#i think the reason why one works over the other for me is

[dreamsteddie]

There is an AITA out there that I can't find but it's been haunting me for weeks with visions of semi-angsty Steddie that I need to release onto the world. (If anyone happens to know what I'm talking about hit me up and I'll link it)

Edit: @jazzathebunny found the original AITA from Reddit linked Here for anyone who wants to read it. ------

Modern AU, Eddie and the guys are a moderately successful local band in the Chicago area playing gigs on the weekends and doing small tours whenever they all have the time. Gareth and Jeff are both in college while Eddie and Freak are both working part-time at a game store. Eddie managed to lock down that assistant manager position that lets him work 30 hours a week with weekends off for gigs. All in all, it's a pretty sweet deal and they can't complain.

Eddie had sworn off dating after a small handful of disastrous relationship attempts in their first year in the city. He dismisses any advances from people who attend their shows and tries not to think about how much he wants to make a genuine connection with someone and have something real. He's been burned one too many times to try and make something with someone he met in a bar or at work.

He knows the guys talk about it behind his back sometimes, he catches Jeff and Gareth fervently whispering to each other and stopping when they catch him entering the room one time too many to not suspect they're talking about him and he can't think of anything else going on in his life that they would feel the need to whisper about.

The fervent conversations take a slight uptick one day and about a week and a half after they do, Gareth hits him up and tells him he wants to set Eddie up with a guy from one of his classes. At first, Eddie is skeptical and cites all the reasons why he doesn't want to try with anyone right now but eventually, Jeff jumps in to plea the case and Freak jumps in on top of that and under the combined weight of his best friends he agrees to meet up with this Steve guy.

The guys set up the whole thing and before Eddie knows it it's Saturday night and he's wearing his best black jeans and a gray button-down, untucked, to go on an honest to God blind date like his life is some low-budget romcom.

Steve is not at all what Eddie thought he would be. Not the kind of guy he thought his friends would pick out for him given they know he usually goes for other alternatives like himself. Steve, who is shyly waving him over and getting out of his seat to great him, is the very epitome of prep. Well-fitted polo, light blue chinos, and what Eddie assumes this guy thinks are casual loafers. He's handsome to be sure, a 12/10 at least with perfect hair and defined biceps but Eddie is fairly sure he's being punked.

But, Eddie doesn't want to be rude so he goes to meet Steve at the table, confirming just in case that he's actually here to meet with a guy named Eddie. Steve gives him a bit of a confused look, saying that Gareth showed him a couple pictures of Eddie before he agreed to meet and figured he'd done the same for Eddie off Steve's Instagram. Gareth had, in fact, not done anything of the sort but they both dismiss it and get on with their date.

In all honesty, Eddie is expecting it to be a complete wash, but it turns out that even if Steve is not at all what Eddie would have previously said what his type, Steve is damn near perfect. He's funny, kind, a little bitchy, and even though he proves himself to be every bit the sports nerd he looks like he doesn't turn his nose up at Eddie's own much more classically nerdy interests. By the end of the date, Eddie has a new type and that type is Steve Harrington. He's quick to lock down a second date for the next weekend which Steve happily agrees to. They exchange numbers and Steve gives Eddie a chaste kiss on the cheek that has him floating all the way home.

Steve texted him that next morning letting him now he had a great time and is really looking forward to their next date and Eddie thinks this might be the start of something big for him. When he gets to practice he's clearly still floating on cloud nine and in his own little world designing their marriage invitations and matching tombstones so he doesn't notice the sly grins on his bandmates' faces.

"So...how'd it go last night? Everything you dreamed it would be?" Gareth asks, a strange glint in his eyes that Eddie doesn't clock.

Eddie goes on and on about how nice Steve was and how he might be The One, thanking Gareth profusely. Freak looks pleased for him, giving him a hard pat on the shoulder in congratulations but when Eddie finally tunes back into the real world he's greeted by Gareth's livid expression and Jeff's overly concerned one.

He asks the guys what the fuck is up and it turns out that Gareth and Jeff set this whole thing up as a prank of sorts. Eddie was never supposed to hit it off with Steve who Gareth selected specifically because he's a "totally brain-dead prep" and as far away as someone could get from Eddie's previous relationships. He was supposed to be someone Eddie could go on a date with and not form a connection with without getting completely burned at the end like all his previous relationships in the hopes of getting him out of his slump.

Jeff was in on it as well. He wanted to get Eddie back out there, so when Gareth presented the plan he sat in on a couple of Gareth's general credit business class sessions to help pick the guy out.

After Jeff and Gareth finish explaining he does a complete 180 and just...leaves. In any other situation, he would be raging and verbally tearing his friends a new asshole but instead, he completely disengages and walks out the garage door, ignoring his friends' shouts to come back.

He goes back home, socked and hurt and so very confused about how the hell he found himself in this position when his phone lights up.

New Message: Steve H.

Fuck.

-------

Part two coming soon??? Maybe???? We'll see.

[with-my-calamitous-love]

burnt toast, sunday / i wanna teach you how forever feels

katsuki bakugou x reader

the morning after a fight with katsuki. for the yail series ❄️

inspired by all of the girls you loved before

bakugou sat up, groaning a bit as his back ached. he looks around, hit with his surroundings. he slept on the couch, in the midst of the living room torn apart from arguing.

he knew you were probably still pissed at him. worst of all, he couldn't even fully recall why you two had been arguing the night before. he only remembered that it was really, really bad, and you had ended up locking him out of the bedroom. just the thought of not sleeping next to you hurt blonde’s chest.

he lets out a sigh as he got up from the couch and headed to the kitchen to make coffee. when he sits up, he sees you walk in.

he cringes slightly, seeing your puffy red eyes. you had been crying all night, probably.

“…hey.” you say, softly.

he grunts in response, his words unable to reach his throat.

its a sunday, a quiet morning to contrast a loud, abrasive saturday night. the two of you resolve to make coffee silently, only speaking when you need a spoon he’s standing next to or when he needs you to move so he can grab the sugar.

the silence felt incredibly awkward. the two of you just stood there, quietly making your own cups of coffee. the only noise in the room was the sound of the coffeemaker brewing. bakugou’s thoughts were a mess. he couldn’t believe the two of you had gotten in such a big fight, and he wasn't even entirely sure why it happened. but he knew he was probably at fault, he was the one with the explosive personality after all.

he curses at himself quietly when he realizes he grabbed two pieces of bread. he does that normally- one for you, and one for him. but right now, you’re pissed at each other. he’s a little worried that making two pieces of toast will be seen as a violent act of aggression.

he moves to grab plates, too absent minded to notice that the toast is now burning. you take it out for him. thats when he noticed you’re still wearing his shirt, even though you’re mad.

he picks up his phone and scrolls, trying to distract himself. thats when he remembers what the fight was about.

whoever it was that got ahold of katsuki bakugou’s dating history was really obsessed or really, really bored, maybe both. for whatever reason, his fans were now talking about all his previous partners, the good and the bad. and, because you’re dating a celebrity, they just have to question your worthiness to be dating the handsome and strong dynamight.

he feels his anger flare up as he doom-scrolls some more. it pisses him off, thinking about how people would so mindlessly say things. it pisses him off more that its getting to you. don’t you know that he loves you?

he has yet to do anything about it, to address his dating life and who he’s with now. truthfully, katsuki doesn’t feel like he should have to. his pr team already works overtime for his asshole-self, anyway.

he’s so distracted by his own thoughts, he fails to notice the way his elbow knocks over your mug, sending it shattering on the floor. maybe its the silence, but you honestly jump a little when it happens.

both you simply stand there at first, blinking. did he do that on purpose? no, he wouldn’t break his own mugs.

maybe he just wanted your attention.

nonetheless, you wave it off with a soft “its okay” before kneeling down and carefully cleaning up the shards. he’s silent as he gets down in front of you, helping you clean the mess he made.

he wants to tell you its okay, and that he’ll take care of it. he wants to tell you that he’s sorry and that he loves you. but this is the closest he’s physically been to you since the argument, and he wants to relish in it for a moment.

“are you still mad at me?”

he almost flinches when he hears your meek voice. why would he be mad at you?

“..what are you talking about, babe?” he sighs, his voice gruff.

he is mad, but not at you. mostly at himself for not seeing how the recent speculations about him had been bothering you.

“i don’t wanna repeat myself. i just… i don’t know. i know you don’t want me to care about what everyone else is saying, but, i do.” you admit, still on the floor in front of him. at this point, you’ve both forgotten about the coffee and the shards.

he can see how upset you are, and it makes his chest tighten. “yeah, well… i don’t want those shitty extras getting to you. even if what they’re saying is the farthest thing from the damn truth.”

he so desperately wants you to know that he loves you. that when he’s with you, he doesn’t think of all the times he woke up to someone else, feeling alone. he doesn’t think of late night arguments that left him feel empty. when he looks into your eyes, he’s reminded of everything he wants to protect.

but you don’t see that as clearly as he does. “i guess i just… wonder if you agree with them. you never say anything to address those rumours, about your exes. and its not your fault, i get you don’t want to get involved, but, still…”

bakugou’s heart twinges as you bring up those accusations. he hates that you wonder such things, that you wonder if he agrees with those rumours or not. he wants to reassure you that you are the one he loves, the only one he loves. but he knows you wouldn't believe him right now, especially since he's been acting so shitty towards you lately.

“damn it, dumbass, i just want you to know that i love you. not any of those other bitches.”

“i don’t like when you call them that, katsuki.” you correct him. he nods, though both of you should be used to his sailor tongue by now.

“they’re people you’ve loved before… and thats okay. sometimes i just wonder if you love me more. i know its stupid.” you sigh.

he finally gets the courage to hold your hand, his calluses gentle against your skin. “..i feel i shouldn’t have to say it, i guess. in my head, you’re the only damn person in the world who matters.”

“maybe i’m just insecure.” you chuckle, self deprecatingly. you’re both tired of the arguing, now. “you’re #1, you’re gorgeous… and i’m me.”

he looks at you like you’re a complete idiot for that.

he hated hearing you say those things about yourself like it was a bad thing, that you were just you.

“just you? you really think it’s a bad thing to be you, dumbass?”

he pulls you in tighter, wanting you to really hear what he says.

“you’re amazing, you're incredible. there’s no one else I want to be with. I don't want anyone else, just you. you’re way too good for me, [y/n], in more ways i can count.”

“…you really mean that?”

he scoffs, a beautiful smile on his face. “yeah, i mean it. i love you.”

you give him that smile he loves, the one that made him fall so deeply in love with you all those years ago. “thats all you had to say, kats.”

your past and his are parallel lines. he isn’t sure how he got so lucky. how, by some cosmic miracle, the starts aligned so he could intertwine with you. you’re all he needs.

he hugs you deep, burying his face into your neck. he loves how you smell, how smooth your skin is. theres bot much proof, but he sees enough in you. he feels enough when he holds you, his entire world in his arms.

“i’m sorry.” he says, quietly for only you to hear. “you’re everything to me. i’m in love with you.”

your heart swells, ignoring the burnt toast and spilled coffee. you’re wearing his shirt, and he’s keeping his word. thats enough to make you melt, hugging him back, arms thrown around his muscular back. “i’m sorry too. i shouldn’t have doubted you. i love you too.”

he pulls back slightly to kiss you, making sure you’re in front of him and that this is real. for once, he let’s go of all of his fears and his ghosts. you’re his best friend, the love of his life and every beautiful thing he loves. he hears it in the silence, on his way home, and in your voice.

“if anything, i think i’m grateful for everyone you’ve loved before.” you chuckle, face close to his. his blonde eyebrows knit in confusion. “what do you mean, babe?”

“because the people you love make who you are, even if you’ve only loved them for a moment.” you say, squeezing his hand. “all those dead-end streets led you to me.”

he pauses, strange look on his face when he realizes you’re right. all that fake love, the teenage heartbreak and pains he’s been through- it’s made him the man you love. all those breakups, those unsaid goodbyes, they’ve led him hear.

he huffs, and then smiles, pressing his forehead to yours.

“i wouldn’t change a damn thing, then.” he says. “it all led me to you, dumbass.”

you stroke his cheek affectionately, pressing a kiss to his temple. his eyes close when you do that, relaxing into your touch. everyone that he knew brought him hear. and now, he gets to know what forever feels like.

“and in the end, it doesn’t matter who loved you before.” you conclude. “cause i love you more.”

he almost laughs at how cliché it is, resigning to press kisses all over your face. “i love you more, i’m not arguing on that.” he says, holding you in his lap. he’s tough, and explosive, and “too good for all that clingy couple bullshit”. at least, thats what he lets the world believe.

you’re his, and he’s yours. he’s so god damn thankful for everyone you’ve loved before. ‘cause now he gets to love you 10x more.

[aspoonofsugar]

"I'm done blaming myself for your mistakes"

This line by Vi pretty much sums up her conflict in Act 1 of season 2, but I have yet to see it discussed. The point is, in fact, that Vi does blame herself, which is why she is unable to properly call Cait out. If Jinx specifically were not the one responsible for Cassandra's death, I doubt Vi would have stayed silent in front of Cait calling Zaunites animals or that she would have accepted many of Cait's actions without saying a word.

Vi still feels at fault for Powder becoming Jinx, which makes her vulnerable and willing to compromise on her morals, so that Caitlyn would not leave her. Ironically, I think this behavior is among the reasons why their love story does not work out in the first Act. They fail to communicate properly.

On the one hand Cait treats Vi badly. She insults Vi's people and insists that Vi should become an enforcer, despite her knowing of Vi's painful past. Obviously this is wrong, but personally I think it stems from Caitlyn's poor attempt to reconcile her love for Vi with her hate for Jinx:

"Three faces keep spinning through my mind. I see mother when they found her. And every fiber of me just sinks like in dark water. But then there is Jinx. Laughing. I want to tear that laugh from her throat forever. Then I see Vi. I asked her to put on the uniform. Suffice to say, she declined."

Cait's solution is to have be become a part of her society, so that she can keep on hating Jinx and the "bad" Zaunites, while loving Vi and the "good" Zaunites. Except it obviously does not work.

On the other hand Vi is unable to call Cait out. And the whole point is that Cait needed someone to call her out. She is grieving, but she is obviously becoming like the enforcers she once despised. Like the enforcers Vi despised. She negates Cassandra's legacy, by using her ventilation system to poison the air. She acts cruelly against a man, who is unharmed and who has clearly been hurt by that same gas she weaponized. She is ready to shoot a child (even if she does not intend to kill her), so that she can get at Jinx. Vi clearly sees all of this, which is why she asks Cait not to change:

Vi: Everyone in my life has changed. Promise me you won't change.

However, she fails to confront Cait about it all. Except that when you are in a relationship, you must feel secure and free to call the other person out. Even to get into a fight with the other person. Still, Vi is so terrified of losing Cait too, that she is indecisive. And in the end she is tragically left behind by Cait.

This happens because Vi herself has not yet decided who she wants to be. Is she a Zaunite or an Enforcer? Does she want to kill Jinx or not? Vi can't choose. Jinx even calls her out on this:

Jinx: Plastering my face all over, so someone else would do your dirty work?

She tells Cait she wants Jinx dead, but the moment she can kill Jinx she doesn't. Sure, Isha comes between them, but after Cait disarms Isha, Vi could pretty easily take Isha away from Jinx and let Cait kill her sister. However, she does not. That is clearly because she sees Powder in Isha. Jinx and Isha embraced are clearly representative of who Jinx is as a whole. She is an unstable terrorist, but she is also a hurt child. That is who Jinx is and that is what Vi (and Jinx herself) needs to see and to reconcile. Even now, Vi insists that Powder is dead and that only Jinx remains. However, Jinx is Powder no matter how much Silco, Jinx herself and Vi insist she isn't. She still clearly is.

It is just that Powder has changed, but this is normal. Just like it is normal Vi herself has changed and will need to change again, so that she can decide who she really wants to be. Just like Jinx and just like Cait will have to do.

As a side note, I am loving the foiling between Cait and Jinx. They have always been foils, but while last season focused on how this juxtaposition impacts Jinx, right now we are seeing how it impacts Cait.

In season 1, Jinx sees Cait as Vi replacing her. In a sense, Jinx's jealousy of Vi stems from that same inability to accept change. Jinx too deep down hopes she can go back to being the innocent Powder and that Vi can love her, like she did in the past. However, that is not possible because people change and forge new relationships. Jinx forges a bond with Silco she can't simply erase because Vi wants to. Just like she can't erase the one with Vi simply because Silco wants to. Similarly, Vi has a new bond with Cait that she can't break simply because Jinx asks her to. So, Caitlyn is really who Jinx wants to be. Someone complementary to Vi in battle, but also reliable, dependent, lovable. By the end of season 1, Jin realizes she can't really be that person anymore and interiorizes there is a part of her Vi can't understand. That same part Silco instead accepts.

Silco: Don't cry. You are perfect.

In season 2, Jinx becomes Cait's dark side. She is really Cait's Joker, as she is the one who challenges Cait's sense of justice and morals:

Cait: It's her blood in your veins. Vi: Then why are you the one acting like her?

Cait is letting grief and pain change her for the worse, just like Powder was transformed by her own losses and traumas. Cait keeps insisting she is different from Jinx, but she isn't. In fact, her whole fiasco kinds of hint at it symbolically. Cait poisons the underground city in her attempt to catch Jinx. Only for Jinx rewinding the ventilation system, so that the poison Cait used is sent back to Piltover. Jinx literally acts like Cait's mirror, which is why Cait's shot ends up hitting exactly this, a mirror. As in, Cait can't really kill Jinx without hurting both herself, Vi and the whole city :P

I am curious to see how their foiling will develop, now that both girls are growing into the leaders of their opposite factions.

[spookygibberish]

Your thrones are absolutely top-tier . It may or may not be intentional, but I love the way the concept deconstructs the "dragon rider" trope by recontextualizing the relationship between "dragon" and "rider" as this ersatz arranged marriage that's been cooked up as a power-consolidation structure for royalty and oligarchs.

No high-soaring metaphors for nascent individuation newfound personal freedom for you! You get permanently anchored to a literal political monster!

You. You understand.

This is 100% intentional and a significant, foundational goal of the setting, particularly with Jacanti, is to deeply overthink and pick apart "mons" and "bond creatures".

It's also a part of why I'm hesitant about people finding wish fulfilment in Thrones. I can't control how anyone chooses to engage with my work, and they're objectively sick as hell, but the in universe reason they exist is the entitlement of wealthy merchants and and oligarchs towards the bodies of a genetically engineered laborer underclass as a deep deep deep misinterpretation of a work designed to generate sympathy and solidarity but instead fostered.. fetishization more or less.

Thinking about bond creatures in particular it's sort of a genre based entirely on wish fulfilment. What if a horse was a big lizard and my best friend and loved me in particular with no stipulations. The defacto ownership (but not really, because it loves you and wouldn't have it any other way) of this intelligent being is, like you point out, something that's associated with the autonomy and freedom of the person who gains control over the creature (Eragon leaps to mind but that's one of many examples, and Eragon is just Pern fanfiction really (I do love pern.... flawed ass series)), but the creature itself leads an existence dedicated to the whims of the person it imprints on, they're destined to be half-creatures.

I think it's a setup worth picking apart and critiquing, especially since it has so so so many unpleasant caveats and snarls it can run into so easily, and that sort of stuff is just catnip for me. I think leaving an ethically complex situation at "it's fine if everyone's happy and everyones happy because thats how its supposed to be" is both naive and also incurious, if I'm honest.

[jazeswhbhaven]

A Successful Hunt in Heaven | React | Spoilers | Prologue

LETS GO YA'LL

First, let me say that this is completely different than Levi's Torture story and when I get a chance to read the rest of this???? I'm pretty sure it's gonna be a 10...

Cause let's jump in???

We start with the fact that MC is standing in front of a throne, everything is in white and angels are calling them Gabriel.

I was like???? AYO ARE WE GABRIEL???

It seems, that we are indeed Gabriel....

it's so good to see our angry bae again, even if he's cussin' us out

not that he can help it, we are literally Gabriel right now. but why the fuck are we????

SO it's flashback time and we're in Gehenna after a big battle. Three kings Mammon/Levi/Beel came to help out and the results were victorious.

Mammon is so that guy because if I were watching him lifting buildings with ease all day, I would. Lemonade in hand like those ladies watching the lifeguard at the pool.

So the kings are talking amongst themselves about Satan reacting to Mammon's saying of "how Gehenna is his so ofc he's gonna help" and Beel saying that Satan would headbutt him with his horns if he heard him and it's surprising that he didn't (foreshadowing??)

Mammon just loves to call his boyfriend small huh? Lol

We know Beel, you like to spy on us. Next you're gonna be randomly showing up when we're showering or something and be like HEY JUST CHECKING UP ON YOUUUUU.

My stinka boo. <3

Anyways....

Leviathan, give me one reason why I shouldn't box with you right now. One good reason other than the fact that I can't fight demons 💀

I ain't payin' you nary a cent back.

But yeah everyone starts to depart though, since the job is done and it's time for the devils of Gehenna to relax and chill!

I'm crying because I like how Levi and Beel's dynamic here is still "Ugh my dumbass best friend that annoys me sometimes" because He was getting onto Beel for being careless and making Bael work too much and Beel was like "Awh but you're closer to me :(((((" and Levi is like "Nah you got 6 other kings" skskskkskskksks And then he drags him away here? I love them your honor, their dynamic makes me crack up each time.

BUT now that this is over and done with we're at the PUB GETTIN' DRUNK LETS GET IT

Even Ppyong comments that he hasn't had a drink in a while and Sitri is over here yappin' about tea and how long it takes to brew compared to just pouring alcohol and throwing it in your mouth. Then a funny thing with Leraye happens...

I can hear him in my head and it's hilarious. Because Leraye why you sayin' it like this? lmaoooo

After being chided that he was being too damn loud in his ear and some other interactions from the other nobles, it's then realized that Satan actually hasn't been around in a while. No one has seen him in a couple days and I'm just like....wait ya'll just been doing whatever and not concerned that your King is literally not around for over 48 hours? o k

We then get Belial/Jjyu busting in the pub and saying there's an emergency meeting to talk about Satan's disappearance. Turns out Zagan and Belial noticed that Satan has been gone for a quite a while, Zagan being the first to notice and so he called the meeting. During this time when everyone is thinking of what's happening and what's going on, with MC thinking more about the "how this happened" rather than the "how can we fix this"??? There's a solution right outside the door.....

BUT FIRST

Paimon is so real because if a bead can shut up Jjyu it really does give us a reality check on how small he is lmao

ALSO POINTING WEAPONS AT THE DOOR? ITS ON SIGHT?

Oh.

oh.

That's my cat daddy right there.

I'm so happy we get to have Ronove content ya'll. And so randomly too. I wonder if we will get other Abaddon devils as a cameo in the other cards??? Hopefully? MAYBE?

So the nobles are wondering who called him there, and it turns out Zagan did.

And he was trying to say that from the beginning but since Ppyong wasn't looking at him, he couldn't translate. To which Astaroth is like "Just speak tho." LMAO

Anyways,

It seems the Abaddon devils love the thrill of danger. Dantalian also seems to love that to where he will literally put himself in harms way. But I mean I guess the devils there are just built different as they keep saying anyways.

So in order to save Satan though, someone has to go undercover as an angel. Problem with that is devils are unable to lie so if they were caught they would immediately just give up and admit they were sneaking in. But MC....

LOL this dialogue had me like??? OMG p l s. First...this is actually for once something I'd say, more in a joking sense even though this is clearly a serious moment.

I also love how Sitri was like "okay but the only thing you know how to do is lie, MC" and I was like...thanks Sitri thank you so much for your support you have no idea how much it means to me /s

But he's right, MC doesn't know how to do anything else which at this point damn we still don't know how to fight with magic or something??? Anything??

Thank you for letting us know this information Ronove. You are a treasure.

So, we end up seeing Ronove's power in action btw. How it works is that he says the words, and they work as long as he doesn't swallow.

R o n o v e

I do not need to know how you were eating food with your butt. Thank you sir. (why did I go there? Because it's a joke that's been done already in another media lmao so if you know you know) Honestly though if not his butt then probably made another hole somewhere or he ate through his dick who the fuck knows this is Hell and he's from Abaddon, anything could go.

He's so hot I'm crying. Like...I'm trying to imagine what a wet voice is and it's making me shiver in a bad/good way.

So his power is in action, he says "you will be an angel" and he pretty much spits in in MC's mouth and mixes it up and tells you to swallow. (reference my thirst post with him saying to swallow it)

So, there's no specifics to his powers. It works, but not the in way anyone would expect. This type of theme in most stories always ends up bad in some shape or form when the words are vague or broad. So yeah MC was an angel alright.....

So we were back in Heaven, and now we understand that MC is possessing Gabriel's body. I wonder if he's aware that's happening and he's internally screaming or if he's just kinda unable to do anything about it and is unconscious the entire time?

It's believable surface wise because everyone is falling for it, even Satan who was cursing and spitting on MC/Gabriel to point where they had to gag him.

Ngl, I'd have a hard time being into this "roleplay" too because he legit doesn't know it's MC so he hates them. It's kind of like a revenge mirror thing from Gabe's christmas card (i still have to do a react on that btw)

THIS????? FACE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gabriel needs to make those faces more.

But the entire time MC was pretending to be Gabriel I was like "GURL FOCUS" because they kept getting distracted by Satan looking fine as fuck in those restraints and that gag in his mouth. Which I mean??? EYAH but we're here to do mission rescue. But now we about to do some

Mission I'm going to fuck Satan as the angel he hates. And I'm so anticipating that Satan is going to react and sort of like it....SO YEAH YEAH YEAH INDIRECT WAY OF CXC

I did not originally ship any of the angels with any of the Kings or Nobles butttttt after I get my hands on the rest of this card story I'll be a believer.

Funny thing though is that I did in fact get the artifact for that discounted 250 pull they give us each time and it clearly is a reference to the key from Hellraiser which is one of my favorite Horror films~

we have such sights to show you

Okay but crossover of Kings as each of the different Cenobites when? Cause I need it.

[jupitermoontarot24]

POV: You're In a Scary Movie 🎃 Villain or Victim?🔪

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Piles 1-5 and oh yea... BOO

Pile 1🤬

You would be the villain. I think you would be the villain because you're sexy and you bring all the cats to the yard.  you provide food and comfort. It's like if everybody in the neighborhood had cats and dogs and you put dog treats in your yard everyday, you know you will be attracting everybody's dog. like can you stop? lol and you might just be like oh well I'm just giving the dogs a treat but everybody else is like no. Yeah it's like you're so connected with people that people are like getting hypnotized. In this scary movie you could be seducing somebody's wife or seducing a couple. So the reason why you would be a villain in this is because maybe people wouldn't know what you're doing with the people that are seduced. like where do they go and what happens to them? Yeah it gives you collect souls or you do something with them. Okay so it could be like this couple has joined a cult. they look to you as a savior, as a guidance for them. It could be somebody else who's trying to get away from being hypnotized in this movie because they're afraid that it will cause them to  spiral. But honestly it seems like it's real true guidance from Spirit though. like in this movie you are looked at as a villain but it's just because this person is scared of the real truth. okay it seems like this person could be watching a couple be seduced by you or alert by you so this person is on high alert because they're like pile four is alluring people into them. So the only reason you're the villain in this movie is because you're the magician. So kind of like how people will burn witches at the stake but all witches are not bad witches. Pile 1 doesn't just have one person, they have two people, they have multiple people so what are they doing behind the scenes? They could also be getting Karma in this movie but it's weird because they don't see you doing anything like they can't see what you're doing so it could be like maybe you're doing magic. So in this scary movie this person is suspicious of you. They don't come to you and fight you but they might go to the man in the couple and see why or they might get in contact in some type of way. for some people the couple that you seduce is not together anymore because they both like you were one of them likes you more. Okay so to this person in this movie your villain plan would be to send out a frequency that reaches people and makes them loyal to you and then you harvest their energy or their souls and it makes you more abundant in the physical world. I think you do send out a frequency that goes to people, it brings them to their higher self it brings them to a piece of Nirvana and helps them gather resources for themselves strength…or it’s a evil ploy. It gives dr.doofinsmirk

Victim: none?/ everyone

Uzumaki

Pile 2 🔪

Okay so you would be the victim. they're going to be somebody who is obsessed with you or really really likes you. but the thing is this person wouldn't want you to be out they wouldn't want you to be a hot girl. no other girl no other person would be enough for this person but you.This person can already have a partner/girlfriend but they don't satisfy them enough. like this gives Joe energy from the show where it's like he might be obsessed with somebody but then once he gets them he becomes obsessed with somebody else. they would try to trap you but I feel like you would trap them instead. The crazy thing is is that you do know this person but it's not like you guys were ever in a relationship like you could have just worked together you could have went to school together, you could have mutual friends that ended up at the same places but this is not somebody who you romantically were involved with.I don't like this energy like that like the other pile was a little bit lighter but this person is kind of dark. So in this scary movie this could be a group of people or just a specific person but I feel like they feel that getting you would even the odds like it would make whatever situations balanced. Okay so this person probably did have a accomplice. it seems like this person could have manifested through their third eye basically evil eye because the third eye is very significant so this person could have been sending evil eye and trying to infiltrate you through the mind. The villain was trying to infiltrate you from the inside so you would basically unravel and be lost. Yeah, it seems like you were very hot girlish because this is Bratz rock angelz as the picture so I feel like you're somebody who was on the go, who was cool, who really left a impression on people and on this person specifically. so this is somebody that you could have just met on your adventures like not somebody that you really deep involved with. The accomplice could have made it their mission to make you cry. Maybe they didn't see you as emotional,  maybe you didn't come off like that and this person could have come up as emotional but you give steady and calm and balanced. They tried to plant things in your mind that weren't true basically make you crack,make you sweat. Okay so you're the main goal of the villain could have been to knock you off play with your head maybe close down certain chakras. Basically make you scared/ scare you off. I feel like everything dark comes to light and this person didn't want you to shed light on them so they were trying to cloud your judgment. They could have tried to do this through accomplice.So you definitely beat this villain by playing the switcheroo. you could have lured them to a certain place expecting you to be there but you aren't and instead you got them accomplished. it seems like they get offed energetically though I think you and your lover so maybe you can have like a surprise lover in this movie but they come and you guys energetically kill them off so it almost gives like couple versus couple or just accomplice versus accomplice like Kim Possible. Checkout pile 3

Villian: associate, could have been one your friends.

Blink twice, Bratz rock angelz ,death proof

Blink twice

MAJOR TRIGGER WARNING FOR THIS MOVIE

Pile 3 👻

Unfortunately pile three you would be a victim. You would be a victim for being the it girl/boy. Have you watched this movie form the picture Love Don't Cost a Thing ? The girl in the middle and her friends were kind of mean. So this could start off with somebody liking you romantically. This could also be a situation where your friend is obsessed with you like obsessed with you being The It Girl. In this scary movie I think you could be coupled up with somebody so you could be dating somebody and the whole time one of your friends is plotting to mess it up. it gives me Mean Girls. Regina George was looked at as the bad guy, it could be said that that was her karma but Cady pretended to be her friend to sabotage and then she fell in love with her boyfriend that's messed up lol. in this scary movie you're just doing your thing being perfect, being beautiful, dressing amazing, being the main character and you attract someone's attention :a guy/girl?. but you have a whole bunch of Love offers because you're the most popular good looking person around and there's a particular person that proposes something to you and one of your friends sees it and they're like I don't like this. they're like that offer should be made to me? why does this person get everything? Why do they look so good? Why are they so alluring. so they gather up weaponry maybe not literally but different things to make this downfall. Yes so this could be a situation where this friend is only popular because they're around you..  the person that wants you romantically could be real popular as well they could be really good looking and they can have a lot of money.  I feel like this person was already maybe shallow in the first place but when you got with this person it was too much. So I think it would be two people because it is two friends in the picture but one specific person could have been the one trying to really seek out the revenge. The thing is that I feel like realistically it wouldn't work like this person wouldn't succeed at this plan. but you would still be the victim because the plan was made for you but I feel like you will get out of this in such a smooth way that it's funny. I feel like the universe will protect you to the point where you might notice something is off, but it works out like you might not have to do much to get this person away. this is not the type of scary movie where you are fighting to the death at the end with the killer no. this is the scary movie where you do know there's something off and you sense something's off and maybe you're having some type of paranormal experience but it ends up getting solved and the two people kind of disappear or disintegrate off. So in this scary movie it's like one friend would actually have been doing something and you can feel it and the other person probably will try to gas light you. so you could be like something's wrong I feel something is off and it could be specifically this person and the second friend is like you're crazy I don't like when you act like this I don't know if I can be friends with you anymore.Orrrrr they could have just been like you're overreacted its nothing take a chill pill, yeah this person could have been shallow like I said so they could have just been worrying about their looks and how they feel when you were likenreally going through it.So I think this villains plan was almost unknown to them I don't think they really knew where they were going with this they just wanted to be you.

They could have wanted to Destiny swap with you and also by doing that made you be with somebody else. Yeah so maybe they didn't really like their partner like that so they're like I want to be pile 3 and I want their partner and they can have my partner. Their boyfriend/girl could have been involved. check out pile 2.

villains:  a Duo ? a couple, two friends.

Gothika, Love Don't cost a Thing, the craft

Pile 4👿

I think you would be the victim. it gives one of those movies where you know those scene where its this couple out on the town,having fun and they're just in the moment and little do they know it's somebody up on the balcony staring at them. yeah you could be just minding your business and there's somebody who is hot! behind the scene. somebody who doesn't want you to be as abundant and Luscious as you are. This could be the type of scary movie where it's like a wolf in sheeps clothing around. so this person might present something to you but it's like a gag gift. They want you to be stuck somewhere. So you could just be minding your business having a good time and maybe a specific person starts pursuing you and now you're dating this person and they're treating you well  maybe you guys even get married? And the whole time it's this person in the back upset! do we know why? It's because they broke up. Honestly this person could have broken up with their partner but usually their partner comes back like a dog but they didn't because they found you. So you will be the victim because this person will now be on the bottom and their use to being a top priority. This person will be upset but I don't think they would do anything to you per say. I feel like they might try to protect you as a couple? like they don't want anybody else to date  your partner so they'll make sure that you guys stay together or at least make sure nobody else gets in between the relationship but they will be also trying to put themselves in situations to talk to your partner. Yeah like maybe not trying to outwardly get them but say they have the kids together like oh I need you to drop off some paperwork to me, or we need to talk about signing the bills off on my name now. something to where they have to speak. Your partner is really loyal in the scary movie so it's like they're not going for it like they don't want to be with them but it seems like they're always there so they could be following you guys around. you might look up and you guys are at Disneyland with your kids and you're like is that them in sunglasses and a hat? then the villain is like it's no way  pile 5 is this perfect like it's something about them thats going to come out, they're not perfect.  you come off really perfect and balanced. They could have seen you as a villain. They could feel like you were trying to erase them and what they've done but they're plan was to erase you especially if you guys haven't been together that long. they were just trying to get rid of you so they can focus on what they had, the history they have or the relationship/kids. Even make you mad to the point where you leave like you get fed up with the situation and you're like I'm just going to leave. Villian:an ex, stalker

Obsessed

Pile 5 🥵

Definitely the villain. something is shady about you pile 5. Not going to lie you are the sexiest villain to ever be. the villain but this gives a crime of passion. is it a crime? sade voiceYeah like this is more sexy than anything else. so in this scary movie you and your lover can have a lot of eyes a lot of suitors. and that could drive you to do certain things. I heard evening the playing field. this could be a situation where you just get your get back. Okay this is the type of scary movie where it's a psychological war on your partner. so maybe you make them go crazy, they don't know who's really you, is this the real you or if you're playing a game with them maybe they just aren't sure about anything.  it only drives you even more. it makes you raise your level of taunting. yeah the movie for you guys is basic instinct. people could be or your partner could be almost paranoid being with you because it's like are they going to kill me? are they going to do something to me when I'm not looking. but it seems like this is if they did something to you. this doesn't seem just unproved kind of like if they broke your necklace, is pile 5 going to break my neck. are they going to slit my throat? You're the villain because people are scared of you especially if they do something to you. you're like the Grim Reaper.  that type of energy where it's like the reaper is looked at to be really scary but he only comes when it's your time to die it's not really his fault. yeah and you could be nosy or just know a lot of information, see a lot of things, have a lot of eyes, find out things about people really easily so that makes you even more scary. yeah people are like if I do something pile one, if I make them mad.. they go blow out a candle and end my whole life. If I'm not nice they can find out my secrets. Maybe people have received really bad karma surrounding you, like maybe they totaled their car and then somebody walks up to them and issues them a government official debt collect on top of that and the person that presents it has the same name as you or has the same initials something like that. so people like dang there go my karma from pile on. like you have voodoo dolls and you poke them when they do something bad to you or if they were just a bad person. Also people could feel like you're the villain because you are good at seducing people even if it's not on purpose like people might try to seduce you into seducing them. people could lose their partners and be like dang what a villain. so in this scary movie you're a hot Queen / King that everybody is scared of and steals people partners. Either way you give crazy psycho hot person. I would say that your plan as a villain would be to give Karma to people that did you wrong. But honestly I do feel like you would use their energy to become hotter and smarter and faster. 

victim: could have been ppl who weren’t there for you during a tough time, a person left you to drown in your own stuff. 

Scary movie: Jennifers body, american psycho,

💗💗💗💗💗XOXOXOXOXO💗💗 💗🕺🏽🕺🏽🕺🏽🕺🏽

SEE U THERE ;)

[anthropwashere]

THIS but fucking. MBTI. When I was still in the Air Force my... hell, I don't remember his position name. I'm so happy to realize I've brain dumped so much military minutiae after only three years out. Anyway. My supervisor's supervisor. This Master Sergeant (MSgt) was OBSESSED with MBTI. It was literally the first conversation I had with him when he took the position and was doing the rounds to meet all of us. We were working for a 3-letter agency AND working outside our unit in an almost wholly civilian org on top of that, so thankfully we didn't work in the same office, but good christ he took potshots at ANYBODY he ASSUMED was one flavor of alphabet soup or another that he didn't "agree with."

He did, for whatever it's worth, correctly guess my flavor of alphabet soup (I have never ever been able to remember or care what my MBTI is, it's fucking alphabet soup, leave me alone) after a 5-minute conversation. He also, however, failed to notice my far more aggressive and obvious extremely mentally and physically unwell signs thanks to my miserable recent divorce and far more miserable unfolding chronic illnesses that were going to end up with me getting a whole-ass 100% disability rank/pay with Veteran's Affairs and insisted on visiting my shit-ass cubicle EVERY. FUCKING. DAY. to CHAT. USUALLY DISCUSSING FUCKING THE MBTI OF VARIOUS OTHER DUDES IN OUR CHAIN OF COMMAND (COC). THAT I BARELY KNEW THE NAMES OF. NEVER MIND WHAT THEY LOOKED LIKE OR WHO THEY WERE AS LIKE. ACTUAL DUDES. BECAUSE. I MUST STRESS AGAIN. WE WORKED IN A MOSTLY CIVILIAN ORG. SO 90% OF THE MIL FOLK IN OUR COC DIDN'T WORK ANYWHERE NEAR ME. TO THE POINT WHERE I LITERALLY DIDN'T HAVE THE DOOR CODES TO ACCESS WHERE THEY WORKED. AND THE OTHER 10% DID LIKE. ACTUAL INTEL SHIT IN OTHER OFFICES I HAD RARELY ANY REASON TO EVER ENTER. AND THE ONES I DID HAVE REASON TO ENTER WITH MILITARY FOLK IN THEM WERE USUALLY FUCKING INSUFFERABLE. AND I AVOIDED THEM AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. SO. I DID NOT. FUCKING KNOW. WHO HE WAS. EVER!!! TALKING!!! ABOUT!!!!!

Hngh. This is why I try not to think of those awful fucking 5 years of my life. I get caps-lock-y about it. Sorry.

Anyway, this motherfucker like. Trauma bonded? To me? Because of his also miserable recent divorce? And he wanted to fuck me SO HARD while also endlessly ranting to me about MBTI horseshit 60% of every conversation we had (the other 40% and his otherwise normal behavior did actually meet me compatibly on the Normal Human Scale and we got on well, and also he was my supervisor's supervisor so like, I had to be somewhat respectful of his stupid MSgt rank). It was an exhausting fucking. What. 8 months? A full year? MBTI this. MBTI that. Etc. Etc. Etc. ETC.!!!!!!

Anyway the SECOND I said "asexual" he entirely quit talking to me entirely, so I guess that's something.

Secondary anyway birthstone-obsessed people are wild to me. Us March folks got royally fucked over by boring-ass AQUAMARINE and you expect me to take that stuff seriously? Lol

Thirdly anyway I haven't dealt with any hardcore astrology people since high school, but she was my friend's mom and she and her husband were honestly the best role models in my life at that age? To the point my shit-fucking-terrible mom resented her otherwise a-okay positivity in my life for like? A decade?? Hell, she probably still does. It's wild how many times I had to remind my Chronic Gaslighting Bitch of a mom, "I haven't talked to Betty since I was 18, WHAT are you talking about."

Fourthly anyway shout-out to Civilian Megan (whose spelling variation I can never remember on account of having one of those Normal White American Girl names with 50 spelling variations, even with her full name on a paper name plate) who sat across from me and went out of her way to save me from Awkward Lengthy conversations with MSgt MBTI and SSgt Marvel Movies Nerd every goddamn day, she was a real one and I should probably shoot her a 'hi how are you' message on Steam today

“Bat swinging at wasp nest” post but I cannot be nice about astrology people. No you did not find the one good or cute or quirky way to believe the quality of someone’s character is biologically pre-determined. Just because you found a way to not base it on race or ethnicity or gender does not make judging someone’s character on an innate and uncontrolled attribute suddenly teehee fine.

I’m even more baffled by the people going “it’s just fun!” “It’s just a hobby!!” Sure if it was something harmless. It’s not. We are quite literally talking about how you intend to judge, treat, view, respect, and interact with someone entirely differently based on an inherent trait. How are you not aghast? How are you not embarrassed? Why are you so insistent on needing to operate on a hierarchy of pre-determined character judgement?

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Hopefully this doesn't come off as snarky, but I find it genuinely hilarious that every "big-name" Leona fan that I've seen seems to like him against their will lol. I've always had Leona as my favorite, so it's fun to see the journey other people go through to liking/appreciating him!

Look 💦 I can’t speak for other L*ona likers (regardless of size, honestly; I'm a firm believer that one's level of internet fame isn't a factor in the devotion for a character) but for me—to quote Scar—“my words are a matter of pride.” And by confessing to (ick 🤢) LIKING LION… it’s throwing all that pride out of a window. It seriously does feel like these feelings exist against my will.

I have a summary of my story to explain my relationship with the lion lore 💀 I call it a summary, but it’s still kind of long— It's below the cut for those who are interested!

To begin with, the promotional materials didn’t sell me on him. Everything about how he initially presents—from his arrogance to his “tough/bad boy” design (seriously, that biker-cowboy combo of his dorm uniform is SO ugly and shows way too much skin for my liking…)—was so unappealing to me. He seemed exactly like the kind of character and tropes I tend to dislike. The only “good” thing I saw in him was his face (which, ironically, is what Vil says about him) and maybe his UM chant particularly the line where he demands you kneel before him. Then comes along book 2, which is easily the weakest of the main story and does a HUGE disservice to him, making L*ona seem a lot stupider than he actually is. At that point, I had basically written his entire character off. I claimed to all my Twst friends that there was nothing that would ever make me like him.

Around 2022, I decided to get involved in a round of EBG (Epic Bias Game) which is basically like a test of your will?? You’re supposed to compete with your friends to see who can go for the longest without talking about or acknowledging their oshi (which includes not being able to react to fan works of them). As part of EBG, each participant was randomly assigned a “new oshi” to replace the usual one AND GUESS WHAT, I GOT HANDED L*ONA BY THE WHEEL OF FATE 💀

One of my friends (who knew I hardcore hated him at the time) assured me that this would get me to change my mind. They even went out of their way to write a little story explaining how my OC was forced to spend more time with L*ona, which led me into writing interactions between them to build more of the lore. I managed to outlast the friend in EBG, but didn’t win the entire game. I came out of it not really feeling super different about L*ona, but I think forcing myself to write about him extensively helped me gain a little more perspective on his character. I still didn’t like him, but I at least appreciated his presence in the cast a little more.

AND THEN TWST HAD TO COME AND BASH ME OVER THE HEAD WITH L*ONA CONTENT… All the little vignettes and voice lines where other characters would talk about what a good leader he is (*glares at Epel, Jack, Ruggie, Savanaclaw mobs, etc.*), when he sarcastically claims to be a “delicate prince” or a “lost child”, those moments where he sasses others, times when he’s able to use his charisma and/or intelligence to pull ahead, rare instances when he whips out his royal manners, him respecting women… But I think the turning point for me had to have been book 6 OTL GOOD LORD, BOOK 6 FUCKED ME UP 😭 Him using his UM in a creative way to turn falling glass shards into harmless sand? And strategically turning himself in?? Willingly ceding control of the dorm to Ruggie??? Telling everyone about Styx’s lore???? AND THE BEEF HE HAD WITH JAMIL BUT STILL GIVING HIM WISDOM AND ADVICE… Sometimes I still tear up thinking about how L*ona says “You’re not like me,” to Jamil 😔 implying that part of the reason why L*ona guides others is because he has hope in their futures but not his own… (I’m still salty that EN messed up this line by changing it to “I’m not like you,” which makes him come off as way more arrogant 💦) Anyway, I blame book 6 for being the tipping point in my downward spiral 🌀 IT GOT WORSE IN BOOK 7 WHEN HE STARTED SHOWING HE'S MOTIVATED TO ACTUALLY GRADUATE AND TAKES ON AN INTERNSHIP THAT COULD BENEFIT HIS COUNTRY... Special shoutout to the Club Wear card for being especially hot-- I did my best to hold out against the steady drip of content that called attention to his… positive traits… (Not that I’m saying he doesn’t have any; I mean this in that whenever his strengths as a character are brought up, they really get to me as someone who loves intelligent, mature/responsible types and “big brother” figures OTL) BUT IT'S SO HARD WHEN TWST KEEPS PULLING STUFF LIKE THAT???

Then in 2024 came the stupid Lost in the Book with Nightmare Before Christmas event 💀 which finally introduced us to L*ona in full formal attire (MY WEAKNESS) and gave him the opportunity to be in the role of the "hero" and leader... and those Nightmare Suit vignettes 😭 Leona thinking about what it actually means to be "king"... Ugh, it was another strong showing of his character. I'm pretty sure it was this event that started the snowball of my friends (lovingly) bullying me about him and calling me a tsundere about it. Weirdly enough, a BUNCH of things started happening irl to push L*ona at me too. For example, my pet (who usually actively avoids or attacks Twst stuff) was actually eager to pose for a picture with a L*ona standee. In a group fan merch order, I had asked for the bonus Grim sticker but the artist (who had no idea about my complicated thoughts on L*ona) said they were out of the Grim sticker but they had L*ona stickers they could include instead. Most recently, I had just finished this last-minute artwork of Miss Raven eating pocky by herself to celebrate Pocky Day (11/11). Typically the fan art you'd see on this day would involve two characters playing the "Pocky Game" (in which the players try to eat a stick of pocky from either end; usually it's framed as romantic since meeting in the middle results in a kiss). However, I had chosen to do a solo Miss Raven art because I thought this suited her "I want to be taken seriously!" personality better. Well, guess what? I GOT A PACKAGE DELIVERY NOTIFICATION FOR THE TWST MERCH ORDER... WITH L*ONA IN IT 💀 Almost like he heard there was food meant for sharing and he came to claim it for himself... Like I literally did NOT choose for these things to happen to me, THEY HAPPENED ON THEIR OWN. I DON'T BELIEVE IN PREORDAINED EVENTS BUT THE UNIVERSE SURE IS WORKING IN STRANGE WAYS.

So now that the tables have turned, it’s really embarrassing. Everything is coming back to bite me in the butt… It truly feels like L*ona plotted this all along and was on the prowl, patiently waiting for me to get worn down before he pounces and delivers the final blow to my ego OTL Like, it's gotten to the point where many of my long-time friends in the Twst community are now joking that "It's over" for J word... ONE OF THEM EVEN TOLD ME IT FEELS LIKE I'M GETTING DIVORCED AND L*ONA IS THEIR NEW STEPDAD, HOW AM I SUPPSOED TO FEEL ABOUT HTHAT ??????????? ? ? ????? ? ??? ? ?? ?? ? ???? ?

But by the far the worst, the WORST part about everything here is that if L*ona were fully sentient, he would be so smug about recent developments 😡 It makes me SO mad thinking about how he'd look down on me with that hot smug rage-inducing smirk of his and make fun of me for eating my words so badly.

“What was that you said about hating my guts, herbivore? … Hah, it's written all over your face--you're terrible at hiding your true feelings. You can just give in, you know. Tell me how much you worship me. How much you want me. You'll give in eventually one way or another--so why not make this easier for the both of us and save us the time of playing the wait game? I don't bite, promise." (<- a liar)

(Disclaimer: NOT MY MERCH; this is a L*ona Liker friend’s picture that they’re letting me use as a reaction image 😅)

THIS IS FR MY OVERBLOT ORIGIN STORY…

[starberry-cupcake]

oooohhhh boyyyyyyyy Stuff Happened you folks, this might be obnoxious because there was a lot of exposition, let's hope I can keep it decent. As always, sending you all positive vibes in these trying times ♥

previously, in harrowcita del 9:

this happened

CHAPTER 50

30 minutes for emperor destruction, prepare the champagne

gideon is being taken by yandere twin to meet doctor reverend emperor john

she isn't very into that idea, but doesn't have much of a choice

doctor reverend emperor john is having a very important conversation with someone in the room, so gideon and yandere twin hide to listen in

and the conversation is with non other than not!dulcinea

not!dulcinea is being possessed

by commander wake

I ASKED FOR THIS IN THE PREVIOUS ONE

why did you need harrow, then, you dramatic asshat?

so, basically, commander wake's name is actually a couple quotes and lyrics to eminem's song from 8 mile

her name isn't amanda, it's just awake, etc.

I'd take amanda over eminem but ok

they said they are words that date back thousands of years, so we're in the future

I considered this, but not due to book reasons, just because one time I was talking to @lady-harrowhark about one time a barbie of mine was stolen when I was a kid and it somehow related to tlt, this was A Long Time Ago but I thought "what, are the books in the future?"

I have no idea if my hollywood hair barbie had anything to do with the books directly or if it was just some fandom thing @lady-harrowhark knows and I don't, but that planted the idea in my head

if it's a spoiler, don't tell me

but I didn't pick up any clues from the book until eminem

emperor's last name is gaius, which I knew from an untagged non context dashboard post

doctor reverend emperor john gaius wants to know what commander wake was doing in the ninth, because she landed there on purpose

and also is impressed that she's been a revenant for nearly 20 years and doesn't know how she got there

I think it's the sword

so, in come augustine and mercygirl

because now we're having a party

dr reverend emperor john says "Am I in trouble?" because he's the most punchable asshole in the known universe

and introduces commander wake with an evanescence quote rather than an eminem quote

yes, ok, I much prefer that, thank you

thank you, Fallen by Evanescence (2003) you changed my life

so, turns out that commander wake was in cahoots with these two lyctors

but things turned south and gideon the first was sent to kill her

she went to the ninth to break into the tomb

it always comes down to the tomb

ice cube barbie is very popular

so, I was right when I said that gideon wasn't conceived Traditionally

the eggs were my clue on that bit, the eggs on the notes

they were supposed to 1) use dr reverend emperor john's genes to 2) create a baby with his blood to 3) break the blood ward to 4) open the tomb

CONVOLUTED LYCTOR PLANS

but the eggs didn't work, so commander wake decided to birth gideon herself

when I said gideon was a demigod and used hercules memes and when I compared her to superman or whatever

I was more correct than I thought

commander wake called gideon "bomb"

this song could go into the gideon playlist @lady-harrowhark and I were talking about

because we didn't have enough lyctors at this party, in comes gideon the first

from battling the beast, which is what everyone was supposed to be doing, btw, just putting that out there

gideon the first will receive a lot of very clever, funny and amazing nicknames by gideon that I can't even remotely compete with

I vow to you and your prowess for nicknames, queen

gideon the first comes in, removes gideon's glasses from harrow's body, and slides them on his face

commander wake me up before you go go looks at him with heart eyes

and he shoots her

gideon, things were so much easier when you didn't have a family, girl

this is too stressful

everyone is surprised that gideon the first fought the beast, the beast ran and gideon the first is alive

I am NOT SURPRISED because HE WAS FIGHTING ALONGSIDE MATI NONIUS

and ortus, and protozoa, and martita

BUT, MOST IMPORTANTLY, MATI NONIUS

well done team harrow!!!

so, basically, gideon the first didn't say anything about the whole commander wake situation because he thought gideon was his

which accounts for my doubts the other recap on how I thought gideon wasn't Conceived Traditionally but there were doubts from gideon the first's side

gideon prime, gideon zero, gideon senior (all gideon jokes, not mine) says he was with her for about two years

so augustine starts explaining how they got dr reverend emperor john's genetic material through god apate major

WHY AM I NOT SURPRISED

IT'S ALWAYS THE ORGIES, ISN'T IT?

man, I'd rather not know the details, thank you

gideon the first also doesn't want to know the details

the emperor's bolthole wasn't as inexorable as it was advertised to be, turns out

it's basically a revolving door

ANYWAY

the emperor goes "so you killed her and the baby, right?"

IN COMES GIDEON, INTRODUCING HERSELF

"I'm not fucking dead"

and the emperor goes "hi, not fucking dead, I'm dad"

CHAPTER 51

gideon starts remembering childhood things like suffering and fighting with harrow and telling harrow that maybe she is the daughter of someone important and they don't know it

"You remember how the fuck-off great aunts always used to say, suffer and learn? If they were right, Nonagesimus, how much more can we take until you and me achieve omniscience?"

man, this is rough

so, the thing about the eyes

gideon apparently has AL's eyes

whose name isn't only Annabel Lee

it's also Alecto

the alecto everyone keeps mentioning in the fandom

so, this explains why seeing gideon's eyes was like seeing a ghost to these lyctors

also why ice cube barbie had gideon's eyes

THERE ARE A LOT OF THREADS GOING ON IN THIS BOARD

GIDEON IS CONNECTED TO A LOT OF PEOPLE

NONE OF THEM GOOD

the lyctors bring back what teacher said in canaan au, about them asking dr reverend emperor john to kill AL aka Annabel Lee aka Alecto aka ice cube barbie

apparently all of them (except for gideon the first) hated her and were low key scared of her and high key scared of what might happen with her around

they think the beasts are coming partly because of her

and whatever dr reverend emperor john did to resurrect her

the emperor says he didn't kill her, he "switched her off"

not successfully, because she's been sort of roaming around

mercygirl and augustine say that everything about this is very sus because what if he didn't kill AL??? and what is going on with the origin of his power???

dr reverend emperor john goes "you both do tend to go overboard on the foreplay"

mercygirl and augustine figured out that harrow's true cavalier had AL's eyes

but it was impossible for a baby to be born with AL's genes

however, it was very probable that a baby had been born in the ninth with the emperor's genes

because they had been planning on that to happen

albeit in a different way, without the human intervention

so, if gideon has AL's eyes but the emperor's genes

it means AL's eyes aren't hers and the emperor's aren't his

the emperor's weird eyes are AL's and gideon's eyes are the emperor's

because.......

he achieved lyctorhood without having to slurp his cavalier aka AL

I'm very interested in this potential situation if we get gideon alive again

but everyone else is pissed off because they had to slurp their cavaliers unnecessarily

yandere twin also decides to join the chat after this

and, apparently, anastasia had figured it out too

the ninth necro who everyone said was the one who couldn't become a lyctor

the one with a room unused

until harrow

the emperor's version of events is that things went off the rails in the process and he had to kill them both

augustine tells dr reverend emperor john to just stop already with his plan of destroying everything

and the emperor says that the man before his resurrection would have hated him to say that

mercygirl then goes "I'll forgive you if you tell me you didn't mean to kill my cav"

and the emperor goes "yes, I'll do whatever"

so he hugs mercygirl

and mercygirl

FUCKING DECIMATES HIM

SHE WRECKS HIM

SHE MELTS HIM INTO NOTHINGNESS

gideon says she's an orphan again while I'm giving everyone a party hat and a piece of celebratory cake

I'M SORRY THIS WAS LONG but we're reaching the end of this book!!! See you next time!!!

[sherlockggrian]

gonna talk about lore for a second cause it's eating away at me here

this is all entirely personal and 80% made up with zero basis other than the ongoing au for hermitcraft/life in my head, btw. Grian has steadily been getting more confident and dangerous with his powers since the end of season 8. He was terribly afraid of them and refused to use them for the first few years after Evo, and it took a long time during season 9 for him to be more comfortable. Each life series he gets more and more powerful and has more influence over the game. He's still not on the side of the watchers themselves.

In season 10, he uses it casually. He sits on the dock and mentally flies around the server to check on everyone. He can jump in and out of worlds and universes. He can stop time and talk to people in their dreams. Pearl has some powers as well, though she is not a true watcher in the sense and thus isn't quite the same as Grian. I was thinking about Taurtis, and how he made Grian and probably Pearl into what they are, and how he's the reason the watchers are so obsessed with Grian and his group specifically - becayse though Taurtis has lost most of what made him human, forgotten his human form and thinks mostly as a powerful entity, he still has this connection and ties to the other Evo players.

Which is why Grian and Pearl want to kill him. Permanently. They cause a rip in the world borders of Hermitcraft, and Taurtis comes to them, and during the fight something goes wrong and Taurtis ends up posessing Grian. He's now sort of two people, with Taurtis able to control him sometimes, but Grian powerful enough to fight it off. This small disruption in the world is enough for the watchers to trap the players into Wild Life.

Grian/Taurtis choose the wild cards. Grian knows what is going to happen, yet is somewhat powerless to stop it. He's in this sort of interal war while also trying to keep his friends alive (and failing miserably). Scar, who believes the canary curse being broken last time is what let him beat the watchers (he won instead of Gem, the one who the watchers wanted), is working dsperately to stop Jimmy from dying.

Pearl is the only one who knows about Grian. She's keeping quiet, waiting for the right moment to intervene again, like she did last season. They always keep their distance from each other because they know they're the ones who can sort of protect everyone as best they can from the watchers, and it works better when they are spread out. Their alliance is very thin at best. Despite their powers, they don't trust each other.

And Bigb, once again, is there to observe. He is not a watcher, or a listener, but something else, a 3rd being that the watchers keep a careful eye on. He could end everything, if he wanted, he wasn't even intended to be there, but he chooses to go along with it, for reasons unknown to anyone but him. He is not allied with the watchers, but he does nothing to prevent their attacks. Nobody knows where he came from, or where he goes when the games are over. He is merely there.

[mumblingsage]

I also think it's worth being pedantic about important things...and in that spirit I've spent like an hour writing and deleting various responses to this one (I found myself over-policing my tone and stopped that, so I'll just say right off I have no ill-will toward you and appreciate the contributions, even as I disagree on interpretation in several ways):

First, your tags - "for example a book can really kick off a delusion and set something off that can be traumatic." As I've said in another reblog thread, but it deserves repeating, triggering delusions, compulsions, or PTSD or adjustment disorder symptoms is not the same as causing trauma. We should try to accommodate people with triggers, and much of this accommodation will need to be individualized because the range of potential triggers is vast and often does not include things conventionally recognized as upsetting. I had a loved one make an irreversible error because of a delusion he had that was fueled by the due date on his library card being coincidentally the same as the date of his dentist appointment. That's not a reason for us to have a cultural conversation about the format of due date stickers. Though it could call for a discussion of how we can best support people who are experiencing delusional thinking or psychosis (we are currently doing very badly).

Re: vicarious trauma. Reading the Wikipedia article, I see that the examples given are of real life events reported on in the media, primarily social media and news coverage in the wake of terrorist attacks. I'm not going to get too deep into personal experience here, but let's just say this is not my first time hearing of vicarious trauma, and the important thing is that it is a real response to real harm and disaster. I wouldn't refuse evidence, but have not seen any, that it's caused by 13 Reasons Why or The Bridge to Terebithia or Outlander. (Bellingcat has useful advice for safety and 'metal hygiene' when engaging with firsthand sources of violence. I might use similar techniques when watching clips from a horror movie, but the stakes are not the same. Also, heads up that anyone who clicks through that link will read some text about distressing real-life events.)

"Books can have a significant impact on someone’s mind and outlook and that’s why they want them to be banned." < I agree and I think when people talk about how they don't want kids (or others) to read books about death, violence, sex, etc, they are participating in this. Authoritarians want us to have very particular ideas about these topics and resist any alternative information or thinking about them. When people go around saying "Learning or thinking about something upsetting is the same as being traumatized" they are doing the work of Christofascist Censorship Attempts, and I don't care if it's accidental. We don't need to compromise with them. (I don't have room to open this can of worms fully, but I also think too many people go around saying--for example--"13 Reasons Why traumatized me, I can't believe any library would let a kid read it" and thus send a message to the people around them with real-life experience with suicide, suicidal ideation, etc. that their experiences are unspeakable, untouchable. This social stigma is incredibly harmful.)

"I think it’s more productive to challenge the idea that a book that can potentially cause harm should be banned instead of the idea that books can potentially cause harm." < This is an interesting idea. I love its uncompromising stance. It's one I would adopt if I was convinced books can cause something that deserves to be called "harm" (the two of us may just have different definitions). I definitely believe we all have the God-given right to give ourselves nightmares and anyone trying to 'protect' us from that should be kicked in the fork of the legs.

I'm wondering if, as a society who cares about vulnerable people, we could stop saying "traumatize" when we truly mean "upset"?

I am sick of hearing sad books or movies "traumatize" their readers. I simply do not believe that happens. A traumatic experience might be adjacent to books (I have vivid memories of books I was reading around certain experiences and even how the contents of those books affected my processing of the experiences). But it's not caused by the book. And, y'know. The weather is Christofascist Censorship Attempts outside.

Meanwhile from the other side I continue to be surprised at just how badly people fail to understand trauma and traumatic experiences in general. Watering down the term isn't helping. Find other hyperbole to express that The Bridge to Terebithia gutted you, chewed on your heartstrings, and made you cry your first pair of contact lenses right out of your preteen eyes.

[salem-witch-slut]

I Don't Need You (Don't You Leave Me)(18+)

Ellie Williams x Fem!Reader

SYNOPSIS: You and Ellie were always at each other's throats. Everything between you two felt like a competition. But when you are severely injured on patrol one day because of Ellie's carelessness, things between you change.

WARNINGS: Canon typical violence, descriptions of blood/bones breaking, awkward!Ellie, reader described as taller and stronger than Ellie, switch!Ellie (more sub though), dom!reader, fingering, face-sitting (Ellie receiving), spanking, Ellie calls reader "princess"

WORD COUNT: 9.3K

A/N: I always loved this one... I thought it was really cute and Ellie feels very in character for this one.

You hated morning patrols… Well, not so much morning, but the horrendous feeling of being awake before the sun is up. When you agreed to run through Hoback Pass, you were under the stipulation that you’d be riding with Jesse… You know, someone you got along with? Someone who wasn’t so cocky that they may as well have a membership card to the medical tent.

Someone so frustrating that it made your skin crawl just thinking about her… But Jesse had traded shifts with her, and now you had no choice but to put up with the reason you knew how to say fuck you in 3 different languages.

Your hands were tight on the reins of your stallion as you were almost falling asleep in the saddle. It was too warm that morning, and you wanted to go crawl back in bed and forget that this day was even taking place. And yet, fate had other things to say about it, that tricky bitch.

“Would you move your ass already?”

Her voice rang in your ears, forcing you to look up. The way the sun reflected down onto her auburn hair and how it accentuated her muscly biceps in the glow of orange. You may have blushed had you not felt so tired and instead of admiring her hot arms, you were scowling and rolling your eyes so hard that you’re amazed they didn’t get stuck in the back of your head.

“Trust me, Ellie,” You spoke, kicking your horse into a soft trot before yanking on the reins and stopping right next to her and her mare. “I’ll be the happiest I’ve ever been once this shit is all over.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

You clicked your tongue against the back of your teeth and groaned. “It means you are driving me fucking crazy.”

“Yeah?” Ellie yanked Shimmer in front of you and your stallion who halted and gave a challenging huff, much like you did. “Then keep up. Sooner we check in, the sooner we’re done.”

Shimmer trotted in front with her rider in tow and you huffed. “Bitch.”

It was always like this with you two. Sometimes when patrol groups were in threes, you and Ellie almost always got put on those, with Joel or Tommy playing mediator so you two wouldn’t just get into an all-out fist fight in the middle of the trail. Sometimes it worked, and sometimes you left with a bruise on your face and her with a split lip.

What was it about Ellie Williams that just… got under your skin? What was it that made you so infuriated whenever she spoke to you? Was it because she had always been rude to you? Maybe it was her inability to accept her mortality with how fucking reckless she always was. Was it her I’m better than you attitude?

Maybe it was something else entirely… Maybe you two were at each other’s throats because the sexual tension between you two was so annoying that Dina and Jesse had a bet going on who was going to kiss who first.

Everybody saw it. Everybody but you two. Ellie thought you were beautiful, assertive, and highly skilled in hand-to-hand combat. But she also said you were a hard-ass, bossy, and over-analyzed every little detail to the point that she would need a fucking magnifying glass to see all the fine print in your plans.

And Ellie? Ellie was a hardcore badass who thought with her fists before using her head, which was strange due to how absolutely brilliant she was. You heard her talks with her friends; she knew so much about science and space and literature… Why was she always so dumb when it came to her safety?

You were thinking very rude and nasty things as you two continued your trek down the trail, stopping every once in a while, to look for supplies inside of old buildings and watching Ellie do some fucking acrobatic shit just to get another one of her useless superhero cards on the third floor of a destroyed building. You were on the ground, checking your rifle for probably the thousandth time that day when the sounds of obvious distress made you look up.

“Shit, MOVE! ” Ellie shouted and watched as you had to roll out of the way to not get hit in the head with a rusted ladder that clattered to the ground aggressively. Your heart pounded in your ears as you looked up at Ellie who was now trapped on the third floor of the used-to-be, building with no way down.

The emotions that went across your face were like whiplash. At first, you looked angry at her complete carelessness, and then you realized she was genuinely stuck up there and you couldn’t stop laughing. In seconds, you were doubling over, your snorts of amusement echoing in the wind as Ellie pouted. She certainly looked cute with her bottom lip sticking out like that.

“How’s the weather up there?” You paced back and forth in front of the building as Ellie huffed, laying down on her stomach and leaning over the edge a little to see just how far down it was. The only thing keeping her up was that floor and a load bearing brick pillar.

“Stop being a dick and help me! ”

You grinned. “Hmm… and why should I do that?”

“You know I’ve got a clean shot, right?” Ellie removed her pistol from the back of her jeans and held it up like it was a threat. “Bet I could hide your body pretty fucking easily.”

You chuckled and rolled your eyes before picking the ladder back up, only for it to fall apart in your hands, the rusted pieces scraping against each other and falling into a heap on the ground. The amusement began to leave your face and you realized that this actually was a bad situation that she was in.

“Great, figures,” Ellie rolled onto her back and stared up at the sky. “Everything you touch turns to shit.”

“Oh, the optimism is fuckin’ killing me, El,” You shot back with an equal amount of sass. You didn’t see her blushing from where she was, which she was grateful for in the moment. “Just calm down. I’ll figure something out.”

All you got from her was a thumbs up over the side of the ledge and you sighed with irritation. Why did she have to be so… so fucking infuriating? She was 18 and still acted like a damn child sometimes. You were in your bitter thoughts as you looked around for anything that could be helpful. Another ladder? A rope? Anything that can save her sorry ass from getting stuck up there and starving to death.

“God, it’s fuckin’ hot,” The sun was up now, which meant that Wyoming was being cooked from the rays, and that meant with no shade, you were being blasted from every single angle. You stripped off your lightweight jacket and tied it around your waist. Sweat dripped from your forehead and stained your t-shirt as you dug around under the remains of some of the buildings.

You were focused on saving your partner, but in doing so, you had taken your eyes off her. And while she wasn’t exactly far away, you missed the way she was staring at you in that moment. In Ellie’s mind, all she wanted to do was trace your collarbone with her tongue and feel your hands against her ass… She truly was too gay for her own good.

Ellie scooted closer to the ledge when she saw you disappear behind a broken-down truck, and then she heard a cracking sound. The platform trembled and Ellie began backing away from the ledge as fast as she possibly could with her face going pale and her heart rate shooting sky high.

“Ellie?!” You called out, immediately abandoning what you were looking for and running over to the building. The cement between the bricks on the pillar was beginning to crack, and once that was gone, the building would be coming down in literal seconds. Your partner began panicking, looking down at you as you began to pace like a wild animal ready to attack their prey.

“Do something!” Ellie screamed as the platform shook so hard that she was knocked flat on her ass.

You laughed in the most cynical fashion. “Wh-What the hell do you want me to do?! I can’t stop it from falling down!”

“If I die because of this, I will haunt your ass forever !”

Time was running out and the building was coming down any second. You were out of options and only had one choice. “Jump!”

Ellie looked at you with her eyes wide and her fists clenched. “Are you fucking crazy—”

“ Shut the fuck up, and JUMP!”

The bricks in the middle of the pillar began snapping into pieces and Ellie realized she had no other way out of this situation. She looked down at you as you held your arms out for her. With a final, FUCK IT! Ellie jumped off the platform and into your arms.

You pushed both feet into the ground and bent your knees slightly. Ellie didn’t weigh much, and you were certain you could carry her, so why not this? And that’s exactly what happened. At first, Ellie thought you might let her hit the ground, but you had rushed forward just to make sure she didn’t hit the ground! And yes, she was light, but the momentum of her falling and you not moving had your entire body smacking against the back of the broken-down car.

The window to the passenger side door shattered with the impact of your body and you saw stars for a second with how much it hurt to hit something so hard. But you quickly remembered that you both needed to move. Without so much as a second thought, you ran out of the way of the collapsing building with Ellie still in your arms.

Of course, the fucking building had to fall at an angle. And in the direction that you were running. Your blood was rushing to your ears with adrenaline as you managed to slip on the fucking mud and ended up dropping Ellie into the dirt a few feet away from you.

“Shit, look out!” Ellie grabbed your hand and attempted to pull you away, but she wasn’t fast enough. The building came crashing down. The bulk of it missed you, but one of the wooden planks that was holding the floor together snapped off the remains and went flying in your direction. The plank came in direct contact with your leg and the sickening snapping sound definitely wasn’t from the wood.

You shrieked in agony, immediately crawling away from the rubble as it finally ceased its collapse and you fell to the dirt, whimpering in pain and tears streaking down your face. There was no doubt in your mind that your leg was broken, and you just knew that you were gonna catch so much shit for this. Your whole body felt like it was on fire and all you could think of was how much Ellie was going to hound your ass for not moving fast enough to get out of the way.

You looked up and coughed on the dust that the rubble kicked into the air, stomach twisting at the agony as you crawled away and slammed your fist into the dirt. “Fuck! God fucking damn it…”

“Hey, hey, look at me,” Ellie crouched down and placed both hands on your shoulders, getting your attention. You looked up with tears in your eyes and she brushed the hair out of your face and looked like she wanted to throw up. “Stay here… Stay right here, I’ll get the horses.”

You gave a weak laugh and dropped down into the dirt, giving her a thumbs up. “W... Where would I even go?”

A few seconds went by before Ellie returned with both horses behind her. She stopped right next to you and began to freak out, her hands going all over your back and behind your pack straps where she let out a hiss of pain. You had shards of broken glass embedded in your skin and your shirt was now soaked with blood. “Here, gimme your hand.”

Wordlessly, you slapped your palm into her grasp and braced yourself for her to yank you on your feet, which she did. You tried to keep your foot off the ground, but it was almost impossible.

“Can you get on?” Ellie questioned and you just nodded, grabbing at your horse’s saddle and jumping off the ground on your good leg, swinging the other one over the side of his back and forcing yourself to slide the foot on your broken leg into the stirrup.

Ellie jumped on Shimmer way faster than you could, and you both immediately began to ride back to Jackson, not even bothering with the checkpoint. Someone else would have to come out here to clean up your mess, and it would most likely be Maria and Shawn… As if she didn’t have enough to do already.

When the gates to the town opened up, Ellie was already helping you out of the saddle on your horse, putting one hand on your hip and the other holding your wrist as she slung your arm over her shoulder. The amount of concerned looks you two received made you feel sick. You’d have to tell everybody now that you broke your damn leg because you couldn’t move fast enough.

“Could you all stop fucking looking at us and help?!” Ellie shouted, her anger level rising as everybody was whispering but no one was doing a damn thing to help.

“What happened?!” You looked up and made a face of distress at seeing Joel and Tommy looking down at both of you, your face turning red with embarrassment. You felt so stupid.

Ellie readjusted her hold on your hip. “A building fell down; I think her leg’s broken—”

“Oh no,” You laughed, but there was no humor in your voice. “It’s definitely fucking broken…”

“Alright, c’mon then,” Without even warning you, Joel was bending down and lifting you up off the ground and into his arms, so you didn’t step on your bad leg. It was then that Tommy noticed the glass buried in your back and he immediately started swearing. “Ellie, tell Maria what happened. Gonna get her to the tent.”

As soon as you were out of earshot, Ellie let the biggest gasp escape from her mouth in her entire life. Her hand went to her chest, and she doubled over, almost like she was trying not to throw up after all of that. “I’m sorry… God damn it, I’m so sorry…”

The next few days were pretty much absolute torture for you. After the doctor had realigned your broken bone and placed you in a splint, you had been bedridden for the days to come. The timeframe given was not great… 4 whole months of nothing? 4 whole months of being trapped inside of your home with absolutely nothing for you to do? How in the actual fuck were you going to survive?

With stitches on your back and your leg wrapped around metal rods to keep it straight as it healed, you were pretty much incapacitated for the near future. Even getting yourself out of bed was a nightmare. And taking a shower may as well have been curing fucking cancer. It felt impossible every single time and you had no choice but to tape a plastic bag around the metal rods, so they didn’t rust against your skin.

It was early morning and you had just gotten yourself out of bed, sitting on your reclining chair in your small living room and watching one of your many movies you had retrieved during your patrol missions. Your leg was propped up on the bench in front of you, and you were content to stay like this all day long, unless you had to pee or something.

Of course, you were content… And then someone knocked on your damn door. A sigh left your throat as you paused the movie and pushed yourself off the chair and onto your feet. Maria had given you a set of crutches and that was the only way you would ever possibly get around for the near future. This was quite actually the fucking worst thing ever.

“Hold on,” You said as the person knocked once again. You opened the door, not even bothering to look through the window, and stumbled back a bit on your foot, your cheeks turning a soft pink.

God, Ellie sure looked like a kicked puppy when she stood like that. “Hey…”

“Uhm…” You cleared your throat for a second and stepped back. “Hi. Is there some—”

You paused and looked down, seeing that there were flowers in her hand and a solemn look on her face. Suddenly, you felt like she hadn’t come by to tear you apart for getting yourself hurt. Well, she was here for something, wasn’t she?

“How are you doing?” Ellie held the violet-colored flowers in both hands and looked over your shoulder before looking back down at her hands, almost like she couldn’t look you in the eyes.

You frowned. “I’m fine, Ellie… I just have a break, it’s not the end of the world.”

She nodded, still looking at the ground. “Right… Can I— Can I come in? I have something I need to say.”

What’s stopping you from slamming the door in her face? What’s stopping you from saying no and telling her to fuck off? Well, nothing was stopping you… but you kind of didn’t want to. If anything, you wanted to hear what she had to say… Plus, that fucking puppy-dog look was just melting your heart.

You pushed the door open with the crutch and limped away from the door, allowing Ellie to come inside of your home. She closed the door behind herself, and you hobbled your way into the kitchen where you began pouring a glass of water for her. It was just in your nature to be hospitable, apparently.

“What’s this about, El?” You sat on one of the barstools and slowly looked down at your wrapped leg, trying not to think about how your bone was all sorts of fucked under the bandages. Ellie offered the flowers to you, and for a brief moment, you forgot about your broken leg.

Ellie took notice of how you winced when you sat down, and the stitches on your exposed back. Her heart ached at the sight of them. “Listen… I didn’t mean to… W-What I’m trying to say is… I need to tell you—”

You snorted and she finally looked up to meet your eyes. You noticed her cheeks turn the slightest shade of pink. “I’m sorry, okay? It’s my fault you broke your leg… shit, I never meant for this to happen. I wasn’t trying to like, kill you or anything, that was a joke—”

“Ellie,” You reached out and gently grabbed her hand. You saw her whole body tense up as she looked down at you, and you responded with a smile at her confusion. “It’s okay… I’m just happy you’re okay, you know?”

The redhead looked down at her shoes… Those dirty, beat-up converse that you loved to tease her about and how she needed to fucking wear something else every once in a while, or she would be walking with holes in her soles at some point. “Yeah, well… you kind of saved my ass.”

Your own cheeks turned a soft pink as you looked down at the flowers in her hands and slowly reached for them. She offered the velvety flora for you, and you inhaled the scent of them. It reminded you of the smell of rain on a dirt road in the morning… They were definitely beautiful, and you felt something in your chest when you looked up at Ellie who was giving you a slight smile.

“Wasn’t gonna just stand there and do nothing, El,” You placed the flowers down on the counter as carefully as you could and offered her the glass of water. “I didn’t want you getting hurt… And yes, you were the dumbass that went up there in the first place, but I shouldn’t have been laughing about you getting stuck up there.”

“No, no, you were in your right to laugh,” Ellie cleared up. “It was a stupid-ass thing to do.”

“Mmmm, yeah it was,” You chuckled, watching as Ellie took the glass from your hand and looked down inside of it. “It’s not poisoned, dipshit.”

“Just making sure,” She shrugged her shoulders and sipped on the water, making you smile once again… Fuck, this was nice. It was so nice to talk to Ellie and not want to kill her for a few minutes. It was so comforting that she didn’t blame you, and that she was coming to apologize… Like she felt guilty about treating you like dirt for the past 4 years or so…

There was this warm fuzzy feeling in your chest as Ellie sat across from you at the bar and you couldn’t shake the feeling no matter how hard you tried.

It only took 3 months instead of the predicted 4. You did everything the doctor told you to do, and you were cleared for patrols in the morning. You were ecstatic at first, but then you saw the route… You were running with Tommy, and Joel was going with Ellie… But you wanted to go with Ellie; you told Maria you wanted to go with Ellie! Why didn’t she listen?

“Hey Joel,” You pulled the Texan to the side in the paddock and suddenly felt like you were asking his daughter to the fucking prom. “Uh… Is it okay if we switch routes? I-I wanted to go with Ellie.”

“Yeah, uh… about that,” Joel rubbed the back of his neck and looked like he wanted to be anywhere else but there. What happened? “Ellie doesn’t wanna go with you.”

It was like you had just got hit in the face. Your emotions went all over the place but mostly, you felt betrayal. What happened between you and Ellie recently that made her not want to go on patrol with you? Was it from the shots you two took turns doing last week? Was it when you were staring at her in the pastures yesterday? Maybe it was from the way you held her hand during that scary movie you two watched… What could have been the reason?!

Your hands clenched into fists, and you walked over to the stallion with your name on it, grabbing at his reins and yanking him away. “Thanks anyway, Joel.”

You saddled up next to Tommy, taking the rifle he gave you and checking to see if the chamber was loaded. You glanced down the line of patrollers and saw Ellie sitting next to Joel on her mare, checking her own rifle. When she looked down the line and made eye contact with you, she immediately looked away. What the fuck was her problem?

After being stuck in a house for 3 months straight, you had come to find something out about yourself. You had a very short fuse, and almost no fucking patience. Sitting in this kitchen alone, looking down at the countertop and remembering those flowers Ellie brought you when she first came to see you…

In the last 3 months, you two had gotten close. And it wasn’t the guilt that made her come around. No, she genuinely enjoyed your presence and you felt like her being with you was a breath of fresh air. You saw her a lot, and she would come outside with you when you wanted to walk around and stretch out your good leg.

And suddenly, she was cold to you… Like she couldn’t even stand to fucking look at you again. Your heart sunk down into your stomach and you looked out of your kitchen window. It was already dark outside, and you were desperate for answers on why she treated you like such shit… Why couldn’t Ellie even look at you?

In your state of anger, you grabbed your jacket from the coat rack, slid on your shoes, and you were out the door in seconds. It took a full 8 minutes to walk to Ellie’s little shed home behind Joel’s house. You pushed the back gate open and walked up to her front door, banging on the wooden surface with your whole fist.

“Gimme a damn minute!” Ellie shouted from the other side of the door. Your rage just seemed to rise as you curled your hands into fists and as soon as the door opened, you were putting a hand on her chest and shoving her inside of the house. “Jeez— the fuck is going on?!”

You spun around, slammed the door, and stared her down like she just hit you in the face… which you had half a mind to do to her once again. “What the fuck happened this morning?”

Almost immediately, Ellie flinched at your words and looked down. At least she had the damn decency to look ashamed of herself. Of course, when she said nothing, it didn’t help your anger. You just got even more heated, and you stepped forward. You were a few inches taller than her so you had superiority here… at least in height.

“We have been… we were fine! I thought we were good, Ellie. Why? Why are you back to treating me like this— Are you ashamed to admit to your fuckin’ friends that I’m now your friend too?”

Ellie recoiled as if you had just slapped her. “What? No! No, why would I—”

“Then why is it,” You started, stepping forward and towering over her. Ellie inhaled sharply and stepped back, almost tripping on the stuff all over her floor. “As soon as I’m cleared for patrol, and you’re around your friends again, you start treating me like shit again?”

“I didn’t mean for you to—” Ellie gasped and stumbled until the back of her legs hit the bed and she caught herself before she fell on her ass. “Did Joel not tell you?”

“Oh, he made it pretty fuckin’ clear, Williams,” You snapped, and your face was inches away from hers. It was like all those times before that you two had gotten into fist fights. Only this time… Ellie was actually backing down. She acted like she didn’t want this to happen; she didn’t want to fight you at all. “You better explain yourself. Or I swear, I will walk out of that door, and I will never, ever speak to you again.”

The silence was deafening. For the first time in a long time, Ellie was speechless. Her heart was racing, and she was panting as if she just ran a marathon. You scoffed, your lips twisting into a vicious snarl and your brows pulling down with aggression. “Fine. Fuck you then, Ellie.”

Your hand wrapped around the front handle of the door, and you were about to turn it when you felt a hand close around your wrist. You were mere seconds from punching her in the face, but you sure as shit couldn’t do that after what Ellie just did.

The redhead grabbed your wrist with one hand, shoved you by the chest with the other, and slammed her lips against your own. A loud inhale pulled from you at her sudden assertiveness, slamming your body into the door and digging her nails into the skin of your wrist. Well, this certainly was not what you were expecting, like at all…

Ellie acted desperate as she practically devoured you, her lips moving against your own with a feverish desire that you simply couldn’t wrap your head around in that moment. You were still in shock more than anything, but at least you weren’t mad anymore, right? No, just confused now.

A few seconds passed as Ellie reached up and curled both hands into the front of your shirt, and you put your own hands on her jaw, pulling her away from your lips with a wet SMACK! She felt like heaven on your lips, but you needed answers.

Of course, pushing Ellie off was a lot harder than you originally thought. As soon as you separated her, she would dive back in to steal another kiss and you felt your heart pounding in your chest all over again. Breathing her in with every fiber of your being, you mutter against her mouth, trying to get a word in edgewise but matching her kisses with equal ferocity.

“El…Ellie, W-what is—” You paused and gave her one very long kiss and broke it just to finish your sentence. “What’re you doing?”

“M’sick of it,” She whined, sliding one of her hands into your hair and the other slid down the front of your chest before gripping you by the side and pulling you flush against her torso. A gasp left your throat and Ellie took that opportunity to slide her tongue into your mouth. “So, fucking tired… tired of pretending like I don’t want you.”

The color that rose to your cheeks could be seen from space. You inhaled hard through your nose and wrapped both arms around her, like you might drift away from her if every single inch of your body wasn’t pressed against her own.

“God, El,” You cooed sweetly, enough to pull a whine from her throat as she dug her nails into your shoulders. “Didn’t know you were so hot for me—”

“Don’t fucking make me regret this,” She scowled, looking up at you with that familiar challenging look on her face that you found yourself adoring very quickly when it was under different circumstances. Well, if she wanted a challenge, when did you ever back down from the chance of putting Ms. Williams in her place?

The most mischievous smirk crossed your face, and she had no idea what was in store for her. You reached down and grabbed at her wrists with one hand, lifting them up and spinning so this time, it was her back pressing into the door. You pushed both hands over her head and held them there, keeping her hostage and looking down with the biggest grin possible.

Ellie was completely speechless, and her entire face went red with embarrassment. “W-What the fuck was that?”

You slowly slid your free hand up the length of her side, tugging up her shirt as you moved, nails gently raking across her pretty freckled skin. The way her body shuddered against yours was a sure way to make you groan as you leaned down and pressed your mouth against her neck. You inhaled her beautiful scent and pressed your lips down on her hot skin.

“God, you smell so good, El,” You purred as you kissed from the start of her shoulder up to the base of her jaw. Ellie’s hands flexed inside your own like she wanted to fight back. For a small moment, she managed to pull her hands forward, but you quickly slammed them back. It seemed like you had a lot of pent-up strength and energy to burn off from being bedridden for months.

“W-Wait, wait, wait,” Ellie begged, squirming against the door and making you look up for a second. Her desperate tone was what pulled you away and you slowly released her wrists, taking your hands back away from her body. Her body was trembling, and she looked like a frightened bunny in your presence. You suddenly felt like you went too far.

“Are you okay?” You slowly reached out and felt a slight wave of relief when she didn’t shy away from your touch. Both hands went to her face, and you stroked your thumbs across her jaw.

“Y-Yeah, I’m just…” Ellie breathed, putting a hand over her chest and inhaling through her nose like she couldn’t catch her breath. “Fuck, I’m sorry.”

“No, no, Ellie, it’s okay,” You forced her to look back up in your eyes. Her pupils were dilated, and she looked terrified. “Hey, hey… look at me.”

Every time her eyes would try to look away, you would coax her into looking back up in your eyes, pressing a soft kiss against her nose and trying to calm her down as best you could. All you wanted was for Ellie to calm down… But like everything else that happened between you two, that was proving to be even more of a task than you thought it would.

You only relaxed when her breathing went back to normal. Very slowly, Ellie returned her gaze at you and gave you a haphazard smile. A breath of relief filled the air, and you pressed your forehead against hers. “There you are… if you want to stop, it’s okay—”

“Wait, no, no, no, wait!” Ellie grabbed your shirt and yanked you forward before you could back away. You stumbled on your feet and had to slam your arm into the door above her head, so you didn’t end up slamming directly against her. The noise that she made was enough to send you into fucking cardiac arrest. Her eyes were now focused on your strong arms, and she trailed her gaze up to the length of your neck and to your eyes. “…Fuck.”

Your heart sped up all over again and you looked like you wanted to eat her alive.

“Ellie,” You huffed out her name, and she responded by saying your name almost in a taunting manner. “Listen, we can… we can talk about this, and we can… You know, we don’t have to do anything you aren’t ready for, it’s—”

You squeaked embarrassingly loud as she yanked you back down and slammed your lips against her own once again. She reacted to your kiss like it was a breath of air after being underwater. Like it was all she could need to stay calm and collected.

The way she squirmed against you was almost like she wanted more, but you were worried that she just wanted to stop but couldn’t voice it. “It’s okay, baby… I won’t hurt you; I promise—”

“Fuck,” Ellie bit down on your bottom lip and inhaled your entire being with desperate intent. “Fuck, fuck, fuck… I can’t take it anymore.”

You were planning to question what she meant when you felt her grab at your wrist and placed one of your hands around her neck. Almost instantly, you gently grabbed her throat and pushed her back against the door, using your other hand to block her head from smacking into the wood. She groaned as your grip tightened on her neck and it was like she didn’t have a dominant bone in her body.

The way Ellie just fully gave you the reins and relinquished control of herself… it was doing ridiculous things to you. Very slowly, you pulled your hand away from her throat and reached down, grabbing the underside of her thighs and yanking her away from the door.

Despite how obvious it was what you were planning, she still swore with surprise when you picked her up off the ground and wrapped both of her incredibly strong legs around her waist. It was no secret that you were stronger than her, but she was faster than you… It was one of the reasons you two were always at odds. Back when you were younger, Ellie would challenge you all the time. She always won in her mock race, and you always managed to beat her at arm wrestling… It may have been where your feud started.

And now, things were different; so different. Ellie used to hate that you could pick things up so easily and she was beyond jealous that girls fawned over you when they saw you working in the stable and not going on patrol. She thought she was jealous of you… But now she’s seeing that wasn’t the case. No, Ellie wanted you to pick her up and toss her around like she was a fucking bale of hay.

And that’s exactly what you did. You kept both hands on her thighs and took a few steps back before turning on your heel and dropping her down onto the bed underneath you. The sound she made was beyond gorgeous and you felt like you were gonna lose it.

“God, what the fuck are you doing to me?” Ellie whined, arching off the bed as you trailed your lips back down her neck. With one finger, you pulled down the collar of her shirt and without warning, latched your teeth down against her neck. She immediately grabbed your hair with both hands and yanked, hard, making you hiss in pain and pull back away from her skin. “Y-You’re pissin’ me off, you know that?”

All you could do was laugh and immediately pull yourself back. She struggled against you and tried to keep you on top of her, but you simply grabbed her wrists and held them over her head once again, towering over her and gently taking hold of her chin with your free hand. “I can go, y’know… Don’t even have to be here, baby. You’d have to fuck yourself—”

“That’s… Shit, that’s not…” Ellie fumbling on her words was the cutest thing you had ever seen. You smirked, like you always did whenever you won one of her stupid contests and dragged your fingertips across her neck and down over her chest. She looked so angry with you, and yet, she couldn’t stop from giving you the most adorable moan you’ve heard in your life.

Your hand stopped at the hem of her shirt, and you paused. “Can I take this off?”

“I’m gonna be pretty fucking upset if you don’t,” She snapped back, making you shudder with excitement. It was like you couldn’t take her clothes off fast enough. Her shirt was the first to go, and then her jeans followed, along with her sneakers. She yanked on your own shirt desperately, almost tearing the fabric with how aggressive she pulled, and you decided to take pity on her, stripping yourself out of your own clothes and grabbing her hips in order to pull her up higher on the bed so you could fully encompass her body.

You couldn’t help but stare at her, your strong hands grabbing at her leg and lifting her knee up so you could press down between her thighs. Feeling her bare skin against your own was like electricity in your bones and you had to remind yourself to breathe as you kissed all over the expanse of her chest just above her sports bra.

“St-stop fucking teasing me,” Ellie said, almost losing it.

“Ellie,” You broke off from her chest and grabbed at her sports bra before slowly pushing the fabric up around her chest and staring at the soft swell of her breasts. You had to press your thighs together and you were practically drooling over her. “You’re so fucking sexy.”

Her face went even redder at your words, and you immediately bent down, your tongue sliding all over her skin and tracing between her breasts. She threaded her fingers in your hair as you grabbed the soft flesh and squeezed, nails digging into her skin and gently rubbing her nipples with the pads of your thumbs. The way she whined was adorably pathetic and you just wanted to hear even more.

You trailed your lips down her flat abdomen and gently pinched at her nipples, marveling at how her stomach sucked in when she gasped. It was like it was too much for her, and you couldn’t stop yourself from teasing her even more. “Baby… You gonna cum just from me playing with your tits?”

Ellie gasped and slammed her fists into the mattress, sitting up off the bed and looking down at you like she wanted to set you on fire. “I can… almost promise you,” Her voice was breathy and deep, and it made you even wetter. “If you don’t fuck me in the next five minutes, I will hurt you.”

“Promise?” You grinned and slipped your thumb into the elastic of her panties and slowly pulled them down her thighs, tossing the fabric away from you and onto the floor. You had wasted enough time already. And now all you wanted to do was give Ellie exactly what she wanted.

“J-Just… Just fucking fuck me— ohgod! ” Ellie choked on her breath the second she felt your fingers against her slick folds. Her legs opened up for you and she shuddered with each stroke of your fingers along her cunt and creating a map of her with your mind. You didn’t touch any place in particular, and you didn’t let your touch linger; you kept her on edge the entire time.

Every time you pressed your fingertips against her opening, she would bite her lip and grab the sheets with her hands, and then when you pulled away, she would start pouting. You did the exact same thing with her clit, pressing the pads of your index and middle finger on her sensitive bundle of nerves and gave a few little rubs before moving away. It was the most aggressive form of torture she had ever felt in her entire life.

“Stop! Fuck, fuck, stop it!” Ellie yanked your hair until your lips were away from her hip bone and looked down at the many love bites and hickies you left in your wake. She was practically fuming with desperation as she got on her knees and used your hair as leverage to push you down onto the bed as she climbed on top of you. “Fucking pain in the ass.” 

“Oh? What’s wrong, sweetheart?” You teased, biting your lip as she pushed your head into the pillows, slowly crawling up and making it so you couldn’t keep teasing her. You shut up pretty fast when she swung her leg over and her pussy was inches away from your face. She was absolutely soaking wet, and it was clear that this was a final ditch effort to force you to fuck her. 

“Maybe this way,” Ellie grabbed at the headboard behind you and spread her legs even more until she was centimeters from your mouth. “You’ll finally shut that pretty mouth of yours.” 

Ellie didn’t expect the dominance from you as you grabbed her ass with both hands and yanked her down onto your face. With a sharp intake of breath, Ellie whined and began to grind herself against your mouth as you began to lick at her slick cunt. You knew she was strong and in all honesty, could most likely sit on your face for hours without her legs getting tired. And it was why you were confident enough to hardly even hold her in place. 

“Fuck,” Ellie pushed her face into the wall and held still as you sucked on her slick folds and slid your tongue up until it was pressing on her clit. She squirmed a little at the pleasure and you immediately grabbed her hips with your strong hands, holding her still and licking at her clit fast enough for her to see stars. “ Fuck ! Oh fuck…” 

It was adorable; you were on the bottom but you were still in control of her. There was no autonomy left with her as she moaned and did her best to hide the way her body was reacting to your thick tongue. You were certain that you would leave bruises on her skin as you held her in place and practically destroyed her on your mouth. 

And while it was so nice that she was giving you enough room to breathe, a part of you wasn’t having as much as you wanted. You slid your hands up from her hips and grabbed her waist, yanking on her and growling with dominance. Ellie responded with a groan at the vibrations from your noise and looked down to meet your heavy-lidded eyes. 

“Shit, I… I don’t want to crush you–” 

You moaned against her folds and lifted her up for a second just so you could speak, and she was already upset that you stopped. “If you’re gonna sit on my face… you better fucking sit down. Don’t just hover; sit!” 

For a moment, Ellie was reminded of when you yelled at her to jump. She was right about that… So why not this? 

You let out a breathy snarl and decided to make the choice for her when you pulled her back down and immediately went back to eating her out. Your tongue lapped at her clit and you kneaded her strong ass with both hands as she leaned back and pushed her hand into your thigh in order to stay sitting upright. Ellie couldn’t keep quiet even if she tried, grinding down against your mouth and rubbing her juices all over your face. 

“Yeah, just like that…” Ellie moaned, her head falling back as she held you by the hair and slowly moved her other hand between your legs. It was like you knew because you immediately started spreading your legs and dug your heels into the mattress while she put her entire palm against your clothed pussy. The noise you made just seemed to make her even wetter. “N-Not gonna… let you have all the fun, Jesus christ your mouth feels so good…” 

You simply hummed with approval and arched up into her hand as you wrapped your lips around her clit and sucked. She let out a tiny squeal at the sensation and immediately reached inside of your panties, pressing her fingers in between your own slick folds and rubbing at your clit without holding anything back. 

You couldn’t say anything; all you could do was moan into Ellie’s cunt as she played with your pussy, your eyes squeezing shut and your mouth collecting all of her wetness as best as you could. The mess you were making was beyond vulgar. Her juices dripped from her cunt and all over your face, creating a huge wet spot on her sheets behind your head. Your drool slicked her up even more and your tongue spread it around, the sounds reverberating off the walls and making her blush with just how loud you were when you feasted on her pussy. 

“God, fuck yes,” Ellie cried. “Ugh, you know exactly what you’re doing, don’t you princess?” 

The nickname had your eyes rolling and you responded with a soft smack to her ass. Ellie gasped and responded by sliding her hand down and pushing two fingers directly into your tight cunt, making you scream into her pussy. Even when you were eating her out, she had to make everything a fucking competition. 

With one final slurping sound, you lifted Ellie off your face and looked up, gently grinding up into her fingers as she slowly pumped them in and out of your wet cavern, soaking your panties and smirking, feeling like she finally got the upper hand. You chuckled and slid your hand from her ass and began to prod her opening with your own fingers. 

“Easy baby,” You cooed sweetly between your own whines of pleasure as she gently curled her fingers upward and stroked along your soft inner walls. Her hips were moving on their own, bucking against your hand as you leaned forward, kissing her hip and slowly pushing both fingers inside her slick cunt. “Fuck, slipped right in… Naughty girl–”

“Shut up,” Ellie scowled. “T-trying too hard to… ohhhhfuck…” 

With a simple twist of your wrist and your fingers bending inside of her, she finally stopped complaining. Her words died on her tongue as she kept still but pounded at your pussy with her long, strong fingers. “Look at yourself, baby… Oh, you love getting fucked, don’t you?” 

Ellie was too far gone to fight back and her hand began faltering on your cunt just trying to hold it together. You were the lucky one to get a front row seat of seeing her pussy spread apart on your digits and you began to push them in and out of her, listening to the slick sounds of her liquids squelching on your hand and how she was practically bouncing on your hand. 

“Yeah? Oh, you finally decided to shut the fuck up?” You taunted, and all Ellie could do was cry out. You pumped inside of her a bit faster. “Hmmm, that’s it baby… That’s it, good girl… Fucking love how your pretty pussy stretches on my fingers.” 

Ellie slowly released you and in that moment, you took the upper hand once again. In mere seconds, you were shoving Ellie down into the bed, slotting between her legs, and immediately pushing your fingers back inside of her without letting up. You pushed your knees into the mattress next to her, an arm going over her head as you were hovering away from her face. Your lips were so close to her own and she kept trying to meet them for a kiss but all you did was drag the tip of your tongue over her mouth and teased her while fucking her into the mattress.

“Alright, let’s see…” You breathed down and Ellie fisted her hands into the sheets, her moans spurring you forward as you twisted your fingers around inside of her cunt, stroking along her inner walls to see if you could make her go from soft moans to full on screams which you would need to silence anyway with how fucking thin the walls were in her shed. 

“Wha– What are you– AH! Fuck! ” 

“There it is,” You leaned down and pressed your lips on Ellie’s before you began a brutal pace, pumping your thick fingers into her pussy and hitting her sweet spot with every movement you made. Her screams were muffled by your mouth and you pressed your tongue down against hers, tracing the grooves in her teeth and hissing at her bite down on your bottom lip. “Hmm? That feel good baby?” 

Normally Ellie would snap, or she would have some clever retort or insult for you, but not this time. Ellie just groaned and nodded, eyes rolling back in her head and her inner walls clenching down on your fingers. It didn’t matter though, because you didn’t slow your speed. And when you twisted your wrist, Ellie arched off the bed and into your hand. 

From how bad she was squirming and wiggling around underneath you, and how her moans were growing in pitch, you could tell she was right on the edge, and you wanted nothing more than to push her over. 

“Come on baby,” You got closer and dragged your tongue across her neck and down to her shoulder where you gave a soft little bite into her skin. She squeaked, and it quickly blended into a wanton moan as you slammed your fingers up into her poor stretched out cavern. “Come on, cum for me. I know you want to.” 

“Fffffuck…” Ellie purred, biting down on her bottom lip and trying not to scream bloody murder as you slammed down into her. The beautiful way that her body was rolling into yours, and how she was holding you by the arms, so close to crescendo that she wanted to cry. Not to mention the way you were looking at her like she was about to be devoured like a fucking feast. 

“Go one, scream for me baby,” You leaned down and kissed over her neck, angling yourself so you could press your thumb against her clit and rub at the sensitive bud while thrusting your thick fingers into her. You ignored the cramp in your wrist and refused to let up. Ellie was so fucking close and you wanted to be the one who brought it out of her. “Scream for me. Let everybody in this fucking town know whose fucking you so good.” 

Her hips bucked up into your hand and you half-expected her to actually scream. But no, Ellie had a better idea in mind. Her inner walls squeezed your fingers and her moans grew with pitch before you felt her pulse around the digits, her head going back as she opened her mouth to scream but nothing came out. 

You were worried she would actually shriek but Ellie fell forward and bit down on your neck, hissing through the pleasure as you fucked her through the orgasm of her life. Tears began streaking down her face as she whimpered into your flesh and ground her hips down into your touch. 

A bruise would almost certainly be left behind on your skin, but you didn’t care. You held her close and gave soft little kisses against your cheek as she had a moment of relief before she felt your fingers still moving and she immediately grabbed for your wrist to make you stop. 

“Fuckfuckfuckfuck, stop stop stop,” She pleaded, forcing your hand to still as she looked down at you, breathing hard and shaking with aftershocks of euphoria. Very carefully, you pulled your fingers out of her cunt and gave her clit a few more rubs before retracting completely and rubbing at her inner thighs. “Jesus fucking Christ…” 

“Mmm, no, that’s not my name baby,” You teased, kissing her jaw and falling down next to her. Ellie scoffed, but was still smiling when she smacked your arm. You giggled and rested your chin on her shoulder, kissing at her sweat covered skin. “Wanna tell me now?” 

Ellie huffed and looked over at you while wiping the tears away from her eyes. “T-Tell you what.” 

“Why you didn’t want me with you on patrol,” You sat up a little and she blushed at seeing you were still in your underwear compared to her. “I find it hard to believe that this is the reason. Unless you like me that much…” Her silence was not comforting and you continued to jeer her. 

“Am I to believe you didn’t want me there because you wanted to fuck me that bad?” 

“No, dumbass, that’s not–” Ellie put both hands over her face and she sighed. “I can’t get you hurt again…”

You slowly laid down next to her and took one of her hands away from her face. “I’m the reason you got hurt… It was my fucking fault, and I don’t want it to happen again.” 

Almost instantly, you were leaning up and pressing a kiss to her lips all over again. Ellie whined against your mouth and slid her fingers into your hair, gently scratching the base of your scalp and making you groan on her mouth. 

When you broke the kiss, you pushed those auburn bangs away from her forehead and stroked down the side of her face, touching her in the most gentle possible way to convey that you could be gentle sometimes and not always be a hard-ass like she said you were. 

“Ellie… If it meant that you were safe, I would risk my life ten times over just for you.” 

Your words resonated inside of her, shaking her to the core as she blushed and took one of your hands into her grasp and kissed the inside of your wrist. This time, it was your turn to blush as she looked up and gave one final kiss before releasing your hand. 

“Don’t die for me, princess.” 

“No,” You chuckled. “I’d rather live for you, baby.” 

[hellaarknight]

I promised to protect you

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Genre: Angst

Warnings: swearing and mention of physical and psychological abuse, toxic relationship, mentions of bruises and about laying hands on a partner, some of the content may be triggering.

Author note: I would consider this a heavy fic for some. Do not engage if you think it might be triggering.

Images and art from Pinterest if someone knows the original creators let me know so I can tag them properly

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" Well he's not always this bad, he's ok..."

Your weak attempt to defend your shity boyfriend only made Chuuya angrier. Why would you let yourself be in the company of that awful guy, he could never understand. You were bright and nice, powerful and determined and yet you got yourself a... A leech. No, it was worse but he was being generous while describing that abomination of a man... That guy had deemed your light in the past 6 months he's dated you and Chuuya hates himself for allowing you to get with him in the first place.

"Are you even listening to yourself right now?" Chuuya extended towards you a glass of wine.

"Listen Chuuya, I know he's not the man I've dreamed of and doesn't have all the qualities I've wanted my partner to have, but I also have to compromise on some things."

"Not on your dignity."

Your gaze fell on the floor a deep sight leaving your lips. Chuuya ran a hand through his hair, very frustrated. He didn't want to say it like that, but he had enough of seeing you suffer, seeing you renounce your hobbies because that guy deemed them "childish" or seeing you lose your spark when talking about what brought you joy just because your boyfriend found them boring. He knew you were smart, always talked about how you will never lose yourself in a relationship so he didn't really understand why and how you got to this point. Chuuya fell in love with you, but couldn't tell you because of his mafia position and him being away for missions a lot, or work trips how he called them in front of you. Then, when he decided he had to come forward and let you decide if you wanted to give him a chance with all that it would have entailed, he was a month too late. He returned from one long, painful mission and found you in a relationship, one that he despised wholeheartedly, so he chose to remain your trusted friend.

"Listen, I didn't want to say it like that...."

"No, that's not true, you did want to say it exactly like that". Your voice was on the verge of cracking. Something bottled up was about to spill if you weren't careful enough and Chuuya noticed it. The man groaned and took a sip of his wine. Maybe it was time to be honest about it.

" Fine. It's exactly like that. Since you started dating that douchebag you lost yourself. All the things you promised not to compromise on in a relationship happened. You lost your bright personality, you stopped rambling about books, anime and flowers. Hell, you even stopped gardening and that was your therapy. You asked me to stop bringing you flower bulbs from all over the places I go on my work trips and you stopped hanging out with me or your other friends. You stopped wearing your signature perfume and your red lipstick you were so fond of. So I'm sorry, but you're not in a fucking healty relationship! And you're defending that stupid fuck who doesn't do anything with his life and stays at your place, without paying any fucking bill! You left yourself to be a mat for that guy, what is wrong with you!?"

You looked at Chuuya stunned. It seemed that the red head had a lot bottled up as well. For some reason his words stung and made you feel worse. He was right and you fully knew it, but you just couldn't let him know... You could not put him in danger.

Chuuya was deeply unaware of your internal struggles. He only knew what he was seeing and what you were letting him know lately, which wasn't a lot that's for sure. He felt relieved to have finally spoken his mind. At the same time, guilt was eating him alive. This was the first time he raised his voice at you in a serious manner, but he couldn't control it, his anger towards the entire situation had the best on him. You looked frightened to say at least and he could swear that he saw you flinch when he was using his hands to express his thoughts.

Something about your crunched posture, your fidgeting fingers, the way you looked very exhausted made him open his mouth.

"Does he hit you?"

Why didn't it cross his mind sooner? What if you were in an abusive relationship? Your boyfriend's controlling behavior was concerning enough, but if it was worse than he imagined and all this time he blamed you for not keeping your ground? A pit formed in his stomach, he was going to be sick.

"What?? What, no... Is not really like that." You avoided Chuuya's scrutinizing gaze and forced a smile.

He gently reached for your chin and turned your head to face him. His voice was soft, barely a whisper, his gentleness making your heart flutter. Was his calloused hand always this comforting?

"Please, please if anything don't lie to me, especially with things like this. I promised you that I will protect you no matter what, remember?"

"I can't" you shake your head "If I'm telling you everything you're going to act impulsively. He's going to hurt you, he said you'd be the first one to suffer, I'm sorry, I can't..." At this point your cheeks were stained by your tears, your hand cupping his near your face.

Chuuya's heart broke at the sight. It was pitiful, he blamed himself for it. If only he wasn't a coward when it came to feelings. He swore to himself that he'd keep you safe from the mafia world, but that did not mean that in other circumstances he wouldn't be there for you. With his thumb he wiped your tears away.

" I am not going to get hurt, I promise you. There isn't any chance for him to lay hand on me. Don't hide yourself from me anymore, please. You're hurting and it's killing me to see you like this."

Chuuya felt as close to you as ever. Even if you kept your distance from him in the last few months, even if you tried your best to hide the hell you were going to. So you just broke down crying.

Chuuya was quick to pull you towards his chest, wrapping his hand protectively around you. He caressed your back and gave you space to let it all out. He was hurting with you, he hated to see you cry, let alone seeing how broken and hurt you were. He felt like the wall that rose between the two of you had finally collapsed.

" Is ok, is ok, you're going to be okay. I'm here now, you're safe, no one is going to hurt you here, I'll make sure of it. You are safe sweetheart, you're safe." He kept whispering sweet nothings and encouragement words until you got to calm down a bit. He used his gravity manipulation powers to bring closer the tissues and then handed you one.

" You' sure you're ok?" Your nod made him feel at ease, at least for a moment. Then he just grabbed one of your hands and intertwined his fingers with yours, squeezing lightly, silently encouraging you to talk.

" I want you to pinky promise that you won't do anything stupid." Your glossy eyes made Chuuya chuckle.

" You know very well that I can't promise something like that, doll. I'm gn'a promise that I won't get hurt, that I can do."

Your glare only made him raise his shoulder, but that will have to do.

" He... He may or may not have raised his hands at me. I definitely do have some bruises over my body, but they appeared from what he calls accidents. I tripped, or I fell into the chairs from the kitchen but he pushed me..." Chuuya silently listened, his blood boiling in his veins. He was ready to hunt the bastard down and bring him into the Port Mafia's torture chambers.

" ... and I kept all this to myself because he's a member in the mafia and said that he would put you on their killing list if I said anything to anyone so I was scared..."

" WHAT!?" Chuuya couldn't believe what he was hearing, your boyfriend was a what and did what? It was like his worst nightmare came to life but in a very twisted way. That was not plausible, the members in the mafia know very well the consequences of using their status to commit shit like this. Unless it was about some weakling, a newbie who got the hands on a bit of power and now thought nothing would touch him. What the fuck happened?

" I know, I know, it was very dumb of me to stay in the relationship, but I was really scared for you and for my family..."

" No, no, that's not it. Tell me his name and what he told you about being in the Mafia. That motherfucker is about to lose his head."

"Chuuya, you promised that you're not going to do anything stupid!"

"No, doll. I promised that I won't get hurt. But that isn't why I'm saying it. The guy can't use his mafia status however he pleases. There are certain rules even in the Mafia."

You looked at him confused.

" How would you know?"

Chuuya inhaled deeply. It was time to come clean with everything.

" Because I'm an executive in the Mafia and I can guarantee that the motherfucker you're dating isn't going to go about his day and live to tell the tale. I'm sorry, I'm going to explain everything afterwards, I promise. He's at your apartment?"

You were so confused, not really registering what he was saying so you just nodded.

" You stay right here until I come back. Go take a shower, take a bath, go in my office and read a book or you can find some manga collections that I have previously prepared in case you happened to stay here. You can find pajamas for you in the guest room. I'll be back later."

" Where are you going?"

Chuuya smiled and placed a kiss on your forehead.

" I'm going to show that bastard what it actually means to be in the Mafia."

[leresq]

Finally watched Deadpool and Wolverine. First of all I was not coming into this with high hopes because even though everyone was talking about how good this movie is I've never found the Deadpool movies funny. To me they're just different variations of "You haven't seen this in an Iron Man movie" stretched into two now three feature length films. But honestly I liked it at the end.

- Why are Logan's ears and one of his eyes not decayed when no other part of his body is intact? Why does he have a beard on his jawbone?

- I'll bite, the Bye Bye Bye is a fun idea. The wintery forest setting is cool.

- I can't enjoy that opening fight scene because it's not how anything works. You don't get bludgeoned with a dull object, have your body armour completely give way, and have a pint of blood splash out. I understand the whole point of Deadpool is that it's over the top, but this is just so overly gratuitous it's insane. I feel like Marvel Studios felt like they had to make it so unrealistically violent to try and separate it from the mainline MCU to get the people who have Deadpool funko pops to guffaw in the theatre. It's "You haven't seen this in an Iron Man movie" with zero words spoken. Honestly incredible.

- The CGI is better than it's been recently but it's still noticeably bad

- Peter Parker's Iron Man mask is on the desk in the background! How did that even get there.

- Why is Tony's ARC reactor on the table, I thought that was pushed into the river at the funeral

- The timeline is just so incredibly fucked. I still don't understand how the X Men timeline reboot works, or how Logan fits into it; if Logan dying means Deadpool's universe collapses, that implies the Logan movie is in the X Men reboot franchise, but Patrick Stewart is in that and James McAvoy plays him in the reboot making me think it's a one off... Augh my head...

- Something looks up with John Favraeu. I don't know if his wearing a wig is supposed to be obvious, I don't know if he's just under a lot of makeup or it's CGI, it's just weird.

- Deadpool is never going to be an Avenger because Marvel Studios would rather execute everyone working for them than give up the licencing deals from making PG13 movies, and Deadpool wouldn't feel the same in a PG13 movie.

- I think any brand would let Ryan Reynolds walk all over them in muddy boots, for some reason he gets the pass to slander anyone he wants to and he gets paid by the companies to do it.

- 'I don't have a lot of v*ginal sex' 🤨 that has numerous connotations. Also can we not do sex jokes in front of 12 year olds

- I was not expecting a Deadpool movie to contain any hints of character development because the previous two instalments seemed to be hellbent on making sure I understood nothing of emotional value would ever be allowed to appear without being undercut by a sex joke.

- "I've never been a natural bottom" 🤨🤨 I thought Poolverine was just the average two male leads naturally gets shipped together thing but no they're sowing the fields

- If that Thor crying over Deadpool never comes back I will say something about it

- If they didn't want me to know Paradox was going to be a villain why would they make him British

- The 'Suck it Fox' cut to nothing being there is the only time I will accept something raising more questions than answering them at this level as funny

- "Your tailor is a predator" caught me so off guard I started coughing

- Wow I wasn't expecting them to pull the Paradox is actually evil card not even a third into the movie. Honestly a good subversion of expectations.

- How is Deadpool's universe going to evaporate in 74 hours, I thought time doesn't exist at the TVA?

- Are they going to explain why Deadpool's suit can just fix itself now. It used to keep its holes.

- Finally, I think the first time we ever hear Deadpool is from Canada in the movies! I wonder if Ryan Reynolds only wanted to play him in the first place because they're both Canadian...

- "You two gonna fuck or fight?" 🤨🤨🤨

- I actually understood the Honey Badger reference

- the FF floating platform thingy is another reference I'm surprised I got

- The Human Torch CGI is actually really cool

- "Not all of you was asleep" after waking up on his shoulder 🤨🤨🤨🤨

- Too many cameos in Cassandra's little alcove so I'm not even going to bother looking for them all

- I'm not sure if Johnny Storm's death was supposed to be played for laughs or just shock value, either way I'm not laughing I loved those movies ;(

- How does Cassandra know she's Xavier's sister if she was sent to the Void before she could walk?

- Wolvie being nice to Johnny post mortem is cool

- Nicepool having a stronger Canadian accent is a good joke, and Deadpool looking on in disgust as Nicepool talks about his dog's 'G-spot' is good. At least that's not played off as just a normal thing to say even if it is a joke

- "I identify as a feminist" could easily be misconstrued as an 'anti-woke' joke but all of the jokes of a similar calibre in this movie seem to be made ironically. Example: Nicepool is a creep

- "Where's your mask" and Nicepool points to his face actually implying his nice guy attitude is a facade for being a shitty person is actually really good

- Why is Nicepool's car surrounded by untrampled corn, how did it get there? Who grew the corn?

- Deadpool includes Colossus in his world 🥺

- Wolverine is nothing if not an excellent shit talker, and it's actually very out of character for Deadpool to actually get affected by insults

- I wish The Greatest Showman soundtrack was incorporated for more than just a third of a second

- 'Close up magic' ant man reference?

- 'There's only ever gonna be one Blade' about that...

- I think that's Apocalypse's throne in Cassandra's room? Or Thanos's

- I never thought about how both Cassandra and Xavier's powers radiate from their heads until the Juggernaut helmet scene

- Finally some real actual genuine character development that's not thrown away for a joke!!! The best part of the movie to me was Cassandra's redemptio-. Oh. Nevermind. Anyway I like it better than if it were just shoved away for a joke then she died

- Deadpool waiting for the 'extras' to clear was, to me, a good indication that he's a hero now. Caring about civilians is #1 on my makes you a good guy requirements

- "You smell something?" "Yeah you" 🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨

- And there it is. Nicepool's death is probably the most predictable death I've ever seen on film.

- Eastside Pharmacy?! Agatha All Along reference???

- Wolverine's helmet looks like a rubber playground ball

- Will Marvel Jesus come back in three days however?

- Staring at Hugh's abs? Same, but 🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨

- That hand holding ending was actually impressive, I wasn't sure what was going to happen and it actually kicked ass

- Is the guy with the mug who stared at Deadpool in the beginning Marvel's first gay character

- The introducing Logan to Blind Al is so unbelievably 'the parents meeting the boyfriend' I could die there's no fucking way that wasn't on purpose

[the-silver-peahen-residence]

Megumi felt his face darken hearing this. How the hell does this guy live even after all this? It was sick and wrong. However, he was worried about his plan to use her to get others here.

"....." She didn't move seeing him finally let her chin go, moving away as she tries struggling again to get free but the damn chains were tight around her wrists. After the two times he used rope, he used chains to stop her from getting out.

"Anyway...the body does provide a good substance for a soul. All I need to do is to use the remains of the soul, remnant and put it into an animatronic under my control. I never thought I had this kind of power before" Metal Zilla shrugs his arms as he picks up a pizza cutter from the table. "This place is great! The kids are a pain in the ass since I started working here." The man is wearing a long light brown trenchcoat with a hoodie, he has long sleeves. Daichi can't see his face thanks to the mask he's wearing. But his voice is so full of himself.

"......"

"But they do make great resources! Easy to take and easy to corrupt! But now I feel like I need to move on to the adults! But it's hard to get some but one. The good thing is...I'm going to use that shitty security guard! Zilla is good for something besides singing."

"*Muffled grunting while struggling again* Mfffmmm!!!"

"Anyway...I gotta get back to work!" He said. "I still have about 5 more bodies to work on before getting their souls out. But who knows? If you behave I Might let you out...just kidding! You are going to be good and lure your so called friends here. I'm sure you'll be happy to see them again." he smiled.

"So...what do you have to say about that?" he asked to look at her but Miko said nothing feeling him sigh. "Here, why don't you speak right and tell me?" he asked reaching to lower the gag as she gasps coughing.

"..Hmm?"

"I think your t..terrible! How could you! Your nothing but a creep and murderer to those poor kids! What did they even do to you!?" she shouted.

"EVERYTHING! THOSE BRATS DESERVED IT AND IF YOUR ANGRY ABOUT IT GET OVER IT!" he shouted. "I deserve to get what I want even if it means killing someone else!" he glares at her. "Even if it means torturing someone else.." he said showing the pizza cutter near her cheek. However, she looks quiet for him to sigh.

"You don't get it though..I'm doing this for a reason..now...I'm sure whoever sees this will be happy your safe....why not say something?" he asked but Miko looks up at the camera.

"Guys! If your seeing this; don't come down here! I'll be fine! Please, you don't want to come down here!" she said but he laughs finding her funny.

"Oh what a joke you are Miko-chan!" he snickered but as he leans in about to almost cut her cheek seeing the cutter cut her skin drawing blood. "Why not say more?" He teased.

However, she quickly knees him hard in the stomach hearing him groan henching over. She begins struggling more working on trying to get out before seeing Anaconda. He was trying to break the chains again.

"Anaconda!" she was looking to him hearing the other coughing before he growls getting mad. "!?...Anaconda, run! Get out of here and warn the others! Tell them not to come here!" she said seeing him not wanting to leave her.

"I'll be okay. Just go!" she said before she tires using her strength to break the chains only to see Anaconda rush out away as she sees the other growling to stand up.

"WHY YOU BITCH!" he shouted to hit Miko hard as she coughs wincing a bit. "Tch....I'll have to have them look for that thing. But in the meantime....*faces Miko angry*..since you wanna be a brat! I'll have to punish you again for it!" he said cutting her free but saw her trying to run only for him to pick her up over his shoulder.

"LET ME GO!! LET ME GO!!" she shouted kicking but he keeps carrying her away. "LET GOOOOO!!"

"Once I deal with you..it's back to work but lets work on that mouth of yours!" he shouted as she screams kicking before the door slams shut behind him leaving Miko's screams before they were fading away leaving silence.

The roars and the shouts are heard before it becomes silent as something is heard shut. A door. Muffled shouts are heard before laughter is heard, "With this, I can make a new animatronic! Thanks to those brats, I can collect enough agony to make more of these things! It's thanks to that stupid owner who wouldn't give up. Hell, they brought in some damn brats..." Said a figure. It sounded male.

Megumi didn't like that at all. What was he planning to do?! Make more of the animatoric but it sounds like he would make it more danger and disturbing where it might get even worse. He saw Miko struggling but she glares at him while still moving.

"Oh well...I just need to move and leave this dump. Not before bringing more brats in here!" He cackled. "I just need to use those dumb robots and a helper to bring them here."He said.

Someone came into view, he wore a grey Zilla mask, this one looked metal as it had yellow eyes. He looks at Miko, "Tell me...I wonder which of your friends will get here first. The girls, the boys, or that brother and sister! Who knows! It makes the game fun, doesn't it?"

"......" Miko still tries to struggle but he sighed to look at her.

"Now now, don't struggle. You'll hurt yourself like that. I can't let a fresh offering get ruined." he said only to hear more sickening crunch noises to see himself. Miko saw blood on him but also saw the animatronic show up but it was coated in blood along with holding a bloody axe.

Right away Miko's face pales a little. "Though, again, we just begun the game..I'm sure you'll have loads of fun..won't you? Besides, I still didn't forgive you for that kick earlier after you escaped twice. TWICE!" he shouted as he slams the axe above her head almost cutting her hands but missed.

"With your wrestling moves and all that punching and kicking. That hurt you know. BUT! I forgive you for it." he pouts to grip her chin forcing her to look at him.

"I mean after all....I had sooooooo fun making sure you didn't do it again." he said glaring at her but Miko kept looks at him seeing the bloody axe near by.

"So lets see if we can have more guests show up...but you'll be fine won't you.." he smiled petting Miko's head while she was still struggling hoping she can break free again.

"But lets see...maybe you can lead your friends here for me! You can be so helpful and I know I can get them trapped.." he giggled but Miko shook her head furiously not wanting that. He looks to her but he only glares seeing the mask up close that she stares into his glowing yellow eyes.

"Don't you fucking say no to me...you're lucky I didn't kill you.." he said as she was quiet. "Just because you got lucky, I'll be sure you don't...so unless you want me to cut that pretty little head of yours..behave." he warns.

[sepublic]

            I find it interesting that even in the epilogue, four years after Camila has had time to be more acquainted with the Boiling Isles under non-threatening circumstances, she’s still creeped out by it. And this is fine! The narrative isn’t condemning her for it. It’s not demanding that she enjoy these things like Luz does; It’s just asking for her to respect its existence, and to support Luz’s interest in it and love her too.

            In For the Future, we see Camila horrified by what she encounters in the Boiling Isles; But she also spends the whole episode pushing through it anyway for Luz’s sake, being there for her as much as she can. Because she knows these are just feelings and nothing more, and she’s choosing to be kind in spite of them.

            By contrast, in this same episode we find out Belos does feel empathy and guilt towards his brother and nephew, he wasn’t purely 100% only interested in what they could do for him; And yet, he’s still just as cruel and violent towards them. He’s still cruel and violent towards witches and demons, sometimes using the ‘tragedy’ of Caleb as a justification. Hell, he even resents the ghosts for making him feel guilty, telling them to “Shut up.”

            Isn’t that fascinating? Disgust is portrayed as a morally neutral thing. It’s not an indictator of morality, it doesn’t mean something is bad… But it doesn’t mean the person who feels it is bad, either, people don’t consider that enough. It’s just a gut reaction. Sometimes people have internalized biases they need to work through, but other times, it’s pretty harmless as long as they’re self-aware and don’t do anything bad over it; This even applies to the process of unlearning the aforementioned biases.

            Likewise, empathy and guilt don’t actually, necessarily make you a good person. The example with Belos shows how some people will actually be crueler because of empathy, because they resent people for being upset, and thus making them feel upset because they naturally empathize. Hence those who get angry at people in pain and need for “ruining their vibe,” because now they feel bad too.

            There’s a juxtaposition in how Camila seems genuinely more scared and creeped out by the isles on a visceral level than Belos, and yet Camila has the common sense to still respect and fight for its existence; Whereas Belos chooses to make a mountain out of a molehill because it’s not just hatred, it’s pride. It all boils down to his ego at the end of the day. In many ways, other characters struggle with dilemmas more difficult than Belos’, yet still do better than he ever has.

            This all plays into my thesis that TOH is arguing your feelings are secondary to your actions, and that the latter is what decides whether you’re a “good” person or not. In the end, someone who’s had a good life and was a dick for selfish reasons, only to choose to be better, is more sympathetic and morally superior than someone who suffered a million unfair grievances, and proceeded to dole out a million unfair grievances, with no sign of stopping; Especially from an IRL perspective, and I think our IRL feelings sometimes influence how we engage with media, and vice-versa.

            That’s why the finale –and the show as a whole– emphasizes choices, over inherent, instinctual feelings. A decent chunk of Camila’s arc could be summarized by the word Squick; In the sense that it’s meant to describe things that one feels personal disgust and discomfort towards, but otherwise has no moral condemnation or problem with; It’s just a Me thing, is the point of Squick. Camila is like that sex-repulsed ace who nevertheless supports kink at Pride.

            That gets me to how my ruminations were prompted by a similar observation; How some people lump sex-repulsed aces in with the oppressive Puritans who hate sex in anything, but that’s not true at all. Obviously there’s the rare Exception, but as a whole, sex-repulsed aces are on the side of other queers who ARE sexual and are demanding to let these things be normalized; It’s not for them, but they have no moral condemnation and will fight for it in solidarity anyway, especially since both are hated by the system regardless. Sound familiar?