to come back to ours tonight, by the way. Mom and Dad basically insisted on it.”

“What do you guys think?” asked Tim. “Spend one more night here at Danny’s and head out in the morning?”

Cassie sighed. “My mom’s already freaking out that I’ve been gone longer than planned. I should get back tonight.”

“I’ll stay,” offered Conner. “I’m your ride home, anyway.”

“Why don’t you come to my place, Conner,” offered Sam. “Your nails need a fresh coat after fighting today. And I need teach you about the different brands of makeup and what to look for in terms of cost, quality, and ethicality. Plus I can get you more music.”

Tim laughed when Conner looked to him. “Go for it. Have fun.”

Conner grinned. “Then yeah, let’s do it!”

Bart shrugged. “Wulf is going to go back to the Realms soon. I’ll head out after. Wally and Linda want me over for a family dinner tonight.”

“Well, looks like that’s it, then,” sighed Danny. “Been fun having other heroes around.”

Tim nudged his shoulder. “Join the Young Justice. You could join us and we'd help out whenever you wanted. Get you around people who actually appreciate what you do for them.”

But Danny was already shaking his head. “I have to stay here. And now Amity trusts heroes even less. I want to improve that, not make it worse.”

“Even if you don’t join,” declared Conner. “You’re not getting rid of us now.”

Bart nodded his agreement. “Yep. We’re gonna be stopping by all the time. You’re in the group chat.”

“Exactly,” agreed Tim. “And we’ll figure out ways to help you. Starting with how to minimize property damage. That seems to be the big thing people focus on. You can make shields, right? How big can you make them and how much power do they take?”

Danny smiled wryly. “Can’t say I’ve really tested it.”

Tim laughed. “Well, I know one thing we’re doing tonight. We’re going to go back to Nasty Burger—” Tim looked around at the whole group “—all of us. Then Cassie and Bart are going to go home. Danny and I, at least, are going to take a nap. Then we’re gonna test the current limits to Danny’s powers.”

Danny bumped their shoulders together. “You know, this is just like gaming with you all those years.”

“Yeah, well, it’s best to be thorough.”

“We’ve measured, like, his top speed and stuff,” said Tucker, pulling out a PDA. “Want to see what we’ve got so far?”

“Absolutely.” Tim took the device and looked through it. “You’ve a decent amount of information here. Maybe instead of taking a nap, I’ll help you organize it and come up with a testing plan.”

Conner flew over to him and pulled the PDA out of his hand. “Not after pulling an all-nighter you won’t. We’re going to get some food, then the two of you are going to sleep for at least four hours.”

“I’ll set Jazz on you, too,” threatened Sam. “Don’t think I won’t.”

Tim pouted as the device was given back to Tucker. And grumbled more when Conner picked him up and threw him over his shoulder.

“Come on, food time.”

“I am going to put kryptonite in your phone,” threatened Tim.

“Bingo!” shouted Cassie.

Danny laughed as he stood. “Does this mean I can join the next round?”

Tim scowled. “Traitors, all of you.”

-----

Next

And that's the end of this Arc! Arc 3 will pick up where the original fill did. (Only this time, Tim won't be the only DC character there to help Danny.)

I'd say something like I can't believe it's only been a year, but so much has happened to me in the last twelve months that it feels like a lifetime ago, to be honest. But it's been a good year and I'm glad this community has been part of it.

Please follow the subscription post if you want updates for when I start transferring this arc to AO3 or begin posting Arc 3.

[thunder-point]

Long ramble ahead

I've talked a bit about some things I liked, and mostly qotey, but I mentioned already that I adore phumpeem also, and this episode just spurred my love for their dynamic even more BECAUSE

THIS REACTION???????

THIS ONE AS WELL???

HOLD UP SOMEONE HOLD ME SOMEONE HOLD PHUM'S UNSTABLE ASS

For the love of everything on this planet I LOVED LIVED BREATHED FOR IT.

Not only because I adored how positive it was on both ends, but because of the differences and the genuine quality it gave me. The kiss was absolutely delightful, once again pondphuwin just delivered on that aspect, as they did throughout the entirely of Never Let Me Go.

BUT LISTEN Y'ALL

I just????? Fucking love???? HOW DIFFERENT PHUM AND PEEM EXPRESS THEIR LIKE TOWARDS EAC H OTHER

First of all I don't know how others feel about phum's character. Personally, I enjoy it very much. He has very visible flaws, emotional constipation in some aspects, but those in some way give way for other moments that just express how free he is with his feelings.

Because he likes Peem, and this episode he expressed it so openly that it gave me LIFE.

We don't know much about Phum yet, but he seems to have a complicated relationship with his parents. It gives the feelings that he lacked the affection he needed in the past. That, of course, leads to the attitude of seeking it so selfishly like he does with Peem.

And it's enjoyable to watch. He's a needy asshole, he's arrogant and he's attractive and he's attracted to Peem and he doesn't let ANY chance slip to get that attention that he wants. And even if it started in a rough way in the beginning, I genuinely think it's mostly because, for the most part, some people who never really had the attention they needed resort to getting it in very obnoxious manners later on. Phum is doing exactly that.

There are many things to talk about when it comes to Phum, and I hope that as the series goes on we get more from him, and good things while we are at it, but I just love how his crush developed. I loved that as soon as he realized he truly fucked up, he apologized THREE times, I love how remorseful he's looking in episode 6 when Peem's ruined painting is mentioned.

And I absolutely love how blunt he is with his feelings for Peem. He doesn't waste any time in episode 6. Not even caring if his friends catch on, if Peem's friends catch on. My man Phum is on a mission and he is RELENTLESS.

I think it gives me so much joy because they could have totally made a character like Phum, who is prideful and stubborn, hide his feelings behind teasing and this 'you are my slave' act that he puts forward. But instead, we got the softest smiles from him after the kiss. We got him coming into the art gallery TO TAKE PICTURES, TO START A CONVERSATION ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED.

We got him calling Peem adorable and pleading Peem to draw on a cup with him. He just wants LOVE. He wants it and as soon as he saw Peem reciprocated in some way it's like it exploded from him. And there's so much to say about it. God.

But Peem? Listen, I love it even more on Peem's side.

Not only did this man INITIATE THE FIRST KISS, the way he's processing these emotions are so funny AND SO REAL.

I loved it from the very beginning that we see that Peem is attracted by Phum as much as he's incensed with him. He admitted it - Phum is handsome, but he's an asshole. And that's real. As someone who fell for a person who I bickered with a lot at first, I had such joy watching Peem's way through his bond with Phum and how it developed.

Because Phum has his bad sides, and he seems to bring them up around Peem for that attentions and reactions it gets him, but when Phum goes soft? That's when his attractiveness and his personality clash in a way that seems to make Peem WEAK.

"You're so demanding, Peem," said softly had Peem BY THE THROAT. And I felt that.

Phum apologizing so softly, Phum eating Peem's atrocious cooking. Peem? Absolutely GONE for it. And that's certainly such a rushing feeling to have. Peem is clearly not experienced with relationships, and that just makes the fact that he initiated the kiss SO MUCH BETTER.

Because we know that he's not scared of showing his emotions. Even if he's a people pleaser, he's not a pushover. He kicked Phum's balls back into his goddamn body as soon as he had the chance. HE THREW A CHANCLA AT HIM.

Him going for the kiss when he felt the need to MAKES SENSE. it's wonderful.

And don't get me started on how often my man seemed to fantasize back to those soft moments with Phum. Don't get me started ON HIS CONVERSATION WITH Q this episode about affection and relationships and FUCK. Don't get me started on his gay panicked ass.

that's a ramble for another post. I feel like this is already too long and too incoherent. I jumped from so many topics but I have so many feelings for these two. As many as I have for Qtoey.

[froot-batty]

next batch of designs are done! gotham city sirens time >:) blurbs about them under the cut, along with explanations of flags and neurodivergencies!

Pamela Isley came from a rural flower farm a long ways from Gotham. Her parents let her run wild from a very young age, and one of her favorite places on their property to go was the pond, deep in the woods, where everything grew just a bit too tall and nothing looked quite as it should've. Pamela didn't know that this pond was actually highly polluted by the dumping of experimental chemicals from a nearby "research" laboratory. She thought being able to communicate with the plants - the Green, she called it - was completely normal.

...Until the people from that laboratory heard about the mysterious girl helping the plants grow stranger. They came to Pamela's parents to ask if it would be possible to study it, and they, not realizing what exactly that meant, agreed. They whisked it away to a facility in Gotham, where Pamela would end up never seeing it's parents again.

She was kept there for the rest of her childhood and into her adulthood, being experimented on until she twisted into the plant beast that she is today. When she escaped, it came after years of hiding the true strength of her powers, so she could build them up enough to turn the facility to rubble.

(It is AroAce, Agender, and Intersex)

Harleen Quinzel always had trouble controlling her impulses. Coming from a very wealthy, very upper-crust family, any step out of line was harshly corrected by either of her parents. As a child she didn't know any better, but after years and years of repression coming from her family, she eventually clammed up and tried to fit into their perfect little mold. This included going to medical school, though she did at least get to pick something she was genuinely passionate about - psychology.

Harley was finally living on their own by the time they started working at Arkham, though they'd not yet broken out of that mental control their parents still had over them. Being in Arkham was like being on an alien planet. They had come from a world where everyone was fake, and Arkham seemed so...real. Talking with their patients opened their mind up even further. Even if what they did was violent, or utterly nonsensical to everyone else, insanity seemed like it was a sort of freedom that Harley never had.

This was compounded by it meeting the Joker. He saw that piece of it that wanted, desperately, to get free, and through their sessions he was able to get into it's head and...push it over the edge, so to speak.

(Harley and the Joker are not explicitly romantically involved in this, I should mention. They've got a weird queerplatonic thing going on. Also they're not toxic they're BFFs forever)

(They are Pansexual, Genderfluid, and have ADHD and Borderline Personality Disorder)

Selina Kyle grew up like an alley cat on the streets of Gotham. With two addict parents in the Narrows who cared very little about her, she was virtually homeless, with how little time she spent at home and how much she spent wandering the dangerous streets. It was in the Narrows that she met one of her closest childhood friends, Harvey Dent, and through him, the elusive Bruce Wayne.

The three of them were thick as thieves all through her childhood, though began to drift away when college time came around. Bruce had up and left the moment he turned 18 without any real warning to the two of them, and Harvey was off to college to try and become a lawyer. This left Selina all alone, once again.

But she had made a pact to herself. She didn't want to live on the streets of Gotham forever. She had started pickpocketing from a very young age, so she would just expand her skills - become Gotham's cat burglar. It started out as only a way to pay her bills, but she found she grew addicted to the feeling of it; the freedom of being able to slip into wherever she wanted and make some poor, rich fool a million dollars short. It was a sort of revenge for her (and the regular cash flow didn't hurt).

She was surprised when Bruce came back to Gotham and tried to reconnect with her. They hadn't talked in over a decade, but they found themselves reconnecting with surprising ease. Their close friendship would drive Harvey mad with jealousy, but neither of them realized that until it was too late.

The scar on her face is from Harvey's attempt on her life, after he became Two-Face.

(She is a Lesbian)

[fazedlight]

The broken promise of the Phantom of the Opera

I LOVED POTO as a teen.

The music, the story, the romance. At the time, I identified strongly with Christine - hopelessly romantic, pulled in by mystery, torn between choices. It was probably the first real love triangle I cared about, the choice between a forbidden passion versus a wholesome love.

And then I got a little older.

When I'm watching POTO, nine times out of ten, I'm watching it with my nostalgia goggles on. I'm remembering what it was like to be 14, I'm remembering the blurred lines in Point of No Return between who was Don Juan and who was Erik, I'm remembering the drama of the deaths and the fires. I will always stan the chandelier dropping at the end of the first act, though.

But realistically, had I first seen it as an adult, I would've seen a different story: One where Erik is a stalker who groomed a teenage girl, where Raoul uses wholesomeness to hide a controlling and dismissive nature that is societally approved. They're good characters; they're also fucked up people.

Which is why I'm one of the three people on this planet who adores Love Never Dies...

No, I'm not sure why Erik ended up in New York City, but I know he's an obsessive ghoul who destroys the lives of those around him. I don't think Raoul had anywhere to go but to become jealous of his wife's talent and try to drown in a bottle instead. And Christine, her fate was apparently sealed when she was still making dumb decisions at 17 (who hasn't?) - and instead of realizing that this man groomed her, she just thinks he's the one that got away. It's not where we want the characters to go, but they were only ever going to make each other worse.

POTO is gilded, and LND makes that layer crumble away. These characters were never going to break free from circumstance. The only way to avoid a tragedy is to look away earlier.

So, I adore Love Never Dies.

I'm not sure Webber would appreciate my take. But, well, Devil take the hindmost.

[sincerely-sofie]

I just realized how crazy Opal’s family is on paper. Imagine you’re a greedy crook so you kidnap the child of the random Charmeleon lady who you know has more money than she lets on. Then you send a ransom letter and set up a dungeon so this Charmeleon woman can give you the money for her child back. It’s fool proof!

And then you find out said Charmeleon lady is not JUST a Charmeleon lady, she’s the lady who stopped the world from getting paralyzed with her friend. Okay, no problem. They probably haven’t fought in a serious battle for years. It’s still an easy job- oh she still goes into dangerous mystery dungeons and so does her previous partner Kip. Okay, startling, but you can still pull through on this- oh wait, Grovyle the time gear thief, Dusknoir the hit man, and the time traveling mythical Pokémon Celebi are also part of the family? They also care about this Charmeleon lady?? And they’d also be apoplectic about this? Okay, now you’re a lot more worried, but it’s nothing that hiring a few accomplices can’t handle! Wait. The father of the baby is the guy who actively tried to cause the planet’s paralysis? The one who managed to torment an entire town? And all have of them practically stared Dialga in the face and said “yeah I can win this/I have to win this” and actually did win? Or at least one of them caused Dialga’s insanity?

You now realize you have only a few options:

1. Lie to potential accomplices about who exactly you messed with because no one sane would look at the full implications of this and go “yeah let’s do it!”

2. Hope the Charmeleon lady won’t call for backup, and that said backup won’t find out and come anyways, therefore plan proceeds without a hitch.

3. Just give the baby back and apologize.

If you’re really greedy or desperate for money, you’d choose one of the first two options. Otherwise, you’d choose option three and run for the hills.

And that’s before said criminal realizes they kidnapped a baby legendary.

The best part of all this is that her family never talks about the craziness of their lives. So you think you're just kidnapping some rich lady's kid and then a brigade of highly competent, highly dangerous individuals come swooping in simultaneously, but the brigade is comprised of:

That old man who you saw agonizing over what cookware to buy at the market the other day and apparently knows how to corner people who are running from him with startling efficiency

A scrawny, ugly grass-type you crossed paths with at the clinic when he was getting some medicines for his chronic pain and who is also unbelievably fast and hits like a truck

A marshtomp who, despite having famously (and shamefully, according to many) retired from exploration, is arguably even more dangerous now despite his calmer occupation, because he knows everything about the ruins you’re hiding out in, including where all the traps are

The rich lady whose baby you stole and also has apparently BESTED MULTIPLE LEGENDS IN COMBAT with the help of that marshtomp we mentioned earlier, and is currently tearing her way through the countryside and rapidly closing in on your location

And two entire legends who are not only extremely capable on their own, but can destroy your psyche by showing you the exact location, date, and cause of your death (right here, right now, her disemboweling you personally with her bare hands) or locking you in a perpetual nightmare. Also that one over there is the baby's dad? Oh heck you're so dead—

AND THE BABY HERSELF IS A LEGEND WHO KEEPS TURNING INTO DIFFERENT ROCK + STEEL TYPES WHO WEIGH VARYING UNHOLY AMOUNTS AND IS SHRIEKING LOUD ENOUGH FOR ANYONE IN A 30 MILE RADIUS TO KNOW WHERE YOU ARE. OH HECK YOU'RE SO DEAD.

Beyond this scenario, imagine being an older Opal who's chilling with the fam during the holidays. Everyone is having a nice time hanging out and soaking in the good company. And then your uncle who cries whenever you call him Uncle mentions that he hasn't had this good of food since before his parents kicked him out of the house when he was a kid. You don't say anything, but you're extremely confused. Did he say he was evicted from his family home as a child? Maybe you misheard...

And then your other uncle says that he got the recipe from some bidoof during that window of time that your mom didn't exist. Your aunt nods sagely and says that it was very kind of the bidoof to share such a treasured family recipe with him during that time. He probably needed the comfort food while grieving his best friend.

At this point you are very much baffled by the conversation, and then your grandfather politely asks if we can stop talking about this, because he'd rather not be reminded of the fact that they all died when he's still finishing dessert.

Your dad then chimes in by saying he'd appreciate a topic change as well. His appetite is rather soured by the reminder of his part in their deaths.

You have never been more confused. And they all just move on to chat about the weather like nothing about what they said is absolutely unbelievable. So later you go to ask your mom about it and she has the audacity to reply:

TFW you’re finally old enough to comprehend The Family Lore™️

[coirinthyurilo]

Love Game

Lance's flirts are driving the team crazy, and Pidge suggests that one of them pay him back for some peace. Quickly excluding Hunk (not Lance's type), Pidge herself, Princess Allura and Coran, leave Keith and Shiro.

Hunk thinks Shiro is the best choice since Lance has always had a hero crush on the black paladin, but Pidge tells him that Shiro would never agree to cooperate, so Keith is their only option.

At first, after they tell him about the plan, Keith doesn't want to accept: the relationship between the two paladins is still uncertain and that seems like a recipe for disaster.

After much insistence and a mission in which Lance almost got into trouble, Keith decides to accept.

He soon discovers that Lance doesn't know how to accept other people's flirting, and it soon gets out of hand.

At least Lance isn't flirting with Allura anymore, much to almost everyone's relief. But Keith's game can't go on for long, not when he starts to feel like a creep for manipulating a person he's discovered he likes.

Things come to a head, unsurprisingly, because of Pidge: while they are on a planet for a diplomatic meeting, one of the princes shows too much interest in Lance, irritating Keith to the point that Pidge and Hunk have to push him away.

Pidge jokes and says something like, “Wow, you got into the role. You seem in love.”

In denying it, Keith says that no one would care about someone like Lance, and before Hunk gets angry, they discover that Lance, looking for Keith to see what happened, heard everything.

Lance doesn't yell or get into fights. He just smiles sadly and says he should have seen it coming. He says nothing else, and for the entire week that the team remains on the planet, he doesn't interact with Keith, Pidge, or Hunk.

Pidge is ashamed of her plan for the first time and wonders if it was worth it. There was too much peace now and all three were sure that Lance would not forgive them.

Hunk thinks it would have been worse: Lance would have forgiven one day, but that would have remained a scar and he would have continued to blame himself, thinking it was his fault. He can't apologize to his best friend because he doesn't feel worthy of asking, and he doesn't want Lance to blame himself.

Noticing the change, Shiro asks Keith what happened.

Keith tells Shiro everything and asks what he should do. Shiro scolds him and says that before he apologizes to Lance, he needs to understand how he feels. He cannot expect forgiveness if he is not honest with himself first. Then they will have to talk to Lance to make him understand that he shouldn't blame himself for other people's actions because he is better than that. The subtext message is very clear.

And Keith tries, he does, but after a sleepless night, he gets his shit together at the worst time: a faction loyal to the Galra attacks the paladins and their allies. Lance is captured after pushing Keith and Pidge into a portal with the others to evacuate, and Keith then realizes what he felt: love.

Refusing to believe that Lance is dead, Keith and the other paladins help their allies regain power.

After months, they almost succeeded.

There's a problem: the faction loyal to the Galra had druids on their side, and they had brainwashed Lance into their weapon.

Keith vs Lance fight, but Keith refuses to harm the other. When he is disarmed, he says something along the lines of “I was wrong. You are an exceptional person who deserves the stars, not to be courted as a joke by an idiot like me. You are not lucky if someone is interested in you, I am lucky to have met you.“

The speech may vary, but it must be powerful, something that makes Lance partially regain control and, realizing that he cannot fully control his body, he hits himself so as not to hurt Keith.

The battle is won, Allura manages to stop the bleeding but Lance needs a cryopod at the castle. While Lance is healing, and Allura tries to figure out how to reverse the effects of the druids' powers, Keith knocks on Shiro's door: he wants to ask him for advice on courting Lance. This time, he wants to do it right.

_

A better post of the Whump Lance fic idea.

A03 AUTHORS‼️‼️MAKE THIS INTO A FIC AND MY LIFE IS YOURS‼️

[feruslands]

My sketch fanfic "Vader/Ferus"

For @reconstructwriter who inspired me to continue this long, heavy story and for everyone who loves "Vader/Ferus" (later Anakin/Ferus)

"Daddy Feri", part 7

Warnings: rape, cruelty

The next day, Darth Sidious gave the order to go on a new mission, and for the first time Vader realized that he did not want to go anywhere, but he could only postpone the mission.

"My Master, my body is not responding well. I need three days to undergo a set of medical procedures,” Vader said.

Palpatine pursed his lips in annoyance.

“Just one day and fly out immediately,” Sith hissed and cut the connection.

Palpatine was angry that his apprentice did not have the initiative characteristic of him, but it did not matter to Vader — the reckoning would be later, and now he could forget about the exhausting service for a while and be alone with himself. The Sith had a choice of how to spend this day – to start Leia's training or to undergo a course of medical procedures himself. And he chose the procedures without hesitation.

Vader felt that he was deceiving himself in some ways, but he couldn't figure out what. He had long buried Anakin Skywalker inside himself, but sometimes he was visited by unpleasant thoughts that neither Skywalker nor Darth Vader had ever lived their lives. Their lives have always been subordinated to something or someone else. 

Darth Vader hated the Jedi, but at the same time he hated his service to Palpatine. He traveled from one planet to another, suppressing riots, strengthening the power of the Empire, but for every defeated people, there was always another who took up weapons. The riots seemed to be rising in an endless stream of armed uprisings. Vader even had a tempting thought about the sudden death of the Emperor, but he understood very well that he alone would not be able to hold such power in his hands.

Vader wondered if he was really irreplaceable and unique, was he the chosen one of the Force?

He didn't know how many more years it would take him to crush all the rebellions and slaughter all the remaining Jedi, but every year Palpatine took over more and more power, and Vader began to doubt his own need, by the time the entire galaxy was completely deposed at Palpatine's feet.

All his thoughts boiled down to the fact that he had always been just an expendable item in the hands of the great puppeteer. And he sometimes felt trapped by himself, from which he saw no way out.

The regular rapes he committed on the old enemy became his outlet, he needed it like a drug. His body had demanded sexual pleasure for all the years he'd missed, and Vader wasn't going to deny himself that.

Thus, although Olin annoyed him, the Sith still found him useful. Vader's anxious thoughts receded as he forcibly took over the Jedi's body and enjoyed his own undivided power. He was especially acutely aware of his superiority while Ferus was trying to break free, struggling on the floor under him and howling in pain. And Vader felt pleasure, always vivid and incredible. And he couldn't get enough of it.

After the rape, he absorbed the hot, undisguised emotions of the man lying on the floor and sobbing. It was amazing how morally crushed and miserable Ferus became after their forced intercourse. And all this gave Vader satisfaction, his pain, his humiliation, his tears and his great shame. As if the Jedi had nothing else to worry about, just his shamefully fucked, naked, bleeding ass. 

"The shy bitch," the Sith thought with contempt.

He left this fucked-up shy bitch in the care of medical droids and went on the mission. This task turned out to be incredibly boring and long. The worst part was that the planet resembled Tatooine in its climate and landscape. The endless hot desert around the dome that protected the city from the fierce heat was getting on his nerves. He felt like a pickled vegetable in a jar, even though he knew that his armor's thermoregulation systems were perfectly fine-tuned.

When the election of the new ruler of the planet was completed, Vader very effectively and brutally crushed an attempt at rebellion by the opposition, and ordered his subordinates to immediately get out of this disgusting, arid planet. On the way to the Vjun, he reported to the Master that the task was completed, but Sidious ordered him to immediately turn to the capital. Vader knew exactly why. The emperor's personal audience with lightning strikes as a treat is the usual punishment for any disobedience.

He was carried out of the throne room of Sidious on a stretcher because he lost consciousness from the pain. The lightning strikes even damaged his armor. When Vader was taken to the Destroyer, he locked himself in his cabin and did not leave it until the end of the flight.

Wounded, angry, with damaged armor, Darth Vader hardly moved through the rooms of his fortress, and sent mental curses to Palpatine.

The maintenance droids loaded him into a bacta tank and he did not get out for a day. After that, he began to fully repair his armor, but on the same day he received a call from Palpatine demanding that he go on a new mission.

"What's the matter? Do you need long-term treatment and procedures again?" The Master asked.

Such the condescendingly mocking tone made Vader feel even more furious.

"Preferably," Vader replied calmly.

Palpatine's eyes flashed angrily.

“You can perform your medical procedures right on the Devastator. So you won't have to come back to the Vjun so often.”

"Yes, Master. But then I need a complete refurbishment of my personal quarters on the Devastator. The Bacta tank is not enough. I need to build an isolated capsule, and supply it with all the necessary medical equipment, as well…

"Do what you want in your apartment, I don't care," Sidious barked and cut the connection.

Vader smiled at his small victory. Sometimes the fact of his terrible disability could be used as a means of manipulation.

The Sith did not tolerate delay, so he immediately broadcast orders to the Destroyer to prepare for the conversion of his apartments. He only regretted that he couldn't carry Ferus in his pocket like a purebred animal.

But could anyone have prevented him from doing so? No one in the galaxy knew about the captured Jedi, not even Palpatine. Vader went to the next deception of his Master not only easily, but also with pleasure. Olin will be more useful if he is locked in a small cell on a Star Destroyer. And Vader quickly figured out how to do it.

Ferus felt that Vader had returned from his last mission not only embittered, but also wounded. He believed that the Sith had received his wounds and damage to the suit during the battle. Hoping that the Imperial army lost the battle to the rebels would be too positive, but if they suffered such serious losses, it was undoubtedly a good start.

Isolated from the outside world, the Jedi was deprived of the opportunity to observe the political situation in the galaxy, but even in the last year of his wanderings, he noticed a sharp dissatisfaction with Palpatine's policies to the point that many peaceful peoples began to take up arms to fight for their freedom. He wished the rebels luck in his mind, hoping that one day many worlds would unite to fight the Empire.

During his captivity, the Jedi managed to sufficiently study the bestial nature of his captor. Ferus knew that Vader would take it out on him for any of his failures or just because of his rotten mood. That's how it happened this time. At the moment when Vader appeared in the cell, Ferus was meditating, he was looking for a way to protect Leia from the rotten influence of darkness. Leia often had tantrums and cried almost every day for no reason.

Ferus's attempts to contact the Force probably displeased his jailer very much.

“Get undressed, whore,” Vader kicked the Jedi with his heavy metal prosthesis. 

“I won't.”

“Great, then I'll do it myself. ” Vader hurled the Jedi to the floor with a torrent of Force

Ferus saw his sadistic pleasure. Vader, as always, was generous with insults and blows, but this time he also mocked the prisoner and the philosophy of the Jedi.

"And where is your entire Order now?" Sith hissed as he tore off his clothes. Vader leaned on top of him and pinned his superheavy prosthetic body to the floor.

"What will your Jedi Code tell you about this? " Vader asked mockingly as he shoved his dick into the ass of the resisting prisoner.

“«There is no emotion, there is peace», right? Or maybe my dick isn't in your dumb ass right now? Or is there, right?” the Sith just laughed at his helplessness and continued to fuck him roughly.

During intercourse, the Sith made vile sounds resembling something between the roar of a predator, the grunting of a fat Hutt and the creaking of an old droid. Ferus didn't respond to the rapist anymore, so as not to anger this scum even more. But he couldn't hold back the tears because of the pain. The only good thing about this situation was that while Vader was dealing with him, he wasn't paying attention to Leia.

Olin spent the next night in the medical unit. While the droids were treating him, he dreamed that the bastard who was raping him would leave as soon as possible. Palpatine often gave Vader lengthy assignments, but this time Vader unpleasantly surprised him when he informed him the next morning that they were flying together.

“For what?” There was concern in the Jedi's voice, he felt fear for Leia. Did the baby have to stay alone for a few weeks?

Vader didn't know if Olin was pretending to be an idiot or if it was a natural emotion, but he liked the confusion on his face.

“You're asking for what?” Vader asked mockingly, "Of course, so that I can use you for your intended purpose. And for that, I will smuggle you onto the Destroyer secretly, and no one will even know about your existence. You will live in a cramped cell like an animal.

Ferus froze, his face becoming like a mask.

“Why are you so surprised, Olin?” Vader continued to mock him, "What other use can you be? You're a half-educated Padawan, not a Jedi Master. You are a disgusting warrior. You're a lousy babysitter for a kid. But maybe you'll make a capable slut? So I will take you with me to use you to the fullest, that is, daily for my satisfaction.”

Everything inside Ferus snapped. His escape plan in Vader's absence had just been ruined.

“What about Leia?” Olin asked .

It stung Vader uncomfortably that the Jedi was worried about Leia.

“She'll be waiting for us here. And she's going to have to become very obedient for me to want to bring you back here alive. The same goes for you.”

"And what did she do to deserve it?"  Ferus asked indignantly.

Vader saw the Jedi's growing anger and it poured out in response. He didn't like that he was so worried about the baby.

“You annoy me,” Vader slapped him across the face, "Before you try to raise your voice at me again, you mud, remember that punishment will come.”

Ferus fell from the second blow to the stomach.

“Say goodbye to her before I change my mind.” Vader waved his hand, triggering the command to open the door mechanism.

Leia was standing in the open doorway. She rushed to Dad as soon as she saw him.

Through the pain in his head, the Jedi could feel his growing anger. He realized that Vader had already informed Leia about everything. Ferus should have told her such unpleasant news himself to mitigate this traumatic event, but Vader was damn elated at any manifestation of his stinking power, he couldn't help but make this moment painful for both of them. The Sith had easily doomed Leia to the frightening ordeal of being forced to leave her parent, and Ferus hated him for it.

Ferus sat down on the floor in front of Leia. And the girl looked at him in fascination. His gaze was so soothing. At such moments, Leia was not afraid. She believed him. He's her dad no matter what.

Suddenly Ferus's eyes widened sharply, his face froze in horror, he felt only a sharp pain and numbness in his back. It was Vader who slammed a syringe with a temporarily heart-stopping drug under his shoulder blade.

Ferus's body instantly became sluggish, he couldn't even scream. Instead of hugging Leia goodbye, he fell face down on the floor. Vader managed to catch him before hitting the floor and casually smoothed out some long black package.

Leia blinked in disbelief, screamed wildly and rushed to Ferus.

Vader restrained her by Force, he ordered two security droids to grab her.

The Sith stuffed the unconscious Jedi into a thick black bag. Such bags were used on imperial ships to pack rebel corpses.

And the girl looked at it with horror and unsuccessfully tried to escape from the hands of the droids.

“Did you remember your assignment well?” Vader demanded.

Leia couldn't speak, she nodded quickly. 

“If you fail and let me down, instead of “Daddy Feri” I will bring you a small box with soot. You're old enough to understand what this soot is going to be made of, aren't you, girl?”

Leia was choking on tears, she nodded, and promised to do everything, and begged to bring her dear daddy back.

"Very good," Vader said, and slung the body wrapped in the black bag over his shoulder, “I'll come back and check it out.”

[totallyunidentified]

HAPPY PROPHECY PEOPLE

Ok ok I know sad prophecies bad so I talked with the force voices and they gave me this

It’s kinda shit but idk

Spoilers for episode 10/11

So it’s the end of the season. Omega and the force kids have escaped with Emeri and Scorch and Tech has been revealed. He’s broken and hurt but obviously he has his family to help him.

Pabu…isn’t an option. The empire is there. They have been there. They know that that’s where the batch would return to. And the fact that Omega, Scorch and Emeri killed Hemcock makes them want to stay as far from the empire as possible.

They finally settle down. They get a farm on whatever planet it is that Cut and Suu ran away to. Or whatever planet they were originally going to in season one.

Hunter and Omega share a house. The other three brothers have their own. Each with their own room. They end up in the same room each night though. Comforting each other through the nightmares.

Tech works as a mechanic. He gets to spend all his time working on machines and he loves it. Phee decides to live with him and they build their own house. They spend their time inventing things and fixing the communities little whozits and whatzits together. Phee is there when Tech has nightmares about his reprogramming and time as CX-2.They never marry but are partners for life. Phee calls him Brown Eyes everyday and he calls her Pirate or on special occasions “Darling”

Obviously Tech figures out how to reverse their advanced aging. Hunter gets to grow old and watch Omega grow up.

Crosshair and Wrecker share their house for a long time until Crosshair gets fed up and becomes a bounty hunter. He only takes the big jobs that pay a lot so he only leaves for a month and then is back for a while. He never finds anyone to settle down with but is content with being Omegas older (younger) brother. Eventually he takes her on one of his hunts and Hunter just about disowns him.

Now Wrecker. Lovable sweet Wrecker. He meets the owner of the only restaurant in town. And falls madly and hopelessly in love with them. They cook, they are sweet, they love Wrecker and he loves them. He moves into their apartment over the restaurant and they get married have 3 kids together who all love their Aunt Omega.

Now Omega and Hunter.

Hunter gets his normal life as a father. He gets to grow old. Something he never thought would happen. He gets to watch his daughter grow up from a little kid on Kamino to a young woman blossoming in a beautiful galaxy. He gets a farm where he can hide in the hayloft when his senses get overwhelmed. He like Crosshair doesn’t think he’ll ever find a life partner. Until he meets the female owner of the farm closest to them. It’s on site, but they grow to respect each other and agree to disagree. It’s later on that they finally realize they like each other and get married. Hunter already has grey hairs but neither care. Both are content to finish growing old together. Hunter raises Omega in a steady home without the fear of her being taken ever again.

Omega gets to grow up. Without fear. Without looking over her shoulder. She helps Hunter on the farm and is in her mid 20s when he marries his beloved. She realizes that she misses her life exploring and seeing the stars. She joins Crosshair on some of his bounty trips but decides her time is spent better elsewhere. She doesn’t like the idea of having to take people without their consent. Even if they are bad. She falls in love with, to her brothers absolute horror a pirate Liberator of ancient wonders as she likes to call them. They travel the galaxy together seeing every planet that Omega never imagined. She always comes back with samples for Tech, treasures for Phee, exotic food for Wrecker, random packs of toothpicks for Crosshair, and stories for Hunter to be told around the campfire.

Every-time she comes home it’s a celebration. Wrecker and his partner bring food and their children, Tech and Phee bring the latest invention for everyone to play with, Crosshair doesn’t bring anything other than himself, Hunter and his wife set up a bonfire together joking and teasing each other about the correct way to stack the wood. The families all come together and sit around the campfire. Swapping stories as the Batch recall their time during the clone wars. Before everything that happened. Before they almost lost what they all held so dear. Family together, now and always.

[justaghostingon]

With Enemies Like These

Chapter 4: Thorfinn's Adventures in Babysitting

Babysitting Prince Canute, Thorfinn was rapidly realizing, was way more annoying than babysitting Canute the lab partner. It seemed everyone and their mother wanted to talk to or gawk at the prince, as if they hadn't been sharing a class with him for the past three years. Thorfinn's hard won personal space was all but gone as people would crowd around his and Canute's desks. He hated the crowd, the stink and the noise, and the ever present worry that one of them would suddenly pull out a knife and attack the both of them. Baring his teeth worked a bit to push them back, but not for long, as they would inevitably creep closer and closer until they were right back around them again.

Canute was absolutely no help. For all he possessed a singularly hypnotic voice, the kind that could convince any one of anything, he never seemed willing to use it. This had not been a problem when no one knew who he was, but now, couldn't he at least say something? Tell them to leave? But no. As soon as they'd set foot in the school, Canute had gone silent. No matter what question was pushed his way, what praise, he did not utter a word, only clutched Thorfinn's hand tighter and pushing their chairs closer together so he could hide behind Thorfinn's shoulder.

Oh, and they were still holding hands. Thorfinn had been willing to let go once he was certain Canute was safely in the classroom, but by then Canute's grip was like a vice, and he seemed unable or unwilling to let go. It made writing difficult enough, but how was he supposed to fight if Canute wouldn't let go of him? Was he supposed to fight Thorkell one handed?

Then again, maybe Thorkell would just laugh at the sight of Thorfinn of all people holding hands with a prince. Thorgil and Atil certainly had made their amusement known when Thorfinn had slunk past them to exit Gorm's old-fashioned long house and hurry over to the modern apartment Canute called home.

A phone camera flashed in Thorfinn's eyes, causing Canute to duck his head into Thorfinn's shoulder. His soft hair draped across Thorfinn's nose, and Thorfinn inhaled the soft, sweet scent of flowers he was certain didn't grow in Planet Gorm's desolate climate.

A series of coos filled the air from the girls watching. Giggling about how "cute" the Prince was. Thorfinn turned the full force of his scowl at them. Canute wasn't any prettier today than he'd been yesterday. They only cared now because now they knew he was royalty. None of them had wanted to take pictures back when he was just Thorfinn's silent lab partner.

His scowl didn't seem to scare them away. Instead they just tittered louder among themselves, whispering and giggling. Thorfinn couldn't make out their words, but he defiantly heard "overprotective" which he knew was not referring to Canute. Did having a pretty boy prince attached like a leech really take away all his hard won street cred?

Lunch provided some relief, if only because being in a tree meant no one could get close to them easily. Not that it had been easy getting Canute into the tree.

"Haven't you ever climbed a tree before?" Thorfinn grunted while Canute used his joined hands as a foothold.

"Of course not!" Canute huffed as he grabbed a branch and began to try and feebly pull his body weight up. "Do you have any idea how much real trees cost? I wasn't let anywhere near the ones in the palace. Much less allowed to climb them!"

"What's the point of being rich then?" Thorfinn huffed as he shoved Canute's butt with his shoulder, effectively pushing the boy upwards and earning him a yelp.

"The point is the purification they add to the air, and the beauty their shade creates!" Canute snapped as he finally reached a sturdy enough bough to stop. "It's about honoring our history and the long lost planet from which we all hail."

"Why?" Thorfinn snorted as he hoisted himself up to join Canute in the tree. "It's not like it's our home. We were created as a species to traverse the universe. That's our home. The worlds we conquer, not some planet long gone."

"Typical," Canute muttered.

"Excuse me?" Thorfinn snapped. Canute jumped, turning away and muttering something intelligible, but Thorfinn was having none of it. He poked Canute's shoulder. "Hey I'm talking to you, what do you mean typical?"

"Because it is!" Canute snapped "You sound like every Space wolf with half a brain and nothing but bloodshed and conquest on the mind." He looked upwards, towards out through the tree branches to the frigid light of the far away star Planet Gorm spun around. "But if the land we conquer is supposed to be our home, how come we keep searching onwards? It seems no place will ever be enough, and no one will ever be content."

Thorfinn wasn't quite certain what to say to that. Home was a subject he rarely liked to dwell on, a half remembered warmth of a mother and sister and a name as bitter as its constant cold. A place he could never return, not when it was bereft of his father, whose fate lay unavenged.

But when the wind rustled Canute's hair, sending the light shimmering off it in waves of gold, Thorfinn couldn't help but remember that half forgotten tale of Vinland. The bounty of its golden wheat and blue skies made all the more precious for its location beyond the known galaxy.

For half a second, he wondered...

A sharp sound caught his attention, forcing any thought out of his head. He jumped to his feet, laser dagger in hand, only to realize it was nothing more than the click of a phone. It seems the crowd had found them.

Beside him, Canute sighed. "Can't they leave us alone?"

Thorfinn raised his head to look at Canute, hope growing in his chest. "Then tell them to back off! You're there prince aren't you?"

Canute looked away. "It's more complicated than that..."

Thorfinn snorted. "What, so you just don't speak at all? What's the point of having a voice as pretty as yours if you never use it?"

"I'm just being cautious, that's all." Canute hugged his knees to his chest. "My voice holds no authority without my father's approval. Any promises I make, they don't matter without him. All I do is invite scrutiny. It wouldn't be proper to get people's hopes up like that. So I need to be cautious. That's all."

"I guess that's not entirely stupid," Thorfinn reluctantly admitted. A voice that could hypnotize should be treated with caution, after all. It probably wouldn't look good if he used it on the whole school. A shame. Thorfinn would have loved to see it. He gave Canute a grin. Looks like you do have a brain underneath all that flouncy hair."

"Why I never!" Canute huffed, all serious discussion forgotten in favor of hitting Thorfinn ineffectively with his fists. "I have been your lab partner for three years! I got you through science!"

Unable to help himself, Thorfinn threw back his head and laughed. Canute's fists stopped their pointless assault as he stared at Thorfinn, open mouthed. For the first time, Thorfinn realized how close they had gotten, Canute half on top of him to get a better hit, his face inches from Thorfinn's own.

Had Canute's eyes always been that blue?

Thorfinn raised a hand to do something, maybe push Canute off, maybe pull him closer? But in its movement it sent Thorfinn's lunch box tumbling over the edge of the tree branch and down on the crowd below.

"Ouch!" A voice cried from below. Thorfinn and Canute scrambled apart, remembering their audience. Thorfinn tried to keep his face away from Canute's his cheeks still burning from some unknown heat. His head spun in a way he told himself was from the hunger. It looked like he wasn't gettin any lunch today.

"Your lunch," Canute pouted down the tree, cheeks puffed like the cliff squirrels on Planet Gorm's rocky surface.

"It's fine. I'm used to it." Back in space they had to skip meals sometimes when the rations ran low, and even as the smallest and the youngest, Thorfinn was not spared. He'd quickly learned how to handle hunger.

But Canute was not used to such realities. Thorfinn watched his face fall. "That won't do," he said, before pulling out his own lunch, carefully wrapped and packed, and held it out to Thorfinn.

"I'm not eating your lunch." Thorfinn stated. He was pretty sure that was illegal. Plus if he made a client suffer, Askeladd would kill him.

"I'm not offering you all of it," Canute huffed. "But I've got plenty. I can give you half."

Thorfinn eyes traveled from the lunch, still steaming with real veggies and fruits and not nutrient paste, then to Canute's earnest face. Fuck. How was he supposed to get out of this?

Canute looked down at the lunch, and blushed. "Oh my goodness, I"m sorry. I forgot I only had one set of cutlery. How terribly rude of me." He pulled out a knife and a fork, and frowned down at them. He then pushed the fork towards Thorfinn, expression glum as he tried to stab a purple fruit with the knife. It glanced off and sent the fruit spinning across his plate.

Thorfinn choked back an unmanly giggle. Clearly the prince had no idea how to eat with only a knife. Leaning forward, he pushed the fork back towards Canute while relieving him of the knife. With one swift motion, he speared the fruit and plopped it in his mouth. The juices exploded on his tongue, sweet and tangy, no trace of the bitterness of artificial manufacturing.

"I'm not a dog to eat your scraps." He grinned at Canute, before stabbing another fruit, this one green, and shoving it in his mouth. "I'm a wolf, and don't you forget it."

"So scary," Canute cooed, pushing one of the veggies, a strange orange color, towards Thorfinn before loading up his fork with his own.

Thorfinn couldn't hear any mockery in the tone, but he knew by the lack of fear it was in there somewhere. Curse Canute's voice, for making even insults sound alluring. He was probably doing it on purpose. But he wasn't going to get one up on this Space World.

To prove it didn't affect him, Thorfinn leaned forward, ignoring the orange veggie on the plate, to wrap his lips around Canute's fork. He pulled away quickly and gave a wide, toothy smile, perfect to show off the orange veggie now trapped in between.

"Thorfinn!" Canute squawked. Outrage on clear on his face. Thorfinn smiled wider, swallowing the veggie down in one gulp before licking his lips for the last bit of savory juice. Delicious. Maybe this babysitting thing wasn't so bad.

------

"Hello, Thorfinn." Askeladd's sharp smile pinned Thorfinn in place, an old fear screaming danger, danger, in the back of his head. A fear he'd long since thought he'd smothered with anger. It took everything in him to keep from flinching when Askeladd slammed his hand on the long wooden table, three pictures spread out below his palm. "Care to explain?"

Thorfinn's eyes trailed down Askeladd's arm to the pictures below his hand. They were pictures of him and Canute. But not just any pictures. One was of him and Canute in class, sides pressed together and hands joined while Canute buried his head in Thorfinn's neck. Thorfinn's own face glared up at him, his anger and annoyance coming across as possessive.

The next had Canute holding out his fork, with Thorfinn eating off it. In the half a second, with Thorfinn's mischievous grin on his lips and Canute's own smile not yet slipped into outrage it looked as if he was feeding Thorfinn on purpose, instead of Thorfinn stealing from him.

But the most damning of all was the last one. Here Canute lay sprawled half on top of Thorfinn, pinning him down. Their faces were inches apart, red flush from exercise coming across as something far more intimate. Thorfinn looked on in horror as he saw his raised hand, the same which had knocked his lunch box off, half lifted in the air as if to grab Canute's golden locks.

There was only one thing to say to that.

"Shit."

[anniflamma]

so…I spent like hours thinking hard on this and I can’t believe I came up with this..mind you this is my own Crackhead theory so don’t take anything I say seriously but it goes.

me and my aunt were eating dinner and talking about mythology and I told her about a really Christian man coming up to me and saying “because you don’t believe in god and Jesus you will go to hell” and my Pegan but said “cool ima go pet a three headed dog” and then my aunt told me “well Christianity doesn’t really makes sense to me because where the hell did it come from because the first prominent religions were ones such as Greece and Roman beliefs”

and that got me thinking, so I decided to do some thinking.

and I got some connections so Chaos is like the lord right? The very first and most powerful, and he created the primordials, that created the titans and so on, and then Zeus came along and screwed everything up right? Then a few hundred years later Persephone or what mortals at the time called her Core, and after our lovely goddess of spring starting taking care of all of the mistakes, such as taking care of the rejected children of Zeus and others, so I was like who the hell is her dad because she has the power of nature from Demeter but where did she get her chaotic power from? Her father can’t be Zeus because she doesn’t have any power of the sky, and it can’t be Posiden because she has no power of any body of water..

then I remembered Demeter prayed and begged for a daughter..and the fates are directly tied to Chaos so Chaos gave Persephone to Demeter..CHAOS IS PERSEPHONE DAD!! It makes sense to me when I think about it really hard..

and I also realized because the oldest version of Persephone was so feared..but because of *cough* Christian writers a lot of those stories changed because of that. Sadly I don’t think a lot of people know that.

I DO NOT HATE THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION BUT YA’LL BE CONFUSING AS HELL, and also please understand THAT NOT ALL WITCHCRAFT IS BAD I SWEAR I HEAR THAT ALL THE TIME.

okay enough of my rant I hope that shines Al title light in my head.

That is an interesting take and connection! To be honest, syncretism and the evolution of religions and cultures are my biggest hyperfixations. Well, I grew up Christian and now hyperfixate on the Bible with a more historical and cultural perspective. So I'm not really as confused when it comes to the Christian religion. If you have any questions, just ask, and I will try my best to answer them!

The thing with European religion is that almost all of them stem from Proto-Indo-European mythology. And that includes the Abrahamic faith (which makes many people feel very uneasy). This is why the planet Venus is almost always female and the sun is male, and so on and so forth! Many people don't know that the Hebrew Bible starts off as henotheistic (believing that many gods exist but worshipping only one of them, while it is acceptable if other people worship other gods). Then it rapidly becomes monolatristic (acknowledging that many gods may exist but only worshipping one of them, and it is not acceptable if other people worship other gods) and then ends with being purely monotheistic. Of course, the Bible has been edited and changed to make it fit more with the monotheistic view, such as removing acknowledgments of the existence of other Canaanite gods. And removing the goddess Asherah, God/Yahweh's wife, and replacing her name with "the grove" or just the Holy Spirit. And the Christian faith did get syncretized with Roman/Greek pagan faith. There is no hell in the Bible, but there is an underworld! It's called Sheol, the "land of gloom and deep darkness." But there is no deep dive on what Sheol really is or how it was in the bible. It was just the underworld where all the dead people went. However, Sheol pretty much got paired up with Hades in the New Testament because both of them were the name of the underworld, so it just made sense, right? But the Greeks also had Tartarus, which is the place in Hades where you get tortured for eternity. And that is where the Christian hell pretty much stems from, it's just Tartarus but with Satan....

This is just a rough generalization, and the whole thing is more complex than what I have brought up here!

I don't think, though, that it was the Christians who changed Persephone. Kore (Persephone) was already really old before Christianity became even a thing. It's a really young religion compared to the Greek gods. 😅

But the concept of Christian saints was created in a way so it would be easier to convert pagans. Instead of removing the traditions, ceremonies, and celebrations, the god they worshipped was switched with a saint that could fit the description of that said deity. So Saint Sebastian is pretty much just the Christian version of Apollo. A twink God of archery, sports, healing, plagues, and gayness was replaced with the twink saint of archery, sports, healing, plagues, and accidental gay awakening. A COINCIDENCE? I THINK NOT!! This is my crackhead theory!!!

And about witchcraft. Even the Bible thinks that not all witchcraft is bad. What I understand is there is good magic and bad magic. Necromancy is one of the bad ones. King Saul performed necromancy and brought Samuel's soul back, and that pissed Samuel off so much that he cursed Saul's whole family. But then we have good magic, like I dunno Jacob makes some weird unclear stuff with his sheep, and they become really healthy. I think the only thing Jesus said about witchcraft was like: "yeah, you can use your magic for good, and that is a good thing, but you don't need it if you already believe in my Father"!

There is a whole weird rabbit hole on Christian syncretization with the Greek gods....

Then we have the ancient history of where exactly God/Yahweh comes from. There is this popular theory that scholars think Yahweh most likely comes from the ancient Mesopotamian pantheon. And around the economic collapse during the Bronze Age, the worship of then Yahweh became isolated, which created the ancient Hebrews. Essentially, it started with an ancient warrior-storm god that became a god of the whole world. And I'm not even going to start with Gnosticism! What is like Christian Polytheism but with steroids!

I'm gonna stop here! Sorry I kinda derailed!