#i was playing hi-fi rush!! which i have not played before it is very fun

[idolsummons]

good news my sense of rhythm is still super heckin awesome

[fuctacles]

bonding activity

For @steddie-spooktober prompt "can you please stop trying to scare them?" | 1427 | T | getting together, fluff, post-canon | brainstormed with @blasvemous | Ao3 | ko-fi

more spooktober: witch

"Steve."

Steve doesn't react. He's standing by the dirtiest window Eddie's ever seen, peeking from behind a curtain to see the groups entering the house. 

"Steve!" Eddie hisses insistently.

"What?!" Steve snaps back. 

Eddie widens his eyes at him. 

"We should get into positions," he reminds his friend as if they haven't been doing this for over a week now. 

"Mhm," Steve nods absentmindedly, eyes back on the outside. "You do that."

"Are you waiting for Henderson again?"

"Maybe."

Eddie groans, stepping back towards him. They have about ten minutes before the next group walks in, even more before they get to this part of the haunted house.

"Could you please stop trying to scare him? This house is the same every year, and this kid fought Demogorgons, why do you care about stupid fair attraction?" he presses, crossing his arms. 

"It's kind of my duty as an older brother," Steve points out, sparing him a short glance. "Besides, his attitude has been insufferable lately. Gotta teach him a lesson."

That, Eddie could agree with. Henderson has been a little shit about their current gig, talking all cocky about how it was 'entertainment for little kids' and they wouldn't have to do much. Eddie took scaring kids very seriously, thank you very much. 

He was also grateful for the scheme Steve and Robin had pulled to get him the job. It was a small thing, but enough to start getting on the good side with the residents of Hawkins. And also a good way to spend time with Steve, his new and unlikely friend. Eddie reminds him of that, too.

"We were supposed to be bonding," he pouts.

"We'll be bonding after I make Dustin pee his pants," Steve responds shortly, making Eddie scoff. But seeing how unwavering Steve is in his plan, he sighs and steps right into his personal space.

"Promise?" he asks, jabbing a finger into his ribs. 

Steve jolts, but it has the desired effect of getting his attention back on Eddie. He grabs his hand to push it safely away from his body, his eyes finally focusing on his friend and softening. 

"Yeah, man, I promise."

"Great. Because I actually like it here, which I didn't think I'd say about a legal job." Steve snorts softly. "I guess it's fun to work with a friend."

"Yeah," Steve finally smiles fully. "It is."

"And I know you'd rather be doing it with Buckley, but—"

Steve cuts him off with a shake of his head. 

"Don't be stupid dude, even the bestest of friends need some time apart. And it's a blast working with you. The way you made that dude cry yesterday? Fucking priceless." He grins. 

Eddie grins back. 

"Yeah, love how he grabbed onto his wife."

They burst into snickers until a girl rushes past them, reminding them to get into positions. Eddie salutes, and parts with his dear friend. 

"Please think about me fondly. I will miss you dearly," he sighs deeply, caressing Steve's bicep. 

Steve plays along, reciprocating his longing gaze.

"I am missing you already, darling," he says, pressing a phantom of a kiss onto his hand. 

Eddie snickers and skitters away towards his post. For the sake of the job and his sanity. 

Eddie's determined to keep Steve's attention on himself instead of people-watching. Maybe constantly bothering him isn't the best course of action but stick to what you know, right?

"You're putting a damper on my fun, Harrington," he says behind Steve's shoulder as he's eyeing the outside. 

"I know. I'm sorry." And he sounds genuinely regretful. Like his resolve is slowly falling apart, the point of childish games with his brother slowly getting forgotten. 

"You know, you would scare him if you'd just put effort into all of the groups . Keep it at one hundred and you won't miss."

"Yeah, but that's tiring," Steve whines. 

Eddie rolls his eyes. 

"Oh my god, you're such a princess," he mutters. 

"I'm not." Steve frowns, offended.

"Yes, you are." 

Steve already knows there is no point in arguing with Eddie, so he only glares his way. It's not a huge win, but at least he's not looking out the window. Eddie pushes toward victory. 

"And you could be having fun, too, if you weren't so focused on Henderson. I, for one, take pride and joy in my craft of making kids pee their pants," he says with reverence, hand pressed to his chest. 

Steve raises his eyebrows. 

"Yeah, and how many times have you managed that?"

"Zero, but I'm still enjoying myself! And I made one girl faint!"

Steve snorts. 

"Yeah, you'd be proud of that."

"Well, not all of us can do that without the help of a horror setting." Eddie rolls his eyes. "Which, you could be using to your advantage too," he points out, capturing Steve's attention enough to maneuver him away from the window. "You scare a girl, then you take her to a quiet corner to calm her down, a perfect crime!" he throws his arms up but upon seeing Steve's frown, he backtracks. 

"Well, not a crime, of course, but a little, uh, harmless mischief," he amends with an innocent smile. 

Steve's shoulders sag as he sighs.

"Yeah, that was kind of my whole point of doing this. But it's harder than I thought," he says with a wince. 

"Since when?" Eddie frowns in confusion. "I mean, yeah, your game has been off, but you always went for it anyway. Which, I respect as fuck by the way. I could never." He lets out a small, humorless laugh. 

The room falls silent and when he looks up again, Steve is looking straight at him.

"You should try."

"Yeah, probably," he shrugs, but Steve remains unfazed. 

"I'm serious. Go for it." 

They engage in some serious staring competition that makes Eddie squirm, his whole skin itching. 

"Dude, what are you—"

"Have we not been flirting this whole time?" 

Eddie blinks. 

"Uh."

"I wanted this job so we could be alone for once."

"Uh."

"And I'm sorry for getting distracted with the Dustin thing, but I'm back on track now." Finally, his confidence wavers. "That is, if we're on the same one, you know. I might have completely misread the situation."

Eddie shakes his head. 

"No, no. I was, uh, same track, page, yeah," he pulls a strand of hair over his reddening cheeks, but none of them moves. 

"Sooo, are you going to, or am I supposed to—"

"Oh, what the Hell," Eddie mutters, grabbing onto Steve's shirt to pull him forward. He places a lightly off-center kiss on his lips and can feel the body under his palms sagging with relief. 

Steve hums softly. 

"And you said my game was off," he mutters against his lips. 

"Oh, you little shit." Eddie smirks dangerously before he presses in without his previous hesitance. If Steve wants to play, Eddie's good at making up his own rules. 

They find a wall to rest against, and Steve's hand has just ventured to Eddie's ass when an ear-piercing shriek makes them jump apart. 

"What! The fuck!" They can hear Dustin's voice, but he's trying to blind them with his flashlight, so his face stays hidden until the rest of the gang joins him. Someone's light shows his pale, shell-shocked expression. 

"Why are you molesting my brother?!" He points accusingly at Eddie. "And you!" He turns to Steve, still braced against the wall. "You were groping my DM!"

Steve rolls his eyes. 

"Please, I barely touched him," he scoffs. 

"Yeah." Eddie crosses his arms to show his disappointment. "Because you so rudely interrupted."

"Ew! Ew ew ew ew ew!" Dustin covers his ears and moves forward, almost running into a wall in his haste to escape. The rest of The Party follows, though much calmer. Lucas even stalls behind to give the two older boys a thumbs up. 

"Congrats." He grins before disappearing after his friends. 

"Well..." Eddie trails off once the sound of distressed Dustin fades away. "I'd say we scared him pretty well, so, mission accomplished?" He smiles, throwing finger guns to sell his point better. 

"Two missions, even." Steve smiles back, motioning him to come back closer. 

"Two birds, one stone. Very time-saving of us." Eddie happily returns to his place in the other's orbit, which also means his ass is reachable again.

"We could go for two birds one hand later?" Steve offers, but all it does is make Eddie laugh loudly. 

"Holy shit, you truly have no game, Harrington! You're lucky I dig it." 

[yurinaa-world]

Hi! I love your works!! Could you please write something about Blade, Dang Heng and Jing Yuan (separately) with a significant other who is like Kiana Kaslana?

Characters: Blade, Jing Yuan, and Dan Heng x Female Reader

Synopsis: s/o that's like Kiana Kaslana

Warnings: Fluff and spelling mistakes,

𝐵𝓁𝒶𝒹𝑒

Complete opposites of each other you see the world in high regard, protecting everyone needs to be protected while he, on the other hand, is the one causing the damage, he’s basically gasoline thrown into a forest fire, and that never ends well. you’re a saint and he’s a sinner nothing can change that since good and evil are always to be equals.

He is fine with how you think since it’s not like you'll change your mind and you won’t change him, but what does that have to do with your relationship? Your reckless thoughts call yourself, invincible all you want but did you forget you are a human? A human that's such an idiot, rushing into situations with a second thought, some people...

You jump onto him wherever you finish a fight while yelling his name so loudly (which hurts his ears a little) he can hear you normally so just stop yelling so loudly, and you not grabbing onto him right, have a tighter grip, or else you’ll fall off and then whine about it later. 

𝒥𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒴𝓊𝒶𝓃

You show up at his office half of the time and just stay there waiting for him to finish his work, then drag him away to some new restaurant you want to try but also want to have him with you as well.

For how long he’s been alive for the longest time, you make him feel young, reminding him of how the first you met each other, back when you were kids and you were rivals fighting to chance to become better than each other (not like that still doesn’t happen at family game night: jing yuan, you, and yanqing all playing together).

You're still bratty and cheeky, that's the one thing that doesn’t change no matter how old you both get. you age like fine wine though, and look better and better getting older and older with your fashion changes but always making you look very beautiful.

𝒟𝒶𝓃 𝐻𝑒𝓃𝑔

You two are always so close with each other and want to stay with him all the time, he even tells you to go and not waste your time here boring yourself to death: like go have fun with everyone else but NO you going to stay here! because...it‘s boring without him.

You cheer for him when he wins a fight, “Whoa you amazing, you went like this and that” Imitating his punches and kicks, ah he can’t help but get a little embarrassed you didn’t have to imitate it! You look better when you’re the one fighting anyway so you shouldn’t be the one cheering for him. He compliments you on your fighting it improved since the last you fought, seeing your eyes light up with joy, if it makes you that happy then he’ll do it more, if he doesn’t get flustered before that.

He worries for you a lot since you’re all bark and bite, yelling and doing the riskiest things without a care in the world (not true since you always know the consequences of your action but still do it anyway) and has to get one of those backpacks with leashes yeah he’s getting that, he doesn’t want you to wind up in prison again for 50th time.

You guys

if you liked this, consider tipping me on ko-fi! it'd mean a lot!

[talekinesis]

Magical Burnout

Fairly Oddparents fic

Since I'm sick, I'm also gonna make Irep sick :)

I've seen people headcanon Irep and Peri as co-workers/ co-fairies so I'm gonna jump on that too

Summary: Irep gets Magical Burnout and Peri takes care of him

Irep snapped awake and sat up, only to be pushed back down by his goody-two-shoes counterpart. He went to argue, but ended up turning away to cough into his elbow.

"Would you relax? I don't know why you wake up like you fought in war, that's the third time today." Peri grumbled. Though he couldn't help but look at his anti-fairy with pity. The poor guy was pale, thin, and despite sweating and having a fever, he was also shivering. Even his wings were pale and dry.

Dev sat off to the side, sort of just watching them, trying not to give away the fact he was worried, even though Peri had already explained that Magical Backup, and Magical Burnout weren't the same thing.

"Magical Burnout isn't lethal, it just means Irep was stupid and over-used his magic, and now he's sick. He'll be okay." He had said.

Though he told Dev he didn't have to worry, the kid still insisted on staying, and had sat quietly in the corner all morning, playing his puzzle game.

Peri helped Irep sit up and placed a bowl of soup in his lap. "I hope that shark-tornado was worth you getting this sick." He scolded.

The anti-fairy took in a wheezy breath. "Very much so-" he turned away and coughed again as Peri rolled his eyes.

"You look horrible, what spells did you even cast?" He asked, feeling Irep's forehead, and cringing when his forearm came back sweaty.

Dev looked guilty. "Hazel and I watched a bunch of sci-fi movies, and I thought they were cool so I wished for them to be real.. It's my fault-"

"No, Dev, it's not. You're a kid, he's an adult, he should know when his limit is and when to say no." Peri pinched the bridge of his nose. "What movies?"

"Sharknado, Piranhaconda, Robo-Croc, Tremors-"

Peri stopped him. "Some of those movies are too mature for you and Hazel- and I'm sorry, Tremors?? Did you at least wish them away??"

Dev shook his head and Peri groaned, though he turned his frustration to Irep. "You didn't magic them away??"

Irep gulped down the broth and lowered the bowl from his mouth. "No? Why would I do that?"

The fairy groaned and rubbed his face. He pulled out his wand and wished the sci-fi monsters away. "There. Now," he took the empty bowl from Irep and stood up, "Dev, he'll be fine, I'll look after him. You go on ahead and head to Hazel's, alright?"

Dev nodded and hopped down from his chair. Peri wished him over to Hazel's house, and looked back down at Irep, who seemed to be pouting.

"What?" Peri asked.

Irep huffed. "Why are you helping me? I left you to die when you got Magical Backup, and mine's not even lethal, I'd be fine without you're help."

"Yeah, but Magical Burnout sucks. Trust me, I've been there. It's not fun being sick on your own. No energy, struggling to get up and walk. Well, I got it when I was a kid, my mother just carried me-"

Irep scoffed. "My parents would never. My mother had a tendency to drop me-"

"Yeah, my dad too. Grand Canyon."

"And my father made me stay in- I'm sorry, did you just say you were dropped into the Grand Canyon??" He laughed, which just turned into a coughing fit.

Peri shook his head and laid him back down. Irep complied, too tired to protest, and turned over onto his stomach so his wings were comfortable, which told Peri he was planning on sleeping again.

The fairy placed a hand between his wings. "Get some rest. I'll have more soup for you when you wake up." He said. He got up from the bed and without thinking, he rubbed Irep's head before he left the room.

The anti-fairy breathed heavily into his pillow, figuring maybe working with Peri wouldn't be awful. 'He's a better person than me,' he thought.

___

hi sorry this was short or if it didn't make sense, I'm sick, tired, and I ended up rushing it so I could take a nap

I hope it was okay and ended up somewhat legible.

you can kinda see where I tried a "Oh look they're bonding now," thing but again I'm just tired and not feeling well

Anyway, I hope someone liked it

[somethingwittyandweird]

What's your favorite game you played this year?

You've activated my “review of my year in gaming” trap card! I was already going to make this post in some form or another, you've just given me the perfect launching point. So, the first thing you should know about asking me for favorites: I never give just one. How could I, when it's been such a banger year of games? (Heads up, this one's going to go long.)

I loved Tears of the Kingdom to death, and it took home my most hours played on Switch. It is a shining example of what devs can do with an extra few months to polish a game. There were so many remarkable moments that testified to how much care and ideas the devs were able to put in. I loved how it used the time since the first game to develop familiar places and characters, adding depth (no pun intended) and also making sure every familiar location had some new twist. The story was a much stronger followup to BotW, and I think this overall has my new favorite ending sequence of anything in the series (I'd love to make a full post sometime about how the final Ganondorf battles just keep getting more spectacular with each new title). I am so, so, so, so normal about this incarnation of Princess Zelda. 

Also in my favorites this year is Fire Emblem Engage, which hit at just the right time to scratch my strategy itch. As a long time FE fan it’s not a surprise I enjoyed this one- though it lost the political intrigue of its predecessor in favor of a more traditional/tropey story, I still had a lot of fun with all its gimmicks and gameplay innovations. Also it is hands-down the most visually appealing game in the franchise, a title previously held by the series’ GBA entries which are masterworks from the peak era of beautiful sprite art. From the incredible crit animations to the spectacle of super attacks to the battle maps which are so beautifully detailed that the game lets you free roam around them after a battle just to appreciate them better. 

I finished the Link’s Awakening remake this year! It was a charming trip back to an older era of Zelda design philosophy and I found it fascinating to compare the ways where the classic puzzles and challenges differ from what the game would be like if it were made today, as well as the places where modern technology allowed for better QoL changes that weren’t in the original. I really enjoyed the music as well, which I find to be a standout among the series still.

Here at the end of the year, I have to give a shout out to Sea of Stars. It has everything you want in an indie darling- very pretty pixel art, very nice music, turn-based battles with timed hits I joke, but Sea of Stars does a great job balancing evoking/paying homage to icons like Chrono Trigger and bringing new gameplay to the JRPG formula. I like its pared-down take on JRPG combat which revamps skills/mana into a much more dynamic resource that’s constantly being spent and regenerated, and I’m a known sucker for character combo attacks which this game has in spades. The later parts of its story are told with a lot of heart, and again I am a known sucker for certain character archetypes. Surprisingly also, I think the movement and exploration is absolutely a standout- not something that’s typically emphasized in the genre. But this game constantly has you hopping across stepping stones, balancing on tightropes, climbing walls and ledges… the emphasis on interesting traversal and verticality is a strength few games like it can boast. 

Before my final pick, I’m including a special section for all the games I didn't play myself but watched my friends play and still want to praise: Hi-Fi Rush, Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, Mario Bros Wonder, Pizza Tower, the Minish Cap Switch rerelease, and more all came out this year and all of them have brought killer music, excellent gameplay, and stunning visuals that I’ve enjoyed to no end. Anyone considering to pick up any of them would find a quality product without a doubt.

With all that said: I think ultimately it has to be Tunic in the end. Underneath its premise of a Zelda/Souls-like adventure game there is a wealth of secrets that goes as far down as you have the courage to delve. It’s a game built to evoke nostalgia for games that you didn’t understand yet, posing as a game that you watched an older sibling play or a game you could only find a poorly-translated foreign copy of. It obscures everything and teaches you its secrets through context, exploration, and discovering in-game pages of the manual (remember manuals?). It’s a game made for lovers of secrets and puzzles, full of hidden paths and trophies that reward inquisitiveness and observation (and taking paper notes). It was when I saw that it not only has a conlang, but that it gives you the hints you need to fully translate it, that I knew I had to get it myself. It spurred me to screenshot every in-game piece of menu text, then spend evenings cross-referencing it to identify phonemes and construct a key.

The rush I got on completing that key is one of two moments I knew this game was absolutely special. The second standout moment is when the game teaches you its hugest secret, and then invites you to prove your mastery of it by presenting you a huge, multi-part puzzle. But, Tunic does the same thing that one of my other all-time favorites, Outer Wilds, does so well: powerups via knowledge, “unlocking” abilities that you always had, you just didn’t know that you did. The pieces to this puzzle are hidden in plain sight; it’s only when the game tells you what you’re looking for that your understanding shifts, everything clicks, and your eyes are opened to the path you have to follow. I don’t say it lightly, but I consider Tunic to be a one-of-a-kind title, and one that delivers completely on its unique vision. 

In case that brick of text doesn’t make it clear, I love this game. 

I love all of these games.

It's a fine time to be alive.

[legally-brief]

MOVIES WITH MEN IN UNDERWEAR (This is outdated- website shutdown early 2000’s)

“G”

Galaxy Quest (1999) Sci-fi comedy. "Commander Peter Quincy Taggart" (Tim Allen) is at home, asleep on the couch, hungover and trouserless, when awestruck friendly aliens come to visit.

Garp A locker room scene with several unidentified actors in jocks.

Georgy Girl Alan Bates in a couple of shots in his Jockey briefs.

Gharwali Baharwali (1998) Indian musical comedy. An overweight, middle-aged manager ritually humiliated, being stripped, head-shaved and left as a beggar in his underwear (white undershirt and big boxers).

Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999) Crime drama. Ghost Dog robs a couple at gunpoint off-camera, and they emerge into the street, the woman in her skimpy bra and panties and the man in his boxers.

Ghostbusters (1984) I can't believe that there has been no mention of the first underwear scene in a movie that I ever came across. Ray Stanz (played by Dan Ackroyd) is having a dream in which this female ghost is hovering above his bed moments before she vanishes into thin air. He looks around, obviously perplexed, and then his belt gets undone; the button on his pants is next, instantaneously followed by the unzipping of his zipper and then, his pants are opened. Voila! White briefs.

Gig, The (1985) Drama. A charming film, and including some of the middle-aged leads in their underwear.

Gimme an 'F' (1984) One of the main characters strips down to his white briefs and dances around the shower room. He does this for quite a while and gets them very wet.

Girl 6 (1996) Comedy. Phone-sex caller, a slim, fortyish black man, acts out his baseball-hitter fantasy in a room painted up as a stadium, wearing a baseball helmet and a white jock strap.

Girls Are for Loving (1973) Crime movie. At some point, just about everybody ends up naked and bound in one way or another. One interesting scene: two evil henchman have been captured and bound nearly naked with their hands above their heads.

Glitz (1988) (TV) Action/thriller. An attacker fires at Jimmy Smits, who's in bed with Linda Moon at the time. Clad only in his briefs, Smits chases after the guy, out into the street.

Gloria (1999) Thriller. "About 20 minutes into the film (which doesn't compare to the original), there is a cool scene where Sharon Stone forces her criminal ex-boyfriend and his henchmen to strip naked at gunpoint. Rear nudity only, but very intense scene. Every guy seems to have on a different type of undies. I watched the video with my roommate and she couldn't stop laughing at the guy with the leopard print briefs".

Go (1999) Close-up shots of Scott Wolf in his briefs, being wired for sound with a hidden transmitter attached to his thigh. Also, another guy putting on his dark boxer shorts in a suggestive scene.

Gods and Monsters (1998) In one scene, Whale mischievously makes a flamboyant, young male reporter remove an article of clothing for every question that he answers (until the man's down to his underwear).

Gods Must Be Crazy, The (1980) Comedy. Startled by a warthog while taking off his wet clothes, guy flees pants-down in his red briefs.

Going Ape! (1981) Tony Danza running around in a hospital gown and his briefs ... at end of movie.

Gold Rush Boys (XXX) ****my favorite*** This porn-vid is chock full of hot young "pioneer" men in union suits having fun in an all-male bordello. There are quite a few tender scenes (kissing, etc.) One gorgeous guy spends most of the movie falling out of his maroon union suit. Very sexy!! (Sorry I don’t know which studio made this - but I’m sure of the title.)

Gone Fishin' (1997) A witless comedy that at the very end has both Joe Pesci and Danny Glover caught with their pants around their ankles, showing their colorful boxer shorts.

Good Burger (1997) Mild, juvenile comedy. Disguised in drag to spy on a rival burger operation, the heroes are caught and unmasked - revealing the chubby one in his blue and white plaid boxer shorts, and the slim one embarrassed to be discovered in drag all the way down to women's underwear.

Good Man in Africa, A (1994) Colin Friels wears comic loud printed boxer shorts, as Diana Rigg sews his costume. Later, he must exchange every piece of clothing he has on with John Lithgow - even down to boxers and briefs being switched.

Good Will Hunting (1997) Drama. Matt Damon in white boxers in scene with Minnie Driver.

Goodbye Bird, The (1993) Chris Pettiet. His mother knocks on the the door...he gets up wearing only blue silk boxer shorts - you can see his pecker bouncing in his boxers.

Goodbye, Columbus (1969) Michael Meyers in boxer shorts, has a vapid conversation with Richard Benjamin. He is a fairly well-built jock with a rather empty mind.

GoodFellas (1990) Crime drama. Gangsters go to kill their oversleeping driver (Tony Sirico). Unsuspecting, in his yellow undershirt and briefs, he opens the door to them.

Gotcha! (1985) Anthony Edwards standing in Jockeys, briefly. Short scene but NICE.

Gotham (1988) (TV) Thriller. Two scenes with Tommie Lee Jones in a white A-shirt and white boxer shorts, one early in the movie when J.B. White wakes him up, and another later in the film while making love to Virginia Madsen.

Graduate, The (1967) A young preppy-looking Dustin Hoffman gets seduced by Mrs. Robinson, and winds up in bed with her in his white trim-cut boxer shorts.

Grandview, U.S.A. (1984) Drama. C. Thomas Howell spends the night with Jamie Lee Curtis. In the morning, he's awakened when the her boyfriend arrives ... in his trim plaid boxer shorts, he has to get to his pants on the other side of the room, but picks the wrong moment and is seen through the doorway. There is also a scene with Patrick Swayze in patterned boxers, and two scenes with Troy Donahue in printed boxers.

Grease ?

Great Balls of Fire! (1989) Dennis Quaid as Jerry Lee Lewis parades around this movie in loudly printed full-cut boxer shorts from time to time.

Great Santini, The (1979) Michael O’Keefe (most recently on Roseanne) plays a high school student who has Robert Duvall, military officer, for a father. Dad wakes O’Keefe up in the early morning of his 18th birthday to give him his present. O’Keefe is wearing nothing but white briefs.

Greedy (1994) Michael J. Fox in grey Calvins.

Green Mile, The (1999) Drama. Crazy death row inmate "Wild Bill" (Sam Rockwell) in a union suit.

Gremlins 2 (The New Batch) (1990) Mr. Clamps walks outta bathroom in his office in a pair of blue boxers, he then puts on a pair of pants (too bad).

Grim Prairie Tales (1990) Creepy short story compilation. In one segment, an old-west gunman is seen for a moment in his white undershirt and briefs.

Gross Anatomy (1989) Matthew Modine in bed in white briefs and maroon T-shirt.

Guarding Tess (1994) A minor Nicolas Cage movie with Shirley McLaine. Brief scene of Nick interrupted as he is sitting on the john taking a dump, with pants down and colored boxers very visible around his knees.

Guelwaar (1992) Drama. In an early scene at a police station, watch closely for two prisoners, stripped to their white briefs, crossing the scene in the background.

Guide for the Married Man, A (1967) Joey Bishop is caught with his pants down by his wife. Seen in his white full-cut boxers and with a pretty girl, Joey denies it all.

Guns of Navarone, The (1961) Classic WWII action. Scene of Germans officers being stripped for their uniforms.

[mxtwister]

Cult of the Lamb has been on my list of games to play for a good while now and since I'm finally just a few bosses away from finishing Hi-Fi Rush I figured I should get some input from a fan before starting a file. got any comments or things I should know before playing?

Oh yeah!

So I put off answering this for a little while because I was on vacation but also my first instinct was to warn you off of buying the switch version due to some performance issues. Once I hit about 20 followers (which is required at some points to progress the game!!) it started to lag terribly; dropped resources would fly all across the screen, follower dialogue was getting swapped, somehow, it would lag and sometimes crash entirely, etc., etc.

But!

The game's since updated, and after a few trial runs it seems that these issues have markedly improved. Doing some preliminary research I almost think that this might be something of a pattern where the devs release an update and it's absolute havoc on the switch for a little while until they're able to fix it. I can't say for sure though. In any case the switch version is working fine now.

(Although I've seen some shader packs people have been using on pc that are really really pretty so yknow. pros and cons. really it's whichever you prefer)

Anyways, cotl is pretty straightforward. Besides decorations the most important "customization" is the doctrines, which are rules and rituals you can unlock and apply to your cult. You're given a choice between two and have to pick only one (the other can be unlocked postgame, which personally I think is kind of a bad move because it takes the point out of the game having multiple save files, the biggest draw for which is picking different doctrines but that's off-topic). Usually you can go either/or depending on your play style-basically how brutal you want to be-but I'd recommend:

Don't pick the Resurrection Ritual! It doesn't take a lot of resources and has almost no downsides. It takes the punch out of your followers dying when you can just zap em back to life anytime. It lowers the stakes, and a big part of the game's fun (especially the early part) is in the struggle to keep your followers happy, obedient, and healthy. It's better to unlock post-game.

Pick Return to the Earth, which unlocks the ability to turn your dead followers into fertilizer. It will get tedious to deal with the bodies. You'll run out of space to bury them and it costs loyalty to cut them up in front of your followers, meaning you'll have to wait until night (it's more annoying than anything).

Pick Tax Collector. Money isn't incredibly important in the game, but one issue I've constantly run into is food insecurity. Harvesting food doesn't always yield seeds, so your supplies aren't going to replenish themselves. You'll have to buy seeds fairly often. It's better to have someone running around collecting extra cash for you.

(^Note for this one, you can unlock a doctrine that removes the penalty for making your followers eat grass, which seems like it'll solve all your food problems, but grass isn't very filling and you do need it as building material too, so that isn't really sustainable in the long run. Also, feeding your followers better food increases loyalty)

These are just some thoughts that I notice are different from the guide I saw online. Moving on from that, some completely miscellaneous tips:

A big part of the game outside of cult-caretaking is going on crusades...which means leaving followers to their own devices. Unfortunately, your followers are useless and cannot do anything to take care of themselves unless you've unlocked enough buildings to make your cult semi-automated (kitchen, outhouse, etc.) Make sure before you leave your loyalty is full or close to it, the place is completely tidy, and no one's hungry.

They're going to dissent anyways. Build prisons asap.

I didn't realize this for the longest time, somehow, but you can gain extra blue hearts each time you perform a sermon. Stacking them up makes crusades a lost easier before you've unlocked all of your permanent red hearts + stronger weapons.

There's a rat follower form hidden behind Ratu's house and a starfish one hidden in Midas' Cave :]

Photosensitivity warning: Sometimes when unlocking things (usually new stages, I think) there'll be this irritating black-and-white colour-shift/flash. Luckily the game has a ton of accessibility settings that you can fiddle with if anything bothers you.

Recently there was a pretty major update (Sins of the Flesh) and it seems like the devs have the intention of continuing to add more free content to the game Stardew Valley-style which I'm really looking forward to! I definitely recommend it if you're thinking of buying.

God's a catboy. It doesn't get better than that.

[edrel-whitlock]

In light of the dumbfuck wizard game being released, today I'm gonna take some time to tell y'all about a game you should play instead. Now, fair heads up the game i will be talking about has absolutely nothing in common with antisemitism simulator 2023, so if you're looking for a different and better wizard game, not made by terrible people (as far as i know) I'll get to that in a different post when i feel like it.

Also, quick heads up I've never written something like this before, so it's probably just gonna feel like me saying "Dude go play this game!!!" Repeatedly, and basically be one long tangent. It's less of a review and more just a plea to your emotions.

Anyway, I'm gonna talk about Hi-Fi Rush by Tango Gameworks.

So Hi-Fi Rush came out January 25th of this year (2023), and you probably heard of it. If you have, go play it cause it's worth it.

If you haven't heard of it, the best way i can sell this game to you is to tell you to give this trailer a watch. If you're the target audience, you'll certainly know.

Ok, so beyond the trailer, what is this game? Well, it's an entirely single-player 3d platformer with Devil May Cry or Metal Gear Rising: Revengence style character action combat that's full of collectibles to find and challanges to complete. The kicker is that all the combat is synced to the beat of the game's soundtrack. Hell, the entire world of the game is synced to the beat. If you're the kinda person who, when you're listening to music, tends to tap your foot or bop your head along to the beat, this game is made for you. The combat is exceptionally fun, and once you get in the rhythm of each level's soundtrack, you'll be vibing hard.

Beyond the combat, this game is unabashedly, unironically, 100% sincerely joyful in its characters, its story, and its world. In my current 14 hours of playtime (which is how long 1 completion of the story took me), i could not stop smiling. It feels like a game made by people who truly love what they created and had fun creating it! I won't get into the story of this game as, if my rambling has somehow convinced you to give it a crack, i don't want to ruin the experience for you. All I will say is that it feels like you're playing an old Saturday morning cartoon in the best possible way!

As for performance, for me, this game is polished to the 9s. Absolutely no crashes, graphical hiccups, or bugs of any sort. Which, for a modern game, is genuinely surprising (as it seems that most modern games are just thrown out the door once they're relatively playable, but that's a rant for another time)

Alright, brass tacks. Where can you play this, and how is it monetized. Hi-Fi Rush is available on Xbox and Steam and for a well worth it $30 USD for the base game, or $40 USD for the deluxe edition (or your regional equivalent) which includes a handful of in game cosmetics and a bunch of the games upgrade currency called gears. Now, it should be noted that the amount of gears you get is the equivalent to about the amount of gears you would collect in the playing of one of the games levels. It's a drop in the bucket for the amount of gears you'd collect overall from playing the game, and there are no other ways to buy gears with real money. Buying the deluxe edition feels very much like the devs saying,

"Hey! Thanks for the extra bit of support! Here's some fun cosmetics and a small head start to really get you into the meat of our combat system!"

The "base game" is very much you just buying the game on offer, and none of said game is locked behind the deluxe edition.

I realize how defensive i sound about this games monetization. I just know that a lot of people are rightfully wary about companies being shitty so I'm just trying to provide as much information to you as i can.

There are no micro-transactions, no season pass, and no corporate bullshit with Hi-Fi Rush.

To steal a line I liked from one of the steam reviews,

"They made a Video Game in 2023. They don't make Video Games anymore."

And that's what Hi-Fi Rush is. An honest to god video game made to be enjoyed for as long as someone wants and to be put down once you are no longer having fun. It tries to keep you having legitimate fun for as long as it can, through its music or through perfecting its combat system, or through searching out collectibles or challenging yourself in it's, well, challenge mode. But once you put it down and let it sit for a while, if you eventually come back to it (and it seems to me the game does hope you will come back) everything will be right where you left it, and ready to play again!

I love this game. I love this game in a way where it's gonna stick with me for a good long while, and i want others to play it and hopefully love it too. Don't get me wrong, this isn't some little hidden gem indie game that no one has heard of. It was shown off during xbox's own big showcase for christ sake and is published by Bethesda! Hi-Fi Rush has done well as far as I'm aware, especially for a game with basically no marketing budget that was announced and released in the same afternoon!

So why am i shilling for a goddamn Microsoft backed game?

Because this game loves the fact that it's a video game. It loves the fact that it's cheesy as hell; one might even say cringy; but it knows that, and it leans into that and says

"Yeah we're cheesy as fuck! But who cares! Get in here a pretend to be a Rockstar!"

It's just a fun game with a surprisingly sincere story.

Also, for those of you who would care and attribute any meaning to this name, Shinji Mikami is an executive producer.

To cut myself off from any more repetitive rambling, I'll finish off by saying if you have any questions, feel free to ask!

TL:DR of main points:

Play Hi-Fi Rush instead of dumbfuck wizard game

it's a single-player 3d platformer with character action combat that synced to the beat of the soundtrack and feels like you're playing a Saturday morning cartoon

the story is very cheesy, and very sincere, and very fun!

it's on xbox or steam for base $30 USD, or $40 USD for deluxe edition (or regional equivalent)

deluxe edition is basically a thanks from the devs for your extra support.

Shinji Mikami is involved.

I hope you enjoy it as much as i have!

[yesterdanereviews]

R.I.P.D. (2013)

Film review #574

Director: Robert Schwentke

SYNOPSIS: Police officer Nick Walker is killed by his partner Bobby Hayes as he wants to get rid of some gold that the two found on a random drug bust. He finds himself recruited into the R.I.P.D.: The "Rest in Peace Department," which is a supernatural force whose purpose is to hunt down people that have died and still roaming the Earth. Partnered with a veteran officer, the two discover the circumstances behind Nick's death are tied to a much bigger plot...

THOUGHTS/ANALYSIS: R.I.P.D. is a sci-fi action film based on the comic book of the same name. The film opens up with police officers Nick Walker (Reynolds) and Bobby Hayes (Bacon) are discussing some gold they took on a random drug bust, but kept it for themselves. Nick decides he is going to turn the gold into evidence, and Bobby decides to kill Nick at their next drug bust when no one else is around. Nick finds himself dead, but before he is whisked away to the afterlife, he is brought to the R.I.P.D. to be recruited as an officer who specialises in thwarting people who have died and are still hanging around Earth, causing them to transform into hideous creatures called "Deados." Nick is partnered with veteran officer Roicephus "Roy" Pulsipher, who was a sheriff in the Old West before he died, and the two manage to stumble upon a plot that threatens the whole world, which they naturally have to put a stop to. The story can very easily be summed up as a combination of the films Men in Black and Ghost: you can see certain scenes are almost complete cut-and-paste jobs from these two. Alongside this, it doesn't have either the worldbuilding or quickfire comedy of Men in Black, nor the emotional depth of Ghost, leaving a film that just completely fails to build its own identity. The plot of an ancient artifact being built that will wipe out the Earth is basically the plot to every Men in Black film. It feels like the script was just finished at it's first draft, and no one bothered to add in any specific details or worldbuilding to give it some depth. Despite the criticisms, the film actually does a good job of avoiding any boring exposition, and just jumps right into everything and explaining things as it goes. Part of this might be because there's not much to actually explain, but at least the film manages to keep momentum going over the rather short runtime of just over ninety minutes.

The characters are very much what you would expect: Ryan Reynolds is Ryan Reynolds: it doesn't matter what the name of the actual character, because he's just playing the same character he always does. Jeff Bridges playing Old West lawman Roeciphus "Roy" Pulsipher is certainly the stand out performance. Again, he's not got much depth beyond being the "grizzled veteran" type, but it's guaranteed fun every time he is on screen. Kevin Bacon as the villain is unremarkable, and Nick's wife Julia barely leaves a mark. As mentioned, the film lacks and seems to avoid the emotional depth that would have made their relationship and the significance of Nick's death a solid plot point. Even if it was, it wouldn't have been any different from the plot of Ghost (again, as mentioned). The film doesn't seem to know what it wants its audience to be: it doesn't have the established jokes and wit to be a comedy movie for young adults, the lack of emotional drama for older adults, and is a bit too adult for younger viewers, so the film just rushes straight through the middle with nothing sticking to it.

It's difficult to find something else to say about the film, because there's not much content to comment on. The film was blasted for being derivative of other films and a box office bomb, making nowhere near its budget upon release. However, I don't think it's all bad: sure, it has no substance, but it's paced well, and maintains its momentum and energy through to make it a pretty entertaining film with no lulls. R.I.P.D. is the epitome of mindless cinematic entertainment that brings nothing new or significant to the table, but a short bit of fun if you're in the mood.

[kieuecaprie]

KieueCaprie's List of Games Finished in 2023 Entry #8

#16: LEGO 2K Drive

What Platform? - PC, Steam

Finished when? - 18/5/23

Okay, so you may have some questions about the finished date because that date is before the actual release date of the game. So what gives? Well, first, I acquired the Awesome Edition of this game from a trusted 3rd party site for Steam that allowed me to split the purchase up into three instalments rather than buying all the money upfront.

It's a pretty decent game all things considered, I didn't care very much for the story and found the voices to be a bit grating sometimes but exploring the world in a LEGO® car was pretty fun.

The one thing I don't agree on is the heavy monetization that 2K shoved into the game and it's kind of making me regret picking this up in the first place. At least the "battle pass" has no time limit, I guess, but I would not recommend paying full price for this game if you can help it. Maybe at a steep discount, y'know, like the Hot Wheels game.

#17: Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengance of the Slayer

What Platform? - PC, Game Pass

Finished when? - 1/6/23

Clear #2:

What Platform? - PC, Steam

Finished when? - 1/6/23

100% Achievements:

Finished when? - 9/6/23

Well, that's quite a bit to chew through there but Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengance of the Slayer was a game that I played through not once, not twice, but thrice because I enjoyed it that much. Hell, I even bought it on Steam even though I could just play it on Game Pass because I felt like I was committing robbery by doing so, something that very few games on Game Pass has even managed to do with me (The other being Psychonauts 2 and HI-FI Rush, btw, the latter of which I still need to pick up for my Steam library someday).

I loved the aesthetic, the whole narmy edginess, and just about everything about it. Also when I initally posted my log entry to the bluebird hellsite, I was congratulated by the developer himself.

Thank you Zane, I'll be sure to put this on my fridge to remember this accomplishment for years to come.

#18: Street Fighter 6

What Platform? - PC, Steam

Finished when? - 12/6/23

What was finished? - World Tour Main Story, Classic Control Scheme

Now, when it comes to fighting games, I'm more of a platform fighter person, you'd see me playing Smash (maybe not as much since online has soured it for me) or Rivals of Aether more than anything else since I'm too stupid to play the original fighters.

Come Street Fighter 6 and it caught my attention right away with its bright graphics and peppy mood, as well as a custom character creator, which I set about doing to create Azie, whose last name I've yet to determine at this time of writing, because I wasn't too sure who to make an avatar of.

World Tour was pretty much a very glorified tutorial with a story that's kind of hit-or-miss but it's fun fighting goons out in the streets before taking on Luke from Streets™ to gain some style EXP for his fighting moves to equip to my avatar.

I loved it, what more can I say? Well, beside the fact that it finally taught me how to do some of the basic inputs for some moves without making me do a quarterback triple-kickflip to shove-it to manual on the d-pad.

Also played it all the way through with mostly Classic controls, because I wanted to.

#19: Unreal Tournament (1999)

What Platform? - PC, Steam (Game is unlisted, sadly, but I can still play it!)

Finished when? - 15/6/23

What was finished? - Campaign, Average difficulty

The reason? Nostalgia. Unreal Tournament '99 was one of the few FPS games that still sit in the back of my mind for me, and for good reason. In some ways, it feels better than UT2k4 and other ways, the latter is better, but UT99 is still great, even if it's a pain in the ass to get working on modern systems even with the funny fan patch.

#20: Chocobo GP

What Platform? - Nintendo Switch, the only platform that it's on at this time of writing (and probably gonna be there forever unless Squenix decides to port it to other systems)

Finished when? 21/6/23

When Square Enix re-released the game with ALL of its content packaged in and free from any battle pass bullshittery, I decided to reward them for once and... buy the physical copy because it was cheaper than buying digital at the time lmao.

But it was quite worth it because I felt like I would enjoy the game and the story mode, and I did, the only thing that was stopping me was the awful MTX and Battle Pass shit that really bogged the game down and made it a terrible grind.

Believe me, the game feels 10x better when you're not constantly grinding to get a character before time runs out. It's almost like they should've done that from day 1!

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[erigold13261]

Oh! Yea sure! The Eriverse is pretty complicated but also just a stupid (/pos) jumble of a bunch of things. (also this might get a tad bit long so buckle up lol)

At it's core, the Eriverse is literally my hyperfixation with the game No Straight Roads (NSR) gone wild lol. It was a game I LOVED for so long to the point I couldn't care about any other media unless I connected it to NSR.

I ended up really liking Psychonauts and the Spiderverse movies, so I did what any one else would naturally do and just plopped those two media into the NSR universe (which is why everyone is colored in strange ways lol). From there I just kept adding onto the universe with either full media or just concepts from other media (so sometimes I'll have the full character cast list and other times I will only have the magic/power system from a world)

The Eriverse is cut up into a few different parts, but there are 4 main ones at this point in my writing (which the 4th part just recently got created so it's still heavily in development).

Name may change, but for now they are known as "The Past," "The Revolutions/Age of Revolutions," "Post Timeskip," and "The Era of Rebirth." Technically there are 3 more sections, but those are more for exposition than for story telling (before The Past, during the Timeskip, and the time between Post Timeskip and The Era of Rebirth which is a 1000 year timespan).

Anyway, the major points go as follows!

-"The Past" is mainly made up of Psychonauts characters and the older generation of NSR characters. This is actually the most established part of the Eriverse because I was creating the past for NSR characters for like years before I delved into creating an expanded universe.

So most of The Past is set in stone and won't have extra media added onto it except for easy stuff I can plop into the timeline (such as Miguel from Spiderverse being friends with Yinu's mother and father from NSR).

-"The Age of Revolutions" are a like 6 year timespan where 3 major revolutions happen (each 2 years apart from each other). The Rock Revolution (which is the events of NSR), the Power Revolution (which is the Eriverse's version of what happens in the Spiderverse franchise, as Nueva York is a company that suppresses people's natural powers and so Miles and the rest of the Arachnikids and Hidden Inventory/JJKgang cause a revolution), and the Tech Revolution (which is the events of Hi Fi Rush).

The Tech Revolution was going to be connected with the Robot Revolution, but instead I changed that to happen after the first Timeskip which would include Hi Fi Rush and the Robots movie from 2005.

-"Post Timeskip" is the period after a 10 year timeskip after the Tech Revolution. Right now this is the area of the Eriverse that I am focusing on the most as I have added the MOST media into this part of the story.

Basically, during the 10 year timeskip, wild magic of the world built up too quickly and started to create creatures known as entities (which is a concept like how Curses from JJK are made). Entities encompass a LOT of creatures from ghost Pokemon to Minecraft mobs, to JJK curses, and even Hatsune Miku lol. Basically anything I can't justify as human/human adjacent or a robot gets turned into an entity (and the classification for human is very broad in this world).

This is probably the hardest part to explain because there is so much and a lot of lore and relationship are reliant on knowledge of the past acts of the Eriverse, but it is SUPPOSED to be a complicated mess that allows for a lot of relationships to play out between characters from different universe. Like Satoru, Suguru, and Shoko (JJK) being kinda sorta adopted kids of DJ Subatomic Supernova (NSR) or how Miles (Spiderverse) is in a relationship with Gwen, Ganke (Spiderverse), and Kento and Haibara (JJK).

Very mess but very fun and a lot of intermingling between characters thanks to both circumstances (such as being sent to Nueva York or working at NSR) and realtionships (a lot of characters are either related or know someone related to someone).

This is also where lore about the magic of the world comes out to the majority of humanity, as well as things like the Culling Games and the Shibuya Incident equivalents happen (I say equivalents because they aren't going to be 1-to-1 or set in Japan. The Culling Games happen over the whole world and the Shibuya Incident happens in Vinyl City which is Malaysia equivalent).

-"The Age of Chaos" (and other titles). This is the 1000 years between Post Timeskip and The Era of Rebirth. It's also called the "Age of Corruption" and the "Centuries of War" which should be a good indicator of what this time period was like. Very chaotic and messy and was also the time where humans ended up falling as the the ones who were dominating Earth. Now it's mostly entities, with humans and robots having to fight for their lives. Not much story is going to happen here other than retellings from other media (the Great Diamond attack from Steven Universe and Nightmare Moon from My Little Pony happen during this period).

-"The Era of Rebirth" is the new age of story telling after the Age of Chaos ends. It's supposed to be mainly about Mana (the rebirthed Mahito who died before the Culling Games happened), Steven Universe, and Princess Luna coming to terms with what they/their former selves had done while also trying to help bring peace to the world as best as they can.

Magic in this part of the world is much more powerful. Before, like in The Past, magic was very weak and basically only applied to the person themself and couldn't be used on others unless they were very powerful or were boosted by music magic. Now, in the Era of Rebirth, music still reigns supreme but also magic is everywhere to the point that humans can use magic very easily.

This is why media such as My Little Pony, Freiren, Avatar the Last Airbender, and other heavily magical series are placed here!

_____________________

Anyway! That is the just the technical lore part of the Eriverse! Like which media is where (I didn't even go into the whole list of different shows and games that I have planned to be here).

There are still plenty of actual plot points I could summarize as well as in-universe history about how the world works. Things such as Elementals, robots, how magic came to be, Tengen being the first ever Entity, the mutation of magic into the human race that even allowed for things like psychics and elementals to exist.

And THAT'S not even talking about how this world culturally differs from ours in how words like "human" are much more broad and relaxed compared to how IRL live uses those words.

Same thing with Entities having different cultures such as the Trolls having a blood color hierarchy while gems have an entirely different hierarchy which is different from the curses.

All of this is combine to try and make the world seem a lot more fleshed out. I try to go all over the world throughout history while also connecting characters and stories all together.

It really is super hard to explain all in one post, and this is already getting SUPER long, so I will definitely try to make a masterpost connected to sections of the Eriverse where I can talk more in depth about each part lore-wise instead of just the technical stuff.

Hope this was a fun read for you and anyone else! :D

I need to make a new pinned post. Talking about the Eriverse, my random ass tagging system, and also letting people know I am pretty okay with being tagged randomly (though I won't get to every tag some days because of my motivation sometimes lol)

Also need to change my commissions to off because I just can't do those while working. I just can't. I'm not even working full time and can't do them. I plan to work full time so I KNOW I won't be able to do them later.

So uh, for now take this as my new pinned post so my commission page isn't the first thing you see when you open my blog! :D

[kindahoping4forever]

Feedback // Ashton Irwin

I've been sitting on this fic for a minute so thank you to everyone who's patiently waited for me to post it (shoutout to Sly)! This story was really just me getting inspired and clowning after Ashton's "Down To Earth" IG stream back in April. As always, thanks to @cal-puddies for the invaluable guidance as I tried to pare my writing style down into a pwp format (try being the operative word, 3500 words is still the best we could do lmao).

Warnings: Distracted Boyfriend!Ash, oral sex on a male, moderately rough unprotected sex (on the red leather couch) including mild dirty talk, brief choking and a spank or two.

Word Count: 3535

Masterlist // Ko-Fi and New 2021 Taglist linked above

Let  me  know  what  you  think!

"Baby! I didn't know you were home!"

You turn around to see Ashton in the doorway of the bedroom, voice as cheerful as the yellow beanie covering his head.

"Didn't hear you come in," he comments, walking over to you.

You slide your arms around your boyfriend’s neck with a sigh. "Rushed up here, phone was about two seconds from shutting off," you explain, greeting him with a tender kiss.

He watches as you kick off your shoes and yank your bra off under your shirt, tossing everything haphazardly in the direction of the closet before flinging yourself on the bed. "Tough day?"

You groan, dragging your hands over your face before extending your arms, encouraging him to join you. “Eh, not great and very long,” you report, giving a satisfied sigh when Ash climbs on the bed and immediately pulls you on top of him, wrapping his arms around you tightly. You do the same and the both of you lay quietly in this prone embrace for several peaceful moments before you break the silence. “How about you, how was your day?”

You feel him shrug under your body. “Can’t complain,” is his simple reply.

“Make anything cool?” You prompt, knowing he’s being low-key because he thinks you need to chill out, not realizing nothing relaxes you more than listening to him talk about his passions.

“Hmm… anything cool...” Ash giggles, hugging you closer. “I dunno, got a good start goin’ on this one track that could be pretty cool, got a nice vibe.”

You raise your head up to look at him and scratch your fingers across his beard, you’re so glad he decided to let it grow again. “Yeah? Tell me more.”

He hums as you continue to rub his face. “Only been at it for a couple hours, ‘s just a track for now, we’ll see what I can do with it,” he breezes, moving your hand from his face to his mouth so he can kiss it.

“Well, whenever you feel like you need a fresh pair of ears, I’d love to hear it,” you enthuse, moving to lay at his side.

He turns to give you a bright grin. “Yeah? A little in-house focus group?” He teases, leaning in for a sweet kiss that starts to get needy the longer it goes on.

You pull off his hat, running your fingers through his long hair as he moves to kiss along your neck. “Don’t know if you know this but I’m a big fan of your work,” you tease back.

He kisses your lips again, biting a bit as he pulls away to quip, “We talking ‘bout my music or something else?”

You giggle, deciding that indulging this frisky mood is exactly how you would like to unwind tonight. You inch closer, pulling him back into a kiss and he responds eagerly, hand coming up to massage at the base of your neck like it always does. For the next few minutes, the only thoughts in your mind revolve around Ashton, how he feels, how he tastes and where you need his mouth or hands on you next.

When you let out a moan at the way his fingers are gripping your skin under your shirt and he doesn’t press himself against you in response, you can tell he’s gotten distracted. You laugh knowingly against his lips, “You’re back to thinking about that song now, aren’t you?”

He looks at you with a sheepish smile. “I was actually still workin’ and came up here just to grab a hoodie when I found you.”

You playfully push him off of you, shaking your head. “Dude, you should’ve told me! You know I’m not one to fuck with The Process,” you admonish, scrunching your nose up at the trail of kisses he pecks over your face as he sits up.

“Nah, my brain needed a break and my girl needed me, it worked out perfectly,” he insists, rubbing your arm affectionately before getting off the bed.

He quickly fishes his desired sweatshirt out of the closet and pulls it on over his t-shirt, mussing his hair even more than you already had. He walks back over, ready to kiss you goodbye when you sit up on your knees to stop him. “I was serious about giving it a listen if ya want,” you say, smoothing his hair down before resting your hands on top of his inside his hoodie pocket. “If you’re not ready that’s fine but just FYI I‘m interested.”

Ash grins at you, squeezing your hands before using them to pull you to your feet. “Aww, you know you’re my fave audience, baby,” he gushes, reaching to grab his hat off the bed. “Let’s go give it a spin.”

“Well. As much as you can ‘spin’ a computer file,” you mutter, trying to annoy him just because it’s fun.

As you head for the door, you hear him snort behind you a split second before he grabs you, sliding his beanie on your head far enough to cover your eyes; you burst into giggles as he playfully bumps into you, passing you in the hallway. “Smart ass,” he grumbles, voice still smiling.

Ash makes it down to the basement first and starts clicking on files and flicking switches, excited to play his work for you. You stop at the foot of the stairs and survey the room with wonder. Multiple guitars - electric, acoustic, bass, 12-string - are strewn across the room, cables run from his computer to the adjacent room where he houses his drums, food delivery containers line the coffee table; he’s clearly been down here since you left this morning.

While he sets up, you make yourself useful, setting the guitars back in their racks, stacking the food trash; when you’re done, you start to drag a chair over to the computer when you notice he’s staring at you like you’ve grown an extra head.

“What are ya mad at me or somethin’?” He scoffs, patting his legs and looking at you expectantly.

You smirk and take a seat in his lap, watching closely as his long fingers fly over the keyboard, hand adeptly working the mouse, making a few final adjustments to the track. You hear a quiet “there we go” under his breath and then he’s settling in, pulling you back against him and rubbing over your thighs as you wait for the song to begin.

It’s a simple demo so far - layered background vocals, drum and bass, some synth, a little guitar line here and there - but he’s right, it’s definitely a vibe. You’re pleased that his reflection is visible in the computer screen, you love seeing him grooving behind you, pursing his lips and nodding his head along to the beat as you feel his fingers tapping along on your waist while he holds you close.

The track is short and before he can even ask your opinion, you tell him to play it again; his face lights up at your request and he proudly complies. When it finishes this time, you shift to look at him and smile. “That’s wild you did that all yourself and in such a short amount of time,” you marvel. “See, I was right, you did do something cool.”

Ashton laughs, kissing the side of your head as he leans forward to reach the keyboard. “You think so? Well, what’s really cool is this…” He starts clicking around again, isolating the different elements and revealing which sounds are electronic and which are live instruments, which section he thinks he’ll write lyrics over tomorrow, where he’s thinking of pasting in more guitar.

You respond when appropriate but mostly you just listen intently, watching fondly as he animatedly details his thought process; this is why you offered to come down here with him, this is the best part about being his “fave audience.” You love his music but more than that, you love how much he loves his music.

He stops mid-explanation of a section to tinker with it, clearly having a brainstorm right in front of you. You curl into his chest, observing quietly as he cycles through effects and begins stacking tracks. He chews his lip, deep in thought as he lets the song play again and you can't help but press a few kisses to his jaw.

Ash continues his work and you continue yours, moving from his jaw to his neck; your kisses eventually become more heated, with you adding tongue and even teeth to the equation. You suck his earlobe into your mouth, wiggling his earring with the tip of your tongue and finally he pulls away, chuckling, "Baby, come on."

You shrug, playing with his hair. "I just love watching you work."

He laughs, "Then goddamn, baby, let me work!" He growls as you nip at his throat and you smile to yourself because you can tell he's already rethinking his request.

"Seems like you shoulda thought about this before you invited a girl down to your basement to listen to some dreamy space pop alien makeout jam," you tease, relishing the feeling of his laughter vibrating his throat under your tongue.

"Can I get you to leave that review when this goes up on iTunes?" He cracks, finally turning his attention to you.

"I might be persuaded," you flirt, humming with victory as he pulls you into a hungry kiss.

Ashton wastes no time returning the affection you showed him, lips devouring yours, hands quickly making their way under your shirt to lazily massage your tits. You’re mid-moan, his fingers just about to make it inside your waistband when suddenly he’s pulling away.

It takes you a beat to realize what’s happened, your body confused by the sudden absence of his touch. You open your eyes to see him busy at the computer again and it’s so absurd to you, you have to laugh.

“Two minutes,” he says half-apologetically, half-distracted, squeezing your thigh but not taking his eyes off the screen.

You smirk to yourself, immediately aware of what your next move is. “Take as long as you need, baby. When genius strikes, you gotta go for it,” you state ominously, not that he notices. Nor does he notice you sliding yourself off his lap and onto the floor between his legs.

You run your hands up and down his thick thighs before letting your touch wander to the front of his jeans, palming over his crotch, happy to find that at least part of him was interested in your makeout session. You can’t decide if you’re more amused or annoyed by his focus but it’s not until your hand is on his cock, freeing him from his pants that he tears himself away from his project.

“Excuse me, ma’am, can I help you with something?”

You lock eyes with him as you stick your tongue out and dramatically lick your hand, coating your palm with saliva before giving his cock a tight squeeze and beginning to stroke him steadily. “I also had a genius idea I was just following through on,” you shrug. “Might take a little longer than two minutes, though, I’m a bit out of practice… my boyfriend’s been pretty busy.”

Ash giggles wildly, both at your joke and your audacity. “You’re crazy, I’m literally about to be done with… fuck…” His retort is interrupted by you, eyes still trained on his, licking long stripes up the sides of his cock, sucking gently at the head before licking your way back down.

“Go ahead and finish your work, baby, I’ll just keep busy until you’re done,” you insist, mischief in your eyes as you look up one last time before taking him into your mouth.

You hear a sharp inhale, a softly chuckled “fuckin’ ridiculous” and then finally, mouse clicks as he attempts to get back to it. You do your best to distract him, bobbing up and down enthusiastically, sucking loudly, humming around him, making sure he knows how much you’re enjoying your task.

It only takes a minute or so for him to get sidetracked by your efforts. “This is a shitty home demo I’ve spent all of 90 minutes on, there’s no way it’s so good you just had to have my cock right here and now,” he insists, struggling to keep his voice steady, not wanting you to hear how affected he is.

You pop off, gingerly playing with his balls as you zing back, “I dunno babe, you guys had plenty of shitty songs on your first album and from what I’ve heard, you did more than alright in the pussy department.”

Ashton’s laughter quickly turns to a strained moan as you slide back down on him, letting him hit the back of your throat. “My bad, didn’t realize I’d shacked up with a groupie,” he jokes. You silently congratulate yourself as you notice him flexing his hand into a fist, knowing he’s trying to keep himself from pressing down on your head.

You pull off him again, making sure to let the spit cascade from your mouth as you smugly reply, “Like I said before: big fan.” Before he can even think about responding, your mouth is back on him.

You’re not surprised he attempts to resume working again; you’re both stubborn, it’s a wonder anything ever gets resolved in your relationship. You can tell he’s trying his best to stay on task but the whispered curses under his breath give him away. As a last resort, he turns the volume on his speaker up a few more notches, hoping the track will drown out the exaggerated choking sounds you’re intent on making.

A few moments later, he reaches down and yanks his beanie off your head. “Fuckin’ bright yellow bouncing over my crotch is hard to ignore,” he grumbles. “All I see is my hat, looks like I’m suckin’ my own dick for all I know.”

You can’t resist continuing to rib him. “How is that not your greatest fantasy? Your favorite person giving you your favorite pleasure?”

He snorts, shaking his head. “I’m sorry, did you want to blow me or roast me?”

You give him your brightest smile and reply, “Unlike you, I’m pretty good at multi-tasking.”

A brief cackle and a clipped “alright” are all you hear before you’re being hoisted up off the ground, thrown over Ash’s shoulder and carried over to the couch across the room. You squeal with surprise and delight as he unceremoniously dumps you on it, briskly strips you both of your clothes and promptly bends you over the red leather.

He nudges your knees further apart, pressing you against the back of the couch. “Of course you’re this fuckin’ wet already,” he teases, breath hot on your neck as he runs himself through your folds. “You think that’s from my cock down your throat or from you winding me up so much?”

Whatever clever comeback you’d thought up dies on the tip of your tongue because suddenly he’s sliding his cock inside you and now that’s all you can care about. You whine as he quickly establishes a vigorous pace, one hand bracing himself against the couch, the other reaching around you, down your torso to reach your clit. “How’s this for multi-tasking?”

A few breathless cries of his name are the best you can manage as he relentlessly plays with you, somehow in perfect rhythm with his rough thrusts, sending your whole body into sensory overload.

“Or how ‘bout this?” He growls, moving his hand from between your legs to your throat, fingers offering just the slightest amount of pressure, knowing it’ll drive you crazy wondering if and when he’ll add more. “Don’t got any more funny jokes for me, baby?”

You moan at his taunting, placing a hand on top of his on your neck, trying to get him to squeeze harder; he refuses and his denial makes you moan even louder. "Jesus, Ash," you pant, pushing back against him to egg him on. “Feels so fucking good.”

You're so caught up that you don't even notice his song is still playing over the speakers until a few moments later when Ashton suddenly pulls out of you, muttering to himself as he grabs the remote from the coffee table and shuts the music off.

Confused, you look back and see him amusedly shaking his head. "Yes, I was still producing that in my head, don’t start," he giggles.

You fall back on the couch, laughing in disbelief. “We’ve gotta get you some hobbies, buddy, that’s insane.”

He snickers, laying you on your back and settling on the couch behind you, pulling your leg over his hip. “I don’t think fucking you counts as a hobby,” he jokes, gripping his cock and slipping it back inside you.

“Not with that attitude,” you quip, a little more breathlessly than you meant to but with how slowly Ash is rocking into you, you can’t help it.

You tilt towards him, angling yourself to pull his mouth down to yours; you’re feeling overwhelmed and you need him close. His tongue traces over your lips, his kiss the familiar reassurance you need in this moment. “Ash…” You whimper quietly, closing your eyes and savoring the feel of his beard grazing your skin.

“I know, baby, me too,” he soothes, cradling you tighter against him. His hips begin to pick up speed and his hand moves to knead your breasts and tug at your nipples before travelling further down.

Ashton rubs slow, tight circles on your clit, stopping to give your thigh a light smack when you start raising your hips a little too eagerly, bucking up in an attempt to get him to move at a speed more to your liking. You moan first at the realization that he’s going to keep teasing you like this and then again, louder, at the sharp slap of his palm that once again comes down on your skin.

“You’ve got a nice tone tonight, baby, I should get you to lay down some vocals for this track,” he jokes, choking back a moan of his own when your surprised laughter causes you to clench around his length.

You chuckle smugly at him, “Not so funny all of a sudden, huh?”

You feel yourself getting closer so you start rolling your hips along with his, murmuring at the feeling of him deep inside you; you grind against his hand playing between your legs and as he finally amps up the pace, your release becomes closer and closer to reality. Your breathing syncs with his in a needy, staccato rhythm that wouldn’t have sounded out of place in his song.

“Is this what you wanted?” He huffs out. Typically when he asks you that while he’s buried in you, there’s a tone of arrogance or punishment behind it but right now as he holds you, your sounds continuing to meld together, it couldn’t feel farther from that.

“Yes, Ash, god yes…” you breathe, reaching to hold onto him as your orgasm overtakes you.

Ashton keeps driving his cock inside you, whining slightly at the feeling of you pulsing around him. You cry out, not realizing how loud or long your moans are until you hear his voice in your ear, gently lulling you back down.

He’s still moving inside you, hips beginning to stutter and when you hear his breath catch, you know he’s there. You tuck yourself into him, cooing, “Come on, Ash... fill me up, babe.” Three strokes later and he’s pumping his cum inside you, gasping your name. He slows his movements, heavy breath underscored by a contented hum as you caress his bearded cheek.

He leans in and kisses you passionately, completely enveloping you, possibly your favorite feeling in the world. He exhales loudly and keeps holding you, kissing over your face tenderly.

You giggle as he indulges for a moment before reluctantly pulling away, reaching for the takeout napkins on the coffee table; he attentively cleans you up and quickly settles back onto the couch, pulling you on top of him.

You lay together, blissed out, while you play with the necklace hanging down on his chest and he strokes over your hair.

“Hey, sorry I gave you such a hard time,” you smile. “Didn’t realize how much I wanted your attention until I didn’t have it anymore.”

He looks at you, amused. “Honestly didn’t notice you acting any differently.”

You jab his side. “Also sorry I talked shit about your first album, I do actually like it quite a bit.”

Ash cackles, tracing designs on your back. “Oh good, I was worried that was going to be what finally drives us apart,” he cracks.

You snicker, nuzzling your head into his chest. You enjoy a few quiet moments together before he begins softly humming an unfamiliar melody and you smile, knowing his creative wheels are turning again.

You lift your head up again to offer one last apology. “I’m sorry I once again disrupted The Process.”

Ashton laughs mischievously, running his hands down your body. “I mean… overall I’d say this was some pretty valuable feedback.”

————-

Thank you to everyone who has signed up for the taglist, both for the support and the lovely (occasionally hilarious) feedback! If you haven’t signed up yet, the form is linked above! (If you signed up and your name is crossed out or not listed, I was unable to tag you, please check your blog settings and either re-sign up or send me a message letting me know you allow mentions now) @notinthesameguey @cxddlyash @2fangirl4u @cashtonasfuck @talkfastromance4 @itjustkindahappenedreally @saywhatnow07 @mymindwide @suchalonelysunflower @pxrxmoore @findingliam-o @fedorable-killjoys @trix-arent-for-kids @olivia-foster-irwin @saphseoul @calmsweetcreature @onthecliffside-mgc @feliznavidaddycal @himbohood @maggiesupertramp @wiiildflowerrr @karajaynetoday @ashtonangst @sunshineeashton @aladyofalbion @youngblood199456 @xsongbirdx @loveroflrh @fairytrice @calumrose @irwindoll @polycashton @in-superbloom

[ink-flavored]

ask game! 🥺🎃🧠(for feriha!)🤲

You got it!

🥺 Is there a certain type of moment or common interaction between your characters that never fails to put you in your feels?

Well this is a fanfic ask game. Yugi and Atem are my characters now, I've decreed it. Anyway.

It really just Gets Me when I write how devoted they are to each other. Like there's just nothing in the world they wouldn't do for each other and sometimes I think about that so hard I have to go lie down. It's so good. I'm floating face-down in a river like Ophelia.

🎃 Do you write fics for certain holidays? Which is your favorite holiday inspired fic?

Does PuzzleJune count as a holiday?

I don't think I ever have written a fic for a specific holiday before! Not for lack of interest, but because I always seem to have everything happening all the time. I guess I had that New Year's Eve bit in Happy Hour but idk that feels like it doesn't count.

I'd really like to write a Halloween fic one of these days, because I love Halloween and I think I could do something fun with it.

🧠 Pick a character, and I'll tell you my favorite headcanon for them.

I have to be very careful with this one. Feriha is an OC so that means any headcanon I have for her is just canon. It becomes real forever.

I only really implied it in the Arranged Marriage AU-gust prompt (now available on Ko-Fi, check it out) but she is absolutely the type to play games against herself, either because no one is around or because she's trying to Improve Her Strategy. Unfortunately this method does not apply to video games, where she always seems to fail miserably. It's very sad can we get an F in the chat

🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

Only because you asked so nicely.

This is a sneak peak of the Paranormal AU-gust prompt, the last one that will be delivered to Ko-Fi this year, so Ko-Fi subs: you'll see this in a few weeks ;)

Téa sagged over a laptop, fingers flying paradoxically fast over the keyboard. “What are we logging this one as?”

“A shade,” Atem answered. “Below freezing, recoiled from light, tried to isolate us.”

“Could be a wraith,” Joey argued. “It was nasty enough.”

“No, it didn’t have a face. Trust me, I got close enough to check.”

Joey shivered in disgust. “Shade it is.”

“There’s one sure way to find out,” Téa said. “Ryou?”

“Can you hand the capsule up, Yugi?” Ryou asked. No response. “Yugi?”

Yugi sat motionless against the back of the van, frozen in place. Literally.

Thin sheets of ice formed on the ends of the capsule, crystalizing and coating his fingers, creeping up his hands. His eyes stared wide into the blank void, deathly pale and shivering.

“Atem, we need help!” Ryou shouted, rushing to his side.

[send me an emoji ask!]

[lesbian-deadpool]

Happy Little Accidents

Part Two: Hope

Natasha Romanoff x Reader

Words: 2,317

Warnings: I don’t think there is any?? Crying/light angst, adoption process, stress??

Request: Yes

Summary: You work on getting you little girl back. And hope that it’s successful.

A/N: It’s been a long time coming, I haven’t proof read it or anything (but when do I ever? Lol), so bare that in mind.

Ko-Fi

(Not My GIF)

***

Being a pair of Avengers and going through the adoption process was so very complicated.

On one hand, you were well known across the globe. Household names.

But on the other. You were dangerous people, with violent past's -and futures to come- with more enemies than you could count. Some of which you didn't even know existed. And who in their right minds would ever let a child into that environment? People have been turned down for much less.

However.

You were basically celebrity's. And as everyone knows, that comes with a lot of special treatment. Even if you and Natasha -And most of, if not all of your team- denied to use any of it. But in this case? For little Hope? You would do whatever you had to.

So, it was thanks to that, that you were even allowed to be considered for adoption.

And there was so much work that had to be done.

Papers to sign, meetings to attend, visits and screenings every which way. And so much more.

It was a long and tedious journey. And you still had a long way to go.

Right now, you had to watch as someone picked apart your home -once again- to make sure it was okay for your little girl to come home. Where she belongs.

You had moved not too long ago, maybe a little over two months, and in that time, it had been looked at three times. Which really made it seem like you weren't doing anything, in their eyes, considering you were busy working and renovating the whole place out at the same time.

The day after you and Natasha had to say goodbye to Hope, you knew that you had to get a bigger place than the apartment you had both shared. And began looking for new homes the very same day.

Tony's help wasn't needed, you had plenty of money, but he insisted. So when you two found a townhouse that you absolutely adored, not too far from SHIELD HQ -where you both now worked most of the time. As when Fury found out that you were both to be adopting Hope- or trying to at least, the man lowered your hours and took you off missions altogether. Just until you were all settled-, the billionaire bought it for you, the moment he got wind of it.

You were moved in three days later. Deciding to work on the house while you lived there.

"So, where would the child be sleeping?" Your caseworker asked.

"Oh, right this way," you said, leading her down the hall to the newly decorated bedroom. Natasha following behind.

You gestured to the light pink, yet slightly sparse room. "This is it."

"We still have to pick up some of the furniture. But we've been waiting for the room to be decorated first," Natasha said, excusing the bare room.

"Yeah, Hope's not going to sleep on a stack of paint cans," you tried to joke. To which you barely got a smile from your caseworker, Stephany Halla.

"It look's decorated to me?"

"Oh." Natasha smiled. "We're having a friend of ours paint a mural or two on the walls."

"Yeah, Hope has a few favourite Avengers, so he's gonna paint them. And he's been learning how to draw cartoon characters for it, too."

"He's actually trying to adopt the two kids he took in with his fiance."

"Steve Rogers?" Stephany asked.

"That's the guy," you said, nodding along with Natasha.

"I've seen him around the office," She spoke again a few moments later. "So, when are you planning on getting the furniture for the room?"

"Hopefully, within a month," Natasha replied, "But with our and Steve's schedules, things are up in the air."

It was a difficult start to the adoption process, more so than it was now. Considering that the children legally didn't exist to the world. So, everything was so confusing and thrown up into the air while waiting for the kids to be registered.

Almost like you didn't know whether you were coming or going. Everything stuck in limbo as you waited to see what kind of adoption process you would have to take. And even with all of your connections in the world, you were still left in the dark.

There was the fact that the kids were found overseas in Romania, so they could be considered Romanian. And so, you would have to go through international adoption.

However, none of the children have birth parents and were brought to America because you had rescued them. So, some would say they could be considered immigrants.

Nothing like this had ever happened before.

Babies that had been grown in a lab and saved from a further torturous life, that now needed legalization in the world's eyes.

You and Natasha had to watch as Government's essentially fought over these children you saved. Over the same child, you clothed and fed. The one you played games with and bonded with the little girl you grew to love and consider your own.

So, as the world fought for the right of your child, your little Hope, you waited. Just wishing and wanting to bring your daughter home.

But, luckily for you, the children were now classed as American citizens. Which made it ten times easier for you to adopt than it would otherwise.

Which is honestly just crazy to you, considering just how intensely hard this is.

There were times you didn't believe you could ever adopt your child.

On more than one occasion, Natasha would come to you, saddened to her core, because she truly believed that you would never have Hope in your family.

It was so fucking hard.

Natasha had rolled over one night after you two had -once again- gone through the rules and regulations of adopting. Uttering how you were, "Never going to get her back" that there was "Juts no way, they will let us adopt", as she cried into your arms.

But still, the process continued.

"Well, your home seems to be in good standing. So for. But I advise you to get the furniture for the child's room as soon as possible," Stephane commented as she began packing up her belongings and paperwork.

"Oh, we know."

"Steve did say that he was going to start work on it in the next few days," Natasha added, nodding along with you.

"Well, that's is good news." Stephane smiled. "I'll see you at our next meeting with Hope."

Natasha sighed happily. "We can't wait."

"Well, goodbye then."

You whished the dirty-blonde woman farewell, closing the door behind her.

"We get to see our daughter in a couple of weeks," your red-headed girlfriend said excitedly, dancing from side to side out of pure happiness. Her bright smile filling your soul with warmth, that travelled all the way into your bones.

You matched her emotions, hands coming to curve around her shoulder blades and pulling her close to you.

"I know, Honey. It's been so long since we've seen her. And we're gonna bring her home one day."

That was all you could say before your mouth was covered, with the crushing feeling of Natasha's plump lips against yours.

***

Nerves rattled through you, but you hadn't the faintest idea why, considering this wasn't the first time you had seen Hope. However, it had been one of the first times you were able to see her since the day she was taken away from you.

If you thought you were bad.

Natasha was far worse.

She was practically shaking. From nerves or excitement, you didn't know. But you had a good inkling to think that it was both.

You had done so much for this child in the short span of time you had known her.

And yet, you couldn't imagine your life any other way. The thought of how your life had been that time last year.

No Hope. Surrounded by missions and work. Every free moment you had was spent with Natasha, and the rag-tag group of hero's you had grown to call your family.

It all seemed so foreign now.

Like a past life.

'Wow', you thought, 'Maybe I really am growing up'.

A part of you was afraid that the girl you thought of as your daughter wouldn't recognise you or your []. And would be scared of the two strangers that had just barged their way into her life. Breaking both of your heart's.

"Mommy! Mommy!"

Was the thing that greeted you, as soon as the door had swung open. Making you realise just how stupid your train of thought really was.

Natasha rushed forward, scooping the girl up into her arms, with a bright smile upon both of their faces.

"So, I still don't get a name, huh?" you joked, walking over to the reuniting girls.

Brushing a hand over Hope's short hair. Grinning when she reached her arms towards you, ready to give you a hug of your own, which you gratefully accepted.

"Don't worry," Natasha said, rubbing Hope's back as she hugged you, "You'll get a name soon."

"I better. Or else I'm gonna have ta tickle it out of her."

Hope's squeals reached your ears as you threateningly poked her side with your fingers.

"Here, baby. I'll save you," Natasha called, pulling the giggling girl from your arms. Both of them watching as you pulled your hand's in front of your face, wiggling the fingers almost spookily as them. The girls turned to each other, "They're silly."

Then they walked away.

With you calling after them.

"Hey! I may be silly, but-... I have no rebuttal!"

Natasha laughed at this, then greeted the care worker that was patiently waiting for you both. The one that you had only just noticed.

"Hello, Stephany," Natasha said in greeting, shaking the woman's hand. You following suit.

"Hey. How have you two been?"

"Missing this little one," Natasha replied, bouncing the girl on her waist. Receiving fun-filled giggles in return.

"I bet you have. And you, Y/N?"

"Exhausted," you told her honestly, "With moving house and everything, I just want to have Hope home, then sleep for a week."

The care worker laughed at that.

"Let's hope that that's sooner rather than later, then."

Your few hour's with Hope passed faster than you ever could have imagined. You played with blocks, ate lunch, "helped" Hope colour in her haphazardly filled colouring book. You absolutely adored the way her eyes lit up, and she started dancing and flailing her arms when she saw bubbles for the first time. You almost couldn't continue blowing them because of your bright smile.

And now you were watching as Natasha spoke gently to the little girl. Hope's hand's resting on the red-heads cheeks, watching her mother with such concentrating eyes.

You adored your little family.

You just wished you could have them all home.

'One day', you thought, 'one day'.

Saying goodbye was one of the hardest things you've ever had to do.

Just like the last time.

And the time before that.

And the time before that.

And the one before that.

It just got harder and harder each and every time you did this.

Hope was crying. And so was Natasha, albeit silently, as she tried to console the toddler.

"I know, my little love, I know-"

"Mommy!" Hope cried.

"I know, angel. We'll be back before you know it, I promise."

"Mommy!"

"I know."

Once in the car, you let your tears fall, Natasha sobbing in the seat beside you.

"I don't think I can keep on doing this anymore," you admitted. Deciding it was best you explained when Natasha turned to look at you, an incredulous look upon her face, "Keep on seeing her, and not being able to bring her home."

"We'll get there," your [] reached over the centre console to squeeze your hand, "We will. You're the one who's always saying that we've got to take after her namesake and have hope."

"But it almost seems endless, Nat."

"I know, honey." She wetly kissed your tear-stained cheek. Her lips, brushing against it as she continued, "We'll bring her home. I just know it."

"I hope you're right."

***

She was right.

Of course, she was right.

She was Natasha Romanoff, after all.

It was like she just had this inability to be wrong.

But in this case? You were so fucking happy about that.

Granted it had taken a while longer -a good eight months- but finally, you were here.

Exiting the courthouse with Hope in your arms, and Natasha by your side. Bright smiles upon all of your faces, about to take the little girl- Your daughter home.

You would never have to say goodbye to her, like that, ever again.

She was legally a part of your family now. And nothing would ever change that.

"Ready to go home, sweetpea?" Natasha asked the beaming girl.

"I don't know about you," you started, "But I think this deserves celebratory ice cream."

"I think you just want ice cream before dinner."

You gave an overdramatic gasp.

"Why I would never! How dare you accuse me of such a thing?"

Natasha laughed at your antics but nonetheless nodded her head.

"I agree. This does deserve celebratory ice cream."

"Yes!" you exclaimed happily to Hope, your free arm raising above your head in victory, making the girl copy you by raising both of her arms.

She was already taking after you.

Your red-headed girlfriend sighed dreamily after you, as you chanted, "Ice cream! Ice cream! Ice cream!" On your way to the car.

She couldn't remember a time where she was this happy.

It had been a long time since then.

And Natasha just couldn't wait to see what the rest of her life would bring with the two of you now by her side.

***

Permanent Tag List: 

@imnotasuperhero, @veteranwerewolf95, @natasha-danvers, @marvelfansince08love, @higherfurther-romanova, @lesbian-x-blackwidow, @sestra-inestro, @thelastavenger-3000, @mixed-fandom-mess,

SFW Tag list: 

@peggycarter-steverogers, @natalia-quinzel,

[milquetoast-on-acid]

Loving how active your Q&A is. Do you think the lack of emotion in season four was a narrative choice or a symptom of how rushed the final episodes were? I was so blown off course by the beautiful reunion hug that everything that followed didn't feel as deep. Episode 8 especially but even the moments leading up to their first kiss. It felt so casual. They almost died protecting each other, they thought the other was dead, and it was dry eyes the whole time. Hopper had those emotions right on the surface for Eleven. Is it the actors? Can they not "go there" emotionally? They have great chemistry but it's never been tested in any big romantic way until this season. Those flirty moments were flawless but I expected detectable emotion because the circumstances called for it more than any other time. I worry about season five if that can't be achieved between the actors for whatever reason.

Curious what other people think.

Hey anon! I'm really loving the asks too! My ask box has never been this busy and I'm really enjoying the conversations. Thank you so much for the ask! This is gonna be another long answer. 🙃 So I'm going to add one of those break thingys. Apologies for taking so long on this ask.

To answer your question: I most definitely think the lack of emotion is 100% a symptom of how rushed the episodes were. Although I wouldn't actually put it that way myself. There are scenes that I would tweak which I'll talk about later in the ask.

I think the biggest issue with 4 is that there are too many storylines and too many characters. There were four separate storylines and they added Eddie, Chrissy, Argyle, Dimitri, Yuri, Fred, Jason, General Sullivan, Vecna/Henry and Jason's friend 👀 (am I forgetting anyone?)

Not to mention they brought Brenner and Owens back. The fact that this many new characters for season 4 alone is mind boggling. That's just way too many characters for us to really get into the psychology of some of the storylines. Like we don't even know what happened to Owens if he's dead or alive and is Sullivan still after Eleven? So I'm very excited to hear that season 5 is going to focus mostly on the OG cast with the original pairings/groupings.

The actors are most definitely capable of handling this kind of storyline. I have not seen David in much but he was relatively unknown before ST. He's more of a theater actor than a film/tv actor. And before ST really he just did tv/film to pay his bills.

I did see him in some law and order episodes (before ST which is where I recognized him from) and his recent movies Hellboy and black widow (neither of them are great movies by any means but his character in black widow is hella fun and you can really see that David really enjoyed playing that part).

He seems to really throw himself into a role. The guy lost 80lbs in 8 months and added some muscle to portray a staving prison hopper. And wanted Alexi (and his family) to speak Russian in Black Widow instead of English, because they are Russian and that should make hella sense but he lost that battle with Disney.

He's also talked about (in multiple interviews) how Winona is such a rare acting partner for him. That she's truly able to go to very vulnerable places with him that he hasn't had with many other actors. I think this is the reason why jopper really resonates with a lot of people.

And Winona? If you don't know who Winona Ryder is (some people don't because her career stalled around 2000) she's a very talented and unique actress, who's been in a variety of different kinds of films. She's been in everything from period dramas, dark dramedy (drama comedy) to sci-fi action. Been nominated for Oscars, Golden globes and a Bafta (the British version of an Oscar). She's definitely got the chops for a storyline like this.

She's done plenty of romance and seems to gravitate to darker quirky roles and has been acting since she was a kid herself. Her big break was at 16, in the Tim Burton film Beetlejuice, she played the neglected teen Lydia Deetz who was strange and unusual.

So imo the fault isn't with the actors but with how spread out the storylines are in 4. Listen, I loved season 4 but the thing about 4 is, is that it's soooo plot heavy. If we were to go back to past seasons that really explored the psychology of the characters, then season 2 would be it. That season was really great at balancing plot arcs and character work.

Now to go back to the scenes that I myself would change in the jopper storyline for 4.

Pre-reunion, I would have made Joyce and Murray's plot less comedic. I'm not really sure why they choose to portray so much comedy for this plot as it is a rather dark storyline. It's about 90% comedy and 10% drama pre-reunion. I haven't seen Brett in much beyond ST (I'm actually not sure if I've seen him in anything besides ST, I probably have but don't remember). Winona though isn't known for being a comedic actor and Joyce wasn't portrayed as such a comedic role pre-season 3.

This was a choice by the Duffers and really the only thing I can come up with is why they wrote it this way, is because they wanted to balance out the darkness of the hopper prison storyline.

I would have liked to have seen scenes of Joyce grieving Hopper. I remember watching the end of 3 and seeing that scene where Joyce is hugging Will. While looking at Eleven (who's frantically looking for hopper). Both of them end up crying in grief over Hopper's death. But this is really the last scene we get of Joyce grieving.

Winona has talked in interviews about Joyce's grief (in losing hopper) and her burying it by raising her kids but we don't don't get nearly enough of this in 4. We only get glimpses of her grief (when she finds the letter and later her face when she finally is allowed to hug him). And like I was saying earlier it's not as if Winona can't portray grief. They did a really good job of showing the impact of Bob's death on Joyce. Hell, his death still has an impact on her and motivated her into not letting the same thing happen to Hopper.

Post reunion one of the things I love about his character growth is him learning to let Joyce (and El) be her/their own person and learn to trust her intuition. He spends most of 3 trying to protect Joyce by stopping her from following her own dogged intuition. "You're not going back there. Joyce, you are not going back there. (Meaning the lab)" "All the cavities have been filled. I watched them do it Joyce. It's over." "It's a two man operation. TWO!"

I just think because Hopper wasn't actually dead they didn't really show us much grieving of the character. I also think the point of hopper's death isn't so much about the characters grieving him. But more about the type of sacrifice he's willing to make for his found family. And to start him on this final journey to self healing.

So in 4 he doesn't question/stop Joyce when she wants to go back into the prison. He just automatically believes her and trusts in her intuition. Which maybe comes off as him not caring (or lacking in emotion) but that's not the case at all. She broke into the absolute worst Russian prison to save him. While she's not a physical fighter he's learned to trust that she can (and is capable) of taking care of herself. Both Joyce and Eleven are very determined and nothing (not hopper or Mike) are going to stop them from doing what they think is right even if they might get hurt in the process.

Post reunion the only jopper scenes I myself have any issues with are the scene where Joyce is patching up Hopper and In the van when they escape the prison the first time. I thought both kiss scenes were on point emotionally (and we do get a variety of emotions in the first kiss scene).

I definitely did think they could have gone deeper emotionally in the patching scene when they are first allowed to really talk to each other. Hopper doesn't really like to be vulnerable and really hides his true emotions under humor and anger. So imo I don't think I could see Hopper crying here.

I actually think maybe the point of that scene is just to give us a break from all of the chaos. To take a light breather and everything is soft and calm and happy. It's so very different from his super serious scenes with Dimitri where he's talking about how he thinks he's a curse and that he hurts everyone that he loves. I like that they feel... almost like they are in their own world. Completely away from everyone else and what's happening outside.

And he does get really messed up when he thinks that Joyce is dead. He gets drunk and loses the will to live basically until they fight the Demogorgon. Hopper is a deep feeling guy who really doesn't know how to deal with his emotions in a very healthy way.

I think he is trying to do his best to remain strong emotionally for her. Like even though he went through a lot of shit in there I don't think he wanted her to to see it because he knows that it's going to affect her. Joyce is more emotionally strong than Hopper but she's still incredibly caring and empathetic and loving. And this is kind of about his constant need to protect her.

In the van scene. I was a bit surprised that Hopper doesn't react more to learning that she and Murray survived a plane crash that was caused by Yuri. I think the reason behind this is for two fold.

1. This is after Hopper's character growth. I think the hopper we are supposed to see is more settled. More comfortable with himself and much less angry. Because for so long he's been at war with himself. I think he's going to be less apt to punch people in the face.

2. The other reason I think is because of Yuri. I think the Duffers really thought that Yuri was going to be a breakout character that everyone was going to love because they liked his portrayal by the actor. So they give him tons of room to chew the scenery. It doesn't work though because of all of the terrible stuff he's put the characters through.

Hopefully my ramblings helped you out. The actors can definitely pull this off. When it comes down to it, it's really about the Duffers not focusing on its main characters enough. Having too many storylines and too many characters. And for them to properly craft a great story where we can get great psychology and emotional play from the characters.

I loved season 4 but it did suffer from being too spread out. Season 2 such a great job of properly exploring the psychology of the characters. We get Mike after losing El, Hopper learning to be a dad again, trying to protect El. Will being possessed and Joyce struggling with PTSD while trying to live a normal life with Bob.

[iisuya-simps]

Hello! May I please request headcanons with the buster bros (+Samatoki? If that’s okay!) with an S/O who is into anime + idol (rhythm) games? Thank you! Hope you’re having a good day/night 💙

A/N: *Rubs hands together* Buckle up yall, this is a long one. I may have had too much fun writing this... :p lol enjoy~

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Ichiro Yamada

Ichiro first saw you at a manga cafe rocking some merch from your favorite game franchise and had to go over and talk to you

he also found out that you're into anime too

he may try and quiz you to test how into games/anime you are

his eyes light up and his heart pounds but he plays it cool

after a long interrogation conversation, he asked if you would meet him back at the cafe next week

he lent you the latest issue of a light novel that you never got around to reading

now he would have an excuse to see you again

a few months later one of your favorite animes was being played in the theatre once so you both went on a date to see it

if its a sappy rom-com he will 100% deny that he cried and brush it off as an eyelash caught in his eye

but he totally did

to be fair you did too

though he may prefer light novels over anime most times

he will totally sit down at watch the new season of an anime you two enjoy together

prepare for a brain malfunction if you tell him you're into cosplaying

"oh yeah I cosplayed them a year ago"

"y-you wouldn't happen to have any pictures, w-would you?"👀"

*cue nosebleed*

"That's it, I've found my soulmate" he says he's kidding but actually means it

ANYWAY

him being a weeb

Ichiro is also well versed in rhythm games

he will tell you if your waifu/husbando is trash or not

you both have your own little superstitions and rituals you do before gacha pulls

you might use a certain finger to click the screen because that's the lucky one

Ichiro turns the volume up and closes his eyes before clicking

"What no way!! CLICK MY SCREEN! YOU'RE LUCKY TODAY!"

"AHHH thank you y/n! Look at them! They're so cute!"

you both marvel over the cute characters

he is totally impressed by the songs you can do on pro/master

"NO WAY A FULL COMBO?!?!! You're amazing!" 😍

he will totally challenge you to see who can get a better score

but you always win

he did come close a few times

but gets flustered and flubs it up at the end when you're watching over this shoulder

he finds it cute when you're humming along to the songs while DESTROYING the beat map

Bonus+

*you unbox a package left on the doorstep to find a scanty cosplay* "Ichiro, what is this?!?" "What? I thought you would look cute in it" ;p "I'm not dressing up as your favorite idol!" "wh- babe why not?!" :"( "ok maybe..."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jiro Yamada

Like Ichiro, Jiro is a big nerd too

you two met in a soccer match of all places

you were taking a break during halftime when you quoted a line from some weird obscure anime

"No way you watch ___ too? I thought I was the only one!"

you haven't seen each other before because you're on different teams from rivalling schools

after the game he gives you his number then the rest is history

you two end up messaging each other all night talking about other animes and games you enjoy

he likes sports animes along with action and adventure

you also found out he plays rhythm games too

after a while, he'll invite you over to the Yamada household and show you his collection of light novels and games

"There's more where this came from, my big bro is a bigger nerd than I am."

you'll sit down on his bed and show each other your cards and play a few songs

"Jiro why is your tap sound louder than the music!?!?"

"I need to hear the beats or I'll fail the stage!!"

He might challenge you to see who can get a higher score

you both play on hard

but you're pretty evenly matched

"Haha! That's a point for me, y/n!"

"No fair! I don't know that song very well..."

If you don't have the best gacha luck Jiro will cry with you during your loss

he's not much better...

"NOOOO I PULLED THE WORST ONE"

and because of that, this boy spends all of his allowance on gacha...

"Jiro, don't tell me you actually bought a gacha pass..."

"I SPENT ALL OF MY GEMS TRYING TO GET THEM SO I HAD TO!"

"JIRO!!!"

"Y/N PLEASE, I NEEDED THEM!!" (╥_╥)

Bonus+

"Here Jiro I got you this." He excitedly opens the package. "No way! A ___ Figure??!" "They're your favorite right?" "YESS" He sets the figure down and bear hugs you. "Thank you y/n, I'll treasure this forever!"

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Saburo Yamada

Saburo picked up anime from his brothers

they would all watch action animes together as kids

until Saburo started a fight with Jiro and they tried to one punch each other out of existence

"HEY GUYS CUT IT OUT YOU'RE NOT FRIKKIN SAITAMA"

ahem. moving on...

Saburo is a nerd too

but he may be a bit more casual (in his own way)

he spotted you playing a rhythm game in the corner of the hall during lunch break

"Is that _____? I play ______"

"Oh really? Whos your favorite?"

"What? you like them?!? You have no taste..."

"W-what?! Shut up! their cards always have good stats!"

"But look how pretty this one is!"

you two quickly become friends and meet up every lunch and discuss things like your methods to preserve gems

Saburo likes making charts and spreadsheets to predict what event will be next and what characters are featured

"Haha! look y/n I totally called it!"

He likes collecting cards and comparing the stats

cause that's fun too I guess :/

He must assemble the best possible unit

I can see you two having competitions to see who can get the best score

or who can rank higher in an event

Saburo is very good at analyzing the beat map at first glance

he will also point out patterns he sees to try and help you understand the rhythms

he usually plays on hard and pro

while you do pretty well on normal or hard

he likes a good action/fantasy anime

but he likes sci-fi too

maybe even mystery

he was nervous asking you over to his place to watch anime

because you suggested a slice of life rom-com

does this mean he makes a move or you just watch it together and that's it O_o

Bonus+

"Yes! New high score! Y/n, did you see that?" You giggle. Good job Saburo. You lean over to kiss his cheek then see the smoke coming out of his ears. "Y-y/n!" *blush blush* "Hehe, you're so cute when you're nerding out.

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Samatoki Aohitsugi

Rio invited Samatoki out to a neat cafe because they offered cool exotic blends

When they walked in Samatoki was intrigued spotting your crazy colored hair and tattoos from the corner of his eye

which was weird cause that's not his type

or maybe it was

After ordering the coffee and sitting down Rio noticed that he was distracted

"I see you staring, why don't you go over and talk to her?"

"I wasn't staring! But there's just something about her..."

you were sitting in the corner of the cafe reading manga when he approached you a few minutes later

"uh hey, I like your tattoos"

"Oh thanks! Do you watch___ too?"

*casual panic* "Oh yeah totally, what are you reading?"

You knew he was faking it but continued anyway

"Eh, what's the difference?" 😮 "The difference is--"

He didn't know much about what you were saying but he loved watching you talk about something you were obviously passionate for

through an hour or so of conversation, you realized you both had more in common than you thought

he asked if you would like to do something like this again and gave you his number

You were happy to explain plots of random animes and games to him

Samatoki may not get the appeal but he likes seeing you happy

You go on a few dates and make your relationship official

he's absolutely fascinated by you and your nerdiness

"BABE!!!" "What is it?! Are you ok!?" "I JUST GOT A SSR CARD OF (insert favorite character here)"

Tch, *rolls his eyes. "That's good, right?" "LOOK HOW CUTE THEY ARE!"

he may get a little jealous watching you fawn over you your fav

"Hmmph, why would you want a fictional character when you have a real man right here?"

*author sobs* :")

you let him try a song on normal difficulty

but it is still hard for him

"What the hell! Why are these notes coming at me so fast?!"

He doesn't pick up any manga or light novels

but he likes watching anime with you though

preferably a good action and or adventure one

he may become more interested when the female lead shows up on screen

hey, eyes up here buddy >:(

he won't say it but he secretly likes romcoms

maybe cause Nemu used to watch them growing up

I can see him getting so invested he'll yell at the characters

"Are you stupid?? She's trying to confess to you! Moron..." he huffs

(he does this with cooking shows too)

Bonus+

"Samatoki come on! The next episode of ___ is airing! You rush into the bedroom. "Hey, have you seen my pho-" "Shut up, I'm trying- to win." You laugh hysterically at him stealing your phone to get a full combo. "You got this babe, I believe in you!"

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Thank you for reading!