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vasiktomis · 11 months ago

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Loophole (Zayne x F!Reader, 18+)

Summary: Zayne has an Evol flare-up while you’re visiting Snowcrest. You’re a good friend, so you help him out.

It doesn't mean anything if you don't move, right?

Rating: Explicit (Minors do NOT interact). Word Count: ~6800. Tags/Warnings: Female Pronouns and Anatomy for Reader, Reader is MC, Caretaking, Friends to Lovers, Inappropriate Doctor/Patient Relationship, Childhood Friends, Bickering, Cock Warming, First Time, Vaginal Sex, Photography, Unsafe Sex, Porn with Feelings, Switching. Post-chapter 4 spoilers. Read it on Ao3 Here!

“Let’s get you inside.”

The cold weather poses something of a threat to Zayne, you've realised.

He'd never admit such a thing, of course, but if he hadn't wanted you to make such an observation, he shouldn't have made it his responsibility to impose such an unexpectedly strong presence in your life.

A year ago, you barely knew him. To say he kept you at arms' length was an understatement, but with everything that's occurred in recent months — with such a void left in your life from the loss of Caleb and Grandma — and the ugly mysteries eclipsing once-happy memories — your doctor, of all people, is the one dedicating almost every minute of his time outside of work to trying to fill that void. It's not like he talks your ear off — he's Zayne, after all — but he makes a noticeable effort to make himself accessible to you whenever he can.

He's been a good friend to you at the sacrifice of his own comfort.

In the seven months that have passed since the explosion, you've had more exposure to Zayne than you've had any of your other friends. He rarely strays from his quiet stoicism, but it's far easier to read him. These days, you can't believe you once thought him intimidating. The softer aspects of his personality aren't offered willingly, but accidentally. A slip of the tongue here, a too-long stare at a community cat there, a smile he doesn't think you notice. He masks his requests for you to visit him in his overtime hours as nagging reminders for you to water the plants. He never asks you to bring him dinner, but there's always an extra seat pulled up at his desk when you arrive with it unannounced.

You’re sure he likes it well enough; getting to know you after all these years. You’re just not sold on how fond he is of you knowing him.

It shows stark on his typically taciturn features. Streetlamp light bounces off fluffy snow at all angles in the little village laneway, illuminating the man with an almost healthy glow as he walks stiffly beside you, right hand clutched against his side and his left doing all it can to keep from crushing the bones in yours.

“I’m fine.” He insists while you lead him up to the cabin, grimacing at a sudden chill of wind passing over the porch. There's a certain tone he uses when he's putting on the bedside manner. As a patient, you'd be soothed. As a friend, your patience wanes. He's not fine.

”I’ll get a fire going.” You mutter, ushering him inside. He tries amidst obvious pain to be gentlemanly, waiting for you to enter first, but a scowl on your part has him conceding defeat and ambling through the door. “Get in the shower. Can you turn it on by yourself?”

There’s no more warm light from the street in here. Dr. Noah likely would have fallen asleep hours ago, shortly after you’d left for dinner. Still, even in the dark, you can sense the irritation in him.

“You act like I’m frozen solid.” He retorts on his way to the bathroom, knowing better than to stick around despite the attempt to uphold his pride.

”Get your butt in the shower before I throw you in there myself.”

The warmer months gave you no initial reason to suspect anything, but as the weather worsened and temperatures dropped, Zayne began to feel more on-edge. You’d bore witness to his attacks in the past, but he was no more willing to share his condition with you beyond the odd occasion of being unable to switch it off after a battle. You knew what it looked like when his Evol was acting up. It almost caused a fight, the first time you asked about it. Then, when it became clear you weren’t simply going to leave him to his own devices whenever he was displaying the signs, Zayne steadily, reluctantly, began to let you assist. He couldn’t stand it — he still can’t, you’re sure — not playing caretaker for once, but the two of you found a rhythm; keeping an eye on his temperature, steering clear of fluctuations, little remedies that help him bounce back quicker when his Evol gets the better of him. It became second nature to you, like carrying an Epipen for a loved one at risk of anaphylaxis.

You won’t lie, though. It pisses you off. He’s a constant nag when it comes to your health regarding your heart condition, but there was no allowable mention of his condition when he brought you to Dr. Noah. Not that your opinion counts for anything, apparently, but what idiot cashes out his annual leave for an extended stay in a tundra when he's so prone to such reactions?

It had shocked you even more when your friend declared he’d be staying back for the foreseeable future, conducting research for the old man on a solo expedition on Mt. Eternal. Your friend — the one who'd taken it upon himself to be a stand-in for your lost family — alone, in the worst possible place he could be in his condition.

It was unthinkable.

Four weeks was your breaking point after you’d returned home without him.

Sure, he responded to your texts within seconds. Reception wasn’t good enough for calls, but he made sure to give you no logical reason to worry about him. It didn’t help. Once your dreams started to take the shape of him disappearing into the mountains, you cut your losses and decided to visit for the weekend.

Just as well, considering he’d been massaging his wrist in your periphery for the entirety of your first day. Still, he'd insisted on showing you around Snowcrest, spending as much time away from Dr. Noah's cabin as possible. You knew his tells. He was bordering on a flare-up and hiding it from you. Had he mentioned it and agreed to stay in tonight, you might not of had to drag him home with frost seeping out of his clothes and a foul mood. Instead, he chose to be proud about it.

Idiot.

God knows what could have happened to him if he hadn't come down from the mountain to spend the weekend with you.

He’d never let you get away with such stupidity, and it’s hard not to hold it against him. You came here out of worry in the first place, and the visit isn’t doing a thing to set your mind at ease.

You tend to rekindling the dimming embers in the fireplace, content to mind your business once you hear the shower turn on. At least he’s doing what he’s told.

The living room heats up steadily. New flames settle into a longer-lived glow. You get yourself changed into more suitable bed wear; a commandeered hoodie from your doctor’s medical school era, large enough to reach halfway to your knees. The frayed cuffs have since lost their elasticity and there are a few choice stains, and most condemning, the drawstrings have been chewed to tassels — but god, if it isn’t comfy. Time stretches on, and while the worry gnaws at the back of your mind, you leave Zayne to his privacy. So long as you don’t hear a thump, you’re content to imagine he’s probably just in there being mad at himself over not being the sensible one for once.

Zayne keeps himself locked away for the better part of an hour, in the end. Even Pie pads out into the living room to investigate what you’re doing up alone in the middle of the night before a scritch sends the fox on its way back to bed.

You’ve slid most of the way off the couch by the time the man emerges from his room in fresh pajamas. With your back to the rug, you watch him approach stiffly, slowing to a halt upside-down. He’s still rubbing at that wrist, you note.

“You’re still up.” He mutters, brow knitted in discomfort.

There’s frost on his neck. His lips are blue. It wasn’t even this bad when you were outside. A pit forms in your stomach.

Then, his wake hits you. Cold air, chilling you to the bone, and you sit up in a flash.

“Zayne—“

He silences you with a little hand motion, stepping around you to seat himself as close as he can to the fireplace.

“You’re half-frozen.” You continue when he offers you nothing else. Crawling onto the couch beside him, you reach up to tug at the collar of his sweater, trying to inspect the severity of the attack. “God, you should have said something.”

“I thought you were asleep.” He replies quietly. “I’ve seen — how much it takes to wake you-“

Zayne flinches from your touch when your fingertip skims his neck. The most aggressive warning to stay back that he can risk without waking his mentor. You ignore him, of course. You always do. Sitting close, you press yourself to his side on the couch, guiding his right arm between your thighs. Your fingers lace between his from both sides, covering as much surface area as possible as you use your body to fend off the cold.

A moment is all it takes to see some of the tension in his face disappear. He breathes through the pain, eyes closed, and you shift your gaze to the fireplace to give him his privacy with it.

”You’re in so much trouble when this passes.”

A short, sharp chuckle slips through Zayne’s teeth. He nods once. “I know.”

You sit together like this for a long while, letting him sap the heat from your body to combat the flare-up. If not for the fire, you’d be shivering. It takes time, but eventually Zayne’s breathing evens out. His face relaxes, bit by bit. His half-frozen arm feels just a little cold to the touch.

Neither of you part. Not just yet. There’s too much left unsaid, and Zayne takes far too much solace in quiet to make the first move.

You let your temple drop to his shoulder. “Snow village dates are nice, but most girls would say yes to ‘Go Fish’ and hot cocoa if it means their date makes it through the night.”

After a second, Zayne rests his head against yours.

He inhales.

He pauses.

Then…

“I wanted you to have a nice time. I didn’t think it through.”

…God, he’s such a sweet man. It’s not wonder he’s got you wrapped around his finger.

There’s such a sense of finality to the way he says it. You suppose it’s not necessarily a wrong way to think of it, but it’s not his fault. Sure, it’s your last night together for what may amount to months, and he was stupid enough to think he could get away with poking the bear, but you’d rather have him come home alive and well. Not a victim to his own Evol.

It doesn’t sit right with you to let it end like this. The moment he’s recovered, he’s going to insist you both go to sleep. You’ll take the guest bed, and he’ll take the pull-out trundle, and he’ll remain there, soundless with his back to you. In the morning, you’ll say your goodbyes, and that will be that. The next time you see him will probably be for a check-up, and he’ll spend the entirety of the ECG acting like you’re mere acquaintances again.

No, you’re not losing momentum.

You’re not sure if it’s warmth in general, or if it’s a reaction specific to you — through trust, or the Aether core — there’s just no telling. Zayne keeps his cards too close to his chest for you to ever be sure, but you do know for certain that you hold the quickest remedy. If it’s just warmth, he never lets anyone but you get close enough to supply it. If it’s trust, likewise. The Aether core? You’re the only one.

“What are you—“

Zayne stiffens when you climb into his lap. He winces in discontentment; at such an intimidate proximity, at the physical danger he still poses, at the feeling of your thighs astride his. He doesn’t look pleased in the slightest, but still, his knees shift together, offering you a more comfortable perch on which to explain yourself.

You can feel the cold still radiating from him, fighting his body to keep from regulating its own temperature. It’s unpleasant, the way the chill claws at you, reaching across the expanse of your front. The joints in your hands already ache just from holding his arm to your chest. It’s imaginable, what it must be like to host such an Evol. What it must be like to have your own flesh freeze from the inside-out on a whim.

“Not done keeping you warm.” You answer simply, making a conscious effort to keep your teeth from chattering for his sake. He’s exercising enormous restraint not flinging you off of him already. You shouldn’t push your luck by sending him into any more of a panic.

“It’s not safe for you to be this close.” Zayne protests.

“Then I’m making you safe.”

This time, a growl escapes him. Pain cuts his patience with your impudence short. “You’re going to get yourself hurt—“

Zayne’s words die in his throat when you drape yourself over him, chest to chest, arms languidly curling over his shoulders. He goes completely silent.

“Aren’t you always telling me you can control it, anyway?” You muse, relaxing into him, moulding yourself to his body. The white frost that blooms beneath his skin begins to fade from his throat, unable to contend with the warmth of your breath. “If you didn’t want me doing this you shouldn’t have shown me how well it works.”

“That was after the aid of a hot shower.” Zayne argues. His logic might apply for that aborted attempt at an early-morning hike, but it falls flat tonight. “I was trying to warm up after the shower.”

Yeah, look how well that turned out. He’s as bad at lying as you are.

“So you’re saying I ought to have—“

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

“If it’s not helping, Zayne, tell me.”

“…It’s helping.” He mutters.

You declare your victory with a hum, tucking your face into the collar of his sweater.

Even his scent is cold, somehow.

Beneath you, Zayne shifts, conceding defeat. You feel his lips ghost the side of your head. Considering — then retreating from a kiss — opting instead to rest his chin on you. His affected arm remains wedged between you, while his free hand comes to rest on your waist.

Minutes pass. Zayne’s breathing steadies to a resting rhythm. Eventually, the ice retreats into his flesh, disappearing with only a lingering chill. It shifts, marking the man’s return to normal, but he doesn’t announce anything. Instead, he tugs his arm out, only to wrap around you, surrendering to the moment.

“Do you have plans, while I’m away?” He asks.

“Tara’s been looking at the blank spots on my calendar, so I’ve probably got things on without knowing, yet.”

“Blank spots.”

”Yeah. Some of us have those.”

”Sounds like you don’t know what to do with yourself without me.”

“Please. I won’t have to worry about you bullying me. Maybe, y’know, I’ll do just fine without you.”

A chuckle escapes him. Tentatively, he toys with the fabric of your hoodie. “You’re not going to wash this at all, are you.”

Heat climbs up your neck at the suggestion. Of all the night clothes you had to bring, why did it have to be something you’d stolen from him?

You’re no coward. You rise to challenge. “Can’t miss you when it feels like I’ve got you with me.”

“I know you’ll miss me,” Zayne retorts, and wow, he’s really angling for a comeback after having you subject him to being taken care of, “But that’s no excuse for poor hygiene.”

“Poor hygiene—!”

You lean back to glower at the man, only to find him smirking up at you.

“I’ve half a mind to expect to find you asleep on the platform when the train pulls in, simply because you were too excited to wait at home for me to drop by.”

Your ears are positively scalding. You feel yourself shrinking, suddenly not so confident taking up as much space in the room. How does he have you so well figured out? Are you really that much of an open book? Compared to him, sure, but you’d hoped you carried a little more mystery about you than sitting on a station platform for a quasi-boyfriend-without-benefits like a dog.

Even if that is the case — does he really have to rub it in your face?

He can’t get away with this.

Speaking plainly, Zayne’s warmed up plenty. There’s no real reason for either of you to remain this close, and yet — despite lauding himself as the rational half of this friendship, his arms almost keep you from moving any further away.

His expression doesn’t falter with your silence, remaining ever-undisturbed. It unnerves you. His smiles never last more than a second, and you can count on one hand the amount of times he’s looked you in the eye with a pleasant face on. He’s on a power trip. If you don’t cut him down right this second he’ll go nuclear. He’ll leave you hanging with a ‘goodnight’ and a kiss on the forehead and you’ll both never speak of tonight again.

This is it. This is the last straw. Tonight, you leave him hanging.

“You want me to miss you so fucking bad, huh?” You accuse him, tapping a finger to your chin as you pretend to wonder. His eyebrow ticks. “Is that what you’re into? Man, you medical staff are all so power hungry.”

Zayne looks thoughtful for a moment. A thumb idly traces back and forth along your skin, barely tucked beneath your hoodie. It’s such a cautious touch. You wish he wasn’t just all talk. “Perhaps you’re easier to deal with when one considers you might actually like getting bossed around.”

There’s no hiding the erection that sits wedged between you. There’s no ignoring the heat that pools in your core every time it strains against your cunt, blocked only by his sweatpants and your underwear.

There’s no way he can’t feel your heart beat throbbing against him.

And yet — he pretends not to be taking part in any of it.

You think about it for a moment.

Then, you roll your hips forward, slowly, gently. Your nerves spark as your clit finds the pressure it needs against the underside of his cock.

It takes everything in your power to keep from doing it again.

A tiny shiver makes its way out of Zayne. Frustration, perhaps. You angle a knowing little smile at him, and his throat bobs. He knows he’s been caught.

Checkmate.

“Doctor Zayne, are you getting off on this?” You ask, and his face flushes scarlet. His eyes widen, caught off-guard by you finally crossing the threshold.

”I…don’t know what you’re talking about.” He answers lamely, pointedly avoiding looking down.

“You are!”

“Not so loud. It’s n-… it’s nothing.” He insists in a hushed voice, shooting a look over your shoulder before he’s satisfied that the coast is clear of anyone who might be privy to what the two of you are doing. “Just a biological reaction to stimuli.”

“Which stimuli?” You ask, feigning curiosity. “The cuddling, or this?”

To stress your point, you do it again, biting back the swell of enjoyment at the way his lips part of their own accord. A little hum spills forth, and his own hips chase the motion, just for a second, before he halts.

“Please.” Zayne murmurs, moving to hold you still. Inching you back onto his thighs, condemning himself to reveal two little damp patches. One where the grey fleece of his sweatpants pulls most taut. The other a little lower, where you’ve been rubbing your cunt along his clothed shaft.

“You need to learn when you’ve teased enough.”

What — fall back? Now? When all your nerves are alight?

Your tongue wets your lips as you take in the sight of him. Well on his way to wrecked, but not quite there. His expression remains otherwise impassive, but his pupils are far too blown to help him maintain the facade.

“You’re one to talk. Can’t hack it when it’s not you in charge?” You challenge him. “You’re not usually one to shy away from uncharted territory.”

You can’t help but reach out, itching to touch him. Fingertips smooth along his length, feather-light from the bottom up. His cock twitches when you reach the tip, begging for more.

“Ah—“ Long fingers snatch at your wrist, holding you fast. “Try no man’s land.”

“It’s nothing.” You assure him. “You said it yourself.”

Nothing. No different to how he so often strays into treating you, with all his dates and touches. Nothing, midday naps and linking your pinky-fingers as you walk together. Nothing, like the spare clothes you both reserve a drawer for.

“Just warming you up. That’s all.”

Zayne’s chest expands. His gaze fixes on your fingertips curling insistently at his waistband despite his grip keeping you at bay. “That’s all.”

Disbelief? Determination? Disappointment? You’re not familiar enough with how each of these sound in his throat to properly identify it, but Zayne’s grip on your wrist releases nonetheless. He opts to help you make more comfortable work of his track pants, pushing them down just a little to allow you easier access. There’s no presence of approval at how greedy you are about it, pawing and snatching at your prize while he tries to remain nonchalant.

You do try to give him the dignity of privacy by not looking down when he settles and you finally wrap both hands around his cock. He’s already indignant as it is, and the rumble that vibrates deep in his chest as your fingers close around him isn’t helping.

Oh — maybe just a little tease.

“Hey.” You chide, grinning. His eyes crack open, just enough to narrow at you. “Don’t make it weird. I’m a professional.”

It earns you a scoff. Zayne’s fingers, settled on your thighs, give a retaliatory squeeze, thumbs pressing just hard enough into your adductors to skirt on discomfort. He watches you tense at the feeling, and sensing an opportunity to shift the attention back off himself, decides to squeeze harder.

You finally flinch with an “Ow!”, and the man smiles to himself. Mission accomplished. He lets go.

”You’re the professional? How many surgeries have you performed?”

”How many have you performed?”

”…A lot, genius.”

“Didn’t you tell me that some of your worst patients are doctors themselves?”

“Your point being?”

There’s no point — at least not in arguing with him. He’s only trying to distract you. You shift over him, and his attitude dissolves. He leans back, maintaining as much distance as he can — or perhaps to watch, as you tug your underwear to the side — line yourself up — and sink down onto his cock.

Zayne’s chest expands, but he makes no noise. His eyes close. His lips part. A minor crease forms between his eyebrows. It might as well be a sob. You’d use such a reaction against him if you weren’t more concerned with suppressing your own, lest he catch you out. Your cunt burns from the sudden, full intrusion, and his diverted attention gives you the moment you need to grow accustomed to it.

Once you’ve gotten over the initial shock of the feeling, you brush any intrusive thoughts aside. It doesn’t matter if he’s one of your oldest and closest friends. It doesn’t matter if he’s your doctor. You were already squarely planted in conflict-of-interest territory the moment he took you on as a patient.

You try to ignore your own desire. Your body catches up with your actions quickly, igniting touch-starved nerves that you’ve long-fantasised him satisfying. Heat builds inside you at a nervous system realising you’re finally giving it what it wants, and it only screams for more. Of course you’ve wanted Zayne. You adore him, but he’s not the kind of man who could balance a friendship with benefits; if anything, he finds a way to be the inverse of such a thing. He gives you everything in the way of a relationship except sex, and with him steering so clear of crossing that boundary with you, you have to tread carefully.

As much as you want to, this is delicate.

“My point is: zip it and let me take care of you.” You manage.

Besides, its not like you’re actually having sex with him. He’s continually pushing the boundaries of platonic with all his touches and hugs anyway. It’s not like he has a leg to stand on if he wants to protest what sitting on his cock might mean for your relationship. Hell, this isn’t even the first time he’s been hard when you’ve had his hips pinned down with your own.

If anything, you’re doing the guy a favour by taking the responsibility off him to go this far.

Zayne doesn’t bounce back as quickly as you do. His eyes remain scrunched shut, his core engaged beneath your palms as you brace your weight to settle into a more comfortable position in his lap. He looks worried. Apprehensive.

“Doctor Zayne?” Concern begins to creep in, just a little. “Okay, you can say something now.”

“Please,” He grits between his teeth, and relief floods your body as some semblance of calm returns to his expression, “Don’t call me that — like this.”

“Like what? I’m just warming you up, remember?” You offer a smile when he opens one eye, mood shifting to quizzical.

“You’re so immature. And for the record, this constitutes malpractice. You’re a terrible doctor.”

”Trust the process.”

”Fine. What’s the course of treatment?”

“Nothing.”

You can’t help but chuckle at such quiet outrage. It’s getting easier to read him. Relaxing against his front, you ignore a little gasp on his part to loop your arms around his neck again. Dishonest pretences be damned, this really is doing the trick. “All you need to do is stay still.”

Zayne weighs up his options for only a moment before giving in. His arms slip around your waist. His chin hooks over your shoulder, just barely nuzzling into the crook of your neck. He’s breathing in your scent, and the following exhale into your skin has you stifling a shiver.

Then, there’s a flex within you.

“Hey!” You choke, “I said stay still back there!”

“Quiet down. It was only a reflex.” Zayne defends, a little too cavalier to fly under the radar. “Besides, I’m not the one squirming.”

“I’m just getting comfortable. Your hips are pointy.”

Zayne’s hips slot up into yours, and the feel of him nudging just a little deeper has your eyes stinging. You fail to stifle a little squeak, and you’re shushed for it immediately.

“Just getting comfortable.” Zayne’s words lick at your ear, and the sound of him sends shivers through you, pooling between your legs, pleading with you to satisfy the ever-nagging want to start riding him. “You’re like a vice.”

He has to know how much of an effect he has on you. There’s no way he doesn’t.

You don’t respond to his attitude — however, the condemning, responding, constricting of your insides around his cock surely doesn’t go unnoticed, and with a hollow breath, he lifts you, just a little, enough to draw back and push back in. He’s slow about it; infuriatingly so, almost like if he inches in and out at enough of creeping pace you’ll either not bother to be strict with him, or you’ll simply abandon your own rules in favour of crossing the boundary he’s silently begging you to cross for him.

No. He’s not getting the upper hand here. Not when he gets to pretend all his little actions are forgettable. Platonic. Accidental. Misunderstood. There’s only so many times a guy can subtly grind on someone during a spooning session and claim ignorance when called out about it.

You lock your feet beneath his knees, and sink down onto him, hard. Pleasure blooms. Your cunt aches for more. A sharp breath escapes Zayne, threatening to blossom into an appreciative groan that would only serve to tempt you without your hand clapping over his mouth and a ‘shh!’.

“You can keep still, or this stops.” You announce in a whisper, and he watches you defiantly from behind your hand.

Zayne’s gaze eventually breaks away from yours. Conceding. For now, at least. You lower your hand from his mouth, and relax, reaching across the cushion to pluck your phone from the couch and check your messages.

Already, he’s bothered by your lack of undivided attention.

“You’re on your phone.” He huffs.

“I’m not rewarding your behaviour.” You reply simply.

“You’re not implying that behaving differently would warrant a reward, are you?”

That’s for him to figure out.

You shift your weight maybe just a little more than you need to, indulging in the feeling of his cock shift with you, within you, pressing insistently against that one spot that almost has your constitution coming apart at the seams. Zayne trembles momentarily beneath you, swallowing hard. He’s keeping his cool well enough, but as you settle into the new angle, no longer moving, his frustration makes itself known with another twitch inside you.

If he keeps doing that, you’re not sure you can hold out.

“You really think this is helping?” He asks, voice tight.

“You don’t believe me?” You pout, tapping your home screen and opening your camera app. “Fine, let the expert see for himself.”

Switching to selfie cam, you watch as the man glances at his image on the screen for half a second, before tearing his gaze away. Not a shocker, you reason. He’s probably never seen himself with a hair out of place. Flushed cheeks and dilated pupils? You might as well have shown him a traffic collision.

“Aw, come on. Look how much colour’s come back to your face.”

Zayne musters the courage to look up, but not at the phone. His eyes narrow at you. Accusatory. “I’m not interested in giving you blackmail material.”

“What? Get real. There’s nothing incriminating going on. Especially not when you angle it like this.” You switch on a filter and lean down into the man. “See?”

Curiosity gets the better of him, and his head tilts to get a better look at whatever scheme you’re cooking up. On the screen, both your flushed faces smooth out, blushing perfectly. Cat ears and whiskers. Cheek to cheek. Just another one of your countless selfies with completely platonic friends.

You take the shot. The shutter clicks.

“Cute.” Zayne mutters drily.

“You think so?”

“Only how much fun you seem to be having of it.”

Your brow knits. “Oh yeah? All right, stick in the mud, you take over.”

He gives too much away at that response. His long fingers immediately slip over your hips. He’s readying to flip you onto your back before he notices you’re holding the phone out to him. Then, knowing he’s shown his hand, he has no choice but to recover his pride.

Much to your chagrin, Zayne plucks the phone from your hand, aborting whatever miraculous step he’d been about to take. A corner of his mouth ticks, minutely. He angles your phone away from you, tapping and swiping. His own phone buzzes. Then, he casts the device at the other end of the couch, out of your reach. “I think it’s getting a bit late for screens.” He murmurs. Fingers smooth up and over the swell of your hips. His long arms uncoil from your waist, releasing you as he leans back. Leaving you with a lonesome chill. “And you ought to be going to bed.”

Is that…rejection? Has he just been humouring you up until this point?

You tilt your head. “I’m sorry. Is this not okay?”

“This is fine.”

He looks at the fireplace. Stoic as ever.

“Then what?” You frown.

He doesn’t respond.

Your throat runs dry. Dread creeps up through your heart.

“Hey. Talk to me.” You urge, smoothing your fingers along his jaw, and he leans into your palm.

Seconds pass. Zayne finally regards you again. There’s an acknowledging incline of his head — almost a polite bow. A pre-emptive apology for what he’s about to say.

“What happens after this?” He asks. “Do we part ways at the train station in the morning and the next time we see each other, it’ll be as doctor and patient?”

Oh.

“Is that what we are to you?” You ask, not entirely sure if you want to know.

He dodges the question the best way he knows how: with rationality. “I feel that if that scenario is what you want, we should say goodnight. My understanding of our relationship won’t change, I promise you, but if this goes further, at least one of us is going to feel differently. It would be better if there were no misunderstandings between us.”

Something tightens in your chest. Something dreadful and lovely all the same, anxiety and anticipation at the prospect of a tipping point, at least before saying goodbye. Trust Zayne, of course, to turn to smoke and mirrors when it comes to a confession of feelings, but you’ve known him long enough to see how far out of his comfort zone all of this is.

“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” You ask, aborting an attempt on his part to avert his gaze with a finger beneath his chin.

His expression remains inexplicable. Then, there’s that little tilt of his head. The quirk of an eyebrow. “Your assumption is correct.”

The apprehension that’s been building in the back of your mind disperses the moment he says it. Your resolve all but disappears. “My understanding,” You begin, reaching up to cup your hand over the other side of his face, “is that I’ve wanted you ever since I walked into that restaurant last year.”

Zayne doesn’t hesitate. His mouth finds yours in a heartbeat. Previously unsure hands pull you against him, locking you in his embrace. He’s so awfully gentle about it all despite your combined strength. Such a gentleman. It comes as no surprise that he shudders at the intrusion of your tongue past his lips — what does surprise you is how quickly he catches up to your pace. Inviting you in. Slipping an arm lower to brace your weight, and you feel yourself being pulled up off of his cock, just until only the head remains at your entrance.

The loss of him has you incensed. He keeps you from sinking back down, and your protesting whines are suffocated with another kiss. All he’s left you with to express yourself is your hands, and you seize the opportunity, combing your fingers through his hair and tugging, just slightly at the roots.

He breaks away with a little noise. Not pained, but shocked. Another one of his spots, you reason, and he’s just as displeased that you’ve found it.

“You don’t know when to quit.” Zayne pants. His fringe dusts your forehead. “What — what were we saying about bad behaviour going unrewarded?”

You’re too mindless right now to play any games. There’s no more thrill of the build that you can handle. Not after this long.

You break, instantly.

“Please —“ You whimper, almost trembling in his grip, trying in vain to take him back in again. “Zayne, I need it — please—“

Zayne relents right away. He gives you what you want, lowering you, burying himself in you to the hilt. Then he lifts you again, building into a steady rhythm.

”You’re so — you’re so frustrating.” He manages between kisses. “Should’ve told me this is all it takes for you to do as you’re told.”

More. You need more. Heavenly as it is, it’s not enough, just having him in you. You push back, and Zayne takes the hint. He’s said his piece. He lets you take the lead again without a fight, admiring the view as you roll onto the balls of your feet, gripping the back of the couch to keep yourself stable. The new angle feels deeper, each stroke rolling drifting sharply over your nerves as he brushes that spot inside you. It takes a moment for Zayne to kick into gear, brain short-circuiting as he watches you squat on his cock, taking what you need from him. Then, he leaves you to support your own weight. Fingers wrench at the front of your hoodie, yanking it up to your sternum, and his tongue sweeps a nipple. In the time it takes for you to react, his other hand has snaked between you, between your legs. His thumb rolls over your clit just as he latches onto your nipple and sucks. The keen barely escapes your lips before Zayne’s hand claps over your mouth, continuing his assault.

It goes from too little to too much. It creeps up on you so fast, so suddenly, and there’s nothing you can do but ride through it. A muffled hum is all the warning you can give him. Your pace staggers as the burn in your thighs catches up to you, but Zayne only goes faster, rubbing merciless little circles into your nerves. His hips roll up into you, compensating as best he can for your loss of control. Finally, the band snaps, and you sob against his hand, spasming around him, tears pricking at your eyes with the intensity of it all. You go positively boneless, and Zayne breaks away just enough to let you collapse into his chest as he carries you through it, breaths quickening as the lingering spasms of your orgasm invoke his own.

“Fuck, I’m—“ He barely stammers, releasing you only to coil his arms around your torso again, readying to pull out.

“Not going anywhere.” You promise, clinging to him. Your fingers comb through his hair, tugging again, and a whimper dies in Zayne’s throat. He buries his face into the crook of your neck. His hips roll up into you once, twice, thrice more, and then he goes still. Buried in you to the hilt as he tips into oblivion.

He’s so subtle about it that you barely even realise he’s coming. Maybe it’s the effort not to wake Dr. Noah. Maybe it’s like this every time. Having him hold you with such desperate reverence while he does his best not to judder in stark contrast to to the feeling of him pulsing within you, you reason you’d like to find out. He hides his face from you throughout, only pulling his forehead from your clavicle when the aftershocks have come and gone.

Zayne looks lovelier than ever like this — coming out of a blissful haze, gazing up at you with cautious adoration. His focus flickers between your eyes and your lips. His chest expands and collapses like he’s like a 5-miler, but his breaths are smooth.

Even now, he’s trying to maintain a cool composure.

“Forgive me.” He mutters, not quite meeting your eye.

Your head tilts. Chasing him. “Huh? Why?”

“I exercised poor judgement. That was rotten of me. I should have known better, given I’ve never prescribed birth control to you.”

“You really think I’d come to you for birth control?” You snort.

Zayne’s brow creases. An incredulous look totally undermined by how positively wrecked he looks right now. “I am your physician. Or has your other doctor friend decided to become real after all?”

Your fingers comb through his hair again. Despite a pleasant sigh on his part at the sensation, his expression remains steeled.

“Hey.” You finally manage to capture his gaze, only for any tells to evaporate. “Could you tell me something?”

“I’ll do my best.”

“Are you more jealous that I might have had sex with someone who wasn’t you, or that I might have gone to another doctor?”

Zayne considers his answer for a long moment. His head tilts in that particular way it does when he has to make a decision, eyeing you expectantly. Punishment for daring to push him out of his comfort zone.

He presses a hand to your forehead.

A thoughtful hum escapes him.

“Curious. Your temperature’s dropping. On second thought, you should stay another day so I can observe you.”

“You’re avoiding the question!”

“Here. I’ll keep you warm. You can install those camera filters on my phone to pass the time.”

#zayne love and deepspace #li shen #zayne x reader #love and deepspace fanfiction #vas fics

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charmandabear · 1 year ago

Text

Yule

Summary:

While snuggling by the Yule fire, you forget just how sensitive elf ears can be.

Pairing: Astarion/f!Reader Rating: E Word Count: 2.2k Tags/Warnings: post-game spoilers, cunnilingus, blood drinking, p in v sex, spawn!Astarion, soft!Astarion, fluff and smut, Astarion deserves to be bitten too

Read it on AO3.

Enough people said they'd still be interested in reading holiday-related fics even after the holidays, so here you go! Huge shout-outs to Idylla for their incredible art used in the banner. Their modern!Astarion absolutely ruins me.

Midwinter Nights: Yule | Christmas | New Year's Eve

Astarion curled against you as the Yule fire burned low in the hearth. You knew he wouldn’t be able to stay awake all night, despite his insistence to the contrary. It amused you even more because, as an elf, he didn’t really need to sleep. But he had grown so accustomed to it at this point, snuggling up with you each night as you got your mandatory eight hours, it was a harder habit to break.

You had only just put the most recent batch of cookies in the oven, but you were a little concerned for what would happen when you needed to take them out. Astarion was much like a cat in that way; if he climbed on top of you, it was a crime to disturb him. You could lay there forever, pinned beneath his weight, and you’d thank the gods for it.

You peered down at him, sleeping so peacefully. He almost looked like a cat, pointy ears occasionally flicking at the warm air that emanated from the fire. You could practically see his tail swishing contentedly. Ever since killing Cazador and reclaiming his freedom, he’d been so drawn to creature comforts, looking for softness and indulgence in all he could find.

You ran your fingers through his white curls, scratching his scalp absentmindedly. He shifted in his sleep, subconscious nudging him into your touch. You would sit here all night if you could, nails dancing over his pale skin while he slept soundly. You knew that eventually your timer would go off and you would need to take this latest batch of cookies out. But for now, at least, you could just enjoy having him pressed up against your side.

You stared into the fire as your hand wandered, gently stroking his back, his shoulders, his neck. You marveled at how much had changed in these past few months. Karlach and Wyll ventured to Avernus to fight on the front lines of the Blood War, and while you missed them, you knew you were only a ritual away from seeing them at the House of Hope. Gale had gone back to continue his studies in Waterdeep, and Lae’zel found herself living a surprising life of domestic bliss with Shadowheart, newly reunited with her parents. You haven’t heard much from Halsin, Jaheira, or Minsc, but you were certain that they were finding respite wherever they were.

As you’re getting lost in your thoughts, you stopped paying attention to where your hand flitted across Astarion’s skin; that is, until you heard a breathy moan escape his lips. You looked down and realized that you were running the tip of your pointer around the shell of his ear. You pulled away suddenly, embarrassed as you realized you were basically doing the elf equivalent of teasing his nipples. He whined at the sudden loss of contact, and you sat frozen, unsure if he was awake or not.

He stirred, legs squirming against a definitive bulge growing in his loose pants. He sat up and blinked sleepily, gears turning as he put together where he was. He turned to you and suddenly his eyes focused, pupils wide like a cat focused on its prey.

“If you wanted something, you could’ve just asked, you know,” he said in a low purr, and you could feel yourself clench in response to the fire his words stoked deep in your core.

“Sorry love, it was an accident,” you whispered, trying to sound cool but the crack in your voice gave you away.

“Accident or no, you’ve made your bed, so I hope you’re ready to lie in it,” he said with a grin, fangs glinting in the firelight. He launched himself onto you, kissing you roughly as he tangled his hands in your hair. You tried to regain your breath as you kissed him back, your hands scrambling for purchase on his clean linen shirt. Your body bent back with the weight of his as he shifted on top of you, prying your legs open with his knee. An unseemly moan escaped your lips as he pressed his hardness right up to the apex of your thighs. You ran your fingers through his hair, though whether it was to regain control or just hang on for dear life, you couldn’t tell.

Between the heat radiating from the fire, the slight delirium from staying up all night, and the way that your arousal for this man made your head swim, you could barely think straight. He continued to roll his hips into you obscenely, and you could feel the telltale dampness seeping into your small clothes. You spread your legs a little wider, trying to feel that delicious friction through the several layers of fabric that separated you.

You broke the kiss to take in a gulp of air, beginning to feel a bit lightheaded. His lips migrated to your neck, flicking the tip of his tongue along the puncture wound that had only recently closed up. A shudder surged through your body at the sensation and you squirmed involuntarily, your body urging you closer to his. You rolled your head away from him, presenting your neck as a silent offering as you had so many times before. He needed no further invitation and sunk his teeth into the sensitive flesh, your simultaneous groans of pleasure mingling together in your ears. You knew you were courting danger by letting him bite when you were already woozy, but it was worth the risk for the good it did you both. He always became a little more powerful, a little more dominant right after drinking your blood; for you, the feeling of him siphoning just a little of your life force away gave you an unmatched feeling of ecstasy.

He detached himself from your neck and looked down at you, panting. The sight of him post-feeding always sent you into a frenzy. His cheeks and ears uncharacteristically flushed, his bloody lips in a sedate half-smile, hair a tousled mess, and a wild look in his eyes like he was ready to devour you. You could only imagine what he saw in return; your hair splayed out beneath you, eyes glassy, mouth open in a suspended moan as blood trickled down your neck.

He ran a hand down the front of your blouse and you arched your back to meet his touch. He was still pressed between your legs, your knees hooked around his waist. He ran a finger along the waistband of your pants, causing you to whine needily.

“Tell me what it is you want, pet,” he purred, the predatory cat out in full force. Your hips bucked up against him as you grasped at the rug beneath you. He looked so gorgeous in the orangey firelight, his skin soft and glowy. You pawed wantonly at the hem of his shirt, any semblance of speech leaving your body. He grabbed your flailing wrists and pinned them above your head, bringing his lips within an inch of yours.

“Your words, love. Tell me what you want,” he growled, a little more forcefully than before, eliciting another desperate mewl.

“Ah- I.. Astarion,” you pled with him and he grinned, fangs pressing into your lips.

“Yes?” The word was a breathless whisper. He looked down the length of his nose at you, crimson eyes piercing into you.

“I want you to taste me,” you squeaked out, writhing beneath the hard length of his body. He pressed his lips to your ear just as he pressed his erection into your mound.

“Good girl,” he hissed, and pushed off your chest to slink downward to your hips. He grabbed your waistband and slid your pants down over your ass, dragging his cool hands across your heated skin. He pressed his lips into your hip and you arched into him, yearning to feel him on every inch of you. Your skin prickled from the heat of the fire, his contrasting touch making you shiver.

He traveled downward, each kiss pulling a new and more debaucherous sound from your throat. His lips hovered above yours and he relished in making you twitch with need. After a second of teasing that felt like an eternity, he swiped his tongue along your slit and you groaned in relief. He dug his fingers into your thighs as he gently lapped at your folds, making you feel more heated with each pass. He spread your lips apart with his dexterous fingers, tracing lazy shapes with the tip of his tongue.

Your fingers curled into his hair once more, hoping to regain control of your cantering hips. He pushed his tongue deeper into you and your breath grew ragged, your hips begging to fully fuck his face. He relented to your control, letting you grind on his lips and tongue to chase your own satisfaction. Your cries grew in tandem with the pressure that mounted in your core, and this time when your hands wandered to stroke his ears, it was intentional. He moaned into your cunt, a deep, primal sound that sent vibrations directly to your clit, sending you over the edge. He buried his face into you as you rode out the waves of your orgasm, thighs squeezing around his head.

He pulled away once the pulses had subsided and you delighted to see his disheveled face, your juices reflecting in the firelight. He roughly pulled you up onto his lap, pulling your still sensitive swell down hard onto his erection. You moaned into his lips, sharing the taste of you with him.

“You saucy little minx,” he growled even as you could feel his smile through the kiss. Your fingers fumbled at his waistband, desperate to free him and feel him inside you. He peeled your blouse over the top of his head just as you released his cock from his trousers, tip already glistening with precum. Your breath hitched at the sight of it, your pussy already aching to be filled.

The length of his cock teased your folds, and he cupped one of your breasts in his hand, the pad of his thumb skating over the pert nipple. You threw your head back, raising your tits up with a heaving breath just so he could latch on with his mouth, suckling gently. Your arms around his neck, you danced your fingers close to his ear, teasing him as much as you were asking him for more. He pulled off your nipple with a pop and stared red hot daggers into you.

“Careful love. Mess with the cat and get the claws,” he warned in a low and dangerous whisper. He raised your hips up and pulled you down in one fell stroke onto his stiffened cock. The cry he tore out of you was your most obscene yet, but you were already so wet and hungry for him that you slid down to his base without resistance.

You began to ride his dick, your knees pressing against the floor as he stretched you out with every thrust. Now it was his turn to toss his head back, leaving his pale throat open and vulnerable. You sunk your teeth into the cold flesh, your dull human incisors not actually piercing skin, but eliciting a delicious groan from him nonetheless. He kept his hands squarely on your hips as you bounced up and down, relishing the slide of him along your inner walls.

You wanted to see him lose himself in you. You wanted him to come undone like you were. You needed more of those breathy moans in your ear as he unleashed the predator within.

You nipped at his earlobe.

Almost as though an external force possessed his body, he slammed you down onto your back without pulling out of you. He pushed your knees up to your ears and pounded into you forcefully, the edge of your second orgasm rapidly approaching. Your tits bounced with the force of his thrusts, and it took everything in your power to keep your eyes open so you could watch him unravel above you. Sweat beaded on his forehead and his red eyes looked down on you, positively feral. You could see his fangs through the soft o-shape his mouth formed as he came, his orgasm sending you crashing into yours. You could still feel his cock throbbing inside you with each burst of his seed even as your vision slowly faded into black.

You awoke a few moments later curled up on some pillows and a cool washcloth laid across your forehead. Next to you was a glass of water which you gulped down eagerly.

Astarion came back into the room, face still looking deliciously flushed and bitten, with a small plate of cookies. He kneeled down next to you and held one up to your lips, and you accepted the snack without hesitation. He pulled the washcloth from your forehead and kissed your cool damp skin, his lips almost warm in comparison.

“Love, you can't scare me like that. I thought I fucked you into a coma. If you're feeling unwell, say something,” he said, red eyes full of concern. You wave it off with a shrug.

“What can I say? Maybe I like messing with the cat,” you respond with a giggle as you bite down on your cookie, teeth bared playfully.

#astarion #astarion ancunin #astarion fanfic #baldurs gate astarion #baldur's gate 3 #baldur's gate iii #baldurs gate fanfiction #astarion smut #astarion fluff #fluff and smut #baldurs gate smut #astarion x reader #astarion x you #fanfiction #bg3 spoilers #bg3 fanfiction #bg3 astarion

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shellshocklove · 5 months ago

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interlude: does anyone know where the love of god goes? | joel miller

pairing/AU: joel miller x female!reader – post breakout & no ellie AU

summary: a dark shadow lurks in the woods, searching for his angel.

warnings: this is an 18+ fic so mdni!!! canon-typical violence, age gap (reader is mid to late twenties), dark content, swearing, guns, some tags are left out to avoid spoilers, no use of y/n

a/n: the plan for this series was always three parts, but then i got this small idea for an interlude that i really wanted to include so here it is <3 this is a little different but i hope it's enjoyable still! happy reading <3

main masterlist / series masterlist / ao3 / playlist

from the river to the sea, palestine will be free 🇵🇸 this account stands with palestine. the creator of tlou is a zionist, and the second game is largly based on israel/palestine. please, everyone who interacts, educate yourself about the genocide happening right now, and support/donate.

The snow moaned with each step he took. The muscles in his shoulders ached from the strap of his gun where it gnawed, and his arms were tired from carrying it around all day. On top of that he was cold. His fingers felt like icicles wrapped around the trigger.

Why was it always so fucking cold, Adam wondered.

The woods had started to grow dark around him as a crow played hide and seek between the trees. It had followed him all day. Back and forth he’d walked – on lookout, always ready. For what, he didn’t know, they hadn’t seen anything or anyone since they came upon the cabin.

How he wished to be back there right now. Back in the warmth with a warm meal in his belly.

He looked to the sky with disinterest. Over the treetops twilight deepened into a deep purple, like the color of an old bruise faded to black.

Nothing. No one.

The wind moved and cut right through him, down to the bone, and Adam started to wonder about when the last time he’d felt truly warm had been. The fire, maybe? When the curtains caught fire, it hadn’t taken long before the whole house was aflame.

Something deep inside him shrunk each time he recalled that day. Jonah had barked his hoarse voice at him. Orders, orders, orders. Do this, kill them, kill them all, and take what’s of value.

It had started to get old long before that night, and Adam couldn’t find a reason for why he followed the guys and Jonah anymore. The constant traveling was harsh and hard, especially in winter, with no place to settle for longer than a week at a time, killing and raiding whatever and whoever they came across. Maybe in the beginning it had been worth it, back all those years ago when Adam had felt like he’d had something to prove, something to prove to Jonah, to show his potential, a potential to lead.

But no, it had been years and Adam was always stuck on fucking scout duty. He hated scout duty.

He hated Jonah, too.

Adam wondered what he’d done to that girl. That bitch deserved to get put in her place, that’s for sure– she’d almost given him a speed ticket to hell if she’d been a good shot. She’d ran down the stairs while waving a loaded revolver around, sent most of the rounds into the walls. Somehow, he’d managed to grab ahold of the old woman, used her as leverage with his gun pointed to her temple. The bitch had gone dead silent, and Adam had known he had a clean shot had it not been for the old man. He’d been stronger than he’d looked, attacking Barkley, and giving Adam no other choice than to shoot the old woman. Adam could still feel the spray of her warm blood against his face.

Everything after that happened so fast. Adam couldn’t get a clean shot on the old man, and the girl had gone all crazy, shooting bullet after bullet into the floor, and now Barkley’s leg most likely had to be amputated.

If the wound doesn’t get you, the fucking infection will.

The bullets had drawn the rest of the crew to the living room, and soon both the girl and the man had been pressed against the floor with their hands tied behind their backs. Adam don’t know what happened next, too busy raiding the rest of the house for valuables, but somehow Jonah had decided to take the girl with them while they’d left the man for dead in the snow.

Adam felt a shiver run through him at the memories while the wind howled like a hound in his ear.

He should get back.

Wading through the snow, Adam dreamt of summer. His hand around his gun slackened in his grip while he filled his head with thoughts from before. Of long days at the public pool during summer break, the smell of a barbeque and freshly cut grass, of his mother waiting for him on the porch after a long day of running around the neighborhood with supper ready.

In his daydreaming, Adam failed to notice the shadow trailing him, how it kept to the darkness of the forest.

No mother stood ready for him on the porch of the cabin, only Jack on guard duty tonight. He looked as bored as Adam had felt in the forest.

“Did you see anything?” Jack asked as Adam approached him.

“Nah,” Adam shook his head as he walked past Jack up the porch stairs. “I’ll let Jonah know I’m back.”

“He’s with the girl,” Jack told him, “said he didn’t want to be disturbed.”

Adam felt a frown form across his face. Jonah with the girl? Jonah might be a hard son of a bitch, but he’d never laid a hand on a woman for as long as Adam had been a part of the crew. Not that the opportunity hadn’t presented itself… multiple times. Spoils of the raids Adam had taken advantage of time and time again. A man gets tired of his own hand after a while, and nothing beats a tight cunt. At first, Adam had thought Jonah didn’t swing that way, but nothing stays sacred for long in a crew like this, and one night Barkley had told him about Jonah’s wife, and how she’d died. Jonah killed and plundered, set fire to the world, but would never take a woman again as long as it was not his wife. Adam guessed that some things remained sacred, even after death.

A wall of warmth hit Adam as he stepped inside the cabin. The room was stuffy from the heat of the fire and men, and he could already feel drops of sweat bead on his forehead. The men paid him no mind, their chatter loud and obnoxious where they huddled together over bowls of food.

His stomach growled at the sighed, and he quickly served himself a bowl of brown mush simmering away over the flames. Looking down at his bowl, Adam knew he’d kill for something else to eat, something that wasn’t this fucking diarrhea-looking slop.

Looking over at the men where they sat, Adam mulled it over and shook his head He wasn’t in the mood for whatever ‘jokes’ they had for him today. Quietly, he grabbed another bowl of brown and walked down the hall. Curiosity grabbed a hold of him when he passed the door where Jonah kept the girl locked away. The two bowls shook in his hands as he pressed his ear to the door as he held his breath, listening.

He heard a muffled voice, deep, Jonah’s. Adam couldn’t catch the words being spoken behind the door, but he never heard the girl reply. She hadn’t said a word since they dragged her away with them. She’d kicked and screamed, spat out words of ‘how they’d regret this’ and ‘how they’d soon be dead if they didn’t let her go,’ but the fight in her had died out quickly. Adam wished Jonah would put a bullet in her already. She’d shot Barkley– she needed to pay for it, he thought.

The room smelled sweetly of disease. Adam wanted to crack open the window, but Barkley had begged him not to the last time he’d attempted it. He crept closer to the bed where his friend was sleeping, his dark hair sticking wetly to his forehead from sweat.

The infection had taken him now, Adam thought as he sat the bowl on the bed side table. They should take the leg, but he knew they wouldn’t; Barkley was already dead. Adam shook his friend’s shoulder, but he wouldn’t wake, only mumbled words Adam couldn’t understand – the ramblings of fever dreams.

With a sigh, Adam sat down in the chair in the corner. He’d slept in the chair since they found the cabin, watching over Barkley. The guys had teased him about it, but he’d rather sit in a room stuffed in the rot of disease, than pretend to like any of the guys. He let his eyes wander over Barkley as he ate his food.

His friend was dying. His only friend soon to be dead. What would be the point anymore when he’s not there anymore?

He hated everyone else. The praise and promotion he’d expected from Jonah, would never come. Maybe he should just slip out in the night, go about the land himself, find someplace to settle, leave this all behind.

Adam scraped the bowl and sighed. It was a foolish thought. He knew Jonah would come after him. He didn’t tolerate deserters much. You either followed him or swallowed down a bullet.

He had no choice; it was scout duty for Adam.

The snow moaned with each step he took, and the sun failed to make sense. The trees had been eerily silent today, something different in the endless wilderness. Adam moved about his route, back and forth, back and forth. He couldn’t put his finger on it but all day, it was like he was being watched. He’d watched his six, gone off his usual path, went a little deeper than he used to, but Adam had seen nothing but white snow-covered trees.

He waded back the way he’d came as a nervousness ran through him, bubbling under his skin. His grip around his gun tightened and he couldn’t fight the urge to check it again. A heat flushed his cheeks when he saw it was still loaded and ready, just like it had been ten minutes ago.

He was losing it.

Shaking his head, Adam tried to keep himself steady with calming breaths.

In… One… Two… Three… Out… One… Two… Three.

Over him he heard a branch snap, and his heart stopped. His arms worked on instinct, aiming his gun at the sky. An owl flew overhead, cooing in the silence of the forest, and Adam’s hands fell to his side.

A small breathy laugh escaped him. What was wrong with him today?

He continued on his path, kicking snow with each step. The snow had soaked through the cuffs of his jeans, but he’d stopped caring long ago. Then the wind moved, it cut right through him, making the trees rustle like living things. Adam looked up again, catching a glimpse of the sun through the trees as the world slowly darkened around him.

Then, a warm hand clamped over his mouth. He had no time to react before he felt the barrel of a gun against his back.

“Drop the gun,” a gruff voice ordered in his ear, full of authority.

When Adam didn’t move, the gun pressed harder into his back, the metal burning against his spine. If his mouth wasn’t covered he’d probably let out a whine.

“Drop. The. Gun,” the voice repeated, and Adam felt his gun slip from his fingers. He made no move to resist when the man grabbed his hands and twisted them behind his back.

He thought about Barkley, and Jonah, and the men. What did he have to fight for?

Around him the world darkened, it was like the forest came alive, the quietness blooming with sounds. A crow cawing somewhere, and then accompanied by another. The shadows had turned strange, small half-mooned shapes making patterns in the snow.

The man pushed him up against a tree as he tied his hands. The rope he used was thick– no, not rope, it couldn’t be. Adam twisted his hands, fingers dancing along the material. A belt. The man had used his belt to tie him up.

He could just run, wrangle his hands from the man’s grip and run. Adam looked past the tree, gauging his chances through the thick snow–

Bang.

Fuck.

Adam fell to his knees.

Motherfucker.

Blood bubbled in his ears. Blood stained the snow in crimson, pooling out of his left leg. The pain burned and Adam couldn’t figure out where he’d been shot, it was like it could’ve been anywhere in the growing red staining his jeans.

The man grabbed a hold of him, twisting him around and pressed him to the tree trunk. Adam cried out in pain, he couldn’t hold it back, the pulsing in his leg too strong – it beamed up his thigh. The back of his head slammed against the bark, and Adam was forced to look at him.

“Where is she?” the man asked in a calm voice.

Older. Brown hair. Brown eyes. A patchy beard with streaks of grey. He was larger than Adam. Maybe he’d been able to run from him, if he’d not been shot.

Sucking in a shaky breath, Adam tried to calm himself. “Who?” he tried and earned himself a sucker punch – his jaw aching and blood filling up his nostrils.

The man shook his head, “Wrong answer. Where is she?” The void in the man’s eyes made a chill run through Adam; or maybe it was the snow, or the blood pooling out of him.

The man’s grip in his hair tightened as he slammed Adam’s head into the tree bark. The world spun before him, dark as it twisted it into something strange.

Fuck, he was about to die.

“S-she’s alive,” he tried, his voice not louder than a whisper.

“Where?”

Adam sucked in a breath, tried to focus on keeping his eyes open. A clanging sound filled his ears before metal glinted in the strange light. He couldn’t hold back his scream when he felt the knife in his gut.

“Ah! Fuck! Fuck!” he cried, “The cabin– the cabin.”

Over him the man towered and his grip in his hair tightened even more.

“WHAT CABIN!?” he screamed.

Adam clung to life with both hands. The man before him turned into two, and he couldn’t figure out where it hurt the most.

“H-hunting cabin… a-a f-fifteen-minute walk t-that way.” Adam tilted his head in the direction, as much movement he could manage through the grip of his hair.

The man let go of him, and his head fell back against the bark. The world was suddenly brighter again – or was he walking towards the bright light he’d heard so much about?

“S-she’s alive– I-I swear,” he whispered.

“It’s okay…” the man nodded, his voice laced with pity as he stood before him, a giant shadow against the brightening day, arm raised and blade glinting in his hand. “I believe you.”

i hope someone liked this? i'm very curious about what your thoughts for the last part will be, so if you have them please leave a comment, reply or an ask. they are always super welcomed, and they make me super happy <3 other than that, thank you for reading!!

next part -> here!

#joel miller #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller fanfic #joel miller angst #tlou fanfiction #the last of us fanfiction #pedro pascal

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danmeiblr · 2 months ago

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Finally, a Danmei Blog for Lesser-Known Danmei, Some of Which Are Not Even Translated Yet

Hello, hello, I’m Miya, a voracious danmei reader that gobbles novels every night like it’s her daily sustenance. I’ve been reading danmei since late 2018, and like most people in English danmei spaces, I was introduced to it through MXTX’s Mo Dao Zu Shi / Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation. Since then, I’ve read many other danmei, like all the other popular ones—Little Mushroom, The Husky and His White Cat Shizun, Devil Venerable Also Wants to Know, etc.

Anyways, I have read almost all of the novels the English fandoms are currently obsessed with. Because of this, I often can’t relate to the excitement you guys still have over them because those novels feel like ages ago to me. I’ve long moved on from them and found other novels I love more. (I also read the bulk of those popular novels during my depression era, and I don’t wanna bring up memories of that)

So yeah, I sometimes feel like an outsider in English danmei spaces because nobody wants to talk about the novels I wanna talk about because nobody even knows about them 😭😭😭

Thus, this blog was born.

Mainly, I will be liveblogging the danmei I’m reading. I used to post them on my main @miyamiwu, but I’ve recently transferred my liveblogs from there to here. Just a fair warning: my liveblogs won’t be spoiler-free. I also don’t use spoiler tags because, well, nobody even knows the novels I’m blogging about so nobody would care if it’s a “spoiler” 😭😭😭

Aside from this, I will also post:

reviews of some of the great novels I come across

recommendation lists (you can also ask me for recs!)

rough English translations of the scenes I’m reacting to (otherwise, I won’t make sense)

general thoughts on danmei genres and tropes

translation ramblings

Basically, anything and everything about danmei.

Some stuff about me:

I run the @lizonkanovels website and used to post MTLations

I am studying Mandarin, but I’m nowhere near fluent in it. (I’ve also been too busy with college that my studies have been put on-hold.)

I loooove talking about the intricacies of translation and even took a class on translation theory before. You will see this reflected in some of my posts.

My favorite genres/tropes: whodunit, unlimited flow, horror, broken mirror, and 甜宠 (lit. sweet love/pampering, fluffy novels basically).

Current favorite danmei: Fourth Perspective by Mo Chen Huan

Also a fan of the 188男团 series by Shui Qian Cheng. My favorites in the series are Years of Intoxication and Blazing Armor

Well, that’s pretty much it. If you’re interested in discovering new danmei to read or just learning more about danmei, feel free to follow me~

You can also check out what novels I’ve posted about on my Danmei Directory:

https://danmeiblr.tumblr.com/directory

(If you’re on the mobile app and can’t access the link above, just copy it and paste it directly on your browser.)

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shiroganeryo · 5 months ago

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DGM 252: New perspectives and confirmations it has given us

⚠️First of all, I'll be tagging this under DGM spoilers so if you have somehow stumbled upon this even if you're avoiding spoilers for Chapter 252 (or the most recent DGM talks as a whole), this is your warning to turn back now!

And secondly, I'm under the effect of allergy meds so please pardon me if I'm talking gibberish 😂 But the latest chapter has given us some food for thought and I've been mulling it over.

There are two points I want to cover in this post; the first one being much extensive while the other is rather short.

1. Bookman Jr.

The reveal that the guy we had thought to be Past!A all along was actually the former Bookman Jr. in one of the best twists Hoshino has given us in a while - she sounded very proud of how we were all misled by her narrative and honestly I tip my hat at her for such genius - has also fueled questions about his identity.

I'll start by saying I do not believe he and Cross are the same person. That's not what I'll be talking about so I'm playing this card right off the bat. This theory, although popular, has always had way too many gaps for my liking and after the latest chapter, the chances are practically null that it's true.

If you want a discussion as to why, this post has put it into words better than I could and I agree 100% with OP's point, hence why I don't see the need to say anything on the matter.

But there's one thing that I'm yet to see people discussing and it's about the talk Lucia had with Joe back in The 222nd Night: Searching for A.W. - Hypokrisis.

(I'm showing what I believe to be the official translated English version by Viz and there's a reason why)

For a long time, people have debated about this small exchange between Lucia and Joe. There's no doubt the one they're talking about is old man Bookman, so we can confidently affirm he's the one waiting at the Campbell Mansion.

And what about Lavi? This is where the next dialogue from Lucia comes into play:

Since this is probably the version a lot of people have read, I must make it clear that the like "Junior, his successor, isn't here" was a mistranslation. Here's the original:

Lucia: Koukeisha to naru Jr. wa mou imasen. (The one who'd become his successor, Jr, is no more.)

I've double-checked with the Brazilian Portuguese translation because it tends to be as close to the original as possible, and surely enough, it's translated correctly:

(image courtesy of the volume I own by my so-so phone camera 😋)

"Junior, who was his heir, is no more."

The literal translation for what Lucia is saying is "isn't among us anymore", but that's an expression in Portuguese that means that someone has died/doesn't walk on Earth anymore.

While the mistranslated English version and the original Japanese/Brazilian version have similar meanings, the way it's worded gives the sentence a completely different meaning: in one we're led to believe Jr. isn't physically there at the Mansion, while the other two make it clear that Jr. has died.

And that's exactly why that, after Chapter 252 dropped, this scene is given a new perspective - because Lucia was referring to the former Bookman Jr, and not the current one.

We don't know the whereabouts of current Lavi - cue in the chair jokes, I unfortunately love them all - and while I might be wrong, I have my reasons to believe he's alive.

It just doesn't feel like Hoshino to kill an important character off-screen, plus she has said we'll see him again eventually and that the mystery of what's behind his eyepatch is still to be revealed (and will only happen once Bookman passes away, something that will possibly happen before the story reaches its end).

I have the feeling Lavi still has much to contribute to the story and he's actually one of the characters that, to me, seem to have the highest odds of making it alive until the end. It also isn't mere coincidence that Bookman picked the same alias for both Juniors, since Lavi has mentioned in a discussion room that the aliases refer to their record logs and the Holy War is being recorded under 'Lavi'. There's unfinished business to be taken care of.

Using the mistranslated version to illustrate was important because I've seen people wondering where Lavi is if not in the Mansion, while others were afraid he has died. He's very likely in a predicament, but dead? I don't think so.

So that only leaves us with one viable subject for that dialogue, that being the former Bookman Jr. (now affectionately dubbed Lavi Sr. by the fandom).

"But how come they didn't know Bookman already had a new apprentice back in Chapter 222 if the Zoogles mentioned it in Chapter 251?"

Yes, it's a little odd. What I can infer from this is that they either 1. Didn't know Bookman already had a new Jr. because he had been unconscious and only after they stabilized his situation they could talk, or 2. Did know about the current Lavi but believe him not to be ready to take on the mantle yet while Lavi Sr. was (but unfortunately deserted the clan).

Since only the Bookman and his appointed apprentice, who was born with the seal, can exchange information and records via their blood, it might be not that off the chart that the Zoogles weren't up-to-date on his affairs since they're not Bookmen themselves but rather a bloodline of people scattered across the globe who are supporters of Bookman's mission like Lucia has explained. Yet, even if they aren't all-knowing, it seems odd for them not to know something as vital as that about the person they're supporting.

And of course, there's also the possibility of option 3, something else that I completely failed to consider right now. Time will tell which one.

Note: By the way, the Lucia in 222 and the Lucia in 251/252 are indeed the same person; Hoshino seemed to hint there's a reason behind her sudden aging that we don't know yet. It's important to make this clear since what I've said is related to dialogues delivered by her.

2. Past!A = current Allen

(image courtesy of Kougeki Scans' Chapter 251's translation)

There were theories around and people still considering the possibility of our current Allen being a clone and all sorts of theories because of the unexplainable age gap between him and Past!A, but it seems the deaging theory has been fully confirmed by Chapter 252, as we saw it taking place before our very eyes.

There are still some mysteries surrounding it, but seeing how Apocryphos mentioned the "Helix", we can't help but be taken back to the explanation we've previously seen about the Helix of Life (The 221st Night - The Clown's Joke).

Since that's a topic that feels like there's more to it as of now, I won't be discussing the how and why Allen deaged, especially with the unseen variable in the mix that is Innocence; who knows if that might make the Helix energy behave differently.

I was on the "deaging theory" train because Nea was able to recognize Past!A all right when he looks in the mirror (The 214th Night: Searching for A.W. - Awakening) and also questioned the presence of Innocence on his body as well as how he hadn't aged but instead had gotten younger (The 215th Night: Searching for A.W. - By Your Side).

There are many mistranslations in the official English version of these two chapters (214 and 215) that have fueled countless misconceptions within the fandom but I won't be pointing those out in this post since I'm not here this time specifically to talk about it.

Note: Mangadex seems to have nicely translated versions of these chapters if you want to check them out for a recalling - I can't confirm fully but what I read of them looked consistent and faithful to the original.

Anyways, back on track; now that we've seen what took place 35 years ago in Chapter 252, Nea's bewilderment at the current situation of Allen back in Chapter 214/215 makes a lot more sense.

And even more interesting is that as soon as he noticed the Innocence lodged into Allen's left hand, we see the image of Apocryphos, as if Nea could feel its presence. Turned out that meant more than just Apocryphos being able to resonate with all Innocence, but rather, that the very reason why that Innocence had found home in Allen's body was by its intervention.

Just what the hell, dude. That was, once again, extremely well-played on Hoshino's part. I'm really looking forward to the next chapter!

#DGM #DGM spoilers #analysis #d.gray man #d.gray-man #there was a third point I wanted to cover but the meds make me run on only two overworking braincells #so I actually forgot which that was #it's possible I covered it while talking about the other two points because I have the feeling I talked about everything I wanted #but if the post feels lacking somehow that's why

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wings-of-ink · 3 months ago

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Ask Guidelines

For the sake of streamlining my inbox, please follow the guidelines below when submitting Asks. I appreciate all your questions, but I simply find that I lack enough free time to spend with them. Some weeks are busier than others for my inbox, but I personally feel it's a bit unfair to those of you who may be waiting a long time for a response. Plus, I do need some "me" time now and again, no matter how much I love sailing around on here.

*UPDATED 12/22/24

Reaction/Response-style Asks must remain paired down. These are lots of fun for all of us, but they take up a majority of the time I spend on the inbox. When you submit a request like this, please only specify up to 2 characters (ROs, side characters, etc…) you want to know the answer for (I will throw in some or all of the other characters if I have time and/or can answer quickly). If you do not specify, I will pick for you based on how quickly I can answer.

Please do not submit multiple Asks with the same question for the other characters. This will just eat up my time, and I do not want to delete them, but I will have to.

If your question has been asked before, I will try to find a link to it for you (most of these I have tracked in a document so it doesn't take long). I haven't yet put together an FAQ since I really don't get a ton of repeats for the same questions. One day, I may make a searchable document with them.

*NEW* "Spoiler" Asks. I am trying my hardest to limit spoilers for readers. Some things are going to spill with the nature of a work like this, but I want to keep that to a minimum. This is for the benefit of old readers who still want to experience things in-story and for the new who may have recently started following.

It is still okay to send these questions in – and theories too! I love seeing where your head is at on events and where you think it may be going. I just may not be able to answer certain things and in some cases, I may not be able to post a response. It just really depends on the content.

I will make determinations on these on a question-by-question basis. Sometimes the question itself contains a spoiler (even if it's just a name) that might affect a new reader's experience.

I will make tags to warn when I answer things that may have info others don't want to see.

I'm going to try something new to get the best of both worlds in this. I will compile these asks and make one big new post to address them every so often (weekly/monthly). This will enable me to fully control what is immediately viewable. I will tag up and note what potential spoilers will be on these so you know if it's safe to click to read more. The downside is that my Anonymous Askers won't get notified and will need to watch for this post. Because of this, I may work out a proper schedule to drop these.

Comments are still very much welcomed. If you by chance do not want a response posted, please simply let me know if that is what you prefer. I generally like to post at least a little response to these for you, but if that makes you uncomfortable, please let me know in the Ask.

Music suggestions are welcome (for instance if a song makes you think of a particular character).

Art suggestions are welcome (if an art piece makes you think of a character and such).

Story theories are welcome too!

Error Reports are still welcome with some guidelines.

Game-breaking errors of course are super appreciated so I can address these ASAP.

Coding mishaps (you can see code in the text or something is clearly not coded correctly) can go either to the Asks or to the Google Form, but the Google Form is preferred due to frequent repeats to the Inbox. Reports on Tumblr are tagged as "gc whoopsies" so you can check if the issue you found has already been addressed here.

Typos and grammar issues – please send these in using the Google form linked in the game and on the pinned post. It's been handy getting these in my inbox since I can fix them right away in my main Twine file, but there are a lot of errors in GC, and they're going to fill my inbox and I have no control over repeats.

Asks that are long/wordy are still okay, as long as they meet the other Ask criteria. I don't mind reading a lot since I can still do that fairly fast (and I totally understand the need for context or if you have several comments to make). I can be wordy myself, so I get it, sometimes you just want those details in there. You may not get a super long response in return, but I read every word.

Try to space out your Asks in general. I will leave this to your discretion and trust that you to not submit several in a short window of time.

NSFW Asks are totally okay with me. There is not much outside of my comfort zone. If something is too far, in my opinion, for a public response - I will simply delete it and pop a courtesy post out to try and signal to you that it is one I cannot answer.

I was hoping to avoid placing any rules on my inbox, but I never anticipated this many followers or that anyone would have quite so many questions or comments about my work. This is to ensure that I keep myself controlled more so than any of you. I have so much fun chatting with you and answering questions, that the IF writing and planning ends up delayed. Since that's why we're here, I need most of my free time to go to the IF(s) and any extras.

I will make updates to this post as needed. There will be a link to at the very end of the Pinned Post too. If the inbox gets a bit crazy or is too much to juggle during crunch times, I will continue to pause it during those so I can catch up.

Take care, everyone! ^_^

~Lunan

#god cursed if #asks

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h0neysp1ce · 5 months ago

Note

Hi! I was wondering if you could do my request? Could you any genshin boys (Mainly Neuvillette and Wriothesley, but if you want to do one, do Neuvillette) with a fem!reader who’s like robin from hsr? Like she’s a popular idol and is very famous?

Thanks for reading my request, and make sure to take care of yourself!

Nҽυʋιʅʅҽƚƚҽ x Iԃσʅ Fҽɱ! Rҽαԃҽɾ

Characters: Neuvillette, Fem! Reader Tags: Established Relationship, Fluff Constellation: Head canons, Scenarios/One Shots Warning(s): Spoilers for Neuvillette's character and Fontaine quests. DNI if you haven't played through the Fontaine Archon quests yet or interacted with Fontaine as a whole. There are spoilers! also there are French Pet names mentioned such as Mon Chéri, Mon trésor, and Mon Amour. Reader is Female Aligned , although its rough finding context clues of that (I'll edit later for any mistakes) mentions of other characters such as Seigiwinne, Lyney, and Lynette. Cringe Dialogue between you and Neuv?? sort of. Mentions of Deep kissing sessions but nothing over that??

A/N: Thank you to the person who requested this! It provided a fun challenge for my writing skills, which I enjoyed ^^ I wasn't sure if you meant headcanons or scenarios, so I included a mixture. And thank you do take care of yourself too! <3 (edited post)

word count: 1824

˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.

You had caught the eye of the Hydro Dragon in short...

➺ You and Neuvillette had started dating privately since you were both significant figures in Fontaine, him as the Chief of Justice and you as a popular Idol.

➺ The relationship is very discreet and private; the only person who knows would probably be Sigewinnie. You two had met at the Opera House during Lyney and Lynette's magic show.

To put it simply, you found yourself wanting to get away from the paparazzi. So, you put on a disguise and decided to visit the Opera House, curious about the magic show. However, you had no idea you would bump into the Chief of Justice.

𝒮𝒸𝑒𝓃𝒶𝓇𝒾𝑜 (1)

You took a seat beside the Chief of Justice without realizing who he was. Suddenly, a voice broke your train of thought.

"Excuse me- "

You turned to look, and it was Neuvillette himself. You almost freaked out, but you kept your composure.

"Monsieur Neuvillette—" your voice faltered mid-sentence.

"Ms. "Name" I presume?" he asked.

"How did you- "

"Don’t fret, Madam Name. I’m not going to blow your cover, so you can relax," he stated with a slight smile.

➺ From that point on, you two found ways to see each other—some coincidences and some deliberate. This is what strengthened your relationship the most.

➺ Your hometown is Fontaine, so when you’re not touring or performing, you’re relaxing at home.

➺Eventually, it was clear that you both had feelings for each other. Though it was awkward at first, you two made it official, and it went surprisingly well.

𝒮𝒸𝑒𝓃𝒶𝓇𝒾𝑜 (2)

You had just finished rehearsal for one of your concerts and had promised Neuvillette in advance that you would have a date and some tea together.

You hastily made your way to his office, gently opening the door and closing it behind you.

"Ah, Mon chéri—I presume rehearsals concluded ?" Neuvillette trailed off. He was at his desk, finalizing some paperwork when he looked up at you and gave a smile.

" Yes, Mon amour, they did," you responded. You made your way behind his desk, plopped down in his lap, and rested your head on his shoulder.

"Mon trésor," he murmured, taking one of your hands and kissing the back of it before bringing it to his cheek to bask in your warmth.

He trailed a few kisses from the edge of your palm to your wrist, his hand resting on top of yours.

You and he just sat like that for what seemed like a while until you broke the silence.

"Mon amour, how has work been going on your end, if I may ask?"

"It’s been very tedious, my dear "Name", but as the Chief of Justice, it’s my job," he said with a slight smile.

He looked at you with admiration and suddenly pulled you in for a sweet kiss that lasted a few moments. You both enjoyed the warmth and passion of the moment.

You pulled away first and giggled at how clingy he was being.

You shared a few more kisses before actually getting on with the date, which ended with you both drinking tea and discussing a multitude of topics.

➺ Neuvillette is a man who loves praise. He adores it when you compliment him and will do the same for you, admiring and praising you in every way. He definitely attends most of your concerts; unfortunately, he can’t make it to all of them because of his busy schedule with trials, paperwork, and his duties as the Chief of Justice. However, he always ensures to be your biggest supporter and fan.

➺He loves your voice. When you speak or sing, it’s like listening to an angel to him.

➺ He has been open about his true identity to you. In fact, he told you he was the Hydro Dragon on your second date. He didn’t want to hide it from you because he cares about you and values honesty in your relationship. At first, he was hesitant to tell you because he didn’t know how you would react, and he didn’t want to overwhelm you.

➺ This man even gave you a promise ring. You both have matching rings, though his is hidden under one of his gloves for obvious reasons related to Fontaine's never ending drama. He loves how you wear yours on display.

Interviewer: "Now, Ms. Name, can you tell me about the ring on your finger?" the interviewer asked curiously.

"Name:" “Oh, this is just a new piece of prized jewelry I wear. It’s an important piece and has a lot of value, that’s all I’ll say for now,” you replied.

➺ That’s the excuse to keep things concealed between you two, as you prefer to keep the relationship private.

➺ Sigewinne found out during tea time between her and Neuvilette , Neuvillette mentioned you, and she could tell from the way he spoke about you that you two were definitely an item. She always found you to be a lovely couple.

➺ Neuvillette loves when you return from your travels or tours. He enjoys when you find a comfy spot on his lap in his office while he’s going through files and paperwork. He might pull you closer and sneak in a few kisses and caresses while multitasking.

➺He is excellent at multitasking, confirmed.

➺ He admires you in every way. He finds you beautiful and sweet and feels you bring him so much joy. Whenever you’re around, this Hydro Dragon cries less, to put it simply.

➺ You’re good at easing each other’s stress. For you, you work with comforting him, and your comfort helps him relax when he’s been cooped up in his office for too long. On the other hand, he goes for a more delicate approach, like letting you sit on his lap or resting on the sofa in his office after a lot of rehearsals or concerts.

➺ He’s a physical touch and gift-giving man, and maybe just a bit into words of affirmation. He has a specific way of talking to you. Although he may not fully understand all human emotions, he really tries, and you’ve helped him understand them better.

➺ He loves your touches—your soft hands that fit so well in his, and when you cup his face, he’ll place his hands over yours if you do so for a while. He enjoys basking in your warmth, and he loves to litter your hands with kisses and trail up your hands and wrists. He wants to kiss your soft lips 24/7 and hold you passionately every chance he gets. You are precious to him.

➺ He is a well-mannered man with a lot of courtesy and respect towards you <3

➺ You and him do live together, but the location is kept private between you two.

➺ This man will eventually ask you to marry him—100% guaranteed.

➺ Just ask, and he makes some of your concerts. You tend to attend some of the trials he oversees, though you sit in the back so you’re not easily noticed.

➺ Things definitely grow passionate when you kiss, and it becomes very intimate. By the end, you’re either both slightly out of breath or Neuvillette is covered in kiss marks from your lipstick.

➺ You might think he would be bothered by lipstick stains and marks left on him, but he actually loves them, even though he has to clean them off before making a public appearance, which is rare unless it’s a trial or something.

➺ He’ll often give you his coat on the way home. His coat draped over you is something that makes him happy.

➺ They say dragons like treasure. You are, in fact, his treasure—more precisely, his “Mon trésor.”

➺ Being the Iudex in Fontaine, you know he’s fluent in French, so expect him to speak to you in French sometimes or give you French pet names of endearment.

➺ As an Idol, you have many die-hard fans. It’s not bad for the most part, but sometimes they can get out of hand.

➺ You’re famous to the point that the whole of Teyvat knows who you are at this point.

➺ You made a name for yourself early in your career and are a very successful Idol, beloved by many.

➺ Your music and songs are hits across the world of Teyvat. Lots of people talk about you a lot.

➺ Your Vision is Hydro, and during your performances, you use water techniques from your Vision to create cool effects at your concerts.

➺ Not only are you a hit as an Idol, but you also do interviews, modeling for photoshoots, and there is some merchandise with your face on it. However, you prefer to keep it minimal, as having your face on everything is a bit overwhelming at times.

➺ Yes, there are downsides to being an Idol - crazy fans and intrusive paparazzi, to name a few. But other than that, you love your career.

➺ With your Vision, when used during performances, it creates a trail of water, musical notes, and floating bubbles that sync with your voice and timing.

➺ Sometimes, Neuvillette will ask you to sing something for him when you’re alone, and you get shy and surprised, asking him why.

𝒮𝒸𝑒𝓃𝒶𝓇𝒾𝑜 (3)

"I'm running a bit late," you said, glancing at the time.

"I’ll be back soon, mon amour," you kissed Neuvillette goodbye.

He smiled and pulled you in for one last kiss before you had to go, returning your goodbye kiss.

"I’ll see you later this evening, mon chéri. Remember dinner tonight," he said.

You grinned widely in return and turned to head off, getting ready for another one of your concerts. Unfortunately, Neuvillette was buried in paperwork, so he couldn’t attend this one. But he wished you all the best and good luck.

Later, you returned from your concert, kicking off your heels after entering the shared home you and Neuvillette have.

"Mon amour!" you called out.

"Yes, Mon trésor, I’m in the dining room," he replied.

You entered the dining room, which was dark except for the lit candles on the table.

A candlelit dinner? Your face flushed slightly red as you looked up to see Neuvillette sitting across the table with a wine glass in hand.

"Welcome home, dear "Name", he said.

"Neuvillette, you didn’t have to do all this..." you murmured as you walked over to him.

He pulled you into his lap the moment you reached him, holding you close for a moment before responding.

"Mon amour," he mumbled into your shoulder.

"My sweet Hydro Dragon..." You lightly ran a hand through his white fluffy locks, gently massaging his scalp.

You ended up staying there, chatting over dinner about your day and enjoying each other’s company.

A/N: Dialogue went brrr. I tried to be as creative and detailed as possible but it might be cringe at points. I’m still learning how to write so apologies for any awkward dialogue ;w;

. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.˚. ✦.˳·˖✶ ⋆.✧̣̇˚.

#neuvilette genshin #neuvillette x reader #neuvillette x y/n #neuvillette x you #neuvillette #genshin x you #genshin fluff #genshin x reader #genshin impact #h0neysp1ce #fluff #fem reader #female reader #x reader #reader insert

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ritz-writes · 8 months ago

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okay, since the trailer is out, heres my obligitory message to the lmk fandom:

tag your spoilers

"but its just the trailer right now" not everyone watches those. i almost didn't because i like to be completely surprised. not everyone has watched it and not everyone is going to watch it

"what if its not plot related?" its still a spoiler. and a lot of people have different ideas of what is and isn't plot related. i've had major things spoiled for other fandoms cuz ppl didnt think they were that important, but they were to me

"how am i supposed to know if something is a spoiler?" if it has ANYTHING to do with the trailer or s5, its a spoiler. it doesnt matter if its just an outfit or an interesting pose a character is making. its from the new season, be it the trailer or the show itself, so therefore you need to mark it as so

if you really dont want to take the time to put "lmk s5" or "lmk s5 spoiler" for some reason, then at least put a page break and a warning

like this (dont worry there arent actual spoilers under the cut):

possible s5 spoilers!

like that. its that easy

for those that dont know how to do it, you click this button

its the same symbol on mobile too

and if youre posting on tiktok, please put a warning before the video that gives fans ample time to scroll away if they want to

i got spoiled for major things in s4 and was devastated because of it. so please, lets all tag accordingly this time? my rule of thumb is tagging a minimum of 2 months after the english comes out, but i personally tag past 4-5 months just to make sure.

okay, thats all from me. happy s5 yall! lets be kind and respectful to each other and the new studio <3

#lmk #lego monkie kid #ritz rambles

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halfmoth-halfman · 1 year ago

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My MWIII Thoughts

I’ve finally taken the time to get all of my thoughts about the new campaign together and put them in a single post. There are no spoiler tags since the game is officially releasing today/tomorrow, but everything is under the cut with a warning. I have a lot of things to say here, so I’ve tried to organize it point by point. The points I think are most important are first, and I ask that you take the time to read through them. If you want to skip to the points about characters and that death, the beginning of those sections is marked with red, but be prepared to scroll.

I watched the custscenes, with gameplay, all the way through once and I’m not doing it again. I tried to go back to specific scenes to reference in this post, but even that was a lot for me, so if my timeline in here is a little screwy don't fault me too much.

If you just want my quick, overall thoughts: This campaign was two hours of egregiously incoherent, poorly written, shoddily thrown together military propaganda, even more than the cod games usually are, and your money would be much better spent donating to help Palestine - there are links to do so in this review, marked with green, as well as boycott information, and the same donations links are also provided on this shorter post if you want to go directly to them.

(There are spoilers below, and this is long. I'm not kidding. Do not click the readmore unless you are prepared to scroll.)

Military Propaganda/Islamophobia

I spoke about this some already here and here because I felt this was an important enough topic that deserved its own post.

Call of Duty has never been has never been the game where I expected to see proper representation of the Middle East or Middle Eastern politics. It is first and foremost military propaganda. More than that it is American military propaganda. Just like with every superhero and pro-military movie post-9/11, it should be expected that you’re not going to get any kind of meaningful insight or depth when it comes to Middle Eastern storylines and characters, but there is usually more of an effort to hide the Middle East = Terrorist subtext.

To say I was shocked at how overt and blatant the Islamophobia was in this game is an understatement. We get four deaths of named characters in this game. Two of whom are Middle Eastern women, Dena and Samara, from the country Urzikstan, the fictional combination of Syria and Afghanistan and home to terrorist group Al-Qatala (real subtle, right?). Both of these women are associated with the ULF, the Urzikstan Liberation Force, Farah’s group of freedom fighters whose goal is to free their country from foreign subjugation with Samara no longer being an active member. Both of these women are introduced in this game. Both of these women are minor characters. Both of these women, Samara in particular, are trying to live their lives peacefully now that their country has been freed.

Both of these women are given deaths more brutal and more shocking than the other two deaths of two main characters in the series.

We meet Dena at the beginning of the game when we’re first re-introduced to Alex and Farah. We see her have a heartfelt reunion with Farah, and the two have a conversation while driving where Dena expresses her concerns about wanting Urzikstan to remain peaceful but assures Farah that everyone will support her. After, Dena is suddenly shot in the chest, and Farah is forced to take control of the vehicle they’re in, which ultimately flips over and we get Farah’s first death fakeout.

It’s in this cutscene that we see a lingering shot on Dena as well as her corpse being thrashed in the car as Farah tries to take control and as it flips. We are given a Middle Eastern woman showing hope for her country that the peace she has fought for will be maintained only to then watch her die for shock value and a fakeout for another character, and watch her body fly across the car as it flips. We don’t get that with either of the other two gunshot deaths in this game. Soap’s is just as sudden, but we see it coming, and there are no shots of his body being thrown about, no closer views of his face like there are with Dena. Shepherd’s is entirely off-screen and all we’re left with is a shot of him lying face down on his desk - no blood or bullet wound in sight.

Notably, the only other person we see a comparable amount of blood on in this game is Makarov, the enemy of the series.

Samara, who gets the worst death in this game, in my opinion, is a retired ULF soldier we’re introduced to on a plane. I’ll start by saying I was under the assumption this may have been the reboot replacement for No Russian, the mission in which Makarov and Co. shot up Zakhaev International Airport to frame America for terrorism in the original series, and the mission that was teased after the credits in the MW2 reboot. We get the scene of Makarov and his men at the airport before boarding the plane, which could just be a nod to the original mission. However, until there is an official reboot of the No Russian mission, I’m going to assume this was Activision’s new take on it.

In this mission, we learn that Makarov plans to use this plane bombing to frame Urzikstan, Farah and the ULF specifically. The thing is, as Big Mak and friends are in the airport preparing to board, we are shown that the ULF is already being blamed for the missile attack on Arklov Military Base from the previous mission where their missiles were stolen, capped with Konni’s chemical gas, and one was detonated. There’s even a news sequence showing that the world already thinks of the ULF as a terrorist organization, and has not-so-quietly thought that for years. That makes this upcoming scene feel not only unnecessary but like a deliberate choice made by Activision to be extra cruel to a Middle Eastern character.

We see Samara text with her family and are shown a picture of her husband and children before the man next to her begins speaking to her in Arabic. He compliments her family and, I assume as we’re not directly shown, gets the No Russian text - a text, for those who have not played the original games, meaning to not speak Russian to not tie the terrorist act they’re about to commit back to the Russians. The Traveler, as he's called, then reveals that he knows who she is, knows her family, and knows that she is a former ULF soldier and fought the Russians. He then pulls a gun on her and Makarov and Konni take the plane hostage, purposely speaking Arabic and declaring this is for Urzikstan.

We are then forced to watch as Samara fights back, but is ultimately taken to Makarov where a bomb is strapped to her chest. He gives his usual cryptic speech, and over-explains to the audience what’s happening before diving out of the plane D.B. Cooper style.

Samara is then dragged to the back of the plane by a Hijacker, where the remaining passengers are, kicking and fighting and trying to reason with him to stop. He pauses and we then get this exchange:

Hijacker: Are you a terrorist?

Samara: No…

Hijacker: You look like one.

He then puts a gun in her hands, tosses the cellphone that will let her stop the bomb, and shoves her into a crowd where we have to watch her struggle to explain what’s happening to her and that she needs the phone to a crowd of people that are either afraid of or angry with her. She is shoved to the ground by a random man, forced to fight through people trying to tackle and beat her, and, when the phone is finally within reach in the hands of a scared passenger, the plane blows up.

I want to emphasize that most of this is a cutscene. There are a few button presses for the player to try and get the phone, and you are allowed to look around and try to fight back, but that is quickly stopped, and you are forced to sit and watch through Samara’s perspective. The end result? There’s an investigation for who may have done this, and you play as Farah collecting evidence from the crash site so Makarov can’t frame the ULF. The mission succeeds, because it’s a story mission and it has to, Makarov is unable to control the narrative so people can only suspect the ULF did it but can’t prove it, and Samara…died for nothing. All of that was so people could suspect the ULF was a terrorist organization, which the game has previously gone out of its way to establish was already happening before Makarov got on that flight. This entire sequence and the mission after added nothing to the storyline other than the brutal forcing of a Middle Eastern woman to hijack a plane 9/11 style and die a death worse than two of the series’s main characters.

Two side characters, two Middle Eastern women who have never existed before this game, are put in this game solely to die in ways where their deaths are more emphasized and graphic than a character we’ve played as since the series began, and one of the main villains.

There is a genocide happening in Palestine. Islamophobia in the United States, and the West as a whole, is rising to post-9/11 heights. There is already so much propaganda being spread in an attempt to dehumanize the men, women, and children who are being murdered by Israeli forces, to justify the actions - the war crimes - of the Israeli forces. Could this be a sloppy attempt at Activision trying to mirror real-life stereotypes and how quick the media is to jump to the Arab = Bad narrative? Possibly. I don’t think it is. I think this was a deliberate change from the original No Russian mission in which America is framed for terrorism, made by an American company that makes games meant to garner interest and support in the American military, during a time when the American government is being criticized for funding and aiding an ethnic cleansing.

As slapped together as this game was, I don’t believe they couldn’t have changed the campaign in the time since the situation in Palestine escalated to this level. I firmly believe it was a purposeful choice to write that scene, to film that scene, to keep that scene.

It is blatant, it is clear, it is as in-your-face as it can possibly be. It is not something this fandom gets to ignore because they don’t like the campaign. It is not something this fandom gets to overshadow with Soap’s death as poorly written as it was. It is not something this fandom gets to stay silent about while also posting about #freepalestine.

I have never expected the best when it comes to Islamophobia from the Call of Duty games or its fandom. I’ve never expected anything beyond mildly okay. Call of Duty is military propaganda, I know. The fandom is known for its racism and it’s not getting better, I know that especially. But I don’t see how anyone, in the times we’re living in right now, would be able to look at this and not acknowledge it for what it is.

It is the purposeful brutalization of Middle Eastern characters.

It is propaganda.

It is racism.

It is Islamophobia.

It is wrong.

Engaging Critically/Acknowledging Privilege

While I may be stepping back from the CoD fandom, I understand that not everyone is going to. For some people, these games are a comfort or an escape. I’m not here to call for a boycott of Call of Duty or Activision while there are more important boycotts to be focusing on - and you can find more info on them here & here.

What I am asking, particularly of those of us in the fandom that are not being directly affected by what’s happening in Palestine, is that there is more acknowledgment of the level of privilege that we have and that people learn to engage more critically with the media they consume.

It is a privilege to play a game like Call of Duty and not have to think about the propaganda. It is a privilege (and ignorant) to say “it’s not political”, “it’s just pixels”, or “it’s not real”. It is a privilege to be able to just turn the game off and never have to think about war, and the impact of the representation of the characters, and the real-life events that these games base themselves on. And this isn’t just a CoD issue, this is something that should be considered with every piece of media you engage with.

There is no such thing as a “politics-free” book/movie/game/show. Everything carries the biases - conscious or subconscious - of the person or people who created it. There is no such thing as media or fiction not having an effect on real life, especially in a fandom for what is essentially War Crimes: The Game.

I’m going to take a quote from this post by @yeyinde.

"It’s incredibly egregious to pretend that the media you consume isn’t based, in some part, on real life or has no repercussions outside of it just being fiction. And it’s especially dishonest to say this isn’t the case within the COD fandom when people have said that the erasure of Gaz from the fandom in favour of a white character is traumatising. The portrayal of the Middle East is traumatising. The portrayal of Makarov in fiction as an uwu-sympathetic babbie is traumatising. The portrayal of the military as heroes is traumatising. These are real people expressing real emotions and bringing up important matters that impact them long after they’ve logged out of tumblr. Just because they stop being relevant to you after that does not, and SHOULD NOT, matter. Their trauma, their feelings, and their interpretations shouldn’t be ignored in favour of some catch-all excuse to limit your responsibility as a consumer to think critically about the media you’re devouring just because it has no consequences for you."

Fiction mirrors real life whether you want to admit it or not. It shows real biases, and it affects real people. Participating in fiction and the surrounding culture does not magically absolve you of consequences. It does not suddenly mean you get a free pass at things like sexism, racism, ableism, colorism, romanticization of abuse and sexual assault, etc. just because your escapist fantasies are conveniently free of people who are different from you.

It may be your fiction, but it is someone else’s non-fiction, and you do not get to decide that it isn’t or that the impact doesn’t matter because it’s about fictional characters.

I'm going to link another post from @yeyinde with another quote here.

"It’s easy to get swept up into something when you have no tangible ties to the effects of what’s being portrayed, which can lead to making dismissive or hurtful statements out of pure ignorance. My biggest gripe was the excuses being laundered out and (either unintentionally or intentionally) giving the creators a pass for what they created and the harm they caused other people to experience. Just because they did not experience the same trauma, it does not diminish its impact on others. This is a very important distinction, which I think was being missed."

Does this mean you can’t ever write or read about traumatic things, or that you can’t enjoy the CoD games ever again? No.

But I need you all to understand that you can criticize the media you enjoy. You should criticize the media you enjoy. Criticism does not mean never letting yourself enjoy a piece of media again. Criticism does not mean trying to get a character or creator “cancelled”. Criticism does not automatically equal hate.

Criticism is an act of love, and it is necessary when deconstructing and confronting biases - both yours and other people's.

Resources To Support Palestine

The lovely @moondirti provided some organizations where you can donate to support the humanitarian aid in Gaza with the note:

It's important to acknowledge that, while limited aid is being allowed through, recent negotiations have allowed your charity to reach the people of Palestine.

DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS

PALESTINE CHILDREN RELIEF FUND

UNITED MISSION FOR RELIEF – PALESTINE EMERGENCY

ANERA

Onto the actual game.

The 141

I don't know what happened during development between this game and MW2, but the relationship between the members of the 141 is severely lacking. We get the usual Soap and Ghost banter for one mission, because, let’s be real, that's what got a lot of people into the last game, but that's about it? There’s nothing new, nothing added to their relationships, and the game sticks to the same duos (Ghost/Soap & Price/Gaz) that we’ve had for the past two games. Even Soap and Ghost’s banter during the attack on Milena’s private island doesn’t have the same impact on the characters as their banter during the Alone mission in MW2. They get a few lines about Soap admiring Milena’s cars and Ghost taunting him about marrying an Oligarch, and…that’s it until the cutscene where they interrogate her.

There’s maybe a few quippy lines here and there, but overall the 141 gives off the same feeling as a group of semi-friendly co-workers that sometimes work on the same project rather than an actual team that has shed blood, sweat, and tears with each other.

This would’ve been such a great time to explore deeper into the team dynamics, show us pairings we don’t get to see as often and build on those relationships, make us really feel for these characters on a personal level. In the original series, you got a feel for every character and their team dynamics, and the player felt the impact of each death as they watched the other characters react (something I’ll talk about later). With this game, we get…what? Four men that desperately need a lozenge throwing a few sassy one-liners at each other and giving each other a harsh pat on the back like a bunch of dads at a barbecue?

I feel like so much of the heavy labor regarding the 141 in the reboot is done through fanfiction at this point because this game especially gives us barely anything to go on, and that’s such a missed opportunity on Activision’s part considering how so much of MW2’s popularity came from the relationship built between Soap and Ghost. It all just feels so hollow and surface-level; there’s no depth here, no attempt to build a connection from the player to this group as a team. In my opinion, Activision relies too heavily on the older fanbase’s connection to the original series, and the newer fanbase’s self-created characterizations, to fill in the blanks so they can leave these characters as empty and vanilla as possible in order to appeal to a broader audience.

And they’ve still somehow managed to fail at that. Speaking of failing...

Graves and Shepherd

Graves should’ve died in that fucking tank, and I will stand by that opinion even after I die. It was such a cop-out to have him live, and for him to suddenly come back with the excuse, “Well, I wasn’t in that tank, blah, blah, blah.”

This is supposed to be a game series where characters die and stay dead. The characters die. Some die heroically, some die horrifically, some die quickly, some die painfully slow, most die bloody, but they die. It’s a staple of the series, like Game of Thrones pre-season 5. I don’t know if Activision didn’t know what to do with his character, or if they realized he was semi-popular with the fans and decided to magically bring him back via deus ex remote-controlled tank, or if they were trying to “subvert expectations” and give us all a little surprise plot twist, but it sucked.

Also, no one checked the tank for a body? That seems to be something everyone has a problem doing in these games, and I don’t know what Activision thinks that does for the 141, but what it does do is make these elite military officials look incompetent as hell because their “dead” enemies keep coming back.

There was nothing different that Graves did in this game from what he did in the previous game. We get the same air support mission from him that we got last game, and really that’s it. Okay sure, he’s working with Farah now, that’s a little different, but what did he do in that mission? Give her vague instructions on where to find some GPS trackers and then give her more vague instructions on where to find the missile containers to slap the trackers on? He could’ve easily been replaced with one of Farah’s people who scouted ahead, or Alex, or a decorative cowboy hat, and the mission would have gone the exact same.

Other than that he spends the entire game hiding behind Shepherd like a scared child up until the end when he ultimately turns on Shepherd, and even that felt so blah. He faces no consequences for his (racist) actions in Las Almas other than Gaz refusing to shake his hand, he faces no consequences for betraying the 141, going so far as to lie that it even happened in front of Congress, and he gets off completely free as far as we know. There was no point to his character, no point to bringing him back, no point to him being in this game at all, and if I find the Activision employee who decided to keep him alive I will be throwing hands expeditiously.

Shepherd was…there, I guess? I’m sure he was meant to be a menacing, sly, back-stabbing character, but he came off as more irritating than anything. His rescue mission felt akin to being forced to babysit your annoying younger sibling who questions everything you do. They give you a cute little nod to the OG series with his cutscene with the 141 in the snow (because Activision has to rely on nostalgia and easter eggs since they know this game is emptier than the promises of an absentee father), but most of it is spent with Shepherd preaching about how great he is and threatening the 141 like he’s been doing the entire game. I’m sure he’s supposed to come off as clever, outsmarting the 141 and tricking them into rescuing him - this big, bad, battle-hardened General - but all of that is undercut by him getting captured to begin with.

The General Shepherd in the original series killed two of the player characters. How am I supposed to be intimidated by this nagging grandpa briskly jogging through the snow behind me in his ugly pajama jumpsuit? Even his ending is lackluster. He’s outwitted in front of Congress by Graves of all people, and then we get a cutscene where Price shoots him off-screen. That’s it. There was no satisfaction like in the original series, no triumph, no sense of vengeance, only a tired feeling of thank god I don’t have to deal with this anymore. This constant attempt at build-up in this reboot series of Shepherd being this looming figure over the 141 ends not with a bang, and not even with a whimper.

Makarov

I’m going to start this off by saying I mean absolutely no hate to Julian Kostov, Makarov’s actor, he definitely did his job.

Unfortunately, that job was playing a random Russian man that happened to have the same name as the Vladimir Makarov from the original series. He’s literally just a dude. There’s nothing particularly menacing about him, nothing that really screams Leader of an Ultranationalist group, nothing that would set him apart in a line-up of kind-of-gruff white men. I wasn’t expecting him to be some over-the-top supervillain, but he feels too normal, too regular, too everyday. Maybe that was the point Activision was trying to make - that having a villain with too-sharp features, eyebrows with in-your-face arches, and two-toned eyes is realistically too much - but it feels like they leaned too far in the opposite direction to compensate.

How am I supposed to take Makarov seriously when they gave him such big, brown, babygirl eyes? Though I realize this may be a character model issue because everyone in this game seemed to have huge doe eyes at one point or another (looking directly at you and those unblinking baby blues, Soap).

The first time we get a proper cutscene with Makarov, he shoots one of his own men – one who had questioned his plan in the rescue mission – and he gives some passionate Make Russia Great Again speech that involves a lot of big gestures, promises of showing the world “true power”, and him being weirdly touchy with one of his men. It’s not a bad scene, and I think Julian really shines here as Makarov. It’s a little in-your-face for me, but overall not a bad introduction to what is supposed to be the overarching big bad for the rest of the series. It gives you a good enough sense of danger, and just enough worry for the main crew as they get ready to go up against this guy.

Unfortunately, the rest of the game doesn’t really follow through on that. Makarov spends more time monologuing, asking his men “philosophical” questions about prisoners and guards, and cryptically foreshadowing at the 141 than he does doing…anything. We are told about all of the bad deeds he’s done. We are told how evil he is. We are told that Makarov needs to be stopped at all costs. The only problem is, we aren’t shown any of that. We see the aftermath of Verdansk, a distant explosion after Makarov has been captured, but we never see Makarov do any of that. When we do get to see Makarov, his men are doing all of the dirty work while he stands around and looks evil. It’s his men fighting and killing guards to get him out of prison, his men attacking Farah and her soldiers, his men launching missiles topped with biochemicals, his men forcing Samara to blow up a plane, his men guarding Milena and his finances. The most he does during any of these scenes is order his men around and give evil villain speeches to give the audience exposition about why he’s doing all this.

We probably see more of Makarov’s shirtless Tinder pic than we see him in action.

In the original series, we see Makarov being at the forefront of his movement, unafraid to get his hands dirty. He is part of the group that commits the massacre/terrorist attack on Zakhaev International Airport, he kills the two FSO agents protecting President Vorshevsky, he’s the one who shoots and kills Yuri, and that’s only part of what we see in-game. Sure, we’re told about his other crimes, but we’re shown enough to back up the claims that he is evil. In this game, he kills two people himself, one of them being his own soldier that I mentioned earlier, and the other being Soap (and we’ll get to that later). Two extremely lackluster deaths that are over before you get the chance to really digest them. Maybe he kills more people during the intro mission when you rescue him, but it’s during gameplay and easily missed when you’re too busy trying to fight your way out of this Arkham-esque prison. I think I could look past it if he wasn’t also present during some of the scenes where his men are carrying out his atrocities for him, but instead, Activision chose to have him in the background standing there…menacingly.

I don’t want to say Makarov was a bad villain; he was certainly better than Shepherd and Graves. I just think Activision made very strange choices with his character that resulted in him becoming this weird mishmash of an average monologuing movie villain and the micromanaging boss that stands over your shoulder, and it took a lot of the “oomph” out of his character for me.

Soap's Death

I hope whoever made this decision at Activision has to live the rest of their life constantly feeling like they have to sneeze and are never able to. What the fuck happened here? In what world did Soap’s death make any kind of sense here? This felt like they knew fans were expecting someone to die (and they already retconned the yeehaw war criminal) so they put a bunch of names in a hat and had some poor unpaid intern pick one out.

I have not been quiet about how much death I wanted in this game. I expected at least two deaths, with one of them preferably being Price. Going into this I was prepared to lose characters, and I was prepared to lose them to a heroic sacrifice, to an exhaustingly epic gunfight, to an explosion in a clocktower, to literally anything, but I was not prepared to lose a character to bad writing. And that’s what Soap’s death was. There is no build-up to it throughout the game other than a cryptic, “I’ll see you again, MacTavish.” from Makarov in a flashback scene. There’s no exploration of Soap’s character arc, his background, his family. There’s nothing.

Price and Soap try to defuse a bomb, Makarov shows up and his men overpower them, Makarov goes for the kill on Price, and instead shoots Soap when Soap tries to stop him. The entire cutscene can be summed up as A Series Of Conveniences. Makarov conveniently gets to Soap and Price just as they’re about to defuse the bomb, the officers they have with them are conveniently incompetent to stop any of Makarov’s men, Makarov’s men conveniently don’t notice Soap getting up to stop him from shooting Price, Ghost and Gaz are conveniently one second too late save Soap, and a train conveniently passes by to let Makarov make his escape. It’s over in less than a minute, and there’s little to no reaction from the surviving 141 members before the game starts shoving in your face that there’s a bomb you have to defuse that has conveniently not gone off yet and was conveniently missed in all of the gunfire.

Aside from the bullshit way it happened, the most disappointing thing here was the cutting of Soap’s arc and the lack of reaction from Price, Ghost, and Gaz. There was no growth for Soap in this game, no building of his story that would make his death feel like a satisfying conclusion. We just got the same Soap we’ve had in the rest of the series, and then he was gone. And the fact that we got absolutely nothing from the team in that moment was so…frustrating. Yeah, Ghost kneels by his body, and gives a brief, “Johnny!” but that’s…it? Price says nothing. Gaz rushes to the bomb and says nothing. After that moment in the cutscene, Ghost says and does nothing. There’s not even a hitch in their voices as they finish disarming the bomb. In Soap’s original death, we got Price screaming and begging over his body. We got to see his grief and pain and hurt at losing someone so close to him. Here we get…them standing over the body, a cut to black, and then a funeral cutscene that doesn’t feel earned full of commiserations that feel empty, hollow, and generic.

Maybe I’m too nostalgic for the Captain MacTavish we had in the original series, and the death they gave him that was impactful enough that people still talk about it to this day. Maybe there’s something meaningful here that I’m not seeing. Or maybe Activision can’t write for shit and rushed Soap’s death without a care just like they rushed this game as a quick cash grab to ride the hype of MW2.

Whatever the reason, these characters deserved far better.

Soap deserved better.

And I deserved to see a rebooted Captain MacTavish.

Gameplay

This section is going to be short because I didn’t spend money on this game to actually play it, I only watched gameplay. The general consensus seems to be that this game is nothing but glorified DMZ, and I can’t disagree with that. Supposedly, at least two of the campaign settings were ripped straight from Warzone, the Gulag and Verdansk Stadium, and I think that really shows how much of this game was slapped together because Activision wanted to hurry to release so they could capitalize off the CoD hype as much as possible. The combat is the same in every mission, the air support mission is as boring as ever, the NPC AI is all over the place, and the character models constantly shift from being really good to mobile game bad within the same cutscene.

I’m not saying I could do better, but I don’t think I could do worse. You can take that however you’d like.

The Writing/Storyline

Starting off, I’m going to say this with my whole chest:

Main story content should be in the main story, and not in optional or additional content.

Look, I don’t mind an easter egg here and there in DLC. I don’t mind the mention of a big bad in an extra, paid quest to build up hype. What I do mind is when the understanding of the main storyline of your game is dependent on things that happen in content that players are required to complete outside of the main game.

Do you know how we found out Alex was alive? An optional Raid.

Do you know how we learned Graves was a little bitch and wasn’t in the tank? An optional Raid.

Do you know how we–

You get my point. These kinds of reveals should have been in the main storyline because they pertain to the main storyline. Otherwise, you have people reacting with confusion because the main campaign was all they played, and they were left under the assumption that Alex may or may not be dead, that Graves burned in that tank in Las Almas, that Farah’s brother (Remember him? Activision doesn’t.) was alive and out there somewhere, etc, etc. It feels like they’re trying to do what Marvel does when they interweave their cinematic universe with their television shows: leave references to things only the more committed audience - the audience who will watch every show, play every game, see every movie, buy every DLC - would understand while punishing everyone else. It feels lazy on Activision’s end, and cheapens any kind of suspense they may leave us with going forward.

I wouldn’t even be surprised to see something like “Oh, Soap died and Makarov escaped at the end of the main campaign? Just kidding! They revealed in the newest Raid that Soap actually survived, and Makarov got hit by that train at the end.”

Outside of that, the whole storyline just feels unnecessary. This whole game feels unnecessary. I know there are rumors that this was meant to be a DLC for MW2 that got extended into a full game because Activision wanted more money, and if I didn’t already believe that, the writing would confirm it for me. Nothing feels fleshed out. Not the story, not the plot, not the characters. It all feels very surface-level and shallow, like more of the exact same thing we got in the last game, but somehow worse. The banter between the 141 is just not there, the tell don’t show when it comes to Makarov, the rapid POV switching, it all feels so thrown together, so last minute, like the writers had no idea what they wanted to do up until release.

One thing that really bothered me was the constant death fakeouts. It felt like every mission something awful would happen and one character would be left with their fate unknown in a dramatic cut to black as a cheap way to build suspense…only for that suspense to be immediately undercut by showing them alive in the very next cutscene. This happens with Farah (twice), Price, Alex (partially, there’s no cut to black, but there is a fakeout that he has been captured), and Laswell all within the first half of the game. At some point, it starts to get irritating and kills any and all suspense going forward. I was spoiled on Soap’s death, I knew it was coming before I watched the cutscenes, but by the time I got there, I was almost expecting Soap to show up in the next sequence without a scratch on him. Up until that point, I had stopped caring when characters were in danger because the writing led me to believe everyone was safe. There’s a way to build suspense, and every writer understands that, a majority of the time, less is more, so I don’t get how this went so unbelievably wrong.

The characterization is also so weirdly off. In what world would John “Somebody has to make the enemy scared of the dark. We get dirty, and the world stays clean.” Price not immediately take a kill shot when he has Makarov in custody? Soap was ready to kill every person he talked to in this game, so why did he let Makarov live? Why would Gaz advocate for giving Shepherd a gun after his multiple betrayals that he shows no remorse for? Why would Farah continue to begrudgingly work with Graves after learning about Las Almas? Why is Makarov over-explaining his plans to his victims?

I’m not saying I expect Shakespeare-level writing from a Call of Duty game, but I expect something better than whatever this is.

I don’t know who Activision hired for their writing team, but there are so many instances here where I almost have to believe that they may not have hired one at all.

Overall Thoughts

I wish I had a time machine so I could go back to who I was before I watched this campaign. This whole game was nothing but a DLC lazily stretched to two hours with assets taken from other games and a storyline that was slapped together using blindfolds, a dartboard, and too much alcohol. Please do not use your money to buy this game. Your money would be much better spent donating to help Palestine.

#moth talks #game got me so heated i'm using proper grammar and punctuation and shit #call of duty #modern warfare #call of duty modern warfare #modern warfare 3 #modern warfare iii #call of duty mw3 #call of duty mwiii #cod mwiii #tw: racism #tw: islamophobia

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bunnakit · 8 months ago

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my stand in ep 2 thoughts, feelings, etc.

alright i wanted to write this up nicely but it took me... two hours to get through the episode bc i kept stopping to write notes, so i'll do my best i guess.

weird thing about me is when i watch shows and write notes for these posts i always write the notes on napkins? i have like 5 different notebooks in arms reach at all times but i really like scribbling on a napkin for the true unhinged effect.

anyway blah blah reminder i'm just a silly dude on the internet, idk shit about dick, i just like to say shit, don't take me too seriously.

also please DO NOT leave novel spoilers in my reblogs, tags, or replies without some kind of warning label. please? it seems to happen with every show i write meta for and i LOVE that people get hyped but there's no way for me to avoid it when it's in my notifications like that.

some before the actual episode stuff; after learning last week that some of the kinnporsche people worked on this it really becomes apparent, especially in the style of the intro.

the music choices also seem a bit reminiscent of kinnporsche (and a little bit of not me) which i really enjoy. it feels kind of familiar and comforting.

immediately i loved how soft this episode started, the slight stubble on each of them, the way joe speaks so softly as if afraid to shatter their little bubble of peace, etc. i also love that the show doesn't skirt around the topic of sex and the fact that sometimes sex is awkward and clumsy, especially with a new partner and doubly so when it's your first queer partner.

and then the peace was shattered with ming kissing his back yet again. ouchies.

"will tong be at the set?" he's just not even trying to hide it. he basically said 'yeah ur great and all but tong????' but DAMN if poom isn't the absolute king of microexpressions.

at this point i can't really tell if tong is being a spoiled prince (derogatory) or if he's tired of acting in general? judgement withheld until a later date.

and then we jump into this actress being a parallel to ming and OOF OUCHIES MY ORGANS. she's a fan of tong but has to "settle" for joe - just like ming. and yet joe takes the time to be kind, to soothe her worries and put her at ease, because he has a heart of absolute gold. "it's her first movie but she was left to drown by the male lead." it's ming's first love and he has been left to drown in it.

mek's acting is really endearing. this is my first exposure to him (ive seen some of his social media and really like what he stands for as a person) and i'm instantly drawn to his performance. he also pulls off a great balance of adorable/sexy.

OOH THE SHOW SAID BISEXUAL OUT LOUD. A WIN FOR THE BI'S WE LOVE TO SEE IT.

i personally find ming's jealously hilarious. what a little caricature of toxicity.

anyway, it seems to me that if ming could get over his feelings and enjoy what he has in front of him he could be part of and enjoy a very sweet family, as it does seem tong IS giving him love, just not the exact flavor he craves.

the cut to joe's training made me laugh. little oat lore dump but my bio dad was actually a stunt man for movies (which is another part of why i was so excited for this show) and i can promise you nothing like this was part of it. what do i know, though, maybe things have changed since the early 2000s lol.

(no, they're probably not any movies you know, aside from maybe wild wild west [1999]. he mostly did westerns, historical docudramas, and historical fiction.)

ANYWAY AGAIN. with this little glimpse into ming's home life we get to see that he's very accustomed to doing what he wants and getting what he wants, which makes a lot of sense when applied to his almost obsessive behavior regarding tong - and now joe. i did absolutely LOVE linin and her sassy independence (minus the 'i can buy anything i need'.)

but... girl... did you just spray perfume in your mouth?

your actions are strange and unsettling. i like that in a woman.

ugh getting into ming venting his frustrations on joe's body. listen. liiiisten. while toxic without prior discussion... i'm into it. it may or may not be one of my favorite tropes in fanfic. toxic and unhealthy as fuck and i'm here for it.

AND THEN DAMN POOM THOSE NOISES. ACTING FOR YOUR LIFE BBY -- and the SNEEZE AT ORGASM LMAAAO oh i hope that's a running bit for some comedic relief.

because we then make a SHARP pivot into "then stop me" and there's so much potential for pain and self loathing there, for joe to think "i can't blame ming, i didn't stop any of it." i'm sat.

a little side bar, but i'm enjoying the fact that while there is discussion of topping and bottoming as a narrative device there really aren't any stereotypes here. i think on a surface level people would think "oh joe is the top" (pit babe style) and the show said no actually he isn't. love that for us.

"you can even move in haha jk" but the thing is, not jk, because joe would do that for ming - for anyone - bc that's the type of person he is.

[i had to stop and have a lil snack here]

hold up is this wut out drinking with them? OH SHIT IT IS. OKAY. it didn't give us much but at least it's a little connection to him finally. we knew joe knew him from his first life, just didn't really know how.

"i missed you" and when was the last time someone missed joe? not who he's replacing or the space he's filling, but HIM?

love ming's goofy ass locking the door and going inside just so he can make a dramatic ass appearance like he's 'the other woman' or some shit LMAO.

"what's in you to make me jealous?" quite possibly the worst dialogue tree choice ming could've picked.

[joe's emotional well being -45]

[everyone hated that]

"don't be so full of yourself" something joe has never been a day in his life. "you're just a stand-in." he knows. it's not something he ever forgets.

but after all that toxicity we have ming back home, seeking out joe's food for comfort, and we finally get to see him interact with his sister. i LOVE that she knows the importance of being a little silly as a treat, one of my biggest life mottos. we also get to see more of how ming is surrounded by love that he misses out on bc of his own wallowing and self sabotage.

oh, the homoeroticism of sparring with your bestie.

[everyone liked that]

oop- joe is wearing the shirt ming borrowed while sol is wearing a shirt with the word 'fantasy.' i'm good, i'm fine, gwenchana, gwenchana.

ough. sol with too many eyes on him and none of them sincere and joe with nothing but sincerity to offer but remains invisible. oof ouch.

enter ming with more religious imagery to match last week's cross scene. something something the sin of greed? confessing your sins? coveting - idk man, i don't have any religious trauma, my family let me just do my own thing.

but with ming knowing joe's true feeling every toxic thing he does is going to be 1000x more painful and i'm here for it. bring it you fucked up little guy.

"we can't mess with each other's privacy" don't mess with MY privacy. "you can't mess around with anyone else" emphasis on YOU, not we.

and then it's driven home what a romantic joe is, both with his workout heartbreak poetry and this little lady and the tramp noodle moment. this man, again much like pit babe, wants to be domesticated so bad.

and i know we all have hated on ming, that's the point, he's been a caricature of a toxic relationship spelled out in neon letters --

but when was the last time ming laughed with someone like this?

ok im exhausted, i'm falling into bed to read fanfic, but i'm absolutely in love with everything this is doing so far. i haven't written anything as in depth as this since last twilight (pre-betrayal) so it's really nice to feel insane again.

#oat meta #my stand in #my stand in the series #poom phuripan #up poompat #mingjoe #mek jirakit #clairedaring #usersasa #<- again let me know if you want to be added to my tag list - if you don't have a tracked tag i'm happy to ping you in the replies

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respectthepetty · 7 months ago

Note

I'm gracing you inbox again, Pet, because I saw colours and of course thought of you...

Ploy's Yearbook finished this week and whilst I don't think it was necessarily colour-coded (there are a lot of characters and I didn't put much effort into tracking visual patterns) I wanted to share this moment of deliciousness at the end:

Do you see it? I'm sure you see it... (the blinding light of yellow love and the deep purple and the piiiiiiink 😍).

Anyway, the series was a generally okay het offering which mostly showed that the women at GMMTV need more opportunities to shine. But what it did do very well was the period representation (like, actual talk of bleeding), Joong looking like a whole-ass meal in the last scene (seriously, I think you'll want to go see that, it's a bit too blurry to screenshot), and the woman popping the question for once! (oops 🤭 spoilers, I guess).

#I wish there was a way of adding tags to an ask #so that I could leave a sort of post script ramble #maybe this will have to do #there isn't really any point to this ask #just that I wanted to say hi and that I thought of you #💛💙

*warning* This is going to turn into a

Cupid's Last Wish Appreciation Post

"Do you see it? I'm sure you see it…"

I thought twice about using the above image because it comes across a bit hostile, but any chance I get to insert a Big Dragon moment into the conversation, I'm taking it! Also . . .

Hopefully, we ALLLLLL see that pink = 💕love💕even when it's for the het couple (when the only het couple I've ever cheered for was this one, which oddly enough, also included Namtan).

So maybe I'm just really rooting for Namtan and the other ladies because I'm already seated for her and Film to hit me with that Blinding Light of Love in Pluto.

You already know that I agree with you that GMMTV underutilizes its women, but since I gave Namtan some love, let me turn to Earth while I give some love to Cupid's Last Wish for having good period-rep as Korn clutched every kind of tampon and pad

For his body-swapping not-yet-boyfriend!

And not only did the man buy all the pads and tampons, he bought pain relievers and chocolate based on the staff's recommendations. THEN, he gave his guy a warm water bottle to help with his cramps and held him all night!

And that as AFTER he hugged his man when he was having a breakdown about his body betraying him.

Not only did Korn exhibit the highest level of emotional intelligence every second of that show, in this specific moment, he stopped the vehicle, asked Win what was wrong, and actually took in what Win was saying without dismissing it. Then, he got out of the car, went around to hug Win properly, apologized, and waited until Win hugged him back.

I have my grudges against this show (THAT DAMN MOTHER!!!!!), but Korn was the greenest of all green flags and the way he handled his future boyfriend's period should be held up as the standard.

But one of the writers of the show was Pong who also wrote the screenplay for Cooking Crush and Only Boo! which are two shows I think epitomize care and comfort between partners.

So now that I've gone on a tangent about partners actively taking care of each other, I hope you are enjoying seeing your flowers growing and not stressing too much over things beyond your control. I also want to let you know that I thought of you when I realized Domundi played me and instead of giving me a Pink Person in Your Sky, gave me a Yellow Yal, so I'm getting another Blue x Yellow pair.

But for some *reason*, I'm less petty about it.

I hope you find comfort in that. 💙💛

#I see you played fair this time around #and didn't bring out any last minute shenanigans #so it's good that you can't have tags in an ask!#but now I'm going to rewatch the fourth and fifth episode of Cupid's Last Wish #and that's your fault too daddy

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streamafterlaughter · 9 months ago

Text

Fundamental Differing

gif

nav | chapter XXI | masterlist | playlist | pin board

Chapter XXII: Blood Sugar Sex Magik

tags/warnings (spoilers below the cut!): MDNI 18+ ONLY! angst, drama, confession, tension, ALL YOUR FAVORITES! rockstar!eddie x rockstar!reader, afab!gnc!reader, mentions of reader being bisexual. dual pov

a/n: buckle up people it’s a doozy. i think you’ll like it though.

cw: unprotected p in v, oral (afab receiving), graphic content not meant for people under 18. MDNI, NSFW.

a/n: haha. hey. hi guys. sorry for all that waiting… i hope it was worth it. This chapter is a little different, no prologue flashback, one scene instead of multiple. Decided this deserved its own chapter. a nice lil mindless sex scene for your reading pleasure. thanks SO SO MUCH for reading, and for your patience!

Disclaimer: i do not give permission to repost my work, please let me know if you see my writing posted anywhere else. reblogs welcome and encouraged to support the author!

—

Your POV

Shit. Shit, shit, shit. You were drunk, but not too drunk to forget what you’d said last night.

The sunlight streams through the blinds, giving the room an orange glow. It’s early, but the bed next to you is empty. Understandably. Shit! You sit up, groaning as the movement makes your head throb. You’re in your underwear, and the shirt you’d worn to the bar last night. You can feel the underwire of your bra digging into your flesh. There was absolutely no reason to go that crazy last night, not if this is the aftermath.

As you’re gaining the courage to stand, the door swings open, and you catch Eddie’s eyes for a millisecond before he looks to the floor, face beet red, breakfast burrito clenched in his grip.

“Sorry, shit, I thought you would have left by now.” Eddie tries to leave the room, but you stop him before you know what you’re doing.

“Wait! Wait,” He stops, slowly stepping back into the room. “Eddie, I am so sorry.” You blurt the words out before you can chicken out. “That was so unfair to you. I was so wasted and I was celebrating, and I wanted to tell you about it but I-”

“Y/n,” Eddie’s voice is calm, firm. “Slow down.”

You take a deep breath, centering yourself. Your head has stopped spinning since Eddie’s appearance in front of you, but you try not to make too much of that. He’s dressed in his usual attire, a pair of black ripped jeans, beat up sneakers, and a well worn band t-shirt. Today’s choice just so happens to be the homemade, one of a kind Death Dance Approximately shirt you’d given to Eddie a lifetime ago. He’s since cropped it right above his navel, exposing his midriff, including a tattoo you’d forgotten existed: Your initials on his hip bone.

Shit!

“Okay,” You start, unsure of how you’re gonna dig yourself out of this one.”I want to apologize.”

Eddie’s face contorts, confusion carved into his features. He leans against the wall, still so far away from you.

“What for?”

You gesture loosely to the air. “Well, you know, everything. Last night.”

“Everything, huh?” If you didn’t know any better, you’d think he sounds hurt.

“It wasn’t fair. I was drunk, I shouldn’t have barged in here, put you in that position.” You trip over yourself, feeling your throat tighten. Do not fucking cry right now.

“Well,” Eddie draws the word out slowly as he pushes off the wall and towards you. “I can only accept that apology under a certain condition.” He looms over where you sit on the edge of the bed, surrounding you. He smells freshly like cigarettes and mint, clouding your brain as he fills your senses.

“And what would that condition be?” You try to sound unbothered, but your words come out meek, nervous.

“If you mean it or not.”

You gape at him, unblinking, waiting for him to crack, to say “Nah, I'm just kiddin’! We don’t have to get into this right now!” But he doesn’t. He takes another bite of his breakfast instead before tossing it on the dresser, completely unfazed by your silence.

“Do I mean that I'm sorry?” You’re playing very, very dumb right now.

Eddie isn’t willing to drop it, though. “Sweetheart, c’mon. We’re adults. I thought we were over this tiptoeing shit.” He cocks his head to the side, eyes rolling.

“I-” You huff, flustered with the way his neck flexes.. “Look. I didn’t want it to happen like that.” You look at him, determined to get through this without actually admitting anything. “I didn’t mean to say it.”

“Why not?” Eddie shrugs, like this is no big fucking deal.

–

Eddie’s POV

He really hopes you can’t tell he’s sweating. He can feel his heart in his throat, choking him with every breath. He keeps his eyes on you to focus. He can’t let you go again. Not after those words have left your mouth.

“Why not?!” You shake your head at him, frustration practically bursting out of your ears. Good, he thinks, you deserve to squirm a little. “How about, because this is what happened the first time? We moved too fast, we didn’t think, and look how that ended up! Or, how about, you’re supposed to be getting well, and the last fucking thing you need is me distracting you. Or, because if this doesn’t go well, we still have another month on the road together! And the fans, what are they gonna say when-”

“Stop.” Eddie shakes his head, kneeling on the floor in front of you. He should be pissed, but he can’t bring himself to be even a little upset. He has the upperhand now, and all he wants is to hear you say it again. Sober, this time. “Please, just tell me if you mean it.”

–

Your POV

I should lie to him. It’s not a good idea to tell him, not right now. You could take it back, this is your chance to make everything go back to that uncomfortable, tension riddled “normal” you’ve become so used to with Eddie. Things would be so much easier if you could just lie to him. But the way he’s looking at you, with a hopeful discretion, chocolate eyes wet with unfallen tears. makes every rational thought slide out of your brain, only leaving room for the way he’s pleading with you, wordlessly, as his hands grip yours tightly, hopefully.

“I mean it. Of course I fucking mean it, Eddie.” You barely get the words out before he’s climbing on top of you, hands letting go of yours to find purchase on the mattress either side of you, and you let yours fly to his hair, tangling your fingers through it like it’s second nature. You are quickly overwhelmed by him, your space completely infiltrated. The walls you’d been reinforcing to keep him out now crumble without a second thought, and he’s the one behind the wrecking ball.

“Thank fucking god.” He mumbles against your lips, and you smile into the kiss as he lays you down on the mattress.

“Eddie, wait,” You come to your senses, one final time as his mouth detaches from yours. “Are you sure this is what you want?”

Eddie has moved his mouth to your jaw, and you feel him chuckle against your skin as he kisses down your throat. “Even after all these years, you still doubt that I want this? That I want you?” You can feel his hand slide up your shirt, his skin lighting yours on fire. “You are all I want. All I could ever want. In fact,” He pulls himself away from your neck to look at your face. He’s serious suddenly, all traces of sweet teasing gone. “I should be the one asking if you want this.” He moves to get off of you, but you wrap your legs around his waist, holding him down. You’re tired of pretending not to want him, of avoiding how you feel because it’s easier. “I do. I really, really do.”

Eddie groans as you pull him back to your lips, letting the kiss say everything you’ve wanted to this whole tour. You hold his face in your hands, afraid he’ll disappear if you let go. His hand finds your skin again, sliding up your back to where your bra is still clasped. You’re nodding before he can even get the question out, and you feel the relief as he unhooks the fabric. He tugs your shirt off swiftly, and you let the straps of your bra slide down your shoulders.

–

Eddie’s POV

He separates from you then, getting up to kneel in front of where you lay on the bed, mostly exposed, save for your modest pair of black cotton panties. “Fuck,” The word comes out in a heavy breath as he takes in the sight before him. Your torso is littered with tattoos he’s never seen before, including one nestled between your tits. And speaking of, he can’t help but let his eyes land on your chest, admiring how your nipples have pebbled even before he’s really touched you.

“Still beautiful as ever.” He’s mostly talking to himself, but you smile up at him, eyes crinkling around the edges, and he feels his dick throb in his too-tight pants.

“I can’t be the only one exposed here!” You exclaim through giggles, and he obliges without argument, yanking his shirt over his head before moving back towards you.

–

Your POV

He’s been shirtless in front of you a few times over the past month, but not in this context. You watch, delighted as his abdomen tightens when you run your fingers down his stomach, along his happy trail to the waistband of his pants. You rake your fingernails over his skin, trace the new ink you hadn’t yet seen up close, listening to his breath hitch when you unbutton his jeans. Before you can yank his pants down, though, Eddie grips your hand in his, moving it back to the mattress. “We’ll get to that. Let me taste you first.” If you weren’t so eager, the words would have knocked you out, but you nod again as Eddie climbs clumsily off the bed to kneel back on the floor. He takes hold of your ankles, swiftly pulling you to the end of the mattress. You feel those pesky bats in your stomach for the first time in what feels like forever, heat rushing to your face as Eddie moves further in between your legs.

He’s in no rush as he moves up your body, lingering to place soft kisses in the crevices of your knees, the plush of your thighs, the peaks of your hips. He ghosts over your clothed heat, nose grazing your mound as he watches you writhe and plead above him. He’s amused by your eagerness, you know him well enough, but you can’t bring yourself to care. You want him, need him, and you’re tired of pretending you don’t.

Eddie is about to yank your last shred of clothing from your body when there’s a knock on the door.

—

Eddie’s POV

You have got to be fucking kidding. “What?!” He shouts, irritated, relaxing only slightly when he feels you giggling underneath him.

“Have you seen Y/n?” It’s Steve, taking his morning roll call. Eddie looks to you for the answer, but you only shrug, face getting redder by the second.

He moves to get off of you, but you follow him like attracting magnets, attaching your lips to his neck as he tries to answer his friend, causing his words to get lost in the fog, only letting out a strangled “Uhh…”

“Ed?” Steve twists the doorknob, out of habit probably. You flinch, and he feels his heart crack. “Wha- yeah! Sorry, I'm a little busy right now!” He clenches his teeth to keep from moaning as you lick a stripe up the column of his throat.

“Busy? You wanna know busy?!” Eddie can picture Steve behind the door, leaning into the peephole, one hand on his hip the other gesturing wildly. As pretty as Steve may be, the image is killing Eddie’s hard-on right now.

You’re not about to let that happen, though. “Steve, go away.” A command. He shifts, dick twitching in his pants again like a fuckin’ teenager.

“I-,” Pause. “Y/n?”

“Yeah.”

Silence. Then the fading of his footsteps down the hall. Eddie wills himself to look at you again, and is rewarded with your shit eating grin. “You are such a brat.” He scoffs, no actual effort behind the insult.

You have the gall to pout at him, like you’re an innocent bystander.

“Does this mean you don’t want to fuck me anymore?”

He gapes at your question, blinking rapidly as he digests it.

—

Your POV

You’d meant it to lighten the mood, but you’ve caught him off guard. Instead of his answer, you’re greeted with another interruption beyond the door. “Hey, love birds! Steve sent me over here because it is far too awkward for him to talk to you in this position, but I, frankly, am happy to relay the information.” While Robin is talking at you, Eddie is making his way closer, lowering to the floor while you bite back laughter at the mess you've gotten yourself into.

”We check out in two hours. If you plan to live out your honeymoon a little longer, it will be on your own dime!” Eddie kisses up your leg, grazing your skin with his nose, sending chills up your spine. Robin is seemingly unaware of your state, or she genuinely does not care. “We’re all going out for dinner tonight before everyone goes home, and both of you better not skip it to cuddle up in bed, you can do that for as long as you want, starting tomorrow. Also,” Eddie’s yanking at your waistband, his body shaking with giggles that you echo despite the knot in your stomach tightening with his touch. “Why are you laughing? What are you guys even doing in there? I know you’re not still asleep.”

”Robin!” Eddie calls, voice strained against his laughter. “I’m trying to eat!”

You drop your jaw, sending a backhanded slap to his shoulder.

”Did you guys get room service? Got any extra-,”

You cut her off with an involuntary moan, caused by Eddie slipping a finger past the damp cotton barricade of your underwear to slide teasingly between your folds. You smack a hand over your mouth, but it’s too late. There’s no way she didn’t hear that.

“Are you okay in th-“ It clicks. Finally. “Oh my god. Oh my god! Are you guys fucking?!” No regard for her fellow guests, or her best friend, Robin is cackling on the other side of the door. You’re in crisis, and she’s laughing!

”We’re trying!” You shriek back, feeling the frustration build as Eddie’s finger circles around your clit, causing you to grind against his hand.

“Oh my god. Wait. Is this first time?! Am I interrupting? Holy shit, I am so sorry-“

”Robin!” Eddie shouts again, this time sternly, losing his patience.

“Yeah?”

”Leave.”

”Yup, yup. See ya!” And finally, the fading of her footsteps, scurrying down the hall.

Eddie turns his face back to your center, littering kisses on your thigh as he wiggles your underwear away from your body.

You can’t help but get in one last dig. “You think she’s going to tell Gareth?”

His smile drops from his face completely, jaw tightly clenched. “I have no problem ignoring him yelling at me on the other side of that door. I think at this point he knows I don’t listen to him. And, he’d probably be relieved to find out I grew a pair.”

You scoff, ready with a wise ass remark when he shuts you up with a slow, wet lick between your folds. He glides your panties the rest of the way down your legs, and you don’t miss him pocketing them before moving his hands back to your thighs.

“Fuck,” you whine, desperately clawing at the sheets as Eddie’s tongue latches to your clit, tracing eager patterns across the bud. You drop your head back to the mattress, willing your brain to turn off. Eddie groans into your pussy, rutting against the mattress as he slips a single ringed digit into your hole. You buck your hips, aching for more and blinded by how good it all feels, how familiar. You’d had your fair share of one night stands since leaving Eddie, enough to get used to the normalcy of bad sex. Now, you’re blinded by how Eddie reads your body, like you’re written in a language only he can understand.

His tongue moves in circles over your clit, fingers curling steadily inside of you. The sounds he causes you to make are wet and absolutely filthy, but you can’t bring yourself to feel any shame. It’s Eddie, after all. You can feel your desire ripple through you, the coil in your stomach tightening with each swipe of his tongue, every stroke of his finger. He doesn’t relent, keeping an agonizing pace while you grind your pussy against his face, desperate for release. In response to your begging, Eddie groans into your core, the vibrations sending a shock of pleasure up your spine, and your vision goes white.

“Eddie, I’m gonna, fuck I’m gonna come!” It doesn’t take you long to feel your resolve snap, sending your legs shaking on either side of Eddie’s head. He holds you in place, still lapping at your juices as he claws at your hips, a response to the desperate praise you sing for him, an unintelligible string of curses and his name through breathy sighs as you attempt to slow your heart down. Eddie only pulls away when you tap the top of his head lightly, signaling your overstimulation. He releases his mouth from your core with a wet pop, and you can see his lips and chin are shiny with your arousal.

“Good as you remember?” He hovers over you, teasing smirk on his swollen lips as you scoff, rolling your eyes.

“Even better, somehow.” You wrap your legs around his waist, pulling his body flush against yours. Your breathing is still ragged, heart still skipping around in your chest as he closes the gap between you, letting you taste yourself on his tongue. You take his distracted state as an opportunity, tightening your grip around him, flipping him onto the mattress, landing on top of him a little less gracefully than you’d have liked, causing Eddie to burst into laughter. You’re quick to shut him up, grinding your sensitive cunt over his clothed cock, feeling it kick up at the contact. “You wanna help me get these off?” You ask sweetly, toying with the button of his jeans.

—

Eddie’s POV

“Jesus Christ, sweetheart.” His head falls against the mass of pillows, head foggy with the heat between his legs. “Keep doin’ that and I won’t even get the tip in.” Eddie grips your hips harshly, willing you to be still. Touching you doesn’t help in centering himself, though.

“What a shame that would be,” You tease, unclasping his belt as you speak. “Guess I’ll have to move quickly.” Eddie gets the hint, tucking his thumbs into the waistband to assist in getting his stupidly tight jeans off. He’ll curse himself about it another time, though. Right now, he’s solely focused on you, yanking his pants and underwear from his body, and tossing them to the floor carelessly before straddling him again.

You’ve always been a tease, and even all of this time apart hasn’t changed that, Eddie notices. You move slowly, sliding the length of his cock between your wet folds, head lolled to the side as you close your eyes, as if focusing into the feeling between your body and his. Eddie bites back a groan as he watches your performance, awestruck by the closeness. You infiltrate his senses, and he wills himself not to close his eyes from the pleasure.

Finally, after what feels like eternity, his swollen tip catches on your entrance, jolting him into action. He takes his cock in his hand, preparing to line up to your center the way he must have hundreds of times before. Even after these years apart, the distance both emotionally and physically between you, it is a second nature to him. You’re about an inch away when he has a moment of clarity.

“Wait,”

You huff in complaint. “Seriously?”

“I don’t have a condom.”

–

Your POV

That has never stopped him before, and you can feel the panic in your throat as you ask the question. “Have you ben fucking other people?”

He stutters, “Well, I-”

“Wait. Don’t answer that. Did you wear one when you were fucking other people?”

“Of course.”

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Okay. I’m on the pill, you’re being safe.” You shrug. Nonchalant. Not desperate at all.

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“When you fuck other people, do they… ?”

“I just said I’m on the pill.”

“Yeah, okay, but you don’t know who these guys are, what diseases-”

“Okay, Eddie, stop. First of all, how do you know what genetalia the people I’m fucking have?”

That shuts him up. “Yeah. Also, if you must know, I have made all the people with penises wear a rubber. Feel better?”

Eddie is silent, and you let your brain run with your panic again. The mood is dead, Eddie is over the spontaneous, passionate confession and he’s never going to speak to you again.

“Okay.” He shrugs, and before you can respond he grips your hips, guiding you down onto his cock as you roll your hips forward, taking him deeper. Without much effort, you take his entire length, reveling in the familiar stretch of your walls. He lets you set the pace at first, a vice grip on your hips as you gain your strength, bouncing on his cock as he bucks his hips into you. You feel him growing impatient though, his thrusts growing eager, hands migrating up to grab your tits. Though you would love to draw this out, make him beg you for it, you find you’re just as desperate, watching him beneath you, mouth slack and eyes glossy, a picture you’ve missed for so long.

He finally sits up, and you let him wrap an arm around your waist, flipping you onto the mattress. Effortlessly, Eddie gains control, lifting one of your legs to wrap around his waist, allowing him even deeper inside of you. The new sensation draws a guttural moan from you, unabashed and absolutely filthy.

“Fuck, I missed that sound,” Eddie speaks between grunts, seemingly hypnotized by the way his movements cause your boobs to bounce. He continues snapping his hips, prodding that spot deep inside, that only he’s ever been able to reach. “Thought about ‘em all the time. Couldn’t let myself forget those pretty noises.” All the while, you can’t form a single coherent thought, brain foggy from the heat, coil in your stomach tightening again. He looks so beautiful above you, curly bangs stuck to his face with perspiration, eyes blown out with desire.

Eddie babbles on, ever the talker. “Missed these beauties,” He holds himself up with one hand, the other squeezing your tit again teasingly, and you giggle. “And this pussy too, so much.” the same hand travels down, ghosting over your skin until he reaches between your bodies, rubbing sweet circles on your clit. “Best I ever had, only one I ever wanted. Takin’ me so well, sweetheart. You feel so fucking good.”

“I missed you too, Eddie. You make me feel so good.” It’s a whisper, all you really have the strength for. He’s panting, resting his sweaty forehead against your own as you breathe into each other’s mouths, and his smile widens with your admission. His rhythm stutters slightly, but he doesn’t relent. “Need you to say it again, baby. Wanna hear you tell me again.”

You don’t have to ask what he means. Through your haze, you can barely get the words out, but you muster enough from the way he’s looking at you. “I love you, Eddie.”

Eddie groans at your words, throwing his head into the crook of your neck, like he’s embarrassed by his sensitivity “Fuck, I love you too. I love you so much, y/n. So. Fucking. Much.” He punctuates each word with a thrust, bringing you to peak.

And he’s right behind you. “Where should I-” He lifts his head up, and he looks at you with wide, frightened eyes.

“Inside, Eddie, please come inside me.” Your breathing is ragged, legs twitching rapidly as you cry out, white knuckles gripping the mattress.

“Shit, baby, fuck!” Eddie keeps his pace until you can’t hold on, the tether finally snapping as your walls tighten around him. You throw your arms around Eddie’s shoulders, nails digging into his skin as his cock twitches. He comes with you, spilling inside of you as a shiver runs through his body. You bring your mouth to his, swallowing his whines as you both ride out your orgasms, skin sticking to skin with sweat and spit.

Reluctantly, Eddie slips himself out of you, causing you to whine at the loss. Before you can say anything, he’s rolling out of bed and into the bathroom.

—

Eddie’s POV

He needs a minute. Maybe an hour. Realistically he’s gonna need a month. Shit. Regret isn’t the right word. Ashamed, maybe, of his lack of resolve when the subject comes to you. He’s vulnerable, exposed. He tries to shake the intrusive voice from his brain yelling in his ear that he doesn’t deserve to be loved, especially not by you.

“Eds?” Your voice pulls him from his thoughts, and he takes a deep, heavy breath before returning to you with a wet cloth.

“Sorry, got a little lost.” He chuckles, suddenly unsure how to approach this. Post sex for Eddie lately had consisted of a brief wave and a paid cab at most. Something tells him that isn’t the correct approach this time.

“Where’d you go?” You tilt your head, lending your ear like nothing’s changed since yesterday.

Eddie shakes his head. He won’t let himself ruin this again. “Nowhere more important than here.” He slips the cloth between your legs, gently wiping your inner thighs as he speaks. “Just had to pinch myself a few times.”

When you smile at him, he forgets everything he’s supposed to be worried about. He can only smile back, briefly before he kisses you again. He makes a point to be gentle, to show you he means it. Nothing is more important than here, now, with you. When your hands lace into his hair again he can’t help but sigh, as if relieved to be in your arms again.

He can’t fully shake the tension, though, and you seem to sense that. “We’ll figure this out, okay? We can talk after dinner. Just float here with me a little longer.” Your soft hand caresses his stubbled cheek, tickling him slightly as he reads your features. There is so much love in your eyes, it causes his heart to race.

Eddie nods, leaning his cheek further into your palm. You lean in again, kissing him gently as if sealing your word. He pulls you into his lap, holding you as closely as he physically can. You stay like that for awhile, before migrating to the balcony, lazily draped in t shirts as you smoke your cigarettes, enjoying each other’s presence. For now, Eddie can relax. Even for a few minutes, he is grateful for the silence.

—

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#eddie munson x reader #rockstar!eddie #eddie munson fanfic #smut #angst #fluff #fd #afab!reader #gnc!reader #90s au #slow burn #mutual pining #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x y/n #stranger things #stranger things fanfiction #strangerthingscentral #st4

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shewasverynice · 3 months ago

Text

Fandoms: 呪術廻戦 | Jujutsu Kaisen

⚠️ SPOILER HEAVY ⚠️

Major Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death

Full tags/warnings on Chapter links post

Major Characters: Original Character, Gojo Satoru, Geto Suguru, Ieiri Shoko, Yaga Masamichi, Nanami Kento, Haibara Yu

‎‧₊˚✧ Chapter 3 ✧˚₊‧

Of all the things Satoru was good at, stealth wasn't exactly his strongest skill. Sure he could do it, especially if he really put his mind to it, but so often he didn't really need to. Why bother? It's not like he needed to get the jump on anyone or anything. Besides, most creatures could pick up on his massive cursed energy even if he wasn't doing anything yet, so it's not like being stealthy even worked usually. No, there really wasn't a point to try to be stealthy.

These are the things he considered as the bucket of hot mop water crashed into limitless' barrier and he watched the girl he'd been tailing sprint away with her mop still in hand.

Even since he spotted her that day in class, Satoru had been trying to get some kind of idea of who she was and what she was about. He'd followed her every chance he got, any time he was free he would tail her at a distance and see what she did every day.

She wasn't a student yet, that much was clear. Apparently she was a year younger than him and Yaga had mentioned that she was staying at the school early for her safety. The curses were more drawn to her was the excuse he'd given, but Satoru already knew that was a lie.

Her cursed energy was practically non-existent. She might as well have been a non-sorcerer.

Every day she worked as what amounted to a maid. He'd see her in the morning collecting all the sheets that needed to be washed and by the afternoon she'd be hanging them on the lines. She had a large set of keys strapped to the belt loop of her oversized jeans and was freely able to go into the rooms to change the beds. If not doing laundry, she was scrubbing floors and cleaning the windows, dumping the garbage and sorting the trash correctly or sometimes weeding the garden.

On top of that she just looked so small to him. He had to be at least a foot taller than her. She carried around a little step stool sometimes and he watched her still have to reach up with an extended rod to clean the windows on the top row. It's not that she was really all that short really, but she still seemed too small to be doing this kind of job in particular.

Why was such a young girl made to work the school grounds like this?

The question gnawed at him, and finally he couldn't take it anymore and he'd finally approached her. That's how he'd become acquainted with the mop bucket. He'd be more upset if the water had actually been able to be dumped on him, but he was still irritated that she'd actually tried that! It's not like he did anything weird.

"Hey!" He called after her, catching up nearly instantly, "Relax! I just want to-"

"Back off, pervert!" She grunted, turning on her heels with the mop held out like a sword, "I swear I'll--"

"I'm not a pervert!" He huffed, swatting the mop handle away, "I just wanted to talk!"

"Yeah right, buddy," she narrowed her eyes, taking a few steps back, "I've seen your creepy ass following me all week. I don't believe that for a second."

"Creepy?!" He put his hand to his chest, actually surprised she'd say that to him, "How- what?!"

"Yeah that's right, I saw you," she sneered, "You didn't even try to hide it either. Fucking pervert!"

"Woah, now hold on," he waved his hand, taking a step back himself, "Relax. Let's just chill out for a second. I'm not trying to do anything weird."

"Then what the hell are you doing?" She asked, her eyes still narrowed.

"I'm just curious who you are." He said, holding his hands up in front of him. He felt like he was trying to tame a wild dog or something. Actually... She did look like the kind of girl who might actually bite him if she was provoked enough.

"So why not talk to me like, I dunno, a normal person?!" She huffed, a hand landing on her hip. Her shirt was oversized too, the fabric bunching under her palm.

"I mean yeah I could have done that I guess," Satoru said, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly, "I dunno."

There was a long awkward silence. Even the birds had stopped chirping, gone silent as if they were listening in to Satoru while he fumbled this introduction so hard. Neither of them said anything for so long that trying to break the silence had become the weird part.

Satoru cleared his throat, pushing up his round sunglasses with his fingers, "Alright, let's start over."

"What?!" She yelped, "You can not be serious? After all of that?!"

"I'm Satoru Gojo," he said with a smile, ignoring her outburst, "And you are?"

She finally let the mop handle slide down in her palm, resting the end on the ground. She leaned into it a bit, cocking her head to one side as she kept her eyes fixed on him. Her eyes were partially hooded, the forest green color of her irises catching the afternoon sunlight as she looked him over.

"Sarah," she said cautiously.

"... Just Sarah?" He said, probing her to continue, "No... Last name?"

"Nah," she said with a shrug as if that was the end of it.

"Ooookay...." He said, "Weird, but I've heard weirder I guess," He took a step closer to her as he bent forward to get a better look at her, "You're not from around here though, yeah? Are you foreign?"

"Yeah," she said cautiously, raising her brow, "I'm American."

"Ah," he said, "Thought so. Your Japanese is really fluent though. I can't even really hear much of an accent."

"Yeah well, I was raised here at the school," she said, adjusting her posture.

His eyes narrowed behind his sunglasses. Raised here? That's not what Yaga had told him. He hadn't been specific about when she got here, but he would have mentioned that for sure. Was she lying? She didn't appear to be. As far as he could tell she was genuine.

"Right," he said with a small nod, "So uhh... Are you going to try to be a sorcerer?"

"Hmm? Yeah, next year," she said, brushing some of her hair behind her ear.

"Even with like... No cursed energy?" He asked, pointing at her, "You'd probably be better off as a window or something. You'll get killed day one being that weak."

"Excuse me?!" She snapped, "What the hell is your problem?!"

"I'm just saying," Satoru shrugged, "You're like... Suuuuper weak."

She gritted her teeth, her fist clenching at her side. She inhaled before she shouted, "Yeah, well you're a big fucking asshole!" And turned on her heels and stormed away.

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

Satoru dropped his head on the headrest in the backseat of the car. His arms were crossed and his face was twisted in a permanent scowl. He was still irritated by his interaction with Sarah the day before, and his foot was tapping the back of Yaga's seat incessantly as his thoughts wandered back to that whole disaster.

Big fucking asshole? Seriously?! Most people didn't like him, sure, but no one had ever dared to insult him like that. He hadn't even said anything untrue! It's not like she couldn't understand that, right? She had to know she wasn't going to be a good sorcerer. It was obvious, right?

Then she just walked away from him too! And she didn't change his bedsheets either! She just left them in the bed with a note that said, "Oh sorry, too WEAK."

Satoru's foot tapped faster, his teeth grinding just at the thought.

"Satoru!" Yaga snapped, "Knock it off!"

Satoru huffed, sinking further down in his seat as he muttered a half-hearted, "Sorry."

Suguru chuckled, looking over from his own seat. "What's got you so wound up, Satoru?" He asked, resting his cheek against his fist and leaning against the window.

"Tch," Satoru scrambled to sit up straight again then pushed up his sunglasses, "I just don't understand why people can't just accept it when they're weak. Like, it's not like she is gonna do well. Better for her not to put herself in danger for no reason."

"Who exactly do you mean?" Suguru asked, "Shoko?"

"No, not Shoko," Satoru rolled his eyes, waving his hand dismissively, "That girl who works on the school grounds. You've seen her, Sarah?"

"Oh, yes I've met her a few times," Suguru said with a nod, "She's an interesting character. Did you tell her she was weak?"

"Yeah," Satoru said, mimicking Suguru's relaxed posture on the opposite side of the car, "She got, like, super pissed off and yelled at me after."

Yaga sighed heavily from the front seat then glanced back at the boys and said, "It's generally not considered polite to blatantly call someone weak, Satoru."

"It wasn't blatant!" Satoru clicked his tongue, crossing his arms again, "It was absolutely the truth! She's got no business trying to be a sorcerer. She'd definitely get killed."

"Did you ask her about her technique?" Suguru asked, "Maybe she's like Shoko? She could be more useful than she appears."

Satoru paused. That was true, and of course it's not like Yaga or Suguru would know that she actually did have access to a pretty insane ritual later in her life. But was that part of her technique or just something she learned? A resurrection technique was completely unheard of, not to mention the time travel as well.

Then he remembered: she'd lied about how long she'd been at the school.

"Yaga," Satoru said, sitting up and leaning forward to ask, "Why is she here again?"

"Curses are particularly drawn to her," he said, repeating what he'd told him last time, "She needs to stay within the safety of Tengen's barrier."

"Uh-huh..." Satoru lifted up his sunglasses, "You sure?"

Yaga shot him a look then sighed. He looked ahead again, his hand tightening on the wheel, "There is a binding vow in place when discussing her technique. However, I can say that she is extremely valuable and must be protected."

"Knew it," Satoru said, falling back into his seat with a smug grin, "So she's got a big secret, yeah?"

"Satoru, this is something beyond what a student should be involved in," Yaga cautioned, "You both will likely learn about her technique someday, especially being special grades like her."

"Special grade?!" Satoru blurted, "No fuckin' way!"

"Semi-special, to be more precise," Yaga corrected, "Also, mind your language."

"Semi-special grade sorcerer?" Suguru asked, "Is she the only one with that designation? I've been studying about the Jujutsu regulations and I haven't heard of that for anything but curses."

Yaga nodded, "She's an extremely special case. As I said, I cannot disclose any information about her technique but I advise both of you to keep your noses out of it for now."

"You know that just makes me want to know more," Satoru muttered, lifting up his sunglasses and grinning at Yaga through the rearview mirror. "I'm gonna find out eventually, you know that right?"

Yaga glanced back at him and when their gazes met there was something unspoken, but understood. Satoru had never really noticed how much Yaga was fighting back against the system back then, but knowing the man so well it was clear that from the beginning Yaga wanted both him and Suguru to stand up against it all. They were barely into their second week as students and already Yaga wanted them to catch onto his disdain for the current state of things.

"Why not ask her yourself?" Suguru suggested, "She might be willing to-"

"Nah, I'm pretty sure she hates me," Satoru sighed, "She's been glaring at me anytime she sees me or runs away like a stray cat."

"So maybe you should apologize?" Suguru said, furrowing his brow, "If you're so curious about her then you'd probably need to--"

"I'm not apologizing!" Satoru scoffed, "She's the one who's overreacting. I didn't say anything wrong."

"Well, then I suppose you'd better get used to not knowing," Suguru said with a shrug and a coy smile.

Soon after they pulled up to the site the window had reported. Yaga parked the car, following the two of them as they approached the hospital.

"This mission requires delicacy," Yaga said, placing his hands on their shoulders to hold them still while glancing between the two of them, "Do not do anything reckless or anything to upset the patients. The necessary staff is aware of our presence, so do not answer any unnecessary questions. Just go do what you need to and get out."

The hospital was no different than any other. Bright, sterile and oddly quiet aside from the beeping of machines and hushed whispers. A pretty standard mission for adult sorcerers, but Yaga knew he and Suguru were well past this level of mission. This kind of thing was barely an inconvenience for either of them.

They walked calmly down the hallway together, Satoru twisting curses into mush and outright destroying them easily. Beside him, Suguru easily captured the low grade curses on the other side and pocketed the black orbs for later. Normally they'd need to move people in and out of rooms to let the sorcerers work, but between these two it was too fast to even bother with all that.

Down each hall, through all the wards and on all the floors. Before long the hospital was cleared of most of the curses, especially the ones that could have become stronger. Satoru couldn't help but chuckle as they descended the stairs back down to the ground floor. This job was definitely suited for someone like Suguru. His technique was so undetectable, especially when he could just freely absorb such weak curses.

Suguru glanced in his pocket at his collection of curses and grimaced. He looked up at Satoru and smiled sheepishly before he asked, "Would you like to just crush these in one go?"

"Whaaaat?" Satoru pointed at his full pocket as he held the door open for his friend, "That's a bunch of little shits you can definitely use! Don't waste them! The more you have the better!"

"Hmm?" Suguru raised an eyebrow, "But they're largely useless? I could find much better."

"Yeah but with enough of those you can crush them up together and use your uzumaki technique!" Satoru said, making the motion with his hands like balling up laundry, "The more you have the stronger it is!"

Suguru stared at him for a moment, stopping in his tracks as he asked, "How do you know so much about my technique anyway?"

"Oh," Satoru swore internally before spewing out some bullshit, "I've just heard about cursed spirit manipulation before. Lots of people can do it but only some of them can do the uzumaki thing."

He decided to keep the part about retaining techniques from higher grade curses to himself for now. Suguru would find that out on his own anyway, if he didn't already know and it would be better if he "didn't know" about that aspect. He could probably get away with that stuff a little bit since he grew up around Jujutsu Sorcerers, but he still shouldn't reveal too much too soon.

"Well, I suppose you're right," Suguru said, looking up from his pocket again. He grimaced once again before he pulled out a few of the smaller orbs, working on swallowing them as they met with Yaga at the car.

"All clear?" Yaga asked, opening the back door.

"Yeah," Satoru said, waving his hand dismissively as he climbed in and across the seats, "All good."

Yaga sat in his seat, reaching across to open the folder of their next site. "Next stop is not far from here," he said, "Don't get too comfortable."

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂ ⠂⠄⠄⠂☆

"Go apologize right now," Shoko snapped, flicking her pencil at Satoru, "God, I can't believe what an ass you are!"

He caught the pencil easily, placing it back on her desk, "Oh, come on it's not that bad right?"

"You stalked the girl for a week and then told her she's worthless!" Shoko shook her head, "Yeah, it's pretty bad!"

"I didn't say she was worthless," Satoru corrected her, "I said she was weak. That's two different things."

"You did ask her if she was going to be a sorcerer and then immediately tell her she'd be bad at it," Suguru said, a sheepish smile on his face, "Why destroy her dreams before she's even had a chance?"

"You're just taking Shoko's side now," Satoru grumbled.

"No, you hadn't told me the whole story before," Suguru said, "You really should apologize."

"Yeah and then what?" Satoru rolled his eyes, "She already hates me."

"So that means you don't need to apologize?" Shoko said, slapping her hand on his desk, "Don't be such garbage. Go apologize!"

Satoru threw up his hands in a mock surrender, "Okay, alright! Damn!" He sighed, slouching in his chair, "I'll go find her after class."

He spotted her in the garden right after class after searching for a while. The air was thick the scent of fresh earth and blooming flowers. She was knelt down and picking at the small weeds, her hands already filthy. The bucket that she was dropping the small shoots into had gloves hanging off the side, but she'd apparently decided not to use them?

"Why aren't you wearing these?" Satoru asked, nudging the gloves with the toe of his shoe.

She jumped a little at his voice, then turned to glare up at him. "Oh, thank you for being worried about dirt on my poor weak hands," she said mockingly, rolling her eyes and turning back to her work.

Satoru's eyes widened behind his sunglasses before he inhaled and calmed himself down. He cleared his throat, then waited. She didn't look up at him and he did it again louder only for her to grumble in protest.

"Will you just look at me?!" He huffed, his arms straight at his sides and stiff.

She didn’t. Instead, she pulled a stubborn root from the ground with a force that made the soil crumble in her hands. For a second, he wondered if he should just walk away, but he definitely couldn’t. Not now. He was already in it. Might as well get it done.

“Look, I’m sorry,” he continued, his frustration creeping into the edges of his voice, “I didn’t mean for what I said to sound the way it did. Won’t you give me a chance to explain?”

She froze, mid-movement, and slowly, she turned to face him. Her green eyes caught the late afternoon light and gleamed like polished emeralds. For a moment, he was speechless. She was frowning, her lips pushed into a soft pout that would have been adorable if not for the icy silence hanging between them.

He swallowed, suddenly aware of the awkwardness of his presence here, looming over her like some creep. He was a grown ass man after all, at least internally. She didn’t say anything, just looked up at him, waiting. The irritation inside him flared, his heart pounding against his ribs. How could she just sit there, making him feel like the villain when all he was trying to do was fix things?

"Sarah, you’re being impossible,” he muttered, raking a hand through his white hair, “I’m trying to apologize here, and you’re just—” He gestured aimlessly towards her, not even sure what he was trying to say. Obstinate. That was the word. She was being obstinate, refusing to meet him halfway, or even a quarter of the way.

But then, just as quickly as his frustration surfaced, it dissolved. Because there she was, sitting in the dirt, with her messy hair falling into her face, cheeks flushed, and those damn green eyes still locked on him.

“I get it,” he said, his voice softening despite himself, “You’re mad. But Sarah, I swear, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

For a long moment she just stared at him, her expression unreadable. And then with a heavy sigh she wiped the dirt off her hands and stood up, brushing her knees. Her silence was louder than anything she could have said and it rattled him, making him feel smaller under her gaze.

“You don’t get it,” she finally said, her voice low but steady. There was a sadness there he hadn’t expected, something deeper than anger. It struck him harder than he expected. This wasn't the first time he'd told someone to give up on their dreams, but he'd only ever meant it for their own good. But this time? This was different...

He opened his mouth to respond, to argue maybe, but nothing came out. How could he fight a statement like that?

"Well... Maybe explain it?" He mumbled softly, "I'm not really all that good at this kind of thing."

She stepped closer, to his surprise, and asked him, "Do you have something that you want to do? Something you really want?"

Satoru blinked, awkwardly rubbing the back of his neck. Sure, of course he did. He had a lot he wanted to do, especially with this second chance. The second chance that was given to him by her, ironically. He decided now probably wouldn't be the best time to bring that up to her.

"Sure, yeah of course," he answered after a pause, "Are you gonna tell me to give it up? Is that what you're trying to say?"

"Imagine that your whole life you've been told over and over you have to be something," she said quietly, "And that you had to because you're the only one who could."

His breath caught and he swallowed hard. Yeah, he could definitely imagine that.

"And then you find out that you don't have to do that," she said, clenching her fist, "You find out that even everything they said doesn't have to be true and you can do something different."

He nodded a little and then nearly yelped when she stepped closer and shouted, "And then some big fuckin' asshole shows up and tells you the same stupid shit you've been trying to get away from!"

"I-I didn't realize--"

"You think I don't hear that every day? You think I don't have "well wishing" senpai and pro sorcerers telling me I'm weak and shouldn't try?" She continued, her eyes flashing with anger, "Well, fuck you! I'm in charge of what I do and I don't give a shit if you think I'm weak!"

The emotions going through Satoru at that moment were so bizarre he almost laughed out loud. He'd been yelled at plenty, of course he had. The higher-ups were always bitching about something, but always had a hint of fear. Yaga had yelled at him and Suguru plenty, but that always was a little less harsh than Yaga wanted it to appear. Lots of people would get mad at him for the shit he said, but even still he knew they weren't fully ready to commit to writing him off. They needed him, after all. They couldn't just get mad enough and push him away permanently.

This girl though? This little girl didn't give a shit about him and that was somehow incredibly refreshing. She yelled at him like she wasn't afraid. She would have been perfectly happy to never see him again. No one had ever looked at him with such conviction! She hated his guts completely in that moment and holy shit it was exciting for him!

"Damn, well I had no idea you were so mad!" He said, trying not to show his smile, "I'm serious, though. I'm really sorry."

She narrowed her eyes and pointed at him, "You're about to laugh at me, aren't you?"

"No?" He said, pulling his lips in to fight off the smile threatening him.

"Well, Gojo was it?" She said, "You'll see, shit head. You'll fuckin' see just like the rest of them."

She bent down, angrily picking up her bucket of weeds and started to push past him. He groaned with frustration, following after her and calling, "Hey, hold on, wait! I really am trying to apologize."

"Fuck off, dude," Sarah grunted, "I don't want to hear any kind of advice from some cocky first year who doesn't know shit."

"What? I know lots of shit! What do you mean?" He said, actually a bit offended, "Don't you know who I am?"

"Don't you know who I am?" She mocked him, copying his tone of voice.

"No, like," he scoffed, catching up to stand in front of her, "Satoru Gojo? You know, the guy with the six-eyes?"

She narrowed her eyes, "What, are you some kind of big shot? I don't give a shit about titles."

"It's not about the title, it's because I can see the flow of cursed energy and I--"

As they were talking Sarah had begun to walk faster and faster. Satoru, of course, easily caught up with his long stride. After just a few moments she was practically running and he was still just above a trot.

"Go away!" She shouted, "I don't want your half-ass apology!"

"It's not half-assed!" He shouted back, "Just listen to me!"

It felt like time suddenly dragged as he watched her turn back to shout at him. She didn't realize how close she was to the paving stones on the walkway and the toe of her sneaker caught, sending her toppling forward. Immediately he reached out to catch her but she swung the bucket at the same time. The bucket slowed to halt on the limitless space between them and she instinctively let it go as his arms wrapped around her shoulder and waist to catch her.

This was where things got strange. He saw the rim of the metal bucket crack into her face, he saw the small droplets of blood. There was no way he missed it, because he was already asking if she was okay when he blinked and the bucket was still in the air. The second time she was slightly to the left and the bucket just barely missed her.

He stared at her, his lips still parted and eyes wide.

He instantly let her go, his brow dropping low. She landed on the ground with a thud, grunting before she looked up at him with a glare.

"What the hell was that?" He asked, unsure if he really had seen what he really did.

"What was what?" She huffed, pushing back up onto her feet and dusting off the front of her jeans.

"You... You got hit with the bucket didn't you?" Satoru asked, grabbing her face with his hands. Her cheeks squished a little in his fingers as he turned her face left and right, but not finding even any redness. Not even a single mark left on her pale pinkish skin.

She swatted his hands away and grumbled, "Why'd you even bother to catch me if you were just gonna immediately drop me?"

"No, hold on I saw it!" He insisted, pushing her hair out of her face now and still searching. She swatted at him again and whined with annoyance but he wouldn't quit, "I saw that hit you right in the face! There was blood and everything!

"What are you talking about?" She huffed, struggling away from his grasp.

"No, no no no I'm not fucking crazy," he said, getting annoyed now, "Did you like... Did we go back a second before it happened? Is that your technique? Is it like time travel? Is that it?"

"I don't have a technique," she said, pushing him back, "Stop touching me, asshole."

A puzzle piece clicked into place suddenly for him. The binding vow. If they really wanted her technique to remain a secret, then it made sense that they would word it so that she forgot as well. But then it must work automatically much like his limitless right?

Boy, was he tempted to just slap her to see if it worked. Not that he would enjoy hitting her or anything, but he just really wanted to see if it would immediately reverse again. He decided against it, just in case it might not work that way, but still the temptation was there.

"Are you okay?" He asked, softening his voice, "Seriously. Your knees okay?"

She sighed heavily, looking up at him before she said, "Yeah. Yeah I'm fine."

"You gonna let me apologize now?" He asked, leaning down a little closer.

"Well I guess I should at least hear you out," she muttered, fixing her hair, "I'm pretty sure you won't leave me alone until I do."

Perfect. This was his chance. If he could get to know her then he'd definitely get his chance to figure out how her technique worked. But right now, she really really didn't like him. Like, at all. He needed to get her interested somehow. Needed to hook her in so that she wouldn't half-heartedly listen to his apology and then just leave and ignore him.

No, this was the perfect time. The perfect opportunity to bust out exactly what always worked. No man nor woman had ever been immune to his special technique. Everyone fell for it for at least a little bit. Well... At least until they got to know him a little better.

He peeked over his sunglasses at her, pushing them down with his index finger. He smiled when shen caught sight of his glowing, sparkling blue eyes and gasped. Just like everyone else, she was surprised by how bright they were.

"Woah, your eyes are nuts!" She said, reaching up and pushing his sunglasses down further to get a better look, "Damn! What's up with that?"

He grinned at her. Gotcha now!

"It's like fuckin' light blue Gatorade!" She said, squinting.

"L... Light blue Gatorade?!"

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#fanfiction #writing #a03 fanfic #jujutsu kaisen #jjk #gojo satoru #geto suguru #shoko ieiri #fix it fic #reincarnation fic

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