#if you read my whole rant you are brave and sexy

[shellshocklove]

I swear, if Joel comes along with a “I was thinking of you the whole time!” I am actually going to push him off a building or something lmao!

I am very curious to see what happens next! Especially with you saying it’s going to get worse… I don’t think Joel is really realising something is wrong rn and the reader seemed very resigned at the end there which scares me a bit! I definitely wouldn’t blame her for ending things with him rn or even leaving her job or something like that. (I would absolutely not be okay or willing to watch my boy-something have sex with another woman, even if it’s for porn. Like nope, I’m outta here! Even though he was so sweet in the first chapter, he’s being real stupid right now. With Tess I feel like it was different because nothing happened between them yet. They definitely should’ve talked properly after the time they spend together. Especially with the reader being kinda inexperienced/a bit innocent and definitely insecure, I feel like it should’ve been obvious that watching him with another woman after everything probably wouldn’t have been the greatest thing for her. Joel being a bit of an oblivious idiot haha! And I also felt for her when she was just kinda downgraded to getting coffee and then pushed aside for Cheryl. And then also, Joel “using” her to get hard and then get sucked off by another woman?!! Just man, poor girl. Overall, it’s a very unfortunate situation that definitely hit her deeply and I can see her spiralling now. I’m so glad to read that they will have a happy ending and I’m excited to see how exactly that will happen! I remember reading the first part when it first came out and I think it’s really cool you’re continuing it!)

Sorry for the rant lmao! You’re a great writer! Can’t wait for more 🥰

don't ever apologize for ranting!! i love it and it makes me all 🥺

gonna put this under a cut bc it's a little long:

in the moment after the porn scene ended he probably doesn't understand that something's wrong, but he is not oblivious. you bring up a very good and interesting point tho, which is what drew me to the whole fic in the first place, or at least the continuation of it: would you be okay with your boyfriend fucking someone else? even if it was for work?

i also think it's especially interesting in the time period it's set where women are being liberated, but there is still so much misogyny. sex is taboo but it's also in everything we sell. you're supposed to be sexy but not a whore, and if you're not sexual you're a prude, right? then suddenly she's welcomed into this world where the attitude towards it are much more relaxed (and maybe it's a little liberating?), and that's what's normal for joel, but it's definitely not for her. she's carrying a lot of guilt and shame, and that's not easy to shake.

joel is older and more experienced, but he also said he doesn't seek out sex outside work. i'm sure this is all confusing to him as well. they have this already established professional relationship– which she kinda hammers down on. so how do you navigate that? especially since it's so fresh. their new relationship not even a week old. are we giving them too much credit thinking they're brave enough to have the 'what are we' conversation yet?

[olympiansally]

I often think about how in ep 26 Light is just silent and alone. I wonder what he was thinking?? I like to think that he mourned for L and regretted killing him but he pushes all of these thoughts deep down. I just want to hear light go "fuck maybe I shouldn't have killed that bastard- WAIT NO WHAT ARE YOU THINKING STOP THIS IS PERFECT EVERYTHING IS PERFECT"

Hmmmm ok so i do have thoughts lmao

This is actually a very cool topic for me because it goes into Light’s emotional complexities which are great and i can talk about for days lmao

And like basically, I agree, but I agree with lots of thought that might not all be coherent and I went into them deep so beware LMAO

So like, even thought Light is very straight forward with his morality and tends to know what he wants in terms of goals and such, I tend to think that Light doesn’t quite grasp the depth of his feelings most of the time. Partially, that has to do with him dismissing feelings as something that’s bellow him, going as far as to say that “that’s how idiot happen”. So a lot of the time, Light either just goes with the first emotion he senses in him and tries to “fix it” so he doesn’t feel anymore or just tries to ignore them all completely.

This instance you’re talking about fits mostly into the first category I think and we see him basically focus all his energy on a single emotion so he doesn’t feel the rest. So, you might not like it, but I actually don’t think Light was mourning L then. Not yet anyway.

The way Light tends to function with feeling isn’t all that smooth, so when L dies and he starts feeling A LOT, Light just grabs onto something he feels enough of to quiet all the rest, but also not so much that he wouldn’t be able to handle and then hyper focusses on fixing that one emotion he’s now feeling. Which is why I don’t think Light was grieving yet, I doubt he would have allowed himself to even acknowledge that he was feeling any type of grieve or sorrow over L being death right away. I mean, that’s a boy who has to be hit over the head repeatedly with his feelings before he relents and faces them. So in this first moment he has to choose something else to focus on and there’s an emotion that I think he would accept and that is close enough to actual grief that he’d be able to channel all his sorrow into it and try to deal, and that’s LOSS.

So now you’re probably like uhh Lu, isn’t loss pretty much just grief tho??

To which I answer kinda, but also no, making it PERFECT for Light at that moment. He absolutely feels the loss of having killed L (he’ll eventually even grow to regret it, but not yet). But loss isn’t necessarily in the realm of grief and here is where Light pretty much just manipulates himself into feeling AT A LOSS rather then feeling WHAT he lost. And that is a feeing he can totally handle. Up til then he’d directed all his energy towards L, towards their game, towards beating him. So now that that’s done he has no idea what to do next. He is lost as in, without direction in those first moments after L dies, so we have Light wandering around without purpose or motivation because he has no idea what to do next now that L’s gone. In truth I don’t even think Light thought he’d get that far, he probably didn’t think he’d get to kill L (which is another topic that i also have loads to talk about but i’ll refrain or this reply won’t ever end jsjwjajsjsk).

In a way, he mirrors L’s own behavior after he had to accept that Light wasn’t Kira (even thought like, he is) and has to let him out of detainment.

Obviously there’s going to be some lawlight here because, well, I can’t help it lmao. But I think it’s VERY telling and of huge narrative significance how completely aimless they both get when they’re disappointed in each other. It just shows how completely they depend on one another to drive them, to give them purpose.

L gets depressed (as he puts it) when he thinks Light isn’t Kira and therefore isn’t the worthy opponent, the equal, he had thought he was. Similarly, Light gets utterly lost when L dies because he feels like L disappointed him, he was supposed to keep challenging him, but now he’s gone. They both loose all motivation when they feel like the other won’t be able to challenge them anymore and while Light eventually gets L back in the game during the Yotsuba arc, L is now dead and can’t bring back Light’s motivation. So Light desperately looks for something else to motivate him and goes into that whole “perfect world” spiral moment.

At the same time, I think when L died Light just felt A LOT in a way he couldn’t deal with. Not only are there MANY emotions, but they are highly conflicting ones. That is actually very well represented in L’s death scene, as Light jumps to catch him and cradles his body as he dies, but also shifts into that creepy grin as the feeling of victory takes over.

Since Light doesn’t know how to deal with ALL THAT he basically distracts himself with finding new purpose and with building his new world and shelfs his feelings so he can deal with them when he’s ready (and uh he never will be)

I also think that from a more subconscious perspective Light gets that desperate to start seeing his new world and rushes to make it happen because that’s how he deals with the fact the HE killed L. It’s his end that justify the means and he need it badly. The perfect world has to happen because there needs to be a reason, killing L needs to have been worth it (and eventually part of the reason he spirals is because he realises it just wasn’t worth it, from a more ship centric perspective). He sacrificed his only true friend, his equal (his soulmate jskwka) to achieve this goal so it NEEDS to be worth it and to be perfect.

So like that’s how i interpret Light’s actions right after L dies. I think in time the bottled up emotions definitely start to spill over and he starts facing what he did but that takes quite some time. I truly think Light would try to avoid feeling for as long as he possibly could and that he just pours himself into building the new world work at first. But the more he works on it, the more he realizes that he wanted L to see it too, wanted the only person who understood him to also understand WHY he was doing all he did. And the more he realizes he can’t have that, that L will never see it, that he’ll never know and that he’s actually GONE, the more Light himself starts to slip and take risks until he eventually loses. Because the truth is that Light refuses to grief L so bad that he becomes haunted by his memory and weighted by guilt.

So no, I don’t think that Light was mourning and regretting in episode 26, but he absolutely SHOULD have been. To me, personally, the fact that he refuses to and suppresses his feelings is what eventually puts him in the state of mind that makes him lose, because his attempts at winning become desperate. It stops being that he wants to win and it starts being about how he has to, how he feels that if he fails, then he killed L for nothing, which he absolutely cannot face. I think he only truly starts to mourn L and to regret killing him once he starts getting bored and lonely, when he notices that building his new world without L to oppose him feels more like a chore then the excitement he had with L and in the end he truly regrets because he understands that without L it just isn’t worth it. So like, in a way, his refusal to mourn L is what makes him unhinged enough to make mistakes and lose.

Oooff that was a lot kajwkajwja

But like you made me THINK so there it is

I also wanted to say that I love the way this fandom does asks, i mean these comments that get us rambling and analyzing things in length are very much awesome, so thanks!!!

If you can’t tell I had a lot of fun rambling about these boys so feel free to ask more stuff anytime 🥰

[pixelfun20]

for the trope grading thing: yes i'll bite grade hermit!tommy

Oh boy here we go. So many issues.

TL;DR, Hermit!Tommy is a solid grade F for me. I see why people like it, but as a Hermit main who's followed the DSMP since August 2020, I find it generally harmful to the Hermitcraft fandom and unfaithful to c!Tommy.

Disclaimer: While I was in the DSMP fandom for around half a year, I have not considered myself part of the fandom since June. I personally have never been a fan of c!Tommy, but I talked to people who are in writing this so hopefully the bias isn't too pronounced. I've been watching Hermitcraft since March 2020, right around the start of season 7. While this will be critical of the Hermit!Tommy trope, I don’t intend it to be negative. If you like it, good for you! Write what you love! These are just the reasons I don't.

For those of you who want my full breakdown of the trope, brave the read more below.

Initially, I was actually really open to the idea of the Hermit!Tommy trope. The first big fics to start this up began around the time of Exile, and as someone who personally really didn't like that arc, I was more than ready for something that wasn't angst-centered. I followed a few fics with this trope for a while, the longest for 2 months-ish before I dropped it and started avoiding it.

Why? Well for one, a lot of these fics seem to come from people who are DSMP mains and only know cursory information about Hermitcraft. Nothing wrong with that, have fun with it, but as someone who is a Hermit main, it rubbed me the wrong way. Hermitcraft would be portrayed as this utopia where everybody got along and had perfect coping techniques and would drop everything to help this random dude who dropped in their server.

Which, um, this would not happen. Hermitcraft is chaotic. They are certainly healthier than the DSMP, but that's a low bar. ZombieCleo held a game where people hunted for each other's heads. The Turf war and Mayor race were whole things. C!Docm77 would not trust a random teenager on his server as far as he could throw him. Above all, Hermitcraft is private. Getting in requires not only getting sponsored by an existing Hermit, but the unanimous consent of every member of the server. Random teenagers don't mix in well, traumatized or not. (Also, they would not tolerate swearing).

Secondly, the characters of the Hermits often are twisted to center almost entirely around Tommy. It got to the point where a friend and I made a parody of the Sexy Lamp Test, the Generic Father Figure Test. If a Hermit can be replaced with any other Generic Father Figure (Phil, Wilbur, Batman, etc), they fail the test. The Hermits would not all simultaneously adopt Tommy for reasons explained above. While I can very much see them worry and provide help where needed, it would not be the whole server and it would not be at the level of parent/child.

For my last point, we'll talk about Tommy. Like I said before, though, I'm biased against Tommy, so I found a friend who rather likes him, and got their opinion, so these are their points below:

1) Infantilization: "When I hit rock bottom, I need support, not someone to smother me or shove me onto a healing arc. A lot of fics treat Tommy's like he's incapable."

2) Stubbornness: "Tommy's so fucking stubborn he refuses to accept help. It results in a lot of fics having a constant cycle of tommy refusing to get healed and fleeing while the hermits try to force it."

3) Fanfic Therapy: "The one hermit tommy story I like was good bc it wasn't forced, he just came around bit by bit. Most fics don't do that."

Anyways, that's my rant grading of Hermit!Tommy. If you like it, I really don't begrudge you of it. I’m sure there are fics out there that are great and might not even fall into my criticisms listed here. At the end of the day, you can choose how you want to characterize the Hermits and Tommy, and for a lot of people, including me at one point, it was/is loved mostly for the angsty, hurt/comfort vibes. Which is valid. It's just... not for me. At all.

[radio-goo-goo]

Queen 30 Day Challenge ║ Day 29 ║ Five Favourite Things About Queen       

so i might have accidentally blacked out and written a love letter/essay for this question so if that’s the sort of thing that floats your boat pls read on

1. Their Versatility I know this is said a lot, but one of my absolute favourite things about the band is just how many different music styles they have produced over their time together. I could literally rant forever about how much I love every single Queen era (including Hot Space and I will fist fight someone over this if I have to).

I went NUTS the first time I listened to Queen/Queen II because I couldn’t believe that they started off as this heavy rock meets epic fantasy kind of folksy sound that makes you want to go and run off into the forest and make fairy circles.

I think A Night At The Opera is probably the best example of how versatile Queen is. It’s genuinely masterpiece of an album and 100% deserves to be their most popular album. All of the tracks are so unique and its just such an experience to listen to every single time. 

And of course every single ballad they did; like there’s literally not a person on the planet who hasn’t heard at least one Queen ballad, if that’s not impressive idk what is.

2. Their Fashion This one isn’t that deep, I just really love their fashion and aesthetic, particularly from the early-mid 70′s. I LOVE that they all shared clothes and accessories in the early days, and the fact that they weren’t afraid to get a little bit experimental with their looks.

Zandra Rhodes is absolutely incredible and all of Freddie and Brian’s stage costumes from that era are absolutely beautiful. I also think there’s something oddly poetic about the fact that during the time where the boys were essentially broke and playing their smallest gigs was also the time where they made the effort to look the most grandiose and theatrical.

I also really appreciate that their look from the mid to late 80′s was pretty much exclusively “exhausted dad at the sunday neighbourhood bbq”. I think that was quite brave of them.

3. Their Stage Presence This one’s sort of mainly a Freddie appreciation thing but for a damn good reason because the man KNEW how to capture an audience. That description about how Freddie made it feel like he was talking to you directly in a crowd of hundreds of thousands is so accurate, even from low quality recordings of their concerts from 40 years ago it still feels the same way. The most obvious example of this is Live Aid, but if you haven’t already seen it, go watch Queen’s 1977 performance at Earl’s Court because after every few songs Freddie will just start talking to the audience either about how the night’s going or about the next song they’re going to do, but he talks in such a conversational way it really does feel like he’s just talking to you and its so soft.

I also need to talk about Wembley ‘86 because WOW do I get emotional watching that. Its impossible not to feel the energy from the band and the crowd, and you can tell how much fun all of the boys are having (especially during the acoustic set which might be my favourite part).

4. Their Vocal Harmonies Straight up I just can’t get over how incredible Brian, Freddie, and Roger’s voices sound together. I feel like I don’t even need to elaborate because y’all know exactly what I’m talking about. There are too many songs to give examples of but particularly all of Somebody To Love makes me go absolutely BANANAS (freddie was 100% correct when he said it was queen’s best song)

5. Just Like, Them As People I love that all of them are so different as individuals and the way that shows through their music. Their brotherly relationship really well and truly does warm my heart.

I love that Freddie knew he was a superstar and acted like it even when the band was only playing pub gigs and barely had a dollar to its name, that level of determination and self-confidence is honestly something I aspire to. I also love his consistent “i’m going to love the world and everyone in it but absolutely take no shit from anyone who tries to give it to me” outlook on life.

I love that Brian is so clever and multi-talented, please try and name another astrophysicist 3-D photographer international rock star (you CAN’T because that’s insane and completely ridiculous and it’s Brian and I love him for it). I love how stubborn and passionate he was about making music even if it did result in screaming matches with the rest of the band.

I love that Deaky essentially accidentally helped form one of the most popular rock groups in history, my mans joined the band at 19 and never intended to be a rock star but he did it and raised a whole family at the same time. I also love that this quiet little soft spoken bassist was the dancing queen of Queen and out of nowhere would write some of their greatest hit singles...  we really do have no choice but to stan.

I love that Roger tried to be an Adult and get a Real Life Job but said no fuck that i’m going to be a rock and roll star because that’s what i love and i’m good at it. I also love how in tune he was with the world and all the current fashions and modern trends, he really said i’m going to be well-read and cultured but make it sexy.

Essentially, I think I like Queen so much because it’s this perfect storm of four very distinct personalities that should absolutely clash but for some reason only bring out the best in each other and I think that’s really neat.

[thomaslightwoodenthusiast]

hey guys! i finally had the time to get this started. here was the first request:

an alice in wonderland au - malec edition

i tried my best, i was kinda young when i read the book so i don’t remember exactly what it was like but this is my attempt !!

requested by @tobeornottobetequila !

➰➰➰➰➰

Alec woke up feeling a little dazed, and with an absolutely thudding headache. He stretched his arm out with his eyes still shut, and accidentally slapped Magnus awake.

“What was that for??”

“Sorry. Stretching.”

Now, Alec usually had great vision. It was part and parcel of being a shadowhunter. But even after he rubbed his eyes and blinked a few times, it was clear that he was not in Magnus’s apartment. Or in the Institute. Or anywhere he recognised, for that matter. He shook Magnus -who had went back to sleep- to get his attention.

“Alright, stop messing. Where are we?”

“Huh? We’re in my apartment- oh.”

“You see it too?”

They shared a glance and looked around themselves. It was Magnus’s bed, sure, but it was in the middle of nowhere. There was insanely green grass, and the trees- such an odd shape. Alec could even make out a castle in the distance. “So it’s not my headache. Whatever the hell this is is real.”

The place looked like Faerie, but more in a Fairytale fantasy way- like the pair had been sent into a book.

“You know, this place gives me insane Alice in Wonderland vibes. I’m half expecting the Cheshire Cat to pop out of that tree.”

Alec looked extremely terrified. “Is that another of your cats?” he inquired.

Magnus half-laughed, half-sighed. “Remind me to never make a reference towards anything at all with you. Alice in Wonderland is a famous book, my love,” he said, kissing the top of his boyfriend’s head. Things were going great right now- Alec had finally accepted himself and came out, and whilst the reaction wasn’t the best from everyone, he seemed happier. More free. More willing to love Magnus. Despite being in a completely foreign place with no idea how to leave, he didn’t quite want to. It was peaceful here.

“Do you think you can portal out?”

Magnus shrugged and waved his hands- with no avail. Not even any blue sparks came out of his hands.

“I’m afraid, only magic from this dimension works here.”

“This dimension.” Magnus repeated. “That doesn’t sound good.”

“Why not?” The voice gained a face, to which Magnus’s eyes widened. “Holy fu-“

“Language!” Alec exclaimed, mock offended.

“Sorry darling. But I need to use it right now. WHY THE HELL IS THE GODDAMN FUCKING MAD HATTER STANDING IN FRONT OF US?”

“I DON’T KNOW WHO THE GODDAMN FUCKING MAD HATTER IS!”

“Boys, boys. Calm it down. I’m simply here to tell you that you need to leave as soon as possible. People don’t like your kind here, and I can-“

Suddenly, Alec was angry. “Your kind?! Your kind as in ‘gays’? Well you listen to me, dude. We have every right to exist just like you straight people. There is nothing wrong with me not with my boyfriend and I love him so goddamn much that I’m ready to punch the absolute SHIT out of you if you say that-“

“As I was saying, your kind refers to the fact that you’re from another dimension. I was offering to help you both leave, before the Queen finds out you’re here. Also, where the hell did you get the assumption that I’m straight from? I mean, look at me.” The man gestured at himself, and Alec noticed that he shared a very similar taste in style with Magnus. Now he knew what Simon meant when he greeted Magnus as ‘the Mad Hatter’ all the time. He was still to figure out why Magnus called him ‘Edward’ though.

“Well, I’m sorry. Quite new to being out and happy, so I get defensive.”

“That’s totally understandable! Now, I suggest you two get ready and follow me,” the Mad Hatter said, ducking out of sight. This whole experience was so bizarre.

“That rant was really sexy, by the way.”

Alec flushed. “Shut up.”

“You make gay rights sound even sexier.”

“Why are rights sexy in the first place?”

Magnus rolled his eyes and got out of the bed. “You’re such a buzzkill,” he said, pouting.

➰➰➰➰➰

Alec’s mind wandered yet again to how odd everything was. Where was this place? What was it? Why was there an insane man leading them about?

“Alrighty boys! We’re here!” The ‘Mad Hatter’ gestured toward a portal- guess some things didn’t change. “One thing before you go. You have to take these,” he said, handing Alec a small cake-like item with an ‘eat me’ tag on it, and Magnus a small vial with ‘drink me’ inscribed on the lid. “We give them to everyone who unexpectedly turns up here before they return home.”

Magnus stares at his vial in wonder. “We really are living a fairytale right now,” he muttered, downing the stuff. Alec watched him nervously, swallowing the cake bite whole before he had a chance to taste it.

And of course he started choking.

Magnus slammed his back several times as his skin became increasingly more red from embarrassment. He then stopped, and they brushed themselves off. Magnus of course giggling silently to himself.

“I didn’t quite expect you two to be so desperate to take them- are you in such a rush to go home?” the strange man said, looking sad.

“Well, yes. Plus you did say that-“

“That the Queen would be angry if people not belonging to this dimension were here?” echoed a new voice. A female one.

Magnus spun around. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Not you?!”

The Queen of Hearts raised an eyebrow. “Am I truly that bad?”

“You behead people.”

“She beheads people?!”

“Yes, Alec. It’s the- you know what, forget it. We’re in a fairytale, the book I said about. I don’t know what the hell happened or how drunk I got to be able to conjure this shit up. But what I do know is that this is the part where he,” Magnus said, gesturing at the Mad Hatter, “gets arrested, and so do we, and our heads get chopped off.”

Alec did not quite like the sound of that. As Magnus said, sure enough the Queen of Hearts ordered her guards to arrest the other man and take them as well for immediate beheading. “What did we do?” he asked in a small and vulnerable, panicked voice. Magnus’s heart broke that second; he sounded so scared. His Alec, his brave archer boy, made so small. All he wanted to do was hold him and tell him that it would be okay, but all he was capable of doing was brushing his hand against his.

“You trespassed. And this mad man here was helping you leave. He does this all the time- and gets away with it. Well not anymore, I say! Off with all your heads!”

Alec looked as if he was about to pass out.

➰➰➰➰➰

It took surprisingly less time to get to the castle than they thought it would. As soon as they’d arrived, all three had been sent to the dungeon quarters to prepare for execution, each in three separate cells as extra added torture for Magnus and Alec. They were also brought out with hoods over their heads, meaning they couldn’t even see each other.

“Down!” The Queen barked.

The executioners shoved the three down on their knees.

“Prepare!”

Their heads were pressed against the blocks.

“Anyone have any last words?”

“Damn. You know, I really thought they’d be using the guillotine by now. It would’ve been cooler. Imagine dying, going to hell because let’s face it heaven is definitely not for me, and the other ghosts being like ‘How did you die?’ And then you get to go ‘Guillotine’-“

“Shut up, please,” The Queen yelled. Alec laughed to himself; Magnus was never short of something quick witted to say.

“Ready?”

They were hushed, the axes lined up on their necks.

“Aim...”

They were lifted off. The pressure being removed felt odd. Then Alec began to feel sick again. Like he was going to collapse.

Magnus felt so too. Even though they couldn’t communicate properly he could almost feel it in his veins. For a moment, he thought they were both going to die, and silently hoped that they would before the axes met their necks again. It would be less painful that way.

The whoosh of air they felt against themselves as the axes were brought down with force was oddly calming. Even though they were one second away from-

➰➰➰➰➰

Magnus sat up, first of all aware that he couldn’t breathe. He choked on water, coughing endless streams of it up. Once he’d calmed down, he noticed that he was soaking. His hair was dripping in his face.

“Magnus! You’re okay, thank god-“

“Guys Alec isn’t moving-“

“What?” said Magnus. There were too many voices surrounding him. He looked up and was glad to see that the soft voice that first spoke to him was his little biscuit, Clary. He was on the ground in the middle of Central Park with a few other shadowhunters- Jace, Isabelle, and Simon too- and Alec was lying limp beside him. He was extremely pale, deathly so, and he could barely breathe. His chest rattled with each one he took.

“Magnus, what happened? How did you guys fall in there?” Clary asked, concerned.

“Clary, sweetheart, I appreciate your concern but one; I have no idea what just happened and two; Alec?”

He shifted himself over- he could barely move- and tried his magic. He ordered Jace and Isabelle back. The magic shocked Alec awake, but he was too weak to cough the water out himself. The next few seconds were terrifying- Alec spasming and freaking out, Isabelle loudly sobbing in fear, Clary getting worried, and Jace. Jace was silent, expressionless. He couldn’t quite believe it- in fact- he refused to. Alec couldn’t die. Not before him.

As if knowing what he was thinking, Magnus looked at Jace with a kind smile. “No one’s dying tonight. He’s going to be fine- I can remove the water. But he definitely needs to go to the Institute infirmary. And he needs strict bed rest.”

Seeing as he was unable to make a portal because of his weakened strength, he called Catarina to pick them up and take them to the Institute. On the ride there, he was able to talk to Clary.

“So what did actually happen?”

“I’m not sure,” she said. “You guys must’ve went for a walk and fallen into the river. We got a fire message from a shadowhunter on patrol of the area saying they saw you drowning- he helped you both to stay afloat whilst help came. Then we arrived.”

Magnus considered asking if she knew how the hell they had even fallen in in the first place, but didn’t. He had too little energy. So was the whole Alice in Wonderland thing fake?

Later in the afternoon, Alec had been taken to the Institute to recover and get cleaned up. Magnus went back home, so that he could clean up too. The whole thing was mad. As he took off his coat, he felt something in his pocket.

A little vial.

The exact one that was in that ‘dream’.

He decided to keep it to show Alec and made his way to the Institute. Isabelle opened the door.

“Magnus! Hey! Alec is a lot better. He kept asking for you. He wants to show you something I think.”

Magnus held the conversation with his boyfriend’s little sister for a few moments before making his way to his room.

“Magnus?”

“I’m here.”

Alec was curled up in his bed. He looked exhausted and freezing. “I feel so cold. I had a hot shower to help but it hasn’t really.”

“It’s okay. Just let me hold you. Your sister said you wanted to show me something?”

Alec shuffled up so that he was sitting against the headboard. Magnus slid on beside him, putting an arm around him and letting his head fall on his shoulder. He absentmindedly ran his fingers through Alec’s soft, dark hair. There had been a Herondale once, one that on first sight Magnus thought Alec resembled almost perfectly. The dark hair, stark against pale skin. The deep blue eyes, which held oceans of emotion behind them. And to be fair, Alec was a descendant of him. But after getting to know him, Magnus realised that Alec was not as like Will Herondale as he thought.

“This,” said Alec, snapping Magnus out of his daydream. It was a tag.

A tag that said ‘Eat Me’ on it.

Magnus wordlessly scrambled for his pocket and produced the vial.

“By the Angel. What does this mean? Where were we? What even happened? Were we actually almost killed? What about that other guy-“

“Alec, don’t worry yourself. Everything’s fine. I don’t know either. I don’t even know if we just hardcore dreamt that or if it actually happened. I mean, it’s not every day you just casually fall into a river. And you of all people- a shadowhunter nonetheless- shouldn’t be just falling in.”

Alec sighed. He shuffled back down on the bed and gave Magnus a look that meant he expected him to do so too. So he did. They still held each other tight. Alec took Magnus’s face gently in his hands, like he was precious porcelain. He kissed him, almost relieved that he could. The dream had been so real. His soft skin felt warm on his hands.

“Magnus?”

“Yeah, honey?”

“I’m glad you didn’t get your head cut off.”

The two burst into fits of laughter. This was definitely going to be an inside joke now.

Then someone appeared in the doorway. It was Simon.

“Isabelle sent me here to make sure you guys were okay.”

“Oh, we’re fine. Thank you Edward.”

Simon winked- well, tried to- and left.

Alec turned back to Magnus.

“Where the hell do you get Edward from?!”

(here’s the first of the requests! number two is currently in the making and will be done soon)

[stick-man-simp]

Some stuff about my stick oc Evans that no one asked for!!!

You wanna hear my headcannons about the actual thsc characters?? To bad!!! /j/lh (under the cut cus this is long lol)

1. What’s your oc’s most irrational fear? Is there a specific reason this fear came about?

They’re really afraid of something happening to their neck, like you know, that kind of stuff, ouch, no real reason for this fear, they just have it. They’re also really afraid of being abandoned and being alone oof

2. Is your oc picky about food? What kinds of foods do they like and dislike? What do they consider a comfort or “safe” food?

They hate tomatoes and milk with a passion, but otherwise most foods are okay with them, it’s more about the texture for them, not the taste, but if it has a weird texture, big oof moments. They really like any sort of fast food (except Wendy’s) and they love Dr Pepper so much lol

3. What does your oc’s voice sound like? (Or, if you have one, what’s their voiceclaim?) Can they sing, whistle, or roll their rs? Do they have any speech impediments or notable dialects/accents?

Their voice basically sounds like mine, but low key deep, and kinda raspy too. They can sing alright, not great but they like singing along to songs. They can whistle really well, the kind of really good whistling that pisses you off >:) lol. they cannot roll their r’s lol haha loser can’t roll their r’s :’). they used to have a stutter as a kid and it comes out when they’re really upset.

4. Is your oc good at keeping secrets?

They are great at keeping secrets, because they care a lot :), but also cus they have terrible memory and will probably forget it lol

5. What kind of clothes is your oc most comfortable wearing?

Their usual comfy everyday outfit is just a t-shirt and jeans, and hoodie when it’s cold. Same thing at home, but sweatpants or pj shorts

6. What kind of clothes is your oc least comfortable wearing?

Dresses >:( they’re ugly and uncomfortable, also flip flops, they hate them (they wear crocs lmao)

7. What song reminds you of this oc? Does this match up with the type of music your oc likes to listen to?

I actually made whole a playlist for them oop- https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7qxg8Wm7qbMXKu2FRBKYI4 It kind of matches what they would listen to, upbeat with kind of sad lyrics

8. What’s it like inside your oc’s mind? (Literally, or metaphorically.)

No thoughts head empty, jk it’s a mess, they may seem really chill and confident on the outside, but on the inside they are always worried about saying the wrong thing and scaring people away, they just want friends :’(

9. What are your oc’s goals for the future? Relationship-wise, career-wise, or other?

Nothing much, they don’t like thinking about the future, they just go with the flow really, not good but whelp, it’s going ok so far. NO relationships tho, they are aroace, but boy do they wish they had some friends oof

10. Who’s the first person your oc goes to to talk about something that made them happy? Sad? Angry?

Usually... no one, maybe their cat or maybe their mom, but in the time where Evans is friends with Ocelot (Coelpts oc), they would go to him about literally everything lol and then get worried about annoying him oof

11. Does your oc have any interests/hobbies that they hide from everyone? Why do they hide these interests?

Not really, they have a bunch of hobbies, but cringe culture is dead so they are open about them all to whoever asks, but no one ever does aaa, but they do stuff like gaming, drawing, knitting, embroidery, baking, cooking, model trains, lots of stuff

12. How does your oc handle talking to somebody they can’t stand? What if it’s a situation where they’re forced to work with this person?

They don’t lol, they don’t take shit from no one and will say to their face that they don’t like them lol, but if they have to work with them, they will cooperate, but their gonna be a bastard about it

13. What’s your oc’s dream home like?

A cozy cottage in the woods, with lots of hiking trails all around, a chicken coop, and close to their friend’s house :’)

14. If your oc spent one day free from any consequences or recognition for their actions, how would they act?

They wouldn’t do much lol, probably just steal a bunch of Dr Pepper and snacks from the store

15. What’s your oc’s morning routine like?

They wake up at like 6 am and scroll on their phone in bed for a bit, and then get up at 7:45 to get ready lol, and leave at 8 to got to work, I mean it works but wtf Evans

16. What’s your oc’s nighttime routine like?

They usually just sit on the couch with their cat and some snack and watch TV or play games for a while before going to bed and scrolling on their phone for like an hour before finally passing out

17. If your oc had a social media page, what would it be like? What would they post about? How much personal information would they feel comfortable posting on it? How often would they update it?

They have a Tumblr, they don't make many posts, just reblog stuff, and they would totally share their fucking home address  if someone asked nicely, they are unhinged

18. How does your oc see themself? How does this compare to the way other ocs see them?

They look at themself and think ‘woah that’s one sexy motherfucker’, they are a bastard man with way too much confidence, I don’t have any other os’s that would interact with them, but Ocelot totally thinks of them as just a big dumb puppy (he would never say that out loud tho lol)

19. How would an enemy describe this oc?

An arrogant son of a bitch (and they’d be right >:D)

20. What’s a superpower or magical ability that this oc would hate having?

Being able to read peoples minds, they would hate this so much, because it would make them feel evil and uncomfy, and they don’t wanna know what people are thinking about them, they think it’ll be bad oof

21. What’s a fact you haven’t shared about this oc?

They are nonbinary, AFAB, they used to wear a binder but they got top surgery at 20 years old, now they don’t wear a shirt at the beach and they’re making that everyone else's problem!! >:D

22. What’s your oc’s dream job? Is this similar to what they’re doing now? Do they believe they could ever achieve this dream?

They work for the CCC right now, and they had their dream job as an agent, but the promotion they got kind of ruined the dream, and their job is boring to them now

23. Who would this oc consider their family? What is their relationship with these people?

They have their mom, who is really great, their dad died when they were young, they don’t have any siblings, and they aren’t close with any other family. But, any friends they have they immediately get really attached to and think of as family

24. What is one thing that, no matter who it’s coming from, would anger your oc?

Getting called a coward (haha Marty McFly kinnie lmao), they are not a coward >:( (this gets them in a lot of trouble sometimes oof)

25. How does your oc handle sadness?

Not well oof, they mostly just cry a bunch and eat a lot, anything to get their mind off it

26. How does your oc handle anger?

Basically the same as with sadness but with furrowed eyebrows and ranting to their cat

27. How does your oc handle fear?

They are pretty brave so not much scares them, and they have to be brave for others, but when it comes to stuff that really scares them or just plain anxiety, they usually try to calm down as best they can, or they just run, they can run fast too

28. What’s your favorite thing about this oc?

Himbo :)

29. What’s your least favorite thing about this oc?

They have a primal urge to insult people, they don’t mean to really upset people, it’s all in good fun, but they can still be pretty mean sometimes, especially when they do it with strangers oof

30. Tell a random fact about this oc!

They’ve always wanted to have a beard or a mustache, but even with T they can’t grow much facial hair :(

[ivory-in-rapture]

The Beautiful by Renee Ahdieh: A review

I had to take a break from writing this review. It was four pages of angry salty rant and all over the place but now I’m calm so I can review the book in a logical manner.

Name: The Beautiful

Author: Renee Ahdieh

Genre: Historical fiction, fantasy, paranormal, vampires

Category: Young Adult

Rating: 2/5 stars

The beautiful is a historical romance, a young adult novel with themes of vampires, horror and mystery.

Summary: “It’s 1872. (wow really?!) Meet Celine. A young French seamstress who is moving to the new world (specifically New Orleans) to start anew away from the monsters of her passed. But then a series of crimes begin to terrorize the citizens of New Orleans just as Celine begins to fall for this super-hot, emo, sexy boy with a really weird edgy attitude. And obviously, it seems like this love-interest is the murderer. (of course!)”

                                                   ****************

I have a lot of problems with this book. I’ll start with the good though. The story is very beautifully written. Ahdieh has a lot of poetic, scenic descriptions and all the emotional descriptions are grand and lovely and beautifully expressed. The descriptions of the city of New Orleans are very beautiful. In fact, my favorite part of the story was the exploration of this new town and its customs. I just wish there was more of that in the actual story. (Aaaaaand there ends the nice things) In fact, while the story tries very hard to be diverse and open-minded, we only really discover the very…not-diverse side of New Orleans. I would have loved for the story to get into the other cultures that really define New Orleans as a fictional landmark but it was the same as reading about the rich of Paris.

Well failed to be nice there. Anyway, I have condensed my disappointment in this book down to three points:

1. This was not a good vampire book

2. This is not really a vampire book

3. Vampires aside, this book is actually not good.

I’ll explain. Expect spoilers.

1. This was a bad vampire book.

A lot of readers might have gotten into this book knowing nothing but this book had been hyped for over a year as the “resurgence of the vampire genre in YA lit”. Everyone in the YA community was talking about how this book is going to be innovative and breathe new life into the dead trope and it was subversive and I got really hyped!

I used to love vampire books (until I got tired of the cliche plots.) I have read many vamp books and after reading the description and beginning of this book, I thought I knew just how this book would be different.

I thought Celine was the murderous vampire terrorizing the city and she was actively seducing the guy so he’d get blamed while she can get info about his personal life to further the illusion and also so she can have deniability if she gets caught!

I was wrong. This book actually didn’t do anything innovative in its vampireyness. The story is about a “strong female character” in the most cliché and transparent way you can imagine. Celine takes stupid, illogical risks without any sensible reason because she’s just “so brave!”. She makes mistake after mistake and for some really lousy reason, she becomes the object of the vampire’s obsession. Everyone she meets falls in love with her. She’s just…a really cliché vampire-genre heroine. Just like its genre, this trope of protagonists is outdated now. There’s this push to make vampire stories less creepy by making it so the woman seems so in control and powerful but news flash: Vampires are creepy! It’s not gonna be a vampire story if it isn’t creepy! That’s the whole point! That’s why the trope still works for adult novels but it’s just not working for YA anymore. YA has moved on to better things. All this said, this book?

2. It’s not even a vampire story!

Despite the excessive marketing of this novel, this isn’t actually a vampire book. This book is not interested in the horror, the mystery or even the aesthetic of vampire stories. There are vampires somewhere in there but it’s not really important. The word isn’t even mentioned until 140 pages in and the characters don’t really ever talk about it either. We get every mystery resolved before we really get to stew in it. There’s really no shock or smart plot twist in it (oh there are plot twists, they’re just not smart). We get these long, boring chapters from the perspective of the vampire/killer which just ruins the whole allure of it. This killer is such a snooze! He was so boring that I’m pretty sure I zoned out during his chapters and missed some heavy exposition. The victims of the crimes are skeleton characters we barely care about, too. I mean, I’m pretty sure we learn the name of one victim after he is killed! The stakes are below ground in the story. The story is actually about two humans… reluctantly falling in love...and there are some vampires in the background besides the boring killer, who really should join a theater group and get his angst out there instead of on his food. We only really get some vampire-related action at the very end but by that point, I was already so exhausted by the boring plot and the terrible main character that I was too irritated to care. And that brings me…to the third point

3. This was just a really bad book.

I am sad. I really liked The wrath and the dawn (I’m actually questioning that these days too…) but I have yet to read something else by Renee Ahdieh that I’ll enjoy. It’s possible that we just don’t work; her writing and my reading taste.

But I really think this book was bad. Like I mentioned before, this book has both a plot problem and a character problem.

The plot first: The story doesn’t make sense in a lot of places because the character doesn’t operate on a logical wavelength! It’s terrible at building tension; mysteries get solved before they really sink in and the explanations are not good enough. There’s no cohesive rise and fall to the plot. It’s mostly grunt work; we move from the main character arguing with someone in one scene to her arguing with someone else in another scene. All around, there was just so much argument in this book! Celine is such an outspoken woman that she just can’t leave anything well enough alone. She has to fight with everyone over everything. It was exhausting and she argued over the most mundane and ridiculous things. She is probably one of the worst characters I’ve ever had to tolerate throughout a book! She never actually argued about anything that mattered. It was always about her pride and just for the sake of being stubborn. I think she even says at some point that she didn’t disagree with the character but she just had to argue with their point.

On top of that…Celine is not like other girls. She’s different. She actually thinks she’s better than the other girls she meets on her journey. She acts like she doesn’t want a husband but then goes and falls for the most eligible bachelor of the town after three meetings. (One just a glance, the second an argument…and the third, another argument.”) It’s instalove and it’s convoluted and stupid. By the end of the book, she’s so in love that she’s shrieking over the body of the guy, she’s almost had sex with him and she already knows everything about him because they had one nice conversation while they walked about being mixed race.

This brings me to the character issue: The story tries too hard to be diverse and edgy but it just comes across as fake and pretentious. Every character has one or two “diverse points”. This one is a lesbian, that one is half Chinese and the other is half African. The main three have diverse points of their own which they ‘bond’ over and that was actually one of the few saving graces of the story but as a whole, the book chooses to be about the most boring characters of the story! Others might disagree but even the meek friend, Pippa, who we are supposed to look down at in the story for being a good and nice girl, is more interesting than Celine. If the story was actually about the lesbian vampire side character, this book would have actually been something special. The love interest is so boring? He’s like a nice guy in the most innocent ways possible. A pioneer of consent and equality in 1870s, Bastian is treated as devil-incarnate because he beat up a creepy dude that one time! The book keeps saying he’s a bad boy…but then like he’s one step away from joining a 2010s women’s march! It’s just almost laughable. I don’t have anything to say about him. He’s just a really handsome, nice but bad boy looking guy?! I don’t know.  

Okay, I think I’m done. I could nag more but I’m going to cut it here. This was still salty but oh boy! You should have seen the first draft. There was a lot of all caps!

Anyway as a whole, I think this book was a total failure because it failed in every sense. It failed to be true to its marketing promises, it failed its genre. The plot was poorly thought out and uninteresting and the characters were not compelling or sympathizing.  

I’m not going to read the sequel. Even though the cover looks gorgeous and we might have a main vampire character. I just dislike Celine too much to tolerate more of her irritating narrative voice!

I really hope someone reads this.  Thank you if you stayed through this. I know it was long.

[modern-oedipus]

Rant aside, OH MY GOD what a day today was!!! What a fucked up midterm it was!!! But what a brave thing I did after that kinda left me speechless!!! Also wow... for once in my life I memorized something accurately for the midterm.

MONDAY IS THE LAST MIDTERM though I will have quizzes. I AM SOOOOO EAGER TO UPDATE CONFLICT. I checked the draft I am working on— Apprently, Peter/Norman parts are finished by now (THANK GOD IT was SO FUCKED UP TO WRITE THEM) and RayEmma part will flow easier for me. Then there will be that good nice weird moment where our main boys finally meet, huh. Or will they? Hmm let’s see. ;)

I am now also officially allowed to write a spin off for To Die For and my brain has 4948484848 ideas for that wonderful storyline which includes Ray and Norman being very in love.

HMM WHAT ELSE. I have finally shapened the main idea for the song I am composing. It’s exciting.

I’m applying a new project tomorrow. I really hope I can get accepted. I’m so eager for it. I can’t tell for sure if they’ll choose me, who knows, but I want to hope for the good. I really am passionate about the project because as I mentioned I really want my life to have a meaning so it sounds fucking awesome to CURE DISEASES on YOUR FREE TIME like??? I know an undergrad project will probably not wholly cure whole thing but... a progress is a progress right? It is sooo much more fullfilling than just scrolling on instagram for hours, you know. Being in lab and doing good shit. So let’s see. I hope I’ll get accepted. Who knows.

I finally published my article for newspaper like FUCK, it took me forever. Eager to write next one!!!

I ALSO WANT TO START SOME NEW NEW YEAR’S GOAL EARLIER IN ADVANCE SO I CAN BUILD ITS ROUTINE PROPERLY UNTIL JANUARY SO I DONT ABANDON IT JALFWAY Butndjwhekdkckdnc not telling what itnis yet. Let’s see. You fandom will love it if and when I can succeed though.

THERE IS ALSO A NORRAY WEEK TO PREPARE A A A A A. A AA A. AA. A AA. A A AA. AFUCK

I am ASO EXCITED TO READ MY BOOK FOR ORGANIC CHEMISTRY EXAM DIDNI MENTION I FUCKING LOVE CHEMISTRY like its amazing to examine life and molecules

I need to work out tho I broke my diet again like RIP nila you need to watch out your body and stay as the sexy chick you sre I mean- just avoid pizza or hamburgers or white bread or any sorts ok? You have had them twice this week.

So yes that’s basically it.

IM EAGEEEER TOOO UPDATe

ALSO SOMEONE COMMENTED ON CONFLICT TODAY SAYING THEY ARE READING THE STORY FOR SECOND TIEM AND THAT THEY LOVE IT AND THEY LOOK FORWARD TO UPDATES LIKE IT HAS BEEN SO LONG SINCE I UODAYED SO IT MADE ME SO HAPPY TO RECEIVE A COMMENT LIKE A A A A ANA A A AA. A ALET ME GIVE YOU GUYS A GOOD UPDATE i just need time bc i cant have availability to binge write anymore jekskckdsksklwkeocvk

[alewyren]

final fantasy!

I wasn’t sure if I should include Bravely Default or not because ohhh man I have some fuckin Thoughts, so I’ll just do one for mainline FF and one for Bravely Default.

The first character I first fell in love with: 

Tidus left a strong impression on me as a kid due to the way FFX ended, and I still really like him, but I wouldn’t say I was ever in love with him. On the other hand, Fang from FFXIII turned me gay.

The character I never expected to love as much as I do now: 

Kuja, I think? As much as I will maintain that he is the objective best FF villain until the day I die, and as much as that outfit is IC for him, it’s still, uh. Not good. It’s not even that it’s too feminine, it’s just fucking ugly, lmao. Doesn’t make for a great first impression. But god fucking damn, he is very, very good. Maybe at some point I’ll whip up a meta about him, but I’m not sure what to say that hasn’t been covered already.

The character everyone else loves that I don’t: 

Sephiroth. He’s got a cool design, a great theme song (those chosen by the planet, not one winged angel), and a phenomenally intimidating presence. But the thing is, as far as FF7 itself is concerned, he’s barely a character. He’s long dead by the time of the game and exists only as an echo of the past and a manifestation of Cloud’s psychological problems. By the end, he’s more Jenova (who herself is more a force of nature than a character) than himself imo. He works because of what he represents, and the mystery surrounding him, not because of who he is. Hailing him as the “best FF villain” misses the point. I feel like Squeenix themselves don’t get what was great about Sephiroth, since we keep getting these immensely fucking bland villains like Vayne, Caius, and Ardyn that are clearly trying to recapture the Sephiroth magic by focusing on the cool factor or the relationship with the protag or whatever when none of that is why Sephiroth worked in FF7 to begin with.

The character I love that everyone else hates: 

Vanille. Yeah the English voice direction was awful, yeah the noises she makes when riding her eidolon are immensely fucking uncomfortable, but she’s actually a really interesting character who deserved more time to shine, and I maintain that she should have been the protag of FF13 rather than Pink Squall. Since she has like, y’know, a much more direct hand in the entire plot of the goddamn game.

The character I used to love but don’t any longer: 

uuuuuuuhhh I really don’t know. Maybe Kain. I used to think he was the shit but now I’m just like “haha, mr. friendzone at it again.” Or maybe Cloud, thanks to Advent Children taking a steaming dump on his personality in the name of fanservice.

The character I would totally smooch: 

FANG. SHE IS SO FUCKING HOT GOOD LORD I’M GAY. Also Rydia. Uh, adult Rydia, that is.

The character I’d want to be like: 

Fang is pretty goals, but she’s a bit more butch than I personally see myself, haha. Maybe Celes, sans heterosexuality and poor taste in dudes. She’s very cool, strong, and sexy.

The character I’d slap: 

Squall I guess? Cheer Up Emo Kid!

A pairing that I love: 

Kuja/Terra! I’d toyed with the idea before thanks to Dissidia 012, but NT sold me forever. There are a lot of reasons these two work so well, the most important being that their interactions are absolutely fucking precious. The reason he freed her from Kefka’s control in the first place, apart from wanting to stick it to the asshole clown, was because he empathized with her, but when she thanked him later he downplayed the hell out of it. Terra genuinely tries to reach out to him, and he’s receptive, but aloof, and acts so theatrical about it (”If that is what Her Highness wishes.”) It’s… cute? Like, they’re both pretty damn emotionally stunted due to their, uh, irregular upbringings, and there’s so much potential there! *slams fists on table* GIVE ME MORE

A pairing that I despise: 

Come to think of it, I don’t think I have a single genuine notp in the entire Final Fantasy franchise. Even ships I don’t really care for, like Cecil/Rosa, Locke/Celes or Wakka/Lulu, I wouldn’t say I hate them, just think they’re lame and poorly written. I guess Kuja/Zidane? Yeah, yeah, I know, rich as fuck coming from me, but I just don’t like them romantically at all. The most important reason being that they’re ugly as sin together.

and now, the bravely default hot takes nobody asked for but that I will rant about at literally any given opportunity.

The first character I first fell in love with: 

EDEA!!! I love her SO MUCH! She’s an adorable, precious ENTJ child who’s so headstrong, but naive, and so endearing. Her design (in the first game–blue is not her color) is great, and she has some of the best class outfit designs as well. She’s also the main melee bulk of the party, which I find immensely refreshing in a franchise where the girls are usually mages or rogues. 

Her character arc is pretty basic, sure, but it works. For starters, she’s the best handled rebellious princess I’ve seen, in that she just flat out turns on Eternia–everything she’s ever known–with scarcely a second thought. Not because she feels trapped by the burdens of being royalty or whatever, she’s just stubborn and willful and has an iron sense of right and wrong that she’s willing to fight for above all else. Which, I mean, yeah, evil empire, but it’s not that simple. Which is why her arc is about reconciling with the fact that it isn’t all black and white, and embracing her role as eventual queen of Eternia. 

The writing is pretty hamfisted, what with her literally calling things “black and white,” but she’s 15, so I’ll give it a pass. Yeah, I know the American version aged her up to make the fanservice shit less gross, but it doesn’t really work when her character is about overcoming her childish worldview, lol. Like, she’s a babbu. You can’t just change a number and make her less babbu. Her theme song is literally called “Baby Bird.” Maybe just don’t fucking sexualize characters who are meant to be read as childish in the first place? She deserved so much better than the writing she got in Bravely Second, which I’ll… get to later, but she was still an absolute delight. Did I mention she’s also hilarious? “Oops, my foot slipped.” “You just DROPKICKED ME!”

The character I never expected to love as much as I do now: 

Yew. I mean, I don’t love him as much as Edea, but Bravely Second was kind of a hot mess, if fun, and his arc pleasantly surprised me. He kind of had a similar arc as Edea in the first game, but in the opposite direction. Over the course of the game he gradually overcame his rich, upper class nerd privilege worldview and became Woke ™, and then used his privilege to help people. By contrast, Edea still had to go through the journey of getting past her simplistic worldview, but whereas she was quick to recognize the fact that her world was wrong and had to learn not to see things in extremes, Yew had to work to claw his way outside of that box in the first place. The plot twist about his brother was obvious as hell but like, whatever, it was fun. His mask didn’t even cover that much of his face, how did he not know,

The character everyone else loves that I don’t: 

Tiz. He’s boring, not much else to say there. Except, his design in Bravely Second had me excited as hell because he looks so emo and ow the edge and I was really excited to see what they were gonna do with him, but his personality is… exactly the same as the first game? Why bring him back at all? For that matter, why kill him off in the first place? I know they were going for some meta shit, but like… why?

The character I love that everyone else hates: 

Airy, but idk if that counts because I love her for precisely the reasons everyone else hates her. Even if I think the good end should have been obtained by seeing through her ruse and blowing up the crystals rather than just going along with what she says and repeating the same fucking sequence of bosses over and over…

The character I used to love but don’t any longer: 

Ringabel. Mainly for shipping reasons and because I’m increasingly exhausted with the whole chivalrous pervert trope, especially when Edea was very much underage in the first game, lmao. He’s a good character objectively speaking, but a lot of his potential wasn’t capitalized on and I still don’t get how Alternis did a complete 180 from his brooding initial personality, to… that. Or why there were AU Ringabels in the ending sequence of the first game when I thought the whole point was that he was a spanner in the works who shouldn’t have been part of the party in the first place, and that’s how they managed to foil Airy? Or, it should have been, if they didn’t literally just go along with what she said until the end despite his very clear warnings that she was up to some shady shit. The final stretch of Bravely was a fucking trainwreck, nothing new there.

The character I would totally smooch: 

Edea. But like, a forehead smooch, because she’s a babbu. Though she is 18 for real this time in Second, isn’t she? And she’s matured considerably by then too… hrm.

The character I’d want to be like: 

Edea post-character development. She’s got her shit together, and she’s still strong-willed, outgoing, and adorable as all hecke.

The character I’d slap: 

Yulyana. Fuck the quirky pervert trope, seriously. It’s not funny, it’s never been funny, and it never will be funny.

A pairing that I love: 

Well, Agnes/Olivia is the only pairing that I straightforwardly ship, and I’ll never not be mad that they just, like. Forgot about Olivia in the final stretch of the game. Like they really just killed her off for shock value, huh? Okay Sure.

I like Edea/Alternis a lot too, but it’s complicated. Reading through D’s Journal during a blind playthrough left way more of an impact on me than Ringabel’s dumb flirting, but they definitely have a lot of shit to work through before they get together. They obviously both genuinely care about each other, though Edea’s got other shit on her plate to worry about rather than Alternis being a lovelorn, emo weirdo. But like, he’s not only so emotionally distant from her despite his feelings that she doesn’t even know what his face looks like, but he’s got a weird possessive streak towards her? It might be a translation thing but the phrasing “I would have taken you as my wife” is a bit. Iffy. Especially considering a. the age gap and b. she outranks him. Of course she’s having none of this shit, but I do like the idea of them both maturing, actually bonding like human beings, and getting together when they’re older, ie: when Edea is queen and Alternis has learned to accept his fate as a permabottom. Childhood friend loyalty kink is my passion, and like, while Edea is very much a take charge no nonsense lady, she struggles with personal relationships and emotions. They both do, and that’s why their relationship is so complicated and interesting. I’d love to read slowburn of them.

A pairing that I despise: 

Rindea. But wait, you say! Didn’t you just write a whole paragraph on how you like Altdea? Well, yes. I do stand by that, and I enjoy the ship because of its problems rather than in spite of them. Rindea is. Not that. While Altdea is  a flawed relationship that I’d love to see mature into something functional along with the characters themselves, Rindea is a disgustingly written trainwreck that shits on all that potential, as well as Edea’s entire fucking character, constantly.

I don’t hate the very idea of these two as an item. The problem is how badly said item is written. Even though Rindea has the same problematic base as Altdea, which is treated as flawed, it just completely fucking glosses over all of that, everything that actually makes their relationship interesting, in favor of generic hetero pervy slap slap kiss tsundere bullshit. Yes, Ringabel’s feelings for her run deeper than that, but that’s basically all that their dynamic, their actual interactions, amount to. And for some reason she’s into it? Like, I’m sorry, but fucking when and why did she develop feelings for him? Was it before or after she learned about his true identity? Is it because he’s Alternis or in spite of it? Hell, how did she feel about that revelation in the first place? All of that is very much worth addressing, but they LITERALLY NEVER DO.

Did she just secretly like his annoying flirting all along because no obviously means yes? Like, Ringabel still fucking carries all the baggage associated with being Alternis but the game doesn’t give a fuck! It’s overbearing and weird when Alternis comes onto Edea, but when Ringabel does it it’s peak romance! He loves her so it’s okay! And we don’t know anything about Edea’s feelings for him because the game just never fucking goes into it! It’s just assumed that she must like him back! Hey, here’s a thought! Maybe if Ringabel actually loves her so much he could respect her feelings and lay the fuck off! Oh wait, no means yes, right. And don’t even get me started on Bravely Second, jesus fucking christ. You seriously mean to tell me that, according to Yoko, my girl’s only personal damage is being tfw no bf? Nothing about the stress of ruling a nation or any of her other relationships? Nothing even about how her feelings for Ringabel might actually be more fucking complicated than dokidoki take me with you ringabel kun? Absolutely Fucking Disgusting.

Listen. I like problematic ships, but Rindea is just fucking bad, and it’s made worse by the fact that canon thinks it’s good. At this point they’ve missed so many opportunities to actually expand meaningfully on Edea’s side of the relationship that it’s a lost fucking cause and I want it to die in a fire. Good lord I hate this ship and it’s exhausting being an Edea main when it’s the entire fandom’s OTP. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

I ranted more about this ship as well as the other canon Bravely ships in this post and will probably do so again when presented the opportunity.

[aggresivelyfriendly]

~Meet Me In The Hallway~

Chapter 28-Fern Gully

I was laying on the bottom part of Harry's stomach doing my best to distract him with a game I had made up called, "Between Two Ferns."

It basically consisted of me going over all his tattoos and telling him why I thought they were stupid. It started when we had first gotten to South America. The hours in my bed at home had been frenzied and apparently noisy, but the lights were off and I missed a few additions to Harry' s body. It should have been a game for me. Surely, I could play those memory cards that little kids do and try to write down all of the 50+ tattoos the gorgeous idiot had on his body. I had postulated their meaning one night, using my deep thinking wanna be a writer and have read too many classics brain to give full meaning to many of the pieces of art he had chosen. I had then come to find out many of them were just completely stupid. "Oh, I wanted to try my gun." "Zayn likes Pink Floyd, well that album, I think." "Oh, do you not like 'Pingu', love?" These were the deep well of meaning for his forever etchings I'd run into. When we had a whole hotel room with a big white bed to sleep in one night in Rio, I'd been loose lipped from caipirinhas and loose limbed from Harry and told him that my Favorite tattoo had been the 'might as well' tattoo he had covered up with the giant ferns. I'd been emboldened by the alcohol I was slowly learning to enjoy in his presence. He'd been imbibing it liberally and I'd pulled him off Ben Winston to take him to our room. Some part of me meant this very innocently, but the newer, louder part meant every filthy implication of putting him to bed. I also wanted to try something new. The elevator had been empty, and for once it was handsy Melly. "Baby." He'd snorted, "that tickles!" He'd sneezed while I wiggled my fingers over his newly obscured v lines. "Good, now you know how it feels!" I'd giggled like I was the receiver of the tickles and the door had opened and he made a run for the door of our room. He'd swiped himself in and tried to close me out. My first instinct was to fight my way in, like I would with my brother, but instead I used a tactic I had recently discovered. I stuck out my bottom lip a little and looked up at him through my lashes, "Baby," I added a touch of whine to my voice. It really made me want to roll my eyes at myself, but Harry turned to custard when I combined these moves. He pulled the door back open and linked our fingers, pulling. The momentum of the move propelled me into his body and the closing door meant magnetized lips. Harry walked backwards through the living area making the most direct line possible without eyes and while physically connected to someone by teeth and tongue. It felt sexy, but Harry was undeniably clumsy and drunk. I had thought about his flailing limbs and falling habits one day and remembered when Michael sprouted up during puberty. It was like he was unaware of where his body began and ended suddenly. My brother had grown out of this growth induced bumbling. Harry had not. I wonder if from the outside looked like a pinball game as we ricocheted off of sofas and walls to make it to the bedroom. From the inside, the focus was on one another and getting to the room with the softest horizontal surface. The back of Harry's knees hit the mattress and I'd pushed him down. His hat popped off his head and the light from the window hit the sweat on his cheekbones making them glow. The light also caught the points of his collarbones and the ridges of his ribs and even the tips of his hipbones. These points of interest caught my eye too, in wonderfully frustrating ways. I realized then that he was drunk, but I was definitely tipsy. I pinched his right fern. I really wanted to pinch his v lines, but I couldn't see them so well anymore. "Why the fuck did you get these, mate?" I soothed my finger over the now hidden words. I missed them. He shivered at the contact, but frowned at my words. "You don't like them, angel?" He grabbed at my hands and started to sit up. I stopped his motion and pushed him back down. "Are they supposed to be arrows pointing to your dick?" I ticked up an eyebrow. "Because everybody knows where that is. Can't miss it." I cupped him through the damp cloth of his boxers and found him more than half hard. He swallowed and tried to find something to say. I decided to continue to leave him speechless. "Do you just like to keep the accounts that keep track of your stupid tattoos—" "Heeey!" "Busy?" His skin was on fire beneath my fingertips, running a few degrees above the usual and I wanted to be brave. I bit my lip and decided to go with the bold spirit I was feeling. Teasing him with words was familiar and made me more comfortable teasing him with other tools. I'd just hooked my fingers under his swim trunks when he found his voice. "You really don't like them?" The little people pleaser pouted. "Well," I pulled his trunks down watching his glans pop free of his waistband and hit between the two fern leaves. "I miss the less obscured view of your v lines." I leaned down and licked one, until my face was right next to his bobbing dick. I licked down the other way and stopped just above his waiting shaft. It flexed towards me and he whined. "But if it's a map telling me where I should go..." And I licked his tip and he made a new sound I wanted to hear on repeat.

My boldness started to flag when I realized I wasn't sure what to do, so I stroked him in a way that had become familiar and looked at him beseechingly. "Just," he sucked in a breath. "Just put it in your mouth. You'll be amazing, Melody. Just," he bucked into my hands and I wrapped my lips around the tip. His head popped up to watch, "watch the teeth."

So I opened my mouth wider and pursed my open lips and went down until it was uncomfortable and came back up. A natural suction was created and Harry's neck got weak. "That's it, Angel!" So I repeated the motion, and he reached a hand down to where I was holding his base. He moved my hand with his, up and down while I sucked his tip shallowly. Out of curiosity I pulled off to watch him and I stroke over his cock. The foreskin would come up and swallow his flared head and go back down again. I licked his glans and then again when the jacket covered it. His hand was speeding up and he was panting with anticipation. I jerked my hand to get him to let me take back over and chased his prepuce up and down until his hand buried itself into my hair and he quietly humped my mouth. "Angel, Melody, you gotta..."

I opened my eyes wide. He sounded like he was really close, stumbling over his words.

"I'm gonna cum!" He pulled my mouth off by my hair and I loved the yank. He covered the ferns with thick white spurts and I was transfixed.  Condoms had kept me from coming into contact with his ejaculate. I ran my fingers through and lay my head on the top of his thigh before bringing some gathered fluid to my mouth. It was bitter, but not unpleasant. He whined watching me.

"Next time, don't stop me?" I asked, I was pretty sure boys liked that from being unwillingly adjacent to a lot of male voices for years. "Melody," he prayed a hallelujah and linked our fingers again over a fern. "Still not sure I like these, but they seem to work!" I pinched his right fern and he yelped out a laugh. After that, I'd lay on his lower stomach sometimes before during and/or after and give him my opinions on things like the word big-stupid, sparrows-love, and padlocks-did a five year old do that? I also liked to do it when he was feeling stressed. It distracted both of us from the unforgiving pace we were going at. It was crazy to be on this beast of a tour. The crowds, the dates-one right after another, with no breaks, the constant promo, and now the 1D boys were also recording an album. Most nights Harry did not make it back to our room until 4 am. He'd fall into bed and lack enough interest to fade into me. The Take Me Home tour had been constant and strained and even crazier than the current circuit we were making around world with the film crew and writing and recording and adding dates upon dates.

It did not seem to be as thoroughly exhausting though. It may have been that those were incremental changes. The boys weren't faced with nearly a year of traveling to start with. Also, they had been fresher then. Fresher faced and had not already made three back to back albums and two circumnavigation of the globe in three years. The excitement of their new lives, fame, and money could have staved off the exhaustion. It wasn't so new now. But the pace remained. And it remained relentless. I could see it on the face of all of the boys. Niall weathered it best, you could bottle his energy. Louis got snarkier, Liam alternated between drinking and exercising, and Zayn withdrew. But I saw the changes in Harry more. To be fair, we essentially lived together, like a roving band of gypsies and Harry and I shared our caravan. When he came in and literally timbered into bed, with few words and no cuddles, I worried a little. One night was worrisome, night after night was problematic. "Fuck!" Harry roared walking in one evening. It wasn't the emotion I missed from him, but any show of personality not on stage was appreciated. However, this was accompanied by a slung bottle of water I had to jump over. "Ahh!" I found myself stumbling and tripping over my own feet. "Shit, sorry Melly! Didn't see you." Ouch.

I let the fact that he saw me rarely go. He came over and pulled me up. I thought he'd hug me, but the waves of emotion radiating off of him were of the don’t touch me variety. I took a step back from him and crossed my arms. "What's up Harry?" I gave him a glance over. "They fucking added a video shoot during our off time!" He ranted and started to pace. "Off time, which we don't fucking get, ever, and I had plans, in LA for meetings, about, like, after. Dammit, I'm gonna look like a stupid kid or uninterested! Fucking managements gonna milk us dry and then let us fade to oblivion. Give us no time to get another career or make other connections." All of his thoughts made sense, I knew they were all frustrated with the scheduling and pace and were continually pushing for more creative control. I had never heard these specific frustrations from Harry though and wondered where they were coming from. I knew in our time apart he had had a whole life I was unaware of and that he met and became close to some important people. There was a time when I'm sure I would have known all about his new plans and hopes, but a lot of the time that we used to spend talking was now spent doing other things, and lately, with recording, even that wasn't happening. At least I got to hold him while he slept. Harry gave a big sniff and coughed before running out of steam and deflating onto the couch below him. The coughs intensified and I thought about that too, worried about that too. He was sick, a lot. He had nearly not made it to me last tour because of his weakened immune system. He needed a break, they all needed a break, but they were just over half way through and I had already heard there would be another tour on the heels of this one. I worried. Mostly for Harry, and the other boys, their health and life and careers. But I also worried about Harry and I. There were things I didn't know, that I should. We weren't talking enough, and our other modes of connection where being belayed by late nights, the need for sleep, and snotty noses. I made my way over to the couch and fitted myself behind his body. I tried to tell him everything with that move. Harry nuzzled into me and found his way to my lap like he'd loved since our first movie date that wasn't a date. My hand was going to his hair as he reached to bring it there. "I'm sorry, H. I know you are tired—" "Honestly Melly, at this point I miss tired. Um, i'm so far beyond it that.." he shook his head and I petted him. "If...." I wasn't sure how to tell him I'd take the cup from him. "Is it weird to tell you I'd be you for any length of time to give you rest?" He rolled onto his back then to look up at my face and his lips turned down and his eyes filled.   He caressed my face while he let his frustration leak from his eyes. "No, because then, um, then you would feel like this. And I'd never want that for you." I leaned down to kiss his sweet lips and scoffed when he turned his face. "Harry..." "No, like, you'll get sick, like last time, Angel, and I won't be able to take care of you. Because I'll be fucking gone, like always."

“Baby, is there anybody you can talk to about this? To fix it?” I was scared to ask.

He looked at me in a way I’d never seen. Harry usually looked at me like I was magic, or brilliant, or his. In this moment, he looked at me like I was simple, and not in a good way. “Melody, they don’t care. They only want to milk the cash cow. If I am burned out or washed up at 23, they don’t care. Only I care, or you, or my mom. Maybe close friends, or Jeff?’ There was a question there.

“Who’s Jeff?” I’d heard the name mentioned and seen him pop up in the google alert I’d set for Harry.

“Azoff.” he said, like it meant something. I was going to ask the other questions, I was. I knew that they were important and that there were things that we should say-puzzle pieces missing, but Harry had blown out a breath and settled himself into my lap. “Angel?”

I pulled my attention from where I was staring at his hand, he’d started to wear rings. It was laying on his thigh. “Yeah?”

“Thank you.” His hand cupped my chin.

“For what?” I placed my fingers over his to tangle them together.

“For just…” he closed his eyes. “For being here, for….listening, I guess.”

“Always, H.” I promised and squeezed his hand. “I’m still your best friend.”

His eyes were closed, and I could tell he was nodding off.

The next day, i went shopping with the girl’s, and they all giggled when I bought Harry a ring. Lottie doubted he would even wear it. But Lou, Lou seemed to know him almost as well as me.

“He’ll love it,” she inspected the square lettering-PEACE- “he could use it.” and I nodded along with her.

Harry held me against him when I gave it to him that night. “It’s perfect, Angel.” He slipped it on immediately and we both admired the way it looked against his skin, and then my own.

At the time, it was a sweet moment between us. My wish for him and a promise to be his resting place. I think it still means something to him, he still wears my ring.

I still wear a matching one.

It mattered. It matters, but now I think maybe it was a volley into no man’s land, a lost cause. I was a little child trying to stop a flood by sticking my finger in a dyke.

Because the only way to save us, was to sacrifice me.

 I don’t know who you are, but playlist anon-I love you!!!

[ifishouldvanish]

Home Again (3/?)

Belle left Storybrooke to travel the world- leaving her childhood friend, Adam Gold, behind. Years later, she returns to her hometown to see him again.

Prompts: only a rose; closing up shop; tomorrow Rating: T (for implied past abuse and implied sexy times) Words: 1,745 A/N: This work was previously posted as part of the 2018 Rumbelle Showdown event, under the pseudonym Your Favorite Cryptid. To everyone who voted for my work- thank you so much! It was my first time participating, and I was thrilled to make it as far as the third round! <3 A/N 2: I really struggled with the word count on this round, so I figured I’d post the ~extended cut~ if you will, before I started trimming everything down. It's a healthy 250 words or so over the 1500 limit :x

[Part One] [Part Two] [Read on AO3]

Belle was no stranger to being served breakfast. It had become somewhat of a routine after spending her nights in one hostel after another. But this was so wonderfully different.

She slept a lot– late into the mornings, long after Adam had gotten up. Some nights she clung to him, others he clung to her. But every morning without fail, she came downstairs to a full breakfast with a warm cup of tea, a quick peck on the lips, and a hug that never seemed to last long enough.

This morning however, there was the addition of a single red rose on the table. Belle smiled and watched as Adam flit about, pulling ingredients and measuring cups from the cupboards. He was already dressed, his jacket and overcoat hanging on the hook in the hall, and a crumpled bag from the grocery store sat on the counter beside a fresh carton of eggs. Her observation was cut short however, when she gave herself away with a big yawn.

“Good morning.” Adam smiled over his shoulder. “Ten-thirty's early for you, no?” he teased, throwing a pointed glance at the clock.

He seemed more chipper this morning, and she was fairly certain the fact that he was picking his son up tomorrow had something to do with it.

“That's right. I'll be a functioning member of society again before you know it.” Belle chuckled, stepping over to him and pecking him on the cheek. "But then you won't have an excuse to close up the shop anymore.”

“Ah, yes. The people of Storybrooke have been without someplace to get cash for gold for six whole days.” he deadpanned. “What chaos.”

Belle narrowed her eyes at him.

He smiled back and wet his lips. “What?”

“You sell yourself short, is all,” she shrugged, taking his hand and studying his fingers. “You have plenty of nice things in there.”

“Perhaps. But I think I'll keep my day job as everyone’s tyrannical landlord.” he scoffed, and Belle didn't miss the bitterness in his voice.

Growing up, she'd heard many a cathartic rant about how he wanted nothing to do with his father, to be nothing like him. And now here he was, managing all of Malcolm's properties, running his shop, living in his house. She couldn't fault him for it, though. He had a child to support, and she'd always maintained that it wasn't what his father did that mattered, but how. In that regard, he and Malcolm were nothing alike.

“You're no tyrant.” Belle told him.

He didn't respond, instead only watching the way she studied his hand in silence.

She hesitated and nibbled her lip. “The other day, at the shop–” she said. “I um... noticed the uh, tea set?”

A smile bloomed across his face then, and he nodded. “Aye.”

Belle sighed, leaning against the counter beside him. “God, I can remember that day so well…” she said. “We were so terrified of what your father would do when he found out… how old were we, then?  Eleven? Twelve? I can't believe it's still there.”

“Twelve. And that's because it's not for sale.” he winked.

“No…” she giggled and shook her head. “Come on.”

“Well, who would want to buy a tea set that's missing a cup, hm?” he said.

“What… whatever happened to that cup, anyway? You said you'd take care of it, and–”

“I took care of it.” he said, measuring out some flour into the mixing bowl.

“Adam, I mean it,” she pressed. “I… I was worried for you. What he might do to–”

“I hid it.” he said, finally looking back at her. “Drunk bastard never even noticed it was missing.”

Belle tilted her head, not sure if he was telling the truth or not. Malcolm had struck him for far milder offenses than breaking things in the shop, and she'd carried the guilt that Adam had very likely been punished for her own carelessness ever since.

Adam wet his lips and snapped a finger at her. “Wait right here.” he said, brushing past her and disappearing down the hall. He returned a moment later, holding up her chipped cup with a triumphant little grin on his face.

Belle huffed out a laugh and rolled her eyes. “You really kept it?” she asked. “After all these years?”

“Of course I did.” he said. He gently placed the cup in her hands and brushed the corner of his eye with his sleeve. “You always stood up for and protected me, Belle. I... wanted to remember the one time it was me who was brave for you.”

Belle rubbed her thumb along the chipped rim for a moment. Regardless of the circumstances, she couldn’t help smiling at it.

“You were always brave.” she said, finally setting it down on the table. Her eyes crept back to the rose again, in its slender, fluted vase. “So um... what's that?” she asked.

Adam glanced over his shoulder and smiled at it. “That, ” he said, taking her hands, “is for you.”

“Adam…” she smiled and shook her head. “You didn't have to...”

“What?” he furrowed his brows and gave a crooked little smirk that made her heartbeat thicken. “It's only a rose.”

Belle nibbled her lip and stepped closer, draping her arms over his shoulders. “Well, it’s a very lovely rose. So thank you.”

He settled his hands on her waist and smiled back down at her. “You're welcome.”

It was nice, being like this. Tactile, affectionate. The way they could have been over a decade ago. As she took in his features– eyes, lips, cheekbones, nose, and all– she could remember the first time she began to notice him and the man he was becoming. How the kids at school would sing, Belle and Adam sitting in a tree– and how one day, she could only manage a blush in response instead of a denial.

She hesitated for a moment,, then reached up on her toes to kiss him again– slowly this time, letting her hands wrap behind his neck and her fingers slip through his hair. His hands slid around her waist to pull her close as they deepened the kiss, and nothing else in life had ever felt like this.

His hand wandered downwards to her hip, tucking itself beneath the hem of her shirt, and the sensation of his touch could have burned her. They hadn't made love since that first night. Instead they'd agreed to take things a little slowly. Particularly, to keep their distance around Neal so as not to confuse or overwhelm him. But they wouldn't have to worry about that until tomorrow, and oh, how she wanted him again. Surely, that's what the rose was for, wasn't it? A sign that he wanted her again too?

She tugged on his lip with her teeth and a deep sound came from him as he gripped her more tightly. Heat flared in her belly, but instead of spurring her on, she had a sudden change of heart. They would have time for this, later.

“I'm sorry.” she shook her head. “I– we shouldn't.”

Adam swallowed and cleared his throat. “No. You're right. I'll just ah… finish up breakfast.” he coughed. “Please. Sit down.”

Belle took her seat at the table again, her focus darting back and forth between the cup and the rose. There was the sound of Adam cracking an egg, and it pulled her attention away, over to the fridge. The door was covered with endearingly disproportionate drawings of the house, the shop, father and son holding hands while a bright yellow sun hung overhead. Another of them with big smiles on their faces that read, a dad is somebody who makes you fell better when your sad.

Belle smiled. He was nothing like his father. Not even close.

Soon Adam was sliding food onto her plate, and she startled.

“Are you sure it's alright?” Belle asked.

He followed her gaze to the drawings on the fridge with a smile. “...I'm sure he'll be ecstatic to make a new friend.”

“I know, but–”

“If he seems uncomfortable... I've got an apartment on Third we can get you set up in.” he said, sitting across from her. “But… Belle, I-I'd really like to have you here.”

“I don't know…”

The smile on his face crumbled away. “What?”

She looked out the window and into the cold, at the falling snow. “I just wouldn't want to intrude, or... be a kept woman, is all.” she explained, her gaze landing on the rose again.

“You wouldn't be.” He sounded so hurt, and his eyes focused on her plate instead of her face. “It could be… home, here. Just–” He took a deep breath to get a handle on his emotions, but his chin trembled with incoming tears nonetheless. “Please. I– I've missed you.”

“Hey.” Belle reached across the table and squeezed his hand. “I’m not going to leave you, Adam. Not again.”

He nodded and sniffled, still looking down at the table.

“But if we’re going to try to take things slow, then maybe… maybe we really ought to take things slow.”

Adam rubbed a hand over his mouth and shook his head. “It's just… twelve years, Belle.” he choked out. “Twelve years, and I've loved you for all of them. Every single one.”

“I know.” she whispered.

The words, me too, reached the tip of her tongue, but they seemed selfish. After all, she'd had an entire world to distract herself from the Adam-shaped hole in her heart. He only had reminders.

“...I know.” she said again, brushing her thumb over his knuckles.

“You're here now, a-and I don't want to waste another moment.” he said. “I love you.”

“I love you too.” she told him. “I came back– for you.”

He looked up and nodded, a fragile little smile on his face. “You did.” he whispered shakily.

“And listen–” she pulled his hand closer and put on a smile. “Tomorrow you're going to bring your boy home, and I can't wait to meet him, and to see what a great papa you are.”

Adam blushed and looked away, trying to hide the precious smile that was rounding his cheeks at the mention of his son. “H-he's a good boy, Belle.”

“Of course he is.” she said, rubbing his arm. “His papa's a good man.”

Adam took a deep breath and nodded. “Tomorrow. He’s going to adore you, Belle. I know it.”

[pkmncoordinators]

This question is probably random, but after seeing how many reviews you had for your fanfics (especially TAC), I had to ask. I was wondering if you ever had very incredibly weird reviews that even to this day you think about.

Oh my god, have I. I’ve had several fucking weird reviews, but let me share some of my personal favorites.

To start, a review from The Ash Connection:

Let me tell you something misty is ugly and a Sherman taking steroids and other drugs like drinking strawberry meth so you need to learn to love sexy girls and drug shemans go for flannery Candice Cynthia Soledad skyla elesa ok 

This one needs no comment. It is presented, as is, in its full glory.

To follow up, another review from The Ash Connection. It is, in fact, the sequel to the previous review:

Again I just like to say fuuck this I haven't read it yet but I read the review (I don't know what shipping this is ) but misty a sheman and you need to put in this story so been doing drugs and taking steroids and sex pills (men's one for bigger peniis) and becomes a ugly drugged man in this story ok now I'm going to read it NOOOOOOOOO OO POKESHIPPING IT'S GAY ASH ISN"t GAY HE NEEDS SEXY GIRLS LIKE DAWN ELESA CYNTHIA (damn sexy Cynthia ) SKYLA CANDICE FLANNERY understand POKESHIPPERS GO TO HEELL YOU SICK DOGS (biitches) BECAUSE YOU NEED TO LEARN READ GAY STORY'S LIKE ASH X SHEMAN IS JUST OMG

The final review I’d like to share is from The Ash Connection II. It is unabridged. This is a real review I received, for no apparent reason, and it is to date probably my favorite:

Pokemon Rant on the evil PaulWhy I hate PaulThe Paul I am referring to is a character in the pokemon anime, who is currently Ash's primary rival while the group is in the Sinnoh region. Paul is really a varied character: on the forums, the Paul character discussion thread has, at the time of writing, nearly spans twenty pages, though most of it is saying how "awesome" he is. However, I do not think he is awesome. I hate him more than I hate Harley from the same show. I want to strangle Paul and break one of his limbs. Most probably won't know why I feel this way, so I will explain.First, Pokemon are sentient beings in this setting. As Linkara pointed out in his review of "Captain Planet and the Planeteers #3," if animals were truly intelligent enough to make their own decisions and follow orders, animals would easily be given rights. Considering that many pokemon in this setting are shown to be smart enough to qualify, pokemon should have a bill of rights. In the real world, Paul's treatment of his pokemon would be classified as cruelty to animals and he would be arrested and sent to Juvenile court, regardless of whether or not his pokemon appreciated his method of training. Though seeing how the world lacks competent police officers and encourages ten year old children to wander around with no parental supervision with only tamed animals for protection, the government must be very inadequate. While I'm on the subject, why haven't his pokemon objected to his training methods? Sure, they might want to get stronger, but considering that his training methods in the Tag Battle arc would've gotten Chimchar killed had it not been for Ash's intervention, wouldn't at least one or two of them start having second thoughts about their trainer? Heck, seeing how strong they are and how humans are pretty much powerless without technology, I'm surprised his pokemon haven't killed him by now. Pokeballs must have great taming powers to keep pokemon from generally rebelling against their trainers.Second, why hasn't anyone reprimanded him? I know I'm stressing this, but why hasn't Paul been punished for his behaviour? He clearly abuses his own pokemon, physically as evident in the aforementioned Tag Battle arc and emotionally, as seen when blames his pokemon for defeats, even after he's stated that when a battle is lost, the trainer is at fault, which not only proves he's a hypocrite but also doesn't make much sense considering the pokemon have all the power in this setting. Shouldn't he have gotten some form of punishment by this point? Not even his older brother, Reggie (who I should note is more like Ash in personality and training methods), has done anything about this. Why in the name of Slaking's lazy ass hasn't Reggie done anything to discipline him? Is Reggie really hoping that Paul will eventually change his way, as unlikely as it is? If Paul crossed the line, outright killing pokemon and showing no remorse for this, would Reggie still be hoping for Paul to change? I highly doubt it.Third, why would anyone want to be anywhere near him? Paul's character in the show is that of a condescending jackass who looks down on almost everyone, including those closest to him (when he admits that his brother was weak after failing to get the Brave Symbol and moving on with his life), and he's too arrogant to admit that he's flawed. In real life, absolutely no one would want to be around him, let alone be associated with him. To be honest, I think the only reason Reggie even gives him a chance is because they're brothers. Also, consider the fact that Paul is supposed to be ten years old (and I say "supposed to" because given that he's said to be the same age as Ash, and how the creators have stated that Ash is still ten after more than five hundred episodes, I don't think many actually take that statement seriously). Most ten year olds are not like Paul at all, which would prompt most to wonder, "What is wrong with him?" It's likely that Reggie would've gotten many complaints about Paul's cold and heartless antics, and as patient as he might be, he will eventually run out of tolerance.As for how he interacts with others, with Ash and friends in particular, he's the same as with anyone else: rude, arrogant, and generally unfriendly, despite that Ash and co have tried to be friendly every time they've crossed paths. I'm surprised that, seeing how unlikely Paul is to change his attitude, they still try to be friendly with him. If they were a normal group of teens, one of them (most likely Ash) would've given him a hard smack upside the head.He's said to be respectful to superiors such as Nurse Joy, Professor Rowan, and Cynthia. However, seeing as how he ignored Nurse Joy's warning for Chimchar's safety in the Tag Battle arc (I'll detail this below), ignored Cynthia's encouragement to change into a more caring trainer, I get the feeling that it's mostly a façade. If he truly did respect them, he would've followed their advice.With all of these in mind, why anyone interacts with him is a big question left in everyone's minds. Fourth, he's become the creator's pet. In the many times I keep my eye on the show, I find myself desperately hoping the writers would give him some form of karma. Much to my annoyance, they do not. Even if they do give him some karma, it never lasts: I can think of at least three cases where he could've used a good smacking: the first is a particularly frustrating case when Paul's victory against Ash after having a humiliating loss against Brandon's regi trio. After all, what better way to break him and get him to start rethinking his priorities by beating him after a particularly horrible loss? Instead, they have Paul win against Ash in a very one-sided battle, with Paul pretty much learning that no matter who he loses to, Ash will be his punching bag.Another case I hoped for a good smacking was for a gym leader to confiscate and refuse to hand Paul a gym badge due to his rude and condescending gloating after getting the Veilstone Gym badge from Maylene. Maylene was pretty much a new gym leader at this point, and gym leaders command respect, no matter how new they are. By all means, Maylene should've forbid him the badge because he didn't treat her with the respect that gym leaders deserve. The aforementioned tag battle arc is another point that could've given him the chance to be taught the error of his ways. After Chimchar was rescued by Ash and put into recovery, Nurse Joy warned him not to put the injured pokemon into battle because the injuries are numerous; naturally, being the insensitive jerk he is, he ignores the warning, knowing that a rival pokemon that Chimchar feared would be there, stupidly thinking that Chimchar would fight with more fury: as expected, Chimchar froze in fear, which is what happens most of the time in real life. Again, why in the name of Slaking's lazy ass didn't Nurse Joy report this? In the real world, people such as her are required to report such abuses to authorities, though considering Japan is drastically behind on the whole reporting abuse issue, it just leaves negative implications. Had I been in her position, I would've reported him to the authorities, complete with the threat of removing him from the tournament if he ignored the warning, as well as following on that threat.Seriously, the lack of punishment and defeats lead me to believe that Paul is like a cheating spoiled brat who has to win, and the writers are following his demands. I swear the only reason he isn't on the TvTropes Wesley page is because of his Draco in Leather Pants status, which is described below.Fifth, the fanbase adores him for all the wrong reasons. I have to admit, this is one of my biggest gripes with the character. It wouldn't be so bad if the audience treated him appropriately, but they don't. Instead, he's glorified and held in a positive light in spite of his generally repulsive attitude, which gets downplayed. While the entire fanbase doesn't adore him and shares some of my sentiments, those who don't raise him to god status are the vast minority.Many say they like Paul because how he's isn't a "goody two shoes" rival like many rivals in the show. In real life, a rival like Paul is the last kind of rival you'd want; since he's an arrogant bully who'd more likely drain the fun out of everything (it wouldn't surprise me if a lot of trainers who lost to Paul gave up training all together). A good rival is someone who provides a challenge, but is a good sport and gives friendly encouragement. Another point that drives me crazy with the fanbase is that they do romance stories with him and Dawn. Forgetting the fact that they barely have any interaction in canon, their personalities are the exact opposite: Dawn is a cheerful girl (when she isn't faking smiles through all of the defeats she's gone through) who is supportive of her friends and participates in contests; in contrast, Paul only goes into battling and is, as I've said before, a cold, condescending jackass who'd more likely make you want to slit your wrists when you're in a depressed mood. And then there are the people who pair him up with Ash, of all people; first, this is a kids' show, so romance is likely light at best, if close to nonexistent. Second, knowing how dull Ash is with romance and how Paul only thinks about battling, a romance with the two characters is near impossible. Third, it's very unlikely that they'd strike in a homosexual relationship, even if Japan is more lenient on the whole subject.No matter what Paul does, the fans who worship the ground he walks on will downplay the horrific stuff, such as Chimchar's abuse in the Tag Battle arc. Even if he destroys a clutch of pokemon eggs after beating up the guarding parents, even if he murders people, or even if he nearly destroyed a town, they'd still fawn over him, where normally most people would consider him a monster after any of tho

[pengiesama]

A Reasonable Amount of Trouble (Fic, Sorey/Mikleo, Detective AU, Chapter 1/?)

Title: A Reasonable Amount of Trouble, Chapter 1/? Series: Tales of Zestiria Pairing: Sorey/Mikleo Summary: Sorey is an experienced member of the supernatural detective division, the Shepherds, but is a fresh face to the city squad when an unexpected transfer lands him in Lastonbell. Things tend to get complicated when you realize that hot hookup from the bar last night is now your new partner on the force. (Detective AU)

Link: AO3

This was a commission from @shamingcows, who requested fic from her fantastic Detective AU!

Check out my commission info here.

Read on Tumblr!

--

Lastonbell wasn’t a bad assignment.

A major metro center, it was a city known for the arts, theater, and music – and all the accompanying drama that came with it. A writer, wretched with rejection letters, going hellion in the streets; a seraph, strung out on the torrid emotions of starving artists, going missing and turning up a week later rampaging through the commercial district wearing scales. Organized crime rings, trafficking drugs and bodies both, occasionally facing off against each other in the streets.

Sure, it didn’t have the glitz and glamour of Pendrago. But Sorey had gotten too comfortable with the detective beat in Ladylake, and welcomed the change of scenery – but mostly he welcomed the change in local attractions and historical points of interest. When he wasn’t being wined and dined (more like boozed and burgered) by his local friends as part of his farewell festivities, he was scrolling through Lastonbell food and travel blogs and devouring every book about the city’s lengthy history he could get his hands on. These research efforts had a predictable effect on Sorey’s packing efforts, and on the eve of his big move, he had to sheepishly call in a favor to Rose to enlist her help in getting the remainder of his apartment into boxes.

(“I helped you and Alisha move into your place,” Sorey pointed out in response to Rose’s endless griping, over the sounds of packing tape and clattering plates.

“I bought you pizza and beer!” Rose countered. “That debt was paid in full! Man, how many books do you have!? You owe me a night bar-crawling in Lastonbell for this. While I wear a crown. And you’re carrying me on one of those fancy back carriage thingies.”

“Palanquin,” Sorey informed her.

“Gesundheit,” Rose blessed him.)

Now that he was in Lastonbell, there was the matter of getting his apartment out of the boxes. Sorey flopped down heavily on one of the few open spots on his couch, and brought out his phone. He’d had a long day, and maybe it was time for him to make use of his extensive city research to check out some of the local bars.

He scrolled through some of the blog posts he had bookmarked, and landed on a name – The Katz Pajamas. It looked way…louder than the bars he tended to frequent. And definitely had a certain vibe to it. A certain vibe that Sorey, stressed and lonely in this big new city, could maybe appreciate tonight.

 --

 Sorey didn’t usually go for casual encounters, much less one-night stands. Even if someone checked all his boxes for physical attraction, he just generally wasn’t interested in anonymous sex with someone he barely knew. There was also the matter of common ground – normal “pickup talk” conversation bored Sorey to tears, and he wasn’t naïve enough to think that most people (or even some people, or a few people) would be interested in what archaeology journals he was reading, or wanted to rant with him about that badly-researched documentary he caught on Netflix the night before.

But there was always an exception to be had, wasn’t there? Especially as a stranger in a strange land.

Which sums up how Sorey wound up with his cock buried hilt-deep inside a guy he picked up at the bar.

His name was Mikleo, and he was a regular at the club, had great taste in books, and was absolutely stunning. He was tall; almost a head taller than Sorey, who was no slouch himself. He had a slim build; light enough for Sorey to pick up and throw onto his bed with ease, with slender wrists just the right size for Sorey’s hands to wrap around. He had legs for days; they were previously showcased in a pair of tight jeans, and were currently wrapped around Sorey’s waist. His eyes were a deep and fascinating violet, his hair was long and wavy white, frosted with pale aquamarine streaks, and – Sorey noted, as he slid a hand through it, prompting Mikleo to damn near purr at the feeling – was just about the softest thing he’d ever felt. Sorey had never gotten with a seraph before, and with how this encounter was going, he wondered why the hell that was.

The second he stepped into the club and had his eyes adjust to the low light, he’d spotted Mikleo at the bar, chatting with the bartender like an old friend. Dumbstruck with how gorgeous he looked in the colored lights and running on fumes and exhausted idiot courage after his long day of moving, Sorey slid up to him in a neighboring seat, and struck up a conversation. About five minutes in, Mikleo was laughing at Sorey’s dumb pickup lines in Ancient Avarost and buying him a drink to welcome him to the city, and Sorey realized that this was the best decision he’d made all day. About ten minutes in, as they crowed together about shitty movie adaptations of the restoration period, Sorey realized this was the best decision he’d made all week. About an hour in, as they ground on each other in the back of a taxi making its way back to Sorey’s place, Sorey realized that he really should have tried harder to unpack, and was about to hook up with a beautiful stranger amidst a maze of cardboard boxes. For his part, Mikleo almost seemed charmed by it all – or at least was too polite to do more than laugh as Sorey scooped him up and carried him bravely through the debris and into his bedroom to ravish him.

Sorey hadn’t really gotten much action since his last relationship about six months back, but managed to last longer than he thought he would with such a mind-blowingly sexy partner. From the look on Mikleo’s face as Sorey carefully pulled out of him, he’d given Mikleo a great ride as well – which was good, as Sorey wanted to at least make Mikleo’s efforts in putting up with his cardboard kingdom worthwhile. Sorey removed his condom and wrapped it in a tissue, and leaned in to kiss Mikleo deeply before he got up to clean up in the bathroom. The smile Mikleo gave to him in return just about killed his desire to leave the bed. Sorey leaned back in for another kiss.

Then another.

Then another.

In the end, Sorey wound up climbing Mikleo like a tree one more time before they collapsed into unconsciousness. The next morning, he wished he had more to offer his houseguest hottie than coffee and a muffin from the chain across the street, but Mikleo took the gift with the same good grace that he put up with Sorey’s bad jokes last night. Sorey really, really wanted to ask him to hang around while he went off to check in at his new station, but couldn’t justify asking him to; not with his apartment…the way it was. Mikleo bid him good luck and farewell, sweeping that silky hair of his over one shoulder as he bent down for a last, long kiss. Belatedly, as he creaked his way out of the taxi and into the station, his whole body aching from moving strain and from screwing Mikleo like his life depended on it, he realized that he hadn’t asked for Mikleo’s number. Sorey’s heart twisted a bit with disappointment.

It was the appeal of one-night stands, he supposed. You meet a gorgeous, brilliant guy, hump his brains out, and then never see him again. No strings. No expectations. Nothing but fun, pleasure, and the lingering memory of Mikleo’s smile burning in his brain like embers.

Sorey hung around the station for a little while, getting his new hire paperwork and greetings out of the way – he had been hoping to meet his new partner, but had been told he was taking a long weekend and would probably be next in the coming week. Sorey supposed it was a blessing in disguise. He was still more than a little cranky from exhaustion, more than a little homesick for Ladylake, and more than a little hung up on a hookup that he had no right to be hung up on. He probably wasn’t in much of a state to be making good impressions on coworkers.

As he headed out for the day, his shoulder devil whispered to him to go back to The Katz Pajamas. Great plan, that – nurse drinks for a few hours, lurk like a creep, and skulk off into the night when Mikleo inevitably didn’t show. His shoulder angel told him to go to the grocery store, pick up some real food, and spend the night and the rest of the weekend unpacking. Sorey hung his head, listened to his shoulder angel’s admonitions, and went to pick up some kitchen supplies.

Well, the joke was on his shoulder angel, because he ran into Mikleo again at the store.

Sorey fell too hard, too fast in his relationships. Thus, he was so bad at one-night stands. So horribly bad. He saw this character flaw of his and tried to keep himself under control, but oh, his heart was singing as he saw Mikleo blinking at him across the freezer section. He looked just as beautiful under the florescent grocery store lights, dressed in a comfy oversized sweater over a button-up, as he did in the neon club dressed in skintight pants and a black choker.

What, exactly, was hookup etiquette in a situation such as this? Was it jogging over to where Mikleo was looking at ice cream bars, striking up a conversation with him, and after another half-hour of wonderful conversation, inviting him back to his cardboard kingdom? Was it popping a boner in the middle of the store like a teenager when Mikleo smirked at him and picked up a 24-pack of condoms from the shelf, and tossed it into his basket next to the ice cream?

This, in fact, was probably not hookup etiquette in any sense of the word. But it netted Sorey another night with Mikleo.

And then a whole day with him, lounging in bed, eating Mikleo’s ice cream bars as they watched documentaries together, idly discussing and debating, Sorey’s head in Mikleo’s lap, trying not to purr as Mikleo pet his hair.

They didn’t leave bed that whole weekend, and Sorey got zero unpacking done, and kind of felt like his dick was going to fall off from using it to nail Mikleo in every position he could. But by god, Sorey didn’t regret a single moment of any of it. As he and Mikleo finally said their farewells to each other early Monday morning, Sorey felt like he was walking on air. Mikleo still had to get back to his place, change, and head off to work, all with Sorey’s hickies marking up his neck, but Sorey now had his number tucked safely into his phone, and a sly little suggestion from Mikleo that they could meet up again sometime if Sorey ever got bored. Sorey dreamily stared at his contact in his phone as the subway rumbled toward the station, his thoughts full of the books he wanted to loan to him, the museums he wanted to visit with him, the things he wanted to keep doing to that firm, tight little ass of his.

The whole weekend combined made it really awkward when the station chief introduced Sorey to his partner on the Shepherd detective force, the seraph specialist Mikleo.

 --

 So, he had had a one-night stand, or rather a one-weekend ice cream-and-debauchery fest, with his now-coworker. Sorey knew that dating at work was bad news, and constantly had to overhear gossip on the latest drama about office hookups in the break room at his old station in Ladylake. He’d thought he was above it all, but alas – karma was a bitch, and it was paying him back by banishing him to the realm of sexual limbo. What had seemed like a sure thing, a great way to start off his life in a new city, now seemed too awkward to even consider as they rolled out in a squad car to investigate their first case.

Sorey couldn’t bear the silence any longer.

“Listen. I am so sorry I didn’t mention where I was going to be working, it’s just, some people get on edge when I say I’m on the force, so I didn’t really want to--”

“It’s fine,” Mikleo said, shortly. “Just – don’t worry about it.”

Sorey managed to stay silent for a few minutes. He did not manage to not worry about it.

“It’s just, we’re going to be working together now, and I had such a great time, I really did, and I don’t want to make things awkward between us--”

“We’re here,” Mikleo informed him. He threw the car into park and unbuckled himself, trying and failing not to look at the wretched look on Sorey’s face. “…listen. I had a great time too, and I don’t blame you for anything. But let’s just focus on the case for now, okay?”

“Yeah…yeah,” Sorey agreed.

The case itself was a pretty standard one. There had been a rash of hellionizations in the area, all producing a certain kind of hellion – goblins, who had an appetite for theft and property vandalism, and also illegal street racing. As was covered in basic Shepherd training, certain types of malevolence tended to create specific breeds of hellion. Goblin hellions grew from turbulent greed and raw gluttony, and the number of cases plus the profile of the area the cases were centered in pointed toward drug-related activity. Lastonbell was a big city, and big cities had drug trafficking problems. And drug trafficking problems led to goblin street races.

“We’ve been making some arrests in the area recently,” Mikleo explained. “All straightforward purify-and-process. Some have had intel on mob activity in the area, but nothing our undercover informants haven’t already gotten us. We’re closing in on the distributors who are likely operating in the area, but we’ll have to monitor to make sure more don’t move in when we take down the current big dogs.”

Nothing Sorey hadn’t already seen in Ladylake. He knew the ins and outs of Ladylake’s streets and back alleys better though, and that made it way easier to break up these goblin races when they went down. He also hadn’t fucked his investigative partner in Ladylake. Lots of new things to consider in his new home.

A commotion interrupted that line of thought – the telltale hooting, hollering, clattering wheels, and cannonball fire of a goblin street race. At the sight of the squad car, they abruptly changed routes down an alleyway. Mikleo smirked and jumped out of the car.

“Right on time,” he said. “Hope you’re up for a chase.”

“You’re on,” Sorey replied, giving him a cheeky little grin.

Mikleo took off like a shot, his long legs and knowledge of the area giving him a solid lead on Sorey. Sorey felt his heart flutter, and not just because of the thrill of the chase. He was so, so bad at hookups.

 --

 Well, the good news was that they caught the speed demons, and the purification process went smoothly. No surprises there – a bunch of petty street punks were no match for Sorey’s knack for purification; the silver flames leaping from his blade and streaking across the ground to burn the taint from their flesh, mind, and souls. He’d been informed his partner was the sharpest shot in the precinct, and he’d lived up to the reputation already; shooting out a wheel axel from one racer, sending him careening into another, setting off a panic among the riders that allowed Sorey to commandeer one of the perps’ carts and ride it, flaming sword held high, rattling and clattering through the streets, his own mighty chariot of justice.

It got results. A crew of beat cops was helping them load the purified perps into a transport car, and a tow truck was on its way to pick up the wrecked carts. That being said, it was clear Mikleo was furious with him about the whole chariot of justice thing, and he wouldn’t even look at Sorey as he read off his report over the radio.

“A half dozen gobblecarters in the slammer in one shot,” one of the beat cops said, admiring. He offered a paw to Sorey to shake. “Not bad for a rookie! Put ‘er there, champ.”

“Hey, I graduated academy five years ago. You’re looking at a seasoned pro, here,” Sorey said. However, he knelt to accept the handshake. “This isn’t even my biggest haul.”

“You tryin’ to impress me or your boyfriend there?” laughed the cop. Mikleo continued to ignore them both. “Don’t look like he’s swayed. Maybe bring in some werewolf pelts and he’ll let you take him out on the town.”

Sorey rumpled the cop’s beret until his paws came up to swipe at him.

“’ey! Knock that off or I’ll report you to HR. Don’t think you special ops bozos get the privilege to touch this fine headgear.”

Leaving the beat cops to coordinate cleanup and transport, Mikleo and Sorey began to make their way back to where they parked the car. Sorey scratched his neck, wincing at Mikleo’s silent treatment.

“…I’ll take care of the paperwork?” Sorey offered.

“I’m sure Captain Strelka will be ecstatic to read it,” Mikleo said dryly. “‘Dear Captain, today I nearly made my partner shoot me by bowling into his line of fire, riding atop essential evidence, streaking through the streets like a flaming comet.’”

“You’re a flaming comet,” retorted Sorey. Mikleo was confused into silence, mouth twisting into a pout, one eyebrow arching. It would be a problem if his partner was this cute, and this easy to rile up. It would be a big problem.

They slid into the squad car, and Sorey yawned and stretched, priding himself on his efforts to not flop one arm around Mikleo’s shoulders.

“But it’s not a bad haul for my first day, you’ve got to admit,” Sorey said. “Can I drive?”

“Not a chance,” Mikleo said, turning on the engine without missing a beat.

Sorey’s eyes were bright with exhilaration. “I think, as my senior, you’ve gotta take it upon yourself to familiarize me with the city. I need to get the lay of the land, you know? Why don’t we go out to the belltower tonight; I’ve always wanted to see it in person.”

Mikleo scoffed. “The belltower? Sure, if you want people to think you’re a tourist.”

“Well,” Sorey drawled. “Would a Lastonbell native instead prefer to be taken out to the exhibition on Avarost-era sculpture at the Historical Art Center?”

“No, a native would more prefer to hit the bar district and then heckle the pretentious performance artists in the college town. But I on the other hand have been meaning to see that exhibit anyway.” Mikleo got them on the road to the station. “As long as it’s not too late when you’re finished with your paperwork back at the station, you can tag along, I guess. And if you can pass a city map test.”

Sorey pumped his fist. Lucky for him, he’d always been good at geography.

[ouraidengray4]

Learn to Talk Dirty Without Wanting to Die

While talking dirty seems to come easily to some people, for the rest of us, it can feel (extremely) awkward and unnatural—especially when we first get started. As with any other sexual situation, nobody should do something if it makes them feel genuinely uncomfortable, but if you're simply curious but nervous, here are some excellent ways to ease into a whole new form of conversation.

Start Slowly...

"These things take practice!" says sexual health advocate, director, and adult film performer Jessica Drake. "Moans are great, followed by things like, 'Yesssss… and 'right there,' or 'lower!' Drake says what works best here is to use phrases and terminology that are part of your normal vocabulary—just emphasize their sexiness.

"Describe something your partner is doing in that moment," she says. "For instance, 'I love it when you ________' and 'Your ______ is so ______!' It's like adult Mad Libs!"

It can also be fun to use all the dirty words that pop into your mind when you fantasize. "If there was ever a time for the F-word, it's now," Drake says. "Even if you breathe it softly in your lover's ear, it can have a big impact."

... Even Quietly

Building from a slow burn also applies to tone of voice, which is so important when talking dirty. "Nobody wants to be screamed at by a drill sergeant when you're getting down to business (unless you're into that sort of thing!)" says Miss Fox UK, who works professionally talking dirty on the iWantPhone.com platform. "Try talking really slowly and sensually, whispering naughty words into your partner's ear, and accentuating words like 'hard,' 'wet,' and 'lips.' That will really get your partner going!" she says.

EDITOR'S PICK

Or Go Solo to Start

"You need to get used to saying the words, feeling them roll off your tongue, hearing them come out of your mouth," says Laurel House, dating coach and resident sexpert for My First Blush. "One way to get into this is to dirty-talk to yourself out loud when you masturbate. Get comfortable with it. Then start slowly dropping in a statement or asking a question in the dirty-talk style while having sex," she says. Don't pressure yourself too much—you don't need to go full throttle and talk throughout your entire sex session, after all.

Remember That Nobody's Recording This

"Find absolute solace in the fact that nobody will ever hear you utter these words again," says fetish model and adult performer Allie Eve Knox. "So no matter how bad you are at this, nobody is going to play back that one time you described that very dirty experience."

Let Them Take the Lead

If you're really uncomfortable exchanging dirty talk with your partner, then ease into it by mirroring their tone. Simple commentary like, "Mmmm that's making me so hot/hard/wet," can keep things spicy and moving along well. "Shorter is better—especially as you expand your comfort zone," says Antonia Hall, M.A., psychologist, relationship expert, and author of The Ultimate Guide to a Multi-Orgasmic Life. If you ask complicated questions that force your partner to have to stop and think, it could actually break the flow and mood.

"If you want some inspiration, try reading erotica," she says. "Or if you're feeling especially brave, read it to your partner as foreplay and let things unfold from there."

Eye Contact, Eye Contact, Eye Contact

"If you want to know if what you're saying is having its desired effect, don't be afraid to look your partner dead in the eye as you speak those seductive words," Fox says. "But make sure you're not looking like a deer in headlights—be relaxed and confident with what you say."

Ask for What You Want

If there's something you've been dreaming about, put it into words and ask for what you've been craving. "This can amp up the action in the form of requests," Drake says, suggesting options like, "Spank me!" (if you're into that) "Bend me over and _____," or "Do you want to ______ my _______?"

There's nothing off-limits as long as it's true to who you and your partner are. "I think to be able to talk dirty in bed starts with you being comfortable in your own skin," says adult star Daizha Morgann. Be vocal—and genuine.

"Do not, under any circumstances, put on an elaborate fake act—your partner will sense it and question their ability to really make you feel good," Morgann says. You don't need to play any role when hitting the sheets. Be you—just a more amplified, fearless-with-your-words version of yourself. If you're normally the kind of person who says "darn it," when you stub your toe, don't feel pressure to be over-the-top vulgar in bed.

Don't Overthink It

Don't think too much—just go with the flow and say what's on your mind. "Tell your partner how much they are turning you on, how good that thrusting is feeling, how hot their body is, and how naughty they are making you feel," Morgann says.

"The biggest sex rant I hear from both my male and female followers is about the dreaded 'silent sex.' Sex should be a time to really let loose—physically and mentally! Start slow when gearing up for dirty talk, with moaning and playful small talk, and you'll really get to know a side of yourself that has been dying to come out."

Expand the Scene

Talking dirty isn't just for the bedroom. What better way to get your partner all amped up than to send a few dirty text messages during the day? The classics are classic for a reason, Fox says. "Telling them what you'll be wearing and what you want to do to them when you get home never fails to have its desired effect," she says. Just make sure you're messaging the right person before you hit send!

Build Your Way Up

Dirty talk is most successful when you create imagery so vivid that your fantasies feel real and in the moment. Details and description can help you get there. "Overly describe every single step you would take, from eyeing them across the room, to undressing your partner, to the sexy things you want to be doing to them tonight," Knox says. Describe all five senses you want to experience: what their body smells like, tastes like, etc. And then, just let go.

To up your game even further, Drake suggests watching an adult movie together and providing commentary while you do—then ask your partner if you'd like it if you perform the acts you're watching on them.

Most Importantly: Don't Stress

The whole point of dirty talk is to have fun. "Sex is fun, awkward, hot, messy, funny, and everything in-between. If you say the wrong words or talking too dirty just feels cheesy to you, laugh it off and keep going," Drake says.

Aly Walansky is a New York-based lifestyles writer. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter @alywalansky.

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Learn to Talk Dirty Without Wanting to Die

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Learn to Talk Dirty Without Wanting to Die

While talking dirty seems to come easily to some people, for the rest of us, it can feel (extremely) awkward and unnatural—especially when we first get started. As with any other sexual situation, nobody should do something if it makes them feel genuinely uncomfortable, but if you’re simply curious but nervous, here are some excellent ways to ease into a whole new form of conversation.

Start Slowly…

“These things take practice!” says sexual health advocate, director, and adult film performer Jessica Drake. “Moans are great, followed by things like, ‘Yesssss… and ‘right there,’ or ‘lower!’ Drake says what works best here is to use phrases and terminology that are part of your normal vocabulary—just emphasize their sexiness.

“Describe something your partner is doing in that moment,” she says. “For instance, ‘I love it when you ________’ and ‘Your ______ is so ______!’ It’s like adult Mad Libs!”

It can also be fun to use all the dirty words that pop into your mind when you fantasize. “If there was ever a time for the F-word, it’s now,” Drake says. “Even if you breathe it softly in your lover’s ear, it can have a big impact.”

… Even Quietly

Building from a slow burn also applies to tone of voice, which is so important when talking dirty. “Nobody wants to be screamed at by a drill sergeant when you’re getting down to business (unless you’re into that sort of thing!)” says Miss Fox UK, who works professionally talking dirty on the iWantPhone.com platform. “Try talking really slowly and sensually, whispering naughty words into your partner’s ear, and accentuating words like ‘hard,’ ‘wet,’ and ‘lips.’ That will really get your partner going!” she says.

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Or Go Solo to Start

“You need to get used to saying the words, feeling them roll off your tongue, hearing them come out of your mouth,” says Laurel House, dating coach and resident sexpert for My First Blush. “One way to get into this is to dirty-talk to yourself out loud when you masturbate. Get comfortable with it. Then start slowly dropping in a statement or asking a question in the dirty-talk style while having sex,” she says. Don’t pressure yourself too much—you don’t need to go full throttle and talk throughout your entire sex session, after all.

Remember That Nobody’s Recording This

“Find absolute solace in the fact that nobody will ever hear you utter these words again,” says fetish model and adult performer Allie Eve Knox. “So no matter how bad you are at this, nobody is going to play back that one time you described that very dirty experience.”

Let Them Take the Lead

If you’re really uncomfortable exchanging dirty talk with your partner, then ease into it by mirroring their tone. Simple commentary like, “Mmmm that’s making me so hot/hard/wet,” can keep things spicy and moving along well. “Shorter is better—especially as you expand your comfort zone,” says Antonia Hall, M.A., psychologist, relationship expert, and author of The Ultimate Guide to a Multi-Orgasmic Life. If you ask complicated questions that force your partner to have to stop and think, it could actually break the flow and mood.

“If you want some inspiration, try reading erotica,” she says. “Or if you’re feeling especially brave, read it to your partner as foreplay and let things unfold from there.”

Eye Contact, Eye Contact, Eye Contact

“If you want to know if what you’re saying is having its desired effect, don’t be afraid to look your partner dead in the eye as you speak those seductive words,” Fox says. “But make sure you’re not looking like a deer in headlights—be relaxed and confident with what you say.”

Ask for What You Want

If there’s something you’ve been dreaming about, put it into words and ask for what you’ve been craving. “This can amp up the action in the form of requests,” Drake says, suggesting options like, “Spank me!” (if you’re into that) “Bend me over and _____,” or “Do you want to ______ my _______?”

There’s nothing off-limits as long as it’s true to who you and your partner are. “I think to be able to talk dirty in bed starts with you being comfortable in your own skin,” says adult star Daizha Morgann. Be vocal—and genuine.

“Do not, under any circumstances, put on an elaborate fake act—your partner will sense it and question their ability to really make you feel good,” Morgann says. You don’t need to play any role when hitting the sheets. Be you—just a more amplified, fearless-with-your-words version of yourself. If you’re normally the kind of person who says “darn it,” when you stub your toe, don’t feel pressure to be over-the-top vulgar in bed.

Don’t Overthink It

Don’t think too much—just go with the flow and say what’s on your mind. “Tell your partner how much they are turning you on, how good that thrusting is feeling, how hot their body is, and how naughty they are making you feel,” Morgann says.

“The biggest sex rant I hear from both my male and female followers is about the dreaded ‘silent sex.’ Sex should be a time to really let loose—physically and mentally! Start slow when gearing up for dirty talk, with moaning and playful small talk, and you’ll really get to know a side of yourself that has been dying to come out.”

Expand the Scene

Talking dirty isn’t just for the bedroom. What better way to get your partner all amped up than to send a few dirty text messages during the day? The classics are classic for a reason, Fox says. “Telling them what you’ll be wearing and what you want to do to them when you get home never fails to have its desired effect,” she says. Just make sure you’re messaging the right person before you hit send!

Build Your Way Up

Dirty talk is most successful when you create imagery so vivid that your fantasies feel real and in the moment. Details and description can help you get there. “Overly describe every single step you would take, from eyeing them across the room, to undressing your partner, to the sexy things you want to be doing to them tonight,” Knox says. Describe all five senses you want to experience: what their body smells like, tastes like, etc. And then, just let go.

To up your game even further, Drake suggests watching an adult movie together and providing commentary while you do—then ask your partner if you’d like it if you perform the acts you’re watching on them.

Most Importantly: Don’t Stress

The whole point of dirty talk is to have fun. “Sex is fun, awkward, hot, messy, funny, and everything in-between. If you say the wrong words or talking too dirty just feels cheesy to you, laugh it off and keep going,” Drake says.

Aly Walansky is a New York-based lifestyles writer. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter @alywalansky.