#id like to go to one in the US some time they seem like bigger events

[felicitassews]

Went to a ren fair for the first time today and it was a lot of fun! mostly just to dress up a bit silly and hang out with my friends. It was very windy and I lost my hat a few times, but such is the risk of being a wizard.

[snoopyracing]

back to december // ln4

pairing: lando norris X reader

word count: 9k

warnings: swearing, alcohol use, and implied sex

includes: friends to lovers, pining, fluff, and angst.

summary: follows lando and the reader from the beginning of their relationship all the way until the end. based off of ‘back to december’ by taylor swift.

A/N: some of this is may not be biblically f1 accurate so please just close your eyes and pretend it is. who cares when the vibes are great. also don't forget.... i'm also just a girl...

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

The days blurred together anymore, blurred into the same monotonous routine.

Wake up, get ready for work, go to work, come home, and then distract yourself from your own thoughts until it was time to go to bed. Some days were worse than others, but it was your own self destructive tendencies that got you into this state.

Today was a particularly shitty day, especially for a Friday. You couldn't wait to get home, but walking through the door to an empty apartment was something you still hadn't gotten used to. The bright warmness that always seemed to cascade through the apartment was replaced with dark coldness. The blinds were always shut now, the apartment could easily be mistaken for a vampire's liar at this point. The music that once played almost 24/7, that got you guys plenty of noise complaints, now collected dust on the shelf. The smell of dinner cooking as you walked through the door was now replaced with the Chinese takeout from two nights ago heating up in the microwave.

As you watched the plate spin your reflection in the yellow glow caught your attention. Oof. Have you really looked like this recently? The dark circles under your eyes looked like you had been taking up cage fighting as a hobby recently. You weren't sure how long you stood there, picking yourself apart, finding something new with each pass over yourself. The beeping from the microwave had been drowned out by your own thoughts.

Your phone had started to ring on the counter behind you, causing you to jump. Combine that with the now incessant beeping of the microwave and your heart was racing. You pressed answer, not bothering to glance at the caller id.

"Hello?" You asked as you opened the microwave, careful to not spill the plate as you picked it up with one hand.

The sound of your clearly already inebriated best friend filled your ears. "Heyyyyy!" You made your way to the couch, ready to stuff your face and then rot in your usual spot until you fell asleep. "I think you should get up off that couch and come over. We are having a little get together."

You couldn't help but roll your eyes at her statement. She had tried multiple times after it had happened to get you to go out. She had once famously said 'the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else'. Something that you gave a hard pass to. You thought she had finally given up on trying to get you to go out. It had been maybe almost a month, if you remembered correctly, since your last invite. Also, her get little get togethers were never little. They always escalated into bigger than her house could handle parties. Not that was always a bad thing, it's just the more people the more of a chance for you to run into him, or one his friends. The idea made your stomach turn.

"Would love to, but I'm already settled in for the night. Plus, sounds like you've already started the party without me."

"Oh come on! Please come over. It's been almost three months. Even for just a little bit." Before you could decline again she was already begging for a second time. "Please. For me?"

She was right, it had been almost three months. Maybe a party could do you some good or even just getting out of this routine you've been in for months. Then your mind wandered back to the same person it always has for months. "Is he going to be there?"

"Why would he be here?"

Your eyes darted to the picture frame on the tv stand. Inside the white wooden frame was picture of him and you and all your shared friends. It was from a trip you all had taken last summer to Greece. You both looked so happy and in love, which back then you were. You really should have put that picture up a long time ago, but you couldn't. There were a lot of things you couldn't put away.

"Maybe because we have mutual friends?" You pried.

"He's probably busy this weekend or out of the country. It will be fine. Just please come."

You sighed looking up to find that same reflection from the microwave now residing in the black screen of the TV. As you glanced back between your reflection in the tv and the picture of you from almost a year ago, you decided it was time to get back to the girl you were in Greece. Even without him.

"Fine. Let me get ready and I'll be over." The squeal that came from your friend's mouth was borderline inhumane. "I'll see you in a little bit." But as you hung up the phone that creeping what the hell did i just agree to feeling had appeared.

You tried to push those thoughts aside and hurried to get ready. Maybe this sudden spontaneous so out of character decision for you lately would be a good thing. You slapped on some makeup, making sure to cover those horrible dark circles and chose a casual, yet still party worthy outfit. Honestly the person who stood staring back at you from the mirror looked like the old you. The old you, the you that was happier, the you that was and still is in love.

The uber ride to your friend's house thankfully wasn't that long, it didn't allow for you to psych yourself out and change your mind about going. As the driver pulled up to her house it didn't seem like that crazy of a party, so maybe it was just a little get together. You thanked the driver and made your way to the front door. You took a deep breath before entering, here goes nothing. As you closed to door behind you, your eyes scanned the room. Some familiar faces filled the space of the living room. They noticed your presence and gave you a smile, but nobody came over to talk. You weren't sure if you should be offended or thankful.

Weaving your way through the house, you were on a mission to find your friend, her house wasn't that big, it shouldn't take that long to find her. As you entered the kitchen you realized it was the most crowded room in the house, granted it was were all the drinks were at. You found your friend in the center of the crowd, of course, but as she spotted you coming towards her she stopped her conversations and closed the gap between the two of you. Her arms squeezed you in so tight you could barely breathe.

"I'm so glad you came!"

You smiled back at her, but wanted to get some drinks in to loosen up some. "Yeah, yeah. What about a drink? I know you've started without me."

"Here. Your favorite." She grabbed a beer from the counter, pushing it towards you.

Not your favorite, in fact you hated beer, but you took it with a smile on your face. Some more people began filtering into the kitchen. "I'm gonna go talk to them real quick." Your friend stated. She was gone before you could say anything.

You tried to find something else to drink, but it had seemed that all that was left was beer. What was this? Some high school party? You took a swig of the beer your friend had handed you, hoping your taste buds had changed, but you were wrong. The one swig was enough for you to set it back on the counter.

The kitchen was becoming a little too stuffy and your friend didn't seem to be making her way back to you anytime soon, so you slid out the door to the patio. The fresh air already making you feel better. There were some people out there, a group of guys passing around a joint and some other people just talking, but nothing like the crowd in the kitchen. The empty lounge chair at the corner of the patio was calling your name. With nothing to drink and not really anyone here that you would like to talk to, besides your friend, this party was not turning out like you had hoped. You leaned back in the chair, looking up at the night sky. You tried to find some of the constellations, but the city lights made it far too hard to do.

You could hear footsteps coming towards you and you assumed it was your friend finally coming to hang out, but it was someone far worse than that.

"I think I might see the big dipper." You froze in the chair, goosebumps formed on your skin as your stomach turned. There was no need to turn around to see who was behind you, you knew that voice anywhere. "Hi Y/N."

Hearing him say your name made your body turn towards him, but also made your heart ache. Hearing your name roll off his tongue once brought you so much joy. Now it was like a stab in the heart. Your eyes scanned over him.

Fuck.

He looked good, so good. Clearly he was doing better than you were. His tan skin somehow still glistened in the night time and his curls slightly moved with the night breeze. Even though it was dark, the light from the patio allowed you to still see those eyes of his. The ones that still made you weak in the knees.

"Hi Lando." You gave him a small smile.

Of course he would be here you thought. You should have known he would be here. You had an inkling your friend knew and did this on purpose. You could kill her, but then again it was nice to see him, even if it did hurt like a bitch.

He stared at you for a moment before taking a seat on the end on the lounge chair where your legs resided moments ago. Being in this close of proximity to him made your heart race. Fuck you missed him and it drive you crazy the effect he still had on you.

He noticed you weren't drinking anything and let out a small chuckle. "Still don't like beer huh?"

You smiled, "Never have, never will."

He nodded and looked down at his shoes. This was clearly one of the most awkward conversations you've had in a long time.

"So how's your family doing?" You thought that might be a good thing to ask, you loved his family, so in all seriousness it was a genuine question.

He took a swig of his beer. "Yeah they're good."

You just nodded at his dry answer. Could this get anymore awkward?

You could feel Lando staring at you, he took another swig of his beer before asking. "So how's your new found freedom?"

Ouch. Sensitive topic. You didn't want to talk about how much of a fuck up you were right now, so you deflected the conversation back to him. "Saw you made podium recently. Congrats."

He laughed dryly, he knew what you were doing. "Thanks."

You had started to pick at your nails, a nervous habit the both of you unfortunately shared. You didn't want your relationship to have turned out this way. You wanted to tell him right then and there that you were sorry. That you missed him more than anyone could imagine. That he didn't deserve what you put him through. That you still love him. The memories of you two came flooding back and as you two sat there on the lounge chair, close as strangers. Your mind hit replay.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Lando had been in your life for years. You had met not to long after he had been brought onto the McLaren team. If you wanted to get specific it was at a celebratory party his friends had thrown him. You were invited through mutual friends. When you went that night you had no idea you had just met the man who three years later you would be in love with. Sure you thought he was good looking, who didn't? For awhile you just remained casual friends, really not even that close. After about a year and a half of seeing him at parties, sometimes at other friends houses, and out at clubs, something had started to fester inside of you.

Needless to say you were developing a little crush. It didn't help that when you did see each other, he always went out his way to talk to you. You could walk into the room and as soon as he noticed you, whatever conversation he was having was terminated and he was soon by your side. Some more time had passed and you had heard through the grapevine that Lando was seeing someone, it stung a little, but other than showing you some attention he had made no claim to you. So, what were you to do other than just get over it and hopefully find someone new to crush on.

Though, his new relationship didn't last long and soon enough he was back to charming you. The talking occasionally at gatherings turned into texting, that then turned into texting everyday, which turned into facetiming, and then turned into you two always hanging out when he was around hanging out.

The two of you would go out to eat, to the movies, or even just hang out at each others apartments. It was always a fun time as long as you were in each others presence. You attended some races that were closer to home, always so excited to see him do the one thing he loved. The races you didn't attend though, the two of you were always in contact. Something that you always made sure of was that he never went without his 'goodluck ♡' text from you.

It had gotten to the point where your friends for sure thought you guys were dating and the public had a hunch too. You couldn't deny that your feelings for him were way beyond crush status at this point. And to say you would have rather ate glass than ask him how he felt about you was an understatement. The idea of Lando rejecting you was something that kept you up at night, so your feelings remained bottled up. That was until a sunny race day last spring.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Spring - i miss your tan skin, your sweet smile. so good to me, so right.

Lando had asked you weeks ago to come the upcoming Grand Prix in Australia. You were hesitant, Australia would be the furthest you had ever been from home and it made you a little nervous. At least, that's what you told him. The real truth was that you would've loved to go to Australia, especially to watch him race, but you just couldn't stand to be around him. Your feelings for him were making it so hard to be in his presence, especially with his naturally flirty personality. Your friends kept telling you that you were blind and that he was totally into you, but those statements always rolled off your back. To you, there was no way he felt that the same way you felt about him. So to try and protect yourself from one sided heartbreak, you distanced yourself.

All that work failed though, because here you were a week later on a plane to Australia. It didn't take much more begging from Lando for you to finally cave. Hell, he even wanted you to come early with him, but you drew the line. He had work to do and you didn't want to be in the way, because knowing Lando recently, he would have wanted you with him 24/7. Which was really tampering with your distancing yourself from him plan.

Two connecting flights later and you were finally landing in Melbourne. As you departed from the plane and collected your bags you realized maybe you should have come earlier with him. The airport was insanely busy and trying to get a Uber was going to be a huge and expensive pain in the ass.

You pulled out your phone from your pocket to see if there was even any Ubers available when a text from Lando popped up.

Lan: I've tried to send this damn message like 10 times. Wait. I hope everything's ok with the plane.....Tbh I think I would have gotten an alert or something. Or I would hope your last dying text would go to me. Anyways... text me as soon as you land. I've got a car waiting for you to bring you to the track.

You rolled your eyes at his dramatics, but was very thankful for him always taking care of you. Hell, the cost alone of your plane ticket was enough to make your eyes bulge, but he took care of it like it was nothing.

You: I'm alive. The wifi sucked on the last plane. Actually don't think I can ever do 26 hours of traveling again... consider yourself lucky Norris.

It didn't take but a minute for him to respond.

Lan: I was starting to get worried. Just saying it would have been much better if you just flew down with me days ago...

You: Perhaps.... I'll see you soon.

The ride to the track was beautiful. The sun had just made its grand entrance to the world as you looked out the window. You tried to look at as much as you could on the drive over, wanting to experience as much as you could with what time you had in Australia.

Lando was waiting for you when you arrived, paddock pass in hand. Cheesy smiles were painted on both of your faces as he pulled you into a hug. His cologne alone made you weak in the knees, let alone the feeling of being in his arms.

"Missed ya," he mumbled.

As you pulled away from him you were able to get a good long look at him. There was something about him during race weekends that just made him come alive, made him hotter. Not to mention how sunkissed he looked. Australia had been very kind to him and it was something you could get used to.

He grabbed your hand pulling you along with him. "Come on. Some stuff we need to do before race time." He was being very touchy today and you could feel yourself starting to become putty in his hands.

You got about ten steps before remembering your luggage. "Wait Lan! My bags!" You turned around to see the car had left.

"Don't worry about it. I've got it taken care of."

He always seemed to be doing that, taking care of you.

The place was already alive as the two of you walked around. In a few short minutes you were in his private room and miraculously so was your luggage "You can relax in here for awhile, or do whatever. I've got some things to do but I'll come get you before the race ok?"

You nodded at him and he closed the door behind him. Glancing around the room your eyes landed on the couch and decided a quick power nap may do you some good. You weren't asleep but maybe a half an hour when the constant sound of text notifications woke you up. You grabbed your phone, nothing, not a single text. You thought maybe you were dreaming it and then you heard it again. You looked to your left to see Lando's phone on the side table. He must have forgotten it.

You weren't trying to be nosy, but you were curious as to who was blowing up his phone like that. Quickly grabbing it you saw multiple texts from multiple people from the McLaren team asking where he was at. Must be missing an interview or something you thought. Then you saw something that caught your eye, his lock screen. Behind all the text notifications was a picture of you two. It was after the the first race of his you had ever come to watch. He had a not so great finish to the race and you knew he was going to be hard on himself. So when he made it back to the garage, you were there with arms wide open, a gesture he gladly accepted. Someone must have snapped a picture of you two and sent it to him.

It was a cute picture, but your head was trying to comprehend why he had it as his lock screen. You kept telling yourself that friends don't make pictures like that their lock screen. Then your mind went to the idea of him feeling the same way about you and you could feel your heart starting to race. You weren't going to get your hopes up, but as you put the phone back on the side table you couldn't help but hold on to a little sliver of hope.

It was getting close to race time so you grabbed your bags to get ready. Of course you put on some McLaren attire, specifically some with the number four on it. Just as you were putting on your shoes there was a knock on the door and Lando's head peaks in.

"Ready?" But when he notices you've got on not just any regular McLaren shirt, but his branded one, a small smirk forms on his face.

"Yep. Let's go." You head towards the door, but stop and grab his phone. "Oh wait. I think you might've forgotten this earlier."

His cheeks flush as you hand it over to him, he knows you had to have looked at it, he knows you saw his lock screen. "There it is. Was looking for it all over." He tried to act cool as he shoved it in his pocket.

Lando leads you all through the McLaren area and some people say hi, remembering you from some of the previous races you had attended. He talks to some of the team, and as you stand back and watch you can't help but admire him. How much dedication he puts in is insane and you hoped he would get that well deserved win soon. It wasn't long before the two of you headed back towards his room so he could get ready for the race. You knew he liked to spend this time alone, he had his traditions, so you lingered in the doorway.

"You need anything before I go?"

A confused expression washed over his face. "Go where?"

Now you had the confused expression. "I figured you'd want to be alone."

"Why would I fly you all the way out here to not spend time with you?" He scooted over on the couch making room for you next to him. "C'mere."

As you fully stepped into the room and closed the door, you could feel the mood in the room change. It felt even more strange when you sat next to him on the couch. You tried to make small talk to make it less awkward. "Nervous for the race?" You weren't even looking at him when you asked the question, which was a dumb one at that.

His fingers gently grabbed your chin. "Would you look at me?" Your head turned to face his, his fingers still lingered near your face. His eyes never leaving yours and you could feel your cheeks getting warm.

Your heart was nearly beating out of your chest. "Lan-"

"God you drive me crazy." His hand now had made a home on your thigh. "In a good way."

"Lando what are you doing?" If he thought you were driving him crazy, he should see how he's making you feel.

He paused, like he was trying to figure out what to say. "Putting my heart and today's race on the line."

Oh god

"Here goes nothing." He took a deep breath. "As much as it sounds like a cliche. I truly think I liked you from the very first time we met. I just didn't realize it until much later. Then I got into my head and figured you didn't feel the same about me as I did you. I tried to push those feelings aside, but as we started to spend more time together, they just kept growing. Then it got to the point where you were the only thing I could think of, only person I wanted to be around. You're my favorite person and one of my biggest supporters. The idea of you not being in my life, not being mine, drives me insane. I want you to be at every race, cheering me on, with my number on you." He glanced at the LN4 on your shirt then back up at you. "Looks like I've got one of those things accomplished already."

Your cheeks felt like they were on fire and as much as you wanted to spill your guts to him too, you were too stunned to speak. Lando tried to read your body language for any sign that you felt the same and after no response from you he started to get nervous. "God. I hope I didn't just fuck everything up between us."

The idea of him being scared shitless of rejection just like you was amusing to you and a grin had plastered itself onto your face. Then before you could even realize what you were doing you were practically in his lap, with your lips on his. His hands cupped your face as he kissed you back. God, did it feel amazing. You couldn't lie you had fantasized about kissing him many a times but you were happy to say the real thing was even better than you had imagined.

As the two of you pulled away both grinning like fools, he asked the question. "Now, are you gonna be mine? So when I win this race I can kiss my girlfriend and celebrate with my girlfriend?"

You simply replied. "Yes."

Things may have escalated at that point and the two of you may have been slightly making out until it was time for him to leave. As he gave you one final kiss as he left, you stayed seated on the couch, trying to collect yourself. The high you were riding was like no other and you pinched yourself to make sure what had just happened was real.

The giddiness was still at an all time high as you tried to focus on the race and you had to admit half the time you were thinking about kissing him again. There were only a couple laps left and Lando had been holding steady at P3 for quite some time now and as he entered the final lap you could hear some yelling from his team and then you saw it. He was inching to pass Lewis and Max and then all at once it happened. Lando was in the lead with the checkered flag in sight and within a second he had won his first F1 Grand Prix. Your chair went hurling backwards as you jumped up cheering. The whole McLaren team was yelling and celebrating.

Lando hurried to find you before he took the podium and when he saw you he ran towards you, of course you got your kiss as promised. Must have been the adrenaline because it was even better than before. "My good luck charm." He said before giving you one last kiss and hurrying off to the podium.

As you watched him take the top spot your heart swelled. It was a long time coming and you were beyond proud. You realized your life would never be the same, but with him by your side it was something to look forward to.

Summer - i think about summer, all the beautiful times. i watched you laughin' from the passenger's side and realized i loved you.

The past couple months had been a whirlwind. You honestly weren't sure how Lando did this for nine months out of the year. Between somehow still balancing work and then traveling on most of the weekends you were drained. Sure, you were nothing but grateful that you even got to tag along and experience these amazing places with your boyfriend. It's just that sometimes you craved just simple quality time between the two of you.

The past weekend had been a home race and luckily there was a gap week before the next race in Hungary. Lando promised you that this weekend would be filled with things that you wanted to do. You just hoped he didn't mind doing nothing.

The first day was great, the two of you basically just rotted in bed all day. It was nice to actually relax for once and you could tell Lando was taking full advantage of it. Although, by the afternoon of the next day you were both getting slightly antsy. Boredom, believe it or not had set in. Apparently you had become more accustomed to the busy lifestyle than you thought. You tried to occupy your brain with playing some games on your phone, but it did nothing for you. Lando had plopped down next to you on the couch with a sigh. You glanced over at him, boredom was written all over him.

"I can't believe I'm saying this but we-"

"Need to get the hell out of this place?" He was already up and putting on his shoes and tossing a pair of yours towards you before you could reply back. You hurried to put yours on as he was already heading towards the door.

"Where are we going?" You asked as you got into his car.

He gave you a small shrug. "Nowhere in particular"

Lando had one hand on the steering wheel and the other was already reaching out for your hand before you guys had even left the parking garage. As you intertwined your fingers with his you used your free hand to pick out some music. Lando always let you choose the music when you guys were in the car together. He did the driving and you were the dj. You liked to tease him that you were a better dj than he ever was, which always earned you some eye rolls.

You hadn't really been paying attention to the time, but by the beautiful pinks and oranges that were painted in the sky, you realized the sun was setting. You didn't mind though, you were having a good time. It had gotten to the point in the car ride though, where your music was just put on shuffle and it was always a fun guessing game to see what would pop up next. The opening chords to Promiscuous by Nelly Furtado and Timbaland came on and Lando was convinced he could sing both parts. By the end of the song both of you were out of breath. Him from trying to do both parts and failing, he couldn't even remember half the words, and you from laughing at him.

Golden hour cascaded through the car and as he laughed along with you he looked so perfect. If you could you would have framed this moment in time, so you would have it with you always.

As you pulled up to a red light he looked over at you a small smile on his face. "You know you're lucky I love you. No one gets away with poking fun at my singing."

Your heart skipped a beat. You guys hadn't said that you loved each other yet, but if you were to pick a moment this would have been a perfect one. You had been wanting to say it to him for awhile now, but once again was too scared to make the first move.

"Well I have never been so honoured than to be loved by the Lando Norris." You teased him.

He scoffed at you. "Oh knock it off."

You rolled your eyes as you leaned over the console. You got as close as you could to his lips without kissing him.

"I love you too." You whispered.

"You better."

His lips closed the gap within seconds, and his hand cupped the side of your face. It didn't last long though as the car behind you guys blared its horn. The two of you were too busy to see that the light had turned green.

"Oops." You laughed as you got situated back in your seat.

"Yeah yeah." Lando grumbled as he sped off.

The whole ride back to your place you couldn't wipe the smile you had off your face. You really were so head over heels in love with him. Looking back you were so glad that you got on that plane to Australia back in March. Who knows what your life would have been like right now if you hadn't. All you knew was that you loved him and you couldn't imagine your life without him.

Fall - how you held me in your arms that september night. the first time you ever saw me cry.

The Japan Grand Prix was this weekend and you were excited to be going. You had always wanted to visit Japan and what a better reason than to be supporting the man you loved. You even decided to fly in early with Lando to maybe go do some sight seeing.

The two of you spent the day exploring all that Japan had to offer. Even if it was just one day the two of you made the most of it. You did all the touristy stuff and between the two of you, a photo album probably could have been filled with all the pictures you took.

You walked hand in hand back to the hotel, feet aching from all the walking you had done today. As soon as you entered your room Lando collapsed onto the bed.

"I'm gonna be so tired for practice tomorrow." He was laying on his back with his hands behind his head. Which in turn caused his shirt to ride up exposing his toned stomach. Something that he knew drove you crazy. You kicked your shoes off and walked to the edge of the bed where he laid, smirking at you. That little shit knew what he was doing. Climbing onto the bed you straddled him, making sure to grind your hips a little as you sat on him. A groan escaped past his lips and now you were the one with a smirk on your face.

"I'm gonna give you something to actually be tired about tomorrow Norris." Your fingers trailed along his exposed skin and up under his shirt. You could feel him shiver under you and knowing the power you had over him always went straight through you. Although, your fun didn't last for long. You felt his hands grip your waist and just like that you were the one on your back as he hovered over you.

"I don't know about that." His voice was smooth and low and you knew you were in for it tonight.

When you awoke the next morning he was already gone for practice and the long night the two of you shared replayed in your head as you got ready for the day. If he thought he was tired last night you could only imagine what he felt like this morning.

The next two days went by pretty fast and before you knew it, it was race day. It had started like any other race day too. Over the past couple months Lando had created some new pre race traditions that included you. They weren't anything crazy, if anything they were super sweet. The one that you always liked was that he wanted you to be the last thing he saw before he got into the car. Now in reality that really wasn't possible he was going to see lots of other people, but he always made sure you were out there when he got into the car. And of course his number one priority, I love you's and good luck kisses.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

The race was almost over and it had been a good one, if Lando could hold his position he'd likely finish P2. There were four laps to go and as you watched the screen closely you saw something that made your blood run cold. You weren't even sure how it happened, but one second Lando's coming towards a left turn and the next his car is flipping.

It felt like everything was happening in slow motion. You could see the team freaking out trying to get in contact with him, but the loud ringing in your ears made the once noisy environment silent. You could feel yourself start to hyperventilate as you saw the red flag being waved on the screen.

You hadn't even realized you were crying until someone from the team came over snapping you out of your trance.

"Is he okay? Please tell me he's ok!"

"We haven't been able to get in contact with him. We think the comms got damaged in the crash. They are working on getting him out now."

The state of his car on the screen made you sick to your stomach. It was all mangled and the longer it took for them to get him out the sicker you felt. The tears just wouldn't stop falling, worst case scenario kept replaying in your mind.

After a couple more painfully long minutes you see what you would call a miracle pop up on the screen. They've gotten Lando out and he's walking. Well walking as best as he can with two people on either side of him, but he's alive. Relieved sighs and thank gods are heard from his team.

You don't even have time to try and collect yourself because within a matter a seconds you're whisked away by someone on the team that you've never met and being shoved into the backseat of a car. "Wait I want to see him! Let me see him!"

"He's already on the way to the hospital. You'll see him there." Before you could respond the door is shut in your face.

Rude.

The drive to the hospital took forever. You were positive you had gotten every red light and to top it off were stuck in standstill traffic at least twice. It seemed like the only thing going fast was your mind. Even though you saw him up, that still didn't mean he couldn't have serious injuries.

The car hadn't even come to a complete stop at the hospital and you were opening the door and hightailing it towards the entrance. Thankfully there was someone from the team waiting for you to arrive, but as you approached them you prepared yourself for the worst.

"Please tell me he's okay." You could feel the tears start to well up again.

As they guided you towards his room they explained his condition. "Overall he's fine. He's pretty banged up, no serious internal injuries or broken bones though. I'd say we all witnessed a miracle today. Thank god for the halos."

They stopped outside a door, the one you assumed Lando was on the other side of. "He's still pretty out of it, but he has been asking for you. So that's a good sign." You glanced at the door, funny how you couldn't wait to see him, but now that the time has finally arrived, you were almost scared to open the door. "Go on." The team member nodded for you to enter the room.

You took a deep breath before slowly opening the door. For some reason you thought, maybe he wouldn't be in there. That this was all just a bad dream, but there he was. He was asleep, his chest slowly rising and falling. The sight of him in the hospital bed and finally processing what happened an hour ago hit you all at once and the tears just wouldn't stop coming. You tried be quiet, the last thing you wanted to do was wake him up. You slipped back out the door as you tried to collect yourself. People walking past gave you concerned glances as you sat against the wall with your head in in your hands.

Once the tears had subsided you quietly entered the room again, but to your surprise he was awake. His eyes lit up when he saw you. "Hi baby." He had reached his hand out to you.

You smiled at the term of endearment and took his hand in yours. Your eyes scanned over him, looking for any serious injuries. He had some scrapes and obvious bruises, but nothing that looked too bad. You seriously didn't know how he got this lucky. "You scared the shit out of me Lan. I thought I had lost you."

There they were again, the tears. You had tried to quickly wipe them away, but Lando had beat you to it. His hand gently cupped your face as he thumb wiped away your tears. "Don't cry. I don't like seeing my girl cry." He whispered.

This in turn made you cry more.

Lando tried to console you. "Baby. I'm fine. I promise. Honestly you can't get rid of me that easily." He patted the slightly empty space next to him in the bed. You were unsure, you didn't want to hurt him or make him uncomfortable. "Come on. I think some love from my love is just what the doctor ordered."

You slowly climbed onto the bed next to him, but as you tried to snuggle in close to him he winced. You immediately sat up, ready to sit in the chair next to the bed. "It's fine. It's fine. I just have some bruised ribs." You gave him a questioning look, like you didn't believe him. "That's all it was. I promise. Now please come here." He tugged on your the hem of your shirt. "I want to hold you."

Somehow the two of you made it work in the small hospital bed, but you still weren't entirely convinced this was a good idea. Although you couldn't lie and say it didn't feel nice to be in his arms. It was the one place where you always felt safe and felt comfort. You traced small designs on his arm, something you knew that brought him peace.

You felt him place a kiss on the top of your head. "I love you."

Hearing him say those three words was something you swore you would never get tired of hearing. You raised your head to look at him, and leaned up to press a kiss to his lips. "I love you more."

The two of you sat in silence for some time before Lando spoke up.

"I've got to ask you something and I need you to be so honest with me."

You rolled your eyes playfully, already knowing what his question was going to be. "Don't worry pretty boy, your face doesn't have a single scratch on it."

He let out a deep sigh. "Oh thank god."

If there was one thing you had learned from being with Lando for these past six months was that there was never a dull moment with him. Even after near death experiences he still knew how to somehow lighten the mood. Although, it was something you were thankful for, because after a day like you had, you truly don't know what you would do if he wasn't in your life.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Winter - then the cold came, the dark days. when fear crept into my mind. you gave me all your love and all i gave you was goodbye

Off season had arrived around a week ago. A time that you had looked forward to for months was finally here and you were miserable. Well, perhaps you weren't miserable, but mentally you were struggling.

It had all started in October, a couple weeks after Lando's crash. An article had gotten spread around that you were cheating on him with Charles. Someone had gotten ahold of a picture of you and Charles leaving from a dinner party. You guys had decided to leave out the back after hearing about all the paparazzi out front. As you guys exited the building you gave Charles a hug goodbye. It wasn't something uncommon between you two, you guys had become close friends over the year.

What the two of you didn't know though is that there was a pap hiding in the back, just hoping for a moment like the one you guys had just given him. The pap had taken the picture at just the right angle and far away enough that it looked like you and Charles were kissing. Did the pap think to take a picture of Lando who was right behind you and Charles? Or take a picture of Charles and Lando saying goodbye? No. All they wanted was a story to sell.

That next morning when you saw the article you couldn't help but laugh and Lando did the same exact thing when you showed him. Although the laughter stopped when you scrolled through Twitter. You had always had a good relationship with the fans, and the media left you alone really up until recently. Sure there were gonna be some fans that just didn't like you. It was just something that came with the territory of dating someone like Lando. It was something that never bothered you, but as you scrolled through Twitter all you saw was hateful tweet after hateful tweet.

You couldn't believe that people actually thought you were cheating on Lando. Gold-digger was used quite frequently in the insulting comments. You just tried to shake it off, people would eventually get over it. Lando and you knew it wasn't true and that was all that mattered. Though the straw that would break the camel's back would come two months later.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Social media hadn't been that bad recently, maybe people were feeling the holiday spirit and had decided to lay off you for a while. As you scrolled through your notifications you noticed had gotten tagged in a tweet a couple times. You figured it was probably just another fake tabloid, but clicked on it anyways.

when's Y/N gonna realize her time with lando is ticking.... he can never make it past 10 months with a girl. probably already scoping out someone new on insta.

the way all his past relationships have ended the same way lmao. it's like he sees that one year anniversary and says i gotta go!

You rolled your eyes as you locked your phone, tossing it next to you on the couch. Why couldn't people just stay out of your relationship?

The more you sat on the couch the more the little gears in your head turned. You had never really asked or did any digging on Lando's past relationships. You never really had a reason to, and you didn't want to compare yourself to some undoubtedly beautiful women. But here you were getting back on your phone and going down the rabbit hole. You didn't want what people were saying to be true, but the more you dug, the more it was confirmed. What a lovely thing to have constantly in the back of your mind now.

Christmas was in almost a week and your birthday not to long after that. You had been trying to just focus on the upcoming holidays and not that little nagging in the back of your head about Lando leaving you. That was easier said than done. He had been distant recently and you just knew what was coming. It broke your heart because you had so looked forward to spending the holidays with him, but it seemed like he was always busy. You gave him the benefit of the doubt when he said he was going to do some extra training during the off season to come back even stronger after his crash, but how much training could you do.

You would text him and not get a response for hours or you would ask him if he wanted to go do something and he was busy training or with his friends already. You wouldn't consider yourself clingy, but the fact that you hadn't seen him once the week leading up to Christmas was causing you to spiral. You shouldn't have been so stupid enough to get involved with someone like Lando. Should have known before you guys even got together that he would get bored of you. Every version of self doubt entered your mind as you sat on the couch staring at the Christmas tree in the corner.

It was Friday December 22nd when you broke your own heart and Lando's.

You've had enough. You were going to break it off. Be done. Rather break it off now on your terms than be blindsided by him. You pulled your phone out to text him.

You: Hey, can you come over today?

For the first time in weeks he responded in a timely manner.

Lan: Yes, I was just about to text you asking If you were going to be home today. I need to talk to you.

There it was. He needed to talk to you.

About and hour later he had shown up. You were in your room putting away some laundry when you heard him clear his throat from behind you. You took a second to compose yourself before turning around to look at him.

"Hey." You said softly.

"Hey."

You sat down on the edge of your bed, you weren't sure how you should go about this. You felt sick to your stomach, was this the right thing to do? You were about to ruin the best thing that ever happened to you.

When Lando sat down next to you you felt like all the air in the room had disappeared.

He shifted his body to face you and took your hands in his. Here it comes you thought.

"So I-"

As soon as he began to speak you cut him off.

"We should break up."

His eyebrows furrowed and have you a confused look. "Sorry. What?"

"I'm breaking up with you." You swallowed thickly, you could feel that familiar lump forming in your throat. You couldn't read his face at all, it was almost like he was emotionless. Your looked down at your still intertwined hands. "I'm breaking up with you Lan. I know you're bored of me. So it's better to just get it over with now. I know that's why you came over today." You pulled your hands away from his.

His eyes shifted down to his now empty hands, then back up to your eyes. Shaking his head as he got up from your bed, he felt like his heart was being ripped out of his chest. "What are you talking about 'that's why I came over today?'"

"Don't play dumb Lan, I-"

He scoffed. "You don't get to call me that as you're breaking my fucking heart."

You felt the first tear slide down you cheek. "I know about all your past relationships. How you can't stay with someone for longer than ten months. You get bored and you were clearly getting bored with me."

He threw his hands up in the arm, he was getting mad. "Why would I be getting bored of you? And what does my past relationships have to do with US?"

"People on twitter-"

His face was red and he was talking (yelling) with his hands. "Oh my god! Here we go! I told you, especially after the Charles thing to just stay clear of social media. All they do is get into your head!"

Now you were up, voice rising to match his. This wasn't going to end pretty. "Well sorry I didn't have my boyfriend here to reassure me. To tell me that it wasn't true! Christmas is in three goddamn days and I've barely seen you!" You were sure to be getting a noise complaint later.

"I've been busy!"

Your arms were now crossed. "Busy finding someone new?"

Lando thought his head was going to explode. Where the hell has all this come from? "Jesus Christ! I haven't been cheating on you! All that shit on twitter is just stuff to try and get between us. Which it clearly did it's job."

The tears were falling pretty steadily by now and you could see Lando wipe away a few of his own. "If you weren't cheating or planning on leaving me than what were you doing? What was so important that you couldn't barely be bothered to see me recently?"

He threw his hands up in defeat. "It was a fucking surprise! I had came over today to tell you, I couldn't keep it a secret any longer. I planned an early birthday surprise dinner for you tomorrow and at the party I was going to give you your gift that I had been working out too. That's why I had been so distant. I didn't want to ruin something I had worked so hard on."

Lando had sat back down on you bed, his head in his hands. You just stood there, flabbergasted. How could you be so fucking stupid? You had just ruined the best thing in your life over some stupid doubts.

"What was the gift?" You asked softly.

"Two weeks in Italy. We'd leave the day after Christmas. Spend your birthday in paradise." He looked you dead in the eye. "Only the best for the love of my life."

You felt like you couldn't breathe. What the fuck did you just do? You knew there was no coming back from this.

"Why didn't you just come to me about your doubts?" Lando asked.

You shrugged. "The seed was already so deeply planted and you weren't coming around even when I asked."

"Yeah, well maybe if you would have stayed off social media this wouldn't have happened." He was back to be shitty and that meant so were you.

"Well maybe I'm glad I didn't. So now I don't have to deal with people hating me for just loving you. Or people constantly invading my private life. I want to be free to do whatever I want! Without worrying if it will tarnish your image or create drama!"

His eyes narrowed at you, you clearly struck a nerve. "You're unbelievable you know that? I loved you with all my fucking heart and I can't help that what I do for a living puts the people I love in the public eye! I tried to protect you from it, believe me I did. So I'm sorry for being a burden on your freedom." You had never seen him so mad before, so hurt. It hurt you even more knowing you were the one who caused it.

His words stung, you didn't mean for what you said to come out that way. "Lan-" He had started to walk out of your room and you tried to grab his arm, but he just yanked it away from you.

"No, please, go enjoy your new found freedom."

Seconds later your apartment door slams shut and your left standing in your room a heartbroken idiot. That night was filled with many tears, a bottle of wine, a long facetime call to your best friend, and some more tears as your scrolled through pictures of the two of you on your phone.

The next morning hit you like a freight train. Your head was pounding you weren't sure if it was from the wine or the sobbing, probably a combination of both. You shuffled to the living room and stopped in your tracks when you noticed the bouquet of roses on the coffee table. You picked up the notecard and the crying started all over again as you read it.

For my love, Happy early birthday baby! I love you more than you'll ever know. I don't know how I got so lucky to have someone like you in my life. You're my best friend, my number 1 supporter, and the best girlfriend I could ever ask for. -Love Lando

God, you had fucked up so badly. How could you ever think a man so in love with you like he was, was planning on leaving you? The part that hurt the most was that you still loved him. You loved him so much it made you sick. You only did what you did to protect yourself and look at where it got you. A broken heart that you were sure was beyond fixable. The only person who would be able to fix it, just had his broken by you. Maybe you should quit your day job and just become a professional heartbreaker, it was something you were clearly good at.

Christmas and your birthday were beyond shitty that year and the roses he gave you had died on your birthday, how fitting you had thought. After the holidays is when you fell into your self loathe spiral that had been going on for three months now. You thought back to December all the time. How you wished you could fix things, but you had never thought that was a possibility until you saw Lando at that party.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

Present

You still nervously picked at your fingernails, you wanted to badly to try and make things right, or at least tell him you were sorry. Fuck it you thought. You swallowed your pride and turned towards him to speak.

"I'm sorry about that day Lando." There was no comment from him, so you just kept going and once you started you couldn't stop. "I think about it all the time. I wish I could turn back time, and somehow change my mind or at least change what happened. I would have came to you with my doubts or when you came over that day I would have let you speak and not interrupted you."

Still no response from him, he just watched you intently. "And to answer your question earlier about my freedom... it's just been filled with missing you."

You took a deep breath before continuing to speak. "I still love you, and I know you probably hate me. And this is me just wishfully thinking, but I hope you would give me a second chance in the future. I know you didn't deserve what I put you through. I'm sorry, so sorry."

Your heart was beating so fast and you felt like you could throw up. You prayed he felt the same way and he would hold you in his arms and tell you that it was ok. That things could go back to the way they were before you fucked everything up, but that only happens in fairy tales or romance movies. Two things your life is not.

Lando sighed, took one final swig of his beer, and got up off the lounge chair. And for the second time, you watched him walk out of your life.

[captainzigo]

what was the point of making G5 a sequel? who was asking for this? was it bronies?

i love G5. its fun and cheeky. the absolute worst parts of it by far are the lame nods to G4

if you don’t care about anything they did in g4, any of the themes they had, and of the changes they made to the world, any of the characters they made any of the world they made, any of it at all,,, then why make a sequel? why not a reboot or a remake or starting from scratch or anything else? its not a bigger world with more lore if you disregard litterally all the world and all the lore.

was it for brand recognition? you can literally use the same characters tho. literally put twilight in there as just a new character with the same name and then tell a different story. that’s what all the other generations of mlp did. old fans will like seeing twilight again even if she is deferent. and new fans will get a new character made for them that has a bigger presence if and only if they want to see it.

the way g5 presents g4 actually just feels like a fuck you to g4. the characters you love? they died and nothing they did ever mattered. the togetherness they created with other creatures? gone. completely gone. the togetherness the litterally made with the three pony tribes? nonsense. even just their legacy? undone. the litteral cities they built? ash. no crystal empire. no ponyville. it’s all gone and it never made a difference. ponies still hate eachother. they still lack any shared identity. they don’t even remember a time when they did. there’s no yaks. dragons are reclusive and feared. no griffons. no changelings.

yeah sure there’s one girl who remembers, and she can like talk to twilight posthumously, but they don’t seem to want to do anything with that. and that kind of grand save-the-world plot doesn’t really fit the genre they seem to be going for

it really feels like they hate g4. the whole thing reads like a bitter mockery of it. if i saw their treatment of G4 by itself, i would assume it was like a hit piece. or atleast some edgy brony nonsense. G5 to me is a fun silly and sometimes exciting cartoon because i choose to just ignore all the G4 stuff. that twilight sparkle? no relation. big coincidence.

i’m not even trying to glorify g4 id just like to say. it really wanted to be something grander than the cartoon it was and it pulled it off to very mixed results. it had a lot of major flops, and some very questionable decisions. like their full time commitment to a colonialist fantasy in the last few seasons? but i still love it. and im not really interested in watching a sequel that hates it. hence my cognitive dissonance

[beemochi-art]

*slides in $5* id like to order one 'bees thoughts on the brutality of cybertron and its society' please

I CANT GET THE MONEY!!!! IM SCRATCHING THE SCREEN!!

(WARNING I SHOULD HAVE POSTED THIS A LONG TIME AGO SO SOME OF THIS RANT IS Irrelevant . Or I just guessed right! So imma post it anyways, cause why not.)

Regardless! I’m going to turn this into a tfone tangent on how their society works and other things: because not having tha ability to transform in a transforming world is really interesting. Is that even natural?

In other continuings your class is based on your alt mode. Because in the society of functionalism everything works like a big cog in a machine. To me not having a cog seem ani functional in a way. Cause all they can do is walk, no taking bigger loads of cargo no flying. Does that make cogless bots the lowest low. Both Megs and Orion are significantly smaller than any transforming bot so I think it could make sense that they are miners, they could get into tight places to get minerals. Makes me wonder how the caste system works for transforming bots. I also couldn’t help but notice that the cogless bots have a lot to entertain them and keep them happy, like the races or here Red alert isn’t working (guessing) it looks like he is playing a game. The fact there are Monitors everywhere playing the race for them to watch, or that there are so many cogless bots actually at the race.

Do you think they are trying to distract them from their shitty situation? Maybe it’s not natural to not have a cog, or the fact they don’t let them to the surface or interact with other cybertronians with cogs. But most miners don’t both cause they are content with their simple life without knowing what natural rights have been taken from them. Maybe it’s like bananas, like how bananas used to have seeds but have been genetically alter to not? Maybe it’s like like that. Is it the quintissions fault???

[ganondoodle]

I probably still wouldn’t have been a big fan of the game, but I don’t think I would have been NEARLY as upset about TotK if BotW didn’t seem like it was so obviously setting up plot points for a sequel. Like, you’re very clearly MEANT to wonder what malice is, and how Ganon became the Calamity instead of just the Demon King. Fi is awake again, where are they going either that? What’s the deal with the Triforce-shaped symbol on Zelda’s hand? There were a LOT of other things like that, and many of them had to do with overarching lore for the series.

I get it if they want to reboot the series, but “BotW 2” was the single worst game you could have done that with. It could have been an amazing conclusion to the original continuity.

EXACTLY, you, you get it

botw felt like the introduction to a vast world with secrets and hints to things that were planned to become a bigger thing- a big giant game as a big giant set up, and then ... like totk likes to do alot, it lacks a pay off, and that is something it even does within itself, cosntantly, set up and no pay off, or set up and the most boring and uninspired pay off you can really not even call that, from the bigger things like the whole dragon thing being hammered into your head as irreversible and then it IS reversible.. out of nowhere without you having to do fuck all, the whole thing with the ancient hero beign a big mystery with lots of interesting ideas attached and then its some weird ass dog creature that doesnt resemble any other race with, of course, sonau armor, bc there nothing that isnt sonau in that game, even finding the old treasure maps you can find that then lead to amiibo stuff from botw id call that

botw wasnt that great with rewards either but exploring the world and wondering about those, surely intentionally, placed mysterious and intriguing designs and places did alot for making it so interesting to think about, totk fumbles it all and even the new stuff doesnt even come close to that environmental storytelling botw was so great at, sonau ruins? ha they look entirely different than in botw actually, bc those were built by hylians you see, the actual sonau stuff is in prime condition considering the time thats passed and its all the same blank blocky blocks that serve no purpose but to be a place for you to find a thing or exchange some currency- the most you can think about it is ... that the sonau hollowed out the entire underground of hyrule, every inch of the map, ... which is WEIRD and doesnt exactly make them look that good but ... thats all there is

at least with the shiekah it made somewaht more sense and it felt much less .. invasive? and you didnt have anyone from that time to talk to, other than dead monks whos only purpose is to give you their last piece of their own spirit, but in totk ... raurus ghost and mineru too are both just there to talk to but DONT tell you shit but vague hints that were already clear, the sky islands used to be on the ground? oh you dont say, you see them there in the stupid memories! and dont get to know how they got up there and theres nothing that can clue you in to that, its just sonau magic yet again i guess

dont even get me started on the whole malice/miasma thing, it made so much SENSE that there was a source of it, someone that has keep kept in a horrible place just between life and death for thousands of years trying to break free by their hate and anger manifesting to such a degree its literally spilling out and building creppy eyeballs, mouths and ribcage like structures like they are trying to rebuild themsleves outside of their awful prison no one knows about is so damn compelling, but no, actually, the guy trapped there was the msot evilest evar, was sealed bc him evil and no other motive, and the previously mentioned stuff is pretty much utterly unceonnected, and his magic beign miasma with red instead of pink and no creepy body parts was the true version of it, that pink one was its own thing heehooo SHUT UP argh

it doesnt help that really, i dont feel like the sonau were set up either, they were a tiny part in botw, really only serving to make the world seem more ancient and more full of history, having ruins from a past civilization there you know nothing about and cant find out more is so good, its compelling and sad and makes the world feel more real, just shoving them into everything, being the center of attention all of thes udden and not even the architecure fitting feels so ... forced, i really truly believe the og sonau werent meant to be more than that, but in their fear of the game being too similarly looking like botw they took the sonau to replace the shiekah with them- imo the shiekah were the ones set up to be deeper explored in botw, with their whole misstreatment by the royal family in the past, monk miz kyoshia reacting the same way a yiga commander would was deliberate and brings up even more interesting ideas, the comments about where the mysterious energy the ancient shiekah used to power everything being concentrated in certain regions?? thats a big ass set up, the fact that the center of what is signaling everything to reactivate being below hyrule castle? the fact the whole arena thing was BUILT INTO THE CASTLE or it on top of it is so??? cool??? and sso damn intriguing, we are scratching the surface of their history- but then no, actually, the sonau are the cool new shit those other ones just uh ... disappear, also the sonau did everythign the shiekah did but even better wayy before them haha

its like they didnt want to tackle the more complicated stuff with the shiekah, their relationship to the royal family and how the yiga ... have a point and a good reason- so they replaced them with entirely new purely goodest good guys that did the same stuff before them with none of the history attached :))

this is why im so insistent on it not really being a sequel, thers no follow up on anything that was set up, NOTHING, and no, a couple having a kid now or whatever isnt a follow up on an interesting set up, how hard is it to understand that-

.... listen to me rambling, you probably know all that already nhjdfkbnkd

(i know i always bring up the shiekah but ... they were so central in botw, while also not taking up every single corner- unlike some other ones >_____>, with so much interesting stuff to connect and think about, i cared about them so much i felt kicked down the stairs by their treatment in totk)

[bloodyneptune]

Sister Sage theory:

I think her plan is to drive Homelander to do something that'll have people turning on Supes and Vought. So she starts pushing him to see himself as superior and humans as something he shouldn't care about killing.

That would feed into Homelanders need for love and approval, because hed only want it from people who are 'worthy'. He already thinks hes better than most supes, so of course the only 'worthy' person is Ryan.

But look what she did by insulting Ryans suit as not being 'unique', it hit Homie in the ego, which caused him to ruin Ryans first foray into Superheroing and turning him away from the only thing Homie has to bond with him, pushing him to Butcher. Which triggered Homelanders need for control, while shes causing uncontrollable chaos in the world around him. The more chaos, the more he has to control, the bigger the chaos the bigger his actions will be

He'll snap, massacre some folks, and everyone will be terrified and vote for all that anti supe legislation, crippling Vought. Which I think is her goal, she clearly doesn't enjoy her powers, and Vought is the reason she's got to lobotomize herself just for a break.

She's based on Lex Luthor, who's whole thing was stopping Superman from taking over the world, and Ozymandias who was cool killing millions to save billions with an incredibly intricate plan involving working with, tricking, and ruining the reputation of his 'Superman' (Manhattans even referred to as 'the Superman' at one point)

But theres more! I think she's working with Neuman, and knew Homelander would go to her if they just put her name in front of him. The most prominent book on her table is 'Beyond Human' almost like she set the scene for him.

Why do I think this? You know what causes strokes? Lack of blood flow to the brain. Do we know any supes that can control blood and would want Hughie distracted from his mission? See, I think his mom is being forced to work with someone, because theres no WAY his dad gave the power to make medical decisions on his behalf to a lady who he cant count on, that he talked to a few times after two decades, over his SON who knows him better than anyone. And no way he didnt know his dad had a DNR.

I think they caused the stroke, changed his will, and planted his mom there to make sure his only option was V. Why would his mom even look in his pocket, know what was in the vial, or how to administer it? It's one of Voughts biggest secrets. So someone had to know he had it and told her (You notice the side eye that Sage gave A Train when Hughie texted? He's one of the most famous people on earth in the middle of filming a blockbuster, theres no reason for a sus side eye if he gets a text...unless she knew)

[POTENTIAL SPOILERS] And most of us know what happens when you give V to someone who's brain dead (lets just say his dads not making it to the Winchester this time). Maybe its a ploy to make Vought look bad, cause chaos, maybe he'll have to take his own dad down and they have plans for Hughie that they need him in a certain mindset for. Idk, Im not the worlds smartest person

I think the whole theme of this season is "nobody is who they seem", and I think Sage is going to do what nobody else could, and bring them down. Id love it if next season was a take on the Mutant Registration Act. Could you imagine Homelander, on the run, thinking supes are superior to humans? Still with his need for love and adoration? Dude, he'd be Magneto (with several personality disorders).

[mountttmase]

Am I Doing It Right?

Note - I hope you all enjoy this one 🙊 it a bit different to anything else I’ve done. There are big chucks of flashbacks and those will be in italics so it hope it’s not too annoying to read 😂 but please let me know what you think 🩷🩷🩷

Also a massive thank you to @carlottawllms who helped me so much with how to structure this and with some of the plot. I know she’s excited for this one so I hope it lives up to your expectations 😂🩷

Pairing - Mason Mount x Reader

Word count - 6.2k

Warnings - smut, fluff and angst

‘I’m sorry, how is it 3am? I swear it was only 11 like twenty minutes ago’ your best friend Mia giggled as you and a few of your friends stumbled out of the club and into a waiting taxi.

‘My legs are killing me’ you moaned as you all squished in together but thankfully it wasn’t a long trip back to to the hotel.

You were currently in Edinburgh for one of your girlfriends birthdays and as you watched the unfamiliar city roll passed the window in the back of the taxi, your mind wondered to Mason being tucked up in bed at home. Your heart thudding at the thought of his pouty lips as he breathed softly in his sleep.

You were sharing a room with Mia and as soon as you got inside, you plugged your phone into charge as it had died about an hour and a half ago. You sat waiting for it to turn on as Mia was messing about in the bathroom and as soon as the screen lit up you were straight in your messages.

Your heart lept at how thoughtful he was and you quickly text him back in your half drunken state.

‘What the hell are you smiling at?’ Mia slurred and she came out of the bathroom, flopping down on the bed next to yours as you put your phone down.

‘Nothing, was just saying night to Mason’ you shrugged and she rolled her eyes with a smile.

‘What? He’s still awake?’

‘Yeah he said he wanted check I got back alright’ you told her and she started laughing loudly.

‘What on earth did you do to that poor boy? After all these years and he’s still completely wrapped around your finger’

‘Well I did take his virginity, maybe it’s that’ you said without thinking, laughing lightly as you looked at her but her face was a picture as you settled on it. Mouth agape and eyes wide and a look of shock on her face as she sat up to stare down at you.

‘You what? You took his- what?!’

‘Shhh’ you giggled, pulling here back down to try and get her to be quiet as you both erupted into laughter.

‘I need details, now. Why have you never told me this?’

‘Cause it’s private. You’ve never told me when you lost yours’

‘Yeah but we’re not talking about us here. We’re talking about Mason and I need you to tell me now’

You rolled you eyes, laying back and thinking back to all those years ago when you and Mason had first started dating.

You’d just started a new job in a local cafe whilst you were studying and you were on the way home from a shift when you found a wallet on the floor.

Thankfully his ID was inside and you smiled at the cute picture before your eyes landed on his date of birth. You weren’t that far apart in age and you quickly googled the address listed on it to find he lived about a 15 minute walk away. Fortunately for you it was a nice sunny day and you didn’t have anywhere else to be so you thought you’d do your good deed for the day and return it to them.

You had no idea where you were going, not knowing this particular area of town that well and the houses seemed to get bigger and bigger the further you went until you were on what seemed to be a private road. You were unsure of what to do as it was gated and you had no idea how to get to the other side as no one was around but thankfully a car pulled up just at the right time and after a mini pep talk, you ushered yourself in just before the gate closed.

The house was beautiful from what you could see but you were met with another gate, however this time there was a buzzer and you nervously pressed it in hopes someone would answer. It didn’t take long and after the third ring you heard a confused hello blast from the speaker.

‘Oh h-hi. My names y/n, um I was just on the way home from work when I found your wallet on the floor. Well I think it’s yours anyway the address is for here’ you rambled and you mentally slapped yourself for how stupid you must of sounded. ‘Sorry, I’m just returning it’ you gulped and without another word the gate began to open slowly. You took this as your cue to enter and you nervously made your way up the path to his front door.

You were about halfway when the door swung open and you felt yourself blush immediately. He was gorgeous but it was his smile that caught your attention immediately. His wide toothy grin making your tummy flutter from the first second you saw it as he made his way over to meet you and all you could think of was how his picture didn’t do him any justice.

‘Hey, Mason right?’ You questioned and he nodded before you handed his wallet over to him.

‘Thank you so much, I had no idea I’d even lost it’ he laughed as he quickly flipped it open. ‘Where was it?’

‘Just in town, by the roundabout?’

‘It must of fallen out when I came out the shop’ he laughed, tucking it back into his pockets. ‘Thank you so much for bringing it here’

‘That’s alright, it’s a nice day so it was a nice walk’ you smiled and he looked at you with a shocked expression.

‘Wait, you walked here?’ He exclaimed and you nodded at him shyly. ‘Do you um, do you wanna come in for a minute? I feel like I owe you a drink or something’

‘No you’re fine honestly’

‘Please? It will make me feel a bit better about myself’

‘Won’t your parents mind’ you asked and you watched his face flush slightly.

‘Oh uh, this is my house. They don’t live with me so I think they’ll be fine with it’

‘Oh’ you breathed, swallowing hard before nodding. If anything you we’re more curious to see the inside and work out who he was.

As predicted, the house was just as immaculate on the inside as the out and after a quick coffee and a chat he offered to drop you home as another thank you. His car was sparkling and expensive and you assumed he must of come from money so you were a little embarrassed to have him drop you outside your building but he didn’t bat an eyelid.

Two days later you came home to a beautiful bunch of pink roses and you were unsure as to who they had come from until you read the note from Mason letting you know how thankful he was and wondering if he could take you to dinner sometime with his number at the bottom. You only deliberated for a few hours before texting him back and in a few days time you were sat opposite him in some swanky restaurant you’d never heard of. You couldn’t hold it in anymore and asked him what he did and when he replied a footballer suddenly it all clicked into place.

He was unbelievably charming and made the worst dad jokes but you couldn’t help but laugh at them and it didn’t help that was was easy on the eye to the point you couldn’t look at him for more than 5 second intervals. By the end of the night you were fully under his spell so when he asked to see you again you agreed.

He seemed so different from anyone you knew, wanting to get to know you before anything else to the point you thought he might not even fancy you at all since he kept everything so platonic but on your fourth date he’d kissed you on your doorstep and you finally felt all those feeling you were told about in books and films.

‘Yeah yeah I know all this’ Mia laughed as the pair of you got comfy in bed after getting changed. ‘I want the juicy stuff’

‘I’m getting to it, it was years ago I can’t remember everything’

‘We’ll try harder. You must remember when he first told you he’d never done it?’

She was right, you did.

You’d been dating for around three months and even though he was an absolute dream, things hadn’t progressed passed a steamy make out session on his sofa and you were beginning to doubt yourself again. You’d tried making subtle advances but he seemed to be none the wiser and you thought maybe he was being respectful so you’d had a word with yourself and when you were next alone with him at his house you were going to put the moves on him.

It was his day off and you had gone to his house after work for dinner. You were currently cuddled up to him on the sofa as you watched tv, halfway through some weird film he’d found and you were waiting for the moment he looked down at you to kiss you so you could take it a bit further.

It didn’t take long and when he looked at you with a shy smile, you connected your lips in a deep kiss. You could feel him holding back a little bit like usual but you pushed through it, kissing him even deeper and sitting yourself in his lap so you could hopefully make him see what you wanted.

Your hands were all over his neck and chest whilst he kept his on your waist but that’s not what you wanted. In the end you grabbed hold of his wrists and pushed them down so he would hopefully touch you somewhere else but he resisted, pulling away from you entirely and resting his forehead on your shoulder. You were both out of breath and when he eventually looked back up at you your tummy dropped.

He didn’t want you like that, you could tell from a mile off and you quickly scrambled off of him as not to embarrass yourself any further.

‘Y/n, wait please’ he panicked, running after you but you couldn’t look at him, struggling to put your shoes on as he tried to stop you. ‘Y/n’

‘What?’ you snapped and his hands fell to his sides instantly. ‘What, Mason? I get it alright. If you don’t wanna have sex with me then you can just tell me. I’m a big girl, I can take it’ you shouted and you watched him wince at your words.

‘It’s not that at all’ he told you quietly but you didn’t believe him and you’d given up trying to talk to him. ‘Just stop, please’ he told you, holding you by your forearms as you looked up at him with a teary expression. ‘It’s not you-‘

‘Oh piss off Mason. Don’t even insult me with that it’s not you it’s me crap.

‘But it’s true’

‘Unless you give me a good enough reason then I’m off’ you told him and if you hadn’t of been so caught up in yourself you might if seen how vulnerable he looked but his silence told you everything so you pulled yourself out of his grasp and went to grab your things. ‘Bye Mase’

‘I’m a virgin’ he said quietly but it was loud enough for you to hear. Your head spinning round to face him as his eyes dropped to the floor, a wave of guilt washing over you as his words sunk into your skin. You didn’t know what to say as he stood there scratching his chin awkwardly but he beat you to it this time. ‘If you still wanna go I get it’

‘No no, Mase I’m so sorry’ you told him, rushing over to him and cupping his jaw so he would look at you but his eyes stayed glued to the floor even when you stroked your thumbs across his cheeks and you were now panicking that you’d pushed everything too far. ‘God I’m such a bitch I shouldn’t of said all that, I’m sorry I didn’t mean it’

‘You’re not a bitch’ he huffed lightly, finally placing his hands on your waist which made your heart settle a little bit. ‘I just… it’s not easy to talk about you know?’ He told you and you could see how nervous and unsure of himself he was. ‘I know we need to though so please stay. I promise I’ll explain everything’

‘Go sit I’ll be in soon’ you told him and with a kiss on his nose he shuffled off back to the living room. You couldn’t help but feel awful as you took your shoes off again and gave yourself a talking to in the mirror. You knew how much it would of taken for him to tell you what he just had and you needed to be there for him so you gave him a reassuring smile as you walked back in. He looked petrified but when you held your arms open for him he melted into your neck as you held him to your chest. ‘I’m sorry for blowing up at you and not speaking to you properly. I should never of forced you to tell me that if you weren’t comfortable. You don’t need to explain anything to me, not if you don’t want to’

‘I’ve been meaning to tell you for a while, I’m just a bit embarrassed’ he told you, voice slightly muffled by your neck

‘You’ve got nothing to be embarrassed about’

‘I’m nearly 19 and I’ve never had sex, y/n’

‘So? I know people older than you who haven’t had sex yet’ you told him and you felt him sigh into your neck ‘can I ask why you haven’t?’

‘Too focused on football I guess, never had time for girls or a proper relationship. It’s not like I haven’t wanted to but I think the longer it’s gone on the more I’ve built it up in my head and I’ve freaked myself out’

‘What’s the furthest you’ve gone with someone?’ You asked and you saw his face flush a deep red shade. ‘You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to like feel free to tell me to mind my own business’

‘No I want to’ he breathed, nodding his head before taking your hands in his so he could play with your fingers as he spoke. ‘About six or seven months ago I started speaking to this girl and we had a little thing. I thought maybe I could just got for it and get it over with but it didn’t work out that way’

‘What happened?’ You asked gently and you smiled as he cringed a little bit.

‘We made out a few times, she um… she gave me head’ he laughed, hiding his face in his hands and you rubbed up and down his thigh gently to let him know he was fine and he eventually showed his face again. ‘I couldn’t cum though, and then she expected me to return the favour so I panicked and told her the truth and that I didn’t know what to do. She basically told me I was pathetic and left’

‘Oh Mase’ you whispered, linking your fingers through his as his eyes stayed in his lap.

‘I didn’t wanna mess up what we have so I didn’t say anything and I know you’ve wanted to do… stuff for a while but I was scared to loose you’

‘Come here’ you whispered, holding your arms out and he lent into you gently. ‘You’re not gonna loose me Mase. I get why you didn’t wanna say anything and I’m sorry for being so bratty earlier but I’m not going anywhere’

‘Are you sure?’ He murmured, holding you tighter as you nodded and stroked the back of his head.

‘Positive. Look I’m not exactly a master between the sheets myself. I only did it a handful of times with my ex so there’s still loads of stuff I don’t know and haven’t tried. If you want to do stuff we can but only when you’re ready. I don’t want to force you or anything’

‘You’re not forcing me’ he laughed against your chest and you held him even tighter. ‘It’s pretty much all I’ve thought about but I don’t want to disappoint you. I don’t wanna be shit at it you know? I wanna make you feel good’

‘Hey’ you huffed, pulling back so you could look at each other. ‘You could never disappoint me. It’s all a learning curve and we can work out what the other likes from the start. I know it seems scary but it’s fun when you know how’ you laughed and he finally smiled a real smile.

‘I wanna do thing’s properly with you, I think that’s why I held off saying anything cause you’re the first girl I’ve not wanted to just get it over with and be done. I want it to mean something’ he told you honestly and you lent in to give him a heavy kiss.

‘I really am sorry, I feel like a right cow. Having a big strop just because you won’t give me any’ you joked rolling your eyes. ‘I just thought maybe you didn’t like me in that way or something’

‘I like you in every way’ he told you sincerely and your heart fluttered as he brushed some hair behind your ear. ‘And this isn’t just about being physical, I like you for who you are and I want to spend time with you for as long as I can’

‘I want that too. I’d hate for you to think this is just sex for me’

‘I don’t think that’

‘Really?’

‘Of course. I love being with you and if we can take that next step then great but it might just take me a little bit of time to get there fully’

‘God you really are a cow’ she laughed and you hid your face out of embarrassment. ‘You practically outed the poor boy’

‘I didn’t mean to. I felt awful but can you blame me? Every time I look at him I wanna rip his clothes off and the fact it felt like he didn’t feel the same was making me feel like shit’ you laughed as she nodded in agreement. ‘I just presumed he’d done it already’

‘So how long did it take until you did it?’

‘A little while. I mean we did other stuff first’ you shrugged and you heard her let out an excited little squeal.

‘Spill. Now’

‘Mia, I’m not giving you a run down to the start of our sex life’

‘Yes you are. Now come on I haven’t got all night’

‘Fine’ you huffed with a laugh, actually enjoying thinking back to all those years ago.

You knew he was nervous about it all and wanted to let him know you were ready whenever he was, trying to reassure him over anything else but he seemed to want you just as much even if he was scared.

‘Well whenever you wanna start we can’ you winked and you watched him get all nervous again.

‘We could um- we could start now? If you wanted?’

‘If that what you want?’ You asked him quietly and he gave you a gentle nod. ‘Well, how about I look after you a little, make up for blowing up at you earlier’ you teased, running your hand up and down his thigh as he looked at you with blown out pupils. ‘We can start slow, like just kiss for a bit. Whatever you’re comfortable with and then if you want to try anything else we can. Does that sound okay?’

‘Yeah’ he told you quietly but you could tell he was on edge about the whole thing.

‘Just relax yeah? We can go as slow as you like and you can just tell me what feels good. And if it doesn’t then we can stop or try something else. Do you trust me?’

‘Yes’ he smiled, his shoulders finally relaxing as he repositioned the pair of you so you were slightly laid back. Your legs over his thighs as his arms circled your waist and you cupped his jaw to bring his lips to yours.

It all felt so different to before, he was finally relaxing into you properly and you hummed contently into his mouth as he slipped his tongue in after a while. You stayed like that for a bit until you were truly happy that he was relaxed before you started to move, sitting up so you could straddle him whilst not disconnecting your lips from his once. Moving your hands to his shoulders and across his chest where you could feel his heart beating just as rapidly as yours.

You could feel him underneath you and from the way his hands were now stroking lightly over the backs of your thighs you knew he was getting into things so you began to ever so gently rock your hips over him causing him to quietly moan into your mouth.

‘How’s that, Mase?’ You whispered against his lips but the way he was now gripping your hips told you everything you needed.

‘G-good. So fucking good’ he told you and you smiled, kissing his again and grinding down a little harder before you slid off his lap and sat next to him, lips still attached as you palmed him over his joggers and you moaned along with him at the feel of him in your hand.

‘Mase? Can I?’ You asked, your fingers dancing over his waist band and you felt him let out a shaky breath against you lips before he shimmied them down his hips along with his boxers until he had freed himself but you paid no attention to it at first pulling him back in for a kiss so he could relax again before you attempted to do anything. You couldn’t help but let your fingers wonder down to his length, griping him lightly before his head rolled back on the sofa.

You took the opportunity to see what you were working with and you felt your mouth water at the sight of him. You pumped him a few times before his lips were back on yours, hungrily kissing you as you worked on him until he was biting your bottom lip.

You moved down off the sofa to you could pop yourself in between his legs and pull his boxers down all the way but you didn’t want him feeling self conscious so you stripped yourself of your top to leave you in just your bra and the small growl he let out made you clench your thighs together.

You took him in your mouth gently, looking up at him through your lashes as he balled his fists as the side of him. You reached out to take his hands, threading his fingers through your hair so he could keep your hair out of your face while you made him feel as good as you could. And by the moans and whimpers coming from him you thought you were doing a pretty good job.

He was tense though, you could tell that much so you came of off him with a pop, taking him in your hand so you could pump him whilst looking back at him.

‘Relax, Mase’

‘I-I’m gonna cum’ he told you and you smiled up at him cheekily.

‘Good’ you breathed before taking him back in your mouth again, making sure you got him over the line and when he started bucking his hips up into you you knew he was close. ‘Don’t think about it yeah?’ You breathed ‘Just cum for me Mase’ you told him again and your words seem to hit this time as your name fell from his lips. You swallowed him down, pulling off of him and making sure you didn’t spill a drop as he looked down at you with wide and curious eyes.

‘Jesus Christ’ he laughed, his face flushed from embarrassment and you crawled back up into his lap so you could kiss his cheek.

‘How was it?’

‘You’re amazing’ he smiled, kissing you quickly before he cupped your jaw. ‘I can’t believe we just did that’ he giggled and you could tell he was feeling a little bit shy. ‘I promise I’ll pay you back when I’m ready’

‘Mase, it’s not about payback’ you laughed but he silenced you with a kiss.

‘I know but I want to’ he smiled before wrapping himself around you.

A week later you were back at Masons and after you’d cleared up from dinner he took you up to his room where he told you he wanted to be shown how to please you.

You stripped down to nothing with a little help from Mason who was eyeing you up like he never had before, confessing you were the first girl he’d ever seen fully naked and you felt yourself blush as he lead you over to his bed. Mason kept his boxers on for now and you laid next to him, guiding his hand and showing him where on your body you liked to be touched and kissed and even though he was technically learning, every touch of his fingers and lips made you shiver so when he took your nipple into his mouth unprompted you nearly lost your mind.

‘What you did to me, I wanna do that to you’ he told you quietly, looking up at you through his lashes as he moved to position himself in between your legs and you felt yourself melt at how vulnerable he was. ‘Tell me what to do’

You gave him a quick explanation, blushing and stuttering through it as he smiled up at you before dipping his head down suddenly. You could tell he was unsure but he was also listening to how you reacted to what he did and when you let out a loud moan he looked up at you with a small smile.

‘Am I doing it right?’ He asked and you nodded your head with a laugh before he was diving back in. You gave him a few more pointers but he surprised you again by dipping a finger inside you slowly, making you arch your back at the new sensation.

‘Mase, keep doing that’ you told him breathlessly and he did just that, find a rhythm the pair of you enjoyed and you sunk into the sheets, threading your fingers into his hair as you began to rock your hips against him. ‘Fucking hell, Mason. That’s so good’ you breathed and you felt him moan into your core, clearly loving hearing how good he was doing so you made a mental note to praise him when you could. You’d been waiting for this for a while so it didn’t take long until he was eventually riding you through it, feeling him move back to beside you with a cheeky grin. ‘What the fuck, Mase?’ You laughed, pulling him in for a kiss and you hummed as you tasted yourself. ‘You’re a natural’

‘I can’t take all the credit. After last week I did a bit of research’ he winked and you giggled as you pulled him closer.

‘So you watched porn?’

‘A shit tone, yes’ he confessed, kissing your forehead gently. ‘But don’t worry, I know most of it’s just for show I just needed a few pointers. Did I do good?’

‘Better than good’ you winked as your stroked his face, noticing the slight flush of his cheeks at your words. ‘What about you? did you enjoy it?’

‘Yeah, more than I thought I would. I like the idea of making you feel good and putting your pleasure above mine. Like knowing I can do that to you and make you feel that way’

‘And that’s the answer I was looking for’ you giggled as you pulled him in for a long kiss.

The pair of you had been experimenting for a few more weeks until he had a week off and once you’d taken a few days off yourself, he invited you over to stay for a few nights so you could spend some proper time together. You were in the bathroom taking your makeup up off when you felt him come up behind you, kissing your neck gently as he slowly stroked over your arms meaning you were covered in goosebumps.

‘Come with me?’ He asked softly as soon as you were done, and you took his hand and followed him back into his room.

He’d dimmed the lights and there was gentle music playing in the background but your eyes were focused on the bed where he’d sprinkled rose petals over the sheets and you felt your face flush as you took it all in.

‘What’s all this’ you laughed, turning to look at him but his shy smile told you everything.

‘I’ve been thinking about it and wondering what it feels like for days. If you talk me through it, I wanna try’

‘Yeah?’ You laughed, cupping his jaw so you could kiss him gently and you felt him smile onto your lips

‘Yeah. I’m not gonna lie I’m bricking it but I wanna do this’

‘It’s not that scary Mase, I promise. We can just do what we’ve been doing before so you can relax a bit and when you’re ready we can do whatever you want. But if you wanna stop just tell me yeah?’

‘I love you’ he breathed, looking right into your eyes in the most adoring way and you almost lost your breath. ‘I do, and I’m not just saying that cause we’re about to have sex and I feel like I should. You’ve been the best thing to happen to me in the longest time, like all this stuff you’ve been so calm and patient with me and there’s no one else I’d rather be doing this with’

‘I love you, too’ you giggled, pulling him into a kiss but the pair of you couldn’t stop smiling so you pulled away, playing with the hem of his top so you could subtly let him know you wanted it off and he didn’t stop you when you started tugging it up his body.

When the pair of you were undressed, he laid you down so he could kiss you again you you let your hands wonder all over him. Just as you told him, you fooled around a little first just to get each other going but it didn’t take long for him to look up at you with curious eyes.

‘What do I do? Where do I-‘

‘Shhh’ you cut him off when you could see he was panicking, kissing him again to relax him before speaking. ‘What way do you wanna do this? I can ride you, or I can lay down? Whatever you want’ you told him gently but you could tell he was overwhelmed so you stroked his cheek gently to soothe him. ‘Mase, we don’t have to rush this’

‘I’m just being stupid, I’m sorry’ he laughed

‘You’re not being stupid at all’ you reassured him before kissing him gently. ‘Why don’t you let me take control yeah? Just sit back there against the headboard and if you wanna try a different position after a while we can’

‘Okay’ he blushed, but did as you asked and sat himself back the headboard whilst you sat over him, rocking yourself along his length as you kissed him until he lifted you by your hips and you knew he was ready. You reached down to line him up with you as you held his eye contact as you sunk down onto him, his breath stuttering as you fully took him in. ‘Oh my god’

‘That feel good?’

‘Yes’ he whimpered as he gripped your thighs and you kissed his forehead to try and relax him.

‘I’m gonna start moving, yeah?’ You told him and with a gentle nod from Mason you began rocking your hips, keeping yourself steady with your hands on his shoulders. His eyes were wild, staring into your soul before he couldn’t take it anymore and shut them as his moans grew even louder.

‘You feel so fucking good. Why haven’t we don’t this before’ he gulped, starting to guide your hips and buck up into you slightly.

‘You’re so big Mase’ you moaned, getting lost in the feel of him and it wasn’t too long before he stilled your hips and you looked at him in confusion.

‘Can we try the other way?’ He asked shyly and you nodded with a smile before climbing off of him and swapping places so you were laying where he’d just sat. You could see he was a bit nervous still but you let him take his time and slowly push himself into you, moaning along with him as you watched his eyes roll back in his head.

‘That’s it, Mase’ you told him as he began to thrust into you ‘Don’t hold back, yeah? Don’t think about it just do what feels good. I want all of you, give me all you’ve got’ you told him quietly as your stared into his soul, watched his eyes roll to the back of his head again as he got into it before grabbing the backs of your thighs until you were even more spread out for him. You went hot all over at the way he was looking at your body before his eyes would flick down to where you connected, watching himself go in and out of you as his mouth hung open in a quiet disbelief. His thrusts became deeper as he pounded into you, his forehead coming to rest on yours as he held your eye contact and you knew he was close.

‘If need need to cum then you can’ you breathed but he shook in head in a mini protest.

‘I wanna make you cum’ he huffed, halting his hips and you thought his little scrunched up face was adorable.

‘We’ve got all night’ you told him, reaching up to cup his jaw and bring him down to kiss you. He started moving his hips soon after, breathing into each others mouths until you felt him shoot up and pull himself out of you, stroking over himself before releasing all over your chest and tummy.

You smiled at him as he blushed, dipping one of his fingers in and popping it into your mouth so you could taste him and the sight must of sent him feral as he was quick to lay down and start licking away at you. Making sure to make you cum as quickly as he could and after all the practice he’d had lately it didn’t take long.

He laid down next to you, linking your pinkies together as you you both got your breath back, eventually looking at each other shyly before erupting into giggles.

‘Congrats Mase, how was it?’ You chuckled and he looked down at you adoringly.

‘Well, all I can think about is cleaning you up and going again so I’d say pretty good’ he laughed. ‘I can’t believe I built it up for so long’

‘It’s okay, these things can be scary but we’ve crossed that line now. No going back’ you joked and he just smiled and shook his head it you in agreement.

‘Thank you. I really mean it. You could of walked away when I told you and I wouldn’t of blamed you’

‘Mase, I’m not going anywhere and I’m really glad we’ve got to do this together’

‘Me too, I feel way closer to you now. I still can’t believe you’re mine, I’m so lucky’ he told you, kissing you lovingly and you felt your chest fill with warmth as his fingers traced your skin. ‘I love you’ he breathed kissing your forehead as you felt yourself blush.

‘I love you too’

‘The pair of you make me sick I swear, of course it was perfect’ Mia laughed, rolling her eyes as you’d finished off your story.

‘Well in my mind it was perfect anyway’ you told her as you both let out a yawn.

‘So what you mean is you’ve trained him to do exactly what you like and basically ruined him for every other girl?’

‘Pretty much’ you winked

‘Wow, you really do have it all’ she laughed. ‘I still can’t believe it’

‘Just keep it to yourself. Mason would kill me if he found out you knew’

‘Set me up with one of his teammates and I’ll think about it’ she winked before shutting her eyes. You knew your secret was safe with her and with one final glance at your Lock Screen, a cute mirror selfie of you and Mason, you drifted off yourself.

[cogmented]

how do you come up with your designs for mcyt’s? theyre so creative and cool so i thought id ask

THANK YOU AND THANK YOU FOR THE QUESTION

now entering yap city tihs will be a long post

my steps are basically

voice

personality

og look of minecraft skin/branding

player movement

other ppls fanart (if any)

things that happened/cultural associations

i start with a bunch of random sketches to get the feel of the person.. that's why so many of my early posts were doodle pages. to me, character design is more based on what the person is like rather than what they look like. i think a lot of people do that

I do this with all of the above and shape language, but in bigger art pieces outside of lineups i also use color and perspective (as in youll see more of someone like spepticle in large, sweeping scenes while someone like zam in closed, heavily perspective-based ones) to indicate personality. ill change designs when suited for this too (spoke with or without a gas mask, vi with or without a mouth, etc etc)

my first iteration of lifesteal designs heavily relied on the look of the skins and were gradually tweaked over time. my most prominent example of this is my spoke design, so i'll use him at least once in the examples for continuous comparison.

i watch a couple of each person's videos first, understand their voice, personality, and what they do, then focus on them in other people's videos too to get a full story, their movement, and what others think of them (helps with personality and things we might not see). streams are the most helpful because they're less biased and you see so much more of their antics. huge stream fan.

i get into the how after this

this process doesnt go in order for some designs and others have a more prominent focus on particular parts of the process that override or effect other parts

Voice

starting off with not spoke here's a problem i encountered when designing wemmbu

I based him a lot off of spoke and ashswag due to not knowing much about him besides the fact that he schemes (spoke&ash-esque) and he doesn't move his character around too much when talking (ash behavior). he didn't match the left one because his voice doesn't have the dramatic, flamboyant fratboy flair that spoke has, so I shifted it to be more friendly yet still dangerous with curved square shapes rather than triangles. i made his scheming, diabolical nature more evident through his clothing that's pretty jester-like and sharp, but with a smoother middle that spoke doesn't have (and to match his eyes).

voice also impacts character height. i dont know how to describe this. mapicc and zam are similar heights because their voices are similar, same goes for parrot and vortex, but leo and vitalasy are close to the same height (due to vitalasy's huge fuckass ears) despite having wildly different voices, with leo's bold text voice and vitalasy's higher-pitched jumbled kinda speech they still take up the same "amount of space" in conversation. they stand out. and even though spoke's voice also stands out an incredible amount he is still only slightly taller than average. this is where personality overrides voice in my designs.

Personality

spoke is sharp in every sense of the word, but is also able to mold himself around to get what he needs.

my first attempt at him was pretty lackluster. i didn't know much of him at the time, only his wither video, and thus understood him mainly through his association with parrot. he seemed a lot more evil and more serious at first glance. like woah! fully fledged mouth and nose?! not anymore.

i cover certain expressive parts to also depict more of their personality in some abstract, holistic way. after watching streams and whatnot, spoke doesnt actually speak (excluding his random sounds and yips or whatever he does) too terribly much, except when the spotlight is on him or he's trying to get something. so, i tweaked his design to encompass that when i understood him better.

i take away his arms to allow his hands to stand out more (character movement thing, he moves around a lot when no one is paying attention to him, punches the air when ..not talking but making a point ig. he's a big fan of hovering menacingly), i give him a slinky-like outside skeletal structure to both capture his affinity for withers (i made him a wither thing because of the wither sounds in his video.. and the withers in general) and to give him the feeling of more freedom with his movement.

i also just really like gas masks so. basically, spoke is someone that hides away until he chooses to stand out. thank lord heaven he looks like some shadow creature.

later on i gave him more magenta highlights, especially in the wormhole era because 1. magenta wasnt heavily included in his rainbow look, making it stand out on his whole being, and 2. because magenta is really really cool and people should use it more.

og minecraft skin/branding

hi spokeis here. this will be quick because his branding is so heavy. lightning, rainbow, black. boom. character. withers and white eyes? easy. causes a lot of anarchy? again, lightning and withers.

planetlord on the other hand is someone i greatly differed from the og skin and branding. i saw the design in a vision idk. i shift his colors all the time in different pieces but i use more of his pfp colors now because there's too many purples in this world. his branding, personality, and voice all connect very well. a bit misleading, he's a bit of a weasel.

Movement

i never used to look into movement, but pvp styles and conversational movement of lifesteal is intriguing. unfortunately it was only something i started paying attention to during the end of s4 because vitalasy's movement was so interesting. he's a big fan of getting in people's faces.

ill be real, i didn't really notice spoke a lot during things because he was almost always never alone, and when he was it is always at a distance or you knew he had people to back him up.

spoke's movement isn't actually too abnormal. he's goal oriented and tends to always be doing something, and when he does he finds the most efficient way possible. pretty basic. his design choices are based mainly on voice and personality.

someone like mapicc on the other hand has very particular movement. he spins around people when fighting and gets right up in their face (in nethpot pvp mostly), so i made his clothing tighter to the skin with looser parts to accentuate that movement: practical clothing for close combat battles. it was also noticed (by the lord) that he tends to look straight forward instead of the slightly down that most players do.

zam fights differently, but i made him with the og branding (he's princezam) and what he does in mind. his body language in my art is more indicative of his personality.

Other people's fanart

shoutout the community, a notable amount of ideas were from the mid-late 2022 lifesteal community.

dog leowook and leather jacket mapicc were from gen, jackalope rek from aoi i think, "croptop" jacket spoke from saints-blade, snail terrain from navy-leader, tv ashswag from kish, sock puppet red definitely from someone i dont remember, 4 armed squiddo from seri, and old cartoon jaron was from bucket

Things that happened/istarted talking about cultural inspirations

spoke and his connection to godhood influenced his redesign greatly. this section affects what the character wears most of the time.

i give both spoke and vitalasy painted palms (alta) due to their connection with godhood and destruction, with spoke in particular reminding me a lot of Kali Ma, thus i gave him a skirt (due to nppp too). vitalasy's clothing is based on Indonesian cultural clothing. wemmbu's also takes inspiration from Indonesian and Bhutan cultural clothing.

indigenous cultures inspired some designs too (i do a lot of ethnographic anthropology work with some of the tribes i base the clothing off of), with woogie having Yupik and Inuit inspiration. polar bear = cold climate in my head. and leo has Haida and Yunnan (minority Chinese providence, not a tribe) inspiration.

bacon's... not bacon strip design's clothing was based on Bangladeshi clothing (im Bangladeshi, i also added alpona patterns to ash's design), nomadic cultures, and some german pilgrim thing?? idk not my best design. i specifically looked for nomadic inspiration because of his willingness to flee at any moment lol. i didnt do this for rek despite his fleeing reputation because i dont watch rek content too much and he already had hybrid traits that took care of that presentation.

poafa's design is a goat because of the medusa trials where he was used as a scapegoat. makes sense i think. his horns are from past associations with jepex that infected mapicc as well (devil trio s1). zam's design is very much from s3 empire and s4 castle.

planet's design changed slightly, mostly rounder shapes, but also the number of "spikes" on his scarf, now stuck at three because of 3ht.. and easier to draw than five. minutetech has a bow instead of a bowtie from jumper due to s5 happenings. the gem on his crown has wemmbu's highlights from his gem's main color.

roshambo's design was also heavily influenced by medusa where i gave him a snake body. in my art that depicts before medusa events he doesn't have the snake body, and same goes with before s4 spoke where i draw him with full pants. in some sketches ive depicted mapicc with a muzzle only after the destruction of s4 spawn due to quix's mapicc dog influence shoutout.

mapicc and ro have matching things that persist seasons (mapicc periwinkle collar, ro red painted ring finger... head finger?), as did subz and vitalasy with matching shoulder pads (beginning of s4 subz had a bandana and vitalasy had a bell that traded between them through artworks of mine) Vitalasy also gained sun and moon earrings. mid and 4c have matching hoods/cloaks ^_^ marriage or something.

hope this made sense and covered everything you could have ever wanted forever... feel free to ask me questions i love explaining processes

[askuemki]

@vivgst new thread <3 (I have the cut so it won't be a pain to scroll lol)

I've never watched Death Note, but I guess Ill just say L is my favorite since we share a name (technically) Honestly? my answer is simple w/ what animal Id be Almost ANY cat (not the flatfaced or folded ear ones though they can have some bad health issues :( ) Like if you're a domestic cat, you have the stuff to survive both in the wild, or in someone's house. You have super scenes of smell, night vision, claws, sharp teeth, AND probably enough smarts to not get eaten by dogs or smth. On the other hand with humans, at least 70% of the population would adore you, and maybe even take you in to pamper you. It would be very easy to get them to do your bidding since you'd be just some animal, and perhaps put above your caretaker's needs. Pets? Affection? Just act all adorable and stuff and they'll give it to you, cling on to them and they'll say they're your human now. On the other hand (or paw) there's the wild cats!! Still very cute. Still very cool. Now your defenses are upped by a ton, and people still find you cute. Though with how shitty environmental conditions are, and with the bigger cats slowly going to extinction :( , I may or may not just stick to domestic cats But hypothetically.. It would be neat to be either a snow leopard, tiger, or a jaguar. I love snow leopards for their big fluffy tails, and it would be cool to be able to roam through snow and stuff, but that seems to get a little boring from time to time. Love tigers for their stripes, I don't think they can roar..?? But that doesn't change anything. Think Tigers and Jaguars are both pretty efficient in survival, but I'd pick Jaguar just for their athletics and HUGE bite force (least from my 1st search). Or maybe, maybe not because there's an outfit/skin or two of Valeria's that are based on jaguars.. (or leopards, but ill go w/ jaguars) im obsessed w/ this woman man hdwhadwjadawnk OH ALSO ON THE TOPIC OF BIRDS??? AS FUN AS IT WOULD BE TO BE A MALE BIRD AND SHAKE YOUR COLORFUL BUM AROUND, THERE WAS A WHOLE ASS WAR W/ EMUS AND AUSTRALIA Honestly who wouldn't wanna be a relative of a dinosaur, but smaller and just as fucking scary Also for vacation.... I don't like going on vacation. I just like being in my sad little room, on the internet or drawing my ass off But, Id love to visit Japan and see their Ghibli Studio museum, it's so cool... Or even just go to a few hotels or smth here and there, I love their stellar technology, I love how everything is so cute or neat there, oh and I especially LOVE the social rules there, I'm a goody-two-shoes at heart and perfectly agree with being "nice"... Like yeah sure I may not like you or the opposite, but at least we can co-exist without biting our heads off (unlike the fucking us) and japan seems open to their culture being explored by others, so I'd totally love to (respectfully) participate in some traditions here and there OR I could visit Europe. Like not even a specific country? Just Europe. Cuz the US is like really fucking big, and a country like France is apparently as big as Texas. And it would be cool to take a week trip just exploring cultures and stuff (well everything except food, I'm a terrible picky eater ugh) Vacation in the US scares me tho, I'm fine where I'm at rn Maybe id be a little open to going to canada.. but bc of how they're treating the Palestine genoside rn maybe like later in life if they redeem themselves, but like the us? Fuck them too I think crocodiles r cute, but I wouldn't wanna go near one :3 Most of my relatives are either in the Philippines or Maryland, I barely know abt them now Never thought I'd be the one to be the gay cousin, ngl

[darling-i-read-it]

Not Fun Dreams

Dalton Lambert x fem!prophet(esc)!reader

Word Count: 6.1k

Warnings: insidious 5 spoilers, some angst, canon level events/violence (descriptions of the readers visions as violence and never being good), shared trauma, a lot of unedited fic lol 

Author’s Note: This ended up a LITTLE LONG good lord lol. I just kept going! I hope you enjoy love, it ended up being a little less angst then I wanted to have some sort of preunderstood relationship. ALSO i made up the art school dalton goes too because I couldnt’ find the name or remember if it was mentioned. When will this movie be available to watch whenever i want smh. Anyway, enjoy!

Requested: by anon, your dalton fics were amazing and if you’re still in the mood to write for him i got an idea! dalton with a prophet esque reader. maybe not full out but maybe they have dreams or in certain places they can see what will happen there but doesn’t get the full event ( mostly negative/horrific things because this is the insidious universe and nobody can have nothing). id imagine they’d be more reclusive than dalton because even though they’re both obviously very traumatized reader constantly has to see these horrific things and not know how to stop them. knowing possibly from a young age where you and the people you love will die. the trauma bonding. the protectiveness. imagine the drama if she knew the whole time he could astral project and didn’t tell him, like being childhood friends and going to the same college as you saw something in a dream (one of the dorm scenes) and are trying to prevent it. i’m an angst girlie through and through and this movie made me worst. please don’t feel pressured to write at all, and i hope you have a great day/night! 

I don’t own these characters. They belong to author/director/creator

(not my gif)

When you were a kid it was much more simple. It made far more sense to you when your imagination was stretched as far as it could go. It was clouded by the guise of childhood, never knowing what was supposed to happen and what wasn’t. You figured that when you went to sleep and pictures flipped in your head piercing like a migraine, everything was normal. Your parents told you it was just dreams, even when the dreams started to get darker. You saw flashes of people’s faces, drenched in fear as they faced something unknown. The nightmares got worse. You insisted they weren’t nightmares. Children dealt with weird things all the time. 

It helped when the boy next door flew away in his sleep. 

Everyone must have these little gifts then right? All the children had a perk that slightly scared them, one they told their friends about that their parents didn’t pay much attention to. 

You’ll never forget the day Dalton moved. He left the house he had grown up in so that his parents could move somewhere bigger, somewhere to raise the new baby. You remember his little face, matching yours. You had never had a friend you cared for so much. It felt like the world could be taken on when you were with Dalton. 

“Are you sure you have to go?” you asked, quietly. You knew the answer to the question, even then. You had had an awful nightmare the night before. You had seen flashes of Dalton in bed, tubes surrounding him, IV’s in his arm. 

“My mom says so,” he muttered. You were hunched together in the corner of his house. Now empty, it seemed much larger. You didn’t like being in places that seemed to be experiencing change. You saw enough change. 

“But I’m worried,” you whispered. “Something might happen to you in the new house.” Your voice was hushed. Even then, you knew it was no use in telling his parents. No one would believe you. But you had to warn him because if anyone trusted you, it was Dalton. 

“Maybe it’s just another one of your not fun dreams,” he said quietly. He had gotten used to protecting you from them. You were often shaky when you woke up. He had seen it after a sleepover, cold sweats dripping down your petrified face. “Not one that would come true.”

You had known the lady down the street would trip down the stairs and die three weeks prior. But no one cared to check with the little girl who had silly prophetic dreams. 

“But what if it isn’t.” You pouted, a genuine pout. Dalton put his hand on yours, in a way only children could do. The most innocent of gestures. A sign of good faith. 

“I’ll be okay.” Even then he didn’t believe his words. He had been wandering further and further out in his dreams. You told him to stop, that it scared you. He insisted they were nothing like your dreams. His weren’t real. 

“You ready to go guys?” Josh Lambert asked. He walked up behind you, carrying a book at his side. 

“You’ll call right?” you asked quickly, suddenly overcome by emotion. Dalton nodded eagerly. 

“We’ve got your number, don’t worry,” Josh assured you. “We won’t be that far, right Dalton? Just down the road.” Dalton wanted to disagree but he didn’t. He just nodded, not ready for you to leave his house. Not ready to leave it himself. 

“I’ll call everyday,” Dalton promised. 

After a couple weeks he stopped calling. Your parents wouldn’t tell you why. Just that he couldn’t come to the phone. You could see him in your dreams, desperately lost and you had no way of helping him.

-

You woke up with a start. 

As you grew up the dreams started to become less violent. They were always violent in nature but sometimes you could wake up and not feel panicked. You looked at your bedside table, the orange bottles staring back at you. Some were for panic attacks, some were for general anxiety, some to help you sleep. You debated taking one, wondering if you could stick it out for the day. The thought was quickly dismissed. 

You had dreamt of Dalton. 

You hadn’t dreamt of Dalton since you were a kid, since you lost touch. The memory of it became so blurry over time. There was no way you could have blamed him for it. In hindsight you blame your parents and the cycle of time. You went to different schools and there was no reason to stay in touch because you couldn’t ever see each other. 

You grabbed your phone off the side of your bed. You hadn’t seen much. 

Dalton. Older, taller, handsomer. A full man now, though you weren’t sure why you were surprised. A school, the name of the school just barely on the tip of your tongue. You wrote down everything you remembered furiously. The feeling of dread. A familiar creeping of darkness that you couldn’t quite place. Your dreams were sporadic. Whatever you had dreamt of could still be months out. 

You got out of bed and walked down the hallway. You were packing for school yourself, eager to leave by the end of the week. The car was almost packed with most of your things. 

You reached for your parents phone book. They kept it beside the fridge, even though it was ancient and most of the numbers were outdated. You had given them grief about it before. Everyone had numbers saved to their phones now, what was the point of a phone book?

You ate your words as you flipped through the pages, looking for Lambert. Sure enough, both Renai and Josh were separately listed. You reached for your phone, trying Renai first. 

It rang for a while, leading you to believe the number might’ve been wrong. Then there was an answer and a kind voice spoke on the other end. 

“Hello?” 

“Hi! Is this Renai Lambert?” 

“This is her. Who is this?” 

“Hi Mrs. Lambert! This is kind of weird but my name is Y/N. I used to be friends with Dalton when we were kids?” There was a beat of silence and then a laugh, one you remembered well. You had always liked Renai. She was endlessly kind, always offering you lemonade when you came around. You could still hear her playing songs on the piano while you and Dalton ran around their house. 

“Y/N! Oh goodness, it’s been a while hasn’t it? Why are you calling now?” You smiled, happy she remembered you. 

“I just randomly dreamt of Dalton last night and hadn’t seen him in years. I was wondering if he still lived with you or if I could talk to him?” 

“For sure! Gimme one second.” She moved away. You could hear a muffled call for Dalton. The phone returned to her ear. “How have you been?” 

“I’ve been good! I’m going to art school at the end of the month,” you offered. 

“Really? So is Dalton! Oh, here he is!” There was a moment as the phone was passed along. You cleared your throat. 

“Hello?” 

“Dalton?” There was another beat of silence. You thought maybe he didn’t remember you, which would be slightly awkward. You would have to re-explain everything before he would even believe a word that came out of your mouth. Then he spoke. 

“Y/N?” You let out a breath of relief. 

“Yeah.” He scoffed and you could picture him shaking his head in disbelief. 

“What’s up? Are you okay?” Still the same protective boy he had been when you were kids. 

“I had a dream about you last night and I wanted to call, see if you were okay.” Another moment of silence. You wondered if Renai had left the room.

“A not fun dream?” he asked quietly. You nodded, looking down. 

“Yeah.” You could hear Renai in the background. 

“She’s going to art school too.” 

“Really? Where are you going?” 

“Western. Not far from home, at least, where home used to be.” 

“Me too,” he breathed. “Who would’ve thought?” You bit the inside of your cheek, wondering what it would be like to be back with Dalton again. You had never felt so understood like when you were with him. 

“When do you leave? We should meet up for lunch.”

-

Dalton Lambert had gotten tall. You noticed that first when you saw him. He stepped right out of your dreams and onto his dorm room flooring. You had just missed Josh who had eagerly scurried away. Your parents had left you too. Now you and Dalton were finally in a place where you could hang out away from adults, which was a weird feeling when you were together. 

He had texted you his room number and you knocked on the door. When it opened, he hugged you. It wasn’t awkward or weird. In fact, it felt like you had finally come home. 

“How are you?” you asked. 

“I’m okay,” he promised. He ushered you in. “I’d be better if you told me what your dream was about.” You shook your head. 

“It was just you being here.” 

“You have good dreams now?” You shook your head. 

“That’s the whole thing.” He gestured for you to sit at his desk or at the empty bed beside his. You sat down on his bed anyway, putting your feet up to your chest like you were a child. “I don’t. But I remember feeling bad when I woke up, like something was coming.” You looked over at him. “How are you? How are your dreams?”

He paused for a moment, like he was glitching or buffering. You tilted your head. 

“Dalton?”

“My dreams are fine,” he answered finally. “Not nearly as interesting as yours.” You nodded slowly. That wasn’t exactly the answer you were expecting to get but you trusted him to open up when he was ready. “So do you think somethings gonna happen?” 

“I don’t know. I think I’ll know more later,” you promised, though you only half believed it.

“The last time you dreamt about me I went into my coma,” he said quietly, cautiously. He opened up to you quickly, knowing what it was like to be friends with you when you were a kid. There was something so special about being known before you even knew yourself. 

“I know. That’s why I found my parents' phonebook and called your mom.” 

“At least you’ll be closer this time around,” he suggested. “You’re welcome to hit me in the head if I start drifting off when I’m not supposed to.” You laughed gently. 

“Good to know.” You looked up at his wall. He had started to put drawings up. His mom was in the one above his pillow, at her piano. She looked just like you remembered her. “How is she?” you asked. Your eyes scanned the room. “Oh man, how is Foster? Cali?” 

“Good, good, they’re all good,” he promised, laughing a bit. “My parents got divorced a couple years ago. My dad is slightly losing it.” 

“As all dads do.” Your eyes scanned the wall. There was a picture of his brother. Another of his grandmother, who you only met every once in a while. Above her was a picture you recognized. It was you. You when you were a kid, in a room you no longer remembered. “Is that me?” He cleared his throat. 

“Your call had me looking through pictures.” You glanced at him, smiling a bit. 

“I loved your house so much. It was like a second home to me.”

“It was a first home to me.” You rolled your eyes. 

“We have so much to catch up on. Tell me everything. I have nowhere to be.”

-

Dalton’s room became a second one to you. It was serendipitous, moving from swapping houses to swapping dorm rooms. The transition felt comfortable and seamless. His roommate Chris moved out because she was a girl so you mostly got the room to yourselves. 

A couple weeks in, he started to have nightmares. Nights where you recognized the look on his face when he woke up. It was the same look he had after he had wandered too far, daring you to go with him. When he woke up he looked just like a kid still. Big wide eyes, confused. 

You sat on the spare bed. Dalton had fallen asleep half an hour before but you couldn’t bring yourself to leave. There was nothing wrong with just falling asleep there. You had done it before and you would do it again, waking up to his alarm for his early class. 

You laid your head down on the pillow, scrolling on your phone. The night had fallen, indicating that you should let yourself drift off into sleep. You raised your head a bit, wondering if you could easily find one of Dalton’s shirts to wear to sleep instead of your uncomfortable day one. You should’ve asked him before he fell asleep. You stood up lazily, rubbing your eyes. The room was only illuminated by the nightlight at Dalton’s side. He had fallen asleep with a pencil still in his hand, his sketchbook still out on his side.

You groggily slipped the pencil out of his fingers, putting it on the desk. You grabbed his sketchbook, looking at what he was looking at. It was still just lines on a paper, soon to be something beautiful. You put it aside. You were about to turn around when he woke up with a start. 

He lifted his head completely, almost ramming into you. You jumped, startled. 

“Woah!” you exclaimed. He was breathing heavily. He looked up at you, eyes wide. You met his gaze, almost positive what had just happened. “Did you wander off?” 

“What?” 

“In your sleep. Did you project?” He was silent for a moment, still trying to catch up on whatever it was going on in his head. He didn’t say anything for a second, staring at you with bewildered eyes. “Dalton?” 

He finally opened his eyes up to speak but was cut off by a loud screeching. You put your hands over your ears, wincing. The fire alarm was going off. Dalton scrambled out of bed, looking at the door. He rushed forward, pushing it open. 

Down the hall, all the other students were leaving their beds. Most were still muddled with sleep, wearing nothing but their pajamas. You peeked your head out behind him. He grabbed your arm and started to bring you down the hallway to the stairs. It was too tight for everyone so his grip was iron tight, weaving through the confusion. You pushed through the door to the stairs, moving with the herd down. You glanced back, trying to find the source of the confusion. 

You emerged outside into the night. It was freezing. The group dispersed into the courtyard, everyone looking back to the building you had just left. You brushed against Dalton behind you, who had finally let go of your arm. You couldn’t see anything in the building, nothing to indicate a reason everyone was leaving. 

“Do you see anything?” you asked him. He shook his head. 

“No.” You shivered, suddenly very aware of how cold it was. 

“Maybe it was a drill,” you suggested. He nodded slowly, not wanting to argue as his eyes scanned the building. 

Someone was yelling something in a megaphone you couldn’t make out. You tried to find the source of the voice to no avail. 

“What are they saying?” 

“False alarm,” he said, like it wasn’t a question. You furrowed your brows. 

“How can you hear that?” 

“I pulled it,” he said, finally. You turned around to look at him. 

“How? You were right there with me the whole time.” 

“I did it in my sleep.”

“If you knew it was a false alarm, why did we come out here?” 

“Because I wasn’t sure.” His voice sounded far away. You looked back at the building, completely safe in the backdrop of the night. You turned back to him. His look was dreary and unreadable. “You should probably go back to your room,” he said, voice still far away. You tried not to take that badly. It just seemed random. 

“Okay,” you said quietly. “Are you okay Dalton?”

“Yeah, yeah I’m good.” You nodded slowly. People started to pass you, going back inside. 

“Want me to walk you back up?” “I’m okay,” he assured you, some of the life returning to his voice. 

“Alright…I’ll see you tomorrow?” He nodded quickly and started to walk into the crowd. 

-

The next morning you woke up in a daze. You couldn’t quite remember what happened the night before, all of it glossing over your memory like a blur. You grabbed your phone off the side table, your roommate still snoozing away. You had a text from Dalton and a text from Chris, his old roommate. 

Taking Dalton to that frat party tonight. Wanna come? 

You opened that one up first. Dalton at a frat party? You almost snorted. You hadn’t been back in his life for very long but it didn’t seem like his vibe. You opened Dalton’s text next. 

Sorry about last night. Had a weird dream and woke up weird. 

You texted him back immediately. 

No worries. Are you really going to the frat party tonight? 

Almost immediately a little bubble showed up in the white box. You laid your head back down on the pillow. It felt like you had only taken a nap because of the weird in between moments. A text came from Dalton. 

Supposedly. Chris wants me to go. Do you wanna come? 

You glanced at your calendar. 

I have a test in the morning, I think I’ll pass. Thanks for the invite tho :) Try not to get too drunk! 

You opened Chris’s texts back up too to answer her as well. As you were typing out your response, Dalton texted you again. 

Are you sure??? I could get lost, drunk and suggestive. Who would protect me from the onslaught of potential girls? 

You rolled your eyes harder. 

Chris will! 

You turned off your phone to get ready for the day. 

-

You sat on your bed in your dorm room. Your eyes were dropping off to sleep, phone down on your comforter, computer open as you looked at reference pictures. Your sketch book was open, though it didn’t have anything except the bare bones of some sort of idea. You hummed to the music coming from your phone, mind wandering from your work. 

Your roommate had gone to the same frat party as Dalton. You were by yourself tonight as the sun dropped. It was becoming more clear that you just wanted to go to sleep tonight to wake up rested for the test. You picked up your phone, pursing your lips as you tried to decide if giving up homework was worth it for the night. You had no new texts from Dalton or Chris except a picture from Chris’s phone of the two of them there. You smiled a bit. Dalton looked awkward and out of place. It was good that he was branching out. 

Finally you set your things aside. There was no use in trying to do any more work when you were still catching up on sleep from the night before. 

As you placed your head on the pillow a simultaneous pierce through your skull erupted. You grabbed your head at the familiar feeling. Usually you only got visions when you were asleep, waking up to some sort of horrific memory. 

A bathroom. It felt cold, like ice, like the ground hadn’t been stepped on by humans in years. A boy was there, his face shrouded by the toilet. He gripped the sides but his hands didn’t look real. Something was wrong with him. You couldn’t tell what it was. The sound of the door opening, a creek, a sudden stop. 

You dug your nails into the skin on your forehead, willing it to stop. It had been so long since you were awake when this happened. 

Before it subsided you could see Dalton in the doorway. The dread returned, the same dread you had when you were a kid and he was moving away where you couldn’t protect him. You let out a breath that you had been holding. Your hands were shaking. 

Usually you wrote down what you saw, quickly jotting down things you could remember. Typically nothing would stand out for you to take immediate action. This time you jumped out of bed, quickly putting on slip on shoes. You were wearing shorts and a hoodie, clothes to sleep in, when you ran down the stairs. You had never been to the frat the party was at tonight but there were still fliers everywhere and you assured yourself you would find one. 

Thankfully, right on the pole outside of the building was a green poster with the address. You knew where Greek Row was, not more than a five minute walk from your dorm. You turned towards it and started to run. 

By the time you got there you were already exhausted. You crashed through the door, entering a chaotic scene. There were people everywhere, ramming into each other, sloshing drinks on people’s clothes, too drunk to care. You scanned the crowd. You pushed through people, to the staircase. There were people hanging out there, leaning against the railing, leaning against each other. You walked upstairs, searching for a bathroom. The doors were mostly locked. 

You ran right into Chris, leaving the bathroom. You peeked inside but it wasn’t the one from your vision. 

“Woah! You decided to come after all! What are you wearing?” 

“Where’s Dalton?” She gestured to a door down the hall. You rushed towards it, almost tripping over yourself. You swung the door open. Dalton was on the ground, half under the bed, face filled with fear. “Dalton!” He snapped his head back up at you and then back in the air. There was nothing there. “Did you..did you see that?” 

“No.” 

“There was something-” You fell to your knees beside him, helping him out from under the bed. 

“What did you see?” 

“A kid in the bathroom. There was someone in the bathroom and he was-”

“Dead.” Chris emerged at the door frame. 

“What are you guys talking about?”

“Have you been astral projecting lately?” you asked him, voice low and serious. His eyebrows furrowed. 

“Have I been what?” You stared at him for a long time, unsure what he meant. Maybe he just didn’t want to say anything in front of Chris. 

“Dalton come on.” 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said and he felt honest. He grabbed your hand, willing you to believe him.

“When we were kids you could walk around in your sleep. Your soul left your body or whatever.” You paused, trying to read his face. “You don’t remember?” 

‘No,” he said, honestly. 

“What are you guys talking about?” Chris repeated. 

“We should go,” you said quickly. “We’ll talk back at the dorms.” You helped Dalton up. 

-

Though she protested, Chris left the two of you alone in Dalton’s dorm. The explanations coming out of his mouth weren’t something she trusted and she trusted you to make sure he went to bed alright. Though she did feel bad for dragging him along, unsure if the drinking had something to do with his abnormal reaction. 

“We have to call your parents,” you said as he sat down at his desk. He shook his head. 

“I can’t.” 

“Yes you can. They know what happened here and why you don’t remember it.” You hadn’t known everything about Dalton being in a coma but you didn’t expect him to remember nothing of it completely. He detailed not even remembering being sick. They moved into the new house and then the rest of the year was nothing but a blur. 

“I wouldn’t believe you if I hadn’t just seen it,” he breathed. You grabbed his phone off the table, opening it up. “Wait-” 

“No wait. We have to call your mom. She’ll know what to do.” 

“But this could just be something completely normal. You said I could do it before I went into my coma.” 

“And then you went too far, Dalton. I don’t actually know how far too far is but I know you’re already too close to it.” You held up the phone for him. “Call her.” He looked at you, eyebrows knitted. He looked at the canvas at his desk, completely covered in black, a red door created at the edges. There was something at that door he couldn’t remember anymore. He set his jaw and grabbed his phone. 

“I don’t think this is gonna help.” 

“Put it on speaker.” 

The phone rang for a moment but no longer than that. Renai answered quickly. 

“Hello? Dalton?” 

“Hey mom.” 

“It’s nice of you to call,” she said, half jokingly. “How are things there? Are you settling in nicely?” 

“Yeah mom, that’s not really why I called.” He gave you a look as you sat beside him eagerly. “I’ve been having these dreams and Y/N said you might know something about that.” 

The line was silent for a moment. 

“What kind of dreams?” 

“I can see my body when I leave it. Like I’m walking around in this other world.” 

“Is Y/N there?”

“Right here Mrs. Lambert.” She paused again. The tension seeped from the phone. You met Dalton’s eyes. 

“Mom?” 

“Maybe I should just come up there and talk to you in person. Can Y/N stay with you until I get there?” 

“What? Mom, you don’t need to come all the way up here.” Shuffling came from the other line.

“It’s too hard to explain over the phone. I’ll be there in the morning.” 

“No, mom.” He took a deep breath. “What happened? Tell me now.” His hands were wrapped tightly around the phone. He had grabbed your hand. You couldn’t remember when. 

“You and your father don’t know,” she said quietly. “We made it so that those memories were suppressed. I don’t know how it came back.” She shuddered. “When you were in the coma you went somewhere Dalton. For three months, we lost you.” 

“Where?” 

“A place called The Further.” Her voice was gravely serious. He stared at the ground. The name sent shivers down his spine, like all that repressed childhood fear came back. “You got lost there and things tried to take your body. Your dad went back to find you and…something else came back instead of him.” Dalton looked at the door painting on his desk. 

“How do I stop it?” 

“I don’t know honey. I’m coming down.”

“What about dad? What if he’s going through this too?” 

“I’ll get your father. We’ll come together.” Dalton had nothing to say to that. It must be serious if they were going to stay together for a long period of time like the drive up to school. “Stay with Y/N.” There was a beat. “I love you Dalton.” 

“I love you too mom.” 

She hung up the phone. For a long time you just sat there in silence. You hadn’t ever gotten those answers before, the ones you had only gotten glimpses of when you were a kid trying to sleep. 

“I remember the demon trying to get you,” you whispered. “He was dark…with red,” you said. “I had nightmares about him for months. I kept seeing him get closer and closer but no one believed me.” 

Dalton looked over at you, his look unreadable. 

“He’s trying to get me again,” Dalton muttered. “I can feel him.” 

You shook your head. That was the last thing you wanted to hear. You stood up, letting go of his hand. 

“This is bigger than us. There’s this whole other world and you’re going to it and it’s so close-” 

“But if I don’t go to it then-”

“Are you gonna stay awake? Forever?” Dalton shut his mouth. “Repressing the ability didn’t work so what else is there to do but enter the place?” You shivered. Just the memory of your visions sent chills down your spine. “I haven’t seen the demon recently. I’ve just seen you.” 

“Maybe that’s a good thing.” You nodded. You paced, unsure what to do with all the fear in your body. “We just have to wait till the morning, then my mom will be here.” You both knew that might not solve anything. Still, you nodded. There was nothing else to do but wait.

 “I’m staying here with you.” 

“I don’t wanna be alone anyway.” He shook his head, voice far away. This dorm had started to become a safe haven, despite the places your brain went when you were asleep. It felt much better than your own dorm with the roommate you hardly knew. You’d likely be getting a text from her in the morning, wondering where you were again. 

You sat back down on Dalton’s bed. 

“Are we gonna try and stay awake all night?” He shook his head. 

“If I wake up I’ll just stay right where I am.” 

“That sounds easier than it will be.” It was already late, nearly midnight. You were tired and your heart was starting to slow down now that the problem didn’t seem as pressing. You rubbed the sleep out of your eyes but it didn’t do much.

“Are you ready to sleep now?” he asked. You nodded. 

“I really thought I was gonna go to bed early tonight. Looks like I’ll be skipping the test in the morning.”

“I don’t want you to do that. I’ll be fine by myself.” You shook your head. 

“No way. I’m staying here until your parents show.” You yawned. “But I should probably go to sleep soon.” He glanced at the bed on the other side of the room. He knew you would go there automatically if he didn’t say otherwise. He couldn’t exactly explain it but he would just feel safer if you were closer to him. 

He could explain it but suddenly that feeling was scarier then wandering off into The Further. 

“I’ll take that b-”

“You could sleep with me.” You raised an eyebrow at the suggestion. Without so much as a beat you answered. 

“Okay.” He let out a breath. You got up. “Scoot over then.” He looked up at you and your willingness to be so close to him.

“I’ve gotta change.” 

“Then change.” He stood up, walking to his drawer. He shuffled around in there for something acceptable to wear. Usually he just wore his boxers and a shirt but suddenly that felt so revealing. He could see you in the corner of his eye, getting under the covers and getting comfortable. 

You tried to pretend it wasn’t a big deal to you that he asked even though your heart was in your throat. 

“Don’t look,” he said. You made a dramatic gesture of covering your eyes. He took his shirt, facing away from you. You peaked between your fingers, admiring his back as he quickly slipped the other shirt back on. When he undid his belt you covered your eyes again. 

“You can stay awake,” you offered. He turned off the lamp on the desk, leaving only the nightlight. He moved the blankets aside so he could sit beside you. 

“I’m exhausted from finding out my memory was erased.”

“It sounds so dramatic that way.” 

“What would you say?”

“Hypnotism.” He put his head against the pillow, facing you. It was rare you were at eye level. 

“That’s dramatic too.” 

You sat there in silence for a moment. You hadn’t seen his face so close to you since you were kids. It was just like the sleepovers you had when you were a kid, just a little less innocent. 

“Are you scared to fall asleep?” he asked, voice a whisper now.

“Sometimes. Tonight I am. I don’t wanna dream about you.” He should be feeling awkward, being so close to you. Instead he felt more comfortable than ever. 

“Then don’t.” 

“I’ll give it my best effort.” Your eyes were so heavy. They closed without you even thinking about it. 

“I’m gonna be awake a little longer. I think I’m gonna sketch.” 

“Okay Dalton,” you whispered and it sounded so incredibly childlike. He sat up a bit, leaning against the headboard. He grabbed his sketchpad off the table. You nuzzled your head into the pillow. “Do you mind if I use you as a pillow?” you asked quietly. 

“No. Not at all.” 

You moved forward a bit and then your head was on his lower chest, arm over him. He put his hand over your back and suddenly sketching seemed much less important than making you comfortable. 

“Goodnight Y/N.”

-

Neither of you had set an alarm. 

Renai and Josh showed up early at 7 the next morning, the sun still slowly coming up. Renai knocked on the door, antsy to see her son. She had explained everything to Josh on the way over. He was pleased to find he wasn’t crazy. 

The knock went unanswered. She took a deep breath and knocked again. 

“You don’t think it’s unlocked do you?” she questioned. Josh tried the doorknob. It opened with ease. They shared a look. 

The other bed was still unused. Laying in the other bed was you and Dalton. You were on his chest, a pencil lazily in his fingers. He was hugging you with both arms, cheek pressed against your head. 

Renai couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief. 

“They’re okay,” she whispered. Josh nodded. He wanted to smile at the sight. It felt right. 

“Should we wait for them to wake up?” 

Renai couldn’t help but feel unhappy when Dalton slept. Even years later, whenever he slept in, she was checking on him constantly. 

“They’ll understand.” She approached him, sitting at the edge and nudging his shoulder. He groaned. He was okay. He was there. You nosed your face further into his chest. 

Neither of you had any nightmares that night. Your sleep was as black as it should be, consumed by each other's arms.

[rottenpumpkin13]

There are plenty of reasons to get back on Zack, of course. BUT with number of accidents caused by Genesis, ASZ + Lazard definitely need to plan something bigger to get back on him as well.

The Stolen Books Prank

[Lazard dials up Genesis' number from a throwaway phone. Sephiroth, Angeal and Zack are standing behind him. It rings five times before Genesis picks up]

Genesis: Hello?

Lazard: Good morning, am I speaking to Mr. Genesis Rhapsodos?

Genesis: This is he. Unless you're a crazy fan....in that case, this is Sephiroth speaking.

Lazard: I'm calling from the Midgar Police Department. The Shinra Electric Power Company put me through to you.

Genesis: That's.... not good.

Lazard: It isn't. I'm calling to inquire about a stolen lot of books. The Loveless bookstore in Sector eight was broken into last night—

Genesis: Oh no! That's awful!

Lazard: —And an entire lot of rare and expensive one-of-a-kind copies of the book Loveless were stolen.

Genesis: How dare they!? I was waiting for that shipment to come in!

Lazard: Well, Mr. Rhapsodos, the problem is multiple eye witnesses and anonymous tips are pointing you out as the suspect.

Genesis: WHAT? ME? AS IF! Do I really seem like the kind of man who would need to steal? I'm financially well off, mind you, and I wouldn't dare steal from a book store of all places. Let alone the Loveless bookstore in Sector eight!

[Knowing what's coming, Angeal slaps his hand over Zack's mouth. Sephiroth has to step away from Lazard so his laughter doesn't echo]

Lazard: We have you on video breaking into the establishment, loading up a truck with the stolen merchandise, then speeding off and breaking several traffic laws.

Genesis: WHAT? WHEN?

[Sephiroth starts laughing uncontrollably in the background]

Lazard: This was last night.

Genesis: THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE! I WAS AT HOME LAST NIGHT.

Lazard: Were you with anyone who can vouche for you?

Genesis: Well....no? But I can prove it! I was writing last night, and the program I use shows you the time each paragraph was written. And I was up until at least 2 AM.

Lazard: What were you writing, Mr. Rhapsodos?

Genesis:

Lazard: Sir? Can you hear me?

Genesis: Do I have to admit to this?

Lazard: You're potentially facing some serious charges.

Genesis: Fine! Fine! I was writing Sephiroth reader-insert fanfiction!

[Angeal has to bolt out of the room before he laughs too loud. He drags Zack with him, who has since turned red]

Lazard: Oh? And you were up writing until 2 AM, correct?

Genesis: Yes.

Lazard: Unfortunately the crime happened at 3 in the morning. We'll be dispatching an officer to the Shinra building shortly. The higher-ups are aware that there is a warrant out for your arrest. I ask you that you do not try to run—

[Genesis hangs up abruptly]

Sephiroth: Did he hang up?

Lazard: I think so.

[Sephiroth's phone starts ringing. He looks at the caller ID and sees Genesis' name flash across the screen. He places a single finger against his lips, telling Lazard to be quiet as he picks up]

Sephiroth: Yes, Ge....

Sephiroth: Genesis. Genesis, slow down.

Sephiroth: Please stop crying.

Sephiroth: You can't move to France and change your name to Pierre, Genesis. That's evading an arrest and another crime on its own.

Sephiroth: Genesis, you can't desert SOLDIER, either. All of your solutions are crimes. Why don't you get a lawyer?

Sephiroth:

Sephiroth: I hardly think the timestamps on your erotic fanfiction about my person are going to help you.

Sephiroth:

Sephiroth: This is not the time to explain the plot of your writing to me, Genesis.

Sephiroth: Gen–

[Sephiroth covers the phone with one hand]

Sephiroth: He's just listing kinks, what do I do?

[He places the phone to his ear again]

Sephiroth: Genesis, I don't even know what barebacking means.

[Lazard loses it and doubles over cry-laughing]

[demonqueenart]

Thank you for answering, I really appreciate it <3 I remember when people were speaking up about these issues a few years ago and many people in the phandom either shut them down or ignored them, and while I’m sure there’s still a lot of that going on even now, I’m really glad that we’ve reached a far more open and understanding point where it’s okay to talk about this stuff now. You and blogs like yours are doing a really good job putting yourselves out there, and we really are striving for a more inclusive community, because we all deserve it!!

Per the subtitle thing, I did some more research and went back to their recent videos, and it seems that while the majority of them do have proper subtitles, I think DnP don’t tend to upload their videos with proper subtitles on them at first, and instead do the subs afterwards and then add them when they’re finished, because the most recent video still has auto-generated subs on it.

While I am thankful that they do put on proper subs, since far too many YouTubers (some even bigger than them) don’t even bother, I believe they should make sure that the subs are there when they upload their videos; since I usually wait a few days to watch new videos, I didn’t notice the time-gap between auto-generated and proper subtitles, so that was my mistake! I appreciate their captioning, but D/deaf people, HoH people and people with sensory processing issues shouldn’t have to wait for accessibility, so I do think they have the capacity to do better in that regards. I’m not an expert on how captioning works on YouTube, so I don’t know how long it takes for captions to be made, but overall I think there’s definitely room for improvement.

That’s my opinion, though, as someone who uses subtitles, but obviously someone else may see this completely differently!

Absolutely! People should be able to enjoy an upload right then! I imagine it’s disheartening that someone would have to wait for a subtitle to be in a video while others have already watched and geeked about the whole thing. That must have made people feel excluded from this community in some way. I hope they’ll hire professionals for subtitles in the future, or find other ways to make people able to enjoy an upload right then! (It’s still very nice of them to use subtitles in their video early on tho. I think it’s something that people can overlook so easily, I’m glad this is not what they do :) )

Also, if anyone wants to share their pov about this, I would love to hear them. The more pov, the better!

[ID/ a banner with light blue sparkly background; the disability pride flag slides in from the left and darker blue text pops in reading "Make some noise for Disability Pride Month!!" /end ID]

Banner by dapg-otmebytheballs

Auto-message: This ask’s purpose is to acknowledge dnp’s past/present exclusivity, not to cancel them! But to embrace mistakes that they’ve made so that 1. we won’t exclude people in need in this community, and 2. we can normalize bringing up exclusivity so that improvement can happen. Hopefully this will one day help dnp realize that this is a safe space for them to talk about their mistakes, so that this space can become safe for people of all kinds too <3

*If you don’t understand what is happening, scroll through my blog for context. And I’ll be taking time to answer my asks, so don’t think I’m ignoring youuu*

[droughtofapathy]

For those of you in New York, don't think that just because we are a blue state it means you don't have to vote or that your vote does not matter. Maybe it will be a forgone conclusion that our electoral college votes go to the Democratic candidate, but voting is not, and never is, just about the presidential election. We are voting on all levels this and every year, and it is vital that you make informed and educated picks. Your local elections are majorly important. If you really want to enact systemic change, this is the most realistic and doable way to achieve that. It starts with small community-based change. Young people statistically has poorer voter turnout as compared to older demographics, and that is why your local councils and small-town mayors and hell even your school boards are able to run business as usual without the interests YOU want in mind. Because you let them.

The first ballot I ever cast when I turned 18 was not in a presidential election. It was to vote on my local school district's budget. It was in the school's gymnasium and despite it being open after school as kids left for the bus or practice or whatever, I was the only student there. This was a budget that directly impacted us, the students, and the people voting were all far older. I have voted in dozens of small elections and ballots where the margins can be as little as two votes.

It matters.

In New York, it is so damn easy to register to vote and to cast your ballot. I do not want to hear your excuse about how you can't register and vote because you don't drive, or you're disabled and can't stand in line day-of, or whatever your "well actually" comment is. If you are eligible to vote in this state, you can and must vote.

You can register online here

What do you need to register? Three things:

NYS driver license, permit, or non-driver ID card

ZIP Code currently on record with the DMV

Social security number

As a member of society, you have those things. If you work, you must have those things. If you want to rent an apartment, you must have those things. If you do anything at all, you have those things. If you don't have those things, then you are a very hyper-specific case and honestly, what are you doing on tumblr dot com when it seems like you might have bigger issues at hand?

But what about the actual voting?

Guess what? New York has some of the easiest voter methods in the damn country. Since 2020, requesting a mail-in ballot is easier than getting a sandwich at the deli.

Apply for a Mail-In Ballot Here

Any voter. You do not need to have a reason. You can just fill out the form. It takes five minutes. The ballot arrives at your residence, you fill it out, you mail it back. That's it. No waiting on lines if you aren't able-bodied, no risking contact with anyone else if you're immunocompromised, no taking time off work if you can't afford to.

For those of you not in New York, check your state guidelines here. In Ohio, for example, it's as easy as New York. You can vote by absentee ballot as long as your voter registration information is current. And as one of the most notorious swing states, it is crucial to vote blue in Ohio. Texas, on the other hand, doesn't actually seem to want to encourage voting, and you must meet certain criteria. But those who are disabled can and should request a mail-in ballot.

You can vote. Do it.

[girldragongizzard]

Chapter 17: Second Megnitude

That voice, that insidious crackly hissing voice, begins reciting the most incredible clichéd pap inside his very mind.

“With a sky of dragon belly Where a fearful terror reigns While the city cowers beneath it We sing and turn your fate”

And yet, despite how ridiculous and silly it is, he feels something begin to happen.

—

Let’s establish another bit of important planning I’ve done, as I’m landing in the Eastern end zone of the Fairport stadium (it has an official name, that of some businessman, but I don’t care for it).

I’ve left almost everything valuable that I own with Rhoda. 

In particular, I’ve left my ID, name change paperwork, and SNAP and debit cards. The pendant that Chapman made me is not with me either. I still have my purse and tablet, in hopes that they’ve both got the enchantments necessary to survive whatever is coming my way, so I can use the tablet to try to talk to Säure.

Now, whether I’ll survive is a different matter, but I’ve also got a lot of things going for me at the moment.

I’m trying to focus on my uncertainty and anxiety, though, making myself a more obvious target to my adversary, hoping he can feel those emotions radiating from me. So I’m not going to reiterate just what’s going to save my hide right now.

But once my velocity has slowed enough that I can bounce around to face my incoming doom, I do so, and then I let loose with my territorial song once again, just to let him know I’m here and I’m challenging him.

“grrrrrrrrRRUMBLE-SQUAAAAAWK-NOKNOKNOKNOKNOK!!!”

I can see that the sun is about to start setting, shining through a string of poplar trees that are lined up along part of the freeway, visible just above the high wall of the stadium.

And just above that is the increasingly growing shadow of Säure, wings stretching from South to North like an incoming storm, his underside all limned silvery and gold from the sunlight.

His belly scales glow like pearls the size of Winnebagos.

They might actually be bigger than that. His size baffles me.

He roars right back at me and it’s a little bit like being hit by a cosmic oscilloscope.

I stand my ground.

—

Once she makes her final challenge, his eyes pinpoint the speck that is that whelp of queer ersatz royalty, Meghan. 

But his thoughts and intentions are dashed by the next verse.

“The smokey columns rise And dance in wind's refrain Pushed by wings of envy We sing and turn your fate”

Consciousness reeling from whatever foul Architecture these words are constructing, he does manage to remind himself that he can take his time to really burn this one, this Meghan.

He needn’t do his dive bomb routine. He can just soar and spear her with his death ray until the poem has run its course, and maybe even after that.

And he opens his mouth to do so, before his impulses can be interrupted by more words.

—

I do wonder which of us has the greater hubris. Säure or me?

He’s already made numerous mistakes, and he’s digging himself deeper and I’m sure he knows it. Right now he should be in the grips of whatever the Poet has in store for him delivered by Chapman’s speakers.

And, also, since he’s now become the new nightmare of Fairport by terrorizing nearly everyone in the city for so long, that puts him squarely in Ptarmigan’s crosshairs, if her quip about Finland was perchance a lie.

Some of the other stuff I said she said was a lie on my part.

And he’s the clear villain and maybe I’m the people’s champion. And narrative physics should be in my favor.

Oh, I hope.

However, I know that I’m far enough away from the infrastructure of the stadium that he can light me up without doing much damage to it. And I’m counting on magics and powers that are as yet untested by a direct attack on this scale. I’m counting on Rhoda’s need for me to be strong enough that her proclamation will bend everything in my favor, and this will be the only proof of that, if it works. And I really don’t know what Poetry can actually do. It seems almost childish to call on it.

Furthermore, while I think that my imperviousness to my own flames might extend to other forms of heat, that’s really only a wild guess. A fervent wish.

And then, there’s still also the question of whether I can even get him to come down and talk to me if his breath somehow doesn’t hurt me.

He could just try to land on me.

Worrying in thought takes far fewer words than what I’ve written here. I’ve considered these fears and swallowed them within the two heartbeats it also takes me to realize the Poet’s verses won’t likely be done by the time Säure attacks me.

And there it is.

His jaws move and his head becomes the largest sunlamp. I don’t even understand how that works, only that I’ve seen something similar in a movie. And it sparkles with static. It's a true laser.

My nictitating membranes have flipped up reflexively, like natural sunglasses, but I’ve still got brilliant spots on my retinas where his mouth marks the sky.

And every inch of me and the ground around me for several yards reflects that fizzing indigo-white light.

I can smell ozone, the turf smoking, and the hot metal of the goal posts baking in the laser.

And that’s without tasting the air with my tongue.

—

Once he’s started, he doesn’t even think. He just sets himself to the task as the hideous words continue to filter through him.

“We know you think you own us But your cries they reek of shame And we rise to turn and face you While we sing to turn your fate”

He can’t feel Meghan’s fear anymore, and he hopes that means she’s gone and no longer a problem for anyone. But he’s on automatic. He’s going to torch that spot of ground until he’s about to land on it.

—

The figure lurking in the control booth of the stadium watches impassively through UV blocking wraparound sunglasses that were maybe a little too pricey for not being actual laser grade safety goggles.

Even with them on, it’s nigh impossible to tell what’s happening out there. Not with human senses, anyway.

Timing here is going to be everything, and even though Säure is obviously flying in as slowly as he can it’s still a meteoric descent.

It might not matter if Meghan survives, honestly, but the world would be a nicer place if she did.

The modifications to the stadium’s electrical systems that the Janitor managed to cobble together at the last minute better not go to waste, either. That required a deal that was surprisingly costly.

Siblings sure do love to stick it to you when you’re desperate for time.

Behind the figure in sunglasses, in the darkness of the room, something large moves.

—

“No one owes you allegiance No one here feels your pain Struggle to no avail, Dear Säure We sing and turn your fate”

And that seems to be it. There’s a distinctive pause in that onslaught of supposed poetry, and his mind clears.

Just in time for him to cut off his own blitz, close his mouth, and pull up before slamming into the entire stadium.

He doesn’t feel anything more in particular. While the poem was being recited, something was happening, but now it’s not, and he has no idea what it was.

And as he rises, he steals a glance at the ground below him.

The circle that marks ground zero of his attack is charred completely black and he can’t see Meghan in it anywhere. If her corpse is there, it’s as black as the grass beneath it.

So he takes a deep breath as he works his wings, filling his blood with oxygen to feed his muscles, and to soothe his nerves.

What a nothingburger.

It’s all done and maybe now he can deal with the remaining Architects who’d swarmed his county on his terms, rather than that whelp’s.

He closes his eyes and imagines the peace of his soon-to-be newly reconstructed lair.

And that vision is interrupted by a, “wump, wump, wump, wumpwumpwumpwmprrrrrrrRRRRRRAWACK-NOK-NOK-NOKNOKNOK!!!!”

—

There’s a movie I never watched that had a super famous scene in it, like, back in the 80s. I remember my classmates talking about it on the playground, and one of my friends at the time just fast forwarding to the scene on his parents’ VCR when I visited so I could see it. I wasn’t at all interested in the movie, but this stuck out to me.

There’s a soldier in the jungle, and behind him is a muddy cliff. And as the camera zooms in, an eye appears in the cliff. My memory of it is that we see both eyes slowly opening, but I’ve gone back and checked and it’s just one eye that’s there.

I like to imagine what I just did looked a bit like my memory of that movie, the black patch on the ground slowly opening a pair of flame orange dragon eyes followed by an opening dragon mouth full of teeth.

Säure couldn’t possibly have seen it. He was too far up by then and I saw him looking away. I couldn’t see his eyes. But I like to imagine it anyway.

It’s pretty amazing just how covered in soot I became from that laser attack. But I also feel like maybe I learned something about physics.

I’ve definitely learned something about myself.

Is all this black ash all over me a layer of dead skin? Or several? Am I ablative?

Taking a deep breath after having croaked my loudest call yet, I glance down to find that my purse is now a molten wreck on the ground. All the leather is nothing but charred scraps fluttering around the remains of my tablet.

Shit.

If Säure does take the bait the Poet is about to deliver to him, and comes down here to talk to me, I’m going to have to lean on my emergency vocabulary.

I don’t think this is going to work, but I’ve got to try.

On the other hand, I also expect a few more attempts on my life, first.

—

“No applause is necessary. Snapping like a beatnik will suffice,” the Poet’s voice audibly carries a smirk. “And now that you’re my captive audience, it’s probably worth mentioning that if you take your human disguise, the bone conduction speakers installed on your horns will drop off. So, if you are done with my show, feel free to tune out at any time.”

He’s in the midst of arching his back and twisting to find Meg and slam down onto her as hard as possible when these words slice through his consciousness.

And he thinks this is easy. He can just switch to his disguise and back in a matter of seconds, incidentally allowing himself to change his position more quickly at the smaller size and weight.

But before he does, the Poet quips, “Oh, and please do attempt that at the highest altitude possible, Dear. You’ll want plenty of time to figure out how to remove your costume, afterward, won’t you?”

That gives him a pause of alarm.

Of course! He’s been played like a puppet this whole time. Why should he assume anything the poet is saying right now is the truth? It’s meant to manipulate him one way or another. He knew this while flying into the whole mess. Even if he’d stayed at home, he’d have been playing into their hands.

He can’t disregard what the Poet says, unfortunately. Which leaves him only one reasonably safe thing to do, remain in his true form for as long as possible. Morning Glory Stadium has been overdue for demolition and replacement for nearly a decade now, anyway.

Time to force that issue.

He could just land carefully, folding himself up into his humanoid form as he reaches the ground, to confront Meghan that way, but he doesn’t want to, and it seems like the thing they’re all trying to get him to do.

So, he scans the charred area of the field and its surroundings, but he still can’t find her. He likes to think of his eyesight as exceptional, as he can see clearly to the horizon no matter how high he flies. But the truth is, if something is small enough he just can’t focus clearly on it.

It hardly matters. If she’s still in the stadium, as her challenge seemed to indicate to his ears, he highly doubts she can evacuate in time to avoid being crushed.

So, he folds his wings and slams down into it with all the force of his incredible mass.

And as he does, he catches sight of something fluttering like a moth down the ball field, away from his center of impact, desperately attempting to get out from under him.

—

Maybe I don’t want to test being crushed, actually.

Just before he pulls his wings in to drop, I feel like I notice some kind of telegraphed movement and I just bolt. It’s almost as if I’m a fly that’s about to be swatted, and my body moves before I realize what’s even happening.

The greatest source of movement in my vision is now the ground as I’m sprinting up to takeoff speed, so I’m hyperfocused on that.

Blades of carefully manicured grass proceed toward me in the deepening twilight of sunset under the swiftly dropping doom above me. Every couple of divot ripping gallops, a white stripe of chalky paint flies under me. Sometimes I think I spot a bug, but I think that’s my imagination.

Wings are up, waving to feel the wind and judge a sense of lift while providing the balance I need to shift to a two legged gait, and I bring my forelegs up to my chest. I’ve still got quite a ways to go before I make it out of the stadium.

Which is good, on the one claw, because I don’t see any obvious thermals in front of me, and I’ll need that room to gain enough altitude to make it over the stadium wall before I slam into it at the velocity I’m trying to go.

On the other claw, I think Säure might just hit both ends of the stadium at the same time, he seems big enough to do it, and I’m not sure I can make it out before he does.

I take a big leap and I flap.

Two more flaps in quick succession and I’m airborne, and I just keep going. I breathe in as much oxygen as I can and I focus on that feeling of being chased I’ve experienced so frequently lately.

Either I’ll make it or I won’t, but I’m going to ride every sliver of an advantage I can think of.

And then I experience something fascinating.

Säure is big enough that he’s compressing the air underneath him as he falls. Actually, anything falling does this, though it’s more noticeable with an object that has flat sides, like a box. Drop a box on a dusty concrete floor, and you can see the particles being pushed out from under it by the wind of its descent.

Säure, like me, is normally aerodynamically shaped to avoid pushing that much air around as he flies through it. But he’s now attempting to body slam the stadium, to hit the ground with as much surface area as possible, and he can’t help but reflexively spread his wings a little as he nears impact.

And, with my wings spread, the feel of that wind is a bit more intense than I ever could have expected.

It’s warm from the compression, and lifts me up from below and behind like the billowing currents from a jacuzzi jet.

It’s almost gentle, but it makes staying upright in the air harder, and it pushes me forward at a constantly accelerating rate.

For a few even more terrifying moments I’m worried the wind will slam me into the stadium seating.

I’m now moving so fast I can’t imagine pulling myself up in time.

But as the air pressure rises, I’m less dense in relation to it, and the current also has to go up and over the stadium wall, and I’m flapping, and using my fire below me to create my own thermals, and it’s the direction I want to go, and I’m suddenly free!

And there’s parking lot, freshly heated by the now setting sun.

I don’t know if I’m quite clear yet, but it feels like safety and affords me the moment to wonder if anybody else happens to be in or near the stadium. I didn’t see any runners using the track, but somebody might be taking shelter there in the ruckus of today’s attacks.

Oh, I hope not.

And then the wind blows sharply and as hard as anything I’ve ever felt, tumbling me snout over tail, wings wrenched this way and that, just before I’m hit by a literal shockwave full of dust and debris.

There is a sound.

The entire city hears it.

Possibly the county.

They must feel it.

It has to have registered notably on the Richter scale, though I’m not on the ground to sense it that way myself.

I’m so disoriented and numbed by the whole experience, I’m not even sure I’m still alive.

—

In the darkness of trees on the lee side of Fairport Arboretum, as far from the sun as possible, Wentin steps into an unoccupied trail and opens its mouth.

It starts hacking and coughing just like a gigantic housecat with a hairball, arching its back and thrusting its face toward the ground.

Within seconds, its convulsions are productive and a person-sized lump unfolds from its throat and sprawls out on the gravel and mud of the trail.

Wentin doesn’t wait, doesn’t say anything. Instead, as soon as its charge is vomited up completely, it turns and leaves.

It has business to attend to.

The person-sized lump moves and starts to half-flail and half-brush wetness away from what appears to be a hair covered face.

“Bleh,” Ptarmigan says, instantly regretting the act of speaking as it exposes her tongue to Wentin’s digestive fluids.

Well, that plan was demolished.

—

Säure had turned and twisted, using his wings unintentionally to maneuver effectively, so that he landed on his belly, tail to the East, head facing the sunset. And he’d opened his eyes from blinking just in time to watch the shockwave of his landing slam the whelp Meghan into the wall of the Sportsplex Arena just across the parking lot and street.

That portion of the building’s wall implodes with the impact.

He starts to get up, lowering his head to glower at the mark of her destruction, to walk over and crush that structure as well.

And within two steps, he hears a voice in his ear. His left fucking ear, not his head. It’s not coming from his bespeakered horns. There’s something near his ear with an obnoxious, whiny voice.

And it says, “I forbid you from flying higher than the trees around you.”

[scribbleweb]

Id: 565845455965... Check Entry request... Check On the list, check

"You're free to go, Mr. Rudboys," the doorman yawns, before putting his head back down on the desk, trying to get a nap in before the next resident arrives.

 It was a boring and tedious job, Steven figured, so he didn't hold it against him. He nods his head in thanks, as he walks through the door.

As hheads up to his apartment, he can't help but smile. Today is going to be a great day, he's sure.  He enters the elevator as another resident, Izaack Gauss is exiting. He flashes his signature smile, and Steven, being in a good mood, shoots back a small grin before the elevator closes.

Arriving at his floor, making his way to his apartment, something seems... Off.

He can hear something coming from inside- groaning? There's another noise, and then it stops abruptly. He furrows his brow, takes the door that should've been locked and throws it open.

He stares in shock and disbelief at the scene unfolding before him, and while any regular person's blood would run cold, his runs hot with anger. He can see what's left of Mclooy Rudboys, a puddle in the back hallway with but a few bone shards left. ...and in front of him, one dead Steven Rudboys, alive only moments ago, with a double crouched above him. 

"Oh fuck you!" 'Steven' shouts, ripping off his shades, exposing the yellows of his inhuman eyes. He no longer feels thankful to the doorman's sloppiness, who lets in the same guy 3 times without noticing? 

 The other doppelganger, already feasting on what was supposed to be his meal, snickers.  "Looks like we both played the same game, eh? Except I won." There's an edge to his voice, a snarl warning the other doppelganger to find a meal somewhere else.

'Steven' ignores it and takes a step forward, demanding, "Cmon, at least give me half-" 

"Hell no!" The other Doppelganger growls out angrily, "I got here first, I did all the work, I'm the one who's eating tonight"

"Just because you got here first doesn't mean I didn't put in the same effort," he complains, gesturing to himself. "I worked hard on this disguise, I memorized his schedule, and fooled the doorman,"

"I'd hardly call it 'fooling the doorman', that guy's been sleeping through most of his shift and let three Stevens in without a second thought," the other Doppelganger scoffed and rolled his eyes.  "And anyways, that's not my problem. You're late, I already caught these. Go feast somewhere else," He says digging into the original Steven's body, making a mess of himself.

'Steven' stomps over to the two, with clear attitude. He plops himself down on the other side of the body, and takes a huge bite of the original's arm, all while making eye contact with the other doppelganger.  "Fuck you," he says again, mouth full of bloodied raw meat. 

"I hope you choke on it," the other responds.

The two eat in silence, clear tension in the air. They're making quick work, determined to eat faster than the other, to devour a bigger portion of their now-shared meal. It would be too much trouble to fight, they figured. One of the other residents would hear the commotion, and call the D.D.D. Then neither of them would get a good dinner.

The idea of sharing is unacceptable to them, but after each eating an entire arm too fast to really savor it, one breaks the silence.

"Fine," he starts, "we'll split this one. One takes the top half, the other takes the bottom," he decides, shoving the other away from the cadaver's torso. 

"Good," 'Steven' says with a sharp toothy smile, and you can feel the smug satisfaction radiating off him. 

"Whatever, just hurry up, I want to get out of here before anyone finds out, I'm not taking my chances with the DDD,"

"You know", the other says between bites, now working on the original's thigh.

"My plan was to just take over Stevens life. Pretend to be him, use this place to lure back more food, maybe some dates. No one would ever know he was gone," he looks down at the body and the pool of blood spilt around it. "Cleaning the place up looks like a pain, though..." He trails off.

The man stops for a moment, thinking about what the other doppelganger said. "Actually, that's a really good idea. It would be so easy to take over, pretend like I'm him. The doorman here is incompetent, he wouldn't even suspect anything. He let me right in. And then I could just keep eating as much as I wanted. No one would ever catch me."

"Us," he corrected. "It's my plan. And-" he points to his disguise "I'm Steven," he says with a smirk.

 The other Steven rolls his eyes, but thinking about how easy the plan is, he agrees. "Fine. Your plan. Whatever. We're going to share it. But I pull off that pathetic excuse for a disguise better than you anyways."

That elicits a glare from the other doppelganger, clearly offended. But otherwise he leaves it at that, intent on finishing up their meal.

"When we're done here, we need to think about who is next. If Steven's visitors keep going missing it'll be suspicious, we'll need to move to another identity eventually.. Any of the neighbors look tasty?"

"hmm," he says thoughtfully. "There's Francis Mosses, just down the hall. He should be easy."

"I've seen him come and go a few times, he looks like a snack," He licks his lips, "It'll be easy to take him out, we'll split him, take our own halves, and move on to the next one."

"I'm not gonna be stuck with the bottom every time, am I?"

"No, of course not. We'll switch them up, keep it fair. I already called the top on this one though, so the next one's yours."

"Oh! There's a pair of twins on one of the other floors, they'd be easy to split"

"The twins, I like that idea. The two of us could each take one of them, be one of them. No one would ever suspect a thing."

'Steven' holds his hand out, not seeming to care that it's covered in blood. They're both drenched, anyways "it's a deal then?" The other double looks at his hand, at the blood covering it. Then he shrugs, and shakes it.

"Deal."

[anonymoushotsexyperson]

GROWING UP A FAT GIRL IN THE Y2K ERA

I know peoples attention spans suck so don't worry im adding sections. So you can scroll through and just read whatever intrigues you if you can't commit to the whole thing!!

this post will talk about my experiences growing up as a fat girl and just a little bit about how it effected my relationship to my body as I grew up as well as the struggles of fatness intersecting with racism and ableism as well as very briefly touching on the wojack giving fat girl backshots meme going around!

SECTION 1 THE BEGINNING OF MY RELATIONSHIP WITH MY BODY AND HOW FAT PHOBIA EFFECTED IT.

My first experience with fat phobia I remember consciously is around the ages of 6 or 7. My mother and father had recently divorced and I was growing into myself more and more everyday getting stronger, smarter, limbs getting longer, body getting bigger. I was going through growth spurts. I would chub up a little then id grow a few inches, chub, grow, chub grow. Seems like a pretty normal concept or idea to manage right? Well not for the average y2k adult. Everyone would always make comments to my mother or out of fear of being judged for being a bad parent she would bring it up herself. I remember my mothers response to the comments about my body. "she is stress eating because of the divorce!" was always her reply... and giiiiirl no the fuck I wasn't. I was not really that effected by my mom and dads divorce till later on. At that age as long as I was surrounded by most of my family and I had YouTube much else didn't matter to me and kind of went over my head if i'm being real with you. Hey I'm a kid though who knows maybe I was stress eating and just had no idea what to call it at the time and then don't remember but honestly, if my memory is serving me correctly I used to be so confused when she said that! If I was eating a little more it was probably because I was GROWING INTO MY BODY MAYBE?? That was my first run in which followed up with many more, like when my dad made me step on a scale in the living room of his new home strangers -that later became family- walking around, free to stare at whatever the number said. "If you don't lose weight you are coming to live with me." Still echoes through my head, I was about 7. It doesn't stop there I was being called a cow at school, or by my older brothers at home during petty fights we'd have. Some how none of the insults really stuck like that (besides the situation with my dad). They definitely hit me, but if I denied that they did then that counts as dodging them right? Growing up I always thought I wasn't that heavily effected by the raging and rampant fat phobia permeating through the y2k, but in reality it caused me to start neglecting my body all together. Up until the summer between 7th and 8th grade I never looked at myself in the mirror. Maybe a quick glance but I would never fixate on my appearance. Now hyper fixating on your appearance can be unhealthy but so is pretending you don't have one at all which was the type of timing I was on. Fat phobia among other factors was the leading cause of what became a history of neglecting myself.

SECTION 2 DEVELOPING AN EATING DISORDER AS A FAT PERSON

scroll to the next section if you want to avoid triggers!

The effect fat phobia had on me didn't really start to show on the surface until 7th-8th grade. My girlfriend had an eating disorder and she was living with me at the time because her family was homeless (we were closeted as best friends). She didn't encourage my eating disorder but it was kind of a monkey see monkey do kind of thing, she made me start to consider it. At that age range I was looking for different ways to destroy myself as well as connect with my peers and some how those too things strongly intersected as the glamorization of self harm and mental illness was at an all time high. I'm not sure why twelve to thirteen yearly anon wanted to destroy themselves so bad but I think if anything it stemmed from a need for control over my surroundings. At this age my home life wasn't the best. I forgot how, but I think maybe through just looking up depressing quotes in general I found the infamous Ana and Mia. Oh and trust me Cassie Ainsworth from skins did not help AT ALL. CUE THE INFAMOUS GIF:

TW CASSIE AINSWSORTH GIF:

even LOOKING FOR THIS GIF BEGAN TO STIR SOMETHING INSIDE ME OH MY GOD??

The worst part about being a fat girl with an eating disorder is how proud of me everyone was. "Anon you're getting so slim!" "Anon look at you slimming out see I knew it was just baby fat!". My friends knew of my ed so they would never compliment me for it or really talk about my body in general, probably half because of my ed but also half because I was still fat and not considered desirable or something to be jealous of regardless of if I lost a few pounds. But my family complimented my figure a lot as I slimmed and I got less fat jokes and the doctor was happy and people did treat me a little different. JUST a little cuz I was still fat but a noticeable enough change in the way people treated me for me to want to keep going and indulge myself deeper in my unhealthy habits.

But yeah long story short I developed an ed and I thought I was so fat and gross and disgusting and dude I look back at myself and why was my body LICHRALLAY SO T??? I honestly wasn't even morbidly obese or anything (which I am now BECAUSE of my eating disorder but fuck it we ball and also I ENJOY BEING FAT I knowww plot twist right?) also you minors in the ed community YES YOU take NOTE at this next part: I was literally just growing into my body... but then I fucked up my metabolism really bad and completely skewed my relationship with health, dieting, and workout culture so i'm either doing too much or not enough. So not only did my metabolism get utterly destroyed but having to learn how to take care of myself from scratch ended up destroying all the progress made and here I am literally 60 pounds heavier than I was back then and i've dropped weight since i've developed a healthier relationship with my body so if we are keeping it a buck until about a year ago I had accumulated about 100 pounds of weight since my pre ed days because of the effects the eating disorder had on me ! (oh and I have heart problems now not from being fat but from attempting to become skinny the wrong way! if you fast and binge or fast and do cardio and feel your heart beating like that... if you know you know...yeah you're fucking up your heart and need to stop like right now girly!) SO yeah I am a recovering anorexic with some bulimic symptoms. Though even after developing my eating disorder my issues with body image didn't really really affect me until later on.

SECTION 3 THE SOCIALIZATION OF FATNESS/THE INTERSECTIONAL STRUGGLE BETWEEN MY BLACKNESS AND FATNESS/ BECOMING THE DUFF/ WOJACK MEME.

Along side subconsciously neglecting myself I would also publicly portray myself as very tough skinned and overly confident all throughout middle and high school as a defense mechanism when in reality I was pretty indifferent toward myself and extremely sensitive. I think that my tough exterior wasn't only due to me being fat but also being a black woman although I am biracial/light skinned in complexion I feel like I was still hyper masculinized due to my blackness especially growing up in an area where I was closer in proximity to blackness then a large majority of my counterparts. I feel like a lot of my aggression and flamboyancy came from constantly being in a state of self defense and also subconsciously feeling like I had to play the role that was written for me or else I wouldn't be loved or appreciated or wanted. By the role that was written for me i'm talking about Precious, Rasputia, Mercedes Jones, Ivy Wentz, the stereotype of being the fat black women, and for my non black fat baddies for you this would be The DUFF role. This is when you're known as the flamboyant friend with the attitude that everyones scared to make the butt of the joke because she is NOT afraid to snap you in two. The stereotype isn't entirely wrong i'm sure a lot of people fall into it for the same reason as me but then it becomes our main character trait, and that mixed into a juicy cocktail of dehumanization of fat bodies turns you into the friends the skinny girls bring to the club to scare off ugly dudes as if you're a bodyguard and are immune to sexual or physical assault because you're fat!

So I grew up neglecting my body because of fat phobia developed a life altering eating disorder because of how romanticized they were due to fat phobia, and spent my whole life being guys secret crush, or the "annoying dramatic fat girl" because of fat phobia but still even then it didn't seem it had the real detrimental effect on my body image everyone said it would until I was 20. When I was 20 I moved back to my hometown for a little bit where the beauty standard is very much "ambiguous white skinny girl" and I thought that maybe I would get play because hey we are like adults who are deprogramming all that bullshit anyway right? WELLL I did get play, crazy play of course! Just in secret, and I've had guys have secret crushes on me etc but never to the extent I began to face it in my 20's where they would so obviously be horny over me all the time while simultaneously being mad at me for making them horny because I'm fat and it confuses and embarrasses them ( men are genuinely socialized to be suchhhh fucking psychopaths. -if you're a guy and you're reading this don't say that not all men bullshit yes we know not you i'm not gonna specify every time to preserve your ego goddamn). I have some sad and weird stories about that, that involves men thinking they could be more aggressive with me or literally impose violence on me or be extremely weird and creepy because they're embarrassed they're attracted to a fat girl and on top of that a fat black girl that they hyper-masculinized and degraded in their head due to societal pressure/influence... but imma save that for another day or maybe never because I see nothing coming out of me posting that on here but relived trauma. Also the type of man I just described are the same ones reposting this new viral wojack meme by the way:

thats all im saying about that meme, the guys reposting it like fat bitches and are scared that they like us and can't think for themselves thats literally all I wanted to input into the conversation regarding THAT....

also I use the word bitch in an endearing aave way not in a deragotry way so please don't hit me with that "don't call women bitches" thing I don't be doing it a lot but im also not gonna stop using aave and also i'm LICHRALLY AFAB sooooo shut up...

ANYWAYS...The violence I faced at this point in my life really triggered something in me it made me realize that because of the stereotypes held up against me I will never be treated or respected or perceived authentically by the average Joe. The only person that would see me is those who have taken extensive time to deprogram parts of their brain that created these deep routed bias etc. ( also if you're wondering why these biases were created it all leads back to capitalism but THATS for another post..) After facing literal violence cause of my body it definitely caused a blow at my self esteem, but even then I shined on and persevered continuing to be my sexy self.

SECTION 4 FAT PHOBIA AND ABLEISM INTERTWINED.

It wasn't until I randomly got into an accident and became temporarily handicapped while also in the most toxic relationship of my life did I really start to fucking hate myself. For multiple months I couldn't walk, and not only was I physically handicapped but the trauma I was experiencing at that time of my life had left me mentally handicapped as well I simply didn't want to be alive and exist in this body or any body I just didn't want to exist. I had a foot I could hop on but I couldn't carry all my weight on that foot because of my previous issues with my health, (I had already been struggling with a chronic illness that effected my muscles) and i didn't have the strength in my arms for the crutches so I succumbed to my injuries, resulting in weight gain, eventually hip and back issues etc. Then, when my leg healed, the access weight made me feel like I couldn't walk without pain. I was having issues with my health unrelated to my weight since 2020 but I was homeless up until last year and it was also covid so I had no way to really see a doctor and also I was like 18-19 and had no fucking idea how any of that worked and am still figuring out how it works to this DAY. I actually just got my insurance card for the first time this year. YIPPE YIPPE EVERYBODY CLAP. These issues with my health effected my muscles and my bodies ability to absorb the nutrients from the food I ate so this injury was kind of like the icing on top of the cake because my chronic illness made the recovery almost in possible. I would cry a lot, stopped taking pictures of myself, and everything. But even then I knew I didn't really have any interest in being thin I actually really fuck with my warm fluffy voluptuous form, I just didn't want to be unhealthy.

I still haven't fully unpacked the shame I felt around being unhealthy, I was so ashamed despite me trying my best with what I had, and what I knew, and I also still haven't fully unpacked why I feel like I have to specify as I literally just did a few lines earlier that I was 'trying my best', why do visibly disabled folks only deserve care or sympathy when they're actively trying to fit into a world that isn't set up to support or aid them when it very well could be? The intersectional oppression of ableism and fat phobia is still something i'm actively developing my thoughts about.

A thought ive been thinking about a lot is how obesity is a health condition and it can be detrimental to some folks and that saying that it isn't is a reactionary trauma response to fat phobia BUT also a lot of things can be detrimental and the level of detriment different things give you differentiates based on the person. Some people are bigger than me and healthier. Some people are smaller than me and UNhealthier. The detriment fatness has on your health as all things doesn't exist on the linear scale we have created for it. SO although obesity is a disease and proposing that fat doesn't correlate with health in an important way is harmful it is also harmful and plain weird to hyper fixate on obesity. Im also thinking about how obesity is treated this way because it's one of the most visible health issues and how that bleeds into ableism. I'm still working on these thoughts i'm having and how to explain and dissect them in a proper digestible and understandable way. So I think this where I leave you to think on your own about this, what do you think? Please feel free to comment below!