#i think it's the half-repetition that trips me up

[wintersera]

"so are you ovulating?" || ningning x succubus!reader

notes: i actually wrote this fairly quick, but finding the right pics for the moodbaoard actually pissed me off erm.. but first of all FIRST NINGNING FIC WE CHEERED (a/n i forgot to say this was a part two of the succubus!reader thing soooo here’s the link!)

cw: tail sex (kinda), succubus!reader, top!ning, bottom!reader, mentions of a singular man

wc: 4k

after the ‘feeding on your unnie’ incident that had happened a few months ago, your performance was phenomenal. with all that energy you gained from that one night, plus some extra other nights following from then with jimin unnie, it was as if your every move, every note and every emotion was amplified by tenfold. you were on fire and the audience could feel your passion for performance burning brightly with every stage you did.

your mentors and managers commented on how energetic you had been for the past couple of months, how your performances were absolutely phenomenal, the knetz weren’t on your ass - which was surprising since almost half of them were all the time. the western fans said that you were, quote on quote,“serving cunt” in the recent solo weverse live you did… whatever that meant. even your own members were surprised at how active you were throughought day and night. 

but like everything in life, things weren’t bound to stay all too well.

a few days ago you tripped on stage, and to make matters worse, it was in front of your fans. the audience heard a small little thud and spotted you on the ground looking at the ceiling for a few seconds before you stood up embarrassingly. luckily this was the first take, you had other opportunities to do your very best with the smidge of energy you had left. 

knowing your fans, particularly your stans - either they’d make a meme out of you spacing out on the floor, or, they’d spam hashtags all over twitter saying “SM PROTECT YOUR ARTIST” or something around those lines.

not only did that happen, but whilst you were preparing to record your lines in the studio, that familiar pain you would get whenever you were starved from energy came back ten times worse; it felt like you were being pierced in the stomach.

jimin noticed your pained expression and squeezed your shoulder in reassurance as she entered the recording room, but it kind of translated wrong in your head, causing you to moan out loud into the mic in front of your directors - not to mention you could hear yourself through the headphones echo. jimin chuckled lightly “what’s up with you?” then left the room a moment afterwords.

fast forward to the present day. a mundane and repetitive one. you had a photoshoot early in morning and a small meeting sometime in the afternoon and then you were free to do whatever you wanted afterwards. you thought that maybe some vocal lessons later in the evening would distract you, but you were pretty sure your vocal teacher was out with his husband drinking today. good on him, it buys you more alone time, and alone time makes you think about what to do about your situation. 

on to more pressing matters, aka your raging desire for sex. 

it randomly hit you hard while walking back from the company to your local seven eleven. you thought to distract yourself with buying a sweet treat for everyone, but instead you began to feel dizzy “ouh.. this isn’t good” there wasn’t a bunch of groupies following you around the block to your own misfortune, and it was still bright outside.so what was there to do about that urge?

it’s not like you could message jimin unnie out of the blue and ask to fuck. where was the decorum? plus you’re in the middle of promotions, what if you drain too much energy that she’s unable to perform the next day.

and it also didn’t help that your internal monologue was fucking you up.

“shit, do i just ask the manager to… NO- ew what the hell am i thinking? he’s way older than me. nevermind. why did i think about that jesus christ.” 

your options were slim. it was either wait for night, go to the practice rooms and prey on a cute trainee, with consent of course - or go ask jimin unnie again and risk exhausting her even though you just started promotions… 

you wondered who was at home right now.

you recalled ning going straight back home as soon as the meeting had finished. you could always ask? i mean she is your unnie after all, it wouldn’t hurt to ask to her. 

ah, but it would be awkward though. it’s not like when jimin unnie walked in on you tweaking out and then you had to shamefully ask her to “help you out”. either way you had to go home and do something about it. being out in the open wouldn’t be good for you anyway. anymore stress and you could lose your mind, probably going out of your way to do something that would be highly illegal, and you wouldn’t wish that on anyone.

–

on the way home you couldn’t suppress your excitement. you had already made up your mind to ask ning if you could, you know, do something nasty. multiple scenes were made up in your head. she could bend you over the table, press you against the wall and limit your restrictions with her pretty hands, or maybe she could shove your head into the pillow and pound into your desperate pussy.

as opposed to jimin, you never caught ning wound up in her own thoughts, nor staring at you in a sexual manner. whether it was pracitce, a stage, any event with the members, or an upcoming show, you had never caught her once. maybe she did look at you while you were dancing promiscuously as a joke. even so, her expressions were so nonchalant that even if she was, you would never be able to tell… though that thought alone excited you even more. who knows what her pretty little head was thinking about.

although jimin said to tell the other members about who you actually were to prevent you from being too awkward to ask your members for help, you refrained from doing so because well… you’re just like that, what else. how were you gonna do it anyway- hold a meeting in your apartment around the dining table and say that you need sex to stay active and alive? then what, they’ll eagerly accept the fact that you literally need to be inside of them, or vice versa, so you can get up on stage and preform as if it was a regular ass day.

those five minutes you spent daydreaming and thinking about telling your members were stopped abruptly by the door in front of you. when did the walk home become so quick.

then you started to think once again. 

would ning be the type of person to go out of their way to help you? yes she’s that type of person, however, does that mean she would willingly want to have sex with you… god, you don’t know her ‘that’ well. you’re close, close as how close a lifetime friend could ever be, but still, things would be weird if she ultimately says no to your request.

“you’ve been staring at the door for an awfully long time y/n. are you coming inside or do you want to stare at the door a little longer?”

fresh out of the shower, yizhuo greets you with a friendly smile followed by a giggle. her towel sticking against her body showing off the curves of her hips. 

oh fuck, why does she have to be wearing that now. 

“did you just finish showering? also, girl… get back inside. what if someone sees you with just a towel on” the aroma of your shampoo wafted through the air “you smell good…” you all were tight on money this month, so you all shared things like perfumes, shampoos, pretty much all products you and the other members owned. each time either one of your members had applied your shampoo, god, you had such perverse thought about them, wanting to ravage them until they couldn’t walk or even stand

“yeah i ran out of mine- and yours was newly opened so you know” she had been looking way too good recently, not saying that she never did look good, but there was something about her that made you feel extra desperate and needy. the wetness between your thighs spoke for themselves

“let’s go in. i need to talk to you quickly before my brain explodes” yizhuo cocked her head in confusion, reluctantly following your lead, closing the door behind her as you walked into your guys’ apartment. 

you followed behind her as she led you to your shared bedroom, looking up because you didn’t want to turn yourself on even more by staring at her ass “wow, the ceiling looked nice. a pretty beige colour… what the hell am i doing” you thought to yourself with a heavy sigh, looking back down and regretting it immediately. you noticed that yizhuo turned around as you locked eyes with the front of her cream coloured bath towel.

as perceptive as yizhuo was, she noticed a little black swish behind your back. she just played it off, too tired from all the practice, so she thought she was hallucinating a tail or something of the sorts.

now, being both the youngest and the least serious members of the group, you rarely ever had a heart to heart. to talk one to one with each other with the tone you had used, yizhuo must’ve thought that there was some topic you couldn’t bring up with the eldest “hey what’s up? it’s been a while since we last talked seriously” her damp hair against her soft looking skin, the fresh scent of soap and the way she looked at you with worry in her eyes. it almost drove you off the edge. she was so tantalising that you almost missed your cue to speak.

“uh- um, you know how we’ve been besties since i came to korea right?”

“yes”

“and you know we said that we’d always tell each other anything right?” you glanced around the room, avoiding her gaze while your fingers unconsciously played with the fabric of her bedsheets.

“yes…?” ning pondered for a while “…are you going to confess your undying love for me, is that what this is?” she cackled.

“WHAT? no, no- i think that might be less shocking than what i’m about to say” you take a deep breath in hopes to stifle the sound emitting from your booming heartbeat “okay so like, hypothetically speaking, would you have sex with any of the four of us?” for a god awful few seconds you sat tensely, waiting for yizhuo to say something. 

“are you trying to redirect my attention from a more important question girl?” her eyes rested on your face, heartily laughing until she released you were being totally serious. 

scratching your arm, you let out a sigh. it would be better to ask her directly wouldn’t it “you don’t need to analyse me like that. i was just saying-”

you could charm her into agreeing, but in the long run you’d feel like a horrible person. charming a person came with moral problems, and you strictly told yourself that you would never do that to a person. ever.  

“yizhuo… can we- can you do me a favour?” your stuttering caught her attention. you simply couldn’t bring yourself to ask, it’s strange out of the blue. 

“mhm mhm, what do you need”

“you”

“me?”

“yes.” with every fibre of your being you held back a variety of different ways to scream out ‘JUST FUCK ME’ biting your lip to help fight back a blush. it’s odd to blurt out ‘im a succubus. let’s have crazy passionate intimate gay sex right here right now’ 

hold on- does she even know you’re a succubus? “listen, it’s going to sound absurd and you probably think i’m not sober, but can you hear me out” it was still weird to outwardly say that you were in fact this demon thing that sucks people dry, literally. saying it to jimin was no easy feat, but you were obviously losing your damn mind that day. and then you have the other two members too? now was not the time to think about what you’d do in the near future, you were hungry and yizhuo was right in front of you, practically naked “are you, by any chance, okay with maybe” your gaze darted around the room before you locked eyes with her “maybe having… sex? maybe?”

“ohhh, okay i see how it is. you’re ovulating” she spoke with a dead serious tone.

you were losing your mind. you couldn’t tell if she was fucking with you or not. but in all honesty, yizhuo did think you looked like you were ovulating with the way your thighs pressed together. yup, ovulating.

your heart began to race as you increasingly became desperate within seconds. you felt feverish, hot to the touch while your head throbbed. almost a whole two months without tending to your needs ended up with you succumbing to the symptoms “please yizhuo. i need you to do something, anything- i feel like i’m gonna die actually” 

“woah woaah, let’s calm down. you’re not gonna die silly. is it just-“ yizhuo paused for a while, coughed and maybe even hesitated to say the word “sex. is that all? it can’t be too bad. plus if it’s with you, i don’t mind…” yizhuo’s words were genuine. it put your mind at ease. 

“you don’t understand though. it’s like… it- i don’t know” you pout at her with the remaining energy left in your body “it’s alright- i’ll ask other people, it’ll be okay” sluggishly pushing yourself off yizhuo’s bed.

“no no, i get it. you wanna relieve stress, i get it” from what you could understand, yizhuo was trying her absolute best, trying to relate with your problem “we’ve all been there. the company doesn’t allow us to go out and meet other idols like that so it was eventually gonna happen. i mea-“

“it’s not about that, yizhuo” your eyes darken, a desperate sigh emitting from your lips “ah, whatever…” with trembling hands, you held yizhuo’s in yours, momentarily silencing her as you sit back down on top of the smooth sheets of her bed “if you’re not okay with doing ‘this’, then will a kiss be okay?” there was a hint of softness to your voice, the rest shrouded with seriousness “it won’t be enough for me, but it’ll keep me… sort of stable” you shut your eyes as you press your forehead against hers, sharing the warmth “please, that’s all i ask for” 

she whispered “a kiss? i can do that. it seems fun.”ning, inches away from kissing you, smiled sheepishly. her gaze drifted briefly towards your lips before finally shutting her eyes  “and if it’s with you i think i’ll be okay”  

you took this as your opportunity to kiss her softly on the lips. a quick peck really. a surge of energy coursed through your veins for half a second before coming to a stop.

that’s all the energy you’ll take from her, and the most you’ll take for the next couple of days “mmm… thank you yizhuo” though it was a sweet couple of seconds before it broke off, the sweetness of her lips left a longing impression on you.

yizhuo asked for “one more kiss?” growing in confidence, she leaned into another, her eyes fluttering shut as she melted into your embrace. though you were unsure, you gave into the moment, savouring her delicate lips. her fingers tentatively reached for your shirt, grabbing you and pulling you in closer. as the kiss intensified, yizhuo’s hands journeyed down your back, directly pushing down so your chests were pressed together “do whatever you want…” her breath hitched as you trailed down kisses from her jaw down to her neck, taking the time and effort to not accidentally leave a huge hickey there. you replied by pushing her back onto the bed, the loose towel that wrapped around body fell apart easily, exposing yizhuo’s pretty tits. she paid no mind, letting you do whatever you pleased. 

“god, you’re so pretty” you climbed onto the bed, straddling yizhuo’s waist as you carefully removed your t-shirt. 

she burned holes through your face, why was she staring so hard all of a sudden? “how are your eyes pink, y/n” taken aback, she sits up and examines your face. she raised her hand and waved it in front of you “is this thing real?” tilting her head in confusion. 

“it is real- mmh?” a jolt shoots right up through your spine and then down to your core out of nowhere. ning held your sleek black tail, rubbing her fingers against the weird leathery texture, caressing and prodding at your poor flimsy, slightly erect(?) tail, as you let out a soft sigh. “yizhuo…” you mewl pathetically “that- that feels weird”

“does it now?” her tongue darted out, licking the centre of your heart shaped tail with the ever so subtle tug at the corner of her lips “sensitive much” a couple more licks and kisses to your tail and you were pretty much done for. 

time to time you forget that you have some sort of libido increasing, aphrodisiac power. the kiss you two shared may have affected her. well it definitely did. the increase of confidence radiating from the older girl was way different in comparison to her usual self. cause by now you’d expect her to be a little more gentle with you.

flipping positions, yizhuo held you down with her two hands with a devilish look on her face “if it’s sex you want, then i’ll make sure to fuck you till your begging for me to stop” her hand travelled down your tail, stroking it as if she was stroking your dick. never before had someone do something like that to your tail, but my god did it feel so fucking good.

she toyed with it, prodded and poked the tip of it and sucked it with her pretty pink and plump lips. the other hand cupped your chest, fondling over your boobs to get a feel for her own satisfaction “i could get used to this…” being on top of you, she had the advantage to do whatever she desired, and also because you were too weak to move at all “what do you want y/n? want me to fuck you with my tongue or my fingers. you choose”

you chose the latter.

throwing your head back onto the fluffed up pillows, yizhuo waisted no time and went to her destination. not one, but two fingers pushed deep inside of your pussy, stretching you out so good. her lustfully hooded eyes looked down at you, absorbing in the expressions of your pleasure contorted face “how’s it feel? want me to add another for you baby?” 

unable to answer her question with words, you nod eagerly, wanting nothing but her fingers to fill you up. so she did, adding in a third finger since you asked to cutely with that nod of yours. now knuckles deep inside, that same devilish grin spread across her face. you unconsciously buck your hips up, smiling wearily at yizhuo “so.. so deep” your moans urged her to immediately start moving. she started out nice and slow, curling her fingers at different intervals to squeeze out those lovely moans of yours. every thrust, she explored your spongy walls, testing out the waters to see which place hit the best for you. then as time went by, she gradually built up her pace until she came to her desired speed.

three fingered merciselessly pounded hard into your tight cunt, your juices leaking and dripping onto yizhuo’s bedsheets, and the sounds of your wetness leaving the chinese girl in awe. noticing the way your hips began to meet with her speed, her hand that played with your tail slowly slided towards them, holding you down by the stomach “let me do all the work” driven by your moans, she leans down to press a hungry kiss on your lips, then leaving a hot trail of kisses down from your neck and onto your perky nipples.

swirling around the hardened bud on your chest, a guttural moan catches her attention “you like it when i suck on your tits, huh?” her thumb pressed against your swollen clit as she muttered those words, all the while still paying attention to your sensitive tits. she enjoyed the way you tried to wriggle your hips in attempts to move them, and how your hands clutched the sheets with pure desperation. she felt hazy, maybe a little bit tipsy somehow, but all she wanted to do was fuck you until you were screaming her name.

as her fingers continued to slide against your walls, hitting the right spots at an intense speed, you felt a knot form in your stomach. you were so desperate for relief, needing to buck your hips into her palm to get that sweet friction you felt on your clit, but she didn’t allow you to do that; her hand still resting on your stomach to stop you from squirming “yi-yizhuo~” you whined, teary eyes staring at her with a pitiful look “please yizhuo.. r-rub my clit please~”

and who was she to deny you.

though she didn’t do exactly what you wanted, she did something way more better. moving away from your nipples, she lowered herself down onto the bottom of her bed to shove her face right between your thighs. tongue darting out her mouth, she gives a few kitten licks on your clit, savouring the sweet essence of your pussy for a starter. those tiny kitten licks turned into something much more. the tip of her tongue circled against your heat, occasionally wrapping her lips around to give you a quick suck before continuing to lap your soaked folds up to your sensitive clit. 

the stimulation drove your crazy. you never knew that yizhuo was so skilled at this. still thrusting those three fingers inside of your now pulsating cunt, at the hot and wet kisses and licks she left on your clit, she knew - and you knew, that you were on the verge of toppling over the edge. but it wasn’t enough for her “is that good, hm? does my needy baby want me to fuck her harder?” yizhuo somehow had the strength to speed up, fucking your hole as she moans at how well you’re taking her. 

those words vibrated from your core and sent shivers across your spine, leaving goosebumps all over your skin - in which also made you clench around her fingers. 

fuck, it was way too damn good. you felt your legs shaking, jaw opening wide, stomach tightening and that course of hot pleasure travelling through your entire nervous system “close- close yizhuo.. don’t stop” your words came out slurred, a few unintelligible praises and swears being ripped out of the back of your throat as you felt yourself on the edge. 

with one final deep and hard thrust, your jaw slacked open as your orgasm was pulled out from your body, legs twitching and spasming as you repetitively screamed out yizhuo’s name alongside even more praises. for a minute your body fell limp against the bed, exhausted from the mind blowing orgasm yizhuo gave you, and also from the built up stress you had from promotions.

now full of the sexual energy you gained from yizhuo, you spring upwards, patting yizhuo’s head gently “t-thank you… i feel refreshed…” 

the older girl finally sat up after she cleaned you up. wiping her face and chin from the juices that dripped all the way down, she flashed you a smile “with that tail of yours, and those pink eyes, you’ve got to be a succubus… right? to answer her question, you nodded, cheeks red from her straightforwardness. 

“y-yeah. you’re right… wanna go again?”

“only if i bottom next”

[haikyu-mp4]

Ice princess – Atsumu x reader wc 597 – gn!reader hockey player x figure skater au

“Miya!” your coach yelled, shaking her head and sighing at the repetitive scene of Atsumu not knowing when to quit. Not that you were any better, angrily bickering back at him until your coach spoke up. “Get off my ice, now!”

“Your ice? I don’t see your name on it,” he answered childishly, scraping his skate against it as if digging for a place where your coach had signed her name.

“You’re taking time from the figure skaters,” she explained. That lady had the patience of a saint. 

“Maybe I should be a figure skater,” he suggested before skating away from you in what he considered a graceful manner.

You cackled and pointed. “You could never do what we do.”

Atsumu was almost off the ice but swiftly turned back around at the taunt. “Is that a challenge?”

“Miya!”

You finished training, the previous ordeal far from your mind when Atsumu came stomping back in. “You, me, it’s on.”

The coach had long left the premises, so no one was out on the ice except you and now, one blonde-passing hockey player.

“Are you sure your gear is strong enough? You might lose your last brain cell when you trip and fall.”

Atsumu scoffed dramatically and curtsied mockingly. “Show me what to do and I’ll do it even better.”

He wasn’t better than you, but he wasn’t… half bad.

By now, all the others had also left and you were leaning against the fence while Atsumu did jump after jump, spin after spin, throwing caution to the wind and miraculously not tripping that much.

“You’re not that bad, I’ll admit.”

He made a sharp stop right in front of you, hand naturally falling on his hip. “Last one. If I make it you go on a date with me.”

A blush hugged your cheeks and you pretended to rub your nose to hopefully hide it. “I’ll have to make it difficult then. And if you don’t make it?”

“I’ll go on a date with you.”

Deadpan, you stared at him in surprise, blush spreading to your ears in disbelief at his shamelessness. You pushed off the fence and cleared your throat, neither agreeing nor disagreeing to his terms before preparing to show him the next move.

Make it really difficult. Okay. Shaking your hands in preparation, you started doing a couple of rounds to gain speed, enjoying the way Atsumu kept turning so his eyes could follow you eagerly.

Aaand jump!

You held your breath as you stretched your legs and arms out for the time spent in the air before sticking the landing and jumping straight into a spin, not landing that one perfectly, but good enough. Finally, the breath escaped you safely and you skated towards Atsumu with a cocky smile. “Go on, ice princess.”

Atsumu chuckled, already starting on the rounds. “Keep your eyes on me!” he called to you, ensuring your eyes followed him just as keenly as he had followed you before.

He didn’t make it to the second jump, too focused on stretching his legs and not at all thinking of a way to land. You were both giggling and leaning on each other as you got off the ice, wondering who should bring up the bet first. It’s not like you had agreed…

After removing all your equipment, you cleared your throat and he sighed heavily, falling uncharacteristically silent.

“Sooo,” you said, drawing it out.

“I lost,” he declared with a coy smile. “Pick you up at seven?”

How could you say no to such a hopeful look?

“Sure, princess.”

masterlist

[pargolettasworld]

So, because I am incurably, morbidly curious, I watched Jessie Gender's four-hour-and-seventeen-minute-long video on . . . well, the title suggests "Zionism, Antisemitism, and the Left." To her credit, Gender does touch on all three of these topics, though not with the same degree of skill, graciousness, or understanding of the topics at hand. I've just had a very nice dinner, and I'm feeling generous, so let's see how this video stacks up. Strap in. This is going to get long.

I should admit right off the bat that I'm only a casual, occasional watcher of Jessie Gender. I'm not a deep fan, and I'm sure there is Jessie Gender Lore™ out there that I'm not aware of, but I think I've seen enough of her videos to get a general sense of her house style. This video hits a lot of the hallmarks of her style. She speaks very fast and very passionately, occasionally trips over her own words (something that I've done many a time, so I really do feel that), and is inordinately fond of nominalizations. She's especially fond of the word "ostracization," for some reason, which drives me nuts because "ostracism" is right there. So, in style, it appears to hew to the Jessie Gender House Style pretty well.

On to the video itself. The first thing I will observe about it is that it is in every possible way a meeting that could have been an email. There was no need for this to be the same length as the Extended Edition of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003). There's a lot of padding, significant digressions, and a certain degree of repetition. It's easy to forget the beginning of the video by the time you're an hour into the thing.

The major question that hangs over this opus is: Why, and for whom, was it made? I'm honestly not sure who the intended audience for this thing is, nor why Gender felt that she had to make it. She alludes in the first half hour to feeling like she's lost the trust and support of some of her Jewish fans/friends/acquaintances/Patreon patrons, and she chalks it up to a previous video that she made (which I have not seen, and which I am not inclined to seek out). But neither the structure nor the thesis nor the conclusion of the video seem like they would win back any of these folks.

I don't think that Jewish viewers are her intended audience -- certainly not with the way she talks about Jews throughout the video. I'm also having a hard time believing that really committed leftists are her audience, either, since I don't think she's really saying much that leftists haven't already heard, or offering new perspectives on her topic(s). And anyone who has made it this far into the year of 5784 and is still undecided about the contemporary iteration of The Jewish Question is probably not going to be interested in sitting through nearly four and a half hours of relentless lecture. So I'm still left wondering why, and for whom, did Jessie Gender make this video?

Gender assures us, her viewers, of several things that are meant to be reassuring. She's done lots and lots of research, for one thing. And she's asked some-of-her-best-friends-who-are-Jewish to be sensitivity readers. We're given to understand that we are hearing the nitpicked, edited, and polished version of the script. I'd hate to see what the first draft looked like . . .

She also tells us that there are going to be lots of Foreign Words And Names, and that she and her mouth-hole have A Hard Time pronouncing Foreign Words And Names. Her loyal staff have made her a pronunciation guide -- which appears to have been used perhaps as a drinks coaster, since there are some howlers here. The Jews originating from the MENA regions are the "Misrai" (Mizrahi) Jews, the first Prime Minister of Israel was "David Ben-Gron" (David Ben-Gurion), the Revisionist Zionist leader was "Zeeeeeeeeev Zarbinsky" (Ze'ev Jabotinsky), and the Palestinian uprisings of 1987 - 1993 and 2000 - 2005 go by the name "Infitada" (Intifada).

You know that phrase "If white people can learn to say Tchaikovsky and Schwarzenegger, they can learn to say [your name from an African or Asian language]?" I agree completely with the conclusion, but I question the premise. Jessie Gender makes me question the premise harder. If she had any real interest in the topic, she would have practiced those names, but I don't think she does, so she didn't.

Moving on to the actual content of the video. It's . . . weird. Jessie Gender begins the video believing that Zionism is an evil force for colonialism, White supremacy, oppression, and genocide. She ends the video believing that Zionism is an evil force for colonialism, White supremacy, oppression, and genocide. But along the way, she's confronted with quite a lot of inconvenient facts that threaten to complicate this perspective.

Gender devotes roughly two hours and fifteen minutes of her video, a smidge over half of the runtime, on three segments that offer a history of Zionism, the iterations of Zionism as a political ideology, and what she calls "Zionism as emotion," which is a condescending way to refer to the importance of Zionism to Jews. I'd guess that her research for these segments might have surprised her. It turns out, per Jessie Gender, that there is both a reason behind and a context for nineteenth-century Zionism, quite a lot of logic behind why the Jews wanted to go to Israel, and ample evidence that a majority of Jews have some kind of stake in both Israel and some variation of Zionism.

The reason I think that this research might have surprised her is that she ends each of these segments with a small diatribe about the evil colonialist, capitalist, oppressive, genocidal force that is Zionism, even as the segments suggest nuance, logic, and reason behind the philosophy. We can't have that on a good lefty video, though, can we? The more Gender confronts evidence that there is more to Zionism than meets her eyes, the more she doubles down, digs in her heels, and refuses to accept even the barest shreds of non-negativity about Zionism. Every now and then, she comes up with a lovely sentence or two that shows some understanding of a Jewish perspective on the world, but then furiously backpedals -- we mustn't forget that this Jewish perspective of oppression, mass murder, and international blame has only led to the Evil Of Zionism, after all.

What's really fascinating is how hard she works to avoid blaming actual Jews for all of this evil. I think she's doing this with the best of intentions. A for effort. C for effect. She wants to make a distinction between "Zionism" and "Judaism," in the sense of "Zionism does not equate to Judaism, so being antisemitic to Judaism because you hate Zionism is bad." She tries so hard that she loses sight of the actual people involved. There are a lot of places where she talks about "Judaism" where what she actually means is "the Jews." Or, as she calls us, "Jewish people." Which isn't bad, and it isn't really wrong, but it doesn't quite communicate the sense of Am Yisrael that is at the heart of Zionism.

In fact, she's so desperate to separate Zionism from Jewish people that she starts to talk about it almost as an individual character in the story, with agency, desires, wishes, and goals of its own, totally disconnected from the people who created it. Zionism demands the genocide of Palestinians, Zionism needs colonialism, Zionism has a nice lunch date with neoliberalism and spends the afternoon browsing department stores with capitalism. In effect, Zionism becomes the dragon, and Gender really wishes that the passive, easily-led Jewish people would unite behind some White Knight and slay the dragon so everyone could be happy and free and leftist. Despite the two hours she spent on her deep dive into the history and meaning of Zionism, she cannot fathom why the Jewish people don't just do this.

I said earlier that quite a lot of this video consists of padding. Gender identifies herself as a lefty anarchist, opposed to nation-states, capitalism, neoliberalism, the United States, the British Empire, Israel, Joe Biden, "Ka-MAH-la" Harris, transphobia in Western societies . . . the usual suspects. Frequently, especially in the back half of the video, she'll wander off into long fantasias about the crimes against liberty perpetrated by the West at large, as well as their character Capitalism, and then remember that this is supposed to be a video about Zionism, and then finish with the equivalent of "Peter Rabbit did sort of that kind of thing, too."

One of the alleged purposes of this video is to discuss Antisemitism On The Left, but Gender . . . pretty much elides doing that. She gets close a couple of times, and she does grudgingly admit that some leftists coming from some branches of leftism might sometimes say things that might be antisemitic, and that's Bad, and it makes Jewish people feel Unsafe and Not Inclined To Agree With Leftists that The Dragon Known As Zionism Must Be Slain Heroically. But don't stress about it. The important thing is that Israel Must Stop Its Genocide and Palestinians Should Have Self-Determination (which is only withheld from them by Israel -- excuse me, by Zionism -- and certainly not by those eminently-justified-if-a-little-uncouth plucky fighters, Hamas.

There are quite a lot of lengthy quotes from Sources, read by guest stars, which is a nice touch to break up the video. The vast majority of these Sources -- especially the ones in the "history of Zionism" segment -- are not actually written by Zionists. You get a lot of academic pontificating about the failures, shortcomings, and nefarious activities of Zionism, but you hear almost nothing from actual Zionists, especially contemporary Zionists. This does not look nearly as good or as well-researched as it's meant to look.

So what do we get in the end, after four hours and seventeen minutes of watching this? Honestly . . . not much. Gender gives enough background on the history of Zionism, antisemitism, and Jewish attitudes toward Israel that hardcore leftists watching will be more annoyed than convinced. She condescends to both Jews and Arabs, mentioning repeatedly that she, as a White Gentile, really doesn't have any business butting in on these complex questions -- but that's not going to stop her from butting in like the lefty shiksa she is! She's too mealy-mouthed to come right out and say anything blatantly antisemitic, but disdain for Jewish concepts of homeland, belonging, origin, and self-determination pervade the whole thing.

I don't think that Jessie Gender is an idiot -- she seems to be pretty smart, and has both a firm sense of her own political philosophy and the stick-to-it-ive-ness to do far more research into things like the development of Zionism and the history of antisemitism than one might expect. But the video really is, to bring up a playwright from the hated West, "full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."

[mysicklove]

𝐋𝐎𝐒𝐓 𝐈𝐍 𝐀 𝐅𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐒𝐘

DAY 31: MASTURBATION

With: Izuku Midoriya

Word Count: 1.5k

Warnings: subish! Izuku, fem/afab reader, izuku masturbates to your voicemail and pretends to fuck you, reader calls him baby, and he calls u hun, needy izuku

A/N: masturbation fics are so fun to write for no reason. anyways, my last kinktober fic. crazy. it doesnt feel this way cause i wrote it halfway through lol.

Izuku was left alone for too long. On the verge of three weeks to be exact.

He wasn't left completely alone, of course. He was just overseas, on an important mission. He was separated from you, but that to his love-sick brain, meant he was left alone. His sleep schedule is all messed up from the times he stayed up late at night to wish you goodmorning, or the times where he woke up super early to catch you before you ate dinner. 

He missed you, an ungodly amount. When he comes home to his luxury hotel, and flops onto the bed, the only thing he can think about is you. What it would feel like to wraps his arms around you, and melt in your warmth. The way your fingers would run through his hair, and comfort him from all he did that day.

Of course he had those innocent, romantic thoughts most of the time, but somehow one way or another those fantasies began to change. The touches reach lower, your words begin to drip with honey, and your lips seem to be more passionate, desperate even. Until five out of the seven days, he daydreams about fucking you. 

He lays against the bed frame, shirtless, and dick pulled out of his boxers. The trip back to the hotel was long, and he's been thinking about doing this for the past hour now. He prepared everything ahead of time, because if he was doing something as pathetic as this, at least do it right.

The lights were dimmed, and his eyelids are drooping, exhausted from the day. He slowly reaches toward the nightstand and grabs a couple of tissues, setting them down next to him. Then with a sigh, he puts his phone up to his ear, and brings his hand to his cock. 

He gulps when he hears your voice, wishing desperately that you weren't asleep. Its got to be around 5 am by that time, and of course he wished he was patient enough to wait a couple hours for you to talk to him. But, he was desperate, and the voicemail you left him a couple hours earlier did the job.

“Hey baby,” Your voice broadcast, and immediately he seems to melt. His eyes fall shut and his hands begins to move up and down his half hard cock. He hums in reply, not caring if you cant hear him. “I miss you. Saw a kid walk by me with your merch on, made me smile,” You say, your voice slightly muffled from a task you must be doing. 

He huffs a laugh, head falling to the side. “Yeah?” He breathes, thumb rubbing at the tip, and then falling back down to his shaft in a repetitive motion. You continue on about your day, mentioning nothing too important, just how you went grocery shopping and a nice walk after work. “You shouldnt be working. Can take care of you,” Izuku mumbles, eyes peering open just slightly to watch his movements.

His cock was on full display now, the tip a pretty shade of pink, and beginning to leak. You always called it pretty. A strange thing to say about a penis, but he soaked up the praise, taking pride in his cock now. 

The thought made his mind wander. Would you praise him for what he was doing now? He wasnt supposed to touch himself without you, but its been three weeks, you have got to understand. Were you touching yourself thinking about him? The thought sends a thrilling shiver down his spine.

Your voice was now a background noise, just listening to the tone, the sound of it, but nothing of what you were saying. Maybe you were cooing at him. Telling him how good he is doing. Or maybe you were calling him a pervert for doing something so gross without you knowing. He lets out a shaky moan, mewling out and picking up the pace of his hand. 

“I miss you,” He warbles into the phone, on top of your speech. What were you talking about now? A dog you saw? Nothing important. Why weren't you touching yourself to his voice? He would die for an audio of that. Or even an audio of where you give him directions of how to do touch himself correctly.

No Izuku, slow down. Don't hurt yourself, baby. Your voice clouds his mind, and he nods, peering back to his cock and slowing his hand down. Thats it. Tighten your hand, and focus on the tip. He obeys, moving his hand up to the head, and making small pumps there. “S-Sensitive there,” He groans to the empty hotelroom, shaking his head from side to side when his heartbeat begins to pick up.

“Went into Victoria's Secret today,” You hum, and his eyes widen, attention snapping back to your voicemail. He quickly turns up the volume and pressing the phone closer to his ear. “Bought something you’ll love. Red is your favorite, yeah?”

Lewd images flash through his head of dark red lingerie sets and he nods. “Fuck. Please,” He moans, wishing he was there to pick it out with you. His dick twitches, and a glob of precum leaks out. Green eyes flicker to it, and he uses his thumb to swirl it around the head, flinger glazing over the slit. “Wanna see,” Izuku pants, growing hot.

You seem to have heard his reply and it makes him whine. “You don't get to see till you get home. A nice reward for doing so good all this time you are away,” You purr, making a short kissing noise into the mic and laughing.

His eyebrows furrow at the possibilities and his mind drifts off from your voice again. Suddenly he is there with you, his rough hands trailing up and down your body. The dark lingerie looks perfect against your skin tone, and his mouth waters at the sight. Well, look how needy you are Deku. Do you want to fuck me that bad?

He nods his head frantically, hand unconsciously picking up the pace. “Please. Please, beggin’ you,” he chants under his breath, his back slightly arching off the frame. He dully notices that the voicemail has ended, but doesnt pay attention to it, too immersed in the movie playing in his head.

His mind cuts the scene forward, growing too impatient and desperate as his orgasm begins to approach. You are under him, sending scratch marks down his back while moaning out. His thrusts are frantic, and he tries to pretend that his hand is you. Its not the same, but it will do. 

“Am I doing good?” He mumbles, dropping his phone onto the bed and resting the other hand on his thigh. You nod at him, kissing his cheek with redden cheeks, and lazy grin. A view he has seen so many times that he has a perfect mental image of it. 

So good, Izuku. You wanna cum inside?

He moans, louder than he should, considering the thin walls, but he doesnt care at the moment. He never gets to cum inside – this was something he was waiting to hear. “Fuck. Pleaseeee,” He whimpers, eyebrows furrowing and hand frantically moving up and down. His cock is lubed up with pre, and its easier for his hand to move now. 

He climbs closer and closer to his high and now hes hunched slightly over on himself. Suddenly, he hears his phone ringing, cutting him out of his perfect daydream. Just a couple of seconds, he just needs a couple seconds more of fucking you, and then he can take this call. He whines slightly, and peers over at it, not stopping his movements.

When he sees your name his eyes light up, and he grabs the phone and brings it to his ear immediately. His hands makes a lewd squelching noise, but he too fucked out to care if you hear.

A couple of seconds go by, and he breathes into the mic, waiting. And then he hears a groggy, “Hey baby,” and he cums on the spot. Groaning into the phone without a care as cum spills out on his hands and his whole body shakes. 

Another second goes by, as you wait silently on your side, confused on what was happening, but too sleepy to put two and two together. Izuku's chest rises and falls with every breath, and he stares at his cum covered hand, trying not to let out a sound of complaint when he realized he forgot to cum into the tissue.

He blinks a couple times, exhausted but glowing. “Hey hun. Was just thinkin’ bout you,” He hums, grinning at his sticky hand and closing his eyes when he hears your girlish giggle.

PREV POST | MASTERLIST | NEXT POST

[tricksh0t]

★ fwb

☾ criston cole x sub top m reader

𝘱𝘳𝘦-𝘵𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘩0𝘵 ⛥ less than satisfactory tbh but i ran outta writing juice (i wanted a spectacular fic for my first sub top reader 😔)

𝘴𝘩𝘰𝘵𝘴 ⛥ 1.19k words

cw: missionary at the beginning, sub top m reader, dom bot criston, riding, friends with benefits but not really friends just benefits with no feelings, criston being selfish, use of the word whore several times, calling criston ser, power dynamics, criston slaps you on the cheek 1 time, mean criston

Criston feels dirty, laying on dirty sheets in a dimly lit room, squashed under a sweaty man, sweating balls himself, with a dick sliding in n' out of him.

But his mind doesn't think it, and his lips don't speak it, either. "Fuck, yeah that's it. Keep going."

The man, you, breathes at his neck. It's hot and humid and he has a hand grasping your hair.

He feels dirty with his mouth open and spilling moans, feels dirty that you don't even answer him back, like he's just a whining whore. Praise him, degrade him, just talk to him like he does.

"Fuuuck, I'm gonna cum."

His legs instinctively close around you, but you just force them open quickly to make space for yourself, making him half-moan half-yelp.

He wraps a hand around his cock, in the sweaty crevice between your bodies, and he feels even dirtier. It's sticky and wet with his own pre, and it feels dirty to like it because it makes even easier to jerk himself off.

And even easier to cum.

When you finish inside him, he does not just feel like a dirty whore, he practically is one.

But that is of no concern anymore, as you're quickly pulling away. There is no kiss or cuddle, no helping him clean up. There is just distance. Worst of all, this isn't the first time.

It's gotten repetitive. The hot pleasure, the sex; it felt good, but it was the same each damn time. Then you slide off him, put on your clothes, put on your armor like you're trying to run away from him. No, not even that. You dress proceduraly like you're getting up in the morning, like he's a ghost.

"(y/n)?" He calls, scooting towards you by the edge of the bed.

"What is it?" You reply, not even sparing him a look. You're already pulling on your shirt and beginning with your pants.

"Just like that?" Criston's words are useless in their purpose of stopping you. He watches as you stand up.

Then you have the audacity to say, "What more could you want?"

As if you're that clueless.

"What more could I want?" He repeats in a shout. It shocks you still, makes you pause, for once. He stands up too, chasing after you, reminding you that he is your Lord Commander. "Is that what you're asking?"

"I–"

"What more could I want?"

Criston pushes you so hard you're stumbling backwards, tripping on your own pant leg and losing your trousers in the process. You land haphazardly on a chair and only have so little time before he's straddling you.

You're trapped in this chair looking up at him, and as if that isn't enough, he holds your chin in a bruising grip and forces your neck to crane.

"I want more than a hot breath in my neck. I want more than a cold touch. I want you to treat me like I'm more than a cold cadaver on the silent sisters' table."

"Ser, I–"

"Ser?" He seethes, forcing your head further up towards him. "You don't even use my name."

His other hand suddenly wraps around your cock, working you up, you think, fruitlessly. "I've just cum, I can't–it won't rise."

Maybe a part of you likes this pain, maybe a part of you likes when he's on top of you, because it does.

"Well, would you look at that? It has." Criston forces himself down, takes your cock all the way down, and it makes you whimper pathetically.

"Fuck, Criston–"

"No. No, you don't get to use my name now." He squeezes your jaw painfully. "Open your fucking eyes."

You can't even pinpoint the moment you closed them. It's instinct that's pushing you forward. Instinct that has you bucking your hips up into him and holding his hips.

"Don't fucking touch me."

It only takes his voice for you to let go of him.

"See? You're paying attention now. You're obeying." Criston lets go of your jaw. For a moment, you think he's taking pity on you, or that he's finally pleased with you; but then he slaps your cheek.

The force makes you open your mouth to yelp, but a moan comes out instead.

"What am I to you? Just a whore?"

The man above you isn't Criston Cole. He's the Lord Commander, the man who makes sure everyone's white cloaks remain white and pristine, by force. He's the man to yell at you the moment you step out of line.

Despite his need to go back to how you first were, this isn't the man that first coaxed you to his bed. This is a man that always gets what he wants, by any means necessary.

"Look at me."

Past the thoughts swirling in your head, past the squeeze of his hole around your cock and sucking, wet feeling of oil and cum inside of him, there's his commanding voice.

You fight to focus your eyes again. "Ser?"

"Is all you need a correcting hand?" Criston scoffed. He didn't even let you talk, despite all his questions. He didn't need to hear you talk.

There was a dark pleasure to it, to this. It's better than fucking himself on your cock. He likes that you're at his mercy, that any pleasure you get is his to give.

He's ridden you before, but this is different. He's already cum once, so this pleasure he chases? It's about dominating you.

A heat crawls through his veins, like an old fire rekindling.

Criston grips your jaw again. He forces you into a kiss, which he moans into. How long has it been since you kissed? Kissed like this, that is: desperately, because the heat calls for it; not just because it's something to close the awkward gaps between prepping him, and not to hide the ugly ways your bodies meld together under judgemental gazes.

Your tongues intertwine, a dance, sloppy and wet but good and responsive. He remembers the time when you took to each other's beds and fucked sweetly, when you didn't need that dance, just pressing lips to lips was enough.

It used to be a privilege to fuck him, to be favored by your Lord Commander, to ravish his body every night and ask about his scars. Over time, you've taken it for granted, turned his body from something to be worshiped to a tool of pleasure.

This isn't that sweetness Criston yearns for. It's not a novelty and it's not innocent, but Criston has his way. The only touch he gives, his lips and his hole, benefit him.

And you, you can't deny that it feels good to surrender yourself to him, just as you had once.

He stills his hips and speaks in that same voice he uses against Aegon's recruits, leaving no room for complaints, "You'll not be cold anymore, you hear? You'll not treat me like a common whore, lest you want the same to be done to you, just like today."

You're powerless to disobey or to urge his hips into movement again. You're powerless under your Lord Commander. "Yes, Ser."

𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘵-𝘵𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘩0𝘵 ⛥ i still think im so clever because fwb in the title written as its abbreviation instead of the full friends with benefits conveys that fuckboy attitude with like "wyd?" type shi and like casual sex

[markantonys]

3x08 thoughts! full book spoilers

my reaction when the credits started rolling was "oh.........that's it?" which is not the best feeling for a season finale to leave you on! it was a good episode with some great moments, but as i'd feared, they left themselves with WAY too much to wrap up, with the result that it all felt rushed and cramped and not particularly satisfying. in the first 2 seasons, i said that the 8-episode model was just the right amount of time to tell the story, and i stand by that. with this season, it wasn't enough, and it's not just the fault of the model but just as much the fault of the writers who should have been more realistic about the limits of 8 episodes and not tried to cram in so much. obviously the main 4 plots of the waste, the two rivers, tanchico, and the tower all had to make it in, but within that i think there was some bloat and dragged-out stuff that could've been trimmed back. (especially considering that they planned for an entire episode dedicated to rhuidean and an entire episode dedicated to the two rivers battle: good choices that let those events shine, but it means that the tanchico-based characters, for example, only even APPEAR in 6 out of 8 episodes and in most of those 6 they're relegated to the B or C or D plot, so no wonder their plotline felt so underbaked; if they were going to devote 2 episodes to single events, they needed to be more merciless about trimming out bloat in the other 6 episodes.)

now for the episode itself. i'll start with the white tower. personally i don't mind siuan's death, but i understand why people are upset. now i can retroactively say that @butterflydm was 100% right on the money in speculating that the reason they jumped the gun on cramming elayne & avi together so fast was not for any story reason, but rather for the out-of-world reason of wanting to establish that there will still be a big canon wlw ship even after one half of moiraine/siuan exited the stage.

as for how this might affect the story going forward, i originally had a whole theory here of "what if salidar is cut and there's no schism & rebel breakoff faction, just bubbling discontentment with elaida's rule, and egwene just gets kidnapped straight into the tower and becomes amyrlin from there?" but then i saw that rafe confirmed there is a cut scene of leane, verin, and ryma heading off with a group of other aes sedai to found salidar, so scratch that whole theory haha we are indeed still getting salidar and the rebels. but he said that the scene had them planning to gather "on the shores of the river where siuan was born", which means the rebel base will likely be moved to tear in the show.

if this cut scene was planned for s3, that seems to imply there is not going to be a tower battle and it was simply some sisters voluntarily leaving. we'll see how it plays out in s4, but min's viewing about a battle in the tower could very well be the future seanchan attack rather than the coup battle. i wouldn't mind that since a coup battle could feel repetitive with the 3x01 tower battle, but it does make me curious how gawyn's arc might play out since the coup battle was a pivotal moment for him in the books (though the show hasn't set up for that at all, so we're probably looking at a pretty new arc for him regardless, at least in the short-term).

off to tanchico. nynaeve's block breaking scene was wonderful, but outside of that, it feels like this poor crew was just off on a sidequest all season and didn't accomplish much. mat's doorway trip was fun but felt like a random sidenote in a packed episode, and now that the season is over i can firmly say that mat did not get a satisfying season-long arc and it felt like he was just There most of the time. his memories were his driving trigger for the season but they weren't brought up basically at all between 3x03 and him asking to get rid of them in the doorway, which makes them feel more like a plot device than something that was actively impacting him season-long. there was big setup for the mat-nynaeve dynamic in the early episodes, but it fizzled out in the back half and nothing meaningful came of it and nynaeve didn't get to do anything to help mat like she'd promised. it absolutely feels like mat just got plot-deviced out of the waste storyline because they wanted rand to feel isolated, rather than because leaving that storyline actually contributed anything to MAT'S story. they say they like to vary up the relationship dynamics season to season, but once again it's a whole season of mat-min with each of them only getting brief interactions with elayne and nynaeve. i need mat and min to get separated next season oh my god i loved their vibe in s2 but i am tired of it now! please don't do a third season of it! let them hang out with other people for once! YES i am VERY bitter over min being the one to take over the cauthor cpr lmao (and of course the second mat's cpr-giver is switched to a woman you have several people going "wait are they setting up a romance here?" when none of them said so when rand was the one doing it in the book version! though thankfully the show itself continues to remain firm in the platonic nature of mat & min even if heteronormative viewers are constantly desperate to read romance there. oh how i mourn a vision of cauthor cpr with show!mat being like "wow rand if you wanted to kiss me you could've just asked" because you know show!mat would 100% say that to rand as well haha)

we'll see what they do with liandrin, but i wish she'd been killed off this season. she was a great early-series villain, but has now overstayed her welcome for me and i wish she'd gotten cleared off the stage. i don't mind ending this plotline on a loss with the collar & bracelets winding up in the bad guys' hands (i'd been expecting it), but if we'd at least vanquished liandrin and left moggy as the new big bad, that would have helped this plotline feel like it got more resolution and like it accomplished something. nynaeve breaking her block, while a wonderful scene, wasn't enough to carry the full narrative climax of this entire season-long plotline (especially since there wasn't REALLY that much setup for her breaking her block, just the one line from the seafolk about how her problem is not being able to let go and go with the flow, though i do like that they used that metaphor to set up for her water-based block breaking scene). then again, there literally wasn't TIME for liandrin to get vanquished because they had too much to do this episode.

as i'd speculated a while back, elayne casually mentioned gaebril to thom and he was like "um who the fuck?" and so now elayne knows that a forsaken is holding power in caemlyn. nice! this was a great way to justify thom's return to the story: he contributes something important that only he could contribute, because his history with the trakand family helps point our gang towards the whereabouts of a forsaken.

caemlyn is now teed up to be a big focus in s4, so i would expect that resolution to come next season, unless something happens to significantly delay elayne, but as of now, she's primed to have helping her mom & country as Priority #1. she also has a balefire rod in her possession, which could lead to her being the one to balefire rahvin instead of rand. i definitely want elayne to take part in defeating rahvin, but i hope rand can still be involved in some capacity! and as much as i like the idea of elayne doing the balefiring, i would be soooooo sad if yet another iconic cauthor (& avirand) moment (rand being so distraught over their deaths that he reverses time to save them) was taken from me haha i will have to hope that elayne, rand, avi, and mat can all be involved and i can get some kind of avimatrandlayne rights out of it, however the specifics might turn out.

over to the waste. rand picking the squashes to meet his toh to alsera!!!! but i think i groaned out loud when it was egwene who came to see him in that moment instead of aviendha lmao i am SO disappointed that we didn't get any avirand interaction this episode! they were completely shafted in favor of randgwene & randfear during their own Main Storyline and i don't think i'll ever get over it, though i hope s4 can bring them some good stuff to semi make up for it (like, i wasn't expecting any out-and-out romance between them for s3 once it became clear that randgwene was lingering, but at least stronger relationship development and a deeper emotional connection by the end of the season than what we got). i'd hoped we would get a nice moment this episode to tie off their arc of rand proving himself to avi*, but instead all we get is avi telling egwene about what a terrible partner rand would make for anyone. okay. cool. We Who Know can interpret this as avi trying to dissuade herself from rand as much as trying to dissuade egwene, but to the show-only audience, it accomplishes nothing but throwing them even further off the scent of avirand (which they were never on to begin with because nothing in this season sets up for it unless you already know it's coming) and therefore making it so that they'll be even more bewildered when avirand starts becoming a thing.

(*we DID see avi willingly kneeling to him as car'a'carn, so we can conclude that she accepts him now, but i would've liked a more personal acceptance moment between them one-on-one too. maybe next season. also, her wonder when he made it rain was very sweet <3)

this season has really been hammering on how rand probably isn't in a place where he should date anyone thanks to his destiny etc, so idk how they're going to swerve into him joining a polycule (and a polycule with his messy-breakup-ex's BFF + a woman who knows all about the messy breakup and disparaged rand to egwene about it). so far, they're making it a lot harder for themselves than it needed to be, and my impression that avirandlayne development/seed-planting is getting sacrificed in favor of beating the randgwene dead horse and that it feels like the show cares a lot more about randgwene than about avirandlayne still remains strong after having seen the whole season.

but now time to link this wonderful josha interview! it contains full season spoilers and full book spoilers, because he is a spoiler-loving king who never makes any attempt to censor himself. one of the things he says here in response to whether rand has closed himself off from love after randfear and randgwene is along the lines of "i think he doesn't trust himself to love again, but i know he will do so anyway because it's just who he is" and then he talks about how in the books it's rand's capacity for love that ultimately helps him win. josha's answer is talking about love in general and not necessarily romantic love, but regardless, very very sweet answer that shows his deep understanding of the character and gives me hope for getting well-done avirandlayne in the future! my other two favorite parts of the interview were 1) the reveal that all the "what does the prophecy say?" dialogue in the alsera scene was not scripted and josha came up with it himself and 2) he says Definitely Mat as the ta'veren boy who's the best at talking to girls jdkfjgh extremely randcore to always think mat is The Best Ever and go "well of course mat is the best at talking to girls!" when mat has spent the entire show trying and failing to get laid. i'm going to take my crumb of a cauthor right wherever i can find it since i barely got any in the season!

okay, back to the episode. i loved all of rand's stuff! his confrontation with lanfear where he finally gets to push back on her narrative was A+, i loved his conversation with moiraine, and of course his alcair dal moments were wonderful and he looked very sexy in that sleeveless shirt with the tattoos out. his rain channeling was so beautiful!! again, i do feel like we might be hammering on the "soul of fire, heart of stone" stuff and whatnot a little too much too soon considering that rand still has to be in a good enough headspace to form two whole new romantic relationships, but we DO see a contrast with him very calm and in control of himself, despite egwene's worry, compared to the more unhinged moments he'd had earlier in the season, so hopefully going into s4 he'll be in a place where he's more emotionally stable yet also not so Cold And Hard yet that he's not open to new love. (though ending randgwene on such an ominous and mistrustful note is going to make it a haaaaard sell to the audience that elayne & avi can wind up dating rand and that won't be doing egwene wrong or anything. but if there's a timeskip, maybe we can pick up with rand & egwene getting along better and being friendly, even if there's still a distance between them. still, i wish they'd gotten to clear the air a LITTLE bit during the squash scene while they had a chance to talk one-on-one.)

egwene didn't really have anything in the finale. not mad about it since she had such a big time to shine in s2 and was naturally going to take a backseat in s3, but it does feel like her s3 story was exclusively rand-centric and like she could have gotten more For Herself if they'd just broken up in 3x01.

not much for avi either, very sad about that since i'd hoped the show would give me more on her TSR character arc than the books did, not less. but they are unfortunately hampered by TV's stricter (compared to books) Cast Tiers, i think; story-wise, i'd say avi should be the third most important character in the TSR waste story after rand and moiraine, or even arguably above moiraine for #2, but in the show, rand, moiraine, lan, and egwene are all a Character Tier above avi and so they have to have a bigger role than her even if the story of returning to her homeland and people naturally calls for her more than it calls for some of them.

lan got his conclusion with melindhra as expected, not much to say on that. i like that they made it so that melindhra genuinely IS loyal to him and malkier and feels bad enough about it to betray her dark oaths, rather than keeping it as a full betrayal.

and finally, the moiraine vs. lanfear fight, which got hyped up big time but then ended in a draw, so i did feel pretty edged! like liandrin, this is a place where i raise my eyebrow over characters seeming to overstay their narrative welcome. are they setting up for the doorway confrontation to happen next season, or are they planning to alter the story and keep moiraine and/or lanfear around longer than they were in the books? i don't care for either option as much as i would have for them simply doorway-ing each other or otherwise finishing each other off in this episode. because if it's option #1, then we spent a whole season building up a conflict that we're just going to have to repeat the buildup for again next season (though if lanfear is now fully at odds with our gang rather than precarious allies with both moiraine & lanfear, that might help it feel different enough). if it's option #2, moiraine is going to continue eating up screentime and narrative importance that needs to be going to rand and the other kids at this stage in the story. she was a great character to center the early story around, but i'm sorry, she has to go in order to create space for the kids to leave the nest and come into their own. although, i wouldn't be mad if she stayed on as rand's permanent advisor and cadsuane was cut (but that doesn't feel likely given all the cadsuane namedropping; but maybe cadsuane could appear but in a different role/storyline) since cadsuane basically does nothing but be a walmart knockoff moiraine, so i suppose we could just keep moiraine - but only if they let her step fully back into the role of a secondary character, which is unlikely since rosamund is the biggest name in the cast and they'd probably want to give her a primary role as long as she's in the show. so i don't know, i feel like we do need to fully exit moiraine at some point, but we shall see.

oh also, sammael died! i completely forgot lmao rip my dude! it feels kinda wasteful to introduce a whole forsaken only to kill him immediately when there's only 8 of them to go around in the first place (now down to 6), but moggy offing him IS a great way of showing just how divided the forsaken are, so if sammael's death can help bulk up the surviving forsaken into even bigger threats, then no harm no foul.

ann ogbomo never appeared, so either she had a scene that ended up getting cut, or wotseries was wrong on her being part of the show (which would be mildly surprising since i don't think they've ever wrongly said that an actor was part of the show before, but when it comes to leaks there's always risk of course). so much for the theory of a semirhage finale stinger scene! we'll have to keep waiting to see when she and the seanchan might enter the stage.

i do have solid hopes for a cauthor reunion in s4! i'd thought they could begin a seanchan invasion of tanchico and leave it open-ended if mat escapes or not and then make that decision in 4x01 according to whether they need to follow the long or short model for the show, but now mat is firmly on a ship with the others headed off to their next destination. there could always be time for the ship to get intercepted or mat otherwise separated from the group, but for now it feels safe to assume that mat is sticking with them, and i find it the most likely that they will meet up with rand's group in tear (to warn rand about the collar and/or to hunt moggy & liandrin who are hunting rand). caemlyn is also a Desired Destination for them of course, but i'd think elayne would want to lie low, gather information, and come up with a plan first, and tear would be a good place to do that since she has a trusted family friend there (per 3x01).

in addition, if the location of the rebel base is moved over to tear, then that puts another Character Group in that area and is all the more reason (out-of-world) for nynaeve & co to definitely be headed there (since whether they follow their book plot of linking up with the rebels or a show-only plot of linking up with rand & co, it's in the same general area and so they could probably hang out with both groups if desired).

this seems to leave us with 3 major locations for s4: tear (rand & co, nynaeve & co, rebels); caemlyn (morgase & rahvin, elayne eventually, maybe perrin & co for his trial plotline?); the white tower (elaida & co)

hopefully, if we get more condensation of Story Groups, then s4 won't feel stretched as thin as s3 did. 3 main groups would be more manageable than 4, even if it's still a lot of characters within each group.

random mat notes since he's apparently the character whose s4 story i'm most concerned with haha (and s4 should be his time to get his Focal Episode anyway!):

rafe confirmed on instagram that they have plans for the band of the red hand. couladin escaped alive (rather than being killed by rand at alcair dal as a couple people had speculated). hopefully, this will lead to mat rejoining rand's plotline, taking part in the battle against the shaido, and forming the band. this would be a wonderful choice of event to center a Focal Mat Episode around, if you ask me!

mat got his medallion for sure, and i missed it but eagle-eyed viewers pointed out that he got the ashandarei too and that's what he's hanging off of. however, he has not gotten his prophecies - will there be a second doorway trip in store for him, or will his prophecies simply not be in the show? i wouldn't mind either way. they did show a good number of doorways in the finn realm that i'm guessing each correspond to one in the real world, so they've given themselves freedom to stick another IRL doorway anywhere they want in addition to the tanchico & white tower ones we've already seen.

then there's the question of mat's memories. he starts with too many memories and ends up with not enough, which is the opposite of his book progression, so i'm puzzled for now, but will wait and see what they're planning to do with this. but i'd been so glad the show had avoided mat losing some of his own memories because that makes me too sad, so i'm heartbroken that that's now the case after all and even more heartbroken because i'm guessing the show might make him forget important things that will make me sad! vs. the books just telling us that mat has holes in his memory but he never actually seems to be missing anything important. at least he clearly remembers min and their relationship even if he forgets how he got where he is, so hopefully that means his memories of his friends and loved ones will be more or less intact and it'll just be little snippets missing here and there. if he forgets his sisters i swear-

update: i just saw a good theory that the finn interpreted mat's problem as having too many memories for one person and "fixed" him by taking away enough memories to leave him with a normal amount of memories, but said normal amount is just a mix between horn & his own memories, and the amount they took away was likewise an indiscriminate mix. i buy that! if so, that means we don't need to do any more Mat Memory Fuckery, just adjust to the fact that he's lost some memories from his own life in addition to some of the unwanted horn memories.

okay, that's all the initial thoughts off the top of my head. this episode was fine, but in my eyes, 2x08 was unquestionably a better season finale and a better hour of television and i'm baffled by all the readers who hated on 2x08 so hard and are now saying 3x08 is the best finale episode by far. what standards are you using to judge that? definitely not the same ones i'm using! heck, i'd even heretically say that 1x08 is in some ways a better season finale than 3x08 since every main character (well, bar mat and lan for real-world production issue reasons) got a moment to shine and a meaningful conclusion to their season-long character arc, everything had enough time to breathe, and no character or storyline felt like an afterthought. but, of course, it's just inherently easier to construct a Season Finale when all the characters are in one location participating in different aspects of one big event together, and maybe that's the very thing i'm subconsciously picking up on when i say that 3x08 didn't feel as cohesive or as well-paced as other finales.

the good news is that TSR is one if not THE densest book in the series, so hopefully future seasons will have an easier time managing to fit everything they want to include inside the 8-episode structure.

[ladybirdswritings]

Bound - Miguel O’Hara x Reader

Summary: Miguel O’Hara was never known to be a man wanting. He was beyond content with the power surging through him upon his multiversal throne. That is until he lays his hungry eyes upon you. Now, he will do whatever it takes just for the taste of you… dark!miguel x reader fic. very steamy as always <3

Notes: I couldn’t stop myself from this hades and persephone-esque fic so I hope you enjoy!! SW&P is far lighter if you desire that <3

next chap

one

Morning is a sweet greeting to you, warm and incandescent to shine it’s rays upon soft skin. As it always is. Though you find it to be dreary on days like this, as it is the same as the day prior, and the day prior to that day. As if it is not sparkling gold but shadowing gray.

All the same repetitive waltz for you.

Yet to your unknowing mind, much would change within the quick hour. Change not in the way of little things but rather in the way that would make your toes curl and your eager hands grab your tresses so you might not trip upon them on your dash toward the tallest hills.

You would have run had you known what was to come.

Yet you didn’t; and so? Your morning was quite a bore.

Similar to a zombie are your sunken cheeks and coffee kissed eyes decorated with awful bags. Your toothbrush is made of oak as is your boar-bristled comb. You tend to your prettying before slipping away from the hustle and bustle of a lively home. Four sisters and two brothers you sport, and an overbearing woman you dare to call your mother.

You made routine of this. Sneaking away with the latest print picked up from the small shop next to the apothecary in town. Out the oak wood door and past the burnt toast and meat to cuddle yourself comfortably against your favored weeping willow by the bend.

Your only company is the ducklings these days, though you don’t mind them much. They are mostly quiet beyond the occasional quack.

Serenity became you as you lay there in the remnants of springtime’s shadow, willfully sprouted in peonies and lilac blossoms.

Your print is a work of Austen, an old and worn thing but one you’d found comfort in recently. It would be your fourth time revisiting.

Would… however.

“Oh heavens sakes! You must enjoy making your mother walk upon tousled soil, girl! Have you got half a mind!? I don’t presume so otherwise you’d avoid any possibility of me losing a leg!”

A whine like that of a carnaged cat rings out from behind the bend. In the grassy plains your mother struggles her way toward you. You stand to your feet in swift motion, but your wandering eye finds curiosity in an unfamiliar bloom. Its colors an odd pairing of red and blue unfurled toward the sun.

What an odd thing, you think.

The huffing and puffing snaps your attention center, and you nearly grumble in complaint as you hurry toward your mother.

“Mama I was just—”

“Oh save it. I see you slip out each morning, I know full well your disdain for the company of your own family… but I didn’t come here to admonish you, sweet girl. Quite the opposite in fact. I am here to ask a favor of you. It seems the cold air has made our chickens most unwilling to provide us with eggs. Won’t you go in town and gather some?”

Like the rainfall’s mist caught by breath of wind, your hopes and plans of reading in the bend till dawn have dissipated. Pursing your lips, you nod— not wanting to administer a guaranteed headache at wake of your protest.

In to town you’ll venture.

✧*̥˚ … *̥˚✧

The cobblestone is cracked underneath your boot, as it is dampened by springtime’s departured mist. You like the clicking sound, though it is most lonesome at this ungodly hour.

The house cannot be run well with lack of your aid. Father left long ago and mother is just a dreadful housewife. The doctor blames her dissonance on the ailments within her mind’s confines though— she swears herself always to be whole and well.

Regardless, for the sake of your sisters— you help. Besides this, you owe it to her.

Your basket is made of weaved wicker and adorned with crimson cloth, at the end of the cobble is where life shines proud. A more lively gathering of townsfolk in search of early morning eggs to enjoy with their breakfast.

A single carriage, outdated as the things are, surges forward in an unstable command by a young man. He cannot be past twenty three, and his face is speckled with pale freckles. His hair is a burnt orange rasp.

The stallions are dark as midnight, sweat being huffed like chimney smoke from their nostrils. Dear god, the way he commands them is certain to ensure an accident.

You tuck the thought away in to the back of your mind to be focused upon your task. You’ll need no more than a dozen or perhaps three what with the vacuum cleaner your eldest brother refers to as his mouth.

Babblebrooke, it is where you’ve lived most your orphaned life. Surely some places have technology of picture books and magazines you skim through when you are awarded the rare chance but— you find yourself content with a place so simple.

You cannot imagine a life of loudness, no quiet space to tuck away and read. It’s a frightening thought.

The stand is nearby, only a few more passing steps and you’ll reach it. Your eyes are locked on the fresh berries, but you know full well you won’t have enough for them.

A bark startles you out of your trance, one excited and pointed. You jump at the sound and turn your head to find a cocker spaniel hound circling round and round to chase its own tail. You giggle at the sight, and its chestnut ears raise in alarm at the vibration.

Oh, it’s noticed you.

The little thing hobbles over excitedly, and you cannot help but bend on your knee to brush back its silken locks.

Beyond a canvas collar of pale pink lays a heart, engraved in molten silver the title: “Lyla.”

So she belongs to someone. Such a kind thing, they are to be a lucky companion indeed.

You smooth back the hair from her excited eyes before lifting to your feet again and continuing forward. She begins to follow you, but a movement in the alleyway shadows is a matter she finds far more pressing for her attention.

“Lyla…” you test in a whisper as you make your way behind a man hunched and gray— awaiting his eggs for breakfast.

Time seems agonizing and the line moves awfully slow, you peek behind the elder man to find annoyance laced in the eyes of the townsfolk. Blaire has taken a liking to the farm boy— it seems she’s busying herself with conversing nonsense with his mother rather than picking her fresh fruits for tart pastries.

You sigh, checking the time on your cracked, golden watch with impatience brewing at the soles of your boots. You sway on them, shifting your weight forward and back. No use just staring ahead.

Though it is quite loud, it doesn’t stop you from reaching in to your tote for “Jane Eyre.”

You find your favorite part, their first midnight meeting in the hallway. How romantic it is, you only wish that to be a possibility for you one day. You forbid yourself from joining the season of course but somewhere tucked away inside— you wonder how marvelous it would be for a broody and handsome thing to appear upon your doorstep with a bouquet the size of France.

You grin at the thought. Though it is swiftly interrupted by the quick patter of familiar paws.

“Woah! Easy!”

Your head snaps up at the gasps of those around you, and you are most horrified to see that the horses have reached the steep bend mere steps away. The ginger fool, they halt in warning and he kicks at them— slapping them with a russet pole. They comply, and the carriage loses control.

It creaks, hurling forward and disconnecting from its rusted shell. Tumbling at godspeed down the cobble and straight for little Lyla who lays mindlessly and happily on her back now.

Panic surges, and your eyes find worry in everyone’s features and yet no motive to act alongside it. Such cowardly men, allowing the poor thing to succumb to the bite of freak nature and cruel fate.

You won’t allow it. Though you feel frozen, the sharp and desperate shout of “Lyla!” from a phantom voice is enough to snap you back into the most horrible moment present.

“Christ!” You breathe, tossing Jane Eyre to the sapphire sky before surging forward. The carriage stalls on a pebble for a quick moment and it’s enough time for you to beat it by a mere step. You scoop the silly thing into your arms and as the wheel just grazes your skin— it is you now that is saved from immediate death.

A warm hand tugs at your wrist and you’re certain the brick wall has grown awfully large palms and fingers; for what you slam up against is hard and unpleasant.

You grunt, Lyla yelping in surprise where she is tucked up tightly against your chest.

Whistles and claps overtake the coward crowd and you sway upon your own boots as the wind itself makes you unsteady with its light graze. Firm palms steel you, grasping your shoulders tight to keep you together and well.

Your eyes venture on an upward path to find two crimson pupils imploring your features as if they are etched in stone and stored away in a beloved museum somewhere in Rome.

Brows pinched and quite bushy, eyes cold but curious, his reddened orbs search your face for what feels like a millennium. Fascinated.

Awed.

You blink, and the cry of the sweet creature in your arms breaks the trance you were entangled in. Lyla leaps from your arms and onto the cobble path— and you only huff and reach a weak arm toward her before the exhaustion of a skipped meal and your adrenaline fueled actions bring you to sit on the cobble ground.

He kneels beside you, the stranger. Yet you cannot find yourself mustering enough energy to truly examine his face. Just his eyes, rare things they are.

“She’ll be alright.” He whispers, hands still pleasantly upon your shoulders as if he fears you’ll topple over and shatter once he parts.

When you do lift your gaze however, stricken curious by the sickly silken sound of his voice, he’s gone.

“Thank y-”

The word croaks in your throat, and you can only wonder how it was possible… how quickly the phantom left you upon the cobble. The farm boy rushes over soon, much to the demise of poor Blaire. She stares on at the carriage and ginger man as if she wishes it was her nearly trampled.

He hands you fresh water and berries, and you wave his concern away and the crowd’s curiosity with a weak hand.

Your mind is only glued upon one thing.

The phantom.

🏷️’s: @reirain @needybitez @migueloharastruelove @laysmt @maomaimao @daisy-artfield @poutysprouty @chorizobeets @tabalittlelong @iitangerine @queenb27sblog-blog @dprmooni @neptunieesworld @cyd2301 @amelialysm @justanothers-things @heartfeltlonging @coralreefses @knightowl019 @cybersry

[stillnotyourmusebitch]

AAAGH I loved your sinner!Adam fic about him and Reader watching TV together 🥺

I heard you take sinner!Adam requests so is it okay to have a sort-of part 2? Maybe watching movies became a regular thing between them and one time they end up kissing during one? If you find it repetitive and don't want to it's totally okay, I understand! I hope you have a nice day and keep up with the good work 🥹

Oh I loved writing this. The fic below is a sequel to this ficlet

I do hope that you liked it. I'm always worried I've made him too ooc but Sinner!Adam is fanon based atm and if he is wanting redemption he would change his ways.

So Urm yeah enjoy. . . .

What we watching?? Sinner!Adam x GN!reader

Fluffy af

That night watching trashy romcoms with Adam could have just been a one off thing and you would’ve been fine with it. But when he approached you in the communal kitchens the next morning with a proposition to make ‘Thursday film night’ a regular thing between the two of you. You had asked him why. He said that hanging out with you yesterday was one of the most fun things he had done in a long time. You smiled fondly at him before agreeing.

-

As Thursday night rolled around again. You were looking forward to sharing some more of your favourite films with Adam. He’d said he would be there by 6ish. You glance at the time on your phone. It was only 6.05pm. He’s probably just running late after the one on one session with Charlie.

An easy way to keep your mind busy was dragging out all your blankets and making a sort of nest type thing on the floor by the couch. You used to do this with your family when you were alive. It just made the movie marathons all that more special. After seeing how far Adam had come since arriving at the hotel. You had really wanted to show him how much he meant to you.

‘Wait, as a friend.’ You stopped mid cushion grab. You liked him as only a friend right? Right?

Your door burst open and slammed shut very quickly Adam was only 45 minutes late, you looked up seeing him breathing hard, carting an armload of snacks, drinks and a few bowls of things.

“There you . . .” he shushes you looking frantically at the closed door. “What did you do?” You whisper as you crawl onto the couch.

A far off loud shouting could be heard in the silence. He waited a minute more before letting out a breath.

“It wasn’t my fault honest.” He looked extremely guilty. You quirked a brow wanting an explanation. “I was trying to make my super awesome dip for our movie night but I maaaaaay have made a really big mess but I didn’t mean to, I just tripped over that cleaner chick who was chasing more of them roaches. This hotel must have an infestation or she is breeding them just to kill. Oh wait, I’m getting off point, the thing is I might have made too much of the dip than I intended and I kinda launched half of it onto another patron. But it wasn’t my fault. This time at least.” He frantically spoke as he juggled the drinks and snacks about in his arms before depositing them carefully on the coffee table. Standing back up he turned and looked down at what you were making. “What’s that?” He points to the accumulated amount of cushions, blankets and other soft furnishings piled on the floor.

“Well, the thing is.” You hopped off the couch into the nest trying to act like it wasn’t a big deal. How were you supposed to explain the reason behind it without him laughing at you? “You know what it’s stupid let me just . . .” You felt shame rush to your cheeks as you tried to dismantle the obviously stupid idea.

“Hey, I didn’t say it was a bad thing. Looks comfy as fuck. Budge up would ya.” You hopped out as he set himself down in the dead center of the nest, keeping his legs open slightly to give you a place to sit. Last week he really liked having you snuggled up close to him, why did you think this week would be any different.

You chose the first movie and plopped yourself down in the space he left for you, his arms wrapping around your middle pulling you flush against his chest.

“So what we watching?”

-----

“I have a question do all of these movie have the same premise?” Adam asked after about 15 minutes into the third film.

“Whatdya mean?” You say through a mouthful of chips.

“Like . . hang on pause the film a sec.” He fumbles for the remote to stop the movie. You shuffle a bit to see him better. “Like don’t get me wrong they’re good films, a bit cliché but surely the lead woman knows that the ‘Oh I’m a famous something or other I have no time for a man’” his fake high pitched womanly voice had you laughing. “Hey shush let me finish my thought.”

“But you make such a good woman.” You poke at his chest playfully.

“Ah ha ha ha.” He grabs your hand in his. “But seriously shush. My point is are there any original ideas in these films?”

“You saying I got trash taste in cinema?” You try pulling your hand away from his grasp. Adam doesn’t let go but pulls you closer to him.

“What I’m saying is watching all these oblivious people who clearly have strong feelings for the other person, got me thinking.” He looks down at your hand in his. “Ya know what never mind let’s keep watching the movie.” He lets go of your hand and grabs for the remote, setting the film going again.

The whiplash from that conversation was enough to make your head spin. You stayed a second more simply looking into the face of a man who had something he wanted to say but couldn’t bring himself to do so. As you turned back in his arms to watch the movie, you could hear a small sigh of relief.

You tried to go back to watching the movie but you couldn’t. Adam only held you loosely now, choosing to focus more on grabbing snacks and sipping his soda. Your mind went into overdrive.

‘What did you do wrong?’

‘Was he mad at you?’

‘Did he . . . wait did he like you?’

You almost choked on a piece of popcorn at the realisation. Adam liked you.

Daring to flick your eyes to look at him. He was focused on the film but the soft look of longing he bore was almost too much.

“Adam?” Your voice was gentle so as not to spook him.

“Mmmyeah?” He was still watching the screen.

You grabbed the remote and paused the TV again.

“Hey, it was getting to a good part.” He looked down at you annoyed. “What. Is there something on my face?” He touches his face trying to feel for any irregularity. “Hey, say something you’re freaking me. mmmf” You pulled him down by his shirt and kissed him. He froze against your lips.

‘Shit was I wrong?’

You move to pull away. But his hands cup your face pulling you back into a tender kiss that makes you melt into his touch. The kiss lasted no longer than 5 seconds but you didn’t care you felt like your entire body was floating.

“I’ve wanted to do that for so long.” He spoke softly as he broke the kiss. “Can I kiss you again?” he asked hopefully.

“Yes.” Your words were barely a whisper but it was all he needed to pull you back against him, he kissed you in such a tender way that made your heart flutter in your chest. You didn’t realise he was capable of such gentility but you craved more of it. Your hands carded into his hair, being careful of his horns, as one of his hands went to cradle the back of your head, effectively tilting your head to allow him to deepen the kiss. His other hand moved to your lower back, fingers gripping the fabric of your shirt. The kiss had an undertone of heat laced in the movements of your joined lips.

You broke the kiss panting slightly, you noted his pupils were dilated slightly as you were sure yours mirrored back.

You had to slow this down now before you regretted anything.

“Adam.” Your voice low in warning. “As much as I enjoy kissing you. Can we take whatever this is a little slower?”

You expected him to whine or pout about being told no. but he just smiles goofily at you. Swiping a thumb over your lower lip.

“Sure thing.” He kisses your forehead before helping you settle back against him the way your were before. He picked up the remote “Ready to continue?”

You weaved your fingers with his other hand and nodded “Ready.”

--------

I hope this is what you wanted.

My ask box is still open if anyone else got requests

[fandom-is-my-drug]

I’ve read a lot of fanfics in my time, but it’s been a while since I’ve done a full read through of Uncle Rick’s series, and the only book I don’t have is The Sun and Star (I think) so if I leave anything out let me know.

One of the most interesting things I noticed in Uncle Rick’s stories is the power levels of different demigods. Most demigods in old myths never stepped foot in the Underworld, much less hoped to survive it, beyond a few who had pretty massive amounts of godly help (Hermes with Orpheus, Herakles with Hera, etc.) to get through the journey.

And yet multiple people not only survived the journey, but also did it multiple times, including but not limited to:

Percy (twice, once with pearls and once with Nico)

Grover (with pearls)

Annabeth (with pearls)

Nico (an undisclosed amount of time including with a ghostly half-sister in tow)

Hazel (with help as one of the undead)

Sally (as a kidnapping victim)

A good list of demigods who likely died and came back all on their own while Thanatos was chained

Thalia (while with Nico and Percy)

And while, yes, all of these examples are either because of massive problems on the godly side, or because they are/were accompanied by a Big Three kid (which is BS that Hestia, Hera, and Demeter aren’t included in “they have super crazy powerful kids” despite only Demeter having kids), it doesn’t take away from the fact that it’s happening more often.

“But Nick, like you said, those are major influences that’s helping these guys get out of the Underworld. It’s just relevant to the plot!”

Fair enough, but now here’s the next point: Tartarus.

Basically, Rick’s Greek world essentially functions as such:

While I don’t think Eris is confirmed to exist in Tartarus (again I haven’t read The Sun and Star), Nyx is, and since Nyx is darkness and Eris is light, it makes sense they exist on the same plane (either beneath Tartarus or coexisting with it) despite both being a concept for all planes except arguably Chaos, which is why I put it on the same level as well.

There are various creation myths, but the overarching plot is: There is Something, that Something creates Others, and this Others become known as Primordials, which make their own Others, such as Titans, Giants, Gods, etc. The creations make essentially layers on Earth, similar to the actual layers of the Earth.

Think of it like this:

And when new beings are made that take over for the last generation (like Helios and Apollo), then those layers get kinda funky.

So, back to Tartarus. Obviously you have 3 separate “Underworlds”, one for deities (like with Python in Trials of Apollo), one for monsters, and one for mortals. Each of these places is built to recycle beings, similar to the idea of Conservation of Energy and Conservation of Matter. Not only that, but upper level beings can’t (or at least shouldn’t) go below their respective underworld, but lower level beings can’t go up, which is why monsters can go up to the Underworld and Gaea but a human can’t go down into the Underworld or Tartarus without dying.

So this is why demigods surviving Tartarus is crazy work. Sure, there are demigods that can become monsters or gods and survive the trip, but just your average demigod? They’re dead on sight. Between the poison air, the aggressive terrain, no food, no water, monsters being reborn in every direction, etc., survival is slim to none.

Except now we have instances of people surviving the fall and the climb back up, with a questionable amount of sanity intact. Will, Nico (twice), Annabeth, and Percy (you can include Apollo if you like) all survived the fall and came back still kicking, and noticeably not monsters.

So what’s my point?

There’s a common repetition of myth for the Greeks, and that’s the death of the father by their son. Ouranos was killed by Kronos and his siblings. Kronos was killed by Zeus and his siblings. The point is that Rick’s version of the Greeks is approaching the death of Zeus, and the crowning of a new King (if we’re following by patriarchal standards). It’s definitely not going to happen anytime soon, but Big Three kids like Percy and Nico and just your average demigod like the Seven is proof of this. And do you want to know WHY demigods are only going to get more powerful from here?

Because the gods are slowly and indirectly creating their own demise, as had their predecessors. But unlike their predecessors, their downfall will come from not looking in the right direction, instead of thinking they have complete control. Zeus isn’t stupid, and he knows his shit. He’s well aware that he only survived being swallowed because Rhea gave Kronos a rock, because he wasn’t paying attention. Kronos was prideful and believed that he was loved enough that no one would dare defy him, because he wasn’t paying attention the one who saved them. Zeus knows that being ignorant of who is and isn’t against him would be his downfall, so he locks the fuck in. Kronos, while well known for his ability to control time, ruled over the Harvest as well, making him a more Gaea-bound deity. So Zeus chooses the sky. Instead of simply believing in people, he overlooks them, watching them, judging them. He is the God of Justice, after all, so the job title includes the role of “Judge, Jury, and Executioner”.

“But isn’t Olympus a democracy, Nick? Athens was a democracy too, so Zeus wouldn’t be the one in sole power!”

Nope! Well, yes, it is a democracy, but just not a democracy in the way it’s supposed to be. In Athens, they were technically a democracy, but only for those who were rich, powerful, and close to the inner circle of politicians. The building that housed the voting in Athens let people in on a first-come-first-serve basis, so only people who had the time to include themselves and the money to live so close to the place where votes are casted had the power, and on top of that, their politics were wild. One person got a vote, obviously, but it’s like goddamn Survival over there. They made groups and all discussed what went down and who to fucking vote off the island. I’m not joking, they actually did that.

So Zeus consolidated power into a small group of 12, playing it as a “democracy” when in reality those who do not follow him are punished or replaced. Hestia was kicked out for Dionysus, for example, and Apollo was made human, for another. So yeah, it’s a “democracy” in the same way someone gets cohersed into giving consent: it’s not actually real, just driven by fear.

On top of that, they literally have Hephestus TV! They watch their subjects for fun. You cannot tell me Zeus didn’t set up that particularly entertaining baby cam for no reason. He ate Leto! He’s not above being the magical version of the Chaos Council from Sonic Prime.

So in order to create a being capable of overthrowing Zeus, you have to do it slowly, subtly, and have his gaze averted. He has to be focusing on something else. That’s how Luke managed to nearly overthrow him, because he was so focused on 12-year-old Percy Jackson, Son of Poseidon, then someone so minuscule as Luke Castellan, Son of Hermes. He likes to think he’s got it all figured out, thinking that the one who chooses whether Olympus is going to survive or fall must be one of the Big Three’s children. He ignores bigger details and problems in favor of focusing on one small thing. Percy’s birthday was a prophecized stopwatch, and really nothing more.

How would the gods be able to manufacture such a danger to Zeus’s reign when he supervises everything? They don’t manufacture anything at all, at least not on purpose.

“Nick, what the fuck? You’re making no sense.”

HEAR ME OUT.

Our first example of this is our lovely Frank Zhang. Both a demigod and a Legacy, he has power like we haven’t seen unless provided by a shape-shifting god (such as Loki with Alex). Despite being a Son of Mars, who, alongside Ares, have children who’s main god-given skill is “fights good”, he has the ability to shapeshifting and keep up with powerhouses like Percy, Hazel, and Jason. Sure, you could argue that Clarisse can keep up with Percy well enough, but not to the extent of Frank. He has the blood of multiple gods stacked onto one another, helping him have the power to survive the quest to stop Gaea.

Another is Leo Valdez. Poor boy got the attention of a literal Primordal being at a young age, and also managed to kill said Primordal being with his own fire powers, and lived to tell the tale. In the past, that required an elaborate plot to lure the Primordal away from their domain and slice them to pieces, but Leo just did it with a dragon and two other demigods, and incinerated Gaea. Please tell me you understand how absolutely insane that is!

Piper McClean managed to break down Charmspeak into its basic concepts, and understood how it worked well enough to gaslight a Primordal, and before that she had the strongest charmspeak in the room alongside her siblings.

Jason Grace took down a Giant more or less on his own with little to no help from a god, and can take control of wind spirits that don’t even belong to his father’s domain. He’s Hera’s (or Juno, I guess) champion, and she could have chosen Thalia, but she didn’t. She chose Jason. Jason is a full-sibling to Thalia, only divided by pantheons. Having full-siblings is almost entirely unheard of, with only a handful of mortals able to seduce powerful gods not once, but twice, like with Bianca and Nico. That takes INSANE work.

Hazel has the power not only detect precious metals, but also curse them, and channel that power into raising a whole Giant, something that can only happen in Tartarus. She escaped the Underworld after having already died and lost her memories.

Percy is, I’m just going to say it, absolutely insane. He beat The God of WAR in a fight. At 12. He set off a volcano summoning water out of seashells and a stupid idea. He held up the Sky, something that was purposely held up by 4 pillars and later the Titan of Strength for a reason. He survived Tartarus and Polybotes and stole the domain of another goddess. It’s one thing to utilize the abilities bestowed on you by your parent and make them your own, but he stole another bitch’s domain! And used it against her! And probably would have killed her too if Annabeth hadn’t snapped him out of it! You CAN’T tell me that this man isn’t the beginning of the end for the gods.

And my MOST POWERFUL POINT HERE: goddamn Annabeth Chase. Yeah, you know all that batshit insane stuff Percy did? Annabeth was right there next to him. Holding the sky, Tartarus, the Athena Parthenos (which is known to be killing off Athena kids since forever) etc. What’s even more insane is that Athena doesn’t give her kids powers. Athena kids’ abilities are “smart”, and wtf does that mean??? It makes everything Annabeth does all the more impressive and terrifying. The rest of the Seven are powerhouses so strong they can take on Giants, and then you have Annabeth with her knife and spite, and she not only keeps up, but she’s a role model. The other demigods look to her for guidance!

But it gets crazier. You know how I said the gods are creating their own demise hidden in plain sight? Yeah, Annabeth is that “plain sight”. Percy, for all his power and abilities, is the distraction. People like Annabeth are who Zeus really has to look out for. Remember how I said that full-blooded siblings are rare and crazy to even fathom? The Chase Family makes it worse.

How the flying fuck did they manage to bag not one, not two, but three different deities attentions?! What are those Chases on to get so much godly attention?! Not to mention it’s cross pantheon! Frey, Loki, and Athena, we’re drawn in by something, and it’s not your normal godly infatuation.

In a small blurb of a story, Percy and Annabeth meet the Kanes, and while I haven’t read Kane Chronicles (I have the series just haven’t gotten to it yet), they say that cross-pantheon magic is quite literally the strongest way to K.O. your enemies. So the four of them swap items, with Percy getting possessed by a vulture goddess. Why am I bring this up? Because these very points are why the Chases are terrifying.

They’re an active site of cross-pantheon activity, which is why Magnus and Annabeth are so powerful all on their own. Magnus has been watched over for years because of his role in Ragnarok, and was specifically requested by Odin himself to be taken to Valhalla despite being a nature demigod. And not only does Magnus survive there as a nature demigod in an entire afterlife full of war demigods, he thrives. He’s never held a sword in his life, and his main powers are healing and trying to convince plants to grow, and yet he manages to delay Ragnarok for a long, long time.

People like Annabeth, Magnus, and Frank are obvious points in this evolution of power, and they fly under Zeus’s radar almost entirely.

So that’s my Rant. Something that’s been bubbling in my head for a long time really, but I never had a place for it until now. It’s likely that we have such powerful demigods now compared to the old myths because of godly blood mixing in with humans after so long, and then that godly blood, especially when enhanced by other pantheons, starts to draw deities in more and more. So that’s how Zeus gets his ass kicked.

[auuwmk]

Re: your tags on that orv post. I was a big ol solo leveling hater before I got into orv. I had rants about what I thought didn't work for the story, I had beef with the characters, I was adamant that I only enjoyed the manhwa for the art, so on and so on. a friend recommended orv to me Because I'd read SL so I went in bracing myself and not only did I love it, it also made me start thinking differently about SL and a lot of other stories I'd panned up until then as cliche or repetitive or boring or whatever else. orv legitimately changed the way I engage with fiction to something WAY more positive and it has been a trip and a half to experience

Anon is referring to this post

I've never actually read solo levelling and only watched the anime but i can see why people enjoy it even if it isn't my cup of tea🥺🥺 There's no harm in letting people like what they like!! Seriously, i also think orv makes me engage in media differently cause if it was me from before reading orv i would've ragged about it too. And let's be honest, kdj would've loved sl too!!

I'm so glad orv changed both of our ways, anon. All stories are worth telling and i think that's beautiful 🥹🥹

[luxheroica]

I wrote Wyll/Karlach, inspired by this art. I have been shipping them hard for months and knew I needed to contribute to the ship in some way. Also on AO3.

Tonight the camp is drunk on success and copious amounts of wine. There is still hardship and danger on the road ahead, not least for those who still bear the tadpoles in their heads. For tonight the goblins are gone and the druids ritual halted, the wine is sweet and the fire bright and that is enough to banish thoughts of darkness ahead. 

The bard Alfira has struck up a string of country dances on her lute, the kind of songs played at festivals and weddings for all to join. Wyll, in good humor and more than incidentally tipsy, joins the first one– a circle dance that has him linking arms with Lia on his left and Zorru on his right as they careen faster and faster around the roaring bonfire. 

There is something liberatory about dancing among the tieflings. None of them stare at his horns (still heavy on his head) or his strange eyes, instead taking them in stride. 

Wyll is the only one among the group that he has privately begun to think of as ‘companions’ to join the dance. Tav snuck off some time ago to find a private tent with Gale. Astarion is skulking around somewhere with a bottle of wine. Lae’zel scorned the idea of any revelry and has gone to bed, and Shadowheart in rare sympatico with the gith has also retired early. 

He is surprised not to see Karlach among the party– until he turns and sees her at the edge of the firelight, drinking out of a flask and watching the dancing, her feet tapping along with the music. 

The song comes to an end with a repetition that is so fast it nearly has all of them tripping over their own feet. Wyll has to catch his breath when at last the lute sings out its last note, and the gathered tieflings break out in applause. 

He excuses himself from the fireside and finds Karlach, who tips her drink at him and nods when he approaches. 

“You don’t wish to join the dancing?”

“Oh, ah,” Karlach shifts on her feet. She’s always in motion, he’s noticed, whether she’s fidgeting or pacing around the camp. “I don’t really feel like setting anybody on fire tonight. Plus I don’t know any of the dances.” As if sensing she’s brought the mood down she grins at Wyll. “You looked like you were having fun though.” 

“It was quite fun,” Wyll says, eyeing Karlach, who is watching the firelight circle with half an eye. “Most of these dances don’t have complicated steps– they’re easy to learn, if you follow what everyone else is doing you’re more than halfway there.” 

“Doesn’t solve the problem of me turning that whole line dance into kindling.” 

She’s keeping her tone light, joking and grinning, like she doesn’t really care that she can’t ever touch anyone without harming them. 

Wyll follows her lead in this. “I’ve got a nice sturdy pair of leather gloves,” he cajoles, pushing her just a little. “And Mizora’s present should make me at least a little resistant to infernal fire.” 

Karlach grins again, softening a little this time. “Don’t worry about me, soldier– I’m all left feet, you get me out there I’ll just careen into everything. Get out there and enjoy yourself.” 

Wyll doesn’t believe that– well, he does believe the part about her careening, she seems like the type to careen– but he doesn’t believe that she truly wants him to leave her to go enjoy dancing. Karlach puts up a good front, but were he in her shoes he would want nothing more than the simple things that had been so long denied him. 

He fishes in his pouch and draws out his pair of sturdy leather gloves which he slides over his hands, like a courtier drawing on his silk gloves so that he might offer a hand to a lady, then bends at the waist in his very best courtly bow. That it is a little out of practice he thinks she will forgive, especially when an irrepressible laugh burbles up out of her. 

Wyll winks, and Karlach laughs again. 

“Well, my lady?” Wyll asks. “May I have this dance.” 

She’s grinning truthfully now, as she takes his hand. There’s a bit of heat, like he might feel pulling a pan from the oven, but it’s shielded by the leather. “You may,” Karlach says, a laugh still at the back of her throat. 

Wyll pulls her towards the firelight. Careful to give her enough space that any careening won’t be a danger, but still within the flickering orange glow of it. A few of the tieflings look at them and grin when they join. There’s a new tune starting up– he knows this one, a sprightly hop meant to be danced with a single partner. 

“This one isn’t complicated, just follow my steps,” Wyll murmurs to Karlach as he begins twirling her around the fire. At first she is clumsy, all left feet as she said, but after a few turns she starts to anticipate the little skip-hop on the third beat. Wyll smiles. “There, you’re getting it.” 

Karlach shakes her head, still grinning. “You’re playing with fire, you know that right?” 

Wyll meets her eyes. Grins right back. “Wouldn’t be the first time.” He sends her out in a spin, and her laugh echoes all the way to the sky above. 

They whirl around the bonfire, until the flames become embers and the music slows and they all at last stumble off drunk and sleepy to bed. Wyll’s thick leather gloves are covered in scorch marks, but he considers it worth the sacrifice to see Karlach’s soft smile when at last the dancing finishes for the night. 

There will be danger on the morrow, but for tonight his heart is warm. 

[pebblysand]

Hi can you do me a prompt? Cause I LOVE your writing! 💗

Ginny comes home from the 2014 quidditch world cup-reporting after a long long time away from harry and kids!

did it take me two and a half years to fill this prompt? yes. as evidence that no one should ever lose hope.

.

spring rolls, pizzas and curries

.

Tonight, after she gets home - after a smiling kiss hoisted up to the corner of his mouth, tippy toes and tight hugs to the kids - after a warm shower and a change of clothes, they'll order in.

It's the end of summer, that year. Leaves wilting in the trees; the wireless runs repetitive adverts for Hallowe'en decorations and this morning, when he headed into work, Harry noticed an irreversible sort of chill in the air; when Ginny comes down later, her hair wet over her shoulders, she'll be wearing a jumper. Lily and Al will soon hound her with questions, about the World Cup and about Namibia or about something else, and James will hurry into the kitchen too, just as she will pour herself a large glass of wine. He will be loud and lanky and almost-teenage. 'Where's food?' he'll ask, then.

And: 'Well, hello, Ronald,' she will laugh. Say.

Chinese, Indian or Italian - the kids will have their pick. It's a long-standing tradition in the Potter household since the dreadful winter of '09, when James had the flu and Lily was sniffling and Harry spent five days battling family germs on his own until Ginny came back from a work trip to save them all. He tiredly sunk into the couch next to her and: 'You should have stayed there,' he observed. Sighed like a headache. 'You're gonna catch it too.'

She shrugged. Smiled. Laid her head on his shoulder. He didn't have the heart to push her away. 'Let's order in, yeah?'

Harry will phone in. Everybody's favourites memorised like the faded lines at the back of his hand. There will be noise - James arguing with Al over the TV remote, Lily talking to herself, playing with her animal figurines and toy soldiers. She's built a whole ranch with Playmobils in her bedroom: fake horses and fake cowboys and fake fences - her magic makes it all move of its own accord - it's a bit of a nightmare.

The kind of nightmare Harry doesn't mind having.

They'll eat pizza on the couch or nems from clear plastic boxes scattered across the kitchen table, and the kids will fill Ginny in on everything she missed. Lily won't stop chatting and 'Mum' this and 'Mum' that, and James will say: 'Oh, will you shut up for once?' One of them - or both of them - will automatically throw back: 'James, don't talk to your sister like that.'

There will be second servings, thirds. Harry will smile and laugh, and feel like a weight lifted off his chest the moment she opened the front door just as easily as he will later clear the plates, with a simple wave of his wand. Ginny will go up to unpack, and he'll try to convince the kids to go to bed - with moderate success. James will try to convince him he needs a new broom, with no chance of success. Al will wandlessly tie his brother's shoelaces together before quietly retreating to his bedroom, a loud tumble ensuing with his victim falling flat on his face at the top of the staircase. He will deny having done any magic the next morning.

'Prove it,' he'll say.

Harry will want to smile (like a headache, too).

And, you know, he wonders - sure - but he's not jealous. Being jealous of his own kids would be fucking weird and, anyway, he's over it, now. He's even stopped being bitter. Ginny hasn't stopped being angry but there's something almost comforting about it, about her anger and her capacity for unrelenting outrage when they sent Petunia a card last Christmas and she wrote back: Please, take me off your mailing list.

'Cunt,' she said.

He winced or cringed, he's not sure. 'Yup.'

He's not jealous - not bitter - but he does wonder. He wonders and thinks of James. So, so tiny, in Ginny's belly. The first time he felt a kick against the tips of his fingers and held his breath - like, forever. And Ginny, who asked why he couldn't sleep, that night, watched him puff cigarette smoke out the window. 'I'm nervous,' he said.

'I'm the one giving birth,' she laughed.

'What kind of father do you think I'll be?'

He thinks of James and he thinks of Tom, sometimes. His palm against the skin of her stomach was sweaty - like warm, summer nights.

And, he looks at the kids and he wonders. What it would have been like. Growing up like that.

With them, you know?

He thinks of James again. Of James and of Albus and of Lily. He wonders if they know. That he's happy. That they're happy. That he's not jealous or bitter or angry. And, that love tastes like food. Like strawberries on Ginny's lips, and spring rolls, and pizzas and curries.

[actualbampot]

Anxiety

For all you neurospicy folk that are struggling this Christmas. Have my anxiety baby, because I needed to write anything to distract me from panic-vomiting all over the train I was on.

TW: Anxious Disorder, Panic Attack

Pairing: Ruby Rose/Cinder Fall

-

“What is the matter with you?”

“Nothing.” Ruby said too quickly. Cinder looked even more unconvinced, watching her carefully. Ruby felt herself heating up and not in any way nice, a sickly flush of color from her cheeks making everything feel stifling and clammy.

“I'm fine,” she breathed a little hard, and whatever else Cinder noticed had the woman on her feet immediately. It wasn't until Cinder had taken one of her hands did Ruby realize how much it was trembling. 

Much to her surprise, Cinder guided her to the seat she'd just occupied, still warm with the heat of her body.

“Far from it, I think.” Cinder touched her face, thumb sliding over clammy skin. The repetition of the movement was oddly grounding, distracting Ruby away from the dread and dizziness making her feel nauseous, if only for a moment. “You're quite pale.”

“Yea,” Ruby gasped the word like she'd been holding it in her chest, but it was all she could manage when the tremble in her hands didn't let up, referring up over her shoulders, into her chest. All she could think about.

“Look at me, darling.” She managed to, only with the caress of Cinder's hand guiding her. She wasn't annoyed, or impatient, the creases on her brow of concern. “Don't think, just breathe.”

“I'm trying,” Ruby hiccuped, but it was getting so hard, until she couldn't stop thinking about how she *couldn't* breathe right and it was making her panic-

Cinder took one of her hands, guiding it to rest on her own chest, fingertips touching her clavicle and sweaty palm resting right over her heartbeat. It was true and steady, and Ruby could swear she felt heat swell on each of Cinders deep inhales.

Her hand was held there, cheek still cradled and before long Ruby was following the rise and fall of Cinder's breast, breathing together with her. She screwed her eyes tight, shutting out any distractions and focusing on that simple binary.

“You're alright, dear. Nǐ hěn ānquán.”

“Could- Can you-” Ruby started, but it was hard to sort her thoughts, to figure out how to ask with any eloquence. In the end she could only manage to blurt the request: “Could you keep talking like that to me? In Mistralian?”

The repetition, the constant of unchanging movement between Cinder's chest and stroking thumb kept Ruby balanced on a thin wire, where any deviation might tip her. She needed to hear the soft, cooing drawl of Cinder's voice, even though Ruby couldn't focus on the words. 

Watching how much Ruby struggled, the older woman did not wish to burden her any further. 

“Zhè shì zhànshí de,” Phrases melding together in sound, the highs and lows of Cinder's voice never broke a warm whisper, “Huì guòqù de.”

They remained like that long enough for Cinder to shift out of a kneel, onto both of her knees in front of Ruby. For her, the nausea and hot flushes were incessant, as was the effort to swallow down each one until she was quietly begging for reprieve. 

There was no magic cure, no pill Ruby could take that would ease the vicious dread and churning nausea making her convulse.

Minutes dragged into hours, moments of progress upsurged by the panicked need to dry wretch in Cinder's bathroom. After half a dozen trips of guiding a Ruby too exhausted and fragile to navigate there herself, the older woman allowed them to slip to the bathroom floor, sparing the younger woman from the sting of cold tile and pulling her weight into her lap. In doing so, her caress never left Ruby's face, just as Ruby's hand clung to Cinder's chest all-the-more desperate. 

“It won't go away.” Ruby whimpered as she tipped bonelessly into Cinder's body, burying her face into the side of the woman's neck. “Just want it to stop.”

“Wǒ zhīdào, but it will,” came Cinder's soft, lilted whisper, cooing quietly, "I’ve got you.”

[zeebreezin]

32 for the sequencer throuple 👀

MWAH! That’s me kissing you for letting me write my favorite bastards :)

#32 - A Kiss while someone watches

There was a hand running through his hair. It was the first thing Laurence was aware of as reality swam back, all too slowly. Long, gloved fingers carding through slicked back curls as he lay there, resting on something soft. Somewhere that felt miles away, a gentle voice hummed a hymn he didn’t recognize. It was a battle to try and keep his eyes open, one Laurence lost almost immediately. His head felt like it was filled with cotton and lead. Every muscle ached, far too sore to even consider moving. Something burned at the crook of his neck. It was tempting to drift back into sleep, lulled by the soothing, repetitive motion. And yet, Laurence did his best to fight off the urge as he tried to put the pieces together.

He remembered the ship, at least. Vincent’s ship, loaded up with a handful of people he’d hired. They’d nearly arrived, apparently, when Laurence had been invited to dinner, just the two of them. Vincent had talked about- something. Something important, something that mattered to him. He’d asked Laurence if he trusted him, that cocksure smile falling away into a soft and sweet thing. Of course he did. He trusted the man more than he trusted himself, enough to follow him out here and still keep going. Things got hazy from there, a jumble of sensations - but there was something bright. Impossibly bright.

“…There you are. Can you hear me?” The voice above him cut through his jumbled thoughts.

It took Laurence a moment to realize he’d begun to hum along to her song. It took him another moment to realize that his head was currently laying across her lap. He tried to shift, to mumble an apology, but all he managed was a soft noise of pain.

She hushed him, brushing a now-loose curl from his face. “Shhh, it’s alright. You’re in no danger here. Breathe. You’re safe, Doctor, but now you need to rest.” Her voice was gentle, but assured. She began her little song again soon after speaking, that same hymn Laurence did not know but felt himself hum. It was far easier to follow the melody than it was to speak. He could feel her smile from above him as consciousness began to slip in and out.

Time passed strangely. Eventually, Laurence heard a door open on the far edge of his awareness.

“Are you enjoying your gift, radiance?” He knew that voice, didn’t he? It didn’t sound like Vincent, though. Placid and oddly emotional, in a way Laurence could only think of as sounding lost.

The woman - Vincent’s Radiance - spoke soon after, never pausing her gentle touch. “He’s coming back to us, I think. There’s no need to worry, Vincent. You’ve done well.”

Laurence faded back in and out of the not-quite-dark of sleep, listening to snatches of conversation. A good trip. Complications, the roses. Half in, half out. A procedure, when his strength came back. The roses. Isobel. Eventually, the overwhelming exhaustion started to fade, leaving an aching pain in its wake.

He’d just managed to crack his eyes open when the two leaned in. Isobel - that was her name, wasn’t it? - pressed her lips against Vincent’s with that almost ethereal grace of hers. It was barely contact, little more than a brush. But the look of overwhelming affection on Vincent’s face made it clear that it was more than enough.

“I’ll be back soon, I swear. Don’t wait for me, my love.” Vincent’s voice was little more than a whisper. It was only then that Laurence considered that he might be the gift Vincent had brought home.

[petiteclover]

LYLE MENENDEZ during a soccer game, 1977.

“What years if you remember, did you coach Lyle Menendez?”

“I coached eleven and twelve year old boys, wherever that falls in.”

“So if he was born in ‘68 it would have been…?”

“1980.”

“What was Lyle Menendez’s behavior like on the field… on the soccer field?”

“He gave 125 percent at all times.”

“Would you describe what you mean by that?”

“Uh… yeah, I used to have the boys if they wanted a break to raise their hand and come out uh… to take a rest uh… Lyle very infrequently raised his hand at times he was tired and coughing out there and I would ask him if he would want a break and he would uh… prefer to stay in the game.”

“In addition to um.. playing soccer with you, did he appear to have a fairly busy schedule during the time that you knew him?”

“Extremely, uh… he was often late for practices, often couldn’t make tournaments and games uh… it was always a chore trying to arrange the team schedule so that he could be there.”

“Do you know what he was doing in the times when he would be late?”

“Uh.. often times there were other lessons involved that took preference, uh… tennis I believe was the main one but thinking back swimming may have come in there, tutoring, trips, he just… as good as he played on the field he wasn’t always a member of the team because there was other priorities.”

“You said he gave 125 percent on the field, what was he like off the field? Around the other boys you were coaching.”

“He was usually in and out very quickly, he uh… the other boys liked him but he didn’t reciprocate towards them he was… he stuck to himself very often.”

“Did he mix with the other boys socially that were on the team?”

“Not really.”

“Was he pretty much a loner?”

“The uh… word probably describes him well then.”

“You said you had some contact with his father, is that right?”

“Well his father would come to most of the games and his father did show up at some practices.”

“And, what was the father’s behavior like in the presence of Lyle Menendez on the field?”

“Domineering. He was uh… he spoke with an accent and the one thing I remember he would always yell, “Lyle get the ball, get the ball!”

“Would that be in an encouraging voice? Or some other kind of voice?”

“Not really, at times it wasn’t even conducive to the team because it… I would like the players to play in position and not to leave their position to go after the ball and he didn’t always understand that I wanted a player in a certain spot on the field not worried about where the ball was but he had this repetitive term, “Lyle get the ball, get the ball!” And he would go up and down the sidelines.”

“Would he yell other things to Lyle besides get the ball?”

“I’m sure he did but that’s the one that stands out in my mind.”

“Did Mr. Menendez have any advice for you as the coach on how you should do your job?”

“I really didn’t deal with him too much, I think he understood that I probably wasn’t gonna listen to him but he did say one time he came up to me and said, something in reference to either Lyle’s grandfather or his grandfather was a professional soccer player in Cuba and that he knew a lot about the game because of that, ya know and that he just felt… I got the feeling that he thought he knew more about soccer than I did, which he very well may have known but I just I didn’t deal with it.”

“Was he a nice guy to you? Mr. Menendez?”

“He was polite to me and I never had any cross words with him.”

“And did you see him interact with his son for instance during half times or time outs in the game?”

“Uh.. yes I did sir.”

“What would you observe in that regard?”

“He was… Mr. Menendez was very competitive and he expected his son to give everything he had and some.”

“Did you see him physically do anything in relation to Lyle Menendez during the half time?”

“I did. He would… right away when the whistle blew for the halftime he would head right for Lyle, the team would come towards me, he would head for Lyle often with a towel, if it’s cold out we played in the winter, possibly some sweats… put them on him, dry him off. He actually uh… this is uh… a little crude to say but he actually treated Lyle almost like he was a thoroughbred racehorse the way he would towel him down at halftime and after the game, but after the game it was more of a quick thing… let’s get you out of here as quickly as possible, often the players and the families would stay around… mill around for half an hour after the game, forty five minutes but the Menendez family was out of there as quickly as possible.”

“When you say he treated him like a racehorse what do you mean by that?”

“I just mean he… it was more of a property than a son.”

“Would there be times when the team would travel out of town?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And would Lyle Menendez always travel with the team or would he get there by some other means of transportation?”

“At the time I had a Volkswagen van that I used to pile the kids in and uh… Lyle may have gone with us once in the van, usually his father would drive him.”

“His father would transport him to games?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did it seem like his father was treating him in a special way from the other players on the team?”

“I took it different, I took it maybe his father didn’t trust my driving, uh.. I can’t answer why his father but most of the other parents would go to the game.”

“And these times when you’d see Mr. Menendez toweling Lyle Menendez down like a racehorse, did that happen on more than one occasion?”

“That happened quite often.”

— Stephen Mosner, Lyle & Erik’s soccer coach, direct examination by Lyle’s attorney Michael Burt, regarding Mr. Menendez’s domineering behavior

[compo67]

failed to launch

i wore my halloween leggings underneath my new pair of jeans tonight so i'd be warm walking from the parking lot to the restaurant.

i wore my heavy wool coat, too.

i don't know who i'm speaking to. you or you or you.

i bundled up. it was me and my hot pink scarf against the world. it's comforting to be wrapped in something i made. my scarf is proof of my patience, my stubbornness, and my brain's desire for predictable and safe repetition.

i drove thirty minutes southeast to a suburb i've only been to once, way back when i was an inventory manager and had to help do inventory at a store in that region. that must have been 2015.

ten years.

i remember, those ten years ago, that i dated someone who sold me on a bunch of lies. empty promises. she said she'd take care of me. she pledged her love for me. she encouraged me to make up scenarios of us together. she's the one who taught me, made me see, that love is not always enough.

i sang to shania twain and waylon jennings on the way to this once-in-ten-years suburb.

i sat in my car before going inside the restaurant, and stared at the grocery store next to it.

i thought, "huh, they have a Caputo's here." that made things less scary-overwhelming-foreign.

i remember being a kid and following my grandfather around the Caputo's near our house.

i ducked inside and so began the next two and a half hours.

i sat there. spoke. listened. made eye contact. smiled. laughed. sipped my iced tea and looked around to see if a game was on one of the many TVs on the walls. i don't know where my soul went, but it certainly wasn't connected to my body.

i thought of you. the whole time. the entire time. all the time.

i didn't even try not to think of you. i didn't dole out those thoughts in pieces. rations. in crumbs. no, no i just *did.*

i let it happen.

i didn't mind. it didn't make me upset. not until the drive home.

i left the restaurant confused and awkward. i started piecing together goodbye-not-for-me words.

i crawled into my car and immediately turned on the bat signal. D spoke with me for half the trip home. Z spoke with me for the other half. they held me tight in their voices. they made me smile. they reminded me that there's someone out there for me.

i told them, i wish it had been you.

i wish it had been you sitting across from me at the restaurant located in a suburb i haven't been to in a decade.

i wanted it to be you.

i got home and opened this app. checked the notifications. and.

i see you.

i saw you.

i tossed off my jeans. shucked my flannel and my shirt, exchanging them for a tank top and my Dallas Stars hoodie.

i kept the leggings on.

i'm curious to know why you've followed me. i'm interested in knowing what fueled your decision to do that. why now. why again. why anything, do i even want an explanation.

i can feel-hear you. just like joe and ox.

i remember you saying, "i don't have a support system like you do."

i took the time, since my departure, and leaned on it. called in the cavalry. summoned the best of the best to assist me in not-drowning. mighty fighters fill out my support system. being with them is being with myself.

i am rich in love, and able to give it back.

i suppose what i want to say is quite simple. but the answer frightens me. why should i trade my sunny spot knee deep in water for a murky, depleted deluge?

why answer the door only to see no one and nothing behind it.

i am tired.

i wonder what a dramatic increase in oxygen feels like.

big deep breath.

do I dare to eat a peach?