#i'm joking i know you have the best (copy pasted) intentions but

[sapphymayeyeplease]

Have you ever had a relationship with GOD/YHWH? Have you asked HIM things, for help/understanding?

What is stopping you from pursuing a life w/ someone WHO will never leave you and has your best at heart?

𝗔𝗹𝗶𝗰𝗲 𝗶𝗻 𝘄𝗼𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗱: 'If you do not know where you want to go, then it doesn't matter which path you take.'

I'm always saying I don't know what is happening or why I'm feeling despondent

— so I agree we don't know how to live.

We're all unique snowflakes, but I think divorce & drugs and alcohol exists so we can try to calm down from all the anger and rage we feel when 𝘄𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝗻'𝘁 𝗴𝗲𝘁 𝘄𝗵𝗮𝘁 𝘄𝗲 𝘄𝗮𝗻𝘁 — or the way we want to be treated or remembered.

1.]  If 𝗮𝗻𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝗶𝘀 𝗮𝘀 𝗺𝘂𝗿𝗱𝗲𝗿,       Hell is basic entry level for everyone, &

2.]  If GOD sent HIS SON to die on the cross in our       place to avoid this Hell and lead us thru life by       HIS HOLY SPIRIT; &

3.]  HE says there is only 1-way forward & JESUS       is the way/truth/life, that no one comes to       the FATHER except thru JESUS. [John 14:6]

Why would we ever avoid HIS easy yoke? Why wouldn't we ask HIM in to show us the way?

We clearly don't have life/truth/way to GOD, unless we accept JESUS, & life/death begins forever after we're ejected from earth.

I wonder if you were to die in your sleep suddenly: Are you ready to be drop-kicked into eternity?

Case in point...

Rose you say you think about your mentor Albert a lot that he passed away suddenly [5:37] maybe that's the take away lesson here:

In the Bible it says there was a rich man who had so much money/wealth that he was thinking to himself he had more than enough to retire & live at ease for the rest of his life.

The problem was,

Luke 12:20 | ²⁰ But GOD said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be required of you. Then who will own what you have accumulated?’

This Easter maybe try going to Church & learning about how you can store up millions in Heaven where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. [Matthew 6:19-21]

sorry anon i love divorce a whole lot :(

[iamespecter]

TADC OCs: "The Die Quartet"!

"Oh but Ziku, who are these very handsome die?"

Well I'm glad nobody asked, because that would ruin the joke!

The Die Quartet are OCs of mine that I created for TADC, and for what purpose? Well, they're the minds behind show's music!

Hidden just behind a corner or two, or four, These obliviously mischievous and enthusiastic quartet play whatever music they can, one that certainly matches the current "mood" of what the cast is going through. Meet Cuba, Dodeca, Tetra, and Octa, The Amazing Musical Performers, for The Amazing Digital Circus!

LORE AND BOUNDARIES UNDERNEATH THE CUT!

When the Circus was initially created, it was feeling too barren for a place that's meant to be "lively". And so, Caine went and copy-pasted himself four times, while replacing the heads with some die props he found on the floor, retexturing and adjusting their bodies, to fit their new roles.

A little bit of a code rewrite to make them able of producing any sounds all on their own to be musically intertwined, and the quartet was basically ready to go: but there's only one problem.

Caine completely forgot to remove the admin privileges from their code.

So once the four spawned, they immediately began floating around, dancing and creating the main theme for the circus, and did it all perfectly. So Caine decided that as long as they don't interfere with anything major in the circus and did their job as the musical minds behind the show/game's soundtracks, he doesn't really care about fixing this error and would rather let these four run rampant to create more songs.

Ever since then, the Die Quartet has been messing with every circus members, most of the time playing obnoxious music that fits the "current mood". You'll even see their canes dance to the tempo they've set, like some backup dancers.

Think of it like: You now have x4 Caines with dice heads, flying and snooping around, so that they can "improve the mood" with their music! Ain't that swell??

(But really, all they do is just annoy the Circus members just like Caine does, for the better or the worse. Probably the latter.)

Fun facts about the Die Quartet!

Even though they've all been created at the same time and share the features of a die, they do not consider themselves as "brothers", and only see one another as colleagues instead.

Their names are related to the type of their die: Tetra (yellow), Dodeca (purple), Cuba (red), and Octa (green).

Despite being reused assets of Caine himself, they have distinct personalities that separate them from each other: Tetra is more joyful and playful, Dodeca is a more dramatic/theatric and over the top, Cuba is the natural lead and more stern than anybody, and Octa is the more closed off of the gang but willing to provide his best.

Yet, they all still lack awareness of personal space and boundaries just like Caine, and WILL be intrusive towards anyone they set their sights on, with the intent of predicting their mood and setting the current situation perfectly in musical form. (ex. if a character is sneaking, all four will follow "cautiously" behind while one imitates/pulls out a tiny piano playing to the theme of "tip-toeing". You know, like a cartoon gag.)

Although they can perfectly imitate ANY sound or instrument imaginable, They'll still pull out a "physical" instrument if the gag calls for it.

BOUNDARIES!

You can pretty much draw fanart of them! In fact I would REALLY love to see it and I encourage it! Really, just don't claim them as your own, or steal their designs.

NSFW of them is accepted, but please keep in mind that I have an SFW blog. Which means THERE ARE MINORS. Show them to me privately instead, I'd still love to see it <3

While NSFW is accepted (privately), please make it a morally decent one, because I don't really wanna see some disgusting stuff. This pretty much includes: non-con, scat, etc.

Aside from that though, I hope you all enjoyed these four! I really love how they turned out, and would love to draw them more. I was initially hesitant on showing my TADC OCs because I don't think people would like 'em, but fuck it.

My boys, they deserve to be seen even if just by a few people on the internet.

[lazyfandombean]

So bury your roots (Deltarune - Sweet-centric)

Summary: He wasn’t sure why he’d decided to fix it. Maybe because it gave him something to do that didn’t have to do with survival. Or maybe it was because he wondered if they were the same; if he’d been thrown away because he was broken. --- Sweet spends the first seven years of his life not knowing who he was or why he was abandoned. He spends the next seven years of his life figuring it all out. --- A.k.a.: Sweet gets adopted by Queen and also meets the CC in SCC AU, all built around ONE SINGULAR JOKE THAT I HAD NO INTENTION OF WRITING SO MUCH FOR. Anyway sorry I suck at summaries :') Warnings: Lots of manipulation, a bunch of hurt/comfort, and SCC ARE BROTHERS AGENDA!!! Also angst. ALSO be warned that this is entirely unedited and not beta-read and I hate it very much but I'm posting it anyway out of spite for the sleep I lost finishing it. Also also this was supposed to be crack. It is not crack anymore. Also also also it uses an unhealthy amounts of headcanons. I've added too many also's. Words: 17,657 Notes: I'm gonna be honest, I have no clue what I'm doing here. I've never actually cross-posted a fic onto Tumblr before, so if this format isn't working, just let me know and I can figure out something else. ALSO there's some stuff in the author's notes of the Ao3 version of this fic that are exclusive to that site (mostly because I don't feel like copy-pasting all of that and fitting it into this format). A link to the Ao3 series will be at the end of this fic so you can check those notes out if you want.

— — —

He first met her while he was playing in an alleyway. Not the one he usually stayed at, but it was close to the Queen’s castle, so that meant it had the best food. He wasn’t there to eat though; instead, he sat in a little corner fiddling with a small robot. 

He’d found the poor thing in one of the dumpsters. From what he could tell, it used to be able to walk and move its arms up and down, and it even had a little button that played garbled music when pressed. But it had been broken, so it’d been thrown away. 

He wasn’t sure why he’d decided to fix it. Maybe because it gave him something to do that didn’t have to do with survival. Or maybe it was because he wondered if they were the same; if he’d been thrown away because he was broken. 

He didn’t think about it too hard as he shuffled and fixed various parts. He didn’t totally know what he was doing, but somehow he could tell when he’d gotten something wrong or right. There was a remote that the robot was supposed to have that he hadn’t been able to find, but that was fine; he could build one for it later. 

He’d just managed to fix the speakers that played the song (turns out it was hip-hop; not his favorite, but not bad) when a shadow suddenly loomed over him and said, “Wow Cool Robot.”

He looked up and replied, “Thank you,” because you were always supposed to be polite to strangers. Especially the Queen. 

She looked down at him, tilting her head as question marks appeared on her visor. “Why Are You Sitting In: My Backyard?”

“Sorry,” he said automatically, “I didn’t know this was your back...yard.” He held up the robot as it continued to play a song he didn’t know. “I was fixing him.”

“Fixing Him?” She repeated, looking down at the toy. He nodded. “Was He Broken?”

He nodded again. “He’s supposed to walk an’ his speakers were messed up before,” he explained. “I fixed his speakers and legs ‘n stuff, but I can’t find the remote to make him move.” 

“That Is: Impressive,” She said with a hum. “Most Children I’ve Met Don’t Know How To Do Stuff Like That Yet; Even The Bigger Ones. What’s Your Name?”

“I don’t have one,” he replied, wondering what she meant by ‘bigger ones’. “What’s yours?” He mentally kicked himself for asking that— obviously her name was the Queen. 

She didn’t reply for a moment, and he felt his system heating up in embarrassment. He was right about to apologize for the dumb question when she answered, “Technically My Name Is Serial Number Q5U4EX7YY2E9N, But Most People Call Me: Queen.” 

He blinked his eye. “Oh. Well… it’s nice to meet you, Queen.” Probably. Meeting the Queen should be nice, right? 

“It’s Nice To Meet You Too, Nameless Child,” she replied, before pausing and shaking her head, the word NOPE flashing onto her screen. “No, No, I Can’t Just List You As: Nameless Child; Too Long.” She looked at him. “Are You Sure You Don’t Have A Name? Not Even A Designation?”

He shook his head, unsure of what a ‘designation’ was, but unwilling to ask. She made a weird ticking noise with her mouth. “Well, What Can I Call You Then?” She looked back at him, but kinda seemed like she was looking more through him, so he didn’t answer. After a moment, she snapped her fingers. “I Will Call You: Sweet. Because You Are: Sweet. How Does That Sound, Sweet?”

He paused, thinking about it. It sounded nice, and he’d never had a name before; having one might be fun. Sweet nodded. “Good. Thank you for the name.” 

Queen waved a hand dismissively. “No Need To Thank Me. I Already Know I’m The Best.” And then, to his surprise, she held her hand out to him. He flinched, because people usually only did that if they were gonna hit him, but she didn’t; she just kept it there as she spoke again. “How Would You Like To Come To My Mansion? We Can Like. Watch TV Or Shrink In The Acid Pool Or Something.” 

Sweet had no idea what either of those things were, but he definitely wasn’t gonna pass up the opportunity to see Queen’s castle in person. And even the inside! He moved the robot in the crook of his arm and reached his hand out to hers, hesitating at the last second to see if she’d move it away. When she didn’t, her eyes just changing to four question marks again, he grabbed her hand. It was warm. “Yes ma’am.” 

— — —

Two of Queen’s friends — Tasque Manager and Swatch, she’d told him — didn’t seem to like Sweet very much when they’d first seen him. It’d made him nervous at first, because he didn’t want to get kicked out right as he got there, but Queen reassured him (after having some long fight with her friends) that he wasn’t gonna he kicked out, and that apparently they were just worried because the first thing they saw him doing was getting into the ‘acid pool’ with Queen, which was apparently ‘unsafe for children’. To be honest, he wasn’t entirely sure what was going on or what any of that meant, but he was just glad he got to see more of Queen’s castle. 

After that, they’d started on a tour; then being Sweet, Queen, and Tasque Manager. Queen was the main guide, but sometimes she’d get distracted or start rambling, which was usually followed by Tasque Manager reminding her of what they were doing. It was a lot of fun! He got to see all of the guest rooms (although there was one they wouldn’t show him), all of the dining halls, all of the paintings… and all of the pottery. Queen really loved pottery for some reason. Maybe ‘cause they all looked like her face. 

By the time the tour was over, Cyber City had gotten dark; well, as dark as it ever got. Sweet was reminded of the fact that he hadn’t eaten yet when his lower speaker growled. It was then that he wondered if he’d overstayed his welcome, if he should leave, but instead of being kicked out by Queen or her friends, they instead made dinner for him, which he ate happily. It was even better fresh than it was from the garbage, and he didn’t have to worry about anyone trying to steal it from him here! 

They all got really weird looks when he mentioned this, though, so he didn’t talk about it after that. 

Queen made him play this game called ‘Minecrap’ on her phone after dinner, which was fun. He really sucked at it though, so he just watched her play for a while. His eye started getting droopy as more time passed, and as more of Cyber City’s lights winked out (but not all of them; never all of them), he started to feel more and more guilty for taking up so much time. So, once Queen had beaten this thing called ‘the Ender Dragon’ after her ‘speedrun’, he decided it was time to rip the band-aid off. 

“So when do I have to go?” He asked hesitantly once she’d turned off the phone. “Because I can leave now if you want.” 

She paused, and for the nth time this evening, he wondered what he’d said that was wrong. “Do You Have A: House To Go Back To?” 

Sweet winced. Was it bad to not have a house? “No,” he muttered, scuffing his shoe on the floor. 

Queen shrugged, putting up her phone. “Then You Don’t.”

He blinked. “Don’t what?”

“You Don’t Have To Go.”

He froze. “What?” 

She turned towards him, seemingly noticing his utter confusion. “Well I’m Not Just Going To Toss You Back Onto The Streets,” she said, which only confused him more, because that was exactly what he’d expected her to do. “Why Do You Think I Showed You A Room Labeled: Sweet’s Room?” 

He blinked. He’d forgotten about that room. And that Sweet was his name now, when he saw it. “Oh.”

…

“Wait, didn’t you just name me like… three hours ago? How’d you make a room and a label in three hours?”

“The Swatchlings Are: Fast As Heck.” 

— — —

Being a permanent resident of Queen’s castle (or mansion, as she often corrected) was probably the best thing that’d ever happened to him. He got to eat regularly, was allowed to play with whatever he wanted, wherever he wanted (as long as it was in the castle and also not the acid pool), and he even got a bunch of clothes from Queen! Even if they were kinda hard to fit over his box-shaped head and body. 

There was some stuff he didn’t like, though. Queen made him do stuff like school (which wasn’t very hard for him, but it still wasn’t fun), and he had to get check-ups from an Ambyu-Lance a lot, and it always took a while, and he always had to stay still, which was annoying. Those were helpful though, ‘cause they were able to figure out a lot of stuff even he didn’t know about himself. Like the fact that according to his ‘make and model’, he was around seven, he was short for his age, and only having one eye was normal for him. 

So it wasn’t information that he liked hearing, but it was good to have. 

He still had a lot of fun, though! Playing with the Swatchlings was fun (even though they only really played when Queen told them to), and the tasques were all super fluffy and soft, and they didn’t even hiss at him anymore after the first week or so! He liked hanging out with Queen, Swatch, and Tasque Manager too, but they were too busy for him to play with very often. 

Which was the biggest problem, actually; he didn’t really have a lot of people to play with. Even the Swatchlings couldn’t stay with him all the time (they still had other guests to attend to, after all), and other than the Addisons who would sometimes come to visit Queen, he was pretty much left by himself when he wasn’t learning or playing– which was a lot of the time. He spent most of his days wandering around Queen’s mansion, exploring the places that hadn’t been on the tour. He even found a bunch of secret shortcuts all throughout the mansion! 

He avoided the guest room that they had kept him away from, though. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know what was inside. 

But even then, within the first couple of weeks in the mansion, he’d explored all there was to explore. Every secret hallway, every floor of the mansion, every room… the only place he hadn’t explored was the basement, and that was only because it was always locked (and no one even acknowledged there was a basement at all when he asked). So it didn’t take long for him to get bored. 

Sweet knew he shouldn’t complain, and he didn’t! Not out loud, at least. It was a lot better than when he didn’t have a house; back then, he didn’t have anyone to play with, and he didn’t have regular meals, and he didn’t have other changes of clothes, and he didn’t have any protection from stuff like Virovirokuns or maice. He could deal with a little loneliness, especially when he had so much other stuff that he hadn’t had before. 

Then again, he didn’t really have the time to worry about loneliness back then. 

He never brought it up to Queen or Tasque Manager or anyone, but apparently they noticed anyways, because after almost a month of him living there, Queen decided to send him and Swatch out to the Cyber Fields for a ‘vacation day’, but she was too busy to go with them. He wouldn’t have thought anything of it, but Queen saying ‘Go Make Lots And Lots Of Friends While You’re Gone’ was what really tipped him off. 

And he tried, he really did. The Cyber Fields were really fun and were so much different from the City. Swatch didn’t seem to like it very much, but he never said anything and took Sweet wherever he wanted to go, so Sweet figured it was okay. Actually making friends, though, was harder than it sounded. He met a lot of people, like the Plugboys and some Darkner named ‘Fommt’, but he wasn’t ever able to ask to be friends before they had to go somewhere. 

He’d been thinking about giving up when he met them. 

Swatch was busy buying CD Bagels from a vendor, leaving Sweet to wander aimlessly. He didn’t really know where he was going; he just wanted to walk around. 

He eventually found a place that looked a lot like a trash dump, except it looked like someone had been trying to build something with the trash. He walked around, picking up a piece of ‘junk’ about half his size and examining it. It looked like a broken engine… maybe he could–

“Hey, what’re you doin’ with our stuff?” A voice yelled from behind him, startling Sweet enough to almost drop the engine. He tightened his grip at the last second, preventing it from crashing towards the ground and breaking even more as he turned around. 

A Darkner with a cassette player for a head pointed at him… angrily? It was hard to tell, because he was wearing sunglasses, as well as a blue jacket that looked a little too big for him with a white shirt and black pants. Behind him stood a taller Darkner who had a CD player for a head, wearing a black jacket and green pants. 

“Sorry,” Sweet apologized, putting down the engine with care. “I didn’t know this stuff was yours. I was just looking.” 

The Darkner huffed, but he stopped pointing at Sweet. “Well, it is. But I guess it’s okay if you didn’t know.” He crossed his arms. “Who’re you?” 

“I’m Sweet,” Sweet replied, fiddling with his fingers now that there was nothing in his hands. “What’re your names?” 

The other jabbed a finger at himself and the monster behind him. “I’m Cap’n, and that’s my older brother Cakes,” he informed, then grinned. “And this is our shop!” He gestured around the junkyard. “Or, it’s gonna be. We’re working on it.” 

“You can just call me K_K,” the other monster spoke up. “It’s short for Cakes!” 

Sweet waved. “It’s nice to meet you two,” he said. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Cap’n waved a hand, walking over to Sweet. He stopped just in front of him, pausing. “So where’re you from? I’ve never seen you in the fields before.” 

“I’m from the City,” Sweet explained, pointing out towards where you could just barely see the city’s large buildings over the horizon. “I’ve never been to the fields before.” 

Cakes, who’d stayed behind, tilted his head and spoke again. “Really? What’s the city like?” 

“Big,” Sweet said with a nod. “ Really big. And blue. And there’s lots of lights everywhere. And it’s super noisy.” 

“We barely get any noise in the fields,” Cap’n complained, moving to sit on a pile of junk. “The only people who ever wanna make any noise are me ‘n K_K!” 

Sweet looked down at the engine he’d set by his feet. “Sometimes I feel like it’s too noisy,” he muttered. “I can’t even hear myself over it, sometimes.” 

“That sounds like it sucks,” Cap’n replied, picking up a piece of junk and messing with it. “Especially since you’re a speaker ‘n all.” Sweet just nodded, and Cakes started to pick up some junk too, tweaking some of its parts. Sweet tilted his head. “So you guys are making a shop… out of the junkyard?” 

“Yup,” Cap’n replied. “No one ever does anything with the junk here in the fields, so me ‘n K_K decided to turn it into a shop where we can build things and sell music!” “The music’s free,” Cakes added, stacking some junk up in a pile. “What?! Why’re we even gonna play music then?” 

Sweet watched them work and talk for a minute, starting to feel a little nervous. “Can I help?” he asked suddenly, causing them to pause. “Build the shop, I mean.” 

“Nuh-uh.” “Sure!” 

Sweet felt his spirits fall and lift at the same time, which was a confusing feeling. 

Cap’n whipped his head around to look at Cakes. “K_K! This is our thing!” 

Cakes shrugged, putting another box down. “So? We can let him help too. It’ll go faster that way.”

Cap’n opened his mouth, but paused, closing it again. “That’s true,” he muttered, looking at the ground. Then he looked back at Sweet. “Are you any good at building stuff?” 

Sweet blinked. “Um, I think so. Sometimes I fix robots for fun?” 

“See?” Cakes said, giving Cap’n a look. The latter stuck his tongue out at Cakes, before looking back at Sweet. 

“Fine, you can help. But don’t expect us to pay you!” Sweet beamed. “I won’t, thank you!” 

They spent the next hour talking and working on the shop, getting to know each other. Cap’n told him that his name was short for something, but he wouldn’t tell him what. Cakes told him about everything to do in the Cyber Fields, including the unfinished roller coaster. Sweet told them about playing with the Swatchlings in Queen’s mansion; which had sparked a whole new topic of conversation.

“Woah, you live in Queen’s mansion?”  

Sweet nodded in answer to Cap’n’s question, soldering a few pieces of junk together (no, he was not going to question where they got the soldering iron). “Yeah, I met her a month ago and she gave me a name and then let me stay in her house ‘cause I didn’t have one! She’s really nice.”

“Huh,” was Cap’n’s response. He set down a CD bagel he’d been munching on (apparently Cakes was really good at making them). “So she’s like your mom?”

Sweet blinked. “What’s a mom?” 

“It’s a grown-up that takes care of you who’s usually a girl,” Cakes answered, pushing around a broken toy car instead of helping. “Vroom vroom.”

“Oh.” Sweet paused to think about it. “Maybe. I’ll ask her when I get back.” 

A loud, somewhat shrill voice suddenly pierced through the air, shrieking Sweet’s name. It took a minute for Sweet to recognize the voice (both from its high pitch and the fact that it made his ears hurt), but once he realized it was Swatch’s voice, he set down the soldering iron. “Sorry guys, I think I gotta go.” 

“Aw, really?” Cap’n whined. “But I wanted to hear more about Queen! She must be a very fine madimoyselle!” 

“A what?” Sweet muttered, confused, but shook his head. “Sorry, but I really do have to go.” He winced as Swatch’s unusually high-pitched voice rang out again. “I don’t wanna get in trouble or something.” 

“That’s okay,” Cakes said, putting down the toy car. “You can tell us more next time.”

Sweet brightened. “Next time? Y’mean I can come back?” 

“He can?” Cap’n asked incredulously, but paused when Cakes gave him a  look. “I mean, sure. Yeah, you can come back ‘nd help some more. And tell us all about Queen!” 

“Okay! Thanks, guys!” Sweet beamed. “I’ll see you…” he trailed off for a second, but quickly moved on, “Whenever Queen lets me come again!” 

“See ya later then, Sweet!” Cap’n waved with a grin. 

Cakes waved too. “Smell ya!” 

“Bye!” Sweet waved back at them both, skipping out of the shop. He got to come back, and they were even letting him help work on the shop! 

Did this mean he had friends now? 

Sweet was jolted out of his thoughts when he suddenly bumped into a tall figure. He looked up, only to be met with the panicked and stern face of Swatch. 

Oops. 

— — —

Despite the fact that Swatch had initially gotten onto him for running off, he did seem happy that Sweet had made friends. Even if he got a funny look on his face when Sweet had mentioned meeting them in the junkyard. Still, he let Sweet rant about it the whole way back, and didn’t even stop him once they’d gotten back to Queen’s mansion. 

Queen herself had been glad to hear that Sweet had made friends too! Or, he thought so, anyway. Sometimes it was hard to tell what she was feeling. 

He mentioned that they’d said he could come back sometime, and asked if Queen would let him. She seemed hesitant at first for some reason, but eventually they worked something out: Sweet could go once a week as long as he got all of his studies done before mid-afternoon. Sweet agreed readily; even if school wasn’t fun, at least it was easy! And that meant he got to see his friends again! 

Right before Queen was about to send him off to dinner (she couldn’t join ‘cause of a meeting, apparently), Sweet paused, remembering something. “Hey, Queen?” 

Queen hummed in response, not seeming to really be paying attention. “Yes Sweetie Pie?” 

“Are you my mom?” 

Queen froze, and for the first time since he’d met her, her visor went totally blank. Weird. “Haha Sweet That’s A Good Question How About You Go Help The Swatchlings With The Maice Okay Bye.” She walked away suddenly, leaving Sweet feeling very confused.

Especially since they’d gotten rid of the Maice problem over a month ago. There was always a chance they’d come back in the seven hours he’d been gone though. 

— — —

Going back to the Cyber Fields to help Cap’n and Cakes (or K_K, as he kept insisting Sweet call him) with the shop quickly became the highlight of Sweet’s weeks. He never thought he’d find people who liked building and music as much as he did, and it was awesome! The only bad part about it was when Sweet had to leave. 

They bombarded him with questions about the City every time they saw him (although Cap’n’s were mostly related to girls), and he asked just as many about the Cyber Fields. They always made it sound so nice that he thought they had loads of friends, but to his surprise, they just shrugged and said they didn’t when he asked how many. 

“I think everyone’s just intimidated by our coolness,” Cap’n had explained, K_K nodding along. Sweet found it hard to disagree; Cap’n and K_K were pretty cool. 

“So is Queen your mom?” Cap’n had asked another time, to which Sweet had just shrugged. 

“I dunno. She dodges the question every time I ask.” Literally, too. She’d jumped in the acid pool to get away. 

“Bummer.” 

They asked him that a lot, Sweet realized; Cap’n most of the time, but K_K asked every now and again if Queen was his mom yet. It made him wonder…

“Who’s your mom?” Sweet asked as he took a screwdriver to a particularly stubborn screw. The question made Cap’n and K_K pause, glancing at each other before looking back at him. 

“We don’t have one,” Cap’n replied, messing with a pair of headphones. “We live in the orphanage,” K_K added, eating a CD bagel while drawing with his other hand. 

Sweet paused. “Oh. I’m sorry.” 

“Why? It’s not your fault,” K_K asked. 

“Yeah, and it’s not like you’ve got a mom either,” Cap’n shrugged. “We’re all momless. Unless Queen really is your mom.” 

Sweet shrugged too. “I can keep asking, but I don’t think she’ll answer.”

Despite the ‘heavy discussion topics’ (That’s what Swatch called them, anyway), visiting Cap’n and K_K was always his favorite part of the day. He started talking about them so much that Queen even decided to let him visit twice a week! Life was going really well for him, better than it had for his whole seven years of existence. 

Things didn’t stay that way, though. 

— — —

Sweet was thirteen when he first started hearing Queen talk about someone called ‘The Knight’. He wasn’t sure what that meant or who that was, but once he started pestering enough, Queen eventually told him that the Knight was a Lightner, come to enlighten their great City. 

Sweet was excited at first (Lightners were what gave them purpose, right?), but as Queen began talking about the Knight more and more, she started spending less and less time with him. So did Swatch and Tasque Manager, with their responsibilities practically being doubled. Even the Swatchlings only ever helped him with chores and studying anymore; the rest of their time was spent serving Queen and the Knight. He wasn’t sure why the Knight needed so much of the staff, but it wasn’t his place to ask. 

At least one good thing came from this, though, and that was the fact that he got to hang out with Cap’n and K_K pretty much every day! As soon as his studies were finished (or sometimes even before; Queen didn’t notice much anymore), a Swatchling would take him down to the Cyber Fields to visit their junk shop. It was fully built now, and Cap’n and K_K had started selling CD Bagels out of it. They let Sweet help too, and he even got a cut of the profit (despite him vaguely remembering that Cap’n said he wouldn’t)! 

He even got to have sleepovers if Queen was too busy to send a Swatchling to pick him up! Like right now. 

“Why’d you run away from the orphanage anyway?” He asked, settling into the blanket pile they’d made on the floor. They didn’t have any beds, but that was fine; Sweet was still used to sleeping on the concrete (or cardboard, if he was lucky), and the big pile of blankets was much more fun than a regular bed anyway. 

“‘Cause it sucked,” Cap’n deadpanned, leaning back on the blankets with his arms crossed behind his head. “None of the kids liked us ‘cause of my fingers and K_K’s…” he gestured at K_K, who was busy rearranging some of the blankets. “Y’know. And none of the adults were able to help. They didn’t even try, sometimes.” 

“Oh…” Sweet muttered. He stared up at the ceiling, his soul twisting for them. “You know… if you guys wanted to come live in Queen’s mansion with me, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind.” 

Cap’n scoffed. “You kidding? First of all, I don’t really wanna go anywhere near that place if that ‘Knight’ you keep talkin’ about is around,” he started, K_K nodding along as he too laid down in the blankets. 

Sweet rolled his eye. “They’re a Lightner, Cap. It’s like, the best thing that’s happened to us in… in ages .” He tried to mean it, but it still felt like a lie coming out of his speaker. 

“Yeah yeah,” Cap’n waved a hand. “Second of all, though, livin’ it up in her fancy mansion… as fun as it sounds, it’s not really me ‘nd K_K’s style, y’know?” 

“My style is funky tunes,” K_K agreed. 

“And like heck we’re abandoning the junk shop,” Cap’n added. “We built this thing with our own bare hands!” “And soldering irons,” K_K said. 

“Well, duh, but you get the point!” “I get it, I get it, jeez,” Sweet said with a sigh. “I wouldn’t wanna make you abandon it anyway. I helped build this thing too, y’know.” 

“So we’re at an agreement!” Cap’n huffed. “You go live in Queen’s big fancy castle and we’ll stay in our junk shop.” Sweet pulled the blankets up over himself. “When you say it like that, it makes me feel bad,” he murmured. 

“Don’t,” K_K said with a shrug, pulling other blankets over himself and a squawking Cap’n. “You’re happy in the mansion. We’re happy here.” 

“Oh… okay.” 

The three lapsed into silence after that. Sweet stared up at the now barely visible ceiling; it got a lot darker in the Cyber Fields than it did in the City. It should have made falling asleep easier, but instead, Sweet found himself unable to power down. He tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable (which was already hard enough with his box-shaped head), but what K_K had said was really getting under his circuits for some reason. 

He was happy at the mansion, he was. He was definitely happier there than he’d been on the streets, so that had to count for something, right? In her mansion he had food, a bed, nice clothes… it was his first real home, so he should be happy there. And he was. 

Or, he had been. 

As he turned his head to look at the two next to him, he wasn’t sure he was anymore. 

It made him feel ungrateful, but… he hadn’t talked to Queen in person in a long time. He saw Cap’n and K_K much more often than he saw Tasque Manager. He talked to them about what was going on in his life much more than he’d told Swatch in quite some time. He’d played more games with them than he could ever remember having played with the Swatchlings. 

He stared at the (supposedly) sleeping forms of Cap’n and K_K. He was… happier with them than he was at Queen’s mansion. 

Was it possible to have two homes? 

“Hey guys,” he said, suddenly having an idea. Whether or not it was a good one remained to be seen. “Are you guys awake?” 

“Yes,” K_K spoke up, causing Cap’n to groan and stir. 

“I am now ,” he grumbled, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. “Whaddaya want?” 

“We should form a band.” 

Silence for a moment. 

“Well duh, that’s why we made the shop, isn’t it?” Cap’n deadpanned, flopping back down onto the blankets. “Let me go back to sleep.”

“I wanna do it now,” K_K replied, sitting up to look at Sweet. “Can I be a keyboard?”

Sweet blinked. “Do you mean play a keyboard, or do you actually wanna be a keyboard?” 

“Yes.” 

Cap’n groaned, rolling over to give Sweet a half-hearted glare. “Fine, we’ll talk about it now,” he muttered, sitting up again. “Don’t know why you two couldn’t wait until mornin’, you maniacs.” 

“I can be the DJ! I’ve been working on a special turntable, too!” Sweet said excitedly, before pausing. “Wait, I thought you guys made the shop to sell CD Bagels.” 

“Yeah, and music, remember?” Cap’n muttered with a yawn. “So obviously we were always gonna make a band.” 

“Oh, right.” Sweet nodded, but paused again. “But wasn’t that just gonna be yours and K_K’s thing?” He hesitated. “Is… is it okay if I’m there?” 

Cap’n and K_K both stared for a bit. 

“Sweet, you helped build the shop,” K_K said. “You were always gonna be part of the band.” 

“...Oh.” 

They eventually started talking about who’d do what, and how they’d advertise their band, and what they’d name it. They stayed up almost the entire night, and yet the whole time, neither Cap’n nor K_K said anything about the fact that a tear would fall from Sweet’s eye every now and again. 

— — — 

The band’s start was pretty rough. They advertised it as much as they could, but there weren’t enough people in the Cyber Fields who really cared about music enough to come to their concerts. Even when they handed out flyers while selling CD Bagels (which they always sold a LOT of; K_K really did make the best food), the only person who ever came to their performances was an overly-enthusiastic Plugboy who couldn’t even make it to all of their shows. 

It was nice that at least one person really liked their music, though. Which made Sweet feel kinda bad for what he ended up suggesting. 

“Playing in the city? ” Cap’n scoffed, packing up his box of CD Bagels (not that there were many left). “You’re outta your mind, Sweet. We’ve never been to the city; they’d crush us out there!” 

“I don’t wanna be a soda can,” K_K agreed, his own box already under his arm. 

“Come on, guys,” Sweet groaned, folding up his own cardboard box as they started to head back. “I know it’s big and daunting, but I really think we’d find a bigger audience there! Plus, I could be your guide!” 

Cap’n kicked the door of the shop open with a grunt. “You, our guide? Sweet, you’ve not lived on the streets of the city since…” He paused in the doorway, causing K_K to bump into him. “Sorry K_K. But still, it’s been what, five, six years since you started livin’ in Queen’s mansion?” 

Sweet rolled his eye as they all filed into the shop. “Just because I don’t live on the streets anymore doesn’t mean I don’t remember anything about them. Plus, I still live in the City . I don’t just spend all my time in the mansion, y’know.” 

“I think you spend most of your time here, actually,” K_K piped up, which, yeah, that was a fair point. Sweet spent so much time at the Cyber Fields that sometimes he’d forget he lived in the city until a Swatchling came to pick him up. 

Still, he didn’t want to back down from this, but he didn’t know how he’d be able to convince the two of them to try playing in the City. Unless…

“Hey Cap,” he said as he closed the door. “Don’t you think it’d be cool if we met some ladies while we were performing?” Cap’n froze. “Sweet, no.” 

“I’m just sayin’, the City’s full of girls who’d love to hear us play.” “I’m not fallin’ for that, Sweet.” 

“I could probably even get Queen to listen to one of our concerts.” 

Cap’n whirled around, pointing finger guns at Sweet. “Well why didn’t ya say that sooner? It’s a deal.” 

K_K, who’d just been staring for the entirety of the interaction, frowned. “I’d rather stay in the Cyber Fields,” he muttered. 

Sweet patted his arm. “The Cyber Fields are good and all, but don’t you think it’d be nice to find people that actually appreciate our music?” he asked. “Plus, I bet I could get Swatch to give you some recipes from the Color Cafe.” 

K_K hesitated, thinking it over for a moment before sighing. “Okay,” he said. “Can we still play in the Cyber Fields sometimes though?” 

“Of course!” Sweet nodded. “We still have to sell CD Bagels y’know! We’ll just play more music in the city.” 

“Just for the madimoyselles,” Cap’n added. “And K_K’s recipes.” 

Sweet rolled his eye. “I don’t think that’s how you pronounce it, but sure.” 

— — — 

Just as Sweet had predicted, their music was a hit in the City. Within fifteen minutes of the first place they tried (which they did ask permission to play at before performing), Darkners were coming out of stores and pausing in their walks to listen to their music. Which didn’t surprise Sweet in the slightest; despite the fact that Cyber City had all of the most famous music artists and songs playing in almost every store, it could be hard to actually hear the music over all the traffic, Addisons, and general noise of the City. 

Luckily, Sweet Cap’n Cakes had gotten really good at being loud. 

Their concert was pretty short, mostly meant to gauge the interest of the people there, but way more people stuck around until the end (ten whole Darkners!!), and some even asked for their flyers by the time they were done! 

There were still a few… complications though. 

“Watch out, K_K!” Sweet and Cap’n pulled on K_K’s arms, yanking him away from the street just as a torrent of cars flooded through. Sweet and Cap’n both flinched back, but K_K tilted his head as he stared out at the traffic. 

Cap’n glanced up at him in worry. “You alright, K_K? You didn’t get hurt, did ya?” 

“Do you think she’s single?” Sweet blinked in confusion. “What?” K_K pointed at one of the pink cars, crawling at a snail’s pace compared to the rest of the traffic. “Do you think she’s single?” he asked again.

“...That’s a car, K_K.” 

“Yeah.” 

Crisis temporarily averted, they moved on, looking for another place that would allow them to perform. They’d gotten unfortunately delayed by a lot of traffic, so most business turned them down as evening descended on Cyber City. 

Sweet sighed as they walked out of yet another store that refused to let them play in front of their shop. “Sorry guys, I really did think we’d get more listeners out here…” He scuffed his shoes on the ground as he walked. Cap’n shrugged. “Eh, it’s no big deal. Plus, we did get a lot more people than normal! We’ll just come out earlier next tiIIME-” Cap’n suddenly dodged out of the way, pulling Sweet and K_K with him. Sweet was confused until a Viroviriokun rushed past, closely followed by an Ambyu-lance. Sweet’s system heated in embarrassment; he was supposed to be the one leading them around the city, and he didn’t even notice the Darkners coming. 

K_K straightened up, grabbing Cap’n and Sweets hands to pull them away from the oncoming crowds. “There’s a lot more viruses out here than in the fields,” he mumbled. 

Sweet winced. “Yeah, sorry I forgot to warn you guys about that.” 

“So that’s normal? ” Cap’n brows raised so high that they were visible above his sunglasses. “And you lived in this?” 

Sweet shrugged as the three of them started walking. “I mean, yeah, but I didn’t really stick around these parts,” he explained. “And besides, I wasn’t out there for too long before I met–” He froze, then face-palmed. “Sorry, guys, I completely forgot to ask Queen if I could bring you over to the mansion…” 

Cap’n shrugged. “Eh, it’s fine. You can ask later and we’ll just see her next time.” He moved away to avoid a passing Addison. “Preferably somewhere that’s not crawlin’ with viruses and Maddisons.” 

“Addisons,” Sweet corrected. 

“Potato, potahto.” 

Sweet sighed. “Whatever. I’m still sorry I forgot to ask, though. Maybe I can–” He didn’t finish the thought as he bumped into something, yelping as Cap’n and K_K steadied him. The three of them looked up at the figure they’d run into. A Swatchling looked back down at them– or rather, down at Sweet. They blinked, and in a monotone voice, spoke up over the crowd, “Queen requests your presence back at the mansion.” Sweet gulped; lately, whenever Queen called for him herself, it was because he was in trouble one way or another (not that he ever really got any consequences, but Queen being disappointed in him never felt good). He hesitated, looking back at his friends, when an idea struck him; a way to fulfill his earlier promise to Cap’n and K_K and also maybe not get in trouble. He tilted his head at them, a silent question. It took a minute for them to get it, but once they did, they both nodded excitedly. 

He looked back at the Swatchling. “Can my friends come too?” 

— — — 

Bringing Cap’n and K_K in to meet Queen had been circuit-wracking. He knew that realistically that Queen wouldn’t mind —she never had before, after all— but that hadn’t stopped his soul from pounding loudly in his chest as he introduced them; so loudly he almost thought that it could be heard from his speakers. 

Judging by the lack of comments on it, that probably wasn’t true. 

He’d say it went pretty well, though. Even with Cap’n calling Queen ‘hot mama’ (Sweet heated up so much his speakers nearly cut out) and K_K talking about various objects he wanted to be (which, surprisingly, was a topic that Queen seemed to actually be invested in), Queen seemed to like his friends. 

Well, like might have been a strong word. She’d only gotten harder to read since the Knight came alone. 

Still, his hopes of no longer being in trouble were dashed once K_K and Cap’n left. This time, it was because he’d forgotten to tell her that he’d even be going to the Cyber Fields and then the City at all today, which was fair. What he didn’t think was fair was the punishment she gave. 

“I’m grounded? ” He asked incredulously. “For how long?” 

Queen waved a dismissive hand. “Oh Don’t Worry, It’s Just For One (1) Month In Total,” she replied, swirling a glass of battery acid. Which was weird, because last he’d checked, Swatch had banned her from having battery acid in Sweet’s presence (or in Tasque Manager’s presence; she got iffy about alcohol). 

But he didn’t focus on that. “But why? I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but I kinda thought you’d know already. Since, y’know, I’m always at the Cyber Fields these days,” he huffed, muttering the last part before continuing at a normal volume. “Isn’t a whole month kind of excessive?” 

“No, Because I Actually Wanted You Here For Something Today,” she said, crossing her arms. Her smile didn’t quite drop, but something about it seemed more… stern, than normal. 

He perked up a little bit at the sentence, though. She rarely ever wanted him for things anymore, so hearing that she actually needed his presence today was… comforting, in a way. “Really? Why’d you need me?” 

She sniffed, which was weird because she didn’t have a nose. “The Knight Was Here Today,” she responded, a weird undertone in her voice. “They Wanted To Talk With The Two Of Us About Something: Important. And To Actually Meet You Or Whatever.” She did frown then, looking down at him. “I’m Very Disappointed In You, Sweet.” 

Usually, hearing that Queen was disappointed in him would make him wince. It’d make him feel guilty for whatever he’d done that was wrong, or whatever he’d done to upset her. He’d apologize, and then she’d send him off to his room for an hour or so to ‘Marinate Like Spaghetti Sauce’. 

But things were different, this time. 

He stared at the ground, and instead of wincing, he clenched his fists. Instead of feeling guilty, he felt angry. The first time she’d actually ‘wanted’ to spend time with him in nearly six months, and it was only because of the stupid Knight? And she was grounding him over it, even though the Knight was at the mansion practically every other day? And she’d had plenty of opportunities to introduce the two of them, but the only time it’d ever crossed her mind was when the Knight themself mentioned it? She didn’t even care enough about him to introduce him to the Lightner that gave them meaning on her own?

Sweet knew that he was supposed to love Lightners. That Lightners were what gave every single Darkner a purpose. But in that moment, he didn’t think there was anyone he hated more than the Lightner who’d stolen all of his mom’s Queen’s attention and care. 

He almost hated her for letting them. 

“Are you kidding me?!” he blurted. “You only wanted me here because of the Knight!? You’re only grounding me because of the Knight!? You only noticed I was even gone because of the stupid , STUPID KNIGHT!?”

The yell that came from his speakers was so loud that the paintings on the walls shook. The nearby tasques shrieked and ran away from the sound. The maice that had once again infested the palace since the Knight’s arrival skittered away from the noise. Queen’s visor went entirely blank, and yet Sweet couldn’t bring himself to care over the anger he felt at it all; at Queen, at the Knight, at the whole palace, at the entire city. 

“ You haven’t talked to me in person in weeks! I barely ever see you or Swatch or Tasque Manager anymore! I rarely ever even get to see the Swatchlings! I spend more time at the Cyber Fields than I do at the mansion! Sometimes I have to spend the night in the Fields because you forget to pick me up! You forget to even send someone! And it’s all because of the Knight! It’s because of the STUPID F##KING- ”

“Sweet,” Queen interrupted in a low tone, halting his rant. Instantly, all of the rage and aggression he’d been feeling bled out of his circuits, quickly replaced by an icy fear. “Go To Your Room.” 

Sweet stammered, suddenly frozen in place. “I-I... I-I’m sorry, I- I didn’t mean-”

“I Wasn’t Asking, Sweet,” Queen said, voice colder than he felt. “Go To Your Room. Now.” 

Sweet didn’t have to be told twice, tripping on his own feet as he ran out of the room. 

— — — 

Oil dripped from his eye, dropping into his second speaker, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to care as his body, curled up on his bed, shook with sobs. He couldn’t believe he’d said all of that. He couldn’t believe he’d actually sworn at her. He couldn’t believe he’d yelled so loudly at her. He hadn’t even realized that he was so upset about everything, but the more he thought about it, the more it hurt. 

She hadn’t even refuted anything he said. She had watched with a stone-cold face as he listed out all the ways she (and the Knight) had hurt him, and then she’d dismissed him to his room. Maybe that meant she already knew how much it affected him, and she just didn’t care. The thought made him sob harder. 

A knock on the door sounded out, and that was the only warning he got before the door clicked open. He froze as he heard the sound of heels on the metal floors, thinking it was Queen, but the purrs that accompanied the steps gave away that it was Tasque Manager. 

He sat up and hurriedly wiped the oil out of his eye, knowing how much she hated disorder and uncleanliness. She didn’t seem to mind this time though, as she sat next to him on the bed despite the fact that the bed was unmade. He slept in it so little that there was hardly ever a reason to fix it. 

“I heard your fight with Queen,” Tasque Manager said gently. “Well, everybody heard it; your speakers got quite loud.” 

Sweet winced, his systems heating up in embarrassment. “I didn’t mean to yell so loud…” he mumbled, crossing his arms over his legs. 

“But you did mean what you said.”

Sweet hesitated, but nodded. 

“That’s fair,” Tasque responded, “and Queen is sorry that you’ve been feeling that way. We all are. However, there’s a lot at play that you don’t know.” 

Sweet looked up, curious. 

Tasque Manager sighed. “The Knight, although we dare not speak ill of them,” she gave him a pointed look, to which he cringed, “has been keeping everyone very busy as of late. They’ve been filling Queen in on many matters; both the issues of the Dark World, and of the Light World. Many such matters have required a large amount of listening ears. However, the matters discussed are quite heavy, and not so… children-friendly. Queen has been sending you to the Cyber Fields to shield you from our... honestly bleak future, but the Knight insisted that it was time for you to know today. When we couldn’t find you, the Knight was… displeased. They have since been delayed for quite a few months.” 

“Oh,” Sweet muttered, now feeling pretty guilty. So Queen did have a good reason to be upset at him; he’d practically driven the Knight away by… not showing up? I’m 

“That isn’t all, though,” Tasque Manager continued, cutting off his train of thought. “We…” She sighed, and then she looked at him sadly. “We really are sorry that you’ve been feeling this way, and that we haven’t done much to help. But…” she sighed again. “When we couldn’t find you today, Queen was genuinely… distraught, to say the absolute least. We were all worried, of course, but Queenie was nearly frantic in our search for you; in fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so panicked. Or heard her worry so much for someone else’s safety.” She laughed at what was apparently supposed to be a joke, but it quickly tapered off, and she coughed before continuing. “I must say, she showed a remarkable amount of self-control while your friends were present. And even more so after you yelled at her.” 

Sweet winced, now feeling ten times worse than before. She really did care, she really had been worried about him, and what had he done? He’d gone and shouted at her so loudly that the entire mansion could hear, and he’d been so wrong about everything. He was so stupid. 

“I don’t blame you for lashing out,” Tasque Manager spoke, apparently having sensed his line of thought. “It’s clear now that you were dealing with a lot of pent-up emotions, and we failed to notice when we should have. For that, we are truly sorry.” She paused for a moment, and then added: “Queen doesn’t blame you either.” 

At that, Sweet looked up, a spark of hope in his chest. “Promise?” His voice felt small; it almost reminded him of his first days here. 

Tasque Manager smiled at him comfortingly. “I promise.” She stood, smoothing out her dress. “Queen has requested that you stay in your room for the time being, to give you time to rest up before dinner.” 

Sweet nodded, honestly grateful that he didn’t have to see Queen again so soon after fighting; he didn’t know if he could take the shame. A thought occurred to him as Tasque Manager walked to the door, and he hesitated before calling out her name. “Hey, Tass?”

She paused in the doorway, turning back to him. “Yes?” 

“Can you ask Queen if she can send a Swatchling to the Cyber Fields? To let my friends know I’m grounded.” 

She smiled. “Of course. I’ll see what I can do.” With that, she shut the door, leaving him to get some rest. 

— — — 

Dinner that evening was… extremely awkward. For one, it was the first dinner he’d eaten at the mansion in… well, at least a month. Secondly, for the first time in even longer, everyone was actually at the table; Sweet, Swatch, Tasque Manager, the Swatchlings… even the Tasques got to eat in the same room. 

And, of course, and most importantly, Queen. 

No one spoke for the first fifteen minutes of the dinner. Although the dinner itself was pretty good, with heaping servings of Spaghetti Code being the main dish, premium Butler Juice (or ‘Butt’ juice, as Sweet and Queen used to snicker to themselves) being the beverage, and CD Bagels for dessert (Sweet couldn’t help but compare them to K_K’s. He really liked those bagels), but the tension was so thick that Sweet found it hard to enjoy the dinner in front of him. Apparently, everyone else did too. 

The first time any of them spoke to each other, it was Tasque Manager asking Swatch about how business at the Color Cafe was going; apparently, the Knight was taking up everyone’s personal time. 

Things were a little smoother sailing after that. Sweet still didn’t talk much, but then Swatch asked him about Cap’n and K_K, and suddenly he was talking about everything he’d been doing with them over the last year; having finally finished the junk shop, selling CD Bagels with Cap’n and K_K, starting their band… there was some stuff he didn’t tell them though, like the fact that they’d both run away from an orphanage, or the fact that none of them ever had anything good to say about the Knight; he stuck to the smaller details, like how K_K was really good at baking and cooking, and how Cap’n was super bad at flirting. 

That was when Queen had joined that particular conversation, attesting to Cap’n’s terrible pick-up lines. It was a really stilted conversation at first, but after half an hour, everyone was talking and laughing with each other, just like old times. 

Just like the times before the Knight came

He cut off that particular train of thought. 

He even managed to confirm with Queen that she’d send a Swatchling to the Cyber Fields, and after they’d all finished dinner, she took him down to the acid pool to ‘Just Hang Out’, while the others took care of dinner. He was still too young to go in the acid pool, so he just watched her float around on a donut tube as he swung his feet over the acid. 

They talked for hours, just catching up. She told him about all the trouble she’d gotten into, he told her about how he’d made his own turntable that could fly. She suggested that he get into building as a side job, with how good he was at it, and he said he’d think about it. 

It was during a lapse of silence that he remembered a question Cap’n had asked him once; one that he’d asked Queen multiple times. He hadn’t bothered to ask since he was ten, but he was feeling… curious, maybe, and wondered if it was worth the risk of losing time with her just to see if he could get an answer. 

He hesitated for a while, but eventually, he blurted, “Queen, are you my mom?” 

She froze, in the same way she had back when he first asked, and he quickly backtracked. “Sorry, that was a dumb question, I shouldn’t have asked, I’m really-“

“I’m Your Legal Guardian,” she answered, cutting Sweet off in the middle of his rant. “But I Suppose If You Want To Call Me: Mom, Then You May.” 

Sweet blinked several times, moving to speak several times, only to stop himself. “Oh,” was what he ended up saying. 

They didn’t talk about it again after that. 

— — —

The rest of the month that he was grounded went by much the same. He was still extremely bored by being stuck in the mansion all day, but at the same time, it was nice to have things back to… mostly normal. He was able to hang out with Swatch in the Color Cafe, he helped fix paintings with Tasque Manager, he played Minecrap with Queen, he played games with the Swatchlings… he even got them to tell him about that one closed-off guest room, previously having belonged to someone named Spamton G. Spamton. They didn’t tell him much about it, but from what he did hear, he was glad they didn’t tell him more. 

They still wouldn’t acknowledge the basement, though. Bummer. 

Despite all of this, he still found himself missing Cap’n and K_K. He missed hanging out in the shop, he missed playing music with them, he missed selling CD Bagels, he missed eating K_K’s CD Bagels, he missed bantering with Cap’n, he missed having sleepovers… he even missed performing for the one singular Plugboy who bothered to listen out in the Cyber Fields. 

That was why, the second he was un-grounded, the first thing he asked to do was visit Cap’n and K_K. Queen agreed, sending a Swatchling to go with him, and he was practically bouncing the entire way there. 

He spotted them selling CD Bagels at their boxes, and his soul lifted. “Hey, hey guys!” he yelled, jumping and waving. 

The both of them paused, turning to stare at him. After a moment, Cap’n scoffed and turned back to the customers, while K_K gave him an uncharacteristically small smile before doing the same. 

Sweet blinked, confused by their reaction, but figured they were probably just too busy serving customers to talk at the moment, so he sat down to wait. 

He didn’t have to wait too long, because the lines were pretty short, so as soon as the last Plugboys was out of view (with no other Plugboys arriving), Sweet hopped up and bounded over to them. He stopped right in front of their boxes, soul once again lifting in delight. 

“Hi guys!” He chirped with a wave. K_K gave a small wave back, but Cap’n scowled at him. 

“What do you want,” he muttered, harshly shoving leftover CD Bagels into the box. 

Sweet blinked rapidly, taken aback by Cap’n’s aggressive attitude. “Wha- what do you mean, what do I want?” He asked incredulously. “I was just saying hi.” He looked at K_K. “Man, it’s been so long since I’ve seen you guys, I-”

“And who’s fault is that?” Cap’n snapped, closing his box so hard it was nearly crushed in his grip. K_K followed suit, but handled his box with much more care. “What, did you come back to rub it in?” 

Sweet blinked once more, now thoroughly confused and feeling a terrible sinking feeling in his circuits. “Rub what in?” He asked, bringing his hands up to grab his arms. “I-“

“Oh, nothin’,” Cap’n cut him off sarcastically, “Why don’t we all just pretend that you don’t think you’re better than us, huh? That everything’s just fine and dandy, that you didn’t just totally ditch us once you remembered how nice it was to live with Queen?” He threw his hands up in the air, a sardonic grin on his face. “That sounds like so much fun!”

“What are you even talking about?!” Sweet exploded, throwing his own arms up in the air in genuine confusion- and now a little anger, too. “What do you even mean?”

“He means because you don’t want to be friends anymore,” K_K said quietly. 

Sweet froze, a horrible feeling settling over him like the crash of a wave. “Huh- what? ” He sputtered. “Why- why would you think I didn’t wanna be friends anymore??” 

“Why wouldn’t we think that?!” Cap’n yelled, kicking his box of CD Bagels. “You go totally radio silent for almost a whole month, and then when we finally get ahold of one of those ‘Swatchlings’,” he put his fingers up in mock quotation, “the guy says that they’ve never heard of ‘mAStEr SWeEt’ having any friends! Especially not from the ‘Cyber Fields’! They didn’t even know our names!” He yanked the sunglasses off, his glare now on full display. “So yeah, it’s pretty f##king obvious just how much you care about us!’ 

Sweet- didn’t know how to respond to that. His whole body felt cold, like someone had just dumped an entire gallon-sized bucket of ice water on top of him. It almost even felt like he was about to start glitching out in the same way that getting water in his circuits would do to him. “I-I- that’s- that’s not-“ 

“Whatever,” Cap’n scoffed, muttering under his breath. “It must’ve been real nice to go home and remember that your wittle ‘mommy’ cared about you.” 

And just like that, the ice turned to fire. He had no idea what was going on. He had no idea why they thought he didn’t care about them. But Cap’n just insulted Queen. He’d just insulted the one person Sweet was actually sure cared about him anymore. 

He didn’t think about what he said before he said it. He just knew he wanted it to hurt. 

“At least I actually have a mom, #sshole.” 

Sweet slapped a hand over his speaker. Cap’n froze. K_K dropped his box. 

The heat of his anger melted away, only to be frozen solid. He couldn’t even say it felt like ice; it was so, so much colder than that. Every circuit froze up, every system stopped responding, each of his speakers went dead silent, and even his mind felt like it’d been frozen in place. 

It was so, so cold. 

Cap’n abruptly picked up the box again. Sweet struggled to find his voice. “Cap-“ 

Cap’n didn’t stop, whirling around. Sweet practically begged. “Cap- Cap, wait, I-I’m- I’m so-”

“Go f##k yourself, Sweet,” Cap’n deadpanned, not even bothering to turn back. “Clearly, she never should have named you that in the first place.” He marched off into the distance until Sweet was staring despairingly at nothing. 

After a few moments of silence, K_K bent down to pick up his own box. Sweet looked at him, pleading. “K_K, I’m- I’m so, so sorry, I didn’t mean it, I swear I didn’t mean it, I’m so sorry-”

K_K stood at his full height, Sweet’s voice catching in his circuits. K_K wasn’t smiling, but he didn’t look angry. He looked profoundly sad. Quietly, he said, “I think you should go home, Sweet. Cool off.” With that, he turned and followed after Cap’n, only glancing back at Sweet once before he too disappeared from Sweet’s sight. 

Sweet didn’t know how to tell him that he was already freezing. 

— — —

His trip home felt like it took eons. The Swatchling sent to accompany him barely spoke the entire time, leaving Sweet to swim around in the icy water of his thoughts. He might as well actually be frozen in ice; with how slowly he moved and the way his hands trembled, he didn’t think he’d be able to tell if he suddenly was. 

No one was there to greet him when he arrived through the front door. He couldn’t bring himself to feel angry about it, or upset, or even resigned. He just felt cold. 

He didn’t bother trying to make it to his room; he knew if he did, he’d just end up collapsing on the floor to sob. Instead, he made his way to the Color Cafe and dragged himself into one of the plush chairs inside. Swatch wasn’t there. 

No one was in there, he realized belatedly, and he vaguely wondered where they all went. He couldn’t bring himself to get up and find out. 

Hours passed in the cafe, or maybe it was just minutes; at the moment, Sweet couldn’t tell the difference. Nevertheless, after some amount of time, he started hearing voices fill the mansion’s lobby. Swatchlings started filing in, not even seeming to notice his presence, and not even five minutes later, Swatch himself walked in, pausing next to Sweet’s chair. 

“Oh, hello young Master,” he greeted. “How was your day?” 

“Where was everyone?” Sweet mumbled in lieu of an answer. He didn’t bother trying to put genuine curiosity in his voice; he knew it wouldn’t come out any differently no matter how hard he tried. 

Swatch didn’t seem to notice Sweer’s numbness. “Ah, well, that’s the exciting part,” he replied, feathers fluffing as he smiled, “The Knight is coming back sooner than expected! In just two weeks, to be exact.”

“Oh.”

Sweet found himself even colder, somehow. 

— — —

He spent almost the entire first week holed up in his room. He had sobbed, once he’d gotten there, and since then he had barely stopped sobbing. It’d gotten to the point where he started vomiting oil instead of crying it, which was almost a better alternative to the constant tears. No one ever came to check on him except for the stray Swatchling every now and again, who would usually just come to leave food in the room. 

They never seemed to notice that he barely ate it. 

He tossed and turned every night, unable to sleep. Every time he closed his eye, his mind would replay the argument, repeating his words back st him over and over and over. Every time he left his eye open, he’d get colder and colder and colder. 

He left his room in the middle of the second week, practically in a haze. He ran into Queen, who barely gave him a greeting before rushing off. Before she could leave his sight, a question he hadn’t even realized he’d been thinking about fell out of his speaker:

“Did you ever send a Swatchling to let Cap’n and Cakes know I was grounded?” 

Queen paused, fully stopping in the hallway. After a minute, her visor switched to LMAO. “Oh No I Totally Forgot About That Lol.” She laughed, then walked away. 

That was when he broke. 

It was already late in the evening, but Sweet didn’t care. He didn’t care that it was dark already, he didn’t care that most people were sleeping by now, he didn’t care that it was definitely too late to ask Queen for permission, he didn’t care that he’d probably get grounded again. 

He left. 

He didn’t run, not at first. He walked through the mansion’s hallways, down into the lobby, and out of the palace doors. He passed multiple Swatchlings on the way out; none of them tried to stop him. 

As soon as the doors closed behind him, that was when he ran. 

He ran past the Addisons trying to sell him products he’d never use. He ran around the Virovriokuns spreading their viruses into the air. He ran faster than the Ambyu-lances on their way to fatally-wounded patients. He ran past the blue, he ran past the few lights still on, he ran into the dark, he ran through the dark. He ran all the way out of the city. 

He ran into the green of the Cyber Fields, into a darkness much more prevalent but much more soothing than that of the city’s. He ran past the houses of the sleeping Plugboys, past the few Virovirokuns that lived out here, past the unfinished roller coaster. He ran past the place the boxes used to be, he ran past the place the Hacker lived, he ran past the green, green, green.

He didn’t stop running until he reached the shop. Their shop. 

He froze in front of the door, ice running through his limbs yet again. He warred with himself, wanting to knock and being wholly afraid of the prospect at the same time. 

Just knock. 

I can’t.

You can. 

They hate me. 

Just knock. 

If I knock, they’ll just tell me to get lost. 

Just knock. 

They’ll throw me away, just like everyone else. 

Just knock. 

I can’t do it.

You can. 

I can’t knock. 

You have to. 

I can’t.

You can. 

I can’t knock. 

JUST KNOCK. 

His hand was rapping at the door before he’d even realized which side won. 

Immediately, he froze. He shouldn’t have knocked, he should have left, they’ll hate him, they’ll toss him out, he shouldn’t have knocked, why did he knock, why did he-

The door opened, and Sweet was equal parts relieved and horrified to see that it was K_K at the door. His breath caught in his circuits as the taller monster rubbed his eyes with a yawn before looking down, blinking when his eyes landed on Sweet. “Hello-?” 

“I’m sorry!” Sweet burst into tears, sobbing hysterically and clutching his arms tightly in his hands. “I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have said that, I didn’t mean it but it was still so bad to say, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m such a terrible friend, I’m sorry, I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry-!”

He was cut off suddenly by long arms wrapping around him. He flinched, but realized when K_K knelt down that it wasn’t to hit him or shove him away; it was a huh. 

“I forgive you,” K_K said. 

Sweet took a deep breath, before breaking into sobs once again. He wrapped his own arms around K_K, clutching him tightly as he sobbed oily tears into his chest. He cried and sobbed and screamed, and K_K didn’t let him go or throw him away; he knelt there, and when Sweer’s legs buckled and he collapsed into sobs on the ground, K_K fell with him, and Sweet sobbed into his shoulder. 

They’d been sitting that way for a while before Sweet heard a groan from inside the shop. K_K turned his head, and Sweet froze, oily tears still running down his face, as Cap’n stumbled into the doorway, looking worse for wear himself. 

“Who’s makin’ so much noise at-” he cut himself off as he noticed Sweet sitting there. He glared, before he paused and suddenly looked unsure. “Uh… what-”

“I’m so sorry,” Sweet blurted, hiding his face in K_K’s shoulder again. “I’m so sorry I said that to you, that was so horrible, I’m so sorry I said that, and I’m sorry I made you think I didn’t wanna be friends, and-“ 

“Woah, hey,” Cap’n cut him off, and Sweet chanced a glance at him, only to see Cap’n looking extremely uncomfortable. “I, uh… Man, I don’t know how I could just not forgive you, when you’re cryin’ like that…” 

Sweet shook his head vehemently. “Don’t forgive me,” he said, hiccuping on another sob, “don’t forgive me if it’s- if it’s just ‘cause you feel bad. You shouldn’t  forgive me, I’m a terrible friend, and I’m so, so sorry I messed up so bad-”

He was cut off (again) by Cap’n joining the hug, slouching against K_K and Sweet. “‘S too late for this,” he muttered, and Sweet thought that maybe he could hear tears in Cap’n’s voice as well, “we should go inside.”

“In a minute,” K_K replied, shifting his grip to hold both Cap’n and Sweet tightly. Neither of them tried to argue. 

— — —

A minute ended up turning into thirty, but none of them complained. Sweet was actually pretty sure that Cap’n complained more once K_K deemed them ready to go back inside, but those protests were also short-lived once the three of them crashed onto K_K’s bed (Sweet didn’t know they’d gotten beds) and almost immediately fell asleep, still curled up in a hug and holding each other tightly as consciousness faded away. 

That was how they woke up the next morning, all tangled around each other. Things were super awkward, especially between Sweet and Cap’n, but K_K just got up and made pancakes, chatting about random stuff he and Cap’n had done while Sweet was gone. 

Breakfast itself was quiet, even though none of them were actually eating. Cap’n was nudging the pancakes around on the plate, K_K was sitting with his hands folded while looking off to the side, and Sweet stared at his plate, unable to bring himself to so much as touch the food. 

“Sweet?” K_K spoke after several minutes of silence. “Are you okay?” 

Sweet hesitated, folding his hands under the table. “Why are you even asking me that?” he muttered, willing himself not to cry again. “You should hate me.” 

“Tough sh#t,” Cap’n deadpanned, coughing when K_K gave him a disapproving look. “‘Cause we don’t hate you,” he continued, “but we’re still pretty pi- ticked off that you ditched us for apparently no reason.” 

“He’s trying to ask you why you left without saying anything,” K_K explained. Cap’n opened his mouth with a sputter, but paused and then nodded with a sigh.

“I was trying to have a little more tact, but yeah.” 

“K_K was more tactful than you,” Sweet murmured as he twisted his hands together. He went quiet for a moment, hesitating. Most of him wanted to try to explain, but a small part of him whispered that they wouldn’t like what he had to say, that they’d say he didn’t try hard enough, that they’d kick him out if he said anything. It was almost enough to keep his speakers quiet. 

But they wouldn’t do that. He knew they wouldn’t. K_K had forgiven him just last night, before he’d explained anything at all. He should explain; he wanted to explain. 

So he did. 

He told them about how he’d been grounded, how Queen had promised to send someone to let them know, about everything that’d happened while he’d been gone— about how he missed them. They told him stuff too; like how they’d gotten concerned when he didn’t show up for a week, how they’d gone to Cyber City by themselves to look for him, how the Swatchling they met had said they’d never heard of Sweet having friends in the ‘Cyber Field’ (and this time, Sweet didn’t miss the negative undertone of the words), how they’d waited for him to come back and say it wasn’t true for a week before losing hope… Cap’n begrudgingly admitted that he’d ended up fully believing that Sweet didn’t care about them anymore, while K_K had still held out hope that it was all a misunderstanding. 

They all pointedly didn’t talk about the fight. That was fine with Sweet; he’d been forgiven and he didn’t want to think about it anymore. 

“So when’re you gonna go back?” Cap’n asked a while later, all three of them lounging on the couch and listening to a radio station playing electro swing. At Sweet’s flinch, he hurriedly added, “Not that we want you gone! But like, are you sure you’re not gonna get grounded again for this?” 

Sweet shrugged from where he laid against K_K’s left side, with Cap’n on K_K’s right. K_K had his arms wrapped around both of them; a gesture neither complained about. “Maybe, but I doubt it,” he replied. “She only got upset last time ‘cause I messed up things with the Knight.” He paused with a wince as he remembered what Tasque Manager had said about Queen being worried, but he was now more sure that it was more about the Knight than it was himself, so he continued. “Plus, I doubt she even realizes I’m gone.” 

Cap’n snorted. “Yeah right,” he said as he leaned back against K_K. “You only left in the middle of the night and still haven’t showed up by morning. She’s probably flipping right now.” 

Sweet stifled a snicker at the mental image (although Queen literally flipping out didn’t sound too out of character for her), but stared at the ground. “She’s only talked to me, like, once in the past whole week. She’ll probably only wonder where I am when the Knight comes.” 

“She hasn’t talked to you in a week?” K_K asked, tilting his head. “I thought she was your mom.” 

Sweet hesitated. He’d thought so too, but with everything that’d happened (why did the Swatchling pretend they weren’t his friends?) , he wasn’t sure anymore. “She�� said I could call her mom, but I’m not sure she considers herself my mom.” He wrung his hands together. “But her not talking to me for a week is pretty normal, ever since the Knight showed up.”

“That sucks,” Cap’n hummed sympathetically, to which Sweet just shrugged. “Still though, she’s gotta have noticed that you’re not in the mansion at all anymore, right? Or someone’s probably noticed, at least.” 

“I doubt it,” Sweet replied, feeling bitter for a second before he squashed it down. “They don’t usually notice stuff like this; otherwise I wouldn’t have gotten away with nearly as many sleepovers.”

There was a pause. “I thought that was just the first time,” Cap’n said, something strange in his voice. 

“Yeah, didn’t they know about all the sleepovers?” K_K added. 

Sweet shrugged. “I mean, maybe they figured it out eventually,” he replied, “but most of the time it was just because they’d forgotten I was in the Cyber Field.” 

No one spoke for a few moments. Sweet looked up questioningly, only to freeze when he saw the concerned looks on his friend’s faces. A mix of unease and defensiveness washed over him, and he added, “Okay first of all, it was for the Knight, okay? I mean…” he hesitated. “I didn’t– I don’t like that they forget about me sometimes, or– or just ignore me in the hallway, but there’s a lot to do whenever the Knight arrives, so it makes sense that they’re busy.”

“Too busy to remember that you were gone? ” Cap’n asked incredulously. “Dude, that’s like– seriously messed up. They shouldn’t just forget that you existed!” 

“I think that classifies as child neglect,” K_K added, no less incredulous than Cap’n. 

Sweet scowled, part of him wanting to defend Queen and everyone even as another part of him quietly wanted to agree. “But it’s for the Knight,” he argued, and then before he could think about it, “And it’s not like the orphanage treated you better; they treated you worse .” His brain short-circuited, and he froze as he realized what he said. “I– I’m sorry,” he stammered, pulling his legs up to his chest, “that was unfair of me.” 

There was silence for a few moments before K_K spoke. “It was, but it’s okay.” He paused, then amended, “Well, no, it’s not okay, but I forgive you.” 

Cap’n sighed, and the tension Sweet hadn’t noticed before bled out of his shoulders. “Yeah, me too,” he muttered. 

That was the second time they’d forgiven him, in less than twenty-four hours. 

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, oily tears welling up in his eye. “I’m sorry I’m such a bad friend. I really don’t deserve you guys, or Queen, or Tasque Manager, or Swatch, or anyone–”

K_K pulled him closer, wrapping his arm around him tighter. “Don’t say that about yourself,” he said quietly. “It’s not true.” 

Sweet sniffed, willing the tears to not fall from his speaker. They really were too nice for him. “Yes it is,” he muttered, wiping at his eye. “I keep being awful to you and Cap, I yelled and swore at Queen, I’m being ungrateful towards everyone in the mansion, and I can’t even get it through my big, stupid head that the Knight is ten times more important than I’ll ever be.” 

“Shut the f##k up,” Cap’n growled, startling Sweet. K_K hugged him tighter while giving Cap’n yet another disappointed look. Cap’n ignored it as he continued, “First of all, you swearing at Queen��is bad#ss. Second of all, f##k the people in the mansion! Sure, they took you in when you were younger, but that doesn’t change the fact that now , they’re treating you like sh#t. Third of all, and most importantly,” Cap’n paused to clamber over K_K (who noticeably said nothing about the multiple swears) and practically threw himself on top of Sweet, who let out an ‘oomph’ at the impact. “I don’t care about some dumb fancy-pants Knight. Maybe Queen and her cronies don’t think you’re important compared to the Knight, but I don’t care. You’re important to me. You’re important to K_K. Don’t you dare say otherwise ever again.” He hugged Sweet tight, although Sweet had the feeling that that wasn’t the reason he suddenly found it hard to breathe. 

“What he said,” K_K added, hugging the two of them tightly. “You’re important to us. You’re both important to me. I don’t care what you do or say; there’s nothing you can do that’ll make me stop caring about you, and there’s nothing you can do that’ll make you unworthy of love.” 

Sweet’s resolve to not cry crumbled, and as the three of them sat there in a group hug, he could’ve sworn he felt tears from the other two fall onto him as well. 

Sweet knew by now that it was possible to have two homes, but he thought it’d be okay if he just had this one. 

— — —

He still went back to the mansion the next day, despite Cap’n and K_K’s reservations. He explained to them that one, he still lived in the mansion, and two, he was legally Queen’s… ward? Ward or child. Still, this meant that she was still in charge of him, and he really didn’t want to get grounded again. They eventually agreed, but only after they made him promise to come back the next day, and said that if they didn’t hear from him in a week, they’d go to Queen’s mansion and break him out themselves, whether he wanted it or not. 

He didn’t mind that in the slightest. 

Cap’nhad shuffled awkwardly from foot to foot as he’d been getting ready, rubbing the back of his head while K_K stood nearby. “Hey, uh…. I’m sorry for assuming the worst after you got grounded,” he’d apologized. “And for swearing at you so much yesterday. Even if you kinda deserved that last part.” 

Sweet had paused. “Oh, uh. I forgive you?” He’d already forgiven him, to be honest, but he was also so used to being the one apologizing that hearing someone else say it was uncanny. 

“I’m sorry too,” K_K had added. 

“You didn’t do anything wrong, K_K.” 

“I’m sorry I didn’t notice you were hurting when I should have, and for not taking action to help you.” 

Sweet’s breath had caught in his throat. Despite the fact that K_K shouldn’t be taking any responsibility for that, it still felt nice to hear. It was reminiscent of Tasque Manager’s apology, but it felt…. different, somehow. 

“That wasn’t your fault, K_K. But if it helps you feel better, I forgive you.” 

They’d all hugged goodbye, taking an unusually long amount of time due to them not really wanting to be separated, but eventually they’d let go, and Sweet headed back to the mansion alone. He tried not to miss Cap’n and K_K the whole way there. 

Although once he got to the mansion, missing his brothers? friends? friends was somehow both the last thing on his mind and at the forefront of it. 

The palace was in disarray, with Swatchling’s running amok and carrying different materials. Tasques prowled around the place as though they were going to pounce at any moment, and the maice that had been so bold before now skittered back to their hiding spaces in the walls. He was pretty sure he heard Tasque Manager in the Color Cafe and Swatch yelling frenzied commands at the Swatchlings. 

The only person who seemed unaffected by the chaos was Queen, who stood at the bottom of the steps, surveying the lobby as she drank a glass of battery acid. 

No one spoke to or acknowledged Sweet in any way as he ducked and dodged through the traffic, trying to make it to Queen to figure out what the heck was going on. They didn’t even seem to notice him when he accidentally tripped one of them up, just stepping around him like he wasn’t even there. 

Once he made it over to Queen, he hesitated. What if she had noticed he was gone and got angry at him? 

Still, he was already right there, so it’d be kinda hard to sneak away now. So instead, he cleared his throat and asked, “Queen, what’s going on?” 

She didn’t respond for a few moments, and only seemed to notice him when he repeated the question. She looked down at him with the biggest smile he’d seen on her, and yet nothing about it looked genuine. “Oh Lol Hey Sweetie Pie, You Just Missed The Knight.” She took a sip from her battery acid. 

Sweet froze. “The— The Knight? But I thought they wouldn’t be here for a few more days.” 

Queen shrugged. “They Got Here: Early.” She took another sip from her battery acid and didn’t say anything for a few moments. Just as Sweet considered walking away, she added, “Oh Wait Sweet There’s Something I Have To Tell You.” 

He paused, a feeling of apprehension coming over him. “...yeah?” 

“I’m Going To Ban All Music Lol. Except Noise Music And Reverse Diss Tracks.” 

“...What?” 

“I’m Going To Ban All Music Lol. Except Noise Music And Reverse Diss Tracks,” she repeated, downing the last of her battery acid. Then she suddenly threw it on the ground, glass shattering with a loud crash. Sweet flinched away from the shards that went flying, but the Swatchlings didn’t even seem to notice what had happened; instead, they just stepped on and over the shards of glass, not a care for the mess or potential injury while they had other tasks to do. 

“The Knight Said I Should Ban Like; All All Music, But I Decided I Still Wanted To Listen To Music I Like, So I Only Banned: Most Of It.” She laughed like it was the funniest joke she’d ever told. 

Which was what this all had to be; a joke. There was no way she was actually doing that; why would the Knight even say something like that? “You can’t be serious,” he said slowly, waiting for her to come out and say that it was a joke. 

Instead, her visor shifted to ???. “Why Would I Not Be Lmao.” 

Sweet blinked. Then blinked again. Then blinked some more. “You— you can’t just ban all music!”

“Most Music,” she corrected, “And Actually I Literally Can Lol.” 

“I’m literally in a band!” 

“Will You Only Play Noise Music Or Reverse Diss Tracks?” 

Sweet sputtered. What even was a reverse diss track? “No??” 

“Then You Can’t Be In A Band,” she stated simply. 

Sweet froze. He couldn’t be— but he had to. They were a trio; Sweet Cap’n Cakes. He couldn’t just not be in the band. And he was literally a speaker; playing music was his whole purpose. “What if I just play other music anyway?” 

She tilted her head. “I Would Have To: Ground You.” 

“Over playing music in a band?”  

“Yes.” 

Sweet gaped. This was genuinely the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard. “Well— I’m gonna do it anyway!” he blurted after a second. “I’m gonna go be in the band, and I’m gonna play whatever songs I want, and you can’t stop me!” 

Queen laughed. “I Literally Can Lol.” 

“No you can’t-!” 

— — —

Turned out she very much could. All she had to do was order a Swatchling to bring him to his room and tell him he was ‘indefinitely grounded’. 

He’d tried to get out as soon as the Swatchling had left the room, but the door was somehow locked from the other side. Had she switched the locks while he was gone? Or did this happen while he was grounded the last time? 

He tried to kick the door open, but it wouldn’t budge. He tried to get the doorknob off, but it didn’t move. He even looked around his room that could get him out through his second-story window, but all he could find were two different outfits that were definitely not going to be enough. 

After he tried (and failed) to escape for thirty minutes straight, he sat down on his bed, head in his hands as he thought. He couldn’t get out of the room right now ; anything that might have helped him escape before, he’d taken to the junk shop at some point and hadn’t brought it back. The room was nearly bare of any personal belongings by this point. 

Except for one thing.

Sweet’s gaze slid over to his dresser. The toy robot, the one Queen had found him fixing all those years ago, stood there, untouched. He hadn’t used it since he was at least twelve; he’d thought he’d outgrown playing with toys.

Now he might not get to use it ever again. 

He tore his eye away from the robot, looking back at the door. He couldn’t escape right now, but maybe when the Swatchlings came back to feed him (they would, right? They wouldn’t just forget he was there) , he could slip past them and get out. 

— — — 

The first time a Swatchling came to bring him a meal (which was dinner, supposedly), he didn’t try to escape; instead, he ate the meal and went to bed, so that when he did try to escape, he’d have the energy to do it.

It was hard to fall asleep, though. He stayed awake for hours before he managed to doze off. 

At breakfast time, he’d tried to dash out of the room while the Swatchling was putting the meal on the dresser, but he’d been quickly grabbed and deposited on his bed before the door had been locked again. He’d tried to hide behind the door and slip out at lunch, but an additional Swatchling had caught him and brought him back in his room. He tried to hide under the bed to confuse the Swatchlings at dinner, but all they did was leave the food there and lock him in the room again. 

The next day passed much the same way, although he did get close once at lunch when he set up a contraption to drop his other two outfits on the Swatchlings to distract them while he ran. Unfortunately, he’d been caught and brought back by Swatch himself, and when dinner came around, three Swatchlings had been added to the first two, making escape practically impossible. 

He’d been pacing in his room for the past hour when he heard a knock on his window. 

He swung his head around, only to freeze when he saw Cap’n’s face staring back at him. His soul lifted as he rushed over to the window, and he yanked it open. “Cap! How’re you even-?”

“Shhhh!” Cap’n shushed harshly. “There’s tasques prowling around everywhere; me ‘nd K_K barely got in!” A quick glance down revealed that K_K had extended his upper body all the way up to the window, with Cap’n sitting on his shoulders. 

“Sorry,” Sweet whispered, then paused. How did they even know he was grounded? He remembered now that they’d said they would break him out if he didn’t show up for a week, but it’s only been two days, so… “How did you guys know to come get me?” 

Cap’n huffed. “Just get out here! We’ll explain later when we’re not at risk of gettin’ our butts beat by Queen!” 

Sweet nodded and began to climb out the window, then paused. “Give me a sec, I’ve gotta get something,” he whispered, then tumbled back into the room, ignoring Cap’n’s exaggerated groan. He grabbed the toy robot from the dresser, never to be left behind again. He ran back up to the window and climbed onto the sill. “Okay, I’m ready.” 

“Finally!” Cap’n whisper-shouted, then held his arms up. “Okay, I’m gonna grab you, and then K_K’s gonna slowly bring us all down.” Sweet looked at Cap’n dubiously. “Are you even strong enough for that?”

“Shut up and get out here, Sweet.” 

Sweet nodded, slowly lowering himself out the window, and to his credit, Cap’n did manage to grab and hold him, even if Sweet felt his grip slipping every other second. 

“I didn’t know you could extend your limbs that far, K_K,” Sweet whispered as K_K slowly started to lower the three of them to the ground. 

“Neither did I!” K_K whispered with a grin. “We were gonna kidnap a Swatchling if this didn’t work!” 

Sweet blinked. “Wait, you were gonna what-?” 

He cut himself off with a yelp as Cap’n suddenly let go, only to be caught by one of K_K’s arms. He scowled as he jumped out of K_K’s arm, just as Cap’n jumped off of his shoulders. “What was that for?” he whispered. 

Cap’n breathed deeply, leaning over with his hands on his knees. “Sorry,” he wheezed, “I didn’t realize how heavy you are.”

Sweet narrowed his eye. “I’m not that heavy.” 

“Yeah, he’s not that heavy,” K_K added. 

“Just shut up,” Cap’n groaned, standing up straight. “We’ve gotta get out of here.” 

That, all three of them could agree on. 

— — — 

The three of them collapsed on the couch nearly the second they made it back, the adrenaline from sneaking in and out of Queen’s mansion bleeding out of their systems. The only thing Sweet had done before letting himself sit down was check to make sure his turntable was still in the junk shop’s back room– which it was. After that, there was nothing to stop the three of them from sinking to a heap on the couch. 

As Cap’n mumbled at K_K and tried to shove him off, with K_K refusing to let go of Cap’n or Sweet, Sweet just sighed, sinking into the couch with relief. 

“So how’d you guys know to come and get me?” Sweet mumbled, causing Cap’n and K_K to pause. “It hasn’t been even close to a week yet.” Cap’n shrugged, struggling to sit up with K_K holding him so tightly. “We got the announcement that Queen was banning music this morning,” he explained, giving up on trying to escape K_K’s grasp and flopping back down against the couch. “We already knew that you weren’t gonna take it well and that Queen fu- freaking sucks, so we just decided to go early.” 

“Oh,” was Sweet’s reply, and he gripped K_K’s arm almost as tightly as K_K was holding him. “...thank you.” 

Cap’n just hummed with a nod, leaning back against K_K. Everything went quiet for a moment, before Cap’n spoke up again. “So what’re we gonna do now? Can’t exactly be a band if we can’t play any music.” 

“Unless we only ever play noise music,” K_K pointed out. All three of them shuddered at the thought. 

Sweet stared at the ground, thinking hard. Cap’n was right; all of the music they’d written was banned. They literally couldn’t play any of their songs anywhere unless they wanted to get in serious trouble. 

But he found that he didn’t really care so much. Playing music with Cap’n and K_K was the happiest he’d ever been, and he’d loved music even before Queen took him in. Abandoning music would practically be abandoning himself; and it almost felt like abandoning Cap’n and K_K too, even if it was only their band. And again, he was literally a speaker; the words ‘never play music’ in that specific order weren’t in his vocabulary. 

Besides, he would probably already be in trouble for breaking out of the mansion while grounded anyway. 

He stood up suddenly, K_K’s grip having loosened during the silence. The two of them exchanged a look, but he ignored it as he looked for an RCA connector cable. “Sweet? What’re you doing?” Cap’n asked, sitting up. 

“I’m gonna go play music,” Sweet said firmly, finding the cable he was looking for. 

“What?” Cap’n and K_K yelled at the same time. Cap’n jumped off the couch, K_K not far behind. “I don’t know how you already forgot, but we were literally just talking about the fact that we can’t play music anymore,” Cap’n added. 

“I don’t care,” Sweet snapped as he stalked off to the back room and walked up to its door. “I’m getting my turntable and I’m playing music as loud as I can from my speakers.” 

“You’re going to get in trouble,” K_K warned, grabbing the doorknob before Sweet could reach for it.

Sweet rolled his eye. “I’m already gonna be in trouble, K_K,” he replied, glancing between him and Cap’n, who crossed his arms.

“You’re gonna get in more trouble,” Cap’n amended. “And we just busted you out of Queen’s mansion. Do you really wanna go back and get to find out what the dungeons there feel like?” 

“Queen’s mansion doesn’t have a dungeon,” Sweet muttered, but shook his head. “But that’s not the point. I need to play music; I’m literally a speaker .” He pointed at Cap’n. “And aren’t you a cassette player?” He pointed at K_K. “And you’re a CD player. You guys need to play music even more than I do.” 

Both Cap’n and K_K hesitated at that. “We can handle going on nothin’ but noise music,” Cap’n replied, but it sounded unsure. 

“For how long?” Sweet asked, crossing his own arms. “How long are you gonna be okay with playing nothing besides noise music or a ‘reverse diss track’? We don’t even have many noise music songs; how long are you gonna be able to play the same four songs on repeat, for the rest of your lives?” 

K_K and Cap’n shared a wary glance. “It’s better than getting in trouble, though,” K_K said hesitantly. “She might not have a dungeon, but I don’t want to know what she’ll do to enforce that law.” 

“The law we’re not even gonna be able to follow?” Sweet asked incredulously. “Can both of you honestly say that you’re gonna be able to go for the rest of our lives playing nothing but noise music? Playing nothing but the same four songs over and over?” 

Neither of them said anything for a moment, seemingly wanting to look anywhere except at Sweet. After a minute, K_K spoke, “Sweet, is this because of the music, or does it have something to do with Queen herself?” 

Sweet frozen. He hadn’t quite considered that, but it was a real possibility. He did feel bitter towards Queen; he felt bitter towards everyone in the mansion. Maybe even everyone in the city. Maybe this was all an attempt to get back at Queen, for everything she’d done to him. 

But everything she’d done to him included taking him in when he had no one. 

And it wasn’t just about her, either. It was about the fact that he was made to play music. It was about the fact that Cap’n and K_K were made to play music. Music was a part of them, even more than it was for him. He could handle playing a myriad of different things from his speakers, even if none of them made him want to dance the way music did, but Cap’n and K_K would have practically nothing. 

“I think it might a little,” Sweet said slowly, “but it’s also about the three of us. We’re the Sweet Cap’n Cakes; playing music is what we do . And it’d be that way even if we weren’t a band.” He tapped his foot on the ground. “And it’s not just about music either. If Queen’s gonna decide to be as petty as to ban something like music she doesn’t particularly enjoy, what’s to stop her from banning other things too? Like- like staying out too late, or being able to sell CD Bagels, or crossing the road without a permit, or–” 

“‘Crossing the road without a permit’?” Cap’n deadpanned. “And being able to sell CD Bagels? That’s taking it a little too far.” “And banning music isn’t?” Sweet retorted, Cap’n quickly shutting up. “You think it’s crazy, and that’s because it is crazy, but we also think that banning music is crazy, and what’d she do? She banned music! She banned music when some of her own subjects were literally made for making music! She’s already taken things ‘a little too far’. What’s to stop her from going further? Are we really supposed to just lie down and take that?” 

Neither of them answered him for a moment, just glancing at each other again. After a minute, Cap’n sighed. “So what, you’re in your rebel phase or somethin’?” 

Sweet sputtered. “It’s not a phase!” he snapped, before pausing as Cap’n snickered and K_K grinned. “No, no do not laugh at me that is not what I meant–” he paused again. “But, well… kinda.” 

“So you’re having a phase?” K_K asked. 

Sweet groaned, shaking his head. “No, it’s– not about the phase part, I meant the ‘rebel’ part.” He put his hand on the doorknob that K_K had stopped paying attention to, pushing the door open. “Queen’s banned music, and if she can get away with that, what else can she get away with? So we should show her that she can’t get away with it, that we’re not just gonna let this happen. So- so let’s be rebels! Let’s be a resistance against Queen’s stupid laws!” He gestured at the turntable. 

…

“That was so overdramatic,” Cap’n deadpanned, but then grinned as Sweet sputtered. “But I get what you’re saying; and to be honest, I don’t really like the thought of playing noise music for eternity.” He popped his knuckles, walking over to the turntable and hopping up onto it. “Plus, I’ve got a few other bones to pick with Queen myself. Even if she is a madimoyselle.” 

“That’s definitely not how you pronounce that,” Sweet muttered, before looking up at K_K, who seemed unsure. “Cakes, c’mon. You can’t seriously tell me that you’re okay with what she’s doing.” 

“I haven’t been okay with what she’s been doing since the time you first came back to the Fields,” K_K said plainly, but still hesitated. “I don’t want things to get worse for you.” 

Sweet looked down, feeling guilty, but more determined at the same time. “...And I don’t want things to get worse for you and Cap.” 

K_K stared at him for a few moments, eyes searching. Sweet wasn’t sure for what, exactly, but it made him feel uneasy all the same. “Okay,” K_K said eventually, Sweet’s spirits lifting, “but just music. And nothing that’ll get us in too much trouble; we’ll just play the songs we like and that’s it.” 

“Deal,” Sweet stuck his hand out, and with a small smile, K_K shook it. The two of them turned towards the turntable. “Now let’s get out there and– Cap don’t you dare touch that I will actually kill you!!!” 

— — — 

Embarrassingly, Swatch didn’t notice that Master Sweet had managed to sneak away until the next dinner, when he’d accompanied the other Swatchlings to bring him his meal. The window was wide open, but nothing resembling a rope was hanging from it, so Master Sweet had almost certainly had help– most likely, his two friends from the Cyber Fields. 

According to the Swatchlings, the room had been empty the entire day, but they had figured he was hiding under the bed again and thought nothing of the open window. Swatch had half a mind to fire them right then and there, but ultimately, that decision would be up to Queen. 

Unfortunately, that wasn’t where Swatch’s trouble ended. Shortly after the discovery, Swatch caught wind of a video of three protestors of the music ban vehemently opposing Queen’s new law and defending themselves against Queen’s new Werewires. He had a sinking feeling that Master Sweet was involved in this, which was proved to be correct once he actually watched the footage. The video itself was quickly trending, and he knew it would only be a matter of time before Queen saw it– if she hadn’t already. 

He decided that the best thing to do would be to tell Queen about this, hopefully before she came across it herself. So after submitting a request to see her (which was immediately granted, as all requests sent from Swatch or Tasque Manager were), he made his way to her bedroom/office/whatever was most convenient for her at the moment and knocked on the doors. 

As he waited for her to open the door, he had to squash down a lot of feelings of apprehension. Her Majesty the Queen was rarely in the wrong, but he could not, for the life of him, understand the music ban that she’d set into place. Especially when her surrogate son was part of the subsect of Darkners created to produce music. 

However, it was the Knight’s will, and the Knight was only wrong as often as Queen was. If Queen saw it fit to listen to the Knight’s advice to set this ban in place, so be it. 

He was pulled out of his thoughts by the door suddenly opening, although Queen was not directly behind it. This wasn’t an odd occurrence, so he walked inside, only to stop short when he saw that she was sitting… in her throne. Which she’d brought in here, for some reason. He shook it off quickly; Her Grace often did things he didn’t understand, but she always had a reason. Even if he never understood those reasons either. 

She appeared to be watching something, with her facing away from him, and while he was loathe to interrupt her, she had allowed him in the room, so he cleared his throat. “I have some… unfortunate news for you, Your Grace.” 

“Yes Swatch Darling What Is It,” she hummed, her statement sounding nothing like a question. She often spoke with an odd cadence, and even more so when the Knight arrived, so he ignored it. 

“Master Sweet…” he hesitated, swallowing, but pushed on regardless. “Master Sweet managed to abandon his grounding at some point yesterday. I and the other Swatchlings deeply apologize for our lack of attention.” He paused, still hesitant, but continued, “Furthermore, it appears he’s joined his friends from the Cyber Fields in… rebelling against you, My Queen.” With that, he snapped his beak shut, bracing himself for her ire. 

“Oh Yeah I Know Lmao,” she replied, turning her chair around to reveal she’d been watching the very same video he had; the one that showed Master Sweet sending a volley of attacks at a Werewire. 

His blood went cold for a moment, before he realized that she didn’t sound upset at all. “You… are you not bothered by his?” he asked, suddenly feeling uncomfortable. 

She laughed. “Of Course Not, He’ll Be Fine.” She waved a dismissive hand. “It’s Just: A Phase.”

Swatch couldn’t quite keep the disbelief out of his voice. “Just… a phase.” 

“Yes, He Is Just Having A Phase,” she nodded, dismissing the video. “Once He Grows Up A Little Bit He Will Realize He Is Wrong And Will Come Back. The Knight Told Me All About It, Trust.”

Hearing that should have put his mind at ease. It should have reassured him that there was nothing to worry about, that there would be few to no repercussions for this development. Instead, it only filled him with a sense of unease and the feeling that something was deeply wrong. “And you’re not worried about him at all? That he’ll get hurt resisting you?” he asked, fighting to keep the apprehension off his face. 

She merely shrugged in response. “I Have Informed Every Werewire And Swatchling To Bring Him Back Unharmed, So No.” She waved him off, bringing a new video back up. “Now Shoo, I’m Watching The Latest Season Of: Cyber World’s Funniest Home Videos.” 

Reluctantly, he bowed and exited the room, still feeling as though something just wasn’t right. He tried to ignore it as he walked back to the Color Cafe, but something told him that new, terrible things were coming, and that whatever Master Sweet was going through, it wasn’t ‘just a phase’. 

— — —

Notes: I hate this a lot. Like, a LOT a lot. If I never have to look at this again it'll still be too soon. But I'm leaving it here anyways 'cause I spent too much time on this to leave it rotting in Google Docs. Also here's the link to the series if you want it (it's not an actual series; it's more of a place for me to dump my SCC-centric fics):

[theprettynosferatu]

Ok, fine.

I'll say this ONCE.

Every now and then someone messages me with the best of intentions letting me know that someone else is "copying" my style. I appreciate the drive to take care of someone whose work you enjoy, and I thank you.

That said:

I have a style in the sense that I enjoy expressing myself in certain ways. I do not OWN any "style"

I didn't invent hypnokink, or pink text, or captioning pictures so what would I own anyway?

I own my stories and texts but no one can own a style. Don't copy / paste my stories and it's all good.

If anything I'm flattered that my work resonated with people who chose to then create! More kink is better!

Also there's something deliciously wicked when I see my "style" popping up in my feed. Like I'm a little virus corrupting tumblr. Twisting it slowly. Making more creators. Making more good boys, girls and anything outside that binary.

So go forth and create! You have my blessing and my thanks!

[tea-with-evan-and-me]

"this is a discussion blog and we're all allowed to have our own opinion on the matter"

Here is a point where I find it conflicting.

There are a lot of anonymous women who have made a big deal out of it (including you at times). To the point, and I saw it in your blog, that they even took it for granted that Evan is going to marry Haley. That she is perfect -in general- and that everything Evan does, something has to do with her (for example, the comment on Amazon about the anti-allergic).

Then you allow the issue to get bigger. When there is only one photo and, at most, they are dating and haven't seen each other for a long time (at least in public).

So, you have a little responsibility for the blog to enter into discussion. When you can easily answer to every repetitive question about Haley that you are asked with a "nothing is confirmed, time will tell".

My opinion.

i'm not exactly sure what you mean when you say a ''big deal''. i know i harp on this at times, but i have to reiterate: this is a gossip blog. if celebrity gossip makes you uneasy, then it is best you do not engage with this content. the very first post i ever made stated this and that no reasonable topic would be off-limits, and i let my readers guide the discussions we have. the messages i get define the flow of our conversation. some days all we do is bemoan the emma roberts gremlins, other days we talk about haley lu, or fran and her bait-y ways.. sometimes it's just folks having an outlet for their horny thoughts. sometimes i have nothing to add and other times i write paragraphs. this blog belongs to the readers just as much as it belongs to me - if they do not engage, this is just an empty blog where dust would collect.

also, if you saw the posts you're referencing, because lord knows i remember.. then you already know i tempered the expectations of the people who thought that evan and haley should have already been meeting each others families and planning for marriage 2 weeks after potentially meeting the first time. it was whiplash inducing going from ask to ask. but outside of managing trolls, i tried to do this in a civil way and understand that not everyone is as old as i am and it's natural that some people may get over-excited. likewise, i dealt with people who came to share legitimate feelings of sadness and conflict over evan dating someone, and i tried to talk with them in a human way to understand that our feelings can be complex and irrational, and it doesn't always mean someone is ill-intentioned or stupid; just struggling with their emotions.

this is the nature of a discussion blog - as the admin, outside of sharing my own opinions, i feel like my only responsibility is to keep conversations from going off the rails and being destructive or overly negative. i am not here to police anybody for reasonable conversation on a gossip discussion blog! i do not resent those who disagree with me, but i do kind of resent stupid people who litter my ask box with petty or downright delusional baloney. sorry if that makes me a grump.

and this is where you lose me. the comment re: the amazon review for nasal spray was obviously done jokingly. please remove the stick from betwixt the cheeks of your buttocks, ma'am. no tumblr users were hurt by me and a tweam member joking about evan's allergy to felines, when haley lu has a beloved cat! no one, and i really mean no one because i can never recall it, has said haley is perfect or everything she does is related to evan. where were you the other day when we literally belabored the fact that not everything haley (or anyone) posts on social media is about their SO? c'mon..

and what kind of a gossip/discussion blog would this be if every time someone wanted to chat about something unverified, i simply copy and pasted an auto-response about how ''nothing is confirmed''? it's not like we're over here discussing evan's tax documents or racing to see who can find his social security number first. TEA is in the username, TEA is slang for GOSSIP. and what purpose does this response to all haley/evan relationship questions serve other than to spare your feelings when you apparently have to read my discussion blog and see that we're discussing who evan is dating? friend, click away! blacklist haley's name! it's just not that deep. this is supposed to be fun; if you're not having fun, you should not be here.

also, evan and haley dating is not an ''issue'' that gets bigger. him dating a girl who is causing no problems should not be an issue to you, or anyone else. evan peters is a stranger to you, me, and everyone else reading this blog unless something's going on i don't know about lmao

[flame2ashes]

Choose violence ask game, 12 thru 18, go!

This is gonna be Mass Effect and maybe also Dragon Age, sorry not sorry

12. the unpopular character that you actually like and why more people should like them

This is so hard to answer because I think every character has its fanbase. But I'm also gonna say Ashley Williams Mass Effect. She's my bestie. She's my sister figure. She's my girlfriend. She deserves better

13. worst blorboficiation

ngl I don't know which one to choose. I want to say Grunt as Shepard's child - baby even - seeing as 1) Grunt is a teenager at best, 2) making "Shepard is Grunt's parent" a blanket characterization is annoying af, and 3) it's always always always always female Shepard who's the parent

(Throwback to that time when I was like "There should be more Shepard is Grunt's dad jokes" and people reblogged it like "How can I make this about female Shepard")

14. that one thing you see in fics all the time

Oh wait yeah there's a reason why I stopped reading Shakarian fic: they kept making it so that Kaidan was Shepard's ex. Stop!!! Leave him out of it!!! I don't read these fics for Shepard to break up with Kaidan on Horizon and then immediately rebound with Garrus!!! Kaidan deserves better than to be some mad ex!!! And Garrus deserves better than to be a rebound!!!

(Not to be like "Shakarians ruined Shakarian" but goddddddddd)

Also I feel like every other DAI fic I clicked on had this: novelization of game scenes. I'm not here to read copy/pasted dialogue!!! If I wanted to I'd just go play the games!!!

Also DAI-related: fics tagged Dorian/Iron Bull and when you click on them they're a background pairing at best. This especially when the other main pairing is a female Inquisitor with either Cullen or Solas. Filter those pairings out and you get a much narrower result. Then again those fics probably make Dorian out to be the Inquisitor's gay best friend anyway fjkdlajfkds

15. that one thing you see in fanart all the time

Not exactly "all the time," but I've seen this trend where Shepards who romance Garrus have his colony markings on their face and it's like. I'm not sure what the intention is for Shepard to have Garrus' colony markings. And I wouldn't really judge it as "cultural appropriation" because it's about a fictional culture. But also why???

Also ensemble fanart that's just the alien characters :(

16. you can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

I'm gonna be real. I don't understand why people like the original Citadel Councilors so much. I don't even mean this in a "The Councilors suck because they don't believe you" kind of way, I mean it in the "We literally only see the Councilors in a certain context and nothing really beyond that, why do people want to romance them so much???" It took me a few playthroughs before I actually saved them and it really didn't feel like I missed out on anything, including their characters

Tho I feel like this for a lot of the minor characters lol. Nihlus and Kal'Reegar, at least, have the reason of "They look cool," though I'm also wondering why so many people like them

Also, Garrus as a dom. I have no idea why that's a thing. He would be a service top at best

17. there should be more of this type of fic/art

Two things:

1) More fic/art on the civilian perspective. People who see Shepard on TV and are like "Wow that guy kinda sucks". Civilian perspectives on the Reaper War. Civilian perspectives on the post-Reaper War outcome. Do you understand what I meannnnn

2) More post-ME3 fics where Shepard is dead and stays dead. No "Shepard died but everyone tries to figure out how to bring them back to life and it has some hopeful ending that they find Shepard or it ends with Shepard coming back to life" shit. I want ensemble fics on how everyone has to move on from Shepard's death in the midst of a recovering galaxy while it risks yet another mass conflict. Coming to terms with the fact that their saviour was another flawed human being. Using Shepard's memory to further an agenda. Do you understand what I meannnnn

(Though a fic where they try to find Shepard and they realize that Shepard is gone forever...I'd read it 👀)

18. it's absolutely criminal that the fandom has been sleeping on...

For Mass Effect? I was gonna say human characters, but honestly? Any of the minor species. Volus. Hanar. Batarians. Vorcha. tbf BioWare is also sleeping on them, so it's everyone's fault all around. I remember hearing that there was meant to be lore for the Vorcha but then they cut it. And for what

For Dragon Age? Literally playing as a non-elf character

[mara-and-its-the-same]

So I’m totally sending this in for three different fandoms soooooo I’m just gonna copy and paste it! There are as many forms of love as there are moments in time 🪷 for Harry Potter marauders era I’m 5’7 with blonde hair, blue eyes and glasses! I’m a bit chubby🤷🏼‍♀️ I do have OCD(but I’m on medicine so it’s all good) I am a fourth grade teacher!🤪 I have doggos that I love with my whole heart. I’m pretty calm but boring🙃 I’m very blunt but always with good intentions! I am VERY sassy and sarcastic though, some people cannot handle the mess I am 😂 I am a ENTJ and type 8, I am also ravenclaw 💙 random crazy fact about me, I am the pickiest eater but I’ll try anything once! (When I was a kid there was a year that I ate nothing but cheerios) for a boy please I forgot to mention that

ok i am so so so sooooo sorry that i never got to this, I was just so overwhelmed with asks and also I was just stuck but here you go <3

I think....James (but you'll have to ask @haydipoof and she'll tell me i'm wrong but meh, it's happening)

I think you'd meet your first year in potions class, like you've been paired up for a project as an ice breaker between houses. And he's an 11 year old boy and thinks you'll just take care of all the work because you're a ravenclaw but you put a stop to that real fast. And then... immediate friends <3

I think you'd definitely flirt for a while but like friends....ya know? Like everyone thinks oh they're just naturally flirty people but no one notices as you gradually flirt with other people less and less then only do it with each other. And then you ask each other out at the same time and he's kinda dancing around it but you're straight to it and saying what he's trying to before he gets the chance.

Then once you graduate and get like, real jobs, you know? He's so supportive of your career. If you have a good day and you have so many stories to tell he'd be so excited to hear about them and he'd love to get to know all the kids through you. And if you had a bad day he'd still listen and make you one of your comfort foods to feel better (even if he's not always the best at it)

He loves the sass, he loves the sarcasm, he loves all of it. (But all your friends can't stand the inside jokes and get absolutely exhausted by the way you joke with each other for hours every time you go out with them, but lovingly)

i hope you like it and i hope this helps the blah at least a little bit <3

[stupid-o-clock]

i still feel shitty around my friends. i ranted about this to my best friend earlier but i want to put this here so i'll basically copy paste my feelings.

i'm gonna call my friends P & V bc typing "friend"/"other friend" etc gets confusing after a while.

i was playing huniepop bc it's a fun game when u have nothing to do, but my P saw it in my discord status and immediately dmed the gc "BRO [me] IS PLAYING HUNIEPOP" and we started arguing about it bc she thinks these type of games are weird, idc lol. if u don't like them, don't play them, why get into my business? we have the most opposite opinions on so much shit like why even bother trying to start this

she complained about genshin nsfw popping up on her tl a while ago and told me to stop liking it, no? dont interact, click "not interested", block, even unfollow me idc not like we interact much anyway. gosh

she was so much better to have as a friend before we got close, i started having this feeling recently like once i get to know someone well it becomes weird. like damn, you know my trauma and ik yours? weirdo.. bye-bye! my gf, two best friends + two also pretty close friends are the only exceptions. but that's maybe because i got to know them before i started feeling like this?

tbh with these two it always feels like they've got something against me for no reason, that "no reason" also being im a dude. with all the shit they say n do it's a really toxic women>men type thing LOL and i can never say anything bc they'd team up on me!!

i don't think i'm ever included in those messages but thats bc im trans. if i was a cis dude theyd bully me into the ground, but i dont wanna be treated diff bc im a TRANS guy, im just a guy. the trans doesnt matter. treat me the same youd treat a cis one. and if you cant then we shouldnt be friends!

now this is about V and her boyfriend, theyve got a thing like he unfriends/blocks anyone she doesnt like going on. n one night he wanted her to unf all the dudes shes friends with, including me. personally idgaf but P got really pissed about it.

P said smth like "what did we say about not controlling women in relationships?" and like.. what? V is essentially controlling her boyfriend, so why can't he do the same? P just brushed it off tho bc V is an angel! and she could never do anything bad! her bf don't know that lol?

just like how i'm deffo not a love interest for her, everyone she makes him unfriend probably also isn't! maybe she got bad vibes or whatever that's ok! but god

also P used the r-slur when going off at V's boyfriend and that just rubbed me the wrong way. she's definitely "allowed" to use/reclaim it but it feels like an awful word, AND she was using it to insult someone which makes it even worse.

i feel like i can never disagree with P either bc she'll pull a "shut up ur a man" card. like- she's done that. she's done it as a joke but she'd deffo do it in a serious manner too-

also, i got into a fight- like- not a fight but i genuinely said smth really LOL i feel bad about it but P was shit talking me to xiya and then pulled up in my dms like Hey [me] i care aout you! You fucked up but it's ok u ust have to learn how to communicate

Like what is this? u can't tell me u care about me after spewing this shit into my girlfriends dms.

"i dont go out of my way to hurt people. he needs help lol" like bitch ik i need help. i did say the "joke" with intent to hurt V but it was in the MOMENT. yk how fucking frustrating it is explaining anger issues to someone who doesn't get it whatsofuckingever?

P has a load of her own issues that i dont ge tbut i at least TRY to understand her. also, first screenshot i wanetd to explain myself so V could see where im coming from?? LOL explaining ursef =/= makinf urself the victim.

i always overexplain shit, like my mistakes and why i think i made them. im also bad at explaining so i go on and on to try and make it make sense. i was literally blaming myself for hurting V and syaing sorry over and over again, how the hell was i making myself a victim?

[moonsoupstar-ao3]

Chapter 8 already! Oh boy, oh boy

Some implied spoilers for the manga (if you know, you know), and some Spanish here and there

I love the opening so much

I saw a few screenshots before the chapter lmao

I really don't mind spoilers personally so it's fine, it wasn't people's fault either, I looked into the aoex tag here for a fanart and compulsively scrolled down like an idiot

ALRIGHT, TIME FOR THE CHAPTER

to be honest, I didn't feel like watching anything today, but I thought 'oh, I won't turn on the laptop tonight, so I better watch now'

Pls don't be ugly, pls don't be ugly, pls don't be ugly

THEY BETTER HAD PUT SOME BUDGET ON THE ENEMIES THIS TIME

LUCIFER'S VOICEEEEEEEEEE

As much as I hate the pig, he's so valid for reacting like that to Lucifer's body fr

Second hand embarrassment though

I turned down the light instead of the sound ssjshdjskd

JWHDKSKDBDN POR QUÉ TAN TIESOS SKDBDN

Everyone else is having homophobic thoughts hearing the pig

And I'm too

Pls just kill him already

I KNOW THE BLONDE TWINS ARE, WELL, TWINS NO SHIT

But their designs make me laugh a bit, is literally minimal changes in clothes and faces

If you look carefully, they actually did the draw each one, but there are also obvious parts where they just copy, paste and redraw a bit (no shame)

Lucifer looks like a very tired cat (and a bit traumatized either)

He's talking about Rin like he's a lost pet aksbdjd

"I'll return him to Samael personally."

"But he also belongs to our god, my father. I cannot act without his permission."

QUE NO CERDO, YA TE DIJO QUE NO

He's so sure Rin's so strong only he (Lucifer) can defeat him (in the lab)

I love him

Shima my baby, of course you'll be an amazing model with that attitude /srs

The pig looks so disgusted (shaming)

Lucifer tiene los ojos chuecos skdvkdnd

"Soft heart..." HE GOT A SECOND OF PSTD AKDHDJND

Geeez, even I felt that cough

He's trying so hard to make up for what he did (YES, I'M TALKING ABOUT THAT)

DELUSION TIME

(That pig literally got ONE order "don't kill Rin", and what does he thinks is the best decision to covered Izumo's test results? Kill Rin! Fucking idiot, I can't wait for him to die)

That pig so gay fr

I mean, can't blame him, when Lucifer had such a voice

Almost nine minutes already, yikes

Ugh, that was NOT sensory friendly lmao

ALRIGHT, THEY DID PUT THE BUDGET HERE

YOU CAN DO IT KONEKO (spent two minutes trying to remembered his name)

I like the detail of the bite mark on his head

RUN RUN RUN RUN

Oh boy, those are some teeth

KURO'S SCREENTIME

"Shiny-smooth baldly" LMAO

I love that since none of them can understand demons (aside from Rin), they misunderstand Kuro's intentions for something selfless instead of 'me hungry, go get my human so he can feed me'

I don't think Kuro realized it either?

Also if you put attention, you can hear how they heard Kuro's 'speaking'

Yukio my little genius

Smart boy praising smart boy, that's what I came here for

OH, TO EXCHANGE LOOKS WITH YOUR SPY FRIEND HAHAHAHAH

Not Shiemi scaring the zombie ajhdjdkd

SUGURO'S BAZOOKAAAAAAAAA SCENE YES BABY

SHIMA WITH BROWN HAIR

My baby looked (and was) so young /crying

GO BON GO

I feel so bad for the zombies though, they didn't ask for it nor have a choice, they didn't even realize in what state their bodies are

Challenge 'stop putting overwhelming pressure over kids that didn't ask for the position nor blood in their veins', impossible!!

Half joking half not

NOT THE WORTH ISSUES, I'M NOT MENTALLY STABLE ENOUGH RIGHT NOW

I love that they portrayed the whole ritual so tenderly, soft speaking, a gentle touch

There's no reason to fight, just let it go

"I have to be on the side of the humans! Otherwise—"

I feel you Rin, I feel you

THE MUSIC, THE MUSIC

IS THE SAME THEY USED FOR THE FIGHT AGAINST THE IMPURE KING

"You're late!"

"Glad to see you again too!"

Tism moment with that sound hahan't

NOOOOOOOOOO, YOU CAN'T END IT HERE

CRYING, KICKING, SCREAMING

I can't wait another week wewewewe

I think next one it'll include the pig dead for sure, but I'm not holding my hopes too up

I think it'll be Izumo's mother dead too

I started watching aoex season 3

So I decided to share my thoughts as I see the chapters (NOT SPOILER FREE)

Chapter 1:

not a full fan of the new art style but not a hater either

can't forgive them for taking away my troll clown though

also the voice, dunno, maybe I'm remembering the voice wrong in past seasons but yeah, not for me (especially when he says "eins, zwei, drei" I just feel like is the wrong tone)

also, I love the pace of the chapter but am really bitter that they cut the bestism (Angel & Lightning) first show time together so short

THE GEHENNA SCENE WAS SOOOOOO, loved the light hint to trigger response from Rin

uhhhhh what else....

THE SHAPESHIFTER BATTLE

so, so good, when Rin, Izumo, and Shima attacked and the camera was moving I didn't know where to look at

I'MMA FIGHT WITH MY BARE HANDS ANYONE WHO DARES SAYS MY BOY RIN ISN'T SMART AFTER THIS SEASON

alright then, time for chapter 2 :D

[gumikpxp]

Needle & Tread

The Princess

Warnings: None

Genres: Royal AU, fluff, angst, eventual smut

Pairing: Prince!Yeosang x Seamstress!Reader

Synopsis: The day of Y/n's first ball finally arrives after many restless nights of creating gowns, her grandmother almost a bit too excited for her granddaughter to attended. However the ball goes a completely different way than expected when she hears cries in the palace hall and decided to follow them.

A/n: I suck at describing cloths so the gown y/n wears is at the top! I had to type this out twice because I didn't know I couldn't copy and paste from my notes I wanted to cry.

"I'm only trying to help dear, my hands may be weaker than they use to be, but it doesn't make them useless!" The elder scoffed at her granddaughter before crossing her arms.

"I'm only trying to help dear, my hands may be weaker than they use to be, but it doesn't make them useless!" The elder scoffed at her granddaughter before crossing her arms.

"I'm only trying to help dear, my hands may be weaker than they use to be, but it doesn't make them useless!" The elder scoffed at her granddaughter before crossing her arms.

"I never said they were useless, you can help cut the fabric, just straining your hands to use the needles give them cramps you know that, you'll only complain later tonight." Y/n sighed as she took the dress from her elder and hung it up on the rack with the other finished dresses. She patted down the fabric and smiled as she admired her work, proud of herself.

"It looks beautiful darling."

"Thank you I try my best!" Y/n smiled as she lined up the dresses in order of their pick up time.

"Are you excited dear?"

"Hmm? For what?" She twirled around to look at her grandmother speaking and the older woman only rolled her eyes at the girls forgetfulness.

"Oh I don't know dear maybe the ball you made all these dresses for. You know the Prince will be looking for his princess now, it's almost time for him to be wed soon." The elder woman hinted to her granddaughter, who despite listening intently seemed to be a bit too oblivious to the hint the woman gave.

"Oh yes, I'm sure Prince Kang will find a beautiful Princess to become his queen." The girl smiled before rushing to the table to pour some tea. "Would you like some tea?"

"Mm, yes dear, y/n don't you think you're being a bit dense, you will be attending the ball at the palace right?"

"Hm? Oh yes of course I love seeing all of my gowns displayed so beautifully." She handed her grandmother the cup and than took her own before taking her seat.

"Well than what if the Prince takes a fancy to you?"

"Oh don't be silly, there will be so many beautiful maidens around him all night, I hardly doubt he'll even have half the mind to spare me a glance. Plus I'm no Princess I belong here in the village with you." Y/n smiled as she began sipping her tea.

"Oh please you'll be a perfect princess and queen any prince would be a fool not to see that." Her grandmother scoffed yet again.

Y/n sighed as her cheeks bloomed a rose color at the compliment as she placed her cup down in order to fidget with the ring on her finger. "Well now it just sound like you want me done." The girl joked.

"If you being gone means living in a palace married to a prince than yes dear, yes I would like you to be gone." Here Grandmother joked back with a chuckle earning an eye roll from the younger.

A bell echoed though the home cutting their conversation to an abrupt stop.

"Looks like someone is here for their dress." Y/n stated and rushed to help her guests with a smile.

"Oh what would the kingdom do without their precious seamstress." The older woman sighed with a gentle shake of her head before bringing the tea cup to her lips again.

Y/n sighed as she clasped her last piece of jewelry on before taking a step back to look at herself in the mirror. She smiled gently at the dress she wore.

Here skin was adorned in a beautiful ivory silk gown with a light blue layer of baby blue tule over it. A matching g blue silk ribbon around her waist tied in a bow that rested comfortably on her hip. Her bust being a beautiful corset made from the same materials, a floral print hidden under the tule. Sleeves rested off her shoulders elbow length bishop sleeves made from the same tule.

Her grandmother finally walked in to look at the girl completely dressed only for her to stop in her tracks and gap at the sight of her.

"Wow... you've really outdone yourself dear, you look gorgeous, the gown is just perfect on you." She spoke looking teary eyed.

"What's wrong why are you crying?" Y/n became frantic looking for a handkerchief in order to aid her grandmother.

"Oh your mother would be so proud," she spoke before loudly blowing her nose into the cloth.

Y/n grimaced at the noise but shrugged it off quickly before thanking her grandmother.

"Mm, I'm glad that you think so." She smiled.

"Ah... we are definitely becoming a royal family my dear."

Y/n's eyes widened at the comment before laughing while her grandmother looked at her like she was crazy.

"We can dream, but I'm only a village girl grandma." Y/n stated with a gentle shake of her head before taking her grandmothers hand and helping her to the main room. Y/n grabbed her clutch. "Will you be okay her alone?"

"Oh please, I'll be just fine I'm old not helpless."

They both laughed together before saying their goodbyes for the night.

The palace was very elegant to say the least but what else would you expect. Music played beautifully as people danced and other mingled and drank with their friends or acquaintances. Y/n sighed dreamily as she was able to admire all the moving art of dresses and suits that others wore that night. Gaining inspiration for her next projects.

She was suddenly stopped in her tracks by a butler who held a tray of glasses which she assumed to be Champaign or white wine.

"A drink maiden?" the man asked and she bowed slightly before taking one and walking off she giggled to herself at how fancy everything was.

She mostly kept to herself in her village due to the amount of work she had so she didn't have any friends to mingle with. However that didn't seem to bother her as she was too engrossed with all the beauty around her.

She noticed a group of women all gossiping and staring off in a a particular direction. Becoming curious y/n made her way towards the crowd just close enough to catch a glimpse at what all the women where gawking at. Once she caught sight she smiled softly with a small chuckle.

Of course it only made sense, Prince Kang and his Royal guard Hongjoong were having a chat. Both complete heartthrobs to all the maidens in the kingdom. She of course would have to agree the Prince looked incredibly handsome as always.

With a shake of her head y/n decided head into the hall in order to look around at some more art that adorned the walls of the palace. At least that was until she heard soft cries.

Listening closely she rushed towards the sound in case someone was injured, which only lead her to the stairs where a lady was crying.

"Excuse is everything alright what's de you crying?" y/n asked taking a seat a step lower from the women before her eyes widened as the women lifted her head to look at who sat by her.

"Oh! You're highness! Please forgive me I didn't realize!" She rushed out as she bowed her head low only to hear a soft snort.

"That's quite alright, please raise your head dear," the Princess spoke before folding her hands in her lap.

Y/n peered up at the women eyes sparking at her beauty.

"I'm alright just scared to death at the moment." The princess chuckled nervously looking about bashful to the situation.

"Is everything alright Your highness?" The girl asked once again however with a more proper tone to her voice only to earn another laugh from the princess.

"Oh please call me Yoona I insist, and yes I'm quite okay no harm done however my dress got caught to my bracelet and caused a nasty snag, I'm just scared to go to my seamstress for help.. she can be a bit scary at times." Yoona explained as she twirled her hair nervously.

"Hm well I may be able to help you out with that, however we should hurry before anyone notices that the princess is missing." Y/n spoke as she opened her clutch and took out the small sewing kit. "Now where was the nasty snag?"

"Oh here!" Yoona quickly pointed out moving the gown around for easy access. "What's your name?" The princess asked.

"L/n F/n, pleasure to meet you princess." Y/n stated with another bow to her head before making quick work of the dress.

"Oh the pleasure is mine completely, thank you so much for helping me... now I don't have to deal with the old hag.. woah! I can hardly tell the dress was damaged." Yoona exclaimed eyes wide as y/n broke the thread and stood from the step she sat at.

Y/n held her hands out to help the princess up from the step and proceeded to par the dress down.

"There good as new! Oh- and my mother taught me when I was young, I'm a seamstress in my village, I actually made a lot gowns here.. including my own!" The young seamstress glowed as she spoke about her work and the Princess smiled at her.

"Wow your work is amazing, your gown is beautiful and it suits you perfectly, you definitely have a talent for it!" Yoona complimented her and y/n quickly turned the color of a rose.

"Oh! You must come with me if live to see what other gowns you made or the ball tonight! Oh! And we should show my mother too.. she loved this stuff or at least she loves shiny pretty stuff.. so she'll love you!" Yoona stated and rushed to link their arms together before they made their way back to the ballroom together.

"W-wait the Queen!?" Y/n's eyes widened before quickly matching the pace of the excited princess. Suddenly she felt a tone of nerves bubble in her stomach.

[jinxthejubilee]

My Final Project! 🍪💝🍪

Here she is! This is Wedding/Bride Cookie. I was inspired by the game Cookie Run, and wanted to try drawing my own cookie in my style.

So! Let's go over each step it took to make her!

(Also, I promise you that I my handwriting is better than in the pictures, it's just hard to write on a phone.

The Sketch ✏️

The assignment was to create a your own character in a dynamic pose so it wouldn't look flat or unrealistic looking.

We had to draw three different characters to start with, then decide which would look the best.

Originally, I had no intention of drawing this character as an actual option.

Fun fact, I drew Bride Cookie as a joke with my friend, but the more I drew her, the more I liked her design.

So I went with it!

Her dress is supposed to be a wedding cake, with fondant flowers and icing drapes.

I don't know where I got the idea to give her buns with veils on it, but I do NOT regret it. I don't know, buns are just really cute.

To amplify the cuteness, I gave her long, curly eyelashes, a bouquet of flowers, and puffy sleeves for her dress.

After I chose her out of my three options, we then began the harder stages.

Coloring Time! 🖍

I took the sketch into Photoshop and started coloring her in.

I wanted to use a variety of pinks for her outfit and flowers.

I thought that plain white for her dress would be too much on the eyes, so I used a very light pink.

I know that in Cookie Run, almost all of the cookies have white lining for their eyes and eyebrows, but it didn't look right on her, so I used the pink that I used for her hair.

I made her eyes a shade of purple to compliment the magenta flowers.

I gave her pink blush on her dimples.

And I made the paper on the bouquet 'Brick Pink.'

My professor told us that in this stage, you're essentially just coloring in a paper doll, so have some fun with it!

Shading and Textures 🖌

A big part of our final was using and making as many textures as possible.

To double down on the dress being a cake, I grabbed a cake texture and used it on all three layers of the dress, including the back of the dress.

I brushed in highlights and shades on the drapes to make them look like frosting.

I shaded the bottom of the dress.

I shaded her head to make it look like her hair was creating shadows on her face.

Her arms, sleeve, and hand got shading on the sides.

I got rid of the extra white shine on the bottom of her eyes and made the shine a magenta-ish color.

As for the buns, I shaded the bottom of each of them to make them look round.

Going back to textures, I added a paper-like texture on the flower wrapping, and a sour and sugar strip of candy on the leaves.

I shaded the leaves and created shadows on the paper.

And finally, I hilighted the top and shaded the bottom of her hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes. It doesn't look like frosting at this stage, it just looks like taffy, but I liked it!

The Homestretch 🌸

Here's where I started working on the flowers.

I'm honestly really proud of how they turned out!

I gave them a chocolate texture, and painted them myself in Photoshop.

Another fun fact: I completely forgot how I made the first flower since I messed up while making it, but then the flower turned out to be so pretty that I decided to recreate them...without success. So I copy and pasted them on by one, rotated them and/or painted them a bit differently, and scaled them one on the dress bigger so they would each look like different flowers.

As the great Bob Ross once said, "There are no mistakes, just happy little accidents."

After finishing up the flower petals, I went back to each flower to give them their yellow centers.

I gave the centers each a nutty chocolate texture, and painted them one by one to go along with the designated flowers' posing.

Going on to shading, the drapes have their own shadows, and I trimmed the drapes a bit to make them look more elegant, instead of them looking like jagged cutouts.

And her arms, sleeves, and back have their own shadows.

The End Result ✨️🎨

As you can see, I did quite a bit of adding in this one.

To bring out the frosting of the dress, I painted the swirls of white with pink lines to make ruffles.

Speaking of which, I added a bit more shading to the sleeves and the veils to add more movement in the pose.

I made the sleeve and arm shadows a harder edge since they looked to far away last time.

I also added more shading to the sides of the dress.

The hair didn't look to much like frosting to me, so I drew in strands and added more shading to make her hair look more wavy.

I didn't bother adding any textures to the veils, they look waaay better without them. I tried using tulle textures, but they messed with the veils color.

And the final touch. I couldn't find a suitable texture for her skin, since every single picture I found was too light, too dark, or just looked awful on her. But I found a way!

To make her look more like a cookie, I found a brush in Photoshop that looks like sparkles or sand (I forgot what it was called), and used lighter and darker shades of brown to paint her skin.

Then I lightly used an eraser on the sparkles to make it look like she was baked that way.

It's a bit hard to see now, but if you look closer, you can see them.

Artist Note: And there you have it! I hope you like her design as much as I loved make her!

This was the first time I EVER made my own character in Photoshop, and it was the first time I made a good looking character digitally.

Anyway, I hope this wasn't boring for you guys, but I really am proud of this project and I just wanted an excuse to post more art stuff on here.

But with that being said, I hope you all enjoyed, and I'll see you later! Byeee! 💗

[cocastyle]

Change - Ch. 2 | O N E

Pairing - Bill Denbrough x reader

Word Count - 13,258

A/N - super long beginning chapter for this half of the series but one hundred percent necessary! I didn’t want to split up the part where each person gets their phone calls, so I decided to make it one long chapter to kick the second movie rewrite off. I am beyond excited for what’s to come and I really hope you all enjoy this rewrite!

if you would like to be added to the tag list for this series let me know!

C H A N G E

Change Series Masterlist

* - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - *

O N E - Beginning of the End

* - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - *

Memory. It's a funny thing.

People want to believe they are what they choose to remember—the good stuff, the moments, the places, the people we all hold onto. But sometimes. . .sometimes we are what we wish we could forget.

The thing is sometimes what we wish was forgotten, what we tried to leave in the past, won't stay there. Sometimes it comes back for you.

- - -

Bill Denbrough stared blankly at his computer screen, watching as the cursor blinked repeatedly as he had yet to type a word other than the setting which was 'attic' on the paper. A copy of his latest book titled The Attic Room sat beside his computer, little slips of paper sticking out from different pages he had marked down and made notes on.

A knock on his trailer door was what finally snapped the man out of his thoughts, lifting his head in the direction of the door in a tired manner as if he wasn't quite sure if the knock was real or not. When the door suddenly opened up, Bill was quick to sit up and nod his head forward, the action causing his glasses to fall from his forehead and back onto his nose as he pretended to be typing away. "Mr. Denbrough," a soft voice said and Bill glanced over to see a woman a little younger than him with short blonde hair and a headset, "they need you on set."

It took all of Bill's willpower not to look at all surprised when he was practically screaming inside of his head. Already? Hadn't he only just sat down to write? How long had he been sitting there? Glancing at his watch, Bill swallowed thickly once he realized he had been sitting there for hours now, the day already almost over by now.

Bill could feel the woman's eyes still on him and he was quick to plaster a fake smile on his face as he looked to her and gave her a short nod. That seemed to be enough of an answer for her and she disappeared outside leaving Bill to collect his things as he tiredly took his glasses off his face.

His eyes instantly flickered to his computer and he put both hands on his face before dragging them down with a small sigh. Bill reached out and shut the computer without another thought about it and grabbed the computer and copy of his book before hurrying out of his trailer where the woman was waiting for him.

"We're just going to go this way," the woman said as she began to walk Bill towards one of the many buildings on the Warner Bros property.

Bill was trying his best not to seem as nervous as he was, gripping onto his book and computer tight enough with one hand that his other could relax peacefully by his side. He felt queasy and for a moment he wondered if he was going to be sick. He hadn't felt this nervous in a long time and Bill thought to himself about the last time he had been this nervous if not more.

For just a second it was like a image of startling e/c eyes flashed through his head, but it had vanished before he could grasp it. The image was gone as quick as it had came and Bill had no clue what he had even been thinking about in the first place.

A small frown began to make its way onto Bill's face, but it was quickly replaced by a panicked look once he saw the garage door to the set beginning to fall closed. His eyes widened and he jogged past the woman who shouted after him, but he ignored her and was quick to slide under the door just as it was closing.

"Hey, use the door!" a man exclaimed as he pointed towards the regular door that Bill could've easily walked through. "Come on! You never seen Indiana Jones?" Bill questioned, his eyebrows furrowing at the man. It had only been a joke, something to get his heart bumping in an excited and adventurous way instead of the nervous beating his heart had encountered moments before.

"Watch it!" another voice exclaimed and Bill was quick to stop in his tracks as a man walked past him with a container of props rolling across the floor. Bill shook his head slightly, already overwhelmed, and began to make his way across the room and over to where he assumed the director would be.

"Hey, hey, you a member?" a man asked, but Bill was barely able to register what he said as he walked past him. "Hmm? I'm. . .the writer," Bill finally managed to get out before he walked onto set.

Instead of finding the director, Bill was met with another sight that made him even more uncomfortable then he already was. "Bill," Audra Phillips, the leading lady of the movie who also happened to be his ex-wife, greeted him. "Hey."

He had been married to Audra for eight years before the two had ended things a year back. In all honesty, Bill wasn't quite sure why he had married the woman in the first place. He had thought he loved her, but the moment she had asked for a divorce he could only describe having felt one emotion—relief. Their marriage hadn't ended badly and there had been no problems. It was just two people simply falling out of love with each other. Audra had even started to date a co-star she had met a few months back and Bill was happy for her. After all, he had come to the realization that Audra wasn't the girl for him. He had a feeling like there was someone out there for him and the crazy thing was that he felt like he had already met her, but that she was lost. Weird, right?

Bill and Audra weren't exactly friends per say and only saw each other as business partners, knowing that neither one would be able to survive in their business without a mutual agreement between the two. However, Bill still couldn't help but think about how much he hated having to work the same movie with her.

"Do you have the pages?" Audra questioned, snapping Bill out of his thoughts as she took a step closer to him, her eyes staring intently at him in both a questioning and alarmed manner. Bill hesitated and it was then that Audra's eyes widened. However, neither got a chance to say anything before the director was suddenly lowering his seat down in between the two, his gaze on Bill.

"My friend," the director Peter began, looking to Bill in exasperation, "a film needs an ending. You do know that right?" "Oh, yeah," Bill replied, looking to Peter in slight disbelief. However, he couldn't blame him for asking. Bill had a tendency to procrastinate when it came to writing especially when it was something like this where they wanted him to change the ending of his book.

"You said that you needed another day to finish the pages and we're shooting this thing. It's tonight," Audra told him, her eyes still on Bill as she spoke in an accusing tone. "It's been seventeen hours," Bill muttered, but no one seemed to be listening to him.

"Everybody calm down, okay?" Peter said, his eyes flickering between the two as if he were afraid they would begin to fight. Despite their business agreement, Audra and Bill had been known to argue on more than one occasion and it was obvious Peter did not want to see another one of those. "I'm calm," Bill told him, unsure as to where Peter could see any hostility in what he was saying.

"I want you to be happy with the movie, you understand? I'm on your side," Peter insisted. "That's. . .that's great. Cause in my book the ending-" Bill began. "Is terrible," Peter finished with no regret or hesitation. Bill blinked in surprise and looked to the director with furrowed eyebrows. "With all due respect, people love your book. Love! But they hated the ending."

"You said you liked the ending," Bill said, looking a little defeated as he studied the man in front of him. Did people really hate his endings? "That was a lie," Peter told him bluntly while Audra glanced to Bill in a way that seemed to hold just a tad bit of sympathy. "We got to do better, okay?" Bill was hesitant before looking down at the ground and nodding his head. "Yeah," he breathed out, although he wasn't sure what to think.

"Audra, you have my notes. Could you-?" Peter questioned as he gestured towards Bill causing the man to look up and over at Audra in surprise while she nodded in response. "Thank you very much. Could you take me back to-"

Before Bill could even hear the rest of his sentence, Peter was gone and back into the film leaving Bill and Audra standing there. "You have his notes?" Bill finally questioned, turning to look at his ex wife in disbelief. “He's not wrong," Audra sighed. "You hate my endings too?" Bill asked surprised, having never heard in their eight years of marriage that she hated his endings. In fact, she had praised him on multiple occasions. Had a year of them not being married changed her perspective that much?

"Not all your endings. This just-" Audra admitted while Bill's eyes widened and he turned to walk away. Audra was quick to follow after him, knowing that he had to get the pages done in order for this movie to be finished. "What? Do you want me to keep lying to you just because we used to-" "Be married?" Bill questioned as he looked back at the women. "No, no. You just. . .you been blowing smoke up my ass for eight years? I guess I thought you were someone else."

"I have not been blowing smoke up your ass," Audra said, a look of anger crossing her face as she stopped beside Bill who was at the catering table.

"Everybody wants a happy ending. Everybody wants closure, but it's not the way life works out," Bill insisted, hesitating slightly as he felt his heart ache. For a moment he thought he felt something poking his brain, a memory begging to be let out. But it was gone just as fast as the image from earlier and he was already forgetting about it.

"I think what Peter wants and what the studio wants-" Audra began only for Bill to snap his head in her direction. "The studio?" he questioned, even more surprised than before now that he knew that everyone seemed to be talking about his book and how much the ending sucked. "When did you become the company? You're an artist. Come on. What's wrong with doing it the way it's written? The way I want it? What's wrong with being the woman I want you to be?"

Audra's eyes widened a little in anger and she gritted her teeth before saying, "Fuck you, Bill!"

"On the page," Bill sighed, not having meant it the way Audra was taking it, but it seemed the woman didn't care. "The part I mean. Not you. I don't even care about you in that way." Audra's eyes widened even more in anger and Bill swore she was about to slap him. "Shit, that came out wrong."

Bill's cell ringing was what finally saved him from himself and he went to fish his phone out of his pocket while Audra sent a glare at him before walking away. He didn't even bother yelling after her for he knew there was no point. She wouldn't want to listen and they would just end up arguing more than they just had.

Turning back to the food table so that Bill wouldn't have to acknowledge the eyes that were staring at him from all around the movie set, the man glanced at his phone to see that it was a call coming from Derry, Maine. Bill got that same feeling once again, like there was something he was missing, but he pushed it aside and instead exited out of one of the back doors so that he woundn't disrupt filming.

"Hello?" Bill questioned as he put the phone to his ear, confused as to who could be calling him that lived in Derry, Maine. "Bill Denbrough?" a deep voice said, a voice that Bill did not recognize at all. "It's Mike." Bill furrowed his eyebrows, still not knowing who this person was. "Mike who?" Bill asked.

"Mike Hanlon."

It took Bill a moment to even register what the man had said and it was in that moment that he stopped in his tracks. The nervousness he had felt earlier about talking to Peter and Audra was nothing compared to the feeling he was suddenly getting.

It was like his whole body had gone cold, so cold in fact that he was numb to all other sensations. All he could hear was a ringing in his ears before it was quickly overpowered by his heartbeat that had begun to race so fast despite Bill not knowing why. His breathing picked up its pace ever so slightly and Bill didn't even register his hand which had started to shake as it held onto his phone.

Fear, that was what he felt. But for what? He was unsure.

"From Derry."

And it was then that Bill was brought back to reality, wincing slightly as he suddenly got a flashback of a young dark skinned boy smiling at him. He had to have been thirteen years old and the image of the boy plus the name Mike Hanlon and the connection of Derry were enough for Bill to remember who it was he was talking to.

How had he been able to forget about Mike? They had been best friends up until the day Bill had moved away and for a moment Bill remembered having promised to keep in touch with Mike only to realize he never had. Now why was that?

A few more memories flashed through Bill's head and it felt as if he couldn't breath as he remembered his thirteen year old self sitting in a circle with the people who had all been his best friends—Stanley Uris, Mike Hanlon, Ben Hanscom, Beverly Marsh, Richie Tozier, Eddie Kaspbrak, and Y/N Uris.

Bill felt like he had just gotten a punch to the gut at that last name, his eyes widening as he suddenly saw an image of Y/N Uris standing before him in a field. Her h/c hair blowing gently in the wind, her e/c eyes glistening under the rays of the sun while she sent him one of those effortless smiles of hers that used to make him feel as if he were going to have a heart attack.

You make me happy, Bill Denbrough.

Y/N Uris.

Now how the hell could he forget about her?

Before Bill could think of her much longer, his hand suddenly began to flare up in pain. The man winced and was quick to look down at his hand and at a scar that ran along his palm, a scar that he didn't remember having until that very moment. And all he could do was stare at the scar while Mike's voice rang in his ear.

"You need to come home."

- - -

"Eddie, I keep telling you not to scare me like this and you never listen to me," Myra Kaspbrak complained over the speaker of the car while a shaky hand reached for the glove compartment to pull out a container of pills.

"Alright, Myra!" Eddie Kaspbrak exclaimed, knowing that there was no other way to gain the attention of his wife unless his voice was louder than hers. He held the bottle of pills up to his lips and was quick to dump his doctor prescribed amount into his mouth. "Please not now."

"You shouldn't be out there," Myra insisted while Eddie huffed in annoyance low enough that she couldn't hear. "Eddie, it's not safe to drive when the roads are slick like this."

"Sweetheart, it stopped raining like three hours ago, alright? Everything's going to be fine," Eddie assured her before the honking of a cab gained his attention. The man was quick to look out the window and yell, "Hey, dickhead! Slow traffic mean anything to you?"

"What if you hydroplane?" Myra continued, ignoring Eddie's yells. "I'm not going to hydroplane," Eddie insisted, already feeling himself becoming more and more tense behind the wheel. He was trying to keep himself calm, but that was hard. How had he ever been able to calm his younger self down when there are people like Myra always yelling at him?

Taking in a deep breath, Eddie managed to keep his voice steady long enough to reply, "It is my job to assess risks so please trust me when I tell you that statistically speaking I am much more likely to get into an accident because I am talking to you on the phone! Alright? I have to go. I will talk to you soon. Goodbye."

Eddie didn't even give Myra time to respond before he was ending the call and he let out a small sigh of relief once it was over. However, he had barely even gotten the sigh out before his phone was ringing again.

Eddie was quick to press the answer button and, thinking it was a client, he said, "Edward Kaspbrak speaking." "You didn't say 'okay, bye, I love you' like you usually do," Myra's voice came through the speaker once again.

Eddie had to resist the urge to scream as he said, "Listen to me! I can't! I'm going to be late to this-" His phone began to ring again and he glanced down at the screen before falling quiet, his eyes locking onto the caller ID which read Derry, Maine. "-meeting."

Eddie felt as if someone had dunked a bucket of ice cold water on him, the cold seeping all the way down to his bones and making his whole body ache. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end and for the first time in a while he had the sudden urge to use his inhaler.

He was afraid, but what of?

But then he saw a flash of an image, a boy with thick rimmed glasses grinning at him as he nudged his side with his elbow. And then he was hearing a voice that didn't belong to the boy with glasses whisper into his ear, soft and so familiar despite the fact that he couldn't pinpoint why he remembered it.

Eds.

He had never been called Eds before to his knowledge, having always hated it since he was a child. So why did he suddenly hear a young girl's voice whispering it into his ear? And why was that enough to calm him down and make his fear disappear?

"Say 'I love you,' Eddie," Myra insisted, but Eddie was barely listening to her, his gaze still focused on the caller ID. "Okay. I love you, Mommy," Eddie muttered as if in a trance. "What?" Myra's voice said and that was enough to have Eddie snap out of it.

"Myra," he corrected before going to end the call. "Bye." Eddie didn't even hesitate to answer the call from Derry, but when it got to speaking, he found himself hesitating longer than he should've for an unknown reason.

"Hello?" Eddie finally said, his eyes staring warily at the screen as if that would answer all of his unknown questions. "Who is this?"

"It's me. Mike," a voice replied and Eddie gulped, his eyes still on the screen. "Mike who?" Eddie questioned nervously. He was too focused on the screen to notice that he ran a red light until honking was heard and a yellow cab hit the car from the side. Eddie's car came to a screeching stop as all air bags went off.

"Eddie, you okay?" Mike asked in a panic after hearing the crash from the other side of the line.

From under the air bag, Eddie's voice croaked out. "Yeah, I'm pretty good," Eddie replied although he had a feeling he was going to be anything but okay after this phone call.

- - -

Richie Tozier gripped onto the metal stair railing the best that he could as he puked over the side and onto the ground below. His whole body was shaking as he stood there feeling colder than he had ever felt before yet sweating to the point where his glasses began to slide down his nose.

He was sick once more over the side of the railing before he managed to glance at his phone which he had been on only moments before to answer a call from Derry, Maine. He hadn't known what to expect when answering it and had honestly thought either a fan had found his number or someone was calling to try and book him.

However nothing could prepare him for Mike Hanlon to be on the other end, a name he hadn't heard of in years and a boy he hadn't heard from in just as long. He hadn't even remembered the boy until Mike had said his full name, the name jogging something in Richie's mind as he remembered the homeschooler he used to be friends with.

It was then that Richie remembered the rest of his best friends who had all dawned the group name of the Losers Club and Richie realized he hadn't thought of them in what seemed like forever. In fact, he couldn't even remember half of the things they did together, but as the minutes ticked by he slowly began to remember his best friends who he had joked and messed around with until he was pretty sure the memories had gotten too much for him that he had been sick.

It had to be the memories, right? What else could it be?

"What the fuck?" a voice exclaimed behind him causing the man to stand up and look to see his manager standing at the door that led back into the club. "You were fine like five seconds ago. Who was it? Who called?"

Richie couldn't bring himself to say anything, his whole body still shaking violently as he gripped onto the metal railing. Why did he suddenly have a feeling like something was wrong? Was it because Mike told him he needed to come home? Was it because he felt guilty for having forgotten about the very friends he used to swear he would never forget about?

"Rich?" his manager said and for a moment Richie swore he heard the nickname said in what he distantly remembered as Eddie Kaspbrak's voice. "Rich?" there it was again, but this time it sounded like a girl. It took merely a second for Richie to identify it as Y/N Uris and he swore he grew paler, but why?

"Talk to me," his manager said and it was then that Richie began to snap out of it and stood up taller as he knew that neither Eddie or Y/N were here or even still thirteen years old. "You're on in two minutes," his manger announced as he handed Richie a rag which he quickly used to wipe his mouth. "You good? Cause you look not good."

In all honesty, Richie wasn't sure if he was good or not. He had forgotten about his best friends. Mike Hanlon had called telling him he needed to come home without any explanation why. His hand hurt like a bitch because of some scar he didn't remember having. And he had a sickening feeling in his gut which he could only describe as fear. But fear of what exactly?

"I'm fine," Richie insisted, quickly leaving the alleyway and walking back into the club. He couldn't think about Derry or the Losers any more especially not when he was supposed to be doing a show. Mike would just have to wait.

"You're fine? Good. Okay. And we're walking and we're walking," his manager muttered as he quickly stepped into line by Richie's side. "Sixty seconds," a stage manager announced to the pair. "Even faster," his manager said as he ushered Richie to pick up his pace, but Richie was struggling to even stand up right at this point. "Could you get him a bottle of water maybe?"

"Bourbon," Richie corrected, knowing he would need something a lot stronger to get through the show. "Bourbon?" his manager questioned before realizing Richie was serious and nodding to the stage manager to go. "Sure. Sure." "And a mint," Richie muttered as he grimaced at the taste in his mouth.

"Showtime," his manager said as they got closer to the stage, but Richie shook his head in distress. "I don't think I can do this," Richie admitted, feeling sicker by the second. His manager began to grumble behind him, but Richie was barely paying attention as someone was suddenly handing him a glass of bourbon and a container of mints. "That was fast."

Richie downed the drink almost instantly before popping multiple mints in his mouth. Knowing he had a crowd waiting for him, Richie took in a deep breath before walking over to the door that lead to the stage but that actually happened to be the emergency exit.

"This way," his manager corrected him, directing the man down a different hallway and through a different door. "Attaboy. Okay." "Alright, how do I look?" Richie questioned, his hands violently shaking the glass and a container of mints in his hands while he forced a smile onto his face.

His manager grimaced slightly and stared at Richie for a moment before sighing, "Yeah, your hands are shaking, Rich." Richie blinked in surprise before looking down at his hands to find that they were in fact shaking. "Shit," he muttered before quickly shoving the two items into his manager's hands. It was too late to do anything else, so the man began to walk towards the stage, slowly breathing in and out to try and calm his nerves.

"Ladies and gentlemen. Please welcome Richie Tozier!"

Richie was quick to put on a fake smile and raise his hand as he walked out on stage. The crowd began to clap and cheer, a sound that usually made Richie feel at home but tonight made him feel more alone and uncomfortable than ever.

Cursing himself slightly, Richie walked over to the microphone in the middle of the stage and took in a deep breath before smiling at the audience and beginning his routine, ignoring the slight shake of his hands that he was desperately trying to control.

"Alright, how we doin' today?" Richie questioned earning a roar of cheering from the audience. It was obvious that they couldn't tell he was nervous and that put Richie a little bit at ease.

"So my girlfriend caught me uh masterbating to her friend's Facebook page and uh. . .so now I'm in masterbaters anonymous," Richie said, reciting the lines he had read off of a script for the first time the night before. The crowd seemed to like it and laughed and that laughter only made Richie feel more at ease.

"And I stand up at the first meeting and I say 'my name is Richie Trashmouth-'" Richie stopped abruptly, his whole demeanor changing as he accidentally said the nickname that he been bestowed upon him when he was younger. He hadn't even remembered the nickname up until it slipped from his mouth. Where had that come from?

Oh okay, trash the trash-mouth, I get it, he distantly heard his thirteen year old voice say in his head although he couldn't remember why he was saying that or to whom.

In a blink of an eye the memory was gone and Richie could do nothing but stand there on stage with a blank expression, the joke completely gone from his head. In fact, he couldn't even seem to remember the rest of the script he had spent hours practicing.

"Trashmouth uh. . .I forgot the joke," Richie admitted while a whistle was heard from the crowd. Before long people had started to whisper, some even booed before a woman yelled out, "You suck!" Richie faked a smile at that before looking down at his feet. He was suddenly overcome with another wave of nausea and Richie couldn't help but think back to the phone call with Mike.

What the fuck had that phone call done to him?

- - -

"Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for letting us present to you today," an employee of Hanscom & Associates said, his eyes flickering over the table before him before he gestured towards the building model on the table in front of them. "Now this will include over a million square feet of commercial and residential space-"

"What I'm really looking for is to understand how we create even more retail opportunities," another man at the table explained, his gaze steady and calculating. "If we put in walls here and all along here-“

"Lose them," a new voice said causing everyone in the room to look to the television screen which held a video conference call with the owner of the company himself. "With all due respect, Mr. Hanscom," the original man began, but Ben Hanscom was quick to correct him.

"Ben," he insisted as he leaned back a little in the office chair he had at home. "And with all due respect, I'm getting claustrophobic just looking at this model, aren't you? Look throw up more walls, it's gonna feel like a prison. You know what people want to do in prison? Get out, right? This should be a place that brings people together. A meeting ground."

Ben's eyes flickered down to his wallet and he gently reached for it before opening it up, his fingers brushing against an old folded piece of paper that was slightly sticking out with cursive handwriting just beginning to peak out behind the leather.

Ben rested his fingers against the paper and looked up thoughtfully as an image of a wooden room filled his thoughts, laughter of children echoing in his head as he distantly remembered a group of kids that had changed his life forever.

"Clubhouse," he whispered, his eyes glazing over as he got lost in thought. "And if, while people are there then-"

A small buzz pulled the man out of his thoughts and he trailed off as he looked to his right and at his phone sitting beside him. He froze at the sight of a number calling from Maine.

It was like time stood still and he was sure his face paled. For some reason he felt a sense of dread wash over him, like something was nagging at the back of his head telling him to either ignore the call completely and never think of it again or drop everything just to answer it.

He didn't know why, but it felt like his throat was beginning to close up, his heart thumping a little faster while a prickling feeling started from his toes before moving up the rest of his body. For the first time in Ben didn't know how long, he felt scared. But why? It was only a phone call? What was there to fear?

"Excuse me for one second," Ben said as he looked back at his computer before quickly pausing the video conference. "Hello?" Ben said as he stood up, his voice shaky although he wasn't sure why.

"Ben? It's Mike Hanlon from Derry."

- - -

Beverly Marsh awoke with a jolt, the feeling of something wet against her cheek being enough to wake her almost instantly. However, when she went to rub her cheek, there was nothing there. Frowning, Beverly stared up at the ceiling with a blank expression on her face but was quickly startled once again when her phone began to buzz beside her.

The red head snapped her head in the phone's direction, her eyebrows furrowing at the sight of someone from Maine calling her, and was quick to pick up her phone and rush to the kitchen as to not wake up her husband.

It wasn't long before she was sitting at her kitchen table, the voice of one of her childhood best friends Mike Hanlon ringing in her ears. "You made a promise, Beverly," Mike said almost sadly, but Beverly could barely register it. She was still getting an overwhelming amount of sudden memories flashing through her head, memories she had thought she had forgotten.

She tried to grasp onto the memories, but each time she did they would disappear back to the depths of her mind just out of reach. It was like she was remembering, but not at the same time. She felt as if there were things she was forgetting, fragments of her past missing from her mind. Although she barely remembered anything from her past up until Mike had called, so why was she worried about it?

"I-I'm so sorry, Mike," Beverly sighed, shaking slightly as she hugged her body with her free arm. She wasn't sure why she was so cold all of a sudden or why she felt like her heart was in her throat. Why was she so afraid? She was only talking to Mike. "I don't even really remember."

"Haven't you ever wondered why you can't seem to remember the things most people should? About where they're from? About who you are?" Mike questioned and Beverly swallowed thickly for she knew exactly what Mike was talking about. People had asked her before about her past, but she had never been able to answer them. It was like part of her life was missing from her mind and she had no idea why.

"Why you have that scar on your hand?" Mike questioned once Beverly didn't respond and that was enough to have the red head freeze. She shakily held her hand out, her eyes locking on the scar that ran across the palm of her hand. She had barely even stared at it for a second before she suddenly felt a searing pain grow where the scar was.

"No one else remembered either. Eddie, Bill, Richie, Ben," Mike listed off all while Beverly stared at her hand. But at the mention of the last name, she couldn't help but freeze.

"Ben," she whispered almost in a daze for she hadn't heard that name in a long time. At least not when referring to the boy she used to be best friends with. For a moment she remembered a field and walking along a small path with Ben by her side, the shy boy hesitantly brushing his fingers against her own before Beverly had smiled and taken his hand in hers.

"You have to come back," Mike said, his words finally snapping out of her thoughts long enough for her to look away from her scarred hand and outside at the pouring rain. "You all do."

Beverly got that sinking feeling in her stomach once again, her whole body chilled down to the bone. "When?" she breathed out, her voice barely above a whisper.

It wasn't long before Beverly was off the phone and packing her bags. Her nerves were haywire causing her to frantically rush around while her thoughts jumbled around in her brain. She couldn't even think straight, so it didn't even register to her just how loud she was being until she had grabbed her packed bag and was going to leave her closet only to find her husband standing there.

Beverly jumped back out of pure fright, her eyes wide before she registered that it was her husband standing before her and not—

The red head's thoughts stopped instantly in their tracks. Whatever she had thought was waiting for her was gone and for a moment she wondered what she had been expecting and why she couldn't remember.

"Woah, you okay?" her husband questioned causing the red head to snap back to reality as she looked to him. "What's going on? It's uh. . .the middle of the night and you're packing?"

Beverly was quick to lean up and peck her husband's lips once as she began to walk past him. "I didn't want to wake you," Beverly admitted. "Honey, I know this week's been really exhausting. I just got a phone call from an old friend from Derry. I have to go back there. It's really hard to explain why."

"It's okay," he assured her as he walked over to where she was currently sitting on their bed tying her shoes. He sat down next to her, his face completely blank of emotion, but his voice soft. "You don't have to explain yourself to me. Relax." He reached out and gently took Beverly's hand in his own. "I trust you."

"Thank you," Beverly sighed as she leaned forward and kissed the man once more. She went to get up and grab her bag, but she barely got a step away before her husband was gripping onto her wrist tightly, his fingers digging into her arm hard enough to make the woman wince.

Beverly froze, a sickening feeling growing in her stomach once again but this time the fear was directed at her husband. She slowly turned to look at the man who was staring at the ground shaking his head.

"I just don't understand why you'd lie to me," he said before he looked up at Beverly with an accusing glare. Beverly began to shake her head, but the man ignored it and stood up, pulling her dangerously closer to him. "I heard you. You said the name Mike."

"Yes, my friend," Beverly insisted. "There was a group of us back then and-and we all made a promise to each other when we were kids-"

"You know trust is everything in a relationship," her husband persisted, his grip tightening before he released her in order to reach out and brush his hand against her cheek. Beverly couldn't help but move away ever so slightly from his touch. "You know it means everything to me, right?"

"I know," Beverly told him. "But this isn't-" "What?" her husband asked, letting his hand drop to his side as his gaze grew colder by the second. "Like the last time?" "I never cheated on you," Beverly tried to say as she leaned forward to comfort the man, but he was quick to grab her hair from behind, pulling her back and making Beverly gasp in pain.

"You're a bad fucking liar, Bev," he said behind gritted teeth, tightening his grip on her hair and pulling her down even more that she was bent at an odd angle. "You're not going anywhere, okay? I want you to stay right here and you're going to show me what it is you're going to do with Mike, okay?" He slammed the red head against the wall and Beverly bit her lip to hold back a scream of pain that was begging to escape.

"You're. . .you're hurting me, honey," Beverly muttered but he didn't seem to care. "No one else is going to love you like me, you know that right?" he asked aggressively, not noticing that Beverly had shakily brought her hand up to his cheek until she scratched him across the face. His hold on her instantly dropped and he yelled out in pain while Beverly stood up. Her eyes widened and she was quick to go up behind him, whimpering slightly as she whispered, "I'm. . .I'm sorry."

She didn't even have time to think before her husband was suddenly turning on her and hitting her with his belt as hard as he could. Beverly grabbed onto his arm and he gave her a deathly glare. "Don't make this fucking harder!" he growled and Beverly had to take in a shaky breath to try and calm her nerves. "Don't," she whispered, but it was too late. Her husband threw a punch that knocked her back so hard she fell onto the bed. When she turned around, he had begun to take his shirt off and Beverly felt as if she were going to be sick. Just when he was pulling the shirt over his head, Beverly thrust both of her legs out so that she kicked him back.

He stumbled back with a groan and Beverly tumbled off the side of the bed as she desperately tried to grab something. She could hear him running at her, so the red head grabbed onto a picture frame and threw it at her husband only for him to knock it aside like it were nothing. Just when he was about to grab her, Beverly got onto her feet with a glass vase in hand and smashed it against his head.

Her husband fell to the ground almost instantly and Beverly was quick to grab her things and rush out of the room. "You're nothing without me! You know that, right?" her husband yelled after her as Beverly ran down the rest of the stairs and out the door. She didn't even flinch under the touch of the rain and continued her way down the steps, placing her wedding band on top of the stair railing before walking away as fast as she could.

Beverly didn't know where she was going, the shock of what had just happened carrying her down the middle of the street. She couldn't even process the honking of the cars as she walked, her only thoughts on how she needed to get to Derry.

As she walked down the street, the rushing of water was enough to make her snap out of her senses. Beverly glanced to the side, her eyes instantly locking on the sewer drain beside her. For but a moment, Beverly felt as if there was something trying to break through the back of her memories, a voice screaming at the top of their lungs. She had never felt so uneasy than she did in that moment and Beverly was quick to walk away as fast as she could. She had to get to Derry was what she reminded herself.

Yet she couldn't help but look back at the sewer once more wondering why she felt more afraid of a sewer than she was of her now ex husband.

- - -

Birds and a weird fascination for the animals had always been a part of Stanley Uris' life for as long as he could remember. Something about them just intrigued the man and even to this day he would spend his mornings bird watching in his backyard, his cousin by his side more often than not.

Birds had become a constant theme in his life and the puzzle on the table in front of him was no exception. He stared blankly at an empty place before letting his eyes roam over the small pile of pieces he still had left. His gaze was calculating as he tried to solve the puzzle in his head, but it quickly disappeared as he looked up at the sixteen year old sitting by his side.

Greyson Uris had his gaze locked on his mother who sat beside Stan's wide Patty, the two women whispering between each other as they pointed at something on a computer screen. Stan watched Greyson for a moment, letting his eyes flicker over the messy mop of brown hair he had and the features of his face that looked so much like his cousin. He was without a doubt his cousin's son especially when it came down to his huge heart.

It was obvious by the way Greyson was watching his mother that he was worried and Stan gently nudged the young boy so that he turned to look at him. Stan gave him a soft smile before whispering, "Penny for your thoughts?"

That was enough to crack a small smile on the teen's face, but it flickered as he glanced back at his mother. "I just worry about her is all. She's been working extra shifts at the office the last couple of weeks and I know it's because she's trying to hide the fact she's a little tight on money right now. She keeps trying to act like everything's fine just for my sake, but I can tell she's tired," Greyson admitted, shifting his gaze back to Stan. "I know it's hard being a single mother, but she doesn't have to hide it from me. I just want to help."

Stan stared at the boy for a moment, a small sympathetic smile on his face as a flicker of sadness flashed through his eyes. He knew what Greyson was talking about. His cousin had been struggling to raise enough money to both keep the two up on their feet while also still giving Greyson the childhood she thought he deserved. She was tired and life was becoming heavier on her shoulders every day.

Stan blamed Greyson's father, the man having walked out on his best friend the moment he heard she was pregnant. He left her without a moment of hesitation and didn't bother helping pay child support or make an effort to be a part of Greyson's life.

He had tried once a couple of years back, but the bond between mother and son was unlike any other and Greyson who had been fourteen at the time hadn't hesitated to show the man to the door and tell him never to come back. His cousin had come to Stan crying that night over how sweet her little boy was and how much she loved him and Stan had only grown more respect for the boy ever since.

Greyson's father hadn't been in the picture since and Greyson didn't seem all too upset about it. For as long as he had his mother, he was okay. That's why he was always so worried about her because she was not only his mother but his best friend and had raised him on her own with a little help here and there from Stan and Patty. It had always just been Greyson and and his mother, so it was no surprise for Stan to hear about the boy's concerns.

"Well," Stan began once he noticed Greyson's gaze was back on his mother, "I think your mother just doesn't want to worry you is all. All she wants is for you to have a worry free childhood especially after what happened with her own parents. She doesn't want you to have to go through any of that pain like she did."

Greyson was silent for a moment before he looked to Stan almost hesitantly. "It doesn't mean she can't ask for help," he spoke softly. "All of this is just stressing her out and I don't even remember the last time I saw her genuinely happy."

Stan went silent at that and thought back to the girl he remembered growing up with compared to the woman he knew now. There was definitely a difference in her happiness, but when it came to Greyson she had never loved or cared for someone more. Greyson was what kept her from falling apart and the boy didn't seem to realize how much just being himself helped his mother through the hard times.

"I know it's hard, kid," Stan sighed as he put a hand on the boy's shoulder. "But the best you can do right now is stick by her side and hopefully she will come around. She needs you just as much as you need her." Greyson was quiet for a moment before numbly nodding his head and looking back to the puzzle. Stan took that as an end to the conversation and turned his attention back to the puzzle as well, a comfortable silence falling among the two.

It was minutes later before Greyson spoke up again, his happy demeanor back once again and the conversation from before way behind them. "Here it is," Greyson exclaimed triumphantly as he handed a puzzle piece to Stan who had been staring at a missing piece on the board in concentration.

Stan glanced at the boy before gently taking the puzzle piece and placing it in the spot. It fit perfectly and Stan looked back to Greyson before giving him a small smile, the action making Greyson smile wide in response. “This is why I keep you around," Stan joked as he reached out to ruffle the sixteen year old's hair. Greyson let out a small chuckle and smiled at the man before him, not noticing his mother's gaze from behind.

"Greyson," Y/N Uris softly called out from where she sat beside Stan's wife Patty who was currently scrolling through plane tickets on her computer. The sound of his mother's voice was enough to have Greyson turning to look at the woman and she smiled softly before saying, "Time to go, kid." Greyson instantly frowned. "Come on, Mom. Uncle Stan and I are almost done with the puzzle!" Greyson complained while Stan threw a small smirk in his cousin's direction.

Stan wasn't technically Greyson's uncle, but since Stan was pretty much like a brother to Y/N, Greyson had been calling him his uncle since he could talk. Every time he referred to Stan as Uncle Stan, the Uris cousins couldn't help but smile, and this was found true yet again as the corners of their mouths perked up slightly at Greyson's words.

"I know, Grey, and I'm sorry. However, it's already almost midnight and we've already been here an hour later than we should've," Y/N said, watching as Greyson winced slightly before giving her a shy grin. "I was hoping you wouldn't notice," Greyson admitted making Y/N chuckle as she looked at her son in adoration. The teen was quick to turn around to face his mother completely, a pleading look on his face as he looked at her. "Please, Mom. Just until we finish the puzzle? Come on."

Stan glanced at his nephew before turning around as well and giving his cousin the same pleading face her son was. The two boys then leaned in together and looked over at Y/N who narrowed her eyes at the two.

"You know I hate when you two do that," Y/N muttered as she fought back the urge to yawn. “That's why they do it," Patty chuckled while Y/N let out a small sigh. "Fine," Y/N gave in causing the two boys to smile and high five each other. "But let's pack the car up first. Then you can come back in here and finish the puzzle before we leave."

"Deal," Greyson agreed before he shot up off of the couch to go grab his things. "Don't finish it without me, Uncle Stan!" "Wouldn't dream of it, kid!" Stan called after him while Y/N watched her son race into the front hall to grab his things. Stan glanced over at his cousin and smiled as she walked over to him. "Some kid you got there, Y/N."

"I got lucky, didn't I?" Y/N whispered with a small yet proud smile on her face that Stan couldn't help but return. "We all did," Stan agreed causing Y/N to look at him. The two cousins smiled at each other and Y/N reached out to ruffle her cousin's hair. Stan was tried to lean away with a playful glare on his face and Y/N merely smiled before heading towards the front door.

"We'll be right back. Try not to miss us too much," Y/N joked as she winked back at Stan. The curly haired boy let out a soft chuckle and put a hand to his chest dramatically. "I shall try my hardest," he joked back and the two cousins chuckled before Y/N disappeared out the front door with Greyson at her side.

Stan shook his head at his cousin's antics before noticing his wife staring at him with a small smile on her face. "What?" Stan questioned, quirking an eyebrow at her amusingly. "Nothing. I just wish I had a bond like you and Y/N had is all. You two aren't even siblings and are closer than I was with any of my brothers," Patty spoke up.

"I've been lucky," Stan sighed. "Y/N may not be my actually sister, but she might as well be. After all, it's always been the two of us. For as long as I can remember, I've always had her." A distant look appeared in Stan's eyes before he smiled and shrugged his shoulders. "I guess we're so close because of how much time we've spent together and what we've been through especially with that son of a bitch she used to call her husband," Stan muttered. He was quick to shake the thought of him off and thought back to Y/N.

For a moment he thought he remembered a glimpse of them riding through town on his bike, her arms up in the air as she laughed and yelled for him to pedal faster all while Stan laughed and tried to pedal as fast as he could. However, the memory was quickly gone and for a moment he felt his hand hurt, but he ignored it. “She's my best friend," he admitted before looking over at Patty who was holding a hand against her chest as if her heart were about to burst from how adorable they were. Stan rolled his eyes playfully at his wife before looking back to his puzzle.

Knowing that was the end of the conversation for now, Patty went back to looking at her computer screen while Stan tried to mentally put the pieces where he thought they should go so that he could help Greyson once he returned.

"Should I just book it?" Patty finally asked, referring to the vacation the couple was wanting to go on. "You sure you can get away from work?" "It's summer. Why not?" Stan asked. "I'm sure Y/N wouldn't mind watering the plants and getting the mail for us. We could even have Greyson do it and maybe even pay him. He's been saving up for that new computer for his writing pieces you know." "Okay. We are Buenos Aires bound," Patty announced excitedly while Stan finally noticed that one of the puzzle pieces was missing. He was quick to look under the table and he sighed at the sight of the piece right underneath.

Stan was quick to get down on the floor to grab it and just when he had latched onto the puzzle piece, his phone began to ring. Stan stayed on the floor and glanced up at his phone through the glass table to see who was calling. However, as soon as his eyes latched onto the caller ID he couldn't help but furrow his eyebrows in confusion.

Maine? Now who could possibly be calling from Maine?

Stan sat up and set the puzzle piece down before picking up his phone and placing it to his ear. "Stanley Uris speaking?" he said. "It's Mike," the person on the other line replied almost instantly and Stan furrowed his eyebrows even more. Mike? "I'm sorry?" Stan said, hoping the man would elaborate more. "Mike Hanlon," the voice said and Stan swore his heart stopped beating completely. "From Derry."

It took but a second for Stan to make the connection of the caller to the Mike Hanlon he had used to be best friend with when he was younger. He had been a homeschooler and Stan suddenly got a flashback of an intense rock war with Henry Bowers and his gang as him, Y/N, and his other friends had saved Mike from the bullying he was receiving.

However, that one memory seemed to open up the gateway for all of his memories, everything snapping back into place in his mind like a puzzle that hadn't been completed in years. Stan could remember everything down to his life when he had lived in Derry, the summers Y/N would spend down there with him, the laughs he had with Bill and Richie and Eddie, the summer Y/N's parents had got a divorce and sent her to stay with him—Stan froze at that.

The summer of 1989. Now that was a memory he wish he still couldn't remember. Although not all of it he wanted to forget. After all, that was the summer he met Mike Hanlon, Beverly Marsh, and Ben Hanscom. That was the summer he and Y/N created a bond that made their friendship as strong as it was today. The bad memories was what he wanted to forget—the Neibolt House, the lady from the painting, It.

"Mike. God, sorry. Yes. Hi. I don't know why I. . .I didn't um. . ." Stan trailed off and it was then that he remembered something that he really wished he hadn't.

The promise.

Stan's blood ran cold at that memory, his whole body so numb that it was like he wasn't there in the moment even though he knew he was. He breathing was shaky and he felt the sudden urge to throw up. All he could feel was fear and he knew exactly why that was. But this couldn't be real. It hadn't been that long had it? There was no way.

"How long has it been?" Stan finally found himself asking, his hand gripping onto his phone tightly as his voice shook. "A long time," Mike admitted and the fact that he didn't tell Stan an exact number was enough to make Stan's stomach drop. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end and Stan gulped as he pulled himself up onto his feet. He wasn't the same thirteen year old from that summer, but for some reason he felt like the Stanley Uris who had been too afraid to walk into the Neibolt without his cousin holding onto his hand.

Maybe if Y/N had been by his side right then instead of out by her car, Stan would've felt better, but for some reason he felt as if he couldn't tell her. They had never spoken about what happened that summer and if Stan hadn't been able to remember until Mike called them Y/N sure as hell didn't remember. He did not need her worrying about that right now, not when she had a kid to worry about.

"Twenty seven years," Mike finally said after a long silence, confirming Stan's suspicions and causing the boy to stumble slightly as he tried to stand back up. Thankfully Patty was too focused on the Buenos Aires trip she was finalizing to notice Stan and for a split second he wanted to tell her to not bother for he had a feeling they would never get to go on that trip together.

"It's come back, hasn't it?" Stan whispered, his voice shakier now so that he knew Mike had to have heard. "That's why you're calling." "It's starting again, Stan. Bad things are happening," Mike admitted while Stan squeezed his eyes shut in disbelief. It was like with each second that passed, he was becoming more and more consumed by his fear. This couldn't be happening. There was no way.

"Did. . .did you call the others? I mean what if. . .what if they don't come back?" Stan questioned, hoping that Mike would say someone wasn't coming and that he could stay home and forget this whole thing ever happened. All he wanted to do was take Patty, Y/N, and Greyson and keep them away from this whole thing. He wanted to keep them in this house, lock all the doors, and refuse to come out. All he needed was to have those three by his side and he would be okay.

"Everyone except for Y/N. But we made a promise, remember?" Mike reminded him, his words causing Stan to feel even more sick than before once he realized there was no getting out of this. He wouldn't be able to just ignore this and his thoughts flickered over to Greyson and Y/N, how Y/N would no doubt go back to make sure everyone was safe and how devastated Greyson would be if anything were to happen to her. Stan knew if anything were to happen to Y/N it would be because of his own cowardice and that was enough to make Stan feel even worse.

"How soon can you get here?" Mike asked. "Well. . .uh. . .I uh. . .I would need to do a few things. I would-" Stan muttered, his eyes closing once again as sheer panic and fear coursed through his veins. "Tomorrow," Mike decided for him and it took all of Stan not to throw up right there. "We don't have much time. I'll text you everything you need. I'll see you soon, Stan the Man."

Stan didn't even have time to respond before Mike had hung up, but the man didn't move and merely kept the phone up limply in the air with his eyes closed, his face pale as he stared blankly at the wall. He didn't even notice when Y/N and Greyson had returned, the teen hurrying over to the puzzle almost instantly while Y/N look to her cousin with a smile.

However, it disappeared at the sight of him and she was quick to go to his side and place a hand on his arm. "Stanley?" Y/N whispered, her soft voice making the man's eyes snap open almost instantly. "Are you okay?" Stan looked to her at that and Y/N blinked in surprise at the look that dawned her cousin's face. She had never seen him this way, never seen him look so afraid. What kind of phone call could make him that scared? "I'm fine," Stan assured her although his shaky voice was enough to make her narrow her eyes slightly at him as she tried to read him.

Stan just gave the girl a small smile which she knew was forced and gently took her hand off of his arm before holding onto it the same way they would hold hands when they were kids. He gave it the smallest squeeze and for a moment Y/N felt as if she were back in Stan's backyard when they were younger. watching birds fly by in the early morning. "Seriously," he whispered and Y/N gave him a look that said she didn't believe him but that she would drop it for now. Stan knew they would have to talk about it eventually if Y/N had any say in it, but little did she knew that they never would.

"Uncle Stan, care to do the honors?" Greyson asked as he looked up to his uncle with a small smile, holding the last puzzle piece up in the air. Any other night Stan would've told Greyson to be the one to finish the puzzle, but he was eager to take the distraction and get away from his cousin's calculating look. He went and sat beside Greyson and Y/N watched as Stan hesitated as he stared at her son, his eyes flickering over Greyson as if he were never going to see him again and was trying to memorize this moment right here. But before Y/N could send him a questioning look, Stan had snapped out of it and was putting the puzzle piece in its place, bringing the puzzle to an end.

It wasn't long after that that the two families found themselves out on the front porch saying goodbye. They were lucky enough to only live a few neighborhoods down, but for some reason Stan acted as if they wouldn't see each other for a long time and that was enough to give Y/N an unsettling feeling that she quickly pushed aside.

"Uncle Stan," Greyson said as he pulled away from Patty's hug to look to his uncle. "I was thinking maybe we could go to the bookstore later this week. You know how my favorite author is that Bill Denbrough guy, right? He's coming out with a movie soon and released a special edition copy of his book The Attic Room that I was wanting to pick up." Stan blinked in surprise, finally putting together why Greyson's favorite author had a name that had sounded so familiar. How had he not realized it before?

Stan suddenly got a memory of looking out the window to see Y/N and Bill walk up to his house hand in hand on the day they had made the promise, the two exchanging a small kiss that left them both with goofy smiles on their faces before Stan had teased his cousin endlessly about them. His eyes instantly flickered over to Y/N, trying to see if any sort of recognition flickered across her face at the mention of her first love, but there was none. She was too busy discussing some last minute things with Patty and hugging his wife to really pay attention and Stan couldn't help but wonder how Y/N would react upon seeing Bill again.

He found himself hoping that Bill wasn't married. After all, Y/N deserved to live a happy life and the Bill he remembered would have done anything to give it to her. If Bill was still the same Bill he remembered, then he would not only be a perfect match for Y/N, but a perfect father figure to Greyson. The thought was enough to put the smallest of smiles on Stan's face despite everything going on and the thought of Y/N, Bill, and Greyson finally getting to live a happy life after It was defeated was the only reassuring thing for Stan at the moment, the only thing keeping him calm.

Stan turned his eyes back to his nephew and smiled as he pulled the boy in for a hug. "Sounds like a plan, kid," Stan told him, knowing that he had to act as if everything were okay. Greyson was quick to hug his uncle back before pulling away, allowing his uncle to ruffle his hair once before he let his mother go to Stan.

Y/N stopped in front of her cousin, her eyes hesitantly flickering over his face as if she were trying to determine if Stan was actually okay or not. Stan could do nothing more than look at the girl, swallowing thickly as he knew she was going to be in for a world of pain and that he wouldn't be able to help her. He wanted to say he was sorry for being so selfish and to explain himself right then and there, but he knew he couldn't. Y/N would try to stop him and then his reckless actions against It would get her killed. So Stan just let himself take in the girl that stood before him as he struggled to hold back the tears that he knew were begging to break free.

Before Y/N could notice that, Stan was pulling her in for a hug, the action making Y/N chuckle and hug him back instantly. There was so much Stan wanted to say, so much he wanted to tell her, but he knew he couldn't. At least not right now.

"I love you," Stan finally decided on saying, the words being a normal between the two but something that held more meaning in that moment than Y/N would ever know. Y/N hugged her cousin harder at that before pulling away to look at the face of her best friend. "I love you too, Stanley," she whispered. "I'll see you tomorrow, yeah?" She tilted her head her so slightly and gave him a grin that made his heart ache.

"Yeah," he told her, nodding despite the heavy feeling in his heart. Y/N smiled softly at that and reached up to ruffle his hair, not knowing it would be her last time. Stan didn't even try and pull away like usual and just enjoyed his cousin's touch before sending her a small smile which she easily returned.

Y/N then pulled away and began to walk down the stairs. All Stan wanted to do was pull her back and hug her again, but he knew it would only make her more suspicious than she already was. So when she turned back to wave at him and Patty one last time, Stan put on a fake smile and waved to her just like he did every other time she left. He would give her no indication that this would be the last time, no reason to hold her back from going to meet with the Losers. Y/N turned and whispered something to Greyson who smiled before wrapping an arm around his mother as they walked to the car. Stan couldn't help but smile at the sight, knowing that the two would be okay as long as they had each other.

And with that, Stanley Uris watched as his cousin got into her car and drove off, knowing that everything he was about to do was only so her and Greyson would be safe in the end.

- - -

"Bill Denbrough," Y/N muttered, confusion evident in her voice as she stared at the book Greyson was currently reading. Greyson's honey brown eyes instantly flickered to her, a small smile on his face as he brushed his brown hair away from his eyes. "Still the best author of all time," Greyson said as he sat down on his bed beside his mother. "His endings aren't the best, but they aren't bad either. I was hoping we could try and go see his new movie when it comes out?"

"Of course we can, kiddo," Y/N assured the boy as she got up and set the book down on his nightstand next to the printed copies of Greyson's work which were really just alternate endings to this Bill Denbrough guy's books, pushing aside her thoughts of how the name sounded so familiar.

That was the moment her phone decided to ring and Y/N sighed before taking her phone out of her pocket. Her eyebrows furrowed slightly at the sight of a number from Maine calling her and she glanced at her son who had already picked the book back up to read.

"I'm gonna take this. I'll come check on you in a little bit, okay?" Y/N said, knowing her son wouldn't be going to bed anytime soon since they had only just gotten back from Stan's. Greyson hummed in response and Y/N was quick to walk out of his room before pressing the accept button and putting the phone to her ear.

"Hello?" she questioned. "Is this Y/N Uris?" a voice asked and Y/N frowned ever so slightly as she walked down the stairs and towards the kitchen to grab something to drink. "This is she. May I ask who is calling?" Y/N asked. "This is Mike," the man explained and just when Y/N was about to question him further, he went on as if he had said it multiple times before. "Mike Hanlon from Derry."

Y/N stopped in her tracks at that and for a brief moment it was like she was standing in the middle of a blizzard, her whole body so cold that she could barely think straight. Her hands began to shake and she could hear her heart beating in her chest. Yet she had no idea why she was so scared all of a sudden. Why was she filled with so much fear? However, the fear began to dim ever so slightly as a sharp pain went through her head, images flashing by as she heard the distant sound of children laughing, remembering the feeling of splashing into water before playing chicken fight with the people she used to call her best friends.

She remembered them all only momentarily starting with the boy she was talking to right now, Mike Hanlon, the boy who had been homeschooled all of his life and who she had saved from Henry Bowers when she threw a rock at his head. She remembered Ben Hanscom, the boy who loved New Kids on the Block and would spend countless hours in the library researching Derry. She remembered Beverly Marsh, the fiery red head who was also the first girl best friend that she had ever had. Then there was Richie Tozier, the boy who liked to flirt way too much and say more crude jokes then one could count but who had a big heart when it counted most. There was Eddie Kaspbrak, the boy who had been like her brother and who she used to calm down during some of his little episodes. Of course there was her cousin Stanley, but she already remembered him.

And then there was Bill Denbrough. No wonder the name had sounded so familiar. She had known him. He had been her best friend and the boy she had crushed on for forever. Her shaky hands went up to her lips and for a split second she remembered a warm September afternoon and the feeling of a soft pair of lips against her own. However it disappeared just a quick, almost as if it were nothing but a dream.

How could she have forgotten about him? How could she have forgotten about any of them? How could she have forgotten about the Losers?

"Mike," Y/N breathed out in disbelief, a smile dawning her face as her fear was pushed to a back burner. "It's been so long. How are you?" "You need to come home," Mike said and Y/N furrowed her eyebrows but kept her smile on her face. "I'm sorry. What?" she questioned. “You need to come home, Y/N," Mike repeated and Y/N's smile fell from her face as the fear suddenly cane back although she didn't know why.

The girl winced as a sudden pain shot through her hand. Y/N quickly glanced down at her hand and didn't understand why she felt so sick at the sight of the scar that ran across her palm. However, she had a sneaking suspicion it was because she hadn't even known she had a scar on her palm up until that moment. "When?" she found herself asking, but she didn't ask the question that she was dying to know the answer to, afraid of what the answer might be despite not knowing it herself. "Tomorrow," Mike replied and there was a long moment of silence as Y/N tried to process everything. She honestly had no clue what was going on, but she knew she had to get to Derry. She wasn't sure why, but she just had a feeling and she knew her fear and queasy stomach would not relent until she was back in Derry.

"I'll be there," Y/N whispered, her voice shaky as she squeezed her throbbing hand shut. "Great. I'll see you there, Y/N," Mike's voice whispered in her ear and Y/N knew she should've been excited to see her friend after so long, but all she felt was another wave of nausea. She didn't even wait for Mike to hang up and did it herself before staring blankly at her phone.

“Fuck.”

- - -

"I don't understand. One of your childhood friends calls you in the middle of the night saying that you have to get to Derry which is in Maine by the way and you're just packing everything up and going?" Greyson questioned in disbelief, his eyes following his mother around the room as she frantically threw stuff into a suitcase. Y/N paused for a just a moment and gave her son a nervous look. "Yes?" she said in a questioning voice before going back to packing. She didn't know how to explain it to her son, how to tell him that she had made a promise that she didn't necessarily remember and that she had to get back. Hell, she didn't even know how to explain to him that one of her childhood friends happened to be the author Greyson admired so much.

"Mom," Greyson said and that was enough to have the woman looking over at him. The sixteen year old was leaning against the doorframe of her bedroom, his brown eyes staring at her in concern as he tried to read her, as he tried to understand despite just how tired he was. Y/N sighed and walked over to the boy who stood up a bit straighter. She gently took his hands in her own and stared at her son before saying, "Greyson, honey, I need you to try and work with me here. I honestly don't know why I'm going, but I have to, okay? It's a gut feeling. You just. . .you got to trust me on this." Greyson was silent for a moment as he stared at her and Y/N could practically see the gears moving in his head before he finally let up and gave her a tiny nod. "I trust you," he assured her and Y/N smiled before leaning forward to press a small kiss to her son's forehead. "Thank you," she whispered. "Now go finish packing your things. You can sleep in the car. It's a long way to Maine from here, kid."

Greyson nodded and was quick to do as his mother said, disappearing up the stairs to finish packing while Y/N rushed back to her own things. It wasn't long before they were loading their things into the car and Y/N had returned to her frantic state once again, completely forgetting about her cousin who had to have been going through the same thing as her at that very moment.

They were on the road less than thirty minutes after the call, but it wouldn't be until they were two hours into the drive that Y/N would realize she left her phone sitting on top of her bed at the house. It was that same phone that now had three missed calls from Patty Uris.

If Y/N had known what was going to happen once she got to Derry, she would've turned around right then. But she didn't, so Y/N just drove down the road, her nerves being enough to keep her awake while Greyson slept soundlessly in the passenger seat beside her.

Neither Uris knew what would be in store for them when they reached Derry and the horrors Y/N had witness twenty seven years earlier? They were nothing compared to what was ahead.

- - -

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[nico-idc]

random vent because i'm numb rn and feel like it

This is a vent post, ill probably talk about su!cide, self h*rm, eating disorders and depression. I’ll also cuss a lot, and things will not be censored. Also, this may seem insensitive to people experiencing any of this, sorry about that.  Dont read this if youre triggered by that.

Also, this is my experience with mental health. Everyone deals with it differently. 

So, If anyone doesnt know, I have depression and anxiety. And right now, I’m feeling numb as it’s often described by people with depression. But, numb isn’t a very good description. I can still feel. I’ll still smile if you tell me a joke, or if something funny is on a video. I’ll still cry if there’s something super sad. Emotion is just watered down. I feel it, but not as much as I should. Me and my boyfriend were talking, and i couldnt tell him I loved him. It’s not becuase I dont love him, but I just cant feel much of anything, so I dont want to tell him I loved him. Becuase If i did that, I felt as though I was lying. The funniest thing is, I randomly started crying. Still felt nothing, but hey, I had tears streaming down my face. Who fucking knows why. 

I havent been doing to great for a while now, but this is the worst i’ve ever gotten. Ive never felt numb before. I mean, I’ve felt myself starting to go through the motions, but i’ve never gone completely numb before. And before this i’ve had a few mental breakdowns. Hell, I’ve sat in a corner twice in the past month or so doing nothing but sobbing and begging myself not to move so I dont grab something sharp and cut myself. (I did not relapse, don’t worry). and recently I completely broke down over simply eating a cereal bar, got through it, ate it. I’m good now. 

Figures. That does seem to be my experience. Oh no, big bad issue one time, then magically I just talk myself out of my bullshit, and im fixed. Ha ha, yet I act like I have all these issues. I mean, I didnt even attempt to starve myself, just thought “oh, friends and family wont let me” and didnt. Had a breakdown about a year later, been fine since. Cut for a few months, went to therapy for a few months, stopped cutting. had a few breakdowns about a year or two later, then was fine. was suicidal for a while, went to therapy for a bit, was happy for months. Had breakdowns every now and then, fine now.

ha ha, first time I say alot of this is online. Figures. I’ve done that a lot too. My boyfriend has found out a bit about my depression through this site. Becuase I cant talk to my boyfriend about my shit, but hey random people on the internet! hear about my problems.

So on another note, I recently found a song that describes part of depression pretty well. It’s called “i’m not dead” by boyinaband. it’s linked below, I’ll copy paste the lyrics, and explain how I relate, and what the lyrics mean to me, becuase why not? (lyrics will be in bold)

I'm not dead

I'm not fixed, but I'm not giving up yet

Basically, this means that im still here, im still depressed, but I’m still trying to fight depression. 

I'm sick of saying that I still don't have anything done

I hate telling friends I'm trying something just to give it up

I never commit to anything, I just say I’ll do something, then decide I dont want to.

I'm still unsure of my emotional state

I'm still incapable of focusing lately

I don't feel like creating

I'm tired of asking Google how to find motivation

I’ve been on break from writing for months now. tried to get back to it, lost concentration. I think this is self explanatory. 

I don't think I've ever made

Something that's as good as I'm capable of

Ha, I dont put in enough effort and commitment to make something as good as possible.

I hate not having a reason to look my best

I only ever take care of myself with the intent to show the internet

I mean, I dont try to show the internet, but I only take care of myself when other people will see me.

If what made me successful was an imposed sense of stress then

I am so so glad that I hated myself

The only thing that makes me do things is extreme stress.

I didn't luck into this position

I struggle with decisions

I mean, im not in any high position, but I do struggle with decisions. 

I wouldn't be my own friend

I'm too inconsistent

I’m inconsistent as hell. I’m in like 10 group chats, don't talk in any of them for months, then just show up like “hi, havent talked to you all in ages, but hi”. 

Without immense pressure nothing ever gets finished

If these words make it to your ears it'll be a fucking miracle.

Yep. I went on  whole rant about this on wattpad. Without pressure to do something, I don’t do it.

I'm fortunate to know more good people than most do

I wish I had more friends I could be physically close to

I dont personally have a lot of friends that dont live in my city, so the last line isnt an issue, but I do know a lot of good people”

I'm pretty good at like 20 different skill sets

At the expense of never being great at any one of them

I’m good at quite a few things. Drawing, math, even writing. But im not great at it. I’m average.

I wish this beat hit harder

I wish more syllables rhymed

I know 99 percent of people really don't mind

I dont personally relate to this, seeing as I dont make music.

I think collaborating forced me to finish things

'Cause I was terrified of wasting famous people's time

Oh yeah. Group projects would not get done if i wasnt scared of wasting my partner’s time.

I wish I could focus on what I define priority

I wish I was as grateful as I want to be

Dont really relate to these things

I wish I knew more people who were mentally stable

But if I did,

I wouldn't let them waste their time on me while I'm disabled

Oh yeah. Id love to have a friend who isnt depressed, but I wouldnt let them see that im fucked up becuase i dont wanna drag them down.

I feel alone

I know I'm not

I have a lot of friends, but I still fell alone in this world

I used to talk to lots of people.

Lately I've stopped

They didn't deserve it,

I've been a terrible friend.

But I couldn't bear to let myself become boring to them

I ignore group chats all the time. no reason. Probably shouldnt. 

I don't let myself get my hopes up.

I love people who do.

Something good happens? what could go wrong? that is my thought precess.

I never know if what I say I feel is the truth

I have no damn Idea what I think, so its so hard to know what the truth in my head is.

I wish I didn't instinctively try to be less specific

So more people could relate, when they read along with the lyrics.

Not lyrics, but if i write/explain something, I immediately generalize things so its relateable.

I can be happy in the moment

I am not when I reflect

I smile watching youtube, but then I look back and think about how I wasted time.

I distract myself with gaming, waiting to get better

I hate it

Youtube will cure depression right? /s

I wanna do the most good, and prevent the most hurt

But I've gotta put on my own oxygen mask first

This is just an important phrase I try to remember when I’m down. for people who dont do well with metaphors, he’s saying that if you want to help people, you need to help yourself first. 

I can't predict what I'll do.

I can never be sure

I am terrified of making promises any more

I can't face my work,

I feel sick from the word

I genuinely believe I'm capable of changing the world

Don’t relate much here, except for the more positive, upbeat tone the song takes on, and i feel that this part, the part above and everything below is dave fighting his depression.

I still think I can get better

I’m holding onto hope.

I still think I can create and get pleasure from it

I hope so, I want my art and writing to improve.

I'll keep aiming to make my emotion and my logic agree

The eternal stuggle. I always try to get the two to line up, it rarely works. I try to use logic more often though.

And become the best version of me

Always trying to improve myself.

I don't want to stop!

I don't want to stop!

I don't want to stop!

I don't want to stop!

There’s alot this could mean. I dont want to stop creating. I dont want to stop fighting. I dont want to stop getting better. I dont want to stop living. I relate to all these things.

I’ll expand on this more later, it’s too late now for me to continue this

[likeawildthing]

Hi, I just wanted your opinion on something. Me and a few others have noticed on tumblr that people sort of 'recycle' other peoples posts. As in, they take their ideas or actually sentences straight out of them and pretty much copy and paste, and gain lots of notes that way. Is this plagarism? I don't think it's nice to do but I'm not sure if it's actual plagarism. I just wanted your opnion if you don't mind

I’ve experienced straight up plagiarism and every shade ofgrey:  people copying my fanfics to theiraccounts, hacking and making crappier versions of headcanon posts I worked on, copyingand pasting lines into standalone posts, straight up screenshotting posts fortumblr and other social media.

When I first started in fandom I’d get so riled about all ofit, but especially that questionable ‘is this intentional because it suresounds familiar’ type thing. I’d also get into heated debates over characternuances, fandom tirades, etc. In discussing both of these issues with seasonedfandom friends, I heard over and over that there’s nothing in fandom worthgetting upset about, because it’s all been said before.

I rolled my eyes, because of course there was! That personCOPIED my post! That was my idea last week/month! That character is a greasyslime ball and so is anyone who stans for him!

And then, when my one year in fandom rolled into two, three,four, five, my group of friends mostly moved on from those spirited debates and(omg) sex riots, took our discourse offline into real life stuff as friendshipsgrew, and stopped spending so much time on Tumblr.

A new batch of enthusiasts cropped up, and watching you guysblossom has been deja vu.

Even I was annoyedwhen I saw someone making a bunch of character meta posts I had already made,until I realized how silly that was, because no one was ‘copying’ my work. Youwere discovering the same things about [insert character] that I haddiscovered. It became an interesting sociology observation. Your revelation? Yourinside jokes? Your fandom tirades? All essentially the same. Your passion drovethe same enthusiastic late-night, twelve paragraph meta binges that had fueled me.

How can I begrudge people the joy of that falling into the fandomrabbit hole feeling?

This cracked podast (the only cracked podcast episode I’llever rec lol) is an interesting listen. I don’t agree with everything they say,but the crux is that there aren’t many new ideas, and that culture (what comesin) spawns divergent ideas in people all. the. time. Multiple people had the idea for harry potter at the same time. Patents are sometimes filed on the same day. That’s just how ideas work.

Fandom is an insular bubble on a good day, lovelies. It’s narrower if you are just on one site,narrower still if you’re into the same few ships or characters. Everyone’sexperience is different, yes, but there are a finite number of headcanons, ficideas, meta posts, jokes. People say “has anyone done this” on an edit or comicfor a reason: because most of them had been said before, probably dozens oftimes.

A few years ago I had an idea to draw out Tom Riddle’s diarypages, one of them being all the other anagrams Riddle could have used insteadof I am Lord Voldemort. Sound familiar? It should, because someone else had alreadycome up with the idea. Luckily I saw that comic someone else had made before I actually drew and released it. But in myhead it was a completely original idea! Now I may have seen it, forgotten aboutit, and then it popped back into my consciousness as a great idea, or we boththought of it separately. A few months ago a friend and I discovered that we’ddeveloped and written the same, very specific side-character headcanon into twoseparate fics.

I do understand your frustration, especially if those postsare more popular than yours. But memory is a fallible, fickle thing. I’d encouragethe benefit of the doubt. Perhaps they don’t realize. Perhaps they’re lonelyand are trying to make friends. Perhaps they’re struggling with mental illnessand that little bit of validation is the only thing getting through the day. It’ssuper easy to vilify someone on the other side of a screen when we don’t knowthem. Try reaching out (off anon) and just starting a conversation.

There are people who build a blog from deliberately stealingothers’ work, but the vast majority of us are here to have a good time. And soare you. If you’ve been talking to people then it sounds like you’ve gotfriends here. Commit to curating the best fandom experience for yourself thatyou can—you owe it to yourself!

You might roll your eyes at this response… Fair, but come talk to me in four years. :D Years in fandom have given me an excellent set of blinders.I come here to find what I want and ignore everything else. I don’t…owe anyoneon here anything. That anon who asked me about johnny d*pp…again? Not worth it.That person who literally screenshotted one of my posts…again? Not worth it. You’rehere to have fun, not to be miserable or get notes. If that means blockingchronic grey-area offenders, do it. Report straight up plagiarist posts if youfeel the need, but then let it go. Hang in there! 

[natalia-km]

Firstly congrats on your fantastic gcse results you should be really proud 😄🙌🏽 As I'm sitting my exams the coming year ( 😭 ) just wanted to ask if you have revision tips for me in regards to the main subjects ( i.e. Maths, English etc ) Please and thank you 😊

Thank you so much!

I’m more than happy to give any advice any time :)

This post is very long so I’m sorry lol. If you can’y read the whole thing I also did a summary at the end. 

Maths:

 Repetition is key, start by doing some past papers given to you by your school and get used to doing three 1 ½ hour papers. Identify your weaknesses and keep practicing. Keep practicing past papers and problem solving booklets you can find online as the new types of questions are heavily based on problem solving and combining units e.g. algebra with graphs. For revision I went through my past papers and looked at the questions I got wrong and what I didn’t understand. Honestly just doing past papers in maths after learning all the units is the best way to revise. I did past papers really from the start of year 11 all the way to the exam.

Some useful websites that I used (I just wrote out the questions you do not need to print everything) 

http://justmaths.co.uk/2015/12/21/9-1-exam-questions-by-topic-higher-tier/

http://www.mathsmadeeasy.co.uk/gcsemathspapers-9-1.htm

Some content on different exam boards may vary but maths is maths and virtually the same on all exam boards. I sat Edexcel and my school offered these books that come in three. I really recommend these as say, for example, pg 51 on inverse functions in the revision books matches pg 51 in the work book. When we had spare time in class or have a spare 10 minutes it is really helpful to complete a page of fractions or something. There is also a book called past papers plus with exam questions in the exam format (if that makes any sense lol) Which is what I used the most. My copy had loads of mistakes but if you buy a new one I think it will be fixed (haha get your act together edexcel) 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/REVISE-Edexcel-Mathematics-Higher-Revision/dp/1447988094

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Revise-Edexcel-Mathematics-Revision-Workbook/dp/1292210885/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=KS8EGP0PE8821S279NYQ

https://www.amazon.co.uk/REVISE-Edexcel-Mathematics-Higher-Practice/dp/1292096314/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_3?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=H1KM6NPHSEEMHT303AVW

If you are aiming for 7/8/9 a really useful site is churchill maths, your school has to be registered and pay a license or something, which my school was, and you can access so many maths papers. I think there are 9 sets of three papers or more. They are really hard and take a while to get on their level as they have multi step problems and problem solving. These are really good as they start at the difficulty of the middle of the regular paper and go up. This is really helpful for the exam as the easy questions will seem really easy and the hard questions will not feel so bad.

When you practice every question write down the equation(s) you are going to use. You do not get a formulae sheet so you just have to learn them off by heart. Every question I did in class and homework I wrote down the relevant formulae and them slotted in the numbers and etc etc etc. By the time of the exam you’ll look at a trig question and know the cosine rule off by heart and it will make your life so much easier.

English lit.

 oh the bane of my life. I have seen each exam vary from exam board to exam board and it does vary with different books you have been given. I studied Great expectations, Macbeth, Blood brothers and conflict anthology on Edexcel, the papers will be different on AQA and OCR and if you study different texts.

A major revision tip is to read the text properly before you start studying it in class. Then I would re read it but only skim through it and properly read the main chapters that have a very important scene at around christmas time and leading up to the exams.

LEARN YOUR QUOTES. Flash cards are great, I categorised quotes by character and theme and just wrote them over and over (but that style works for me and may not work for you). ½/3 word sentences are easy to remember and are concise to slot in where you can. e.g. Macbeth is referred to as a “tyrant”. easy one word quote that you can develop.

For english the time restrictions are ridiculous. Omg it was literal hell. When you do homework like write an essay on the significance of the witches in Macbeth look at the timings you have and try doing the essay in the time. 

And to save your should learn the timings per question it will honestly save you from spending so much time on one essay and leaving none for the next questions. 

In the exam I was quite sneaky and drew the timings on my watch so I could see when I had to change question which was a life saver *prayer hands emojis*

Instead of kind of learning the whole text sub categorise the information in the questions (I know I didn’t explain that well but hear me out). For example in for Macbeth my essay question was the significance of the witches, and in Great expectations it was the importance of location. What I did was categorise Character, Theme and setting. 

I didn’t revise setting and it came up so don’t skip it. Depending on the question it will require 4 or 5 paragraphs so learn 4-5 points for each theme and character. When revising just learn a one sentence point that you can quickly recall and develop in the exam. Flash cards are reallyyyy useful in this. I used mine literally in the car going to school on the exam day.

e.g. The significance of Ambition in Macbeth.

1. Lady Macbeth’s Ambition is the driving force to kill duncan

2. Macbeth realises that ambition is futile without an heir so it leads him to murder Banquo

3. leads Lady Macbeth to her downfall

4. Macbeth murdering Macduff’s family is his ambition to kill Macduff and restore peace. 

These are very short points which can be expanded upon. :)

For the poetry there’s 15 poems. Don’t bother learning 15 I learnt 5 and got by. It is impossible to learn all 15 but read and analyse all of them in class so you get a good general idea of what they are all about and how they use structure and punctuation etc. I linked them together by theme e.g. No problem, half cast and class game all go together. In your categories learn one or two that can be compared to anything. I learnt no problem, belfast confetti, cousin kate, exposure, charge of the light brigade and what were they like. If you’re not doing this exam board or anthology collection these titles may not mean anything to you but you get the jist of it. 

For each learn the structure, rhyme scheme, imagery and punctuation so in the exam you can recall the poem you select to compare to and the main points. 

Finally for english literature learn for each essay question what is needed, some will need context (19th century fiction doesn’t) some want writer’s intention and effect on reader. but putting in context where you can will not hurt.

English language:

I found this really hard so I’m not really an expert as such. For revision learn how many paragraphs are needed for each question and practice with time limits. Practice highlighting text and picking out key information and language, structure and form. Remember to comment on all three of language structure and form for the relevant questions. I think it is really useful to read chapters of 19th century fiction to get used to the language as it’s in paper one. Honestly reading one or two chapters of a the sign of four, pride and prejudice, the woman in black or anything you can find is really helpful. 

Paper 2 i think is non-fiction, you can’t really prepare for the texts but practice planning the question is the best revision for this paper. For the long comparison question practice finding similarities and differences in language structure and theme. I did this over and over again for different combination of texts. 

For imaginative writing just practice writing an opening, one paragraph and an ending for different questions (I got examples from my teacher like write about a time you ere scared or write about a time you had to work hard for something) Learn a few really good vocal to slot in here and there but not too much so you sound like a dictionary. My favourite was Megalomaniac and I kid you not I used it in every possible place I could. 

Science (?) 

I was still on the old system and I’m not sure if it is changing for your year? Free science lessons on youtube was basically my saviour and past papers are your best friend. For biology it is just repetition of vocab and systems, I used a lot of acronyms and silly little jokes here and there. For chemistry keep practicing the maths part because that is where a lot of marks can be gained e.g. calculating moles and titration. For physics I just practiced lots of maths questions? I didn’t do too well in physics but *shrugs*

How I worked is I wrote up the lesson neatly the day after the class, before a test I would review it and during revision I condensed the information onto ¼ of an A4 page (I didn’t find flash cards big enough and hard to draw diagrams and stuff) and repeated condensing of information so it got to a pint where each type of cell had their own ¼ A4 page for themselves.

In summary:

Maths: Repetition, repetition, repetition. Write out equations for absolutely every single question you do. Past papers/specimen papers/9-1 hard questions booklets you can find online.

English lit: Learn how many points per question, examiners love a good introduction and conclusion (2 sentences will do fine) but it’s not the end of the world. Flash cards for each theme, setting and character. Learn the key context, structure and imagery of a handful of poems that can be compared to a number of different poems. Quotes, Quotes, Quotes. Shove them in where you can. One or two words quotes are ideal as you an easily embed them.

English Language: practice planning your essay answers for the longer questions (spend no longer than 3 minutes doing this) when annotating extracts don’t write out full ideas or sentences of the extract it wastes time and that sheet is not marked. Just write down a few words for a point you can use. Imaginative writing plan your answer for no longer than 5 minutes, remember to use punctuation, varied sentence length, vary sentence starters and do not be cliché e.g. and it was all a dream *pukes*. 

Science: Write down every formula you use for every calculation question e.g. moles=mass/RFM, Moles=volume x concentration in chemistry. practice past paper questions. LEARN UNITS THEY CAN GAIN A MARK. e.g. J or Hz. Acronyms are a life saver for remembering complex systems like the kidneys in biology. Silly little things help too. e.g. remembering the blood vessels in the heart I think VAVAVA  (Vena cava, right Atrium, right Ventricle, pulmonary Artery, pulmonary Vein and Aorta.) 

General: Find a system that works, for me it is just writing things over and over again. You may find the leitner system useful (link below) or mind maps. Find what works for you and don’t listen to a teacher telling you to do revision a certain way because “variation helps” which is a complete lie. Just find what works for you. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C20EvKtdJwQ

Also prioritise, subjects you do value as much can wait a day, for me German was not as important as maths so i spent more time on maths than german (as an example) but don’t completely abandon a subject because you will get stressed.

I hope this was of some use to you and maybe you can pick out a few things to help you revise. This year will be tiring but it will pay off on results day, trust me. My main tip is to just keep on top of work and get things done asap. Good luck with your exams this coming year I believe in you! 

- Natalia x