#is there a ship name for the four of them?

[dear-ao3]

well well well

here we all are. at the end of the season. we survived. congratulations everyone. 

you might be wondering, did anything interesting happen after the last checkered flag fell?

and i am here to tell you that the answer is yes. 

so today is december 31, 2024, and for the last and final time. lets hop to it.

so a few fun things happened at the end of the season. one was the post season testing. which is basically the last and final opportunity to gather information about your tires and your car before the cars get shipped off to….well wherever they get shipped off to. and they also sometimes throw their new drivers in to give them a little sneak preview. 

or in the case of red bull. decide who the hell is driving for them next year. 

the red bull car was piloted by both yuki tsunoda

and also isack hadjar. while the v carb had liam lawson. 

esteban ocon was in the haas and he was looking like his grass was watered and his skin was beyond clear and he was loving life. 

it was also hinted at that esteban ocon’s race engineer could be a woman named laura müller, and if she was, she would be the first female race engineer in f1.

and ollie bearmans granddad even hopped on the esteban ocon bandwagon on twitter 

esteban actually responded and said something along the lines of "see you soon bestie"

in the complete opposite. carlos sainz looked like he wanted to die in his williams. 

and speaking of williams, santander, a bank, who had previously sponsored ferrari, announced that they would be sponsoring williams next year. they probably followed carlos to the team.

and silly season of course continued. alpine announced that paul aron was going to be their reserve driver for 2025

and bottas, to almost no one’s surprise, announced that he was going back to mercedes as their reserve driver for 2025.

and lewis hamilton also had his final send off from mercedes, which was emotional and grand.

he addressed the team one last time, saying that they would still go on to have success and that he was proud of everything that they had accomplished together.

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and stephen lord, mercedes’s race team coordinator, told the press about something that lewis had done back in monza, the last european race, for kimi antonelli. 

and carlos also had his send off from ferrari. him and his father both got to driver ferraris on track as part of it.

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and then we had. the fia prize giving ceremony. 

which is. well. that's just it. it just is. 

the prize giving ceremony is supposed to be a very nice, very official and very formal event. 

and it mostly is. 

in 2016 though nico rosberg Did use it to announce his retirement.

and in 2018 kimi raikkonen famously got drunk at it and spoke more than he perhaps ever had in his entire life.

and this year, of course, we had four f1 drivers in attendance: max, the winner, lando, the runner up, charles who came third, and oscar, who was on the winning constructors team.

and it was kind of a mess. as to be expected with those four. 

first the prize giving this year was in africa. in rwanda. and lando got asked upon his arrival how he was feeling and he said “wonderful” and that he always likes to go to new places, and this is a new place and blah blah etc etc. 

meanwhile! the previous night! on stream with his bestie max fewtrell, he was complaining to hell about having to fly to africa. because of how long the flight was.

second, max wore the same bow tie that he has for the last six or so years.

hes worn it more than this many times, but i lost the original image that i had. 

then! we had charles and max using oscar as a messenger. during the award ceremony. during i think actually when lando was getting his award because he was not in his seat. 

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charles talked about in his acceptance speech getting to drive on track with his brother, arthur, but the camera cut to a shot of oscar, because you know, oscar got adopted by charles during the monaco gp. remember that?

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and lando. well. he was not done being insane yet. 

remember? back in brazil? when max stormed from 17th to first in the rain in arguably the most impressive and also most insane race of the season and lando said in an interview that it was not talent it was just luck? and he was referring to the timing of the safety car and mclarens bad luck that race but people misconstrued it as him saying max wasn't talented??? well…..

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he further said “what he did this year and in brazil was incredible so im the first one to acknowledge such a thing when im the one going up against him.”

yea. 

remember, he and max are actually friends. but man what an insane place to say such a thing like that. 

and max of course was given the drivers championship trophy

and oscar and lando brought the constructors trophy home to mclaren for the first time in 26 years

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and they also celebrated by playing what seems to quite literally be strip poker

some teams started releasing their christmas videos, including red bull, who released this one featuring checo.

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and i know what you are all thinking. does this mean he gets to keep his red bull seat?? 

um.

and 

yeah. 

so. checo was out. and liam was in. 

checo said that “driving for red bull has been an unforgettable experience and ill always cherish the success we achieved together.”

and christian horner said that “he will always be an extremely popular team member and a treasured part of our history, thank you checo.”

and while it may not have been abundantly obvious this season, checo has had a pretty good f1 career. he has won from the back of the grid in sakir 2020 (not with red bull but he has still done it. that drive actually cemented his seat at red bull) and he helped red bull win 3 constructors titles and also helped max win four world titles. he himself has also won six grand prixs.

you might be wondering, why didn't they put yuki in the car???

wel theres a lot of reasons that they gave and you know it was something about how theyre not using honda next year and honda was the one who wanted a japanese driver and now theyre going with ford and blah blah blah 

essentially, theyre racist. 

and you can try to defend this any which way you want. but that really is kinda the only explanation here. 

lets look at the stats, shall we?

yuki has done 90 grand prix’s in f1. hes been a driver in f1 since 2021. hes had one fastest lap and his highest ever finish in the drivers championship standings has been 12th place. he has 91 career points and his highest finish has been 4th. 

liam lawson has had 11 grand prix’s and has done two half seasons, one in 2023 and one in 2024. he has 6 career points, his highest finish in the drivers championship was 20th (out of 22). and his highest race finish was 9th. 

yuki out qualified him in every race this season. 

im just going to let all of those stats speak for themself. 

and while we were all stressed about yukis career, where was he? out recreating brokeback mountain pictures with pierre while golfing

 but just remember, no one has survived the red bull second seat. ever. not mark webber, not daniel ricciardo, not alex albon, not pierre gasly, and not checo. all of them had their careers essentially die after they left red bull. (maybe except pierre who has had wins and podiums since then, but he is still at a mid field team)

and who, pray tell, was in the vcarb seat? 

the red bull sponsored f2 driver. turns out that he had spoiled his f1 seat correctly back in that press conference. 

so now. we have our complete grid for 2025: 

red bull: max verstappen and liam lawson 

mclaren: oscar piastri and lando norris

mercedes: george russell and kimi antonelli

ferrari: charles leclerc and lewis hamilton

aston martin: lance stroll and fernando alonso

alpine: pierre gasly and jack dooan 

vcarb: yuki tsunoda and isack hadjar

haas: esteban ocon and ollie bearman 

stake: nico hulkenberg and gabriel bortoleto  

williams: alex albon and carlos sainz

my god. what a silly season. 

and not even from just the drivers. all of the everything else as well. 

im exhausted. 

but that was it. there was nothing left to do except ring in the holidays. 

oscar piastri tried and failed to make a gingerbread house

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and he got clowned on by his mom, who said “What on earth is this???? I’m pretty sure the gingerbread house you decorated when you were 6 was better than this!”

and as one commenter pointed out: “Let's not forget this is the same man who got an offer to study Aeronautical Engineering at Imperial College”  

and oscar also didn't know that die hard was a christmas movie

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williams posted one last team torque where they debated leaving carrots for reindeer

and i am sure there were others but good god am i tired. 

but not tired enough to not remind you about the iconic christmas videos past of:

daniel ricciardo acting out a honey badger in charades while max verstappen drops the sickest piano solo ever

and

carlos sainz incredibly mispronouncing mariah carey

and as we know, the season isnt officially over until they release the great Secret Santa Video

secret santa is usually a flaming hot disaster and somehow always turns into either a shit show, a dick measuring competition or both. usually both. 

this year there were some highlights, including:

-liam lawson getting really really excited about getting a lightning mcqueen remote control car

-both oscar AND lando getting padel lessons from alex and george respectfully and taking it as a massive insult. and also alex getting the last laugh in the great Oscar Sucks At Padel Debate. 

-whatever the hell franco was doing. he built a car out of clay and they kept jumping back to him still yapping

-the million references to zhous gift from charles last year (the bottas calendar) 

-carlos getting the chili costume from zhou, and thus providing the context for the chili costume pics

all in all it was something of a tame secret santa. previous insane gifts have included:

-lando getting a breast pump

-charles re gifting the bottas calendar to zhou

-i think one year daniel got a cheese cake factory cheesecake 

-theres definitely more that i cant think of

-generally they just clown the hell out of eachother, so if you're looking for something to watch in the off season. i cant recommend these enough.

and that's it. were here now. all the way at the very bitter end of the season. 

and what a season it was. 

i did not imagine at the beginning of the season that this post would get so long or that i would even finish it. or that this much would happen. ive learned a lot writing this post, ive also had a fantastic time, but to answer everyones question, this was a one shot deal. i am not doing this again next year. 

thank you to everyone for reading. i hope you learned something, i hope you had a fun time. and to everyone that told me this post gave you a new special interest or allowed you yo better connect or talk with a coworker, a friend, a partner, a family member, etc etc, i am so glad. i hope you keep watching and keeping�� up as best as you can. because its all just ridiculous, isnt it? and not really daunting at all once you start to look more closely at it. 

i want to thank everyone whos posts i cited, who sent me posts, to all the friends that i made. you are all fantastic and thank you this post would not exist without you. 

id also like to thank my little sister, who got me into f1 and is very proud of the empire that she has by proxy created over here on tumblr. and thank you for sending me 11 million instagram reels this year. im sorry if i didn't always watch them

and the biggest thank you. to my lovely roommate and fellow mod katya for forcing me to bite the bullet and finish this damn thing even though i did not want to at all. thank you for sending me twitter links and article links and instagram reels and helping me track down obscure pictures and interviews. 

this post was really, truly a group project. and i am so glad that it is over. 

in case you are wondering, here were all the notes i took, from canada on, the previous ones are in my notes app. it ws 81 pages total, with 53 being front and back. 

again thank you everyone. merry christmas. happy new year. and good luck with keeping up with f1 in 2025. 

peace out :)

the 2024 formula 1 silly season and drama master post, part 2 (part 1 here)

Hello and welcome to ah fucking fuck auto caps fuck fuck fuck how do i turn off auto caps AHA there we go okay. take 2

hello and welcome to the great and very insane formula 1 2024 season drama post, part 2. if you are new here or are just looking for part one (which contains the previous 16 (?) races, the off season, pre season testing and everything else, that can be found HERE. (a word to the wise: open it in a browser, not the app, and preferably on a computer to avoid crashing. its fucking long). 

what the hell is formula 1? car go fast. fastest cars in the world zoom around tracks at top speeds of over 300kph, piloted by the top 20 drivers in the world. it might not sound dramatic, but oh man. you will Not be disappointed. this post focuses on the drama, the insanity, the sheer what the hell how is this a serious sport. no legitimately. we've just about seen it all this year. grindr, dogs, watersports, ice cream brands, its all here.

the point of this post? to educate, to catalog the insane drama, and to just have a good time. people like to gatekeep this sport, there is also a lot happening. i try to make it easy to understand. again, probably best to start at the beginning of the post because it does a pretty good job of explaining things, which i began way back in january, and can be found HERE (again, shes long, be careful)

and, as usual, if you do not want to see this post EVER AGAIN, block the tag #saph explains silly season 2024

and a second caution, i assume this post will be getting long as well. including this one we have minimum 9 updates left!

anyway, those of you who have been following along the whole time, welcome back! i know we got a little delayed. and i know we’re on a new post, so lets just briefly take a second for me to explain what the fuck happened. first i had an anatomy test, second i work 2 jobs with fuck ass hours, third tumblr decided to stop letting me look at any of my drafts, fourth tumblr support ghosted me about the drafts issue and the post was half saving half not so i just decided fuck it, were going with post 2, electric boogaloo, and fifth, i decided to start typing this instead in a google docs so. many changes. if you're new here i am usually more on top of this.

but here we are. were back on street circuits. we’re in baku, azerbaijan, for the start of the last third of the season. 8 races remain, world championship titles are still within grasp of multiple people. the drama is dramaing. and today is september 22, 2024 and lets fucking go. 

first and foremost, on account of the fact that this post is late (again, see above), were going to have to do a bit of a speed run. if you're new here, i promise that this is not representative of my normal dedication to the update post. and for those asking, yeah, ill probably compile it somewhere better than a tumblr post after its all said and done, but we don't have time for that now. 

what we do have time for is the Off Week (and like some of the media stuff). and it was filled with silliness: 

george russell decided to wear what can only be described as slightly ugly yellow short shorts with his taylor swift shirt that he got at the eras tour. this was baffling for several reasons, the main reason being that i don't think the internet knew that he was capable of wearing a graphic t shirt

fernando alonso got his aston martin valkyrie finally. in case you are unfamiliar, a valkyrie i think is the worlds fastest street legal car. he posted tweets about this that made it seem like he wanted to fuck the car. hilariously, the car broke down an hour later.

we also had the very thrilling conclusion to grill the grid. oscar won and he somehow managed to look more pleased about his grill the grid win than his first race victory. 

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nico rosberg went to the green awards and he wore a fantastically insane teal blue suit. yes i know hes not a current driver. but you all like hearing about him so ask and you shall receive. unfornunately i cant find a picture of it though

and also not a current driver is mick schumacher, but my roommate asked me to include that he was seen on his girlfriends instagram being bad at golf. like. exceptionally bad at golf. like he hit a tree 20 feet in front of him.

also playing golf was lando norris. except he managed to look like try bolton from high school musical 2.

he also talked about the world driver championship with his friend max fewtrell while they were playing golf. unfortunately i lost this link in the sea of technical difficulties, but the gist of it was that he was saying that there is still hope for him to beat max in the championship (hes about 60 points behind right now). lando doesnt usually talk about the championship because he doesnt want news outlets to paint him as “desperate” so this was interesting

charles leclerc had an insane off week. first he rear ended someone in monaco. then he spoke at a yacht conference. he was not scheduled to speak at said yacht conference, he was there doing something else and they were like hey you're cool people know you, heres a microphone. he alsp ended up on a weather channel while promoting a karting event he was doing for the jules bianchi foundation (his god father, the one who died during the f1 race in japan 2014). he also changed his instagram pop and re centered it because some random tiktoker told him it matched his aesthetic better.

oscar piastri posted a photo of himself sitting in the cockpit of a plane and then promptly deleted it. because he posted it on 9/11. for anyone who doesnt know what that is, that was when some terrorists hijacked commercial planes and few them into the world trade centers in nyc and the pentagon in washington dc

max verstappen also posted a plane pic with himself and lando norris, but he did not delete it.

we also had the return of daniel ricciardo’s jpg instagram account, which is kinda like a finsta for photos that hes taken. i think lando started this a few years ago. 

heading into the race week we certainly got a weird ass batch of pr. including but not limited to:

lewis hamilton was back on top and slaying in the fit game. as was yuki. 

lewis hamilton also exposed george russell as listening to katy perry pre race. katy perry and taylor swift (this was after he claimed that he liked listening to old school rap music.) though, lewis then started singing wrecking ball???? confusing vibes all around

george was not off the hook yet tho because some intern definitely make him say skidibidi toilet or whatever the thing is idk, i might be gen z but im not insufferable, okay? actually george in baku was just all kinds of unhinged

george and alex also got up to something, what it is no one knows but it is clearly something

max pulled up to the paddock de aged about 10 years. picture one is of him in baku in 2015 (i believe he was 17) and picture 2 is this year. no i am not kidding. 

and franco walked into the paddock telling everyone about argentinian mate (which is a drink, not a friend)

and max shoved a microphone out of the way so everyone could gossip

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then of course, we had some slightly more relevant drama

haas announced that ollie would be replacing kevin at baku. in case you forgot, kevin magnussen received a total of 12 penalty points over the season so far, which means he gets one race ban. how did he get the points? well he was mostly wreaking havoc on everyone else so that his teammate, nico hulkenberg, could drag his car into the points. lets all remember the time in saudi arabia where he managed to get 20 seconds of penalties by basically driving like a mad man just to make sure that nico could keep his position after he pit stopped. anyway, nico was kind of pissed about the race ban situation and said “maybe the guidelines for F1 penalties need to be reviewed as the stewards ‘want to get involved’ no matter the contact.”

in any case though, k mags was out. and ollie was in. we’ve seen ollie before. notably he subbed in for carlos sainz at the saudi arabia gp when carlos had appendicitis. he managed to get points as well. since then, he has been announced as a haas driver for 2025 and is now subbing in for k mags (haas, later in the week called him a super sub. clearly no gen z person read that over.) he can do this because ferrari has a haas engine so they share reserve drivers.

adrian newey finally got employed. i know! i can hardly believe it either! but he did! and youll never guess where! 

ferrari? no that would be too obvious. 

mercedes? nah

williams? no too much of a shit show

aston martin? ding ding ding! just the right amount of shit show! 

that is right. newey is going to aston for 2025. 

apparently he was offered a “good package” according to himself, which i assume means pay and also the fact that lawrence stroll made him a shareholder? stakeholder? whatever its called. in the team itself. basically he has a lot of power. 

he said that he always wanted to work with fernando and lewis. and he couldn't do both. and aston had a better package than ferrari. 

fernando looked positively evil during all the announcement pictures. and called the team "definitely the team of the future" and for those of you who don't know, fernando is positively evil. hes just been stuck in a shit box and we havent seen very much of him, but man does he know how to evilly slut it up. so that will be fun to see.

by contrast, people said that lance was not excited enough. and well. lance 1. has resting bitch face and 2. never really looks excited about anything. also he lives in a world where take your child to work day somehow became his job. (his dad owns the team).

lewis hamilton was asked what he thought about adrian not going to ferrari, and here's what he had to say:

"i feel like, while I have mentioned before that it would be an honor to work with adrian, i have been privileged to work with two championship winning teams that didnt have adrian."

mclaren announced pato o ward would do FP1 in mexico. who is pato o ward? hes one of mclaren’s indycar drivers and one of the f1 reserve drivers. he is incredibly charming and definitely runs his own social media as seen here:

mclaren Also claim they figured out who their number 2 driver is and they claim its oscar. i say they claim because the statements were a lot more complex than that. essentially, according to andrea stella, the priority is to the team first, then lando and then oscar. so they didn't outright say that oscar is the number 2 driver and i am willing to bet real money that this is because mr mark webber, oscars manager, has something in oscars contract that prevents him from being a number 2 driver. this is of course because mark webber was one of the most infamous number 2 drivers in f1 history to none other than menace war criminal sebastian vettel, who in their time as teammates, managed to win 4 back to back world champions. or, top to bottom if you're mrs darbus from high school musical. 

lando was asked about this and he said that yes, the team does support him. though he would not expect oscar to give up a win for him and that it is more complex behind the scenes. i suppose we will see if there are any papaya rules coming out this weekend….

and oscar said "i think the main point is its not purely just going to be me pulling over for lando every single race, because thats how none of us, including lando, wont want to go racing, if we feel that someone has done a much better job on a weekend, whichever way it is, we want that person to be rewarded."

max verstappen commented on the mclaren situation as well. which was funny mostly because red bull has one of the most defined number 1 and number 2 drivers of any team. he said "you look at it form oscar's perspective, he is closer to lando than lando to me. they have to deal with that."

and allow me to put on a tin foil hat as we are about to talk about the future of the red bull seat. because all i have to offer here is a baseball hat and a red bull can. 

a long time ago we talked about the red bull cans. the ones that red bull makes to promote f1. at the end of last season red bull put max and checo on the red bull can. this season at the start it was just max on the red bull can. well. now checo has reappeared on the cans too. and i will tell you what i think this means. it means that checo is not getting swapped this season, which was a possibility for awhile. 

but! there is more! 

daniel ricciardo made an instagram post this week. and it was very interesting. but most interestingly he was wearing a red bull hat.

which he does occasionally, no big deal really. he did race for the for several years, he technically does currently. BUT then he showed up TO THE PADDOCK wearing the red bull hat.

which is Big Interesting. usually you show up in a statement outfit or wearing the team kit. and daniel is not a red bull racing driver. he is a visa cashapp racing bulls driver. they might be owned by red bull but they are Not the same team. so why the red bull hat. in the paddock. well, the rumor is that hes taking checos seat for 2025. and the rumor is that this will be announced before mexico. so checo can have a proper send off. 

and with that. the baku lore. 

theres a lot that has happened at baku. as i said its a street circuit. and i think its the fastest street circuit. but over the years theres been some notable events. 

such as the great kimi raikkonen radio for gloves and steering wheel:

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they gave mini kimi this week gloves and steering wheel in honor of that

the max and daniel crash in 2018 when they were running p1 and p2 respectfully

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and of course. how could we forget. charles’s infamous “i am stupid” radio.

speaking of charles, he crashed again in fp1. not quite in the same spot, but nearly. he took a picture with the marshalls. 

then in fp2 he rage quit, basically saying that the car sucks. 

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but he was back and better than ever in practice three because he managed to top the time charts. welcome back fuck ass ferrari.

some other teams definitely experienced the lows but not really the highs of baku during practice. like lance stroll who came on the radio to say “this is not a car” (good thing they have adrian newey now, right? 

franco colapinto also cut his ear before practice on the neck strengthener stretcher thing that they all use and the team wanted to give him stitches but he was like no no no i need to be in the car in about 5 minutes im not doing that. so he jammed on his helmet and jumped in the car. he also crashed and when he went to the medical center he took off his helmet and there was blood everywhere and they were like no no no you cannot race! and he was like no! this is not from the crash! and then explained it and they let him do qualifying. 

also im pretty sure? ollie bearman crashed? in practice? but frankly i don't have time to google it so whos to say. 

but alas. qualifying. 

i know i know this is kind of a shitty update. i promise ill go all out in singapore. i PROMISE. 

so as i said. its a street circuit. high speed. 90 degree corners. and also windy as hell. we also had the dynamic duo of karun and harry in the commentary box. 

max led the first practice, george led the second and i think charles led the third. or some order like that. 

slipstream here is almost essential (slipstream: going behind another car to reduce the wind drag so you can go faster) 

charles has the last three pole positions (first in qualifying) here in baku, but he has never won. by comparison, red bull have never had pole here but they have won. 

and franco has never been to baku before. 

i think that's all the exposition that we need here. 

q1 started with max complaining about his car. “the car is jumping around like crazy on the rear axle” he said. despite this he was sitting in p3. 

the mid field battle though….the mid field battle was heating the hell up. mostly because none other than franco colapinto, who if you will remember, has never been to baku before, had split the two ferraris. he was in third for the moment, .109 seconds behind carlos sainz and .159 seconds ahead of charles leclerc. we still had a lot of qualifying left to go, so this was probably not going to stay, but it was still insane. he was pushing insanely hard, nearly kissing the walls. clearly he had learned from his crash in practice. 

the two mclarens waited until the very end of q1 to do their final flying push lap, and oscar made it through, but tragedy struck for lando. 

lando was in the middle of his last flying lap, time was ticking down, and there was a Very Brief yellow flag on the track. now, according to rules, you cannot complete your flying lap if there is a yellow flag. so lando pitted and was stuck down in 17th and out of qualifying. this would be the first time that he was out in q1 since vegas last year (which if i remember correctly was also not his fault) 

now though, of course nothing is ever that cut and dry. people thought that there had been a mis showing of a flag. yellow flag means that a car is stopped on track, white flag means that a car is going slowly on the track. and people thought that there had been a yellow flag shown when it was actually supposed to be a white flag (if there had been a white flag then lando would have been able to keep doing his flying lap) lando himself said that he had no idea what people were talking about because there is a light on the steering wheel that lights up when flags are called and he had a big yellow light. so it was clearly a yellow flag. 

if you're concerned about lando being able to pull it out of the bag, id like to point you in the direction of the mexican gp last year where lando qualified 17th and finished 5th. on a track that was hard to overtake on. he can be absolutely insane when he wants to be. worry not gentle reader. 

in any case. also out in q1 was daniel ricciardo, valtteri bottas, zhou guanyu and esteban ocon.

and notably, williams, who was on fucking fire this weekend as we already saw, finished q1 with alex albon in second (ahead of oscar) and franco colapinto in 8th. pierre gasly had somehow managed to also get into 4th. and nico hulkenberg was in 7th with ollie bearman in 13th. i told you the mid field battle was heating the hell up. 

q2. everyone zoomed straight out of the gate. they didn't want to get lando norris’d. but, speaking of that, if lando managed to get no points in the race and charles managed to win, charles would overtake lando in the drivers championship. mark webber himself told this to charles, who was absolutely baffled. 

in any case, charles was kinda suffering right now and that was because he was not getting slipstream from carlos to make his lap faster. meanwhile, carlos seemed to be actively trying to give charles the slipstream because he came on radio to say “he keeps missing the tow” 

and amazingly, franco colapinto was 4 tenths AHEAD of alex albon. alex albon who had not been unqualified by his teammate once since the start of 2023. ex red bull driver alex albon. that alex albon. 

max topped the times in q2, followed immediately by charles. insanely, fernando alonso managed to drag the aston martin to fifth. and franco was right behind him in 6th. by comparison alex albon was in 10th. 

and from q2 we lost ollie bearman, yuki tsunoda (who has never qualified lower than 8th in baku), pierre gasly, nico hulkenberg and lance stroll. so yes, ollie bearman managed to outqualify nico hulkenberg. this is ollies second ever f1 race. 

steaming on forward to q3. 

we had, for review, in q3 the following: 

both ferraris, both red bulls, both mercedes, both WILLIAMS (has not happened since vegas 2023), plus fernando alonso and oscar piastri. 

right out the gate it was wild. 

“red bull! theyve re found their mojo! or have they!” karun said. red bull were in 5th and 6th and not entirely sucking for the moment. 

everyone did one flyer and then came out at the end for a second flyer. 

here were the standings: 

charles, carlos, oscar, george, checo, max, lewis, alex, franco, fernando

and everyone was making it to the line and all was going smooth until-

wait a second what is that

could it be! alex albon! with the air box fan still on his car! surely not!!!

oh but it was! and harry and karun were like oh wow so unfortunate for williams tisk tisk

meanwhile ted jumped on the radio to Loudly announce to everyone that this was insane and if i have time here i will put the rant he ranted cause it was Fantastic.

and what do you know i have time

so we had 3 minutes left qualifying and everyone was pulling out of the pits for their last flyer when oscar hopped on the radio to say

"the williams still has the air box fan in"

"oh what an error! disaster for williams!" karun and harry said. they speculated if the marshalls could get it or if the session needed to be red flagged. but alex threw the fan off the car.

and then they asked "ted have you ever seen that before?" and ted did not hold back:

"ITS A MASSIVE YELLOW FAN HOW COULD YOU MISS IT???!!! HOW COULD THE MECHANICS MISS IT???? I CANT BELIVE THEY WOULD MAKE SUCH A MISTAKE DOWN AT WILLIAMS! SUCH AN EXPERIENCED BUNCH OF GUYS AND GIRLS! WHAT IS GOING ON AT WILLIAMS OPERATIONALLY? HOW COULD YOU SEND A CAR OUT LIKE THAT?"

alex, obviously, got fined for an unsafe release 5k euros. he also had to throw the fan off to the side and got slightly covered in dry ice. he did not get to the a second flying lap. 

franco did tho!

and here were out qualifying results: 

p1: charles p2: oscar p3: carlos p4: checo p5: george p6: max p7: lewis p8: fernando p9: franco p10: alex  p11: ollie p12: yuki p13: pierre p14: nico p15: lance p16: daniel  p17: lando p18: valtteri p19: zhou p20: esteban 

oh ho ho but we werent done yet. because pierre gasly got disqualified from qualifying. for failing fuel flow regulations. and lewis was going to have to start from the pit lane for changing his power unit. 

everyone, and by everyone i mean oscar max and checo, pretty much said that charles was going to get pole no matter what, they knew this coming in and the best they were trying for was second

onto the race. 

notably, this is considered a checo track. this was one of the three races that max did not win last year. because checo won it. its a track that he does well on, evidenced by the fact that he qualified above max in qualifying. so people were expecting big things from him.

and so, we head into lap 1.

charles managed to hang onto the lead. checo passed carlos straight out of the gate for third and max managed to pass george to take fifth. lando had managed to get ahead of nico and up into 13th. notably, franco held onto 8th and ollie was able to hold onto tenth. 

someone who was not doing well was lance stroll, who came on the radio saying that he had a puncture. this was from contact with yuki. lance had to pit for fresh tires and was pretty immediately thrown to the back of the grid. 

by lap 2 lando had managed to get past daniel and was in 12th, he was trying to get past yuki next, which he managed by lap 3. yuki also lost a  spot to nico. 

also slaying in the mclaren was oscar, who took fastest lap. then charles took fastest lap.

and lewis hamilton, who had started from the pit lane, was up to 16th. already. somehow. though he was displeased with the tires, sayig that “this tire is pretty bad” over the radio. 

yuki meanwhile was clearly having a problem because he had started going very very slowly. thought the pit wall said that he had no problems. this would later turn out to be false but we will indulge them for the time being. 

franco was STILL ahead of alex albon on lap 6. STILL. 

lando on lap 8 managed to push his way into points positions, overtaking ollie bearman for 10th. though this was where things were about to slow down for him because in front of him were alex, franco and fernando, who were all very close together and would be hard to get past. 

george was back in bad luck hell as a plastic bag entered his airbox. will he ever catch a break. 

on lap 11 nico hulkenberg finally caught up with ollie bearman and passed him for 11th. 

and max’s car was not working. to potentially no one’s surprise. “i have zero bite in the car” he said. and this was probably true because checo was a whole 6.5 seconds ahead of him. insane gap. 

several pit stops later that i will not detail out because we simply do not have the time, alex albon ended up in 4th and lando ended up in fifth. and oscar was about to get undercut by checo. 

“mojo seems to be back for checo perez” harry said, correctly. 

mojo was back for him indeed. and now he was right behind lando. 

and if you will recall, according to mclaren themselves, priority at mclaren is the team first, then oscar, then lando. but oscar was ahead of lando. so what did mclaren do? 

they asked lando do hold up perez, but not compromise his own race. 

remever a long time ago when i said mclaren wouldn't have any internal drama this season? man how i was wrong.

lando managed to hold up perez for around a lap or two before he got past. this was crucial because this was during when oscar was in the pits. 

thanks to lando and the power of the papaya rules teamwork, oscar ended up coming out in 4th, only .706s ahead of checo. 

mclaren are working together everyone! mclaren are working together!

meanwhile, turns out that yuki did indeed have problems because he retired on lap 17 with a hole in his sidepod from the contact with lance on lap 1. this was now two races in a row where he had had to retire for reasons out of his control. 

several more people pitted. and eventually charles was back out in front, oscar was in p2. until he wasn't. no, he didn't dnf. he overtook charles! he was in p1! he popped out of nowhere! nowhere being 2 car lengths back and just flooring it to spring around charles like a little silly slinky! karun called it a “good, fair and robust defense,” which sounds like its descibing notes in wine. but this was not wine. this was the baku gp. and we were only half done. 

ollie bearman was defending against lewis hamilton, holding on tightly to 14th place. 

charles was still behind oscar and he could not get past, despite the fact that he was still very much in spitting distance. “they are pushing like crazy or they have more grip than us” he said. 

carlos got past both lando and alex albon and was up into 4th

this brought max up behind lando. max was on 11 lap old tires and lando was on 24 lap old tires. but lando still defended like hell and managed to hold onto sixth. max was 0.632 seconds behind lando on lap 25 when he said that “my brakes are not working.” this was hardly a surprise. max has hated the car since china.

also experiencing technical difficulties was sir lewis hamilton. he was stuck down in 14th and was first told to do “everything you can do to get the surface temp down” of the tires. he said “im trying” then several laps later on lap 29 he came on the radio to say “are you seeing how i have to drive this thing?” “yes,” bono, his engineer said. “quite effective though.” 

max was still half a second behind lando. mclaren faked a pit stop call over the radio to get max to pit. he did not. 

but, george russell did manage to pass him. which was “not good for max’s world champion aspirations.”

this was also when ted very bafflingly said that “if i had a sofa in the pit lane i would be jumping up and down on it” im not sure what that was in response to. 

meanwhile, ollie was still holding off sir lewis hamilton. and charles was trying to get oscar to pit again by lying over the radio. it was not working. 

lando did a pit stop finally and came out a whole 15 second behind max. he was hoping to catch max by the end of the race. but it might be tight. lets go last lap lando. 

“lando, imagine andrea on your shoulder saying ‘zero wheel spin’ in every exit,” lando’s race engineer said. if you're confused, everyone else was too. 

10 laps to go and here were the order of affairs:

oscar

+.449s charles +1.865s checo +2.989s carlos +16.530s george  +1.909s max +11.535s lando +9.715s fernando +2.589s alex +2.451s nico +4.667s franco +1.590s lewis +1.261s ollie +1.791s pierre +9.205s daniel +23.919s esteban  +.789s lance +3.862s valtteri +3.631s guanyu 

lando was determined. he took fastest lap on lap 43 and was 8.8s behind max

at this point, the leaders were starting to lap the cars in the back. “the back markers are starting to come up,” checo’s engineer said to him. “its going to get messy.”

“hold onto your hats and if you don't have one go get one and hold onto it” harry said. harry would turn out to be correct. 

we had the top 3 all running very close to eachother, that was oscar, charles and checo and “welcome to the party carlos sainz!” who was now 1.2 seconds behind checo in the four way battle for the lead.

definitely not leading was lance stroll, who retired on lap 47 with a brake problem. 

oscar managed to pull ahead of charles by 1.5 seconds, finally knocking him out of DRS range. so now it was a three way battle for second. and charles had “no rear tires. no rear tires at all.” 

and, just like i said he would, lando managed to pass max on lap 49. he was closing the gap slowly in the championship. 

“verstappen’s day goes from bad to worse,” harry said. because lando still had fastest lap, so he would score 3 more points than max. which is important if lando wants to beat max in the championship (though i think hes still like 60 points behind)

meanwhile! franco managed to pass nico hulkenberg for 10th! he was in the points!!!! at his second race!!! 

but this was short lived because there was a crash! a big smackeroo! between carlos and checo!! checo was mad, carlos didn't know what happened. 

what happened was that carlos was trying to pass checo but checo did not move over. it was deemed an equal fault accident. both of them were utterly confused at what happened and apparently spent 20 minutes in the medical center being utterly lost and aparently saying that sometimes this sport sucks. and! contrary to what several people said! checo did not bang on carlos’s helmet after the crash. 

the crash actually caused chef's dad to have a heart attack. he is stable now.

and well. this clip of george from the post qualifying interviews definitely didnt age well:

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but! since we were a matter of a few laps from the end, this meant that the rest of the race was finished under a virtual safety car. 

which meant 

OSCAR PIASTRI WINS THE AZERBAIJAN GP

and george inherited p3! 

and on his own merit too! no safety cars, no team orders, no weird shit! 

“yes!” he whispered over the radio. 

he almost fell getting out of the car, then gave us all the “one moment” hand gesture before properly celebrating. 

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he also got driver of the day! 

(this was marginally better than george russell, who said over the radio “i cant get any rubber (to pick up on his tires) all im getting is leaves”)

gunther steiner also hosted the post race interviews. which was interesting. 

george said that the most difficult part of the race was “driving full gas into a wall of carbon fiber on the penultimate lap…the vsc should have come out sooner” 

charles bashed ferrari because they didn't do any high fuel runs in practice. 

oscar was entirely pleased. “i managed to overtake and hold onto it for the next 35 laps..one of the better races of my career.” and honestly, oscar winning a race straight after mclaren basically announcing that he was their number 2 driver is nothing short of hilarious.

and! mclaren was now leading the constructors championship by 20 points! for the first time in ten years!!!!

the top three had a moment outside of the car that was filled with baffled: 

and oscar's engineer tom got to stand on the podium with him. he usually takes a selfie with oscar after each race he podiums at, but he was too excited to so george took this picture for them

(george also aparently demomished oscar in a game of uno on the plane, immediately humbling him)

george also shielded himself from the champagne on the podium

the cooldown room reacted to the crash in a very straight forward manner:

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and very quickly cause its midnight and the singapore gp starts in 8 hours, the post race, speed ran: 

-mark webber told off laura winter for thinking that oscar didn't have good tire management

-alex albon was “super happy, that's a lot of points for us” (williams finished in 7th and 8th). he cut his own interview short when ollie bearman arrived, saying “I can go, im happy to go” and then waving comically. 

-williams was so pleased with this result they blasted everyone with champagne. and they overtook alpine in the constructors championship! this was also their best race finish all season

-(and a quick note, if youre going to really blame logan for being that shit of a driver here, please remember that the car he was driving was several rounds of upgrades behind alex's pretty much the entire time he was driving it)

-ollie became the first driver to ever score points in his first two races for two different constructors because the double dnf pushed him up to 10th place. he said that there was not much difference between the haas and the ferrari, the ferrari was just red

-franco continued to charm everyone and flirt with the reporters. 

-they interviewed george and lewis and the camera had to be adjusted for george's height. it was comical and resulted in my favorite edit so far of the season (sound on)

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-lando looked pleased and happy for once. he said about holding off checo that “i didn't hold him up i just had to cool my tires a little.” he was delighted to be leading the constructors for the first time in ten years and he defended alex albon saying “i struggled to get past alex for a while, which is common, alex doesnt make mistakes.” he also ratted on max for going to fast during the VSC and said “i didn't complain, facts were stated.” and to sum it all up he said that “im executing things well, i’m very quick…i’m not going to be the happiest guy, but i am never the happiest guy….car is performing well everywhere…some red cars behind us seem to be our biggest competitors right now” 

-by comparison george insulted all of pirelli. the tire people. “pretty infuriating that it (the pace) changes this so much….its black magic, people who make the tires don't understand the tires…..for 20 laps we had a car not worthy of points and for 20 laps we had a car fighting for victory and the only difference is the tires.” 

-lewis was notably upset after the race and walked through the paddock with his helmet on, not wanting to talk to anyone. but he did talk to franco and ollie and congratulate them on a job well done defending against him and racing against him. franco even fangirled over this on his instagram. 

-charles was clearly upset with ferrari. he was so upset he posted a thirst trap.

-and oscar. oscar was very happy this afternoon. and his mom was there! she doesnt usually come cause it scares her, but nicole was there today! 

-mclaren celebrated with a hell of a lot of champagne. both oscar’s wina and lando’s insane recovery, and the fact that they were leading the championship. red bull have been dethroned, at least for now. 

-there was so much champagne that lando took off his socks to spray it. all seems well at mclaren. 

-at least one thing is for sure, oscar had a better time here this weekend than last year when he got food poisoning and only ate four pieces of toast

and with that. we head into singapore. quite literally as it is starting in a few hours. again, i apologixe about this post. its a little sad, but the next one will be better. pinkly promise. 

see you all soon!!!

[dc-gotham-instincts-wild]

Guys I don't know what to name this fic so gimme ideas and I'll change the title

Summary: At one point when everyone is at Jason's apartment for no reason, Jason, Cass, and Dick are faced with the challenge of getting their younger siblings to sleep (Bruce promised them money) while Bruce is away on a case.

Notes:

I don't ship any of the Batkids, they're all siblings to me.

In my mind, Dick is the oldest, Cassandra is about seven months older than Jason, Tim and Steph are about 4 months apart, Duke is about 2-4 years younger than them, and Damian is obviously the youngest.

Dick, Cass, and Jason form the older trio, Tim and Steph are the middle, Duke and Dami are the youngest, but it's basically oldest three vs youngest four.

Yes Bruce has/did have legal custody of all seven. Tim? he stole it. Was pretty easy for him too.

The next door neighbor part is because..... I didn't exactly know how to start it so i started it that way.

THE ENDING WAS INSPIRED BY THIS FIC, SO UHHH CREDIT FOR THAT PART GOES TO THEM!

----------------

The Batkids all basically lived at Wayne Manor, but Dick, Cass, and Jason, being the oldest three, and the legal adults, all had their own apartments that they did use, just they liked breaking back into WM because it was more home than their apartments.

But every now and then the whole gang just kind of.... went and rolled down to any of the apartments, chilled, fooled around, watched something, even stayed the night etc, etc. 

Case in point, once when Bruce was off on a larger case, but Tim, Steph, Duke, and Damian had school the next day and Cass had a broken arm, so he left Jason, Dick, and Cass in charge and for no reason they kind of just rolled over to Jason's. 

-

The next door neighbor, Owen, knocked on the door, wanting to know about the sudden influx of noise. He didn't mind, he was just curious. 

Jason opened the door, looking a bit tired, his hair messy and a bit sweaty, but there was a spark in his greenish-blue eyes that Owen hadn't seen before in their earlier interactions. 

"...What?" The young man asked. Owen hesitated, hearing voices from behind his strange neighbor.

"Just, uh, heard more noise than usual and got curious. Not annoyed, just curious."

Jason blinked, then seemed to realize.  "Oh, that's just my siblings. They're over." Owen blinked in surprise. "You- you have siblings?"

"Yeah, there's seven of us!" Yelled a girl's voice behind Jason.  "Adopted!" Added a young male voice. 

Jason rolled his eyes, though a hint of fondness was there in his eyes.

"Yeah. Me and my older bro and sis are the oldest three, so as thus-"

"We are left in charge while Dad is away." finished another young man, appearing behind Jason. He seemed to be a bit older than his brother. "I'm Dick. Oldest of seven insane siblings. Jay here is the third oldest."

Jason rolled his eyes. "Yeah. Our sister Cass is between us. Anyway, sorry about the noise, we're trying to wrangle the little ones to bed since they have school tomorrow and Dad ain't here. We're here at my apartment instead of the main house for no reason other than pure randomness."

Owen blinked. Looking over The twos' shoulders he could see two girls, one seeming between Dick and Jason in age, the other somewhere in high school, plus three boys, one the same age as the younger girl, the other two younger than that but still apart. 

"It's fine," He decided. "Hope they sleep though." He added with a wry grin.

Jason actually laughed. "Yeah, Dad promised us money if we manage to get them to bed, so..."

Dick grinned. "Yup!" He turned around to the room. "So you four better get to bed real fast!"

Owen nodded and grinned as the door closed. 

It was nice to know his neighbor had a good family.

-

Jason turned around to his younger siblings. "You heard Dick, hit the hay!"

Steph rolled her eyes. "Do we have to?"  Cass tapped her sister on the shoulder and silently pointed to one of the other extra rooms.  'Go,' her eyes said. Cass was like that. Her siblings didn't even need her to sign to understand. Just her presence was enough.

"Steph....." Dick warned. "School is next morning, sis." Steph sighed and finally slipped off to bed. 

Next was Damian. 

"Demon Brat, you heard us. You have school tomorrow and besides, it's almost past your bedtime, little one." "I am too old for such restrictions." Damian answered stubbornly, crossing his arms.

Jason sighed, running a hand through his hair. 

"Damian...... You do know that I'm saying this on Bruce's orders, right?"

A stubborn glare.

Dick tried. "Hey Dami, if you don't go to bed then you'll be tired during school. Me and Jason can manage patrol and like Jay said, you usually go to bed on this time when you're not on patrol. You want me to call Alfred?" 

That worked. Damian sighed, and went into one of the extra rooms, grumbling. 

Alfred card always worked.

Jason slipped over to the table where Duke was hunched over his math book. "You done with your homework, bro?"

Duke sighed. "Nope. I literally can't get this last one."

Jason looked at the problem and sighed. "Lemme guess- Ms. Rue is the teacher for your math class. Duke blinked at him in surprise. 

"Yeah, how'd you know?"

Jason smirked. "Oh, I had her. She's infamous for being the worst teacher ever." 

Duke groaned. "Tell me about It!"

Jason grabbed the pencil and started telling him how to do it properly. 

Meanwhile Dick had wrangled Tim off the couch and was gently guiding him to another room with an arm slung across his shoulders. It had taken Tim trying to bolt and getting scruffed for that to happen. 

Dick managed to get the younger male to bed and smirked at Tim's glare. 

"Hey, it's not so bad, little brother. You have school tomorrow anyhow."

Tim groaned but reluctantly settled down and pulled the blanket over himself. Dick chuckled fondly and ran a hand through the younger one's hair. 

"Tell you what- you go to sleep right now and tomorrow after school I'll take you and the others to get some hot chocolate, deal?" 

Tim brightened at the prospect of that. "Okay!" 

Dick smiled and knelt to nuzzle him a bit before leaving. 

Meanwhile Jason had gotten Duke to bed, and made sure Damian hadn't tried escaping, while Cass cleaned up the living room. 

Jason sighed big and flopped down on the couch.  "Damn, why'd Dad put us in charge?"

Dick grinned and ruffled his hair, earning a halfhearted swat. "Probably 'cause we're the oldest." Cass rolled her eyes. 

After a bit Jason stood up and grabbed his leather jacket and his Red Hood helmet, while Dick went to a room to find his Nightwing suit. 

"You'll be fine watching the little ones?" Dick asked Cass, whose arm was broken. She nodded and pointed at the window. 

Red Hood and Nightwing clambered out, shot out their grapple lines, and went off on patrol. 

-

Commissioner Gordon raised an eyebrow at the two near the end of patrol when they showed up on his roof with some of Penguin's henchmen tied up. 

"Just you two tonight?" He asked. Nightwing grinned.

"Batman has a larger case on some traffickers, it's a school night for Red Robin, Robin, Spoiler, and Signal, and Black Bat's arm was broken the other night so she's watching the little ones to make sure they don't sneak out."

"Yup, so it's just the two oldest sons tonight, Uncle Jim." Red Hood smirked. 

Gordon sighed, shaking his head as the two grappled off.  "Oh, they are the Bat's sons alright," He muttered.

 -

Bruce, finished up with his case, slipped into the Batcave and took off his cowl and all, slipping into a light grey T-shirt and pants with a black jacket (it was winter).

He knew from a text Dick had sent him that his brood was at Jason's apartment, so he got into his normal car and drove off after briefing Alfred. 

He found the apartment easily, unlocked the door (So, he had one of the keys to his son's apartment, sue him), and slipped inside.

It was dark and quiet. He checked each room, finding one or two of his kids fast asleep in each.

Dick was curled around Damian, Cass was asleep in the bed next to Steph's (Why did Jason's apartment have more than one two-bed room?), Duke had somehow gotten into the same room as Tim.

Finally he found Jason, conked out on his bed, looking relaxed and happy for once. 

"Oh," Bruce sighed. It was so long that he'd seen his son like this, ever since everything fell apart but somehow came back together again. He and Jason were working it out, gettin over the awkwardness and slowly healing their bond. 

“Dad?” Jason mumbled, fist rubbed harshly against his sleep-squinted eyes. 

Bruce ignored the ache that filled his chest at the word, knowing, relieved that his son was... okay. Not mad at him anymore, Here.

Safe. 

“Just me, Jaylad,” He sighed, and pulled the blanket over his third oldest. 

“The case?” Jason mumbled. His voice was deep, rough with sleep, but it was still Bruce’s kid, sleepy but safe, checking in with Bruce after every patrol. 

“Everything was fine,” Bruce whispered soothingly, reaching out to tuck the cowlick of white hair away from Jason’s eyes. He blinked at Bruce, eyes more blue than green. He didn’t push him away.

“You can go back to sleep,” Bruce told him softly. “It’s late, little one.”

And Jason, with the same tiredness as the rest of them, didn’t argue. His eyelids slowly closed, his body finally relaxing.

“Stay?” Jason murmured.

Bruce almost said 'maybe', almost turned to let the younger ones sleep in peace, worried he'd disturb his kids, but Jason’s hand reached out, found the knee of Bruce’s pants and clutched the fabric in a grip so reflexive and old and instinctual. 

And there was a question when he asked Bruce to stay, instead of knowledge that Bruce would do anything he needed, anything he wanted.

So Bruce gave in to what he wanted, sitting down and wrapping one arm around his son, hugging the younger male's head to his chest.

“I’ll stay,” Bruce heard himself say, exhaustion already entangling him. “Love you, kiddo.” Jason mumbled an agreement. 

Bruce ran a hand through Jason's hair and closed his eyes. 

[echoes-of-courage]

It’s November 4th, Minish Cap’s release date, so happy birthday to Forge!

Gods, Forge, think before you speak. You’ll give Shadow a heart attack one of these days.

… how does one illegally officiate a marriage anyway?

[thebroccolination]

This is a great point. Like, under Studio Wabi Sabi, plenty of them could have been equally as open as Cooheart and chose to keep the veneer of mystery instead. For some it’s a career choice but for others it may simply be a “none of your damn business” choice.

Without naming names, there are definitely actors who are Barely Hiding Their Queerness and give me the vibe of “even if everyone got real cool with queer people overnight I’d still keep my private life private, now off ye fuck ye nosy cunts.” (/garron voice)

Just look at how closely guarded KristSingto have become after years of invasive behavior from both media and fandom. As a result, they even gatekeep their friendship from the public let alone their private dating lives. They rarely post when they’re hanging out together, and when Singto came back to GMMTV last year, he literally said, “I didn’t miss him because I never stopped hanging out with him.” We only got like, three photos of them together while Singto was freelance? It’s an ongoing joke in the Peraya fandom that we can only depend on their friends’ stories (and IG stories) for Shipping Moments. And G O O D. I’m honestly extremely proud of them for keeping as much as they possibly can to themselves. My ongoing thing with Singto leaving was, “Now they can finally enjoy each other’s company privately without fans shouting at Singto to sit in Krist’s lap about it.”

And I didn’t mention it in the first post, but openly queer Cooheart has gotten a TON of homophobic bullshit even from interfans who to this day call him a pedophile for doing TikTok dances with Santa. So it’s not like you come out and get universal love. You’re still going to be objectified and villainized and shouted at in a myriad of languages by people who don’t know you or care how it affects you.

Like, I’m not famous, but I still choose very carefully who I tell that I’m nonbinary in the Physical Offline World. That’s for me and my loved ones and Tumblr to know, not United Airlines or Random Strangers Who Make Assumptions About Me. I can’t fathom having to make the choice if I were twenty-four years old with millions of followers who 1) don’t respect boundaries, 2) are SUPER mercurial in their support, and 3) could turn on me the moment it’s confirmed that I’m Not Dating My Coworker for Real???

Anyway, bit of a ramble, but that was an extremely good point to add. It’s no one’s business and there are very good reasons to keep your queerness to yourself if you choose to.

GMMTV ISN’T CONTRACTUALLY FORCING THEIR ACTORS INTO THE CLOSET

Recently, I saw a fan from the U.S. claiming on TikTok that GMMTV contractually forces their queer actors to keep their sexual identities a secret. Why else would there be so few openly queer actors???

So, first of all, it’s not like the few openly queer actors in GMMTV had to break some corporate closet door to escape, and then GMMTV went, “Aw, shucks. Well, I guess y’all win. We’ll keep paying you, you little rainbowy scamps.” There are only a few of them because being openly queer in Thailand’s media industry is still fucking hard.

Fluke Natouch of Until We Meet Again (and OhmFluke 1.0) fame left his agency years ago to work freelance so he could navigate his career on his own terms. When openly gay director New of Studio Wabi Sabi approached him to offer the role of Pharm, Fluke very actually asked New if he was sure he wanted an openly gay actor in his series. This was a conversation that two openly gay men had! No sexualities whatsoever were hidden in the having of this conversation! Or in the public recounting of it later!

Fluke asked New this because there are still roadblocks for openly queer actors, and as a freelancer, he knew this. Some sponsors are hesitant to have a queer face on their commercials, and some of the industry’s upper management are old bigoted guys holding the purse strings. Why do you think so many of these guys have to appear straight-presenting?

Interfans contribute to the glorification of heteronormativity, too. How many times have I seen interfans lusting over the KinnPorsche actors as “real men” or excusing Joss’s myriad issues over the years because he’s “so hot”?

How many femme actors are given roles with complexity? How many are shunted into comedic roles or tragic figures? How many interfans point at Pharm and complain that He Cries Too Much? You’ve all seen it. “P’DEEEEEAN.”

Regardless of what interfans claim to want, the series that tend to do best nowadays feature straight-presenting actors. Bad Buddy, 2gether, My School President, KinnPorsche, etc.

Ironically, the series that lean hard on queer themes tend not to do as well.

So you can see why most choose to keep at least a veneer of heterosexuality or else keep the glass closet door closed.

New cast Fluke and Cooheart in Until We Meet Again because Studio Wabi Sabi was both agency and production company owned by New, and New could do whatever he wanted. SWS was very much a safe haven for queer actors of all levels of openness.

And regardless of my complaints about New’s directing and perpetual insistence that he do all the editing and sound design himself (stop, man, I’m begging you, learn how to delegate), he has been working for years to create a welcoming space for queer actors in an industry that is still extremely cautious, and I’ll always respect him for that.

As much as people love to hate a corporate body, GMMTV’s myriad flaws are more based in the categories of “terrible organization” and “poor management” and “haphazardly throwing a thousand medicore, half-baked projects at a wall until one of them sticks by chance and then celebrating that surprise hit into the ground”—not “forcing their actors into the closet.”

As far as I’m aware, the only khuujin (“imaginary couple”) in the industry who’s Openly Dating is PorscheArm, and they were already out and together before the fame, so they’re more Public Figures Advocating for Social Progress than they are BL actors. I’d say ZeeNuNew are borderline, because while they seem increasingly more cavalier with their subtlety, even they’ve been excruciatingly careful in their labeling over the past few years. (“Are you a couple?” “You could call us that.”)

And there’s a reason for the caution. Things are changing for the better, but progress is slow.

In an early, post-SOTUS interview from 2016, infant actors KristSingto were point-blank asked by TV hosts if they’re “normal” with a heavy insinuation that they’d be mocked and laughed at unless they asserted their heterosexuality in front of a live audience. Not exactly a warm and kind environment to say, “Actually…” As the first in the line of fire, KristSingto were constantly bombarded with invasive questions and suspicion and homophobia, and it’s only been nine years since SOTUS aired.

Now, you’ve got the evolution of hosts making lewd innuendos at khuujin and trying to “trick” them into Coming Out for content. Yet, all the khuujin seem to know how to play the game Juuuust Right to avoid saying anything concrete and damning, leaving just enough crumbs for fans to pick up on and enjoy.

Because look how the few openly queer actors are treated. Bruce Sirikorn Kananurak’s best-known role is framed villain Aey in Lovely Writer, and Gun Korawit Boonsri is regularly cast as Sassy Gay Side Character. Cooheart gets variety in his roles, but he’s with Studio Wabi Sabi under New, an openly gay CEO who famously allows his actors a ton of freedom in their image. And it says a lot to me that Cooheart didn’t make the move over to GMMTV along with his colleagues last year.

So, y’know, of course I’m not saying GMMTV is paradise. While he was with SWS, Boun said he wanted to get tattoos but New advised him against it because it might have limited potential roles. So New didn’t forbid it, he just cautioned Boun against doing it. Meanwhile, he implied recently that he’d like to dye his hair blond again, but GMMTV has to approve things like that. Hence, you’ll hear about some GMMTV actors who just get a tattoo done or cut their hair without telling anyone and then they show up for work with an insouciant shrug; the beg forgiveness>>>ask permission move.

So GMMTV does have some stupid public image rules, and they have also discouraged certain actors from interacting with each other in case it drives their profit margins down (see: The Chronicles of Management Driving KristGun Apart—I’m making a post about it, don’t worry). And I’m sure the Grammy Powers That Be go ://// if a GMMTV actor says, “Hey, I’m thinking of telling the world I’m bisexual tomorrow,” and go, “Maybe don’t though.” It’s just not something they’re Contractually Obligated to hide; it’s more common sense.

Like I said, GMMTV’s real crimes in my eyes are things like 1) repeatedly trying to push men like Foei and Joss who’ve proven themselves to be toxic nightmares to women and queer people over and over throughout the years, 2) overworking their most popular actors to physical and mental exhaustion, 3) barely promoting their GL productions despite their obvious popularity, 4) shoving their Not Singers onstage with zero vocal training, 5) prioritizing trends over quality, 6) having Zero Plan of what to do Most of the Time, 7) hiring on more and more actors without hiring enough managers to support them, and more.

There’s no “you gotta be Heterosexual-Presenting or else” clause in their contracts. They’re just actors in a conservative Asian country where marriage equality has only recently been recognized, and that’s not even close to having social equality. Plenty of western actors don’t want the extra baggage of being Openly Queer (see the Kit Connor debacle), let alone in a country controlled by military and monarchy.

Thailand isn’t a queer paradise.

Hell, look at Japan: they invented BL and GL and their government isn’t even close to recognizing marriage equality. To the majority of Japanese people, BL and GL are embarrassing subgenres that “Normal People” (ie: what heterosexuals are called in Japan—yes I’m serious) would never publicly admit to enjoying. I know this because I was a Queer Foreigner in Japan for eleven years and my whole existence was weird.

As far as I’ve heard from friends who work with GMMTV, it’s a far more progressive company than many interfans give it credit for. Many of the staff are openly queer, a ton of their directors are openly queer, and their actors who are queer are either open with the understanding that there are limitations to that choice or closeted to protect their job opportunities. Once you’re Openly Queer, you’re pushed into a very different and much smaller box, and they all know it.

So y’know. GMMTV actors aren’t All Straight, and the ones who are queer aren’t Closeted by Force. GMMTV is just a company of people with a wide tapestry of nuance, just like you’d expect from any large organization of artistic and business folk producing queer media for a general audience.

In 2025, let’s please abandon the myth that GMMTV is an evil kpop company. <3

It’s a sloppy, poorly run nightmare factory. :D

EDIT: Also, director X confirmed on Twitter last year that GMMTV has no anti-dating policy.

[cirr0stratus]

it finally stopped raining

[bitchywitchheart]

[sodapopbuoy]

my bugs

[nualaofthefaerie]

Everyone chill. Op just asked a question. It was cheeky. It wasn't meant like that. It's not like everyone gets everything. Defensiveness gets us nowhere, on both sides. Whenever someone asks one or the other side about their ship, they jump as if Viktor's a cookie that can't be shared.

I'll be glad to explain. Skyvik is not my "THE" ship. They either come in pack of four or I'm not interested:

But I spend enough time in all the tags to the point where I can explain each of their individual dynamics quite easily.

Is Skyvik based on guilt? Kinda actually.

On one hand, the acquintances to lovers pipeline is appealing to people, it's a tale as old as time. But I do think the guilt/grief angle is much more romantic. Now granted, I am a freak 😔 i do like them doomed from the get go.

Super important I subscribe to 'death of an author'. What Christian Linke or Amanda Overton tell me about any of these four is like air to me, it wasn't in the show it doesn't count. "Jayvik are friends"...like hell they are. "Sky was a stand in for Jayce" I'm afraid visuals do not subscribe to that notion.

Now, to go quickly through the usual Skyvik denial arguments:

1. "He calls her Miss Young"

Viktor's character is based on Slavic men. In most slavic cultures nicknames, first names and last names are used interchangeably without indication of how close someone is to another person.

He calls her Sky more times than he calls her Miss Young ever. At some point it became this Mandela Effect where people act like he didn't know her name.

2. He shows no interest in her before she died

By the time we are shows any sort of interest on Sky's part about Viktor, he's already too obsessed with the Hexcore and saving himself.

Relationships are kind of obsolete to a man who knows he has no time left to spare and the "cure" is a puzzle that's dangling over his head

That scene where he "rejects her" is also the scene he ignores Jayce more or less because he is too focused on the idea that the core can learn.

So all in all we do not know if he cared. And then it's Schrödinger's cat since their backstory was stripped from the final versions of the script

3. She tells him "No, you won't" when he says he'll miss their conversations

He needed reassurance he can let her go. He wasn't ready to do that. That's the shot on their hands where she's letting him go. His hands are shaking, he's teary eyed, he doesn't really want to let whatever she is, go.

Now! Is Sky his humanity? Yes. Does that mean she wasn't herself in there? No. I don't think so. We see she has free will. She is not pleased with the violent turn of events and if she can be displeased, she can argue, if she can argue she can be herself.

She let's him go so he can finish what he started. I believe she told him he won't miss her because that was the last of his emotions and then he is just numb, therefore incapable of missing anything or anyone. Missing someone is deeply intertwined with having any sort of positive opinion or feelings for someone. And he let's these things go.

Now, onto the real juicy stuff.

Was it guilt? YES. Yes it was. BUT, in many literary pieces grief and guilt are the strongest soldiers of romance. They are inherently romantic.

Viktor felt SOMETHING for her. Be it that he's in love with the idea of her or her, it doesn't really matter. Not really. But the acts he engages in post her death are quite in line with those of a classic gothic romance novel.

He scattered her ashes where he met her and was ready to just follow her to death. Jayce stopped him. Which (the implications of that...we can talk about the Hexteam some other time) but Jayce prevents that. When he's resurrected, it's against his will and his body is now the thing that killed the person who loved him.

So he takes the one object left from her (the notebook) and leaves his "creator" (who at that point betrayed him twice - made weapons and didn't destroy the core) behind with a body he detests. The only way to attone for him being alive at that point is to try to do what she wanted - make their home better.

At that point everything saviour Viktor does is FOR Sky as much as it is for him. The commune? Highly implied that was the project she wanted his help on. That's her commune he built for her. Healing people? For her. To attone for her being gone. He needs her approval constantly or at least the illusion of her approval. As seen ⬇️ down here and when he looks up to her in Arc 1 s2. He wanted to make sure telling Singed to go was the right choice. Which is NOT the hexcore manipulating him into doing anything as in the end all he did, he did himself.

The symbol that holds the blanket is her broach, which is a favorite symbol of mine about how Viktor is an amalgamation of the two people who loved him unconditionally. REGARDLESS.

Her spirit is also allowed to touch him. Something others are not. The followers were touched BY him, she and Jayce are allowed close enough to touch HIM. Also in a "single consciousness" she is not shared with the others. Its only for him to see because he is the only one who knew her.

But in doing everything to make it up to her, Viktor triggers the end of the world. And world ending grief and guilt is just something different all together. If Sky doesn't die...Viktor will never end the world. There is only an end to pursuit if Sky Young dies. There is only reversal to that if Jayce Talis saves Viktor's soul. Their fates are intertwined for eternity to chase after one another and take the entire world down with them.

I hope that's not too long, i tried to be as detailed as possible but I'm also tired and my tummy aches 😥 I'm sorry.

I hope that makes a bit of sense to OP. 🪷

full offense to skyvik shippers but literally what basis do yall even ship them on? guilt?

[usercelestial]

buck and tommy and josh and eddie have weekly game nights together. just simple couple activities, double dates and such. they're innocent, light hearted nights. but josh has always felt something like looming tension between all of them.

josh knows eddie has had thoughts about buck, knows he's definitely had thoughts about tommy, has woken up in the middle of the night to eddie bucking his hips against the mattress and moaning their names enough times to know that eddie has plenty of thoughts. and he's pretty sure buck and tommy have whispered dirty things to each other while watching josh and eddie dance together in those dimly lit gay clubs they used to visit more frequently. he's pretty sure they're all on the same page about this but he's about to tear his damn hair out because no one's doing anything about it. they just keep having long, lust-filled looks over monopoly and connect four. so he does what eddie always accuses him of and he schemes.

it's 8 o'clock and they're hosting tonight. josh gets the drinks and makes the little platters and pays chris 20 dollars to ask if he can sleep over at a friend's house (which he finds out later he was already planning on doing anyway so now he's out 20 bucks and chris is lucky josh loves him). he makes eddie put on that pink button up that makes his arms look good and is very fun to take off (mi corazón, it's just buck and tommy, why am i not allowed to wear my sweatpants?" "they don't match the button-up" "okay so why am i wearing a button-up?"). he himself throws on his tightest pants and a ribbed polo (they get a little distracted and let their chicken burn but buck always brings over an extra dish anyways so they carefully deposit it into the trash and continue groping each other.)

when buck and tommy finally knock on their door, he doesn't miss the sharp breath that buck sucks in as he looks eddie up and down. he also doesn't miss the way buck's eyes refocus when tommy's hand comes around to pinch buck's elbow a little. they share a glance and tommy bites his lower lip.

they exchange their normal pleasantries as always, rib each other, talk about their shifts, a few hilarious calls, the delicious food buck brought over and politely ignore the burnt smell coming from the kitchen. josh makes a point to let his hand linger on tommy's shoulder for seconds too long and watches eddie's throat bob as he swallows. then the games begin.

it's some card game tonight that josh is half paying attention to. he decides when eddie brings back the third round of beers for the night that it's now or never. he suggests a light game of truth or dare. ("what are we, russo? 12?" "what are you, diaz? chicken?")

they start easy ("who was your first guy crush, buck?" "hm, probably my gym teacher from middle school, mr. hudgens" "buck's old person fetish strikes again." buck and eddie throw pillows at each other for a second, tommy feigns offense but pets buck's hair with a sickeningly sweet smile, josh is mentally high fiving himself.) he tries to gently guide buck and eddie away from childish dares to more adult truths. he locks eyes with tommy while buck and eddie argue over how many marshmallows buck could hypothetically fit in his mouth (not exactly what josh had in mind but they're going in the right direction here).

he knows he's been figured out and for a second thinks tommy is about to slap his thighs and say "well im beat, let's go before he can try to seduce my partner any more" but tommy squints his eyes, then raises his brows as if to ask for confirmation, and when josh nods, tommy licks his lips and nods back, turning back to watch the love of his life smile at him with spit and sugar falling out of his mouth (the answer was 20 marshmallows for those keeping score).

tommy lets josh guide them, but aids by steering the questions and dares in a leading direction and kissing at buck's neck every so often to keep buck flushed and blushing. josh decides to ramp it up when eddie chooses truth for the first time the whole game and josh pushes his foot up against eddie's leg and asks "what's the most recent sex dream you've had?"

eddie stutters and shakes his head. josh doesn't think buck realizes he's leaning forward or that tommy's hand is gently massaging his thigh. tommy's gaze flickers to josh with a nervous expression ("did we push too far? was it too much, too quick?")

"you don't have to answer, babe," except josh knows eddie, "you know, if it's too much of a challenge, of course, you can always skip it."

eddie's posture straightens and he eyes josh up a bit. it's a challenge, as always, a threat, a proposition, a loving exchange of harshness.

eddie clears his throat (good boy, josh thinks to himself, he'll tell eddie that later) and starts speaking. "well, obviously you were there."

"anyone else?" tommy asks, trying hard to sound bored and a little patronizing. (josh kinda wants to suck his dick about it, he knows eddie does too because he stutters a little and shakes his head and starts over).

"obviously, you were there, josh. of course. um- and, you know it was just a dream but-"

out of the corner of josh's eye, tommy starts to kiss buck's neck again. buck tilts his head to give him more room, closing his eyes and gasping when josh assumes tommy sinks his teeth in a little. he doesn't look, he's too busy watching eddie watch them.

"uh-" eddie starts again, and josh takes that opportunity gently run his fingertips along the back of eddie's hairline, which always gets him purring.

josh is starting to think maybe eddie needs a little push, so he leans in close and bites his ear, turning his soft traces in eddie's hair to a firm tug in buck's direction. he points, "was he there, baby?"

eddie nods, cheeks flushed red, "buck and tommy," his knee jerks and his legs fall open, "they were both- and we were all-"

tommy's hand moves from buck's thigh up to palm him through his jeans, buck's eyes are half-lidded and glazed over as he watches eddie struggle to explain.

eddie looks over to josh, finally, and josh doesn't know what good deed he's done to deserve the look eddie gives him but he'll thank whatever god deemed him worthy of it.

eddie whispers low and quiet, just for them, "baby, you know i wouldn't- you know you're it-"

josh kisses him sweetly, trying to say "you don't have to explain, you don't have to justify anything when you're with me, we can love each other and love other people and come home to each other every day. our house can just be filled with love, not obligation or rules. just let yourself enjoy this, you're so beautiful when you enjoy yourself, you're so beautiful when you let yourself be loved."

but that's a lot of emotion and there are far too many things to say that he just doesn't have the vocabulary for and he thinks that if he tries to say any more than three words, he'll burst into tears and not in the sexy way. so instead he rubs his thumb over eddie's cheek and says, "i know, love."

eddie nods and looks back to tommy, "i think it's buck's turn, now, right?"

buck, dazed out of his mind, wrinkles his forehead, "huh?" is all he gets out while tommy continues his attack on his neck.

"truth or dare, baby." tommy supplies.

buck smiles, "jesus, okay, so we're doing this. uh, dare."

eddie gets on his knees and shuffles forward until their nose to nose, he briefly puts a hand on tommy's neck and there's a small exchange that passes between them. something like permission. josh makes a mental note to revisit that. tommy bites buck's ear once last time and looks up at eddie through his lashes, resting his chin on buck's shoulder.

"what's it gonna be, eds?"

"kiss me."

josh watches buck and eddie take out seven plus years of tension and emotion on each other, biting each other's lips and digging fingernails into each other's waists. tommy pets buck's hair and rubs his back until buck turns and kisses him quick and dirty, whimpers out "daddy" which makes eddie's jaw drop before leaning back and out of the way so eddie has full access to his partner. buck beckons josh over while eddie and tommy wrestle each other on the ground. he slides between his legs easily and when josh tastes him he suddenly understand why tommy's always walking around, looking like he's got his heart outside of his body. they get lost in each other, the four of them. they get lost in their mouths, skin, and heat; lost in their love and friendship and romance.

they collapse together on the floor of eddie and josh's living room.

"so, uh, game nights?" tommy comments, tracing over buck's ribs.

"hm, yeah i like this game." josh adds.

"same time next week, right?" buck turns to face josh and eddie, but josh gives the floor to eddie.

eddie licks his lips, "can't wait. but, uh, you guys are hosting next time."

[justa-moth]

dead boy detectives textposts pt 6 :D

pt 1 - pt 2 - pt 3 - pt 4 - pt 5 - pt 6

[willthemicrowave]

I made Four and X pins a while ago but forgot to upload it anywhere so behold, the gay Ikea pins on my bag

I had to fight with the super glue when I attached it to the actual pin part

[virgoscringe]

certified loverboy christopher chow 🥰 largely dedicated to @atlasthemayor bc every time atlas shows up on my dash i think of polyfrogs hehe

my comms are opennnn <3

[redfinnbluefinn]

I’m not really understanding this discourse around Neve/lucanis/rook??

First of all. If I were around THE Neve Gallus I too would be a fucking mess every lifetime I lived. Honestly I’m shocked everyone else isn’t enamored every moment they’re around her.

Secondly. Neve has two hands and she deserves the burden and honor of having the two most pathetic wet dog partners in all of Thedas. In this essay I will -

[ancha-aus]

RealAgeAU Drabble - Starcrossed

Here we go! the next Drabble :D @spotaus

As the poll ended it gave me two options and I wanted to write a Cross POV. So. Starcrossed :D

First: here Prev: here Next: here

Timewise?

We are about... a Month and like three weeks in. So a month of Nightmare being alone. Three weeks of him being with the gang. about a small week after Killer soul-adopting Nightmare (with Dust adopting Nightmare in the first week as the madlad he is).

Okay? We good timeline wise? okay.

As always, unedited and unbeta'ed. This is not ever going to change unless i one day decide to make a full story of these drabbles and add extra stuff and change the chapters up.

Anyway!

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

Cross rubs his face as he continues to walk "Dust."

Dust just hums to let him know he heard.

Cross shoots him a look "He has legs. he can walk." with he, Cross obviously means Nightmare.

Dust doesn't even look at Cross or look in anyway surprised by that sentence. Instead he just keeps walking as he holds Nightmare in his arms "I know."

Cross stares at him but Dust doesn't continue to speak.

He groans "So why isn't he walking?!"

Dust shrugs and instead bounces Nightmare up a bit to enable Dust to have a more secure and stable hold on Nightmare.

Nightmare for his part does not look bothered as he just relaxes against Dust as he looks back over Dust's shoulder and watches other people go about their day.

Cross rubs his face "honestly what is the deal with you and carrying him?"

Dust shoots him an amused look "I want to."

Cross throws his arms and hands out "That can't be the only reason!"

Dust shrugs "Don't need more reasons."

Cross glares at the ground as they continue walking. He looks up and points at a store "This one?"

Dust looks at it and shakes his skull.

Cross groans loudly "What is wrong wit this one?!"

Dust raises a brow "Wrong style."

Cross crosses, heh, his arms as he glances at Dust "You know. this whole clothes shopping thing would be a lot easier if you actually picked a store to enter."

Dust shrugs again "Not good enough." and he gently bonks his skull against Nightmare's.

Cross can't believe this is the same Dust that got his own clothes by walking into the frist store he saw and grabbing the first set of clothes he saw. before calling it a day. Dust's wardrobe was hardly ever actually his size.

Now? The first store was too low quality; then not the right colours; then wrong materials; then too bland; then too sexy, with this one Cross had agreed and questioned why they would need a shirt for a six year old with the words 'lady killer' on them; then to tight and restrictive; and now just 'not good enough'.

When Cross agreed to help Dust get Nightmare new clothes instead of breaking and entering a place wiht Killer he had hoped it would be the less stressful option.

Cross rubs his face "Wiht you being this picky he is never going to get clothes that fit him."

Dust shrugs again and seems fully unbothered. Which may just be because Nightmare primarily still wears his stuff.

Cross doesn't get it. well he kinda does. Babybones are cute nad he also notices the need to take care of him but. It is Nightmare! It is a matter of time before he is an adult again and then none of this will have mattered! Or maybe they will have and then what? How would he recover from this?!

It is best to remind himself that this may be Nightmare and he may be six but Nightmare will one day become that powerful and formidable monster again and so to keep treating him with the respect he deserves!

They walk silently through the twon for a moment and Cross can see that Nightmare is dozing in Dust's hold. completely content and trusting.

Cross shoots a look at Dust. "I just don't get it...."

Dust blinks nad looks over "What?"

Cross feels himself grow warm with embarrassment. He hadn't meant to say it out loud and he says as much.

Dust rolls his eye lights and waits with a raised brow.

Cross grumbles but tries to explain "How can you... treat him like a babybones that easily?"

Dust tilts his skull and glances down at Nightmare before looking back at Cross "Because he is one." the way Dust says it implies it is the obvious answer.

Cross groans as he tries to explain more "But he used to be big and an adult. Or at least look like one? How can you jsut... switch to seeing him as a babybones?"

Dust tilts his skull adn snorts "easy. people change. people you watched grow up or grow older, do you still treat them like kids even though they are adults. because you knew them as kids?"

Cross blinks nad speaks "This is different?"

Dust shakes his skull "I don't agree. it is the same concept. just slightly different. he used to be a child. magic gave him the body and brain of an adult. but his soul was sitll a child and once the magic was gone he is a child again. So you treat him as a child."

Cross frowns as looks to the side "What if he becomes on adult again?"

Dust starts to grin "I mean. that is usually how growing up works."

Cross knows he is blushing again and glares "You know what i meant."

Dust chuckles and shrugs "The same still implies. We will just be lucky we managed to skip the teenage years with him."

Cross wasn't sure what he expected as answer but maybe he should have seen something like this coming. Dust was after all all for this parentship thing they have going on right now... and Dust is a very smart and logical person. Of course he managed to find comparisons to normal day life and managed to accept it more easily. Hell Dust probably has even more examples ready to use if Cross asks for it.

It is still just... difficult to accept for him. Cross will need more time. Luckily none of them seem to mind him lagging behind in this case. Killer had also taken longer than Dust to accept the situation fully, but Killer managed to work it out.

Horror is much chiller about what is going on. He didn't seem surprised at Dust's reaction and even less at Killer joining the 'parent-camp' with Dust.

Maybe there is just something wrong with him... it wouldn't be the first time...

Cross sighs as they stop by the plaza and manage to just see the house that Horror and Killer should be robbing. "well, either way we are soon out of time and will have been unsuccessful" great. the one thing they had to do was get Nightmare a spare outfit. They didn't even need to try shoes and-

Dust freezes "fuck."

Cross turns "what is wrong?" as he says it he sees Dust eye the plaza around them, all while he ducks further and further behind the fountain as Nightmare shakes.

Dust looks around the plaza "Stars. All three." he glares "empty... can't make a break for it using the crowd as cover..."

and a teleport would be too loud and will clue them in on them being here. Fuck indeed.

Cross sneaks a look and sees the three skeletons talk and converse casually. the rattling from Nightmare is a sign of pure fear and Cross feels himself grow worried even as he texts Horror and Killer about their emergency.

How... how would they react to Nightmare being a child? Dream had already made it clear that he thought Nightmare was corrupted and none of his brother had remained. What would he do if he saw Nightmare?

Best case scenerio would be him kidnaping Nightmare and locking him away... Worst case just... dusting him. Make sure Nightmare never becomes the powerful being he can be.

Cross notices that they have been seen as Dream looks shocked while Blue waves and starts to shout "Hey! DUst and Cross!" Cross acts as if he didn't hear or noticed them.

Cross stares at Dust "What do we do-"

and Dust just, undoes his own hoody. he pulls it over his head and even ignores the red scarf that falls to the ground next to Nightmare- wait when did Dust put Nightmare down.

Dust puts the hoody on Nightmare with one smooth motion and pulls the hoody up, he next uses the strings to make it tight and tests to make sure it doesn't come off easily.

Dust stares at Nightmare as he quickly puts on the scarf again "You just keep your face and skull against my shoulder and neck okay? Don't glance, don't react. Just act shy or asleep. Nothing will get you." and Dust picks him up again. Nightmare, without a single word, pushes his face into the soft scarf and together with the large hoody there is nothing visible that could be used to indentify him.

Holy shit that is so smart-

"Hey you two! We didn't expect to see you just hanging- what... is that?!" Blue looks beyond excited as he stares at the tiny bundle that is Nightmare. Cross feels his anxiety and panic turn hotter into a raging fire. Dont. get. near. him.

Dust just shoots Blue a look and speaks in a quiet voice "sh. quiet."

Blue gives a sheepish look and speaks much softer "oh. I am sorry. The kiddo is tired?" Dust just nods.

Cross sees his change and nods as well "We were taking a quick break but were going to leave again." he can see Killer and Horror look through the window of the house they are robbing and sees them see their situation.

Blue looks sad but nods "Yeah. I get that-"

Ink interrupts him "How did you two get a child?!"

Dream looks suspicious but doesn't say anything.

Fuck, he can probably feel Nightmare's fear doesn't he? and he wouldn't know it is fear directed at the Stars... Oh no.

Dust raises a brow and doesn't even bother to answer as he starts to take a few steps back, away from the Stars. Cross cna see that Horror is climbing down the side of the house as Killer glares at the Stars.

Ink gasps "I knew it! You two kidnaped a child!" he holds out his hands "Hand the child back and we will find their parents!"

Dust growls as he steps further back.

Cross panics and answers without thinking "We didn't steal him! He is Dust's you idiots!"

dead. silence.

The three Stars look shocked at Cross and Cross can actually see both Horror and Killer also stare at him in shock.

Ink snorts "Really? and who is the other parent?"

Cross huffs "First off, you don't nessesarily need two parents to make a child, learn basic monster biology first before making claims. second, obviously it is" think think think think think just say something! "me." NO NOT THAT!

The silence of before is NOTHING compared to the silence now. Cross is actually sure he can hear a pin drop in one of the stores around them at the moment.

No one moves and it doesn't help that Cross can see both Dust and Nightmare shoot him incredulously glances.

Oh please someone shoot him because Horror even pauses his own climb to shoot him a raised eye brow while Killer is ACTUALLY wiggling his eye brows at him.

Just end him. Please his mind did not work with him. He had just been thinking so much about how everyone had been treating Ngihtmare and how he saw the situation.

Dream is the one who coughs and looks to the side awkwardly "oh. wow. euh... congrats? I didn't realise you two were... you know... an item." please please please please shut up. "and a babybones as well! Wow! That is... unbelieveable!"

Blue nods "Yeah! No one knew!"

Cross still can't find the words and is actually afraid of what he will say next. Dust however shrugs and has managed to pull his face back in his normal bored look "prefer privacy. it is no ones business." and he raises a brow at them.

Blue smiles brightly "of course! We won't tell others. stars knows everyone wants a quiet moment nowadays..."

Dream nods before quickly changing the subject "right! We were just curious what you two were doing out and-" he looks horrifed "Oh stars... you two are on a date! A fmaily date! and we crushed it and interrupted it and we are so sorry!"

Cross suddenly understands why Chara and Gaster would use the reset and overwrite power. please just let him change this moment to have been anything else. please.

Dust hums and shrugs. Not really answering any question.

Dream still looks embarrassed "anyway! we... euh... well... were wondering what you were doing. Now we know that that is great! euh... So... my brother just... doesn't mind this?"

Any embarrassement disappears. Hot rage in his body. Cross glares as his crosses his arms.

Dream sputters but continues "you know... be is so against positivity... and this... this is a beautiful and wonderful thing! Doesn't he...isn't he..." he smiles sheepish.

Cross glares "no. He doesn't. In matter of fact. He is very fine with the situation at hand. very willing to help in a way he can." Cross isn't even lying. While Nightmare doesn't like having been changed back he isn't diffficult anymore and more than happy to stick with Dust, and them all, now. Nightmare is also not fussy when out and about on missions and aside from being grumpy he is a perfect good babybones.

Dust nods "you should stop talking about people you know nothing about." he looks at Cross "lets go. he is tired."

Cross nods and sees Horror sign at Killer to get down as well. Killer shrugs and just lets himself fall from the third floor right into Horror's arms. The two disappear into some side street.

Cross nods and looks at Dust "you first." Cross will just walk behind Dust and make sure the Stars don't get any glimbs near the end.

Dust nods and turns easily as he walks away, Cross can see how Dust changes the hand mid turn and Nightmare sinks a little lower. Making it that his skull doesn't even peak over Dust's shoulder.

They walk away in silence and take many turns to get some distance. As soon as Cross is sure the Stars can't hear or see them he says so. Which causes Dust to nod before sprinting, Cross is quick to follow.

They reach the edge of town in record time and Cross glances back "okay. we are good. we are fine... we got out."

Dsut nods before looking at him very amused "we made a babybones?"

Cross feels himself grow warm for so many reasons as he sputters "I panicked! I am sorry I implied we were- that we did!" he hides his face.

Dust chuckles and pats his shoulder "It is fine."

Cross relaxes and smiles in thanks.

Dust raises a brow "Killer will never let you live this down."

Cross groans "just end me."

Dust hums "I don't know. I don't think killing the other parent of my child works in my favour." he grins so goddamnit amused.

Cross is never going to hear the end of this.

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

First: here Prev: here Next: here

Cross was so close to soul-adopting Nightmare but then the Stars interrupted and Cross panicked.

Also, important. Noticed how Cross only apologised for implying he and Dust made the babybones together? But not that he is a parent? Cross is getting there. It will just take him a while.

[n1ghteeea]

POV: one of your husbands finally comes out of his underground lab not at three in the morning so you can see him for the first time in like a week

(click for better quality)

[thelilylav]

I’m not saying a lot but I AM saying that John and Sam should’ve been allowed to kiss at least once