#in particular I love that nails is a part of the 'yeah they totally know' club while also being the closest thing we get to someone's

[arolesbianism]

Ok so good news I have finished unlocking all the oni lore, bad news there wasn't as much left as I was hoping. But on the bright side, Jean and Nails got to do more stuff hell fucking yes

[dadsbongos]

for honor. and duty.

3.2k words / warnings - forced breeding, injections, drugging, unhappy end, reader is written as a woman

summary - it's his job to carry on the bloodline, and its your job to love Satoru Gojo; thankless as both gigs are.

kinktober: day nine - breeding, aphrodisiac ~~~

Satoru was disinterested in fathering children. 

While he loved teaching, and teasing Megumi throughout the years was a joy, raising an entire person from scratch? An unnecessary addition to his plate he would rather be without. Besides, he was only scratching at his late 20s, why should he rush into having babies?

His feelings were not hidden, either. Everything about Satoru screamed childfree. Most respected the decision; for the Gojo clan to be written into history with Satoru as the cataclysmic final bang -- the sole pillar maintaining his clan’s status in the big three. It would be an honor and a pleasure, were he humble enough to silently accept both.

But Satoru loves whining.

“Too bad the Six Eyes and Limitless will be totally lost to time when I die…” he pouts every time he says it. Purely to gloat that not only does he have both, but he will be the last one in history, “If only someone could take them off my hands, huh?”

Maybe he should’ve just shut his mouth.

… 

“Why don’t you donate, then?” Shoko snarks one random Wednesday, finally fed up with Satoru’s haughty huffs this particular lunch break, “I’m sure your swimmers wouldn’t be unwelcome if they could make another special grade.”

“Gross, Sho,” you gag, then pointing at the man, “Don’t respond to that.”

Predictably, you’re ignored, “But who would be worthy, Shoko? Huh?” Satoru snickers when you gag even louder, “It’d have to be another sorcerer, you know? Can’t just put a super baby in any ole lady.”

“I’m sure you could find someone for a good price,” Shoko leans onto her palm, “Some high up clan girl. A Zen’in? It’d make her life better by getting out of that place, I bet.”

“Can we not talk about this while I’m eating, please?” you gesture to your lunch, though you hardly have the appetite for it now anyway. 

“You can say you’re jealous,” Satoru teases into your ear, laying his head on your shoulder. There’s no warmth of skin to feel, and if you closed your eyes the weight wouldn’t be reasonable for a human head either -- much lighter. Airier. As if he isn’t there at all.

“I’m not jealous of not being your incubator, Gojo.”

“Harsh!” he dramatically clutches over his heart, sucking in a breath like he’d been stabbed, “What happened to first name privileges?”

“Revoked,” you flick his head knowing it’ll never land. Knowing he’ll never feel you.

Shoko simpers, long nails tapping against the creaky break room table. When you shoot over a quizzical glance, those nails stretch over her lips; covering so you alone can make out what she mouths: ‘jealous’. 

You mimic the motion to mouth back: ‘fuck you’.

“Hey,” Satoru wraps both arms around you (no warmth, no weight), “Secrets among friends is asking for trouble.”

“Donating out soldier serum is asking for trouble,” Shoto snickers.

“You suggested it!” 

You roll your eyes at the pair, hoping this was the last you would hear of Satoru’s semen stumper, “Well, I’d love to stick around, but you two are disgusting.”

“Boo,” Shoko wads up the shrink of her microwave meal and tosses it at your head.

“Boo!” Satoru echoes the sentiments louder, fingers clinging to your uniform until his long arms can stretch no further.

“Yeah, whatever!” you holler back, “As if the higher ups will even let you just donate!”

Those traditional old heads will want a “proper” heir, and there is no way Satoru would get suckered into that.

It’s part of why loving him is so difficult.

Because loving Satoru means having to share him: always. He is overwhelmingly busy between his work as a sorcerer and his passion as a mentor. Your love for him will forever be yours to own, but Satoru himself could never be.

Perhaps that’s what Suguru realized when he tried years ago, when Satoru was always gone and the space between them only grew. Perhaps that’s why he decided to close Satoru out completely.

“You actually gonna donate sperm?” Shoko returns her tired gaze to her friend, quirking a brow when he laughs and shakes out his phone.

“Nah, the geezers just keep pestering me,” he mimics a flapping mouth with his hand, “Blah, blah spreading the genes- blah, blah good of the clan. As if they care about the good of the clan.”

“They might,” she snorts, clapping a hand over her mouth to hide a grin.

Both of them know full well otherwise.

“I’m just gonna tell them,” he re-pockets his phone, purposefully ignoring the buzzing call of Gakuganji, “Face to face this time, so they can’t ignore it.”

“Ooh, yeah?”

“Yeah!”

“What’re you gonna say, big man?”

Satoru smiles bright, all cocky and sure and cool, “‘There is no way that you bags of bones will ever convince me to have kids.’”

. . .

A cold, soaked cotton pad is swiped over the triangle of your inner elbow, disinfecting the area before introducing a syringe.

You once asked Satoru why he bothered remaining a sorcerer under Jujutsu Tech when he obviously hates the higher-ups. His response, of course, was lackluster and chock full of holes (“Nobody else can do what I do,” he rolls his hand laxly, “Also, it's the only thing that doesn’t make me so bored I contemplate blowing my brains out.”).

You remember rolling your eyes with a single word reply, deeply unimpressed with his typical lack of tact (“Inspiring.”). Similarly, you remember thinking that you wanted to stay by his side, despite his annoying insensitivity.

When you got the panicked call from Shoko, you considered it a test. The universe cruelly examining your dedication. Ever the fool, you sped for the address she spat over the phone to prove yourself.

Now, you can’t even have the shame of reconsideration.

The bedroom has a camera in the far right corner, on the wall opposite a large observation mirror. Men in white coats pace back and forth, scribbling notes and judging every exact twinge in Satoru’s muscles. Satoru is positioned on a king bed with white sheets, hands latched behind his back in solid shackles with a radiant lock.

“He’s not hurt, right?”

“No,” the lead man steadies a needle to the sterilized juncture, “We never want to hurt Gojo,” his eyes flick up to the pinch in your face as the needle punctures your skin, “Or you.”

“He looks miserable…”

Three doctors turn to you, glaring. The man administering a blue, gluey serum into your veins sighs loudly, “Yes, well… you will be, too…”

The doctor folding your discarded clothes on the left scoffs, shaking his head.

Sometimes you spend so much time with Satoru that you forget how mean men can be.

“It should begin taking effect in just minutes,” the man steps back, letting one of his many assistants undo your tethers, “Mostly an additive,” he clarifies, “You don’t really need it, your stamina doesn’t matter much to us here. You can head in for him now.”

Your stamina may not matter to them, but you’d personally like to be awake as long as possible for this.

“Did you tell him it was me?”

Your question is ignored. So you step through the men and creep into the other room. Casting a curious glance over your shoulder to confirm the study window only reflects yourself. And Satoru.

Satoru.

Satoru.

The name is saccharine sweet in your mind. His head twists in your direction, blindfold gone and eyes comically wide. His eyes are dimmer than usual, though that isn’t very surprising when you were explicitly told the drug dampened cursed energy.

Your eyes rake over his body -- red and writhing and naked. Satoru’s gaze falls from your face to your chest to between your thighs, eyes widening further. You know he’s had partners before (lots of them, in fact), so the shock is unwarranted. Unless, of course, it’s because it’s you and not the random woman from a high up clan he assumed it’d be.

A stern voice breaks out from the far right corner of the room.

“He is willing.”

You gnaw your bottom lip anxiously, squinting through harsh overhead lights to the two-way mirror over your shoulder. Then, your eyes return to Satoru, knelt on the mattress and bare -sans the stocks cuffed around his wrist.

“Satoru…?” your face boils, gut fairing no better. Veins direct gutters for the goopy blue in your system, and it's pumping fast.

He copies your quiet, uttering your name through the still observation room, “You?”

“Is it…” you crawl onto the bed, convinced that his skin on yours could cure the overwhelming swelter in the room, “Am I okay?”

He nods limply, hair falling into crystalline eyes, “It’s you.”

Bright fluorescents dim to a more bearable, faint glow. Swallowing the last of your reservations with the swell in your throat, you turn your back to Satoru -- both knees firm on the plush mattress. 

Though his chest beats in sporadic, panicked breaths, Satoru’s lean hips are still -- perfect for reaching between your thighs and grasping his stood cock. He clenches his angel eyes shut to your flesh, but the waves and dips of your cursed energy stubbornly persist in his vision. He sees the wavering as your lust grows, he knows his is the same. Worse, even. So swallowed up in his belly by enforced desire that a stable flow is impossible to maintain.

Satoru is easy in your grasp, slipping inside you with whimpered pleas and huffs. You curve him into you, backing onto Satoru until your soft flesh is flush with his. Heat tickles up your spine, chilling at your neck and causing a rabid shiver all down your shoulders. 

Leaning forward onto your elbows, you slip over Satoru’s cock -- sliding along him with manufactured fervor (if you focus hard enough, you can still feel the needle incision stretch in your arm). 

The stocks rattle as Satoru jerks forward with a thick groan, hips now eager to pap, pap pap! onto yours. Bonds creak, splinters wailing in protest of his strength as he claws out to reach you. Satoru throws his head back, every sensitive nerve set ablaze just by the warmth and squeeze of your cunt.

His shortburst thrusts don’t dig far enough even though you’re kissing hips every time -- he feels overstimulated and yet unfulfilled. He needs to have both hands bound on your hips -squeezing the flesh on your bones and flipping and bending and making you keen under his lithe fingers.

He cannot discern if the need is driven by drooly chemical injection or longstanding affection, and he isn’t bothering himself with the question now. 

“Wanna touch,” he mumbles pathetically, red in the face and sweat beading down his forehead, white bangs slick to the skin, “Need it…” he gasps as you arch, stretching one of your legs to curl around his thigh, “Need to touch!"

As if spontaneously occurring to the crew that Satoru is pleading with them, the leading man jingles over with his key. He looks at the sedation team for extra assurance before unlocking Satoru’s stocks. 

Once the bonds clatter to the floor, Satoru is raking his nails across your body -- thighs, stomach, back, anywhere he can reach he’s eagerly clawing. Pulling and pushing before he collapses over you, his chest scorching your back. He stretches his neck to press his cheek to yours, lips loose and babbling,

“So good, so good, love how you feel -- wanna fuck you,” his brain must be falling through his lips because he seems to forget he’s already fucking you, “Wanna fuck you, wanna fuck you, wanna fuck you,” he lays sloppy kisses over your shoulder, teething at the sensitive bone, “Gonna let me cum in you, pretty girl? Yeah? Gonna make me a daddy, yeah?”

Hanging one arm below, he swirls the soft pads of his fingers over your clit -- soaked with the syrup his cock fucks free. His large hand expands over the pouch of your tummy to snugly press his thumb into your doughy skin; thumping where he’s battering your insides.

“Feel me there, mama? S’wet ‘n’ desperate, you want me bad,” he giggles deliriously, humping at your sex in plasticine frenzy before twitching to completion.

Satoru thinks he could go all day.

Thick arms tied around your waist, keeping your chest bare to his with both knees crimped over Satoru’s shoulders. His overconfidence proves itself as he thrusts up into you, lips pressing wetly onto yours while drooling out affectionate slurs,

“Best girl, pretty and hot and so fuckin’ wet for me, aren’t you? You love me, sweet girl? I think you do- know you do.”

Satoru stills only when more cum is pumped into your womb, pitiful mewls bobbing the apple of his throat.

You’re nodding with a heavy crown, forehead thumping into his sweaty collarbones and biting cresents in his biceps with your nails, “Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh - love you, ‘Toru! Love you so much…!”

Nuzzling along your flaming cheek, Satoru wriggles you loose just to flip you around to kneel in the sheets.

“I’m tired,” he muses, fingers dancing in the baby hairs at the base of your neck, “How about you do something, princess?”

You groan and pout, but don’t disobey.

Your knees are tingling and arms shaking as you twist to nestle against Satoru. Stretching back, you splay your palms over his broad chest to balance over his standing cock; then reach between your spread legs to grasp his erection. Skin soft and warm in your palm, he whimpers at the contact and throws his head back into the plush white pillow. Snowy hair tousled against the case, hips twitching up in you.

His cock bumps against your clit in his desperation and the sensation makes you clamp your knees around his waist tighter. You’re all heavy breaths and whines by the time you finally sink base-down. His cock feels hot and thick inside you, you’re not sure if it's all the eyes or whatever they stuck in your arm or the fact you’re with Satoru but your entire body is simmering.

Satoru’s hands unwind from the sheets to cling around your hips, forcefully rocking you down on him: as if to grind both your bones into paste. Cool air catches in the back of his swollen throat, your cunt wet and swallowing him back in as he tries slipping out. He lifts his head -jaw limping open and drool pooling around his raw-bitten lips- just to watch as he lifts and drops you over his cock.

Clumsily, he jerks his knees up and feet flat on the bed as the lava scorching through his veins inspires him to fuck you faster. Sweat beading and swamping all along his hairline and joints, leaving his skin sticky and sucking against yours with every thrust. Satoru’s fingers squeeze harshly around the fat of your hips, marking the skin with plum stains in the shape of his hand. If a baby isn’t enough, then these bruises surely will be bountiful evidence of your tryst.

Suddenly, Satoru sits up fully, lips pressing into your shoulder before he stabs into bone and flesh with his teeth. His arms swiftly move to curl around your waist, flushing your back to his chest as he pumps into you. One of his hands finds your breast, squishing the swells by the handful, and the other hand swooping to toy with your clit. He works slow circles into quicker swishes, thrusts speeding as the heat climbs and climbs from where he’s inside you up to your necks. Suffocating. Enveloping. 

Ragged breaths pull with terrible effort from both you and Satoru. Wet slaps of skin and syrupy squelching echoing in the otherwise still room. Oddly, the sound is far from grotesque, instead spurring another sweetened gush around Satoru. The dirty, primal nature far overshadows the lurking men in white coats around the edges of the room.

You can almost pretend you’re wrapped around Satoru for real pleasure rather than duty.

Again, Satoru sloppily mouths at your skin, from the bend in your shoulder along your neck and unto the softness of your jaw. Arms clenching around your waist until you’re practically immobile in his embrace, bouncing along his cock only because he puppeteers you to do so. 

Satoru moans hotly against the slope of your neck, licking the sweat off your skin just because he can. You lean into the coolness of Satoru’s tongue as your gut swirls and tightens before you’re seizing in the man’s grasp. His gaping mouth is pressed against your collarbone, slobber inking across your tit and down your arm. He hugs you tighter and soaks in full the clench of your orgasm, continuing to lathe his fingers over your clit until you’re jerking and huffing in overstimulation.

You think you hear him muttering (you hope you hear him muttering), “Thank you, thank you, thank you...”

The unbearable heat is replaced by normal, merely uncomfortable heat. Satoru cuddles you against him still as he plugs you with his cum.

Soft murmurs float back into your ears, men stretching necks to gaze at the both of you and whisper amongst themselves. Satoru lazily drags the sheets high over your chest and settles back against the steely headboard. 

He yelps, back arching and eyes wide, sitting upright from the board.

“What…?” you groan, exhaustion overtaking you -- limbs numb and strewn out uselessly.

“It’s cold,” he grumbles into your ear, yawning and laying against the metal headboard again (this time prepared for the stinging temperature change), “Be nice to me.”

Weakly, you make a sound of protest from the back of your throat. Brain too fried to form words.

Satoru caresses his fingers gently over your stomach, gaze fluttering to the labcoats stiffly remaining in the room. They put much effort into avoiding his stare, heads kept low and ducking behind their collars. Rolling onto his side, Satoru keeps you caged in his arms while shielding you from the mens’ stares. 

He soothes his nails along the bulb of your cheek, six eyes searing through every layer of skin and muscle down to the beating of your heart. He knows, of course, that it beats for him.

Which makes him feel sick, beneath exasperated euphoria, because he knows why you’re here.

He knows the only way to give it back is with a baby neither of you really want.

[k8-marsh]

songs that sound like chloe price sung them

okay so (naturally) i have playlists for most life is strange characters and i found a bunch of songs that sound like chloe sung them! :) it sounds more like her voice in 'before the storm' (rhianna devries) if anyone is interested. so yeah! i just thought it was cool! a lot of the songs also really suit chloe in their lyrics/genre too ^^

also i added photos to help you. visualise. hope you enjoy.

Sorority Girls - Mommy Long Legs

this one is so very chloe, especially with her hate for the vortex club (more specifically, victoria and nathan)

Hey, hey, hey, boys, let's go to the frat party The theme's white people, get your roofies ready Shoot their parent's money away And act like assholes every day!!!

I Threw Glass at My Friend's Eyes and Now I'm on Probation - Destroy Boys

honestly, for all of these songs the entire song sounds like her! this whole album in particular 'Sorry, Mom' is very chloe.

anyway i think this song could kinda be about chloe and frank ;

'Cause you're scary as shit, dude! Like I don't know really know what I can tell you You kinda freak me out, but we can be friends

Never invite me over ever again Just kidding, please do! I really wanna hangout with you

obviously NOT in a relationship way but frank was definitely a bad influence on chloe and someone she kinda looked up to. so i think it kinda fits!

Duck Eat Duck World - Destroy Boys (again)

okay... i'm about to put the whole album at this point, the singer's old voice really sounds like chloe!!!

this song seems like other people's criticisms of chloe;

Ever since you cut your hair You're so different, you don't seem to care Staying out late, X's on hands Since when do you like punk rock bands?

then this verse kinda seems like chloe talking about max leaving her -

I liked the girl with the long locks What's her name? I forgot Ten years and we haven't talked Well, there's a new girl on the block

and the 'new girl' is rachel!

Green eyes leaning in on me Green eyes, am I what you wanna see?

guess who has green eyes... that's right guys. rachel amber. are you seeing these links or what.

this analysis isn't, like, that i think that the artists wrote these songs about chloe, i just love thinking about songs in terms of chloe. as you can tell.

A few other songs from the same album that match chloe with their lyrics:

No Respect - chloe criticizing david!

You don't own everything I've been here for years Stop meddling in my affairs and I'll stop middling yours Get out of my face Such a typical dude Thinking that every tiny little thing is just about you

Goldilocks Spot

This one is kinda sad/subdued. I think this suits Before the Storm Chloe too, i mean she went through a LOT of shit.

My handwriting kind of looks like my dad's Tell me your story, it won't make me sad

...

I don't wanna talk about it anymore I don't wanna talk about it anymore I don't wanna talk about it anymore I don't wanna talk about it anymore So I won't

Junk

The title just gives me junkyard vibes, which is totally relevant to chloe :)

My car exhaust clinging to the base Shiny and lost with onion ring remains Precious flowers lost within the hour I guess you can say they were written to decay

Long and gone Long and gone, long and gone, long and gone Lost my junk again Lost my junk again

B.F.F (Actually from a later album!)

This reminds me of Chloe's breakdown in the junkyard. you know when she just started smashing everything. you can draw a correlation (fancy) between the title and max...

Nails through my baseball bat I'm telling you to step back girl, step back You're dead, you're dust, you're sewage now (< william!!!) You dug your grave and then you asked me how

edit: you thought i was done? absolutely not. i completely forgot about ashly burch's songs!!!!!!!!! MUAHAHAa.... okay. these are usually covers/parts of a show or play so they don't have as deep meaning. but obviously i'll find a way to relate it to chloe.

(Cover) Black Sheep by Metric

I love the second video so much, it's animated by this totally awesome dude on reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/lifeisstrange/comments/3nzxhc/animation_of_chloe_price_ashly_burch_singing/) but the video is private so I attached a different youtube link in case anyone wants to watch it.

Who's The Princess Now? (from Muzzled: The Musical)

The scream of 'who's the princess now, BITCHES??" is... very chloe to me. a little context, this song is from a very peculiar youtube musical episode series thing that ashly burch stars in, i watched it a few years ago and it's definitely something. it's actually got a bunch of popular youtube-musical people (like Joey Richter from Starkid) if anyone's interested. you can watch it here!

Song Battle (...also from Muzzled: The Musical)

okay. so for some reason i really love imagining chloe having a rap battle against victoria for this. someone please make it into an animatic. maybe i will.

How Do I Look? (you'll never guess where this one is from...)

i can also imagine chloe having a sick makeover and like chloe and rachel helping her. or something like that... anyways. rad.

Anyways. That's it for now, i hope anyone who remotely wanted this enjoyed it!!! i hope it helped if you wanted to create a playlist or animatic or anything or just have a little chuckle.... um. please let me know if you have any more ideas because my chloe playlist can never be long enough.

[2hoothoots]

Revisiting P2 since the docu epilogue dropped and your AMV (<3) popped up as a sign for me to ask something that hopefully you haven't already spoken about years ago: What did you think of the in-game psych explanation for Maligula, that she's the primitive savage part of the mind? P2 is a weird mix of sketchy Freud/Jung concepts that Tim likes meshed with modern psych, and Maligula's deal seems like something they probably wrote a lot of different versions of but never quite solved elegantly

yeah, i think you totally hit the nail on the head - it's always felt like one of the parts of the story that they couldn't quite give enough polish to before they had to finalize it and move on with development. like - i went to go get my artbook to see if it had any insight into the writing process, and did you know that Nona and Maligula being the same person was apparently added way later in development? that's wild! i didn't know that until literally right now! i may or may not have skipped straight to my favourite characters when my artbook arrived and then put it on my shelf without reading the whole thing

ANYWAY, retrospectively i think it being a twist that was added later actually makes a lot of sense in the context of everything you mentioned. the Maligula problem, to me, is the fact that they're trying to juggle a bunch of different things that she has to be in the story. there's Maligula, the ruthless big bad, and Nona, the beloved grandma, and if you suddenly have to also make them both the same person... well, it ends up being kind of a thorny writing problem to make that work, haha.

here's some art i made so this isn't just a wall of text, rest of the answer under the cut

i think one thing they could have done when they needed to rehabilitate a mass-murderer into a lovable old lady was pull back on either end of the spectrum. make your villain softer and more sympathetic, or give grandma a mean streak like she's one bad day away from a tragedy at the crochet club. and to give the story credit, i'm really glad they didn't. Nona is relentlessly sweet and endearing - and that's great! she needs to be in order to make the audience care about her, otherwise the emotional beats are never going to land. likewise, Maligula is a great villain, she's vicious and ruthless and at the culmination of her arc we see she simply does not give a shit about murdering hundreds of people. i love that for her, honestly, you go girl

but then, like - how do you connect the dots? how do you frame grandma having a violently murderous streak in a way that doesn't make the ending of "but she's over it now" feel kinda weird and hollow? and how do you do that while also being sympathetic to the game's themes around mental health? Maligula's informed by the traumatic things that happened to Lucrecia during the war, but she can't just be a manifestation of trauma, because the moral of the story being that trauma makes you a mass-murderer (until you beat up your trauma and shove it in a giant pit) would feel... really tonally dissonant!

so i think you're totally right that the sprinkling of pop-psych concepts we get ends up feeling a little bit like an awkward band-aid. Maligula's story is about how the horrors of war can shape you into a terrible person, who does terrible things - ...but there's also, like, special circumstances, so it doesn't feel weird that she goes back to being Raz's sweet grandma afterwards. special psychic circumstances! she's not just any war criminal, she's the fight or flight response gone out of control!

which - i dunno, i think that line in particular always stood out to me, because that's not really what the fight or flight (or freeze or fawn) response is, right? it's a temporary boost of adrenaline to the system to rev you up for getting out of a dangerous situation. an overactive fight or flight response is called chronic stress and anxiety. i know the games are pop-psych and not actual science, but it always stood out to me as a little awkward.

if it were me in the writer's seat - with the benefit of all the time in the world to workshop it, and no looming deadlines, and the hindsight of having a full completed game in front of me to think about - i might have tried to frame it around connection. i think you could swing the lens to instead focus on how violence, stress, trauma etc., make it harder to understand and empathise with the people around you. the tragedy of Lucrecia's story is that she came home to try and help her countrymen, the people she cared so dearly about. but the more time passed, the less she cared, the less she was able to see them as people. after Marona's death, the Maligula that remains is one who's unable to even care about killing her own sister. the alternative is too raw, too painful - instead, she sheds her last vestiges of remorse, and throws herself into the easy relief of violence. (we see this again, when Nona "awakens" as Maligula - when confronted with the baggage of her past, she chooses to wash it all away with force, unable and unwilling to care about the people she used to call friends.)

and i think shifting the focus like that ties it in thematically, too. a big theme (of both games, but especially the sequel) is how important connection is, how being able to understand and reach out to and rely on other people is a lifeline during hard times. PN2 touches on how there aren't really "good people" and "bad people" - everyone has the capacity to do wonderful or terrible things, and i think Raz's line to Maligula about how "everybody's got something like you" works. Lucrecia was never a monster, no matter how everyone tried to pretend she was. she was just a person, the same as everyone else - and just like everyone else, she could be pushed to extremes under the right circumstances. it just feels kind of odd when the implicit context is "everybody's got a mass-murderer hidden in the primal recesses of their brain", hahaha.

but like, again, that's the privilege of hindsight, right? i've definitely also been on the other side of the creative process, stuck with something i suddenly need to make work in a story and having to come up with a solution that feels like a band-aid. sometimes you just gotta call it good enough, and move on. and i think the game is overall much stronger for having Nona and Maligula be the same person - it plays into the wider themes, it sets up some great emotional beats, and i think it's overall well-executed, even if there are one or two hiccups in the writing.

anyway, great ask! thank you for the invitation to ramble, this is something that stuck out to me on my first playthrough of the game and it was fun to sit down and get my thoughts in order

[umthisistheonlyusernamenottaken]

In conclusion, FUCK rhysand

Currently up to ACOMAF, and I just finished the part with Rhysand's exposition justifying his actions UTM, this scene in particular pissed me off beyond measure. I already hated Rhysand in the first book, but this one was the nail on the coffin.

'So I watched your first trial. Pretending- always pretending to be the person that you hated. When you were hurt so badly against the Wyrm... I found my way in with you. A way to defy Amarantha, to spread the seeds of hope to those who knew how to read the message, and a way to keep you alive without seeming too suspicious.' (ACOMAF p525)

Rhysand can change memories. If he'd truly wanted to help Feyre, he literally could have visited her in secret and wiped the memories of anyone who found out about their alliance.

'I found those three picts. I broke into their minds, reshaping their lives, their histories, and dragged them before Amarantha.' (ACOMAF p 523).

Honestly, he could have just been like 'I know that you hate me and I hate Tamlin, but it would be really great if you could break this curse for the good of all of Prythian, so I'm gonna help you. You just gotta pretend to hate me until the curse is broken, m'kay?'

Whilst writing this bit, I also realised that he never apologised for GRABBING HOLD OF AND TWISTING THE BONE OF HER BROKEN ARM?!?

'Let me see it.' A growl rippled from him. Without waiting for my reaction, he grabbed my elbow and forced my arm into the dim light of the cell. I bit my lip to keep from crying out - bit it hard enough to draw blood as rivers of fire exploded inside me, as my head swam, and all my senses narrowed down to the piece of bone sticking through my arm. (ACOTAR p. 331)

Rhysand: Don't you dare touch my mate or even look at her wrong, but yeah I totally twisted her broken arm into an agreement with me that utterly humiliated her for WEEKS :)

(canon, Rhysand was also too stupid to figure out Amarantha's riddle, that's why he had to pull all of this shit.)

Moving on,

'I made you dress like that so Amarantha wouldn't suspect, and made you drink the wine so you would not remember the nightly horrors in that mountain.' (ACOMAF p.525)

I spent my days sleeping off the faerie wine, dozing to escape the humiliation I endured.' (ACOTAR 354)

HORRORS AND HUMILIATION THAT YOU SUBJECTED HER TO YOU FUCKING SJERGT$GT%H

Yep, absolutely, the obvious answer is to dress her provocatively, drug her, make her perform lap dances, and basically put all of your attention on her, that's definitely keeping her out of harms way and out of anyone's attention. TF??!!!

Rhysand has been Amarantha's toy for 50 years now, don't you think she would find it more suspicious that after all that time, he's decided to spend time in any capacity with the one person that is meant to break the curse and defeat her? I just *give up*

There's plenty more that could be said, but these are the things that stuck out to me the most. In general, this entire bit of the book sounded too practised, you know? Like during the time they spent apart because Feyre was justifiably pissed about him keeping the mate secret, he was busy cooking up this convoluted, air-tight story that explained away all of his bullshit. He had an answer for EVERYTHING, and explained it all away as 'but it was for your own good'.

He also never apologised for ANY of the shit he pulled on Feyre, not even a 'By the way, sorry for twisting your arm or making you dress in half a tissue or drugging you or making you do lap dances on me or treating you like my property that no-one else could touch.'

I also find it hard to believe that Feyre, don't-lie-to-me-or-treat-me-like-a-pawn-feyre forgave him so easily for that. She was literally just like 'OH well, you love me, actions excused have some soup :)'

Anyway, that's about as much as I've got energy for right now. Would love to hear anyone's thoughts!

[moonsidesong]

just caught up with Your Turn To Die and absolutely adored it the whole way through. it goes unbelievably hard. calling it Danganronpa But Good feels like an insult. but like... yeah what if danganronpa was good? or rather. game that makes me wish danganronpa was good.

it really keeps you on your toes the Entire time, which is why i ended up saving like......... every five to ten minutes, most times. i would say the only slower part is the minigames during chapter 2? but, i thought those were fun, and they were still broken up by plot important stuff, so i really didnt mind.

ive heard the game had a soundtrack release on CD a few years ago, but i cant seem to find much information about it? much less any resell listings. how sad... i love cd...

i wanna talk more in depth from here on out so spoilers under the cut! warning thoughts very disjointed. and i havent seen absolutely Everything the game has to offer yet (havent done any of the side stories, we'll do them soon probably) so if my takes are disproven by anything ive yet to see please do not tell me htank you

first off OHHH MY GODDDD THIS GAME IS SO MUCH LESS CREEPY ABOUT THE MINORS AND ITS SUCH A BREATH OF FRESH AIR COMPARED TO DANGANRONPA. its not perfect, of course, i do not entirely love the jokes(???) about keiji (known grown adult man) going on dates with sara (known teenage girl), but like, this game does not make me feel gross all the time? thank u nankidai for not making your teacher character with a close relationship with one of his former students a groomer! the bare minimum! im gonna hit kodaka with a stick this should not be a point in the game's favor.

anyway! ended chapter 2 with Reko and Sou (shin) alive, ended chapter 3 having lost Reko .. . :( shes my favorite... i was so sad... ranmaru we're not friends anymore/.... you suck... you killed my best girl... we um, did make a grand total of 175 save files though, so at some point me and the friend i played with are gonna go back and scrub through anything and everything that we missed. maybe after we do the side stories though, not sure yet. reko yabusame i swear to god i will crawl into the screen and kill ranmaru myself for you. i will save you. i love you so much mwah

for years ive only known midori as The Guy That Kids On Danganronpa Discourse Instagram Put Overdramatic Yet Also Somehow Extremely Haphazard Trigger Warnings on every post that included him, so i was really excited to meet him. and boy he did not disappoint this guys NUTS!!! HES CRAZAY!!!!!!!! he has such a perfectly striking look about him. i love how he almost never stops looking straight at you, and how his suit is stark black so it obscures a lot of his shape when he's in the dark, its so cool. they absolutely nailed the atmosphere whenever you're around this guy.

but the first jumpscare when he like reaches out at you from the coffin just kinda made me laugh. me when i get you

also, if you're this far in to care about my opinions on games you probably know that i am Known Danganronpa V3 Hater. i think in particular Kokichi Ouma is way too good of a character for how dogwater the game's actual plot is, and Shin Tsukimi, while not being the same, obviously, scratches that itch of a guy trapped in a death game that spends all his time lying and living under a persona because he's afraid of dying perfectly While Being In A Game That Doesnt Make Me Feel Like Eating Sheet Metal . i love this dude and his ugly several clashing colors outfit. he wants my ass like mega dead right now but thats not important surely

also, i think its sweet that joe and sara are just best friends and they rarely ever even entertain the idea that they had romantic feelings for each other. i think its extra sweet and tragic that joe was able to tell sara he loved her in the end, meaning it as his best friend. and the way the game completely ceases showing you flashbacks of him after that point and just lets the image of the hallucinations replace his actual memory overtime is so good and haunting. this doubled down by the way her memory of him is completely locked up as soon as she starts trying to actually remember the way he really was, its so good.

i think thats all i have to say for now, but umm!!! really really good im excited to go back and fill in the gaps i missed. especially regarding kanna becasue i have a lot of theories about her that i hope im on the right track about #lol. but even if i dont i want to see her i miss her. yaay!!! i love when video games are good. i love you video games.

ill probably make more posts down the line with more thoughts after i let them marinade in my brain for a while... mostly when i have thoughts ive been sending them to the friend im playing with so we can discuss theories together LOL

[justahopelessaromantic]

Upgraded Voices In My Head (Ch. 5: Michael makes an entrance)

Fandom: Be More Chill: The Musical Ships: Boyf riends and Squipemy Links to Chapters 1, 2, 3, and 4 Summary: Jeremy, for the most part, was okay with the effects of accidentally drinking Mountain Dew. Having an upgraded Squip that's no longer a complete douche-bag (okay, he was still a little shitty, but nothing too unbearable)? Cool. Squip playing matchmaker for him and his multiple crushes? Awesome. Falling in love with said Squip? Not exactly ideal.

Dropping down to the final step, Jeremy swiveled around to awkwardly lean against the soda-stained arm of a battered sofa (the Squip would have to convince him to dispose of that later), all while never taking his eyes off the rather uncomfortable advanced AI. He stared the boy down for a few moments in a (successful, if his host’s increased fidgeting was any indication) attempt at intimidation before shuddering, a wave of cold electricity running up his spine, and snapped back in hopes of distracting from his darkening cheeks, air sudden too hot and room too cramped (especially with the gremlin huddled in one of the couch’s corner and gripping the controller so hard his nails were digging into its plastic sides, music blaring from his oversized headphones so loud it was audible even from where they stood as glossed over eyes fixated themselves on crude low poly pixel art). 

“What?” He sneered, practically baring his fangs and catching the human off guard before he mentally scrambled for a reply that didn’t reveal how shamelessly he’d been checking the computer out.

“I, uh, I was just wondering why, um, why you’re human form still looks kinda like Keanu Re-oof!” Before Jeremy could finish, his guest ripped off his headphones, threw them on the woolen carpet, and tackled him in a warm hug, flinging them both into the sofa cushion and wiping the hostile interaction clean from the host’s mind. The Squip, eyeing the home intruder visitor cautiously, silently slipped behind the stairs as Jeremy reciprocated the hug, burying his face in his friend’s soft shoulder for a soft moment before beaming a warm smile at him. “Michael! Holy shit, it’s so good to see you, man. How come you’re home early?”

“Our flight back got cancelled so we took an early one home. The trip was still hella gnarly though. God, you woulda loved it, man! We’re taking you with us next time, I promi...whoooooa, wait...” Eerie silence pierced through enthusiasm to reveal concern as he finally took in Jeremy’s new apprentice in full. The gamer gently cupped his reddening face with one hand, gingerly thumbing over the fresh scar, along with a few stray acne bumps, on his cheek and brushing the soft curls dangling in front of his bandages out of the way. “Dude, what...happened?” Startled by the sudden intimacy, he bashfully turned to the side to avoid his friend’s intense stare and explained what led to the mess that was last night, taking particular care to leave out the face planting like a moron bit and being practically coddled by his dotting Squip before standing back up and bracing himself for Michael’s reaction.

“...Well,...yeah, but...you’re good now, right?” He pried, poking and prodding a now heavily flustered Jeremy’s face in search of any \ injuries he might’ve missed. “‘Cause I don’t think I could ever forgive myself if something serious happened just ‘cause I wasn’t here to, like, nag you about taking care of yourself n’ shit.”

Jeremy's eyes widened before they shifted to the floor, his hands beginning to fidget again (Squip would have to deal with that later). “Aw, c’mon, Micky, y-you know you don’t have to worry about me.” The jet lag from his wonky trip hours ensured that Michael did not have the time, nor the energy, to explain why that sentence took the prize for Biggest Understatement of the Decade. ”I’m totally fine! I mean, my head is givin’ me hell and I’m fucking starving, but, like, besides that Squip says I’ll be fine, so, uh, yeah.” He spat out, earning an overly drawn-out sigh of relief from his player 1 who slumped back into his seat.

“Oh, thank god!” Shoulders dropping, Michael leaned back against his friend and let out a sigh. “Man, you are so fucking lucky you’re not hurt for real, Jer. You pull a stunt like that again and I won’t hesitate, bi-wait did you say squip?” The other nodded casually before Michael shot him a curious look.

“Oh, right! Okay,..” He shot up out of his seat and swiftly grabbed Michael’s sleeve, ripping him up from the couch to reveal a stone-faced, cleanly dressed man that the player 1 could only describe as a stylish and almost threatening version of “chill” personified practically staring into his soul, while Jeremy hooked himself onto the man’s arm, vibrating with an almost childlike excitement. It vaguely reminded him of the joy that the player 2 radiated after finally asking Christine out or finding out about how to silence Squip's excessive internal nagging with a Mountain Dew red binge (the irony between that last example and the situation at hand did not escape Michael) “So! This is my-”

“Squip.” He interjected, extending an arm in search of a handshake while silently bracing himself to touch a most likely greasy and calloused hand. “Shorthand for super quantum unit Intel processor. You must be Michael. Truly a...” Closing his eyes and grimacing, he forced out his best, almost like the words stung. “...pleasure...to meet you, sir. Jeremy has told me many oh, for god sakes, why do you humans insist on throwing things at me today!?” The hologram groaned, bending over to pick up the thrown Xbox controller that had phased through him and place it back on top of its console while Jeremy ran to Michael’s side.

Failing to apprehend his friend due to his less-than-stellar strength (see: noodle arms), he opted for a more reason-based persuasion, muting the voice inside his head nagging on about how the emotion-driven best friend would probably just dismiss anything he said when dealing with something this serious.

“Dude, what the hell is your problem!?”

Micheal gave his friend a baffled look before pointing at the hologram. “That! That thing is the source of like...85% of all my problems.”

“I assume the other 15% stem from your raging idiocy, correct?”

Before Michael could bite back with a “Fuck off, you satanic tic tac!” or something equally unclever, Jeremy glared at his Squip before overprotective wrapping his arms around Michael, whose eyes widened at the sudden contact, and pulling him close, taking a half step back from the program. “Hey, cool it, dude! That’s, like, my favorite person you’re talking about.”

The Squip cringed at the young adult’s poor taste. “That’s your favorite person?” Clearly, he didn’t have much competition for the title.

...not that he wanted it, of course.

“Oh, yeah, uh, sorry about that. I swear, he’s usually not...” Jeremy studied the almost bloodthirsty look in the eyes of his kicking and screaming friend as he clawed frantically at the offending Intel processor. “...like this.” 

“I should hope not. Spending too much time around someone so...” The computer program circled around the calmer yet still scouring teen, combing over every inch of him with his electronic scanners. “...juvenile would hinder my objective.” 

“Suck a dick, asshole!”

The Squip only blinked. “I hope you know you’re only proving my point.”

“I hope you know you’re a defective piece of shit.”

A harsh, palpable silence fell over the room as Michael slumped into his player two’s arms in gradual exhaustion, and said player loosened his grip subtly and unwittingly leaned toward his Squip, his wide eyes frantically picking apart each pixel. Simulated breath hitching, the Squip froze for so long, Jeremy had time to toy with the idea that he might be glitching. The last time Jeremy saw him project glossy, shifting eyes, shaky hands, and a loss for words (God knows that thing never shut up) was during the glimpse he caught moments before passing out from the shock of The Play™. Back then it’d only been there as a last-ditch attempt to draw sympathy out of Jer in vain hopes of reactivation, but there was no reason for it now, considering the lack of real, high-stakes threat (Unless you counted Michael and, quite frankly, he knew the Squip was smart enough not to). The first time was a dull shock to Jeremy’s system.

The second only stirred up a vague sense of concern he was sure the Intel processor saw.

The Squip, of course, couldn’t have that.

[tarisilmarwen]

Ahsoka "Shadow Warrior" Liveblog

*biting nails*

Okay first off, really? That's the title we're going with? Lol Filoni. Okay.

Open on Seatos, okay.

You know it just occurred to me? The long lingering shots we're so fond of, and the deliberately relaxed pacing are very animesque.

Theatrical serious anime, I mean.

In particular I'm thinking of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time, which liked to diverge from the plot to just kind of wander through shots of the environment, for atmosphere purposes I guess.

Wonder if that or something similar was an influence on Filoni's directing style.

The woods also look very ethereal.

Hi Hera!

Frick Jacen is still so precious. I love him. So much.

!!!

Oh! Oh this music cue right here reminds me a lot of a specific part of "Sabine Sees Ezra".

HUYANG IS SAD, NOOOOOOOO.

God, how much death has Huyang already seen? How many Jedi has Huyang had to say goodbye to?

He misses the Order so much. *sobs*

Friiiiiiiiiiiiick the World Between Worlds looks so GOOD in live action.

Rosario finally channeling a bit of Rebels!Ahsoka here.

"Tell me what's going on." Well Ahsoka I think the Force is personally whacking you over the head with the Vision Stick to make you get over yourself.

Oooh Ahsoka flinched when Anakin ignited his saber.

Leia mention! Eeee!

Jacen is totally Force Sensitive, of course. Can hear the lightsabers, either the lingering echos from the fight, OR, he can hear into Ahsoka's vision.

KANAN NAMEDROP.

WEEEEEP.

Anakin being super extra of course.

HO JEEZ.

HE SLICED THE PATHWAY.

Yeah, so with this transition this is definitely a Force Vision, not the actual World Between Worlds. This is almost exactly like the transitions in Ezra's visions in the Jedi Temple on Lothal.

BABY 'SOKA!

BAAAAABBYYYYY 'SOOOOOOOKKAAAAAA.

Is this one long TCW reference?

I feel like it's gotta be.

"We lost so many." Yeeeeeah, that'll happen in a war. It sucks.

Ohhhhhhhh I am going to have to reblog ALL THE META about these scenes, aren't I?

I just know TCW fans have got a million thoughts centerfuging in their brains right now about Anakin, about his relationship with Ahsoka, about the long shadow he cast over her formative development.

FRICK THAT SHOT OF ANAKIN CALMLY WALKING AHEAD INTO THE HAZE.

"THE HERO WITH NO FEAR".

AND THE FLASH SHOT TO VADER.

Outside the vision and the X-wings are sweeping, looking for...? Ahsoka I guess. Because that's what they're going to find, eventually.

"Normally no." LOL HUYANG KNOWS FORCE SHENANIGANS BE AT PLAY.

Also Hera, come on, you saw Ezra phase through a solid rock wall, people can absolutely disappear into thin air.

Chopper being a grouchy sassmaster as per usual lol.

SEIGE OF MANDALORE SIEGE OF MANDALORE SIEGE OF MANDALORE.

"Within you will be everything I am." THAT IS NOT REASSURING ANAKIN.

Oh yeah, yep, I'm not going to be capable of being normal about this, I need ALLLLLLLL the meta from dedicated Anakin girlies on this one.

Frick, his eyes went yellow.

Hayden is making this look effortless, amazing.

OHHHHHHHH OH AHSOKA'S EYES FLASHED EYLLOW JUST BRIEFLY OHHHHHH WOW.

SHE PASSED THE TEST.

Ohhhhhhh and the pathways are dissolving, something Force Weird be about to happen.

We're exiting the vision lol.

Jacen: *smiles*

Me: HE'S SO PRECIOUS IMMA DIE.

Oh yeah no, this episode was VERY heavily styled after some theatrical anime director, I will bet money on it.

Frick, Jacen playing with Chopper is the cutest shit ever.

WHITE ROBES WHITE ROBES THIS IS NOT A DRILL.

Yeah no, the height discrepancy between Rosario and Mary still bugs me.

Hello Rosario can emote, lol.

PURRGIL!

:(((((

~We're gonna follow the purrgil, we're gonna follow the purrgil.~

"That'll do." ARE WE GONNA RIDE SOME PURRGIL? LOL.

Teva is carrying this scene lolol.

"Okay. But you're not gonna believe me."

"How the whales took Ezra and the bad guys far far away." SOBBING, BLUBBERING, NO NOTES, CAN'T TALK.

Well this part is definitely Miyezakian.

Ahsoka looks so much happier and more content. *sobs*

Lol the "HO BOY" look on that Rebel commander's face.

Aw man, this is the kind of wonder and disbelief and awe that Lothal must have had in the finale.

Living legends. Like magic. Come to save them.

FRIIIIIIIIICK.

I HAVE NO NOTES.

I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT TO SAY.

HELLO YES, THIS IS THE FORM THAT I WAS WAITING FOR. THE DEPTH OF EMOTIONAL RESONANCE. THE PSYCHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF WHO THIS CHARACTER IS, WHAT COMPLEXES SHE'S WORKING THROUGH, HOW SHE'S GOING TO RECONCILE HER IDENTITY AS VADER'S APPRENTICE AND MOVE FORWARD, FORGIVE HERSELF FOR THE GUILT.

I AM ROLLING IN THE DEPTHS OF IT.

ALSO, SPACE MARINERS, SPACE MARINERS, SPACE MARINERS.

AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!

[ivysmidnightramblings13]

Hey there! I saw your Wylde brothers headcanons and I was wondering if you could do one for Vert pleaseee?

Yes of course! :)

Vert Wheeler NSFW Alphabet

Summary: A NSFW Alphabet drabble for the character Vert Wheeler from Hot-Wheels Acceleracers

Warnings: Sex...duh. This is my own take on the character btw...all characters portrayed as 18+

Notes: I don't write these very much, but what the anon wants, the anon gets lol! Hopefully it's somewhat in character

A = Aftercare (what they’re like after sex)

He's clingy and a sweetheart. He'll make sure you are comfortable and cozy, have some water to drink, and snacks nearby. He'll tuck you in or pull you close and pull a blanket over the two of you. He's content and kissing the top of your head.

B = Body part (their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

He's got washboard abs, he's a skater and surfer, best believe his whole body is built like a greek god! But he also loves his hair and is very particular about it.

He loves your hands and lips and the sound of your voice. He's clingy and loves holding you and listening to you talk and showing you his tricks and just being around you and your touch.

C = Cum (anything to do with cum, basically)

He has no issues, he'll cum on you or in you, hell he loves making you an absolute mess

D = Dirty secret (pretty self explanatory, a dirty secret of theirs)

He's totally fucked on his surfboard in the middle of the water. Honestly, he thinks about it a lot with you. The sun setting or rising in the sky, the sound of the waves crashing, the sun glittering across your wet skin. Is it practical? No. Doable? Maybe. But it seems so peaceful in theory.

E = Experience (how experienced are they? do they know what they’re doing?)

He's experienced, he knows what he's doing a little too well. He knows where to hold you, push you to get you squirming. But he gets nervous if he really really likes you.

F = Favorite position (this goes without saying)

He's a simple man, Doggy or Cowgirl/boy, really anything that makes it easy to grab your hips and watch or hold onto you

G = Goofy (are they more serious in the moment? are they humorous? etc.)

He's bound to say a few jokes or tease you a bit

H = Hair (how well groomed are they? does the carpet match the drapes? etc.)

Very well groomed, he waxes sometimes, but his hair is like super soft, even though he uses way too much product. His hair is a nice strawberry blonde everywhere.

I = Intimacy (how are they during the moment? the romantic aspect)

He's like a puppy and will do anything you want, within reason, but he also loves taking control and kissing you and cuddling you and wrapping himself around you.

J = Jack off (masturbation headcanon)

Yeah he's definitely done it more than once, but with you he only does it if he absolutely has to...like if he hasn't seen you for days or weeks at a time for some reason

K = Kink (one or more of their kinks)

I'm not sure of any specific kinks (any ideas?), but scratch up his back or arms and leave nail marks. You'll get a huge reaction and response...and he'd secretly love to make you watch him fuck you in the mirror.

L = Location (favorite places to do the do)

His car or room, he's not picky though. Maybe a beach at the end of the day. As long as you're comfortable, he doesn't really care.

M = Motivation (what turns them on, gets them going)

Confidence and humor, if you share a love for the same things as he does or is better at it than he is, he loves someone he can have a good time with, someone supportive, and can slowly shift activities with seamlessly

N = No (something they wouldn’t do, turn offs)

He refuses to hurt you by leaving marks on you that will be permanent, or possibly make you sick. He doesn't want to do anything that will make you uncomfortable or vulnerable. He's really mellow and go-with-the-flow

O = Oral (preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc.)

He loves giving, watching you squirm under his finger work or tongue work, he's honestly so good at it and is pleased when you're pleased

P = Pace (are they fast and rough? slow and sensual? etc.)

A mix of the both, slow when he's teasing and joking, or if you'd prefer he stay slow, but he loves it rough and fast...whichever gets the biggest reaction out of you he'll stick with

Q = Quickie (their opinions on quickies, how often, etc.)

He loves them just as much as a proper moment, but something about the thrill of being caught or seen really drives him over the edge, and best believe he's doing it whenever he gets the chance to rile you up and get you flustered if you're comfortable of course

R = Risk (are they game to experiment? do they take risks? etc.)

He's up for anything once, maybe he'll discover something new he likes or is good at, he's an adrenaline junky

S = Stamina (how many rounds can they go for? how long do they last?)

He's very active, and is always surfing or skating in his free time, so this man has so much energy. He will go round after round until he and you are satisfied. Each round is quite lengthy and intense, so you might only get through 2.

T = Toys (do they own toys? do they use them? on a partner or themselves?)

He's bought them on a dare, but hasn't used them on himself...he's used them with past partners, but to be honest he's kinda too nervous and/or traumatized

U = Unfair (how much they like to tease)

He's kinda an ass, he loves teasing and making stupid comments, and most of them don't land or make sense. He'll laugh it off, or apologize, whichever is needed.

V = Volume (how loud they are, what sounds they make, etc.)

He looks like he'd be a whimperer, but he's actually pretty quiet, he kinda just gets into a zone and spaces out, if anything he's giving praise and a little dirty talk.

W = Wild card (a random headcanon for the character)

Whenever you say the word "fuck" whether you're annoyed or frustrated or whatever context, he follows it up by saying "me". He thinks it's funny, it's not, it's just corny.

X = X-ray (let’s see what’s going on under those clothes)

Above average, it's got some girth

Y = Yearning (how high is their sex drive?)

It's not that high, but when he's in the mood, he is in the mood. Like total shift on the horniness scale and if he can get his hands on you and you're also in the mood you're done for

Z = Zzz (how quickly they fall asleep afterwards)

He falls asleep pretty quick, kisses you on the forehead and makes sure you're comfortable, but then he's out! And he sleeps like a rock.

[bigfan-fanfic]

So who was your gay awakening? If your like me and can’t remember one in particular who are some people/characters you can safely point the finger at?

Okay. Some men that 2008-2014 me was Definitely Not Normal about. I only really realized my own gayness around 2014, so these are the guys it became clear to me that I was actually crushing really hard on but before I realized I liked men in That Way.

Thor/Chris Hemsworth (first appearance 2011) - mythology? love it. hunks? love em. sexy accents? yes please. Put em all together and I'm a goner. Totally in love with Thor from the word go, and Chris Hemsworth was so charming and handsome that I even watched that stupid Red Dawn remake for him.

Gwaine (first appearance 2010) - ahhh, a cute scruffy guy with a playful sense of humor? Yeeeeeee. I was never into Merlin or Arthur the way so many seemed to be, but Gwaine pushed all the buttons I didn't know I had.

Chrom (first appearance 2012) - himbo prince that's moral and loving and even if you play a male Robin, you get a really deep relationship with him that can still read as romantic even with his literal wife right there. I love himmmmmm and he was one of the last nails in the coffin of presumed straightness-until-proven-gay

Steve Rogers/Chris Evans (first appearance 2011) - Steve grew on me over time, mostly due to Chris Evans' charm and sincerity in the character. I think I'd like him as a character less if a different or less-skilled actor played him - I mean, you know, the last part of The First Avenger where Steve sacrifices himself and says goodbye to Peggy is the only MCU movie scene I genuinely cried at. It never occurred to me until later that I had a crush on him.

Prince Phillip (I first remember seeing Sleeping Beauty in 2008) - Okay, he's cute, sweet, funny... and he spends a good portion of the movie tied up, so... yeah.

Bucky Barnes/Sebastian Stan (2014) - Probably the final nail in my coffin. He's just so cute and hot that I'm still happy about him haha

Obi-Wan Kenobi/Ewan McGregor (first remember seeing Attack of the Clones in 2009-2010) - it was the sexy jedi mullet. He's sooooo pretty and his accent slips through his RP voice as Obi-Wan sometimes and it's yum.

Haru (was only able to watch all the episodes of atla when my family got netflix because we didn't get nick and I had to watch it all scattered at my grandmother's, so around 2009) - hehe, was anyone else really interested in Haru the way I was? Long hair, moral and cute in the right ways. Didn't love his mustache later but he's still a hottie.

August Booth (first appearance 2012) - Forget Hook, August was the bad boy that I fixated on from Once Upon a Time. Not really sure why, but I just liked him a whole lot more.

[yangxiaolongprotectionsquad]

Some stand out things to me that were DEFINITELY overshadowed by the most tender, soul-restoring, gorgeous, stunning confession to ever be conceived and executed, in no particular order:

1. I know some ppl are unhappy abt Weiss being down bad for Jaune now but I personally think it’s fucking HILARIOUS and the way RBY were all 🤨 was amazing. Jaune fr looks good…. “MATURE” LMFAOOO Weiss really put on her clown shoes and I love her for that

2. I don’t think anyone thought Alyx’s story was going to be totally accurate but DAMN. Writing her kind brother out of the story entirely, sacrificing him to return to Remnant, poisoning Jaune? What a twist.

It shines an entirely new light on her interactions with those in the Ever After. The Crimson King ascended into a colossal shithead because of how she beat him—no wonder he resents humans so much. I think it’s likely that she cheated to win, so when he came back it was with a vengeance. I wonder at how she and Louis were raised to become opposites?

3. The Curious Cat is basically Ozpin. A helpful if eccentric guide at first, that eventually is forced to confront a painful reality. What really makes the connection stand out is how the Cat deflects by saying things like, “You never asked,” regarding the brother. They both technically don’t lie outright but they do withhold crucial information that would change how the others would perceive them and the world.

I fucking LOVE the parallels man. The nail in the coffin was when the Curious Cat left after admitting Alyx played them. I’m certain the cat will return in some way or another, like Ozpin.

4. Ruby. Oh dear, Ruby. She’s been lost ever since she fell. Literally of course, but mentally, too. She doesn’t know her purpose, her role, her reason to keep going when Salem is out there with two relics and the situation appears hopeless. Volume 8 was a massive pill to swallow, and her plan failing has had horrible consequences. She’s at a crossroad, (lol), because she needs to be a leader.

She can’t doubt herself, she can’t fail, she has everyone relying on her and that burden has never been heavier than it is right now. It’s crushing her, so she’s trying to lighten that load by erasing pieces of herself. Ruby gave away her emblem. Penny’s sword.

Her beloved Crescent Rose, a PART of her, at least symbolically, being given back to her by Jaune, offers ZERO reassurance. Worse still, just looking at it fills her with dread. It’s a symbol of every burden she’s shouldered and every battle she’s fought.

Jaune returning Crescent Rose is akin to him saying, “We need to keep going, to keep fighting.”

And Ruby Rose, the optimistic hero and legend straight out of a fairy tale, wishes she could just disappear.

SO YEAH. That’s my incoherent analysis. I think volume 9 has already become my favourite, and EDDY RIVAS. It cannot be said enough how amazing the script was. Truly. The animators went ballistic. The concept and background designers? They served us a 5 star meal. Miles is SLAYING as an older Jaune, who is both familiar and yet distinctly different. Lindsey, Kara, Arryn, and Barb continue to give us incredible performances.

HOW COULD I NOT MENTION CASEY AND MARTIN??? Banger after certified banger. Give me the album.

Thank you, CRWBY. For everything. I knew you’d deliver but you’ve outdone yourselves. That’s all I can say for now, but I’ve deadass had a smile glued on my face since I watched the ep, and you should know that.

[total-drama-takes-takes-2]

tti episode 15

“Last time on Total Takes Island: The remaining competitors finally made the merge and competed in an ultimate test of endurance. Patrick and Ass were brought back to the island, stirring up some old trouble. In the end, Courtney won immunity, and Scruffy took the walk of shame, leaving their friend Julia with some peculiar parting words. Will the remaining campers survive to see another challenge? Will Bonnie and Courtney stay safe in the game? Find out now- on Total! Takes! Island!”

According to previous weather forecasts, this particular morning is bound to be sunny, with a mild breeze and a warm but not-too-hot temperature- the perfect challenge conditions. According to Chris McLean’s brand new automated weather machine, it’s snowing. 

“What is this?” Julia asks upon opening the curtains on one of the small windows in the former Anon’s cabin (where all the girls and such had recently been moved post-merge). 

“What’s what?” Bonnie groans, not even lifting their head from their pillow. 

Michael murmurs something indistinct in the bunk above them and rolls over. Ass lifts up their sleeping mask to see what the commotion is, and then pulls it back on, putting in a pair of earbuds playing an audiobook retelling of the Peloponnesian war. 

“It’s snowing,” Julia remarks dryly, stepping away from the window to show everyone. 

Kelly raises an eyebrow. “How can it be snowing? It’s June?”

“You know, my second aunt Tracey is a top meteorologist, or um… yeah, that’s right!” Staci says, hopping out of bed to look outside. “I bet I could figure this out!”

“It’s probably just Chris,” Michael sighs, turning back over. “Can we go back to bed?”

“What if we get snowed in and miss the challenge?” Kelly asks. 

Bonnie grumbles. “You mean what if you get snowed in and miss the challenge. It’s all for one, remember?” 

“Whatever. This is lame, I’m getting breakfast,” Julia sighs, putting on the warmest clothing she brought (which admittedly isn’t much) and beaming brightly. “Wanna come, Mikey?”

Michael lifts her head and raises an eyebrow. “Um… yeah, I guess. And don’t call me that,”

---

MICHAEL: “Funny how as soon as Scruffy is gone Julia wants to be friends again, isn’t it?”

---

The boy’s and such cabin is deathly quiet this morning as the only remaining male campers don’t exactly have anything nice to say to each other. They’ve already staked out on opposite corners of the room, Max taking the middle right bunk, McLovin taking the top left and Patrick taking the bottom left. None speak to each other until McLovin walks outside without looking and lands face-first in the thick blanket of snow beneath the porch roof. 

“Snow?” Patrick asks plainly. “Not possible. It’s June.”

Max rolls his eyes. “Nice deduction, Sherlock,” before layering another blazer on and walking out into the cold. 

Chris’ voice blares over the speakers. “Good morning, campers! Lovely weather we’re having! Meet me in the amphitheater for today’s challenge in an hour!”

McLovin shivers violently as he stands, just for Patrick to shove him again while passing by. 

---

Ass files their nails in the communal bathrooms, turning them into pointed claws while casually listening to their audiobook and chewing gum. The doors open and Kelly walks in, dragging a snow-covered portable tanning bed behind them. Ass doesn’t offer to help. 

“Morning! What’re you listening to?”

They ignore them at first. 

“What’re you listening to?” Kelly repeats, assuming Ass simply didn’t hear them. 

They sigh, and take out the earbuds. “One Direction,”

“Oh, I love One Direction! I love everyone, honestly, there are no bad genres,” Kelly remarks with a huff as they drag their tanning bed to the right spot. “Wouldn’t you say?”

“Whatever,”

Ass turns and watches as Kelly plugs in the machine. It fizzles to life with short bursts of electricity around the already-blackened outlet. They sigh. 

“You want some advice?”

“Ooh, sure!”

“You may have had that airheaded doofus for the easy part of the competition, but this is serious stuff now. Compared to who’s left, you’re not exactly the sharpest knife in Chef’s kitchen, you know? And I’m trying to etch out the strongest first, so you staying in the game is a mutually beneficial arrangement, wouldn’t you agree?”

Kelly thinks for a moment, eyebrow raised. “Um… sure,”

“Then let me give you some pointers. Just between us girl friends, right?”

---

Michael looks relatively unbothered in her parka as the rest of the campers shiver around her, hugging themselves and curling their knees up to their chests. McLovin’s teeth chatter. Chris stands in the center of the stage, dressed in mountaineering gear and holding a pair of skis. 

“Now, normally this challenge calls for a pirate theme- however, someone lost our costume bin,” he glares at Chef, who’s on a snowmobile some feet away. He rolls his eyes. “So today, we’re going full-on mountain expedition!” Chris steps out of the way, revealing a lumpy mass covered by a tarp, which he promptly pulls off. Under it are a few locked coolers. “You’ll be exploring around the frozen island to find the keys to open these chests- one of which holding the key to your invincibility!”

The crowd murmurs in relative excitement, though almost everyone is still shivering. Chef distributes a few flimsy parkas (for legal reasons) before handing everyone a clue card for their keys. 

Julia stares down at hers. Chef’s fridge. “Aren’t these supposed to be winter themed, or something?”

“They are,” Chris grins. Chef walks out in a santa costume, holding a butcher’s knife with a mistletoe taped on it. Julia swallows a lump in her throat and turns to Michael. 

“Hey, bestie! Tradesies?”

“Um… no, thanks. I’ll take my chances with the frozen pond by the cabins,”

“Awww, come on, please?” Julia pouts. “Isn’t this what friends are for?”

A flash of annoyance crosses Michael’s face. “Fine,” she nabs Julia’s clue and replaces it with hers, then storms off. 

Patrick rolls his eyes at the commotion, nudging Ass with his elbow. “Heh. Women, right?”

"Tell me about it. Those two are getting on my nerves,"

Max gives Ass and Patrick an annoyed glance and takes a long step away before looking at his clue. “This is just a pine tree. There are thousands of them on this island!”

“Better start looking then, dude,” Chris chuckles. 

“Oh, I can help!” Kelly beams, running over and placing a hand on Max’s shoulder. He gives her an odd look. 

“Fine,”

“Yay!”

---

KELLY: “Since Austin is gone now, I have to start taking things more seriously- that’s what Ass says, anyway. I don’t think I trust them fully, yet, but some of the things they say make sense. I need allies, and smart ones!”

---

“Hey, I thought we were gonna team?” Staci asks, a dejected tone in her voice. 

Kelly winks. “I have a master plan. I’ll tell you later!”

Staci watches Kelly walk off with Max and frowns, then turns to the remaining competitors. She steps up to a still-shivering McLovin and peers over his shoulder at his clue. “What’s that supposed to be?” 

He sighs. “It’s a polar bear,”

“There are polar bears on the island?”

Chris shouts. “Specially imported!”

“Hm,” Staci thinks for a moment. “How about this? I’ll help you with yours, if you help me with mine.”

“What’s yours?”

Staci holds up their clue, an embellished image of an ice block. “Can’t be any harder than a polar bear, right?”

---

Courtney walks through the barely-cleared off path in the woods alone, humming to themselves while holding their clue in their pocket. A hike up the mountain- how hard could it be? Just a few hours walk and they’d be back at the amphitheater in time for lunch. 

They approach a fork in the woods, looking to the path diverging right before suddenly bumping into something hard. “Ow!”

“Hey!” Someone yells. Courtney regains their composure and looks over, seeing Bonnie arrive from the opposite direction. “Oh. Hey.”

“Hi. Not with anyone?”

“Nope. I’m flying solo now,”

“Oh. Me, too,” 

Bonnie nods. “Mhm,”

Courtney nods back. “Uh-huh,”

And with that they awkwardly wave goodbye and start on their separate ways. 

---

COURTNEY: “In a way I’m grateful Bonnie also wants to go their own way now. I never had to break the news to them that we couldn’t be friends anymore. But on the other hand… Is it wrong to be disappointed that they never made a big deal about it?”

---

Kelly and Max walk along a beaten down backwoods trail that’s only been marked by a set of Chef’s boot prints the two have been following for what feels like hours. Kelly is humming a soft tune to themselves, braiding a strand of hair and trailing behind Max. 

He’s been continuously stopping and looking back and slowing down to accommodate them, and it’s beginning to get on his nerves. “Can you go any faster? We have a challenge to win,”

“We do?” Kelly asks sweetly, untying her hair to braid it again. 

“Don’t you want to find your key?”

They reach into their pocket and pull out a yellow metallic key. “This?”

Max’s jaw drops and he stares. “Where did you…?”

“Oh, somewhere back there,” Kelly shrugs, walking past Max as he looks at the ground, completely perplexed. 

---

KELLY: "Rule number 2: stay quiet and keep out of people's way!"

---

Ass watches from behind the snowy brush as Courtney passes, waiting until the coast is clear. Once they’re sure they’re alone, they slip their headphones back in and keep walking, arriving at the mess hall within minutes. 

The inside is dim, lit by candles and filled with the scent of pine. “Corny,” Ass remarks before taking a seat at one of the tables, which is covered in the fanciful feast from their clue card. A massive turkey, a ham, cranberry sauce, beans, casserole, mashed potatoes, three different puddings, and a fruit cake. 

Chef stands at the kitchen door, smiling wickedly. “Dig in,”

Ass smiles at the array before picking up a nearby candle holder, snuffing out the flame and using the silver stand to smash into the food. 

---

ASS: “I figured that Chris must’ve done something with the meal- laxatives or sleeping pills or something gross like that. I’m not taking my chances- the last thing I need right now is Chris walking out from behind a curtain and telling me all the food I just ate was actually made from cockroach parts and styrofoam.”

---

The ham- mush. The turkey- shredded. The cake- crumbled. The sides are reduced to shrapnel as Ass smashes through them. Chef shakes his head, then his eyes widen as they reach the green bean casserole. “Wait-”

A mini-landmine hidden in the dish goes off, sending Ass flying out the window and Chef into the kitchen. Michael opens the mess hall door, eyebrow raised at the charred and blackened interior and the bits of meat and beans everywhere. She walks into the kitchen, stepping over Chef’s unconscious body and opening the fridge to grab her key and walk out with a smile. 

Key in hand, Michael walks over to her original destination- the frozen pond between the cabins- and smiles slightly as she watches Julia scream and slide around on it, taking a seat to enjoy the spectacle. 

---

Kelly continues to drift behind Max as he scans the pine trees around the trail for any sign of his key. They’re rambling on about some asinine story Austin had told them, which is of no significance to Max, thus he tunes them out as he studies the treeline. 

A vague rumbling in the distance catches both of their attentions as they turn just in time to see a massive avalanche coming down the mountain side. 

Bonnie comes running in their direction. “MOVE!”

Max and Kelly comply, following them as a massive wave of snow crashes behind them. Bonnie gets far enough ahead to scale a tree to the top, their two runner-ups following shortly behind. The snow shakes the base of the pine, forcing everyone to cling on. Max watches in horror as a key falls from the canopy and gets lost in the river of snow. 

“NOOO!” he shouts. 

The avalanche eventually settles down, slowing to a grinding halt just as Courtney slides down on a makeshift sled made of tree bark. They groan. 

“Did you find your key?” Bonnie asks, panting. 

They shake their head. “You?”

They hold up a key from their pocket and sigh before falling from the tree to the snow, exhausted. Max grumbles something to himself and growls at Kelly when they attempt to comfort him. 

---

KELLY: “He’s not much like Austin, I don’t think, but it’s like Ass says! Rule number 3: don’t give up until you’ve exhausted every last resource!”

---

Kelly leans over and in one split-second, fatal swoop, they kiss him. Courtney winces and Bonnie, barely awake, makes a gagging sound. Max turns red and immediately tenses, his completely stiff body falling backwards from the tree branch into the snow. 

---

KELLY: “I, um... I may have gone a little overboard, ahah,”

---

COURTNEY: “Okay… gross. And wasn’t blondie dating that weird British guy?”

---

Bonnie sits in the confessional, pointing at their throat and gagging again. 

---

Ass walks over on snowshoes, sooty and blackened with their eyebrows burnt off but holding a key nonetheless. “What happened to him?”

Courtney makes a weak “Ummm” sound before Ass rolls their eyes and declares they don’t care while walking off. 

---

“Okay, on my count, I’ll run in with the fish and you’ll sneak behind the bear,” Staci says, on her elbows and knees in an army crawl. McLovin, sitting beside her with a hastily-knitted hat covering his stubbly head, nods. 

“One- two- three!” she yells, confidently popping up and running into the cave with a handful of fish. The resting polar bear inside wakes up and roars. 

---

STACI: “No, I wasn’t afraid. My great-great-great uncle Flavius was a bear trainer in the Russian circus,” they pause for a moment. “At least, I’m pretty sure. I’ve been a little scrambled since yesterday, I’m trying to keep the pieces together. But... I’m still Staci, aren’t I?”

---

A flash of fear crosses Staci’s face and they scream, running out of the cave with the bear in pursuit. McLovin follows, shouting and waving his arms. 

---

Patrick casually walks down a path in the woods, in no certain rush. He reads his clue again- a simple image of a snowman. 

He smirks as he catches a flash of orange and red from behind the brush, and steps into a clearing to see not one- but dozens of snowmen. His face drops. 

---

Courtney and Bonnie carry a half-conscious Max back to camp, looking at each other nervously while he deliriously mumbles to himself. Kelly lags far behind, a guilty expression on their face. 

A scratched up and tired looking Staci arrives at the cabins with beat-up looking McLovin, who’s holding a snapped-in-half and hastily taped-back-together key. Michael- still sitting by the pond and watching Julia slide around, looks back as the two different groups arrive. “What happened?” she, Bonnie, and Staci ask in unison. 

“Bears,” McLovin sighs. “S-so many bears.”

“Well, just one, but it was like, really mad,” Staci continues. “What’s going on here?”

Courtney rolls their eyes. “Kelly kissed him,”

“Kelly did WHAT?” Michael and Staci shout in unison. 

---

STACI: “That was this big plan they couldn’t let me in on!? Seriously?! I would’ve kissed him… wait, no. I wouldn’t have. But Kelly could’ve kissed me! Why can’t I be a pawn?!”

---

MICHAEL: “I’m not mad! I’m not! I mean, it’s just insane! Kelly has to have some kind of mental disorder to do that. Who’d want to kiss Max? Not me! NOT me!”

---

“Oh, you are so out of here!” Michael shouts, pointing an accusing finger at Kelly. 

“What about Austin?! What about me?!” Staci sniffles. McLovin pats her shoulder to comfort her before collapsing backwards, his skin tinted blue. 

“What’s going on over here?” Julia pants, sliding onto shore with her key finally in hand. 

“NOTHING!” Kelly, Michael, and Staci yell in unison. Julia blinks. 

“Attention, campers! You have five minutes of hunting left- after that, report to the amphitheater for your prizes!”

The collective groans, and the camera zooms out to reveal Ass listening from behind the cabins. 

---

ASS: “Okay, that was beautiful. And I didn’t even intend for that to happen! This is too damn easy,”

---

“Alrighty, explorers, it’s time to claim your prizes! Everyone with a key, come forward,”

The crowd grumbles- Bonnie, Kelly, McLovin, Ass, Michael, Julia, and Scary approach. Julia turns to Scary, and then looks around. “Um… where have you been?”

“Playing the challenge, duh!” she snaps back. Julia raises an eyebrow. 

---

JULIA: “You know… maybe Scruffy was right. Maybe there really is something weirder happening on this island,”

---

Patrick walks in last, covered in scratches, dirt, and wet from the snow. Chris chuckles. “Woah, dude, what happened to you? You got the easiest card!”

He shrugs. “Bears,”

---

Brief flashback to the snowman clearing, where Patrick is sitting in the fetal position in the snow and sobbing. 

---

“Ooookay. Bonnie, go ahead,”

Bonnie tries their key on a cooler, which opens and reveals a shiny toaster. “Seriously?”

Michael tries hers next- nothing. Dud key. Ass and Scary have similar results, though only one of them goes on a monologue about what they had to go through to get it. 

McLovin gets a leg lamp. Kelly gets a bag of chips and a can of soda, which they offer to Michael and Staci as peace offerings. Michael crushes the bag and gives it to Julia (who’s other hand is occupied with an accordion) and Staci just whimpers and sobs. 

“Cute,” Patrick says, hoisting up a gift basket. “Tasteful. Very nice. And oh- lookie here,” he holds up an invincibility pass. Ass rolls their eyes. 

“Looks like Patrick is safe. The rest of you, I’ll see you all tonight at the campfire ceremony,” Chris chuckles. 

---

Julia walks up ahead of the group, watching Scary as they somersault to the campfire pit. Most of the snow had already melted by mid-afternoon, leaving only the cold wind chills and brief patches of ice to worry about. 

Michael jogs up to her. “Hey, I need to count on your vote for tonight. Bonnie and Courtney and I already chose someone,”

“Who?”

Michael whispers in Julia’s ear. She thinks for a moment. “Yeah, no. That’s not who Ass is voting for,”

“Seriously?” Michael snaps. She suddenly steps in front of Julia, blocking her path and lowering her voice. “You listen to me, and actually listen. I am done being your pawn. You’re only still in this because I have been carrying your sorry fake-blonde ass since the beginning. If you want to count on my allyship for the rest of the game, you’re voting with us. Otherwise, you’re next.”

Julia frowns deeply, seeming slightly intimidated for a second. 

---

JULIA: “Me? Scared of Michael? Can you imagine? But I… played along anyway, you know? I need the manpower and she’s been stepping out of line lately. Plus, I need to secure my place on the island until I figure out what's going on with Scary.”

---

“Fine. But tomorrow’s vote is my choice,”

“Fine!” and with that, Michael speeds up ahead. 

---

“Fun challenge today, huh?” Chris chuckles. The campers glare at each other. “Patrick won invincibility today, so he’s safe!” 

Patrick smirks from across the fire. 

“McLovin… Staci… Max… Ass… Scary… Bonnie… Courtney,”

“Julia… you’re safe,” Chris looks between the two remaining competitors. Michael glares at Kelly, who smiles nervously and gives a slight wave. “And the final marshmallow… goes to…”

The campers watch in anticipation- Ass rolling their eyes besides them. 

“Michael! You’re safe. Sorry, Kelly, you got played.” he chuckles.

Kelly sulks as they walk to the boat, head and shoulders hanging. Staci follows, running up the dock as they board. “I’m sorry, Kelly! But I couldn’t go on like this!” 

Kelly frowns. “I was a fool, I never should've listened to them. Can you ever forgive me?”

"Wait- who's them?"

"Ass... it's complicated..." Kelly sighs. "Can you forgive me?"

“Of course. I don’t blame you!” Staci says, tears in their eyes. “And I know Austin won’t either!”

“We’ll see!” Kelly yells as the boat takes off. “You’re my best friend!”

“You’re my best friend!” Staci shouts back before frowning deeply, a tear running down their cheek. 

---

STACI: “Okay, no more of this. No more fun, no more games, no more moping. The original Staci didn’t win, but you know what? I don’t have to follow canon. I can make my own rules. And this Staci says Ass is going down.”

---

[irish-urn]

Dasey on Broadway (Mixer’s Commentary)

Look out y’all, this is long. I’m serious: I’m putting it under a cut because it is 2700 words long.

Proud of Your Boy — Derek (duh)

It’s sung to his missing mom; because I am kinda low-key fascinated by their relationship (and because I think @dustinswill nailed it when they wrote: “George loves him but he doesn’t like him”)

“So say I’m slow for my age, a late bloomer, okay I agree…” Derek is fully aware that people think he’s stupid; he’s charming but he’s stupid and slow (which is amazing when you consider he’s probably born in late November…)

“Say I’m a goldbrick, a goof-off, no good; But that couldn’t be all that I am.” — because Derek IS amazing and he KNOWS he’s amazing, just… not in the ways that his parents want him to be.

“I’ll do my best, what else can I do? Since I wasn’t born perfect like Dad or you” — and here’s the kicker, because his parents are SO FLAWED and SO WRONG, but they’re still somehow still better than he is. Isn’t that the worst? He can’t even measure up to the most flawed people he’s ever met.

Everything Else — Casey (duh)

It’s honestly more the vibe than any particular lines, but it’s about Casey’s ache to get out, to succeed, to put on a performance so people don’t see her anxiety and pressures.

“You play ‘till it’s perfect, you play ‘till you ache; you play ‘till the strings or your fingernails break.” — You try and you try and you try and you try until you actually have nothing else to give.

I Never Planned On You / Don’t Come A’Knocking On My Door — Derek

LOOK. Derek didn’t want to be absolutely fascinated by Casey, okay? He still doesn’t believe in love at first sight, but he knows about attraction and curiosity; and he took one look at this girl with the retainer and the private schoolgirl outfit, and was hooked; which doesn’t make any sense!!! Because girls are fun, but nothing like this?!?!

“You are the most impossible boy — Shhh! — ever!” is the most Dasey-like interaction.

What is This Feeling? — DUET TIME

I don’t think I need to explain this. Because it’s SO THEM in early season 1. Especially when the way they’re feeling could easily be taken as extreme sexual tension. XD

“There’s a strange exhilaration in such total detestation: it’s so pure and so strong! Though I do admit it came on fast, still I do believe that it can last; And I will be loathing, loathing you my whole life long!”

Ladies’ Choice —Derek!!!

HE’S GOD’S GIFT TO THE WORLD, OKAY???? Which is fun, because that first song is about how he doesn’t think he measures up, but Derek is a mess of paradoxes and I love him so.

(He’s also a romantic, as we can see by the fact that the song ends with him wanting a relationship and love and family.)

Breathe — Casey

“It’s me: the biggest disappointment you know.” Basically the idea that Casey has all these expectations placed upon her and she doesn’t know if she can measure up to them; she’s gotta be enough for both parents and her grandmother, and now this whole other family and this new school; and I kinda pinpoint around the whole grade grubbing episode if we’re being honest, but it does linger for years and years.

Anything You Can Do — DUET TIME

I really don’t think I need to explain this either, except for how I LOVE that at the end, the guy yields to her talents, the same way Derek is always admitting defeat when Casey does beat him. It’s a game, alright?

A Guy That I’d Kinda Be Into — Casey

SO! This song is all about how the guy is SURE the girl is talking about having a crush on him, and then she says it’s this other guy. A couple of things about this song is:

(1) there is quite an argument that could be made about how Casey gets clumsy when she’s around DEREK and not Sam; and

(2) although Casey has no reason to trust Derek at this point or even confess anything about anything to him, “I guess a part of me wants to; I guess a part of me likes to talk to you; sit with you; hang with you…” Which… yeah! For all that Casey usually wants to strangle Derek, a part of her still wants to be his friend.

Dancing Through Life — Derek

NOT ONLY is this 15/16-year-old Derek’s philosophy on life — “No need to tough it when you can sluff it off as I do; Those who don’t try, never look foolish.” — but also the start of his and Kendra’s relationship, i.e.: “You’re perfect / You’re perfect / So we’re perfect together.” Because I do sincerely think that a good chunk of their relationship was based on popularity as opposed to genuine feelings.

When He Sees Me — Casey

SO! There’s a part of Casey that feels this way about dating: what if when he sees me, he doesn’t like me? “What if I give myself away only to get it given back?” Should I change a part of me to be more like what he would like? “I’m not defensive! I’m only being cautious.”

And what if when he does see me, the real me, he DOES like me? Damn, that’s even scarier… “Or even worse, he could be very nice, have lovely eyes, and make me laugh… Come out of hiding… What do I do with that?”

This, I think is about Scott AND Max, but mostly Max (and maybe even a bit of Derek): “If when he holds me, my heart is set in motion; I’m not prepared for that, I’m scared of breaking open.”

I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face — Derek

Something There — DUET TIME (but mostly Casey)

POOR DEREK. A combination of him actually realizing he has FEELINGS; starts off with Scott — “Damn, damn, damn, damn! I’ve grown accustomed to her face.” — and goes around to Max: “What a heartless, wicked, brainless thing to do. But she’ll regret it.” — It’s full of jealousy and hating what he’s feeling and trying to shake it off, because it can’t mean much, it must just be a small thing, BUT “I’m so used to hear her say, ‘Good morning’ every day.” But it’s okay, because “she’s a woman, and so easy to forget, rather like a habit one can always break— and yet.”

Casey realizing there’s something more to Derek, around the time he calls Dennis back for her and stands up at Smelly Nelly’s for her…

“There’s something sweet and almost kind; but he was mean and he was coarse and unrefined…”

“New… and a bit alarming; who’d have ever thought that this could be? True, that he’s no Prince Charming; but there’s something in him that I simply didn’t see…”

ALSO Derek: “No, it can’t be. I’ll just ignore… But then she’s never looked at me that way before.”

Fight for Me — Derek (XD)

BULLY BROTHERS!!!

“Could you face the crowd? Could you be seen with me and still act proud?”

“But I would fight for you if you would fight for me.” BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT THEY DO!!! THEY STAND UP FOR EACH OTHER!! THEY FIGHT FOR ONE ANOTHER!!

Also, also: “You can set my broken bones; and I know CPR.” Hey Case? Wanna make out?

ALSO ALSO: “Wow. You can punch real good. You lasted longer than I thought you would.” — CASEY PACKS A PUNCH!!! AND THESE FEELINGS HAVE LASTED A LOT LONGER THAN HE THOUGHT THEY WOULD!!!

Suddenly Seymour — DUET TIME

Post Truman’s Last Chance. Derek taking care of Casey.

“I’d meet a man and I’d follow him blindly.” AND “Seymour’s my friend.”

…which is the end of canon LWD and into…

I Won’t Say (I’m in Love) — Casey

A combination of “same difference” and what I imagine Casey would be going through.

“If there’s a prize for rotten judgment, I guess I’ve already won that.”

“No chance, no way, I won’t say it, no no.”

I Don’t Know How to Love Him — Casey

So THEN we get into Queen’s, and Casey is developing feelings and having a harder time denying them.

“He’s just a man.” Like: what is so special about Derek???? He’s just some guy???? He’s not actually that impressive; and Casey has had boyfriends, alright; they’re not that amazing.

But: “He scares me so.”

“If he said he loved me, I’d be lost, I’d be frightened.” — because Casey REMEMBERS ‘same difference’, and Derek and her are finally circling around this thing, but she’s not ready, she’s terrified.

If I Loved You — DUET TIME

And now both of them are circling around these feelings (I’m thinking second year of Queen’s?), and both are aware that the other has feelings but it’s scary and they’re kind of in denial and they’re not ready to admit it, but if they say it then it’s real, and...

Rewrite the Stars — DUET TIME

SO DEREK MAKES A MOVE. “It’s up to you and it’s up to me; no one can say what we get to be.”

…And Casey says no: “You know I want you; it’s not a secret I try to hide. But I can’t have you; we’re bound to break and my hands are tied.”

Satisfied — Casey

WHICH LEADS US TO THIS, where both Derek and Casey try to date other people for the rest of the time they’re at Queen’s. I imagine Casey sets him up with someone from the Dance Team or some charity she’s involved with; and she goes on dates with various guys. But neither are really happy because they can’t really give each other up — “At least I keep his eyes in my life.” — and it’s really not fair to the other parties, no matter how hard they try. Because: “He will never be satisfied; I will never be satisfied.”

You Must Love Me — Casey

SO: after a couple of years of this, I’m imaging Derek graduates and is living in Toronto: he bartends, he helps out his contacts with odd jobs, and he’s trying to get into the film industry with limited success (but he hasn’t given up yet); and Casey gets into a couple of different law schools. She does a semester in Montreal, but ends up transferring to Toronto and tracking down Derek because she misses him and, well…

“Where do we go from here? This isn’t where we intended to be.”

“Why are you at my side? How can I be of any use to you now? Give me a chance and I’ll let you see how nothing has changed.”

And finally… “You must love me.” Now that I’m finally admitting you, you must still love me.

First Date / Last Night — DUET TIME

SO THEY GO ON A DATE and it starts off awkward and bad because Casey is hopeful and scared and Derek is kinda still hurt and uncertain, because she said no before and what makes it different now? “Why the hell are you still here?”

And they can’t match up and it’s not great; “Don’t expect too much, just walk.”

But then, at the end, Casey makes a joke and he laughs and responds, and she’s laughing too; and they knock shoulders or kick at an ankle, and suddenly everything starts flowing…

Bad Idea — DUET TIME

AND THEN THE MORNING AFTER. Because it’s one thing to think it MIGHT be good, and another thing altogether to realize it IS good. And shit, this is a really bad idea, because of so many reasons; but damn Derek is good with his hands, and Casey is hot and a really good kisser, but “Let’s face it, making mistakes like this will make worse what was already pretty bad.” Because life is hard and Derek is struggling to get into film and Casey is drowning in law school, and it was already complicated and now there’s this; BUT IT'S SO GOOD??? and “no reason to throw it away when there’s love to be had.”

And finally, surrendering, “Hold me tight as I tell myself that you might make sense and make good what has been just so bad…”

Waterloo — DUET TIME

So they’re not really labeling it for a while until, well, one day they do. It’s real, it’s big, and it’s inevitable, “knowing my fate is to be with you.”

As Long As You’re Mine — DUET TIME

I dunno if this needs an explanation; like, “My wildest dreamings could not foresee lying beside you with you wanting me;” and “Say there’s no future for us as a pair; and though, I may know I don’t care.”

We Kiss in a Shadow — DUET TIME

They sneak around for quite a while. I always imagined that if they got together as older adults, like 24+, they would actually hide the relationship LONGER than if they were in university because it would be much easier TO hide it. In university, they have to go back to London for long periods of time: breaks and summer semesters. But as post-grads and living in their own city, their trips back would be a weekend here or there, and probably far more focused on spending time with Simon and Marti than anything else. So they have a secret relationship for a while, all the while wanting to come out…

“Alone in our secret, together we sigh, for one smiling day to be free.”

Take Me or Leave Me — DUET TIME

(last year, someone told me this was a Dasey song, and I haven’t gotten it out of my brain since)

So Derek asks if they can come out. “A tiger in a cage can never see the sun; this diva needs her stage.”

Casey says no, not yet: “I look before I leap; I love margins and discipline.”

So they fight, arguing (honestly, the list of Joanne’s flaws is the most Dasey thing ever), until finally:

“Guess I’m leaving; I’m gone.”

Seventeen — DUET TIME

…I don’t think it takes very long for Casey to come back and apologize. A few days? A week maximum? And even though they’re not 17 anymore (more like 25…), the concept is still the same: Why does this have to be so dramatic? Can’t it be simple? “Don’t you want a life with me?”

“Yeah, we’re damaged / badly damaged / But your love’s too good to lose.”

“I’ll stay if I’m what you choose.” I’ll come out and fight by your side. Let’s do this.

Kristoff Lullaby — Derek

…This is Derek admitting he’s in love. It’s just… So lovely. “You’re what I know about love.”

I’m in Love with a Wonderful Guy — Casey

CASEY IS SO HAPPY??? “Love is a grand and a beautiful thing.” / “I’m as trite and as a gay as a daisy in May; a cliché coming true.”

Moving Too Fast — Derek

And then Derek gets some kind of grant for a film project he actually gets to direct and “I’m feeling panicked and rushed and hurried; I’m feeling outmaneuvered and outclassed. But I’m so happy I can’t get worried—” and yeah, a lot of things are happening: him and Casey are moving in together, they’re in love, Casey is happy; and now this grant and he’s so happy and it’s all very fast—

Something Wonderful — Casey

…And he does something stupid. I don’t know what; maybe he misses a date because of the film thing? But then he makes it up to her, and:

“This is a man you’ll forgive and forgive and help and protect as long as you live…”

It’s just. The most Dasey song and it HURTS to listen to.

If Ever I Would Leave You — Casey

Look, Casey sings this to Derek, I don’t make the rules. Maybe something happens; he doesn’t get the grant the next year, or Casey gets a job offering for another city; and she has to reassure him:

“No never could I leave you at all.”

The Best Thing That Ever Has Happened to Me — DUET TIME

AND THEN THEY’RE JUST HAPPY!!! I just love this song; they’re so happy and healthy and flirty and grown up…

“We might just be the best thing that has happened to us…”

I Love You Like a Table — DUET TIME

Look: Casey is the one reciting bad poetry (imagine, if you will, her draping her leg over a table, and singing, “My legs were carved for you” while running her hands over her very shapely legs, while Derek glares at her because that’s not FAIR, Casey!!) and Derek is the only who wanted to surprise her and has only managed to come up with a drum line (it’s a lot, but then again: the way he feels for her is a lot).

[ylangelegy]

kae 🌟 shared a moment with you! ୨ৎ

initially, i didn't think i could do a 2024 wrapped because i only started writing on this blog in october. when i crunched the numbers, i realized... huh. if anything, this is a reminder not to sell yourself short. <3 sharing some of my stats, insights, and resolutions under the cut. thank you for being here with me!

🧾 TOTAL WORD COUNT (OCT-DEC) -> 120,000+

🎱 IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

mingyu & bento boxes ✩ 2.2k notes.

💬 it’s the “i love you, i want us both to eat well” 🥲 — shirebusking 💬 mingyu is definitely such an acts of service person. cooking is his love language. i can get behind this. mingyu spending $600 on amazon for custom bento boxes and other stuff… is it really that serious? yes!!!!!! yes it is!!!!!! — daegutowns 💬 I LOVE ANYBODY WHO COOKS AS A LOVE LANGUAGE GOD DAMN. it reminds me so much of my own grandma mother and father uncles aunties. THEY ALL COOK AS A FORM OF LOVE MY GOSH. — roselleviennesstuff

blindsided (wonwoo x reader) ✩ 1.5k notes.

💬 yeah this was some good food. it was flirty sexy and fun and using the scene from Business Proposal was perfect. well done! — beomcoups 💬 eagle screaming rn like RAAAAAAAAAAAAH. you cooked frrrrr like i see ur brain is a restaurant the way ur cooking serving and eating + also thank u for including the business proposal gif. needed to be reminded of that fr. your mind! so genius. ty for blessing me w goated fanfic. — ctzenjohnnyreads

lost in translation (minghao x reader) ✩ 1.2k notes. ALSO: 🥇 MY LONGEST FIC OF THE YEAR (25.8k)

💬 the annotations… the amount of thought put into this has actually made my brain expand by like 4 times. i need this hung up at the louvre word by word actually. art is not dead because op exists. i forgot this was fanfiction and needed to take a breather cus i was so… impressed??? — noircheols 💬 author. GRABS YOU BY THE SHOULDER AND SHAKES YOU. i hope you NEVER stop writing. this is genuinely one of the best fics i've read on this app. this is so lovely and warm and so comforting.. oh to have somebody that's just as much as a friend to you as a lover :(((( og tags is real btw. truly Xu minghao the man that you ARE. im so sad. IM DEVASTATED. im in shambles. everyone PLEASE read this fic PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE. this is amazing op. please know that. — akiooris 💬 this is so beautiful and intimate and sweet. falling for someone who speaks a different language of you is a privilege not many people get to have but when they do its so beautiful and you nailed it. language makes up so much of a person’s self and learning a language through someone special means getting little bits of themselves as you learn and i can read it in this. especially when they comfortably address you in their own language its the sweetest. — peachiepiesundays 💬 THE YEARNING WAS SO INSANEEEEE. I was genuinely wondering what I was doing reading this because it felt like I was intruding on their private moments. I ADORE THIS. — lanatheawesome

🍊 SPECIAL MENTIONS

✶ babe for the weekend (soonyoung x reader) 16.6k words | cam and em studios' winter with you collaboration

› i worked on babe for the weekend in four different cities, two different countries, an airport, the back of a taxi, etc. it's the first time i participated in a collaboration and it's overall just so much of my heart in one fic. i have yet to annotate for it, but it was such a joy writing a small-town-exes story with one of my biases. ever so grateful for the opportunity and the trust!

✶ catch you when i can part three (vernon x reader) smau | published on @xinganhao

› my love for cywic knows no bounds, but the headcanons ('vernhow') for part three in particular were game-changing for me. this is where i started truly playing around with the forms of my writing, and it's been such a joy getting to challenge myself across the work i put out. i really hope to get to do more of it next year.

📴 other xinganhao formats i loved:

the script in film major!mingyu x reader -> "genius concept & an even more genius execution <3" (gyusbabydoll)

the genius annotations of seungcheol x fanbase!reader pt. 2 -> "i love love love all the little bonus stuff you do for these literally most creative and fun smau writer ur changing the game" (junhui-recs)

the photo exhibit for our beloved summer!wonwoo -> "the headcanons as an art exhibit. WHO GAVE U THR RIGHT TO BE SO SMART" (wonustars)

✶ all of the while, it was you (hyunjin x reader) 4k words

› i didn't get to write for skz as much as i might have wanted to, and this particular fic is also a little janky (told in third person, etc.) but it's where i got one of the first compliments on my k-fic work, which i think of to this day— "Reading this felt like being allowed to tour the Louvre alone and at your own pace," from fruityuncleskeletor. it gave me just enough drive to keep writing on tumblr when i was starting out. :')

📌 HALL OF FAME

kpop soty: sad song by p1harmony

favorite svt song of the year: orbit (the8)

favorite skz song of the year: as we are (seungmin)

non-kpop soty: buzz by niki

movie of the year: how to make millions before grandma dies

book of the year: everything i know about love, dolly alderton

poem of the year: 'catastrophe is next to godliness', franny choi

quote of the year: “what is done with love is done well” — vincent van gogh

⏭️ HERE COMES 2025

write more for skz. ideally at least one anything, once a month + actually start my blue sky series.

read better. in a book sense: read at least one book/month. (instead of 12 books a month, like some type of psycho.) in a fic sense: annotate/review at least one fic/month.

work on my buzz (seventeen's version) series. only jihoon and wonwoo are up as of posting lol.

collaborate. explore collaborations via xinganhao. pluck up the courage to join more collaborations + survive that's showbiz, baby! with tara.

mark my first milestone event. hitting my follower milestone soon, so i'm trying to think of how to celebrate it!

📦 THE FINAL WORD TONIGHT

✎ i never thought i'd come back to tumblr or that i'd ever venture into writing for kpop, but i'm really glad that i did. i admittedly went a little batshit in the past three months because i'm going through a weird time (lol), and so the goodness i've been granted, the people i've met, and the outlet i've carved out have really gotten me by.

thank you for always looking to me with kindness. i hope you're a little happier than me today + i will keep on writing for as long as you will all have me (˵ •̀ ᴗ - ˵ )✧ happy new year, everyone! — kae

[oraclekleo]

I want to preface this message by saying that I accidentally sent this WHOLE THING to ANOTHER READER I DON’T EVEN FOLLOW and now I’m mortified 💀 For some reason I thought of taking a screenshot of what I wrote and I’m extremely grateful to past me bc I would’ve thrown myself out of the window if I had to type it again 🌚

…

Ok Kleo, it's finally time for the compatibility game feedback I'm so sorry for taking so long 😭 you posted it right before uni started and then I got sucked down the school and work waterslide and kinda procrastinated it🥺

As I told you the other day, when you posted about not getting a lot of feedback and reblogs, I feel kinda "morally ambiguous" about mature-themed celebrity content, just because I think I'd feel weird if I found random sexual content about me online, posted publicly (especially if it was very different from who I really am), but I don't want to be a hypocrite because I did ask you for this reading myself 😬

So... All in all, I think you're quite respectful with the way you conduct and write your readings. I get a more "for research purposes" vibe from them, as opposed to what I've seen in other blogs I've come across, that are outright objectifying and disrespectful in my opinion. So I guess I do feel comfortable with your content? This is just me trying to take a moral stance, so l'm not trying to "give my approval" or anything. I'm just a person who thinks things through a lot Imao

Now about the reading itself...

Right off the bat you had me laughing because what do you mean you "didn't intend for the reading to be very 18+ but it turned out that way"?? 💀😭

Like was it me? Is that bad?? I'm sorry??? 🙃

The second thing that caught my eye were the cards themselves... I think I've told you before, you have so many interesting, beautiful decks and I love how they (in my opinion, at least), give the readings such a diverse, particular vibe. Is it hard to work with many different decks? Energy-wise I mean...

I think, for the most part, your reading actually resonated? (Is it weird to say it resonates if it's a hypothetical reading about my interactions with a person I don't know personally? 😂)

I remember reading a while ago that Yeonjun could be an Aries rising, so if I compare what you said with the Astro synastry between us, it does totally check out! And our charts would be super similar too, since l'm also a Virgo sun with Aries rising

Power couple? My Jupiter would be on his MC, and his Jupiter on my 2H. We both have libra mercuries and our Vertex are conjunct, so... I smell ✨success✨

Deep soul exploration? Based on my only, but tee long relationship, I know I crave that deep emotional intimacy, getting to know each other's darkest bits and learning to love them, and all that dramatic shit Imao. He has a Scorpio moon that would be in my 8H, his Chiron conjunct my Pluto in his 8H and our suns are conjunct too, so yeah I could see the vision.

Do I see him being devoted and submissive? Yes, but personally I think it would be more of an "equivalent exchange" in this personal dynamic, where we'd both be equally devoted and submissive to each other. I see him listening to me a lot, because I'm on the mature, rational side and he gives me "mommy issues” vibes, but I'd honestly wear myself to the bone to make my loved ones happy, so there's that lol

Astrologically speaking, I have my moon, Venus and mars in Leo 5H, and he has Leo Venus 5H too so that would "confirm" the love language and relationship dynamics, but also hints to a lot of attraction, which relates to the sexual chemistry bit of your reading.

I can say you nailed the neck and voice thing for sure, at least on my side... My neck is definitely one of my weak spots, and I like guys being "vocal" so much you can't imagine 😩 12/10 for sure

Also foreplay is key for me, so much that I can't even think of it as "fore"play, it's an essential part of the whole thing, not just the appetizer..

Now, as of now I can't really see myself being dominant enough to enjoy restraining a guy per se, but l'lI like it if I know he likes it, and even more if i know he'll "get back" to me later lol like that would be the end goal maybe?

To summarize, it was very interesting to read, like I'm amazed at how you can get information like that from the cards! And it was damn accurate too.

Again, sorry for taking so long but you've probably realized by now that I tend to write A LOT so sometimes I feel overwhelmed when thinking of writing feedback because I know it will take me a while to write the whole thing

(Also if you think it's just TOO long please tell me so I can try to make it shorter next time 😂)

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR DOING THIS READING FOR ME (and all the other reading as well)… You’re really talented, and definitely have a gift for tarot 🥹

Bye!🥰

Hello!

Don't worry at all. As I said, I don't care about time, I'm always happy to receive feedback. 💖💖💖

Honestly, I don't understand the fuss with NSFW tarot readings. Do people have the same issues with smut fics? Because it's basically the same. Only in tarot readings you base your fantasy on what you interpret from the cards but it's still a work of fiction. Tarot isn't a science. What's written in tarot readings aren't objective facts, they are notions, impressions and interpretations.

Also, I do these readings about celebrities because they have public status. When you become a celebrity you deliberately give a large portion of your privacy up. Not all of it, but much more than a regular non-celeb person. This is not violating their privacy. Fanfics also don't violate their privacy. These are merely fantasies shared. If you are dellusional and want to take these works of fiction as a fact, you will do so no matter whether it's NSFW or not and it's harmful and the only solution is to educate the delusional person not to censor free speech and creative content.

I know it's difficule to take moral stand here but this is how I see it and people are free to disagree with me and even unfollow me if they wish so.

But to like and read a NSFW content but be ashamed for liking it is a road to hell. And it's weak and pretentious. I know it might sound unfair but a mentally healthy and mature person does not feel ashamed for what they like as long as it doesn't break the law. That's my personal opinion here and it might be a bit too strong for more sensitive individuals but once they grow up they will learn. 😊

As for your actual feedback, I'm not big on astrology so... I assume you studied it well and I take your word for it 😂

I like to use very diverse decks of cards because human nature is very diverse, too. Most people aren't just one dimensional characters. It's not difficult for me to read the different energy of the cards as I have picked them myself, I had a reason to do so, I followed my intuition. I have a connection with my decks and I acknowledge and cherish the fact that each one of them has a different 'personality'.

I have mentioned it before that even when it does sound like it resonates, the tarot readings are basically works of fiction as they are not based in research or hard facts but they are based in personal interpretations of symbolics. I think it's the basic mistake many people make, that they take tarot readings as facts. It's not like that. But people tend to follow patterns and if I hit the right pattern in the reading it will sound to you like it resonates with you. Tarot is NOT magic. My intuition picks information about you from your feedbacks and other interactions with me and the cards only help me to give sense to all those random pieces of information in my brain. It's not witchcraft, it's psychoanalysis. I understand why many people get confused here, though 😂

Once again, no need to apologize, I understand that life gets in the way and everyone needs time to think things through, especially to respond in such a detail 😀

I love your long feedbacks. You don't have to cut them short for me. 😂

Thank you so much for taking time to give your opinion on the reading! It means a lot to me 💖💖💖💖

Kleo 🦄

[tartrazeen]

It is a bit tricky nailing down Angus' feelings for all this. 🤔

Deirdre's easy. She's the princess, she's got all the power, and the only line she has to worry about is whether or not something's fair. I'd say 'proper' or 'traditional', but she pushes back on those when she doesn't like them, so 'fair' seems to be the underlying factor for her - and she lumps in a lot of stuff as being fair by virtue of being the princess. Not always in a bad way! She was willing to sacrifice herself in the second episode because she was the princess, so she embraces the responsibility involved.

It's why it's so funny that she is more open with Angus and grabbing him all the time. Like she knows nothing's going to happen because Angus is Angus. Upheaving a whole bunch of rules just to give herself permission to hook up with him? That's not a fair trade. Unless - like... idk, is Angus interested, did he say anything 👀

The line's mostly drawn from her side, is what I'm saying. She's permitted herself to relax and damn near flirt, but going any further would be a massive change that'd need a massive commitment.

But then there's Angus. He's a lot harder to pin down.

First off, lololololol pin down

Second, assume this is separate from the polycule in Angus' mind. I always thought Deirdre was the first person he's involved himself with anyway, and the thought of what he's gonna do with her gets too easy when he's already comfortably moving around four beds.

Third, I'm not looking to rehash everything I've already said (even though I do love mentally rehashing it for fun uwu). There's a bigger fish to fry: if everything could work out the way Angus wanted, what would he do?

Rohan would have to give his blessing. That's the most important thing. We all agree, right? Yay!

Garrett wouldn't have to give his blessing so much as his acknowledgement. This guy's all about battles and showing off, so recognizing Angus as the 'best' for Deirdre and stepping aside would be enough. It's still a lot, but it's easier for Angus to force Garrett to accept it if he absolutely has to. Angus can't force Rohan into anything without risking their friendship, so that's the critical difference.

Ivar and Conchobar would both be non-issues. Ivar would be supportive of whatever made his friends happy, so long as it doesn't distract them from their duties and his quest, and I don't think he'd see an issue with their gap in class. He might chalk it up to being a quaint quirk of Kells. And to be perfectly honest, if Deirdre ever decides she's gonna marry someone in particular, her dad is not gonna stop her. Not that he won't try, probably! But he's gonna lose hard. Deirdre has "Remember when I ran off to become a Mystic Knight and saved Kells" and "Remember when you sold me off to Garrett and I said no" and "Hey remember when you were gonna marry Maeve" triple-attack on her side. Forget him.

Cathbad would probably need to give somewhat of a blessing. Not exactly that. More like... approval, maybe? I don't think Angus could handle a million jokes about a lowly thief stealing his way onto the throne, especially when he barely handles the jokes that are only about the thief part. So Cathbad would have to agree that he approves of the two of them and only give his unsolicited snark when Angus fumbles (oh, and he will. And Cathbad is totally welcome to say that - once).

The village - yes we're going that far - is sort of where it breaks down for him.

The guards - oh yeah, we're talking about the guards too, we're not stopping at the main cast when Angus wouldn't - would have to find a way to privately come to terms with it. There are a number of moments where someone says something in front of the king, and then when the king's out of earshot, a guard gives their real opinion; even if they swear openly that they're fine with Angus now that Deirdre's shacking up with the utter bane of their existence in this place, it's not gonna stick until he can walk around and ignore them. I'm not sure how long it'll take, since Angus'll be coming off of at least a decade of being chased and imprisoned by these guys. But ignoring him would be the best. He doesn't need to be friends with them, and I imagine he doesn't like a handful of them, but getting to walk around as unseen in a hall as he would be crawling through a passage seems like it'd fit his happy status quo.

Angus trying to leverage his status as Deirdre's boyfriend wouldn't be the problem. That'd happen all the time, mostly harmlessly, and the second it hits a level where Deirdre wouldn't like it if she found out, it'd stop. :P And it's not some sexist hen-pecked trope. I think with how seriously Deirdre takes her role as a royal, compared to how begrudgingly Rohan takes to his as a legendary warrior, Angus wouldn't dare to do something like ask the villagers for gold. Pushing Rohan to do it? Sure, Angus'll try, and he'd definitely use his own status as a Mystic Knight. But not Deirdre's as a princess. That's disrespectful, not cute and cheeky.

Angus spending some nights in the castle would be more of a problem, but not the main one either. It's not like he's going to stop talking to his friends in the village, just because that's the crowd he's depended on to survive and old habits really die hard. He's going to want breaks from all the royal prim and properness, too. Problems wouldn't come from any jealousy from anyone there, because he's been fairly comfortable brag-talking about how he's in the castle all the time as a knight. He's already taking any jealousy in stride. Yes, it is nice being with the princess, thanks. Oh, what's it like? Sorry, royal secret, can't kiss and tell. Anm Rohan might get a little lonely from time to time, since Angus is only ever gone when he's stormed off. While I do see Angus keeping visits with Deirdre to a minimum (as far as Rohan can tell) so he doesn't leave Rohan alone for too long, and that becoming its own problem over time, it's not really a problem with the village itself.

It's Deirdre.

Angus can fit in at the castle in his obvious "haha i don't belong here what are you gonna do about it" way, but Deirdre is going to piss off so many people if she's hanging around there for too long.

How do I know?

THE SOUP.

I can genuinely extrapolate every other thing from how it would based on just that soup. You know the one - it's like episode 48? 47? One of the later ones. Deirdre and Ivar go to Rohan and Angus' village, smell something awful, go to the hut, and turn down Angus' very happy offers to share his soup.

🙃

You might be asking what the problem is.

The problem is that Angus is a peasant. And poor. And has been both of those for quite some time. And very openly encouraged these two to try something he says is really good, and is almost certainly something he's made before, and would have definitely smelled as strong to the other villagers. He doesn't think anything of it.

Now it's one thing for the princess to politely hand out scoops of seeds in a charitable visit. It's another thing entirely to go with Angus to places in the village for fun, and not-so-subtly turn down certain foods or drinks, and very-loudly-in-outrage react toooooooo... Ye Olde Blue Collar Humour. A lot of which I am sure involves some crude jokes about the Princess of Kells, and just in general involves some general ribbing ('cause Angus got along fine with his two ex-friends at the tavern roasting him over his maps). There's an assumed All In Good Fun that she's not gonna fully prepare for, and that a lot of others are going to have sucked out of the room purely so they can be polite.

And what happens after that?

🥴 Angus just goes off by himself.

You know, ditching Deirdre.

Because what's he gonna tell her? "Sorry, Deirdre, you can't come, you kill every party you're at"? Hell no! She'll take that as a challenge! But there's one episode where Pyre goes nuts because of a plant and Angus and Deirdre are off to investigate, and Angus makes a joke like "uwu And you say we have nothing in common." A lot of what Angus is has to do with being a peasant! She didn't even find common ground with Rohan in the first episode, and he was the apprentice to the court's druid!

Angus knows this.

Angus also doesn't do well with confronting royals about their shitty ideas.

Angus is also gonna be dating her and ostensibly won't be as quick to say, "okay try it, let's see how this works out for you." (Well, maybe as a last resort, but if she actually comes back upset, he's gonna feel awful.) He's supposed to be her support, and setting her up to fail isn't going to work out on any level.

At worst-best, Angus somehow organizes the village to wait until she's back at the castle to start any 'real' parties. She'd still be hurt when she finds out, like he's hiding her from them (and she'll add some arrogant outrage at that too, since who hides a princess from peasants?), but I could see him thinking it's tomorrow's problem.

The funny thing is, those are all the mandatory obstacles Angus has to leap before he's getting publicly involved with her. And honestly involved too, not just humouring her on some fake-dates. Like I said, everything stops the second Rohan so much as frowns, but if there's not a solution for everything from the guards to the villagers, Angus still isn't surviving this relationship.

I find that hilariously ironic. It should be the other way around, right? Like Aladdin trying to fit in to be with Jasmine. But this time, Aladdin's already at the royal table. It's Jasmine who's gotta figure out how to hack it in the market - and even in that movie, she went out for five seconds and almost got her arm cut off.

🥴

... Oh my God.

Deirdre's gonna have to get Rohan to teach her how peasants live 😭

😭😭😭 Oh my God 😭😭😭 What if Angus thinks they're dating and instead of freaking out like they're cheating on him, he's like, "Yeah, it was a little too good to be true. I'm happy the two of you are finally together, though! I am absolutely okay with this. 🙂 No really, what else could I have possibly been expecting?"

ANGST. GIVE ME LATE 1990'S ROMCOM MISCOMMUNICATION ANGST.

uwu

I'm in ship mode.

Starting the new year with some Angus/Deirdre What If fluff.

By What If, I mean I don't actually think this fits in with the show, but they never technically said it couldn't happen uwu

To set the stage, we know Rohan lived in the castle since he was a kid, and Angus tagged along as part of a package deal. Angus also immediately took to crawling around in the walls, finding passages that were probaby meant for... idk, cats? Maybe? I don't know why there's so much space for him in there, especially as an adult, but there ya go.

But I'm also imagining that with the shape of the stones on the outside of the castle, there are enough handholds for small fingers to find purchase. Experienced rock climbers can get a grip on what seems like a totally flat wall because they can work with such subtle grooves after years of practise. Picture Angus getting into a dozen different places through a mix of gaps between the walls and crawling around on the outside to come in through a window.

Angus and Deirdre technically met in that episode about the curse on Kells, which was just when Rohan went to live in the castle, and immediately after Deirdre referred to Rohan as some "dirty boy". We see Angus getting into Cathbad's chamber, coughing on the way in from all the dust, so no matter how dirty Rohan was, Angus would be even worse. And from the look of things, Angus didn't have a reason to go in the castle until then; the guy makes such a big show of knowing everything about a place when he's introducing someone to it (like Garrett to Tir Na Nog and that kid-prince to Cathbad's chamber too), and he acts like he's never seen this room before.

So.

uwu

Imagine Angus, brand-new to the passages in this castle. He's trying to find his way to where Rohan is, but this place is a maze. He's never truly sure which room he's about to pop out of, but he does realize - after going in a few circles - that there are more than a few ways to enter certain rooms.

Deirdre, who's passing through these halls, hears louder skittering than any rat (or cat) she's heard before. She's curious, and she's bored from all of her princess lessons, so this is the perfect spark of excitement to go see what it is. She follows it around, trying to keep up with it going up and down the floors. It goes all the way until she's in an empty guest room, creeping closer and closer towards the fireplace.

And then out pops a soot monster.

(it's angus but she doesn't know that yet)

Deirdre's surprised for half a second, and then outraged that this even dirtier boy is intruding through her castle walls. Angus can't see her because he's got soot over his eyes, so he doesn't know this is the princess yet. But he figures it out after he pats himself off and covers the whole room in soot, getting Deirdre to start coughing and angrily yell for the guards. That makes everything snap into sense, and Angus is back in the fireplace and off through the walls a second later.

Then the rest of the episode with the curse happens, Angus finds Rohan, the two of them meet Deirdre, and they (or Rohan at least) pretty much never talk to her again until they're adults - based on how they are with each other in the first episode, anyway.

Except now I'm gonna change what happened over the years to plant some better seeds for a budding princess-and-thief romance. 😌

Angus is still going to want to visit Rohan while they're growing up (obviously). He's also going to want to map out the rest of this castle. So he visits, and he explores, and he stumbles into empty rooms, and he leaves a sooty mess behind, and he disappears before anyone else can catch him. He and Rohan probably giggle about this since the servants would mention some soot-ghost causing them all this extra work, and - more importantly - annoying the princess, who says it's some boy that's running around. Rohan won't admit a thing to Cathbad, and Angus is good at staying hidden.

Then one day, he crawls out of a passage in the corner of a room, and comes face-to-knee with...

😵‍💫 Deirdre.

Angus has just found out where her room is, and she is not happy.

She isn't the type to start hysterically screaming for help right away, and now that she's met Angus at least once (during the curse episode), she's much more likely to look down at him crawling in from that corner and go, "YOU. 😠 You're the one who's been hiding in the walls."

Angus goes "whoops" and disappears again, leaving Deirdre to shove some furniture over the hole to block it up.

A few nights after that, and Deirdre - stubbornly getting through her needlework in a different room - sees some soot sprinkle down and onto her fabric. She looks up, and beside a hole in the ceiling by the chandelier, she sees Angus. She goes, "😠," he goes, "🤫" and then he disappears again. Deirdre is scolded for getting distracted and quietly returns to her stitches.

A few nights after that, Deirdre hears rustling from behind the wardrobe in her room. She gets up to go see if it's a mouse that's been trapped... and finds Angus chomping on food he's stolen from the royal pantry. Clearly he's mapped out that route, but he mesed up on finding his way back to Rohan and on finding a better spot to rest for a snack.

Deirdre goes, "😠 OUT." Angus goes "😮 oop" and takes off again.

The key to this is that Deirdre thinks Angus is a pest, enough to want him gone, but is having an easy time getting rid of Angus by herself. No guards required, or else everything would forcibly end early.

There are a other few milestones I picture happening along the way when they're still kids, like Deirdre hearing muffled breathing from somewhere in her room, just to explore and find Angus behind the wall of another corner, only just visible behind a smaller hole that - for once - he can't actually fit through.

Except he's just snoozing back there.

He scatters when she wakes him up - throwing a rock at him or something, because he's in her castle and she isn't going to touch him when he's so filthy - but weeks later, he's in there again. Same thing happens. The third time, though, is when he doesn't really wake up from her snapping at him. With the hole being just smaller than their heads, she can't quite get a good look at him, but she ducks down and puts her ear against it to listen, all to hear him shivering. She thought it was the pop of the fire in the hearth, but it's him.

It occurs to her that the reason he's in this part of the wall is because it's beside her fire. He's freezing. It was winter but she hadn't made the connection to the cold and needing shelter. She knows he has a friend in the castle, but she assumes he wasn't allowed to stay with him because of Cathbad. Their druid's complained about him occasionally to her father.

She considers doubling down and waking him up for sure, but... well, the fire drowns out the noise, he's quiet enough anyway, and it isn't like he can get in here through that small hole in the corner. She puts a basket in the way to be safe, casually adds more wood to fireplace, and returns to bed. He isn't allowed to stay there forever, but if it's so cold that he has nowhere else to be, he can stay for one night.

She never asks about his circumstances, since he's a peasant and it's obvious what they'd be, but on the nights that it's cold enough to warrant a fire, she gets into a loose habit of checking if he's there before she goes to sleep. They don't bother each other, but if he's there when she checks (he sometimes is), she'll add more firewood.

He's interesting to her. There aren't any other kids around, and certainly not any boys (she's not counting Cathbad's apprentice). She's peeked at him during the night a few times, like he was a new kitten in a barn or something. He's always either been asleep or already gone to wherever he goes. Both are interesting, even though she has to wonder how he's somehow never awake to notice.

Another milestone is a time she's lost something. A necklace, maybe, and one that was important to her. She looks in her room and all over the castle, but it's nowhere to be found. Some time later, after another night she's cried herself to sleep, she hears a soft clink in the corner by the fire. There's no fire tonight, since it's quite warm this time of year. She gets up to investigate anyway, and finds her necklace beside the basket, which was pushed to the side a bit. There's no one behind the wall. She even calls out to be sure, and there's silence.

It's never really clear if she did lose it or if 'someone' took it in the first place. All she knows is that she got it back and she's grateful. Eventually, she decides she must have lost it. Every way of getting in here is blocked off by something already, and she doesn't think he'd be reckless enough to come in through the window.

She doesn't hear him for months after that. No scurrying, no snoozing, no snacking. She's pleased that it's finally done, and proud to have endured it...

... but one night, she decides to leave an apple in the spot behind her wardrobe. It's where he'd been snacking when she caught him that time.

The apple's still there days later. There are a few bites missing, but they look like rat bites. She throws the apple away, embarrassed by the whose idea, but a month later, the urge to try again returns. It might have something to do with Cathbad's newest complaints, meaning Angus hasn't actually disappeared. She leaves better snacks by the other corner, the one small hole by her fireplace, and waits to see if it's gone the next morning.

It isn't.

She's even more embarrassed. There aren't many kids she's allowed to talk to (including Cathbad's apprentice), and if she wasn't talking to Angus...

Well. It was probably for the best. That was the thing with strays: feed them and they never leave. Since she didn't accidentally feed anything, nothing is going to stay to bother her. Especially not a boy who wasn't supposed to be here in the first place.

... She keeps trying occasionally. Just to see if he'd come back.

A couple of years pass, and she hears a commotion outside her door. It's a guard running through a hall. Nothing to be worried about, she thinks, and she's about to forget it entirely when something comes in through her window.

It's Angus. :3 Crash-landing.

Trying as hard as he can to smile his way out of her screaming at him while he's still upside-down and on his head ¯⁠\⁠_⁠༼⁠ ⁠ಥ⁠ ⁠‿⁠ ⁠ಥ⁠ ⁠༽⁠_⁠/⁠¯

She's furious at the intrusion, demanding to know who he is to barge into the princess' room. She'll have forgotten his name at this point, since it's been so long, but she has a keen awareness that she knew it once. She'd never ask for it, though, and lucky for him, Angus doesn't misinterpret her demand as that. He's scrambling to right himself and say that he's just passing through, just has to get behind the wardrobe to leave, even moving over to it to start pulling it away from the corner it's been blocking for years.

Deirdre instantly cuts in front of him. He's not touching anything in her room, and she wants him out of it.

In the very back of her mind, she notices he's grown. He's taller than her now. Before, they were almost the same height.

He swears he'll be gone just as soon as she moves, but there's a knock at the door firsn. Deirdre's maid heard her in there and is asking if she's alright. There's an instantly pleading look on Angus' face, and Deirdre glares him into silence because she can't be bothered to kick up a fuss over this. Sweetly, she calls back that everything's fine, and the maid says that's good, but it's also cleaning time so can please she come in. Angus is like o_o because he needs to move the wardrobe out of the way, and that's decently loud.

I guess Deirdre gets inspired by his panic and decides to teach him a lesson. She says the maid can of course come in, but to please start at a certain corner. Angus goes O_O as the door opens for the maid to enter, and Deirdre shrugs while she leaves him to hide. He darts behind the massive curtain beside her window, since there aren't any other options.

The maid starts cleaning around the room, suspicious that the princess is paying this so much attention. Deirdre says everything is fine, but just as the maid comes up to fix the curtain, Deirdre asks her to clean under the bed right now. Not for any particular reason. Just as an order.

As the maid slowly agrees and turns around to do so, Angus sneaks out from the curtain and Deirdre points to under the desk. When the maid finishes there, she's about to go to the desk next, but Deirdre asks if she can go tidy the wardrobe next - and points Angus to under the bed, who figured out what's happening and goes >:( on the way. Deirdre has a great time leading the maid around the room like this, especially as the maid says it's strange that the floor is so worn beside the wardrobe, like someone's been repeatedly moving it. Angus is back to going o_o as Deirdre says, "Really? :3 That's so interesting - what interesting information that is."

Finally, when the maid leaves and Angus can get up, Deirdre scowls and says, "Do not go through my room, or I'll have every guard in my castle drag you to the dungeon."

Angus gives an awkward little bow, and then goes over to the wardrobe, loudly scraping it against the floor as he pivots it to reveal that hidden passage in the corner. Deirdre doesn't even bother saying he could've gone through the door, and simply watches him crawl through and loooudlyyyy scrape the wardrobe over the floor again as he pulls it back in place behind him.

Deirdre puts a small vase at the foot of the wardrobe. Sure enough, weeks later, the vase is awkwardly sat a few feet away - like someone pulled the wardrobe back into place behind them, but couldn't sneakily reach the vase to reset it too.

Once - and only once - the guards are particularly upset. She walks past them and into her room, just to see the wardrobe pulled slightly away from the wall. She rolls her eyes and goes to move it properly, but stops when she puts a hand on it and feels that it's wet. She sees blood on her palm when she checks it.

Before she can do anything, her door flies open and a guard barges in. Deirdre whirls around, and the guard - apologizing profusely for not realizing this was her room, having simply been told to search everywhere - tries to peek around while explaining that they're after a Temran spy. Deirdre tells him to search somewhere else because this is her room, but only when the guard lingers does she fully snap and tell him to gtfo right this second. It works, and the guard jumps and scurries away.

She doesn't yell at him this time. After she's done peeking out of that same, young curiosity, she takes a true look for blood and sees his hand's wrapped but leaking through. Wordlessly, she stands back up, finds another wrapping in her desk, grabs an apple from a bowl in her room, and puts both of them on the ground beside her bed in silence. But she's still not exactly happy at this, and doesn't want to seem like she's condoning it. Just to be safe, she kicks the apple over to him, and is satisfied by the little snort of disapproval that earns. It means he is only playing dead.

She checks outside the door and sees more guards crowding the halls. Then she firmly shuts the door and locks it. The smear of blood on her palm catches her attention again, and she slowly decides to wipe it off the wardrobe before anyone else happens to find it. She's procrastinating, she supposes, because eventually she starts having to check around the room herself.

She's only vaguely concerned that she's locked herself in with a spy, because a spy wouldn't know about that hole behind her wardrobe. There's nothing behind the curtain, but under the bed, there's Angus - eyes shut like he's playing dead.

Ten minutes go by before she finally hears some muffled chewing.

Angus is gone in the morning, along with any trace he'd been there. He must have gone back out through the window, because the door is still locked and the wardrobe was still slightly ajar. The guards caught the spy eventually; it was someone else, and the king notices how unusually pleased his daughter is to hear that.

I don't want these two getting too close while they're kids, because I still want everything to line up with the first episode, where Deirdre's pretty damn unhappy to have him knock her over and doesn't seem to know Rohan that well either. But I do want there to be some established level of familiarity with each other, because she was fast at kicking him for kicking her (which is very unusual for her; she's usually more composed than that, outside of the one time she punched Pyre lol) but Angus reacted like it was normal for them. So there's like a friendly, unique, antagonistic banter built up over the years, where Deirdre's more than comfortable snapping at him, teasing him, and touching him than she is with anyone else, who she always has to be A Princess™ with.

What I love about this is the curiosity Deirdre has. It's completely unspoken and easy to deny, even to herself, but she keeps finding reasons to be drawn to him. When she's young, she sorta treats it like she has a pet? Like a wild rat or something that she pretends is her pet, because she feeds it every so often. She keeps enough distance to avoid getting too attached, but she's quietly delighted to see signs of him around. She's also furious to see any mess because ew, a rat.

Meanwhile Angus gets more and more desensitized to her. He gets kicked by her and doesn't have any problem snapping back an excuse - almost like he does when he's being yelled at by Cathbad. He's comfortable enough to overstep their formal boundaries, but is still fully aware he has overstepped and is cautiously testing the new, 'real' boundaries that exist: he can hide in her room if he's desperate, she won't immediately call the guards if he doesn't make a mess, but she has very little patience for him altogether. It's enough for him to be cheekier and tease her back when he's not in her room (doing his "i think the princess would prefer my hand" schtick), but also to avoid rocking the boat so hard that he loses the tiny privilege he has. Well, until he gets more comfortable and bolder with his teasing over the course of the show.

The pet thing matters too, because I'd like to think the arrangement of Angus being in Deirdre's walls doesn't change. Angus doesn't just stop using those passages, but they wouldn't turn every night into a sleepover. Maybe once, Deirdre would hear a sound in the wall that wakes her up, and she'd nervously call out, "Angus?" And there'd be silence for a moment before he says back, "... Yup?" And that'd be the end of it. They don't have to talk, and there's a look of understanding between them the next morning. (Especially 'cause there's a guard who's pissed about something.) (Deirdre swears she doesn't think it's funny, and Angus swears he totally didn't see her grinning.)

But that emotional distance is important because Angus still defers to Rohan - and hell, even Garrett - as the real End Game for Deirdre. He's just a funny little pet rat that scurries around the walls sometimes. A jester at best. Nothing more, even if he's openly asking her for a kiss. He's completely harmless.

The truest test would be one night in the middle of the show, when Angus is passing through and hears crying. It's Deirdre, mourning her mother, since she never got to see everything Deirdre's accomplished over the years. He's torn on whether he should ignore this like they always do - this is her room, after all, so part of arrangement means respecting her privacy - but then he hears her call out, "Angus?"

He doesn't answer. In fact, he stays silent long enough for Deirdre to bury herself back in her pillow and weep.

It doesn't feel right for him to intrude on her.

He crawls through, back on his way, when he realizes there's no chance she would have heard him. She was guessing to see if he was there. That worries him, because there's a good chance that was to scream at him after correctly assuming he was intruding. He's already back to space where he can start climbing down outside as he thinks this. He can't explain why the hell he doesn't, because he really can't afford to lose his Wall privileges, but he climbs up instead - and through her window.

Deirdre doesn't notice until Angus has his hand gently on her back. At that, she's a bit startled, but mostly just relieved to see someone there. She doesn't hesitate to sit up and pull him around her, taking all the support she can get from him quietly holding her. He stays until she's asleep, and he's gone long before she's awake.

There's no look of understanding shared the next morning, because Angus just doesn't look at her. It's not meant to be rude, just affirming that they were both going to politely pretend it didn't happen. And it doesn't last forever, obviously. Angus does deliberately - cheekily, as always - find her afterwards and maybe even spins her around as extra proof that this is no big deal, and asks if she's okay. She says she is, and he ends it there almost instantly, trying to spare them from her awkwardly thanking him out of obligation. Somehow, it's exactly what they need to reset things. It's their emotional wardrobe sliding back in place over their emotional... emotions.

But just like the real wardrobe, even if Angus thinks he's sealed everything up again, there's something still out of place from Deirdre's side. In the moment, she'd really wanted anyone to comfort her. She'd only called out for Angus since he was the sole person with a chance of being in earshot. But the more she thought about it, she didn't know who else she could've asked for. Angus holding her felt so close and right, like he alone had any chance of soothing her.

She's not going to think about it. She's going to move the emotional vase back in front of the emotional wardrobe, but she's keenly aware that this happened.

And she's curious to see if she can feel like that again.