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cherrygorilla · 2 months

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Ok, so you may or may not have inspired me with your Outsiders post to interrupt my usually sparse story post schedule and indulge in my own obsession with a certain musical. And as chaotic and random as it sounds, I promise it is good haha. But even if you disagree, please just let me vent and get all this out of my brain so that I can go back to writing the next part of TMM 😂

Alright, I've loved Starlight Express ever since I saw it when I was around... 7 or 8, maybe? It used to be my favourite show for years, and (fun fact) it was actually how I found out about fanfiction haha. I never wrote anything properly for the show, just like one or two pages in a random notebook when I was, idk 11 ? But it was around that time that TBM then came out, which I was obviously more drawn to writing-wise - I suppose because it gave me more freedom with stories and characters, since this show is just...you know...about trains lol.

And from the few times I've mentioned it before, I know it probably sounds insane, but if you just suspend your disbelief and accept it for what it is (a bunch of trains singing and falling in love), it is a lot of fun hahaha. I like to think of it like a mix between Cats and Cinderella, but the basic gist of the story, so you can have at least somewhat of an idea of what's going on lol, is that Control (a little kid - I don't think they have a name, they're literally just known as Control) sneaks out of bed one night to hold this big race between all his toy trains to find out who is the best - so the story essentially takes place within his imagination, as all the trains come to life to tell the story. It's like Cats in the regard that most of the first act is everyone kind of introducing themselves in turn. There's Greaseball, the champion diesel train, Rusty, the little steam engine who wants to race with the big trains, and Electra, the electric engine of the future - and a bunch of other trains and coaches, but I won't bore you with all that (just yet 😉). So, to cut a long story short, it's basically a big competition between those three main trains to see who's fastest, with Rusty being the obvious underdog, and hence the centre of the Cinderella story element.

The plot itself is nothing groundbreaking, and neither are the songs tbh, but it's just such a fun show that I can't help but love it anyway. I mean come on, the whole thing's done on roller skates - that's pretty damn cool! And although I've loved it for years, it had taken quite a backseat for a while, but the recent revival that has recently opened in London has really reignited my obsession with it all over again 😆 Because how do you make my favourite pairing in the whole show even more iconic? ...you turn them into lesbians 😎 Plus the costumes were all reimagined by Gabriella Slade, who did the costumes for Six, and they look SO cool!

Now, a big part of why I loved your Outsiders post so much was all the story ideas/similarities for characters you included, but I can't really do that here because (once again)... they're all trains, and none of them are really that deep or serious anyway. BUT, what I did think might be fun, would be going through who I think each of our characters would be good at playing if they were (for some bizarre reason) to ever put on the show - because I do have some strong opinions about that haha. And, as a little bonus, I have written some little random one-off story snippets that are Starlight Express adjacent that I'll throw in at the end lol - more as a reward for you wading through all my nonsense than anything tbh. But they were fun to write too haha.

So yeah, welcome to the insane workings of my brain - and pull up a chair; this could take a while 😅

Ok, I think the best place to start would be with going through the characters in the show and, like I said, matching them up with potential characters of ours I think would be good at playing them. I'll sort of elaborate on 'why' for each one too to help keep things entertaining from an outside perspective lol - and hopefully to help back up my arguments for each lmao. Because, let's face it, none of our characters have particularly...train-like characteristics. 😂

First up we've got Rusty, who's essentially the show's main character. Most of the conflict in the show centres around him; the 'better' trains all totally disregard him, a lot of the coaches tease him, and although he loves Pearl, she's more interested in the newer, more exciting trains than boring, quiet little Rusty. BUT, as with all Cinderella stories, he comes out on top in the end; he wins the race (I would say spoiler alert, but it's also like...duh 🙄😂) and gets his dream girl. He's a really likeable underdog character throughout the story though, and he does put up a good fight to come out victorious, which I appreciate - he doesn't just lay down and let everyone walk (well, roll 😉) all over him.

Now, who do I think would be good to play Rusty? Well, as I mention later on in the one-shots, and have potentially mentioned elsewhere too, I weirdly feel like Riven would really like the show. Maybe he has some childhood nostalgia linked to it like I do - maybe his dad took him to see it when he was younger since it involves skating? I don't know all the details, but something within me tells me Riven would like this show lmao. And so, in the spin-off scenario where our characters put on this show (which is the one I'll always lead with in these things), I think he'd want to take a leading role in the directing side of it - and probably spear-headed the campaign for putting it on in the first place tbh haha. BUT, I feel like a lot of people at Camp (because yes, I think they'd do this at Camp; I don't know when else they would all want to put on a show like this lmao) would think the whole thing was an insane idea, and wouldn't want anything to do with it (because it kind of is an insane idea). SO, I think that Riven would not only end up directing most of the show, I also think he'd have to step into Rusty's skates - which wouldn't be as daunting as he initially expected since he knows the show so well already. Plus, besides the backstory element, I just think he'd be a really cute Rusty; his auburn hair is perfect for it, he's a quietly determined guy, and he's an experienced skater, so he'd have no trouble taking on such a demanding role in terms of the skating.

So yeah, Riven would be my first pick. BUT, this new revival of the show that's being performed in London is playing Rusty and Pearl (his love interest, who we'll get to in a minute) in a much more innocent, shy way - and it's freaking adorable. And I think if we were leaning into more of that version of the show, Royce would make a brilliant Rusty if Vivien could be his Pearl. I don't know how likely he'd be to take on another leading role after being thrown into Hairspray like he was in your last Camp Wanamaker story, especially one that required him to be on roller skates the entire time, but I think he'd really nail it with that more innocent, down-trodden interpretation of the character.

But if everyone was willingly getting involved in the show, and they wanted to lean more into the old-school portrayal of Rusty and Pearl, that feels a little older, and more heavily romantically driven, then I feel like Miles and Carrie make SO much sense for those parts. The whole 'chasing after a girl you think is out of your league' thing has both Miles and Rusty written all over, and I think Miles would, again, play that fluctuating determination and defeat really well. Plus, I know this doesn't really mean anything, but his struggles for money do parallel Rusty being this rundown, tattered, but persistent little steam train pretty well... 😂

Ok, now we'll move onto Pearl. Pearl is the newest coach in the little kid's collection, and is therefore the most sought-after racing partner (since all the trains need to race with a coach - idk why, it's just part of the story I suppose lol). Sometimes she's a 'first class' coach, sometimes she's an 'observation car', it doesn't really matter - all that matters is that all the trains want to race with her, and although she has a soft spot for Rusty, who has loved her all along, she gets seduced by the flashiness of his competitors, and it takes her almost getting wrecked in the final race for her to see sense. She can be a little naive sometimes, or will sometimes just blatantly play the field (depending on how you play her), but her heart is always in the right place, which is what still makes her so likeable.

Again, for Pearl I've got multiple options for who could play her, but I'll start with Juliet. The new all-white version of Pearl's costume that they use in the current Bochum production just screams Juliet to me: that sleek sophistication and quiet confidence, but also a touch of flirty, girly charm is so her! And I think she'd make a great leading lady - which is why she's my pick for that spin-off scenario version of the show. Pearl has some great songs, which would be perfect for Juliet to show off more of her voice, with her wanting to be a singer eventually, and with you hinting at Riven and Juliet maybe having a little bit of a fling or something in your last STDP post, having them play the two leads here seems like a perfect fit for them! Rusty thinking Pearl's way out of his league, but Pearl falling for his kindness and good heart anyway - that just screams Riven and Juliet to me! Pearl also has a strong sisterhood-type friendship with the other coaches, which I think really works for Juliet too. And Pearl does try to stand up for what she thinks is right when the bigger trains start taking the competition a little too far - so I think Juliet could bring a great deal of her own strength to her portrayal of the character as well.

Now, my second choice for Pearl, links with the second choice for Rusty above, which is, obviously Vivien. I feel like the new London revival Pearl was MADE for Vivien to play; the whole space-y vibes of the show, the fact that they made her purple, and the fact that they made her this happy little ball of excitement, with a touch more innocence than previous Pearls - she's perfect for Vivien. And the awkwardly adorable, friends-to-lovers arc Rusty and Pearl have in this new revival was practically written for Royce and Vivien lmao - I just think they'd be able to play them brilliantly. And again, like with Juliet, I think Vivien's fiestiness would allow her to bring a lot of strength and determination to Pearl's character that isn't always there - she can sometimes be played quite airy and 'damsel-in-distress-like', but I think Vivien would really ground her.

And my last choice for the role is Carrie - she's not my favourite pick for the role, and I think she'd be better at other parts (as we'll see in a minute lol), but as I said earlier, if Miles is playing Rusty, I think Carrie would make an amazing Pearl opposite him. Their dynamic just fits them so well - Miles pining for her but not feeling like he's good enough, Carrie being blinded to her true feelings by other options (in this situation I feel like Eric would make a great Greaseball lol) but coming around in the end - it's just perfect! And, I truly believe that the song Pearl sings in the original London production, Only He, can only be bodied in the way it deserves to be bodied by my girl Carrie haha. I'm not a big fan of Next Time You Fall In Love, but I do quite like I Do (the replacement options for Only He), and I think Juliet and Vivien would do great renditions of them, but there's just something about the thought of Carrie singing that song that just makes so much sense. I've got an idea for her to sing it in a legitimate story too (that's how obsessed with that song I am lmao), probably linked to the heartache referenced in the little drabble I'll post below, but I feel like she needs to sing it for an actual audience too haha. It's just such a beautiful, powerful, swelling theatre ballad - she'd kill it!!

Alright, now we're getting to the good stuff. This is Greaseball: arguably the main antagonist of the show because, although most of the characters rag on Rusty, a lot of them do so to show their support for Greaseball. They're the reigning, undefeated champion when it comes to the races, so they have quite the ego on them. They're brash, and cocky, and a little brute-ish, but they're also incredibly competitive, which often gets in the way of their better judgement, resulting in a total disregard for everyone else (including their undeservingly loyal girl, Dinah). They're a total showboat and narcissist, but they do have a dopey, lovable side that Dinah helps to bring out towards the end of the show, which does help redeem them haha.

Now, there are two ways that Greaseball can be played: the traditional way, or the new way. For the traditional way (the sort of wannabe-Elvis, old school rockstar portrayal), Butchy feels like an obvious pick. And although I don't think he's anything like Greaseball's character, you know if he had to play him he'd take to the greaser caricature like a duck to water lmao. Plus, if Mick was playing Dinah (which, you'll see in a bit, I think works perfectly for her), they'd make an adorable duo in the show, and I think they'd have a lot of fun hamming up the roles to make them even more ridiculously cartoonish. And if Mick was his Dinah, I think Butchy would do the whole 'crawling back to her with his tail between his legs' schtick soooo well - he'd just melt into a puddle for her the second he apologised for being such a brute haha. The only thing that's holding me back with Butchy is that I don't know how good he'd be at being so mean to his friends - especially if someone like Miles or Royce was playing Rusty haha; he's just too nice! Plus, I don't know how well he could roller skate lmaoo.

OR, the other way Greaseball can be played is like how they've done it in the new London revival of the show: by making her into a fiesty little lesbian. And this is the role I feel like Carrie could really excel at. I just think she'd have sooo much fun with all the showboating and playing up the bravado. It's so different to anything else she's played before that I think she'd have a great time getting to try it out too - and I think she'd really enjoy getting to lean into playing a villain as well. I'm just obsessed with everything about the London revival Greaseball - her costume is so cool, her attitude is so iconic, the way she's adapted the character I just, uh- it's brilliant! And as cool as it could be to try out a male Dinah by getting Miles into some frilly gingham (lol), I think having either Juliet or Mick be her Dinah would work really well. I'll get into why I think Juliet would be a perfect Dinah later, but her dynamic with Carrie if they were to take on these roles would just be perfect; Juliet's mild scolding of Carrie's bruteish behaviour, but her unwavering loyalty regardless, Carrie's brushing off of her affection for the sake of winning, but then realising she didn't know how good she had it with Juliet by the end - aaaah, I love them. But for the spin-off scenario, where Juliet would be playing Pearl, my pick for Dinah would have been Mick - again, I'll elaborate more on why that works so well for her in a bit, but there's something about Mick and Carrie being paired up romantically like this that just entertains me so much, and low-key kind of intrigues me too haha. In my head, the way it would have played out was that they'd approached Butchy with the offer for the role first, hoping that if they also offered Mick to be his love interest, he'd be more likely to accept it. But after he dismissed it so blatantly, and they couldn't get anyone else to convincingly fit the role, Carrie was called upon to take his place - and to get back at Butchy for not even considering the part, Mick decides to take the Dinah role anyway, but doesn't tell him. Because imagine his face when he realises that this role they'd said couldn't be played by anyone but him was not only being played by Carrie, of all people, but that his wife was playing her love interest (and was practically throwing herself at Carrie the whole show)! They'd have so much fun torturing him with it, I just know it haha. And omg Carrie would have a whale of a time with Pumping Iron lmao. Plus, her skating skills can finally come in handy for something lol; she'd be throwing in all the tricks.

Alright, so here's where I started grouping people together because I realised I was rambling far too much about the rest lol. As cool of a character as Electra is concept-wise, I don't think I can talk about them in that much depth haha - they're just not one of my favourites! I don't feel like they have that big of an impact on the story tbh; it feels mostly Rusty/Greaseball centred to me, but it's nice to give Greaseball a bit of real competition in the races I guess haha. Their futuristic, diva-ish vibe is really interesting though, and the fact they have their own entourage is pretty iconic too. But with that all being said, I just don't think there's any of our characters that really fit their archetype, even just in terms of who'd be best at playing them - especially males, since that's what Electra has typically been played as (even though they're nonbinary in the new London revival). I thought it might have been fun to get Donny to play them in the spin-off scenario, because I like to think he's a good enough actor to pull off any role haha - and like with Carrie and Greaseball, I think he'd have a lot of fun with doing something totally different to any of his other roles. I don't quite know how it would come about that he'd ever get involved in an amateur production like this, but in my head I thought it would be cute if, besides Carrie's constant begging and pestering about how they don't have enough people to fill out the cast, he's swayed by the fact that his son's in his 'train' phase at the moment - and so he agrees purely for shits and giggles and getting to make his son excited hahaha. Plus, I think he and Carrie would have a lot of fun getting to play rivals for once instead of lovers lol. And I just know they'd really lean into the comedic side of One Rock 'N' Roll Too Many. But besides Donny, I really have no other good picks. I thought if it was maybe the situation where Butchy was playing Greaseball they could do a female Electra and cast Carrie - because she'd do a fabulous job at selling the glitzy, diva vibes and overall over-the-top dramaticness of the character, and a female Electra would be incredible - but like with Pearl, it's just not my favourite pick for her. More out of necessity than anything haha - although it would be perfect to have Butchy and Carrie playing enemies like that lol.

And then the second one on this list is Poppa/Momma McCoy, who's an old steam engine that takes part in one of the races to help encourage Rusty and prove that steam trains aren't outdated after all. The role has been played by both male and female actors, but it tends to lean more female lately. And whilst I'm sure Grandpa George would happily help the kids out with their show, I have much stronger feelings on different female characters taking on the role.

Firstly, how iconic could it be if Nonna Dawn surprised everyone who wasn't helping out with the show by rolling out to sing Momma's (Poppa's) Blues?? Because that's my main pick for the spin-off scenario and I feel like Viv's face would just be a picture lmaoo. She helped out quite a bit with the stuff in the playhouse in Camp Wanamaker too, so she obviously likes theatre, and she just has that kind of fun, mischievous charm about her, so I feel like when Riven and Carrie would approach her with the idea, she'd love it - especially with that added element of surprise for the audience. And the whole mentor/advice-giver role Momma takes on in the show would work perfectly for Dawn; she's like the embodiment of the voice of reason haha.

My second pick, if you wanted to play Momma a little younger, like the London revival has done (with her playing both Control's mum, and Momma), would be Charlie, because she took a big role in helping out at the playhouse in Camp Wanamaker, and obviously cares a lot about theatre. And she has a really close relationship to Carrie and Riven, so I feel like they'd be able to talk her around to taking part eventually. My only thing holding me back is that part of my feels as though she'd want nothing to do with the production because she'd be too scared someone was gonna get hurt since the whole thing's done on rollerskates - her pseudo-motherly instincts couldn't cope with the stress lmaooo. And if it's in the spin-off scenario, where in my head Vivien's organising a rival production (probably of The Outsiders since you're enjoying it so much atm haha), I feel like Vivien would have already snagged her to help with directing on her project.

And my last potential pick for Momma, in an AU version, and one where Royce or Miles was Rusty, would, of course, be Mrs Murphy. I don't know how she would have done with performing, but Momma obviously takes on a motherly role to Rusty, and the freight/fuel trucks too - so Mrs Murphy taking on that role opposite one of her actual sons, and helping to give them the confidence they need to succeed, just makes so much sense to me! Pretty unlikely scenario, but a fun one to consider nonetheless haha.

Ooh ok, more of my faves again haha. Dinah used to be my all-time favourite growing up, so I have lots of opinions about her. But basically, she's another of the 4 coaches (along with Pearl), and her main role in the show is that she's Greaseball's racing partner (and therefore, essentially also their romantic partner). They have a kind of strained relationship most of the show, because Dinah's totally head-over-wheels (😉) for Greaseball, but Greaseball's also being fawned over by pretty much every other coach, and is reluctant to give in to Dinah's affection for fear of showing any weakness to their opponents - so they can be pretty mean sometimes. BUT, they do have a really cute moment when Greaseball loses in the end and goes back to Dinah to apologise, realising that they still love each other without all the glory of being champions.

She's a pretty confident character though, and is good at standing up for herself when she doesn't think something's right - but she's still able to show her softer, more vulnerable side, which makes her a really well-rounded character imo. There are a few good options for who I'd want to play her though, and although I mention later that Carrie would be a good Dinah, I only think she'd really get cast in the role if she it was an externally produced show, since she only ever lands secondary parts haha. I think she'd be a great Dinah, don't get me wrong, but I just think that if all our characters were in the show, there are better choices for her.

My first one, as mentioned earlier, would be Mick. The brunette hairstyle she's been given lately, as opposed to the blonde, works for Mick so well, and with red being her favourite colour, taking the red from the new London costume but applying it to the more traditional gingham style - aaaah, she'd look adorable. Plus, like I said above, having her play this role opposite Butchy just makes so much sense - but, having her play it opposite Carrie (like she would in my spin-off scenario) would be brilliant. I just think they'd have so much fun with it, especially knowing how weird it would make Butchy feel watching them together, and oddly, I feel like it would help their friendship grow even stronger😂 It's just such an iconic pairing, and I really think they'd do it justice. I think she'd make a really strong-willed Dinah, and as unsteady as I think she'd be on roller skates at first, I think that'd make everyone all the more impressed when they saw her racing and dancing around with everyone else haha - Riven and Carrie would work their magic with teaching her.

And with Dinah being typically played as a sort of 'Southern Belle' type, the obvious pick for Dinah, and one that also makes a ton of sense to me, would, of course, be Juliet. And if she wasn't playing Pearl, this is definitely who I'd have her play. I think she'd be able to lean into the more sensitive, emotional side of Dinah, whilst also keeping a bit of the strength that Mick would bring to her - and you just know that if Carrie was her Greaseball they'd be in their element playing lesbain lovers 👀😂 They'd peak here, I feel. This and Maureen and Joanne in Rent - they'd be untouchable.

I didn't even know whether to include CB in this or not since he's been taken out and put back into the show so many times, but I reference him in one of the one-shots so I thought it was best to. Basically, he's a caboose coach that, in the second act, reveals that he's got a little evil streak behind his oh-so innocent appearance, and that he's actually notorious for wrecking the trains he races behind. So, (although I don't think it's ever actually explained why lol) he teams up with Greaseball and Electra to trick Rusty into racing with him, only to try wrecking him in the big final race. Naturally, it doesn't work, but hey, he acts as a zany little extra antagonist, which I'm never going to complain about haha.

Like I mention later on, I think Riven would feel kind of drawn to this role - especially because of the softer side we see with him when he comforts Dinah after Greaseball ditches her (for being too moral for their dirty racing tactics lol). Plus, there's that 'red' motif again that would work with his auburn hair - and I think he'd be able to play that coolly sly, kind of crazily sadistic twist well because of how chill he is normally. That switch would be so jarring! But, perhaps an even more jarring option, I think Bentley could also do this part really well. He'd be the perfect, innocent mask to begin with because he's so little and smiley - but then I think he'd have a lot of fun getting to flip that on its head and be the complete antithesis of his usual ball of sunshine personality to be a little crazy criminal instead. Obviously he's nothing like that normally, but acting-wise, if he felt confident enough with it, I think he could really do it justice! And it'd make an even cooler contrast if one of his brothers was playing Rusty; that betrayal would be even harsher!

Alright, now onto the coaches. Let's try to speed through these because I already know I've wasted far too much of your time lmao. If you're still reading at this point, I'm actually pretty impressed 😂 The coaches have changed a bunch over the years, mostly for things going out of fashion (*cough cough* Ashley the smoking car lol) - but the current ones in the London revival are Belle the sleeping car and Tassita the quiet coach. Since these are smaller, more generic parts, I don't really have as much to say about them. But, for Belle I thought that Jade might be a good pick, because I know she can sing since she's in Riven's band, and idk, maybe she naps a lot? 😂 Either way, even though she's said before that she can't act to save her life, I don't think she'd have to act a great deal in this role - but she can sing and skate, and that's enough to give her the confidence to agree to help out in my book haha. And for Tassita, who's the first coach to ever be played by a male performer, which is pretty cool, I thought August might be a fun pick - you know, because he's such a quiet guy himself lol. Besides that though, I've always thought he'd be a good performer (he was originally going to have a part on Find Your Voice after all), and although, like Jade, I don't think he'd have a great deal of confidence at first - especially in a role that still appears quite feminine when he's not totally secure about his sexuality - but I think they'd be able to tweak both the part and the costume until it was something he'd feel comfortable doing. And once he started working on it, I think it'd be really good at bringing him out of his shell! Plus, I like to think he's got a really good voice hidden behind all that shyness - so this is an excuse to finally bring it out into the open hehe.

Other coaches that could be worked in from other productions are Buffy the buffet car, Duvet the sleeper car (an alternate to Belle), Carrie the luggage car (what a coincidence lol), or, the original Belle the sleeping car, from the original London production way back in the 80s. Belle didn't really do a great deal plot-wise besides help motivate Rusty, and Dinah and the rest of the coaches in the second act when they're ditched by the trains they race with (please, Starlight Express producers, bring back the Rolling Stock reprise; it's iconic lmao) - but if for some reason they wanted to use her in the show, I think Charlie would be a great pick for her. She'd give her all the old-school glamour and girl-power she deserves haha. And I think she'd look iconic in that red costume.

Finally, my last category: the freight/fuel trucks. Well, actually just the fuel trucks. I thought about including the freight trucks too, but tbh, I don't really have any strong opinions on any of them, and this post is already far too long, so I just left them out lol. But, like the coaches, the fuel trucks are just more racing partner options for the trains. Some have bigger parts than others, but their main purpose is providing fuel (shocking, I know ha). They're new to the London revival though, and tbh I like them more than the freight trucks; they feel more central to the plot - even if it did make the song Freight significantly worse lmao.

And speaking of central to the plot, Hydra, the hydrogen fuel truck is the new reason why Rusty wins the final race (because before it didn't really make that much sense tbh lmao); he's now powered by hydrogen steam, which gives him the advantage over his opponents. And throughout the show, despite the other fuel trucks ragging on Hydra for being too new and dangerous in comparison to their more reliable fuel sources, he ignores them and stands by his belief in his fuel. The only pick in my mind for Hydra because of this though is Ethan - and although I have no idea if he'd ever have any remote interest in acting, especially in a musical theatre production, you know he's so loyal to his friends he'd do anything to help them out if they asked. And, I think he'd just think the idea was so weird he'd be down to participate just for the hell of it lol. But Hydra's way of not caring what anyone else thinks of him, and sticking to his own beliefs, is so Ethan to me - plus, they just have that same, chilled, laid back vibe. And, naturally, they both have that kind of green motif 😉🍃 So yeah, for me, Ethan has to be Hydra - and no matter who's playing Rusty, I feel like he'd vibe enough with all of them for him to jump at the chance to help them out like Hydra helps Rusty in the show. And it'd finally give him an excuse to use those roller skating skills I know he's hiding somewhere despite his usually terrible clumsiness ha.

For Porter (the red coal truck) I think Zack could maybe play him? Not completely sold on that idea because I don't think he'd really vibe with musicals, but if August roped him into helping out I think he'd begrudgingly agree - and Porter basically does nothing anyway, so he couldn't really complain lol. And for Lumber (the blue timber truck) I picked Erica - not only because her blue hair would look sick with an all-blue costume like that, but also because the thought of Jade and Erica flirting as their characters during the little bickering section between the coaches and the fuel trucks in the song Freight had me weak at the knees. So if they were both in it, their characters would 100% be in love, no questions asked - I need flirty trucks and coaches hahaha.

So then the final role I'm passionate about is Slick, the oil truck, which is the new London revival's answer to CB, since she not only takes on his main song, but also the whole concept of wanting to race with Rusty to wreck him and help out the competition. This revival also gives her a monetary aim though, which is good for giving her more of a motive, I suppose. I don't really know how trains are supposed to use money, but it's at least a reason, which is more than we had before lmao. I think Abby would be such a good pick for Slick though - I'd want to make her a little more girly, giving her some different hair (like my little reference picture, or maybe something like some fun bubble braids or something - like oil bubbles 👀) and a more feminine costume - but I think having a pretty important role like that would help bring out her confidence with performing a lot, without totally throwing her out of her comfort one with a big main role. I think she'd like the added challenge and fun that the villainous twist Slick has would bring though; it'd give her something a bit different to play with. And with Slick's colour palette mirroring Greaseball's, and her being an oil truck, makes me thing that Abby would really want to lean into making Slick a little Greaseball fangirl, who is constantly looking up to her and wanting to impress her (and hence giving her even more motivation to wreck Rusty and help Greaseball win the race) - which I think would also nicely mirror how much Abby would look up to Carrie (an established actress already) if they were to ever meet. I just think it works really well for her, and I love how the show's leaning more into mixing the genders of the coaches and the freight trucks - even if the costumes are still leaning more feminine and masculine respectively, I think our characters would have more fun tailoring them to each performer's preferences. Because come on, Abby being a pretty girly, but still menacing, little secondary villain would be so cool - she needs to let her rebellious side shine!

Excuse the TMM spacer lol, I'm too lazy to go make a new one lmao. Anyway, if you made it through all that, you really are a true friend haha - because that was soooo much insane rambling. But, I do feel better for dumping it out of my mind and onto a page. Maybe now I can finally stop obsessing over it and get back to writing the stories I should be working on. But hopefully this was a little fun post to switch things up a bit! And hopefully you at least liked it half as much as I enjoyed your Outsiders post haha. If, for some bizarre reason, you actually are interested in the show, then just let me know because I have a slime tutorial (*wink wink*) of the new revival I'd happily send you the link to, because I'd love to hear your thoughts on it. But even if not, like I said, this was just a bit of silly fun to give all these ideas a home. It's not a complex show, and it doesn't have particularly elevated songs or characters, but the orchestrations are clever, the costumes and theatrics are amazing, and it's all done on roller skates - so it'll always have a special, fun spot in my heart hehe. I've linked a video of the megamix at the end of the new London revival for you to get a bit of a vibe of what the show's like without having to watch the whole thing too if you want hehe - at least this way you can see some of the skating and costumes in action! And, as promised, as a reward for sitting through the insanity of this post, here are two little drabbles with our characters as a reward.

The first centres around the song There's Me, and a pairing I think works particularly well for it, that I'm dying to see/write more of - it's also plucked out of that Camp Wanamaker spin-off I wanted to do that I'm not sure will ever materialise. But consider this a sneak peek into what would have gone down lol. And the second is a litle bit of what the chaos the concept of Riven and Vivien putting on rivalling productions would have brought about haha. For context, I think although Riven would have bagged Carrie for his show straight away, Vivien would have furiously retaliated by claiming everyone else in their cabin for hers - hence the competitiveness that ensues. Enjoy! Hopefully they're not too weird to not still be enjoyable anyway 😅😂

The dusty deck creaked as a scuffed, black Converse nudged into her periphery. But her eyes never left the lake - as grey as the thick blanket of clouds overhead, and as bleak as her outlook.

"The laundry house, really?" the voice demanded, pausing to give the girl a chance to explain herself.

She did not.

Sighing, the guest realised this was going to be harder than he expected. After all, he wasn't used to her being this…subdued. "You know, I just think it's a testament to our friendship that I was the only one who knew to look for you here," he offered with a playful smile…that went completely unnoticed. Frowning as the girl continued to ignore his very existence, he let out another sigh, this one as he lowered himself down and took up the space beside her, nudging the sole of her now off-white sneaker with his knee to draw her out of her thoughts. "Come on, Carrie. I'm trying here," he said. But when he leant forwards to try to get a clearer look at her face, and found her cheeks marred with glistening tracks in her foundation, and her puffy eyes speckled with remnants of her mascara, his frustration waned. "You can't hide from them forever," he gently added.

"I want to," Carrie murmured.

"You don't mean that," he tried.

"I do; at least that way I wouldn't be able to fuck things up any more than I already have," she limply insisted.

"You didn't-"

"Don't give me that, Riven; I know I did," Carrie said, cutting him off with an exasperated huff. "I shouldn't have done it, I shouldn't have yelled at them like that. But I was just in such a bad mood after that class, and I was so fed up with everything, so then to come back to all that I just…"

"...Let all those years of bottled up frustration out?" Riven offered.

"Something like that," Carrie mumbled, dropping her gaze to her lap, knowing that if she actually made eye contact with the boy her resolve would start to crumble in an instant.

"Hmm," he began, murmuring his understanding as he took his turn to look out across the lake. "I heard it wasn't pretty."

Although Riven was no longer looking at her, he saw her dark blonde curls trembling out of the corner of his eye as she shook her head.

"I'm so embarrassed," she admitted, voice barely above a whisper. A fresh tear plopped onto her thigh as she kept her watery gaze steady, praying she'd be able to get a handle on her waterworks for once. "They hate me for sure now."

"They never hated you, Carrie," Riven promised, turning back to her again as though it would persuade her to believe him.

But Carrie proved to be as stubborn as ever, completely bypassing the comment with a mournful smile she still couldn't bring herself to lift from the floor. "All that time I spent trying to win them over…down the drain, all because I had a shit day and lost my cool."

"I don't know, I'd still say you're pretty cool," Riven tried with a playful lopsided grin, bumping her shoulder until she turned to see it for herself.

When she did finally turn to face him though, it was with that flat, annoyed frown that always just egged him on more. "This isn't a joke," she grumbled, but Riven's little chuckle said otherwise.

"I'm not saying it is," he countered. "I'm just letting you know it's gonna take a hell of a lot more than one dumb argument for me to stop thinking you're cool. Come on, you're Caroline Cole: entertainer extraordinaire-"

"Why are you doing this?" Carrie stopped his playful bolstering in its tracks with a weary sigh.

"Because I want to," Riven said, standing firm in his optimism. "Come on, I hate seeing you like this," he pressed on fitfully, uneasy with her uncharacteristic despondency. She was usually the life and soul of the party in that playhouse, now she had all the energy of a wet paper towel. Hoping to distract her with a little healthy competition, he added, "We should be out there crushing Erica's cabin at volleyball right now."

"Well forgive me, but I'm not really in the mood," Carrie flatly retorted.

"What are you in the mood for?" he challenged, with a primarily jovial tone, but a hint of creeping frustration. "Moping about like a kicked puppy?"

"Yes, actually," she snipped. "Hate to be the bearer of bad news but I can't be the 'smiling showgirl' 24/7…" Her frown twitched into the faintest of wistful smiles as her voice trailed off, carrying her focus back into the turmoil unfolding within her own head. "I'm allowed to have emotions, I'm just not allowed to show them," she went on to explain with a quiet, self-loathing huff. "'Cause that's when things always turn to shit."

All Riven's teasing intent slipped away, seeping into the damp wood beneath them, as it began to dawn on him that there may have been more to her dramatic disappearance than what he'd initially thought. "...This is about more than just you yelling at the boys, isn't it?" he slowly asked, treading carefully, as though to not set off a bomb.

And yet, Carrie dropped one on him anyway.

"I think Miles and I are gonna break up, Riv."

The words hung in the muggy air between them, not daring to be believed.

Stunned, hazel eyes settled on Carrie's profile, unable to tear themselves away until she explained herself. So, she began to talk. Slowly but surely, she unravelled the tangle of thoughts in her head, laying them out before her friend, praying that his sensible, perceptive mind could help her make sense of them. "It's just…not felt right this summer. It's like he's…pulling away, or something," she started, still avoiding eye contact at all costs. At least that way she could keep a handle on her tears, even if her mouth did start to run away from her instead. "And the arguing with Royce never helps, but it's just been getting worse instead of better and I can tell he's getting frustrated with it, but I'm trying and nothing's working and I don't understand why and that's making me frustrated, which makes the bickering worse, I just-" She stopped to snatch a breath, only to blow out all her remaining self-confidence with it. "I feel like I've got no fight left anymore. I can't see it getting better. And when I know Miles would always side with his brothers, and everyone else would side with him if things went south… I don't know, it just kind of stings, I guess; one wrong move and I lose them all. No matter what I do, I'd still be left out on my own."

"Don't lump me in with that."

Startled, Carrie lost her focus and turned to the boy; she'd been so lost in her own thoughts she'd forgotten she wasn't alone anymore. But even when she searched his expression, his comment still made no sense. "What do you mean?"

"Well don't say I'd never speak to you again if things with you and Miles didn't work out," he explained as though it was the simplest thing in the world. "Which they totally will by the way, but that's beside the point," he tacked on as that playful chuckle of his started creeping back into his voice. "Of course I'd still speak to you; you can't get rid of me that easily."

"Really?" Carrie asked, wary despite the hopeful glint in her ocean eyes.

"Yes, really, idiot," he snorted. "I'm not just friends with you 'cause you're dating Miles, you're my drama buddy," he went on to explain with a grin holding nothing but fond sincerity. "You're the only one that keeps me sane in that playhouse, and even then you're so ridiculous I can only take you seriously like 60% of the time. Plus, I did see you naked that one time-"

"I was not- it was just my top."

The frustrated tone shining through in the way she had cut him off, and the way she had hurriedly returned to avoiding his gaze, struck Riven down. "Oh my god, you didn't even laugh at the bikini story. This really is bad," he said - again, half-joking, half-genuinely-concerned. Reaching behind him, his fingers closed around glossy wood as a teasing smile started to tug at his lips. "I didn't want it to have to come to this…"

Hearing fingers start plucking at guitar strings, Carrie's bewildered frown deepened as she turned back to him. "What are you doing?"

"I can't help it, you've left me no choice," he chuckled, cheesily grinning back at her and continuing to lazily pluck out a melody. "I'm not leaving until I've cheered you up - even if that means resorting to music."

"Come on, Riv," Carrie wearily groaned, not nearly as amused by the offer as he'd hoped she would be. "Stop, I'm not in the mood. Can't you just leave me alone?"

The plucking stopped and Riven sat the guitar fully back in his lap, his own brows now starting to furrow. "They really got you this time, huh?"

Carrie sighed as she dropped her gaze to her lap again. "I don't like to show it normally 'cause I know they don't always mean it, they just want to get a rise out of me," she slowly confessed. "But it was…different last night. It's felt different since we arrived."

"I really thought you guys were getting somewhere," Riven softly mused, just as perplexed by the sudden nosedive in amiability as the others in the cabin.

"So did I," Carrie agreed, smiling painfully down at a knot in the wood. A million things she wanted to say swirled in her head, but none of her thoughts were quite able to be fit into words - nothing that could make a coherent sentence anyway. She didn't know whether to get mad, and let the rest of her pent up anger spill across the deck until she'd rid herself of it completely. She didn't know whether to just push it to the back of her mind again, put on a brave face and swan back into camp as though nothing was wrong at all. She didn't know whether to stay hidden, avoiding everyone at the cabin and all her problems at the same time. At least that way she wouldn't have to face them again, or have to try to explain herself and her inexcusable temperament to Miles. God, he was probably so mad at her right now.

More and more thoughts flew through her mind, hitting the walls of her skull like rabid animals until her head pounded and her resolve broke down. Helpless tears started to slip from her eyes as the hopelessness of her position washed over her all over again. She felt a hand on her back that brought her back to her senses in an instant though - having forgotten, yet again, that she wasn't alone out here. She sniffed and hurriedly patted away the tears, trying to salvage what little of her makeup still remained. "Guess I'm not such a heartless bitch after all," she offered, managing a melancholy chuckle at her predicament that, although was an improvement, still did nothing to show Riven that she was feeling more like her usual self.

In fact, he just felt more concerned than ever. Carrie was strong-willed and stubborn, bold and exuberant - not the shying, insecure, tearful shell of a girl before him. He'd already suspected that her confidence had been knocked this summer thanks to the rather personal disruption at the playhouse, but this was worse than he thought. And he couldn't stand by in good conscience and watch her fire be extinguished.

Setting his guitar back into position, he began plucking at the strings again. Carrie shot him another questioning look, with a slightly annoyed huff, but he stuck to his guns and kept playing, offering her nothing but a cheesy, comforting grin in response. "Complain all you want," he chuckled. "But I'm not gonna stop playing."

Although Carrie just rolled her eyes, she did manage a small, resigned laugh as she gave up on the pushback. And soon, to her surprise, lyrics began to accompany his playing - as gentle and reassuring as his own intent.

All alone, you think you're on your own You think there's no one in the world who cares for you That isn't true, there's me May not be, the one you want to see But if you need someone who's kind then look behind And then you'll find, there's me

I'll be near, standing by Never fear, you can cry But in a while, you will smile And I'll be there to see

By yourself you have to cry yourself Nobody else can cry the tears you have to cry But I will try, there's me Until then, when you're okay again You'll look around, find I'm no longer there I'll still be near somewhere You're not alone, there's me There's always me

I'll still be near somewhere You're not alone; there's me There's always me...

The soft, yet cheeky smiles Riven kept shooting the girl as he sang, paired with the meaning behind the words, and the added special meaning to them both, meant that by the time his strumming faded to silence, Carrie was finally grinning back at him.

"You really came all the way out here to serenade me with a musical theatre song from the 80s?" she asked with a teasing chuckle, wiping away the last traces of any tears with the heel of her hand.

"It worked, didn't it?" he teasingly fired back with a satisfied smirk.

"Touché," she giggled, before hitting with a further pointed eyebrow raise. "But Starlight? Really?"

"Again: it worked, didn't it?" he retorted with a snort of laughter she was all too happy to reciprocate.

"You are way too attached to that show," she chuckled, teasingly bumping his arm.

"It's about roller skating trains - how can I not be attached to it?"

"I don't know, ask literally anyone else at camp," Carrie snorted back, referring to the many attempts the pair had made to try to get even just one of their friends to give the show a chance.

Knowing exactly what the blonde was talking about, Riven just shot her a grin. "They'll come around eventually, trust me."

Giving an equally confident, yet slightly more playful grin back, Carrie conceded with another giggle before continuing. "And when they do, I think you've proven you'd make an excellent CB."

Riven pressed a hand to his chest. "I think that might be the nicest thing you've ever said to me," he said with a comically dramatic earnestness that just had Carrie rolling her eyes again.

"Shut up, I compliment you all the time," she retorted, and her smile only broadened when Riven showed no signs of pushing back. "I'm serious though; if you ever manage to convince Nonna you don't need to be sectioned for suggesting we stage the show, I think you'd be great."

Biting back a laugh, Riven instead decided to lead with sincerity. "Only if you'd be my Dinah," he bargained with a fond, yet knowing grin she, again, gladly shared. But it wasn't long before he started rambling again. "But I'd sacrifice that if it meant you could be Pearl…"

With an affectionate shake of her head, Carrie playfully sighed, "I never play the lead - I can't break my streak now, you know that."

Taking his turn to roll his eyes, he retorted with. "Pearl is not the lead; the whole show's about Rusty."

"Ok well maybe you can play Rusty then, Mr Know-It-All," Carrie teasingly fired back as the pair fell back into their typical, theatre-based ramblings - idly chattering away without a care in the world as the wind pulled the clouds across the sky.

It wasn't until Carrie saw the sunlight skittering across the lake, and heard the distant chatter of counsellors start up again, that she realised her head had finally stopped pounding, and her chest no longer felt as though someone had carved a giant hole into it. Astonished, but grateful nonetheless, Carrie turned back to Riven with a smile. "Thanks for coming to find me, Riv."

Grinning contentedly back, he replied, "Well, I don't like thinking of you being sad. You're like my fun, crazy, big sister - I can't have you moping around like a sadsack."

"You really think of me like a sister?"

"Of course. We don't always understand each other, and I tease the shit out of you at every opportunity I get, but that doesn't mean I don't care about you. You always make me laugh, you're insanely talented, you give the best advice, but you're honest when you need to be - you're everything I'd want in a big sister. Plus, like I said, you're my drama buddy. The shit we put up with from those campers has bonded us for life, whether you like it or not."

Unable to hold back her laughter any longer, it spilled out from her grateful smile as she reached out and wrapped him in a big hug, nestling her face into the well-worn cotton of his hoodie.

"And you give great hugs," he playfully added, mumbling through her mane of frizzy, golden curls.

"Thanks, Riv," she murmured between giggles, letting herself melt into the comforting reassurance of his embrace.

"Any time, Care Bear."

Sitting back, scouring his half-finished painting with an acutely analytical gaze, Bentley didn't even hear the door to the art barn open, let alone the footsteps that followed. He squinted his eyes, tilted his head from side to side, screwed up his mouth in concentration… And then his vision went dark.

Blinking, eyelashes brushed against an old t-shirt masquerading as a blindfold. But before he could try to question the ambush, a quiet voice broke through his haze of confusion.

"Alright, listen to what I say, or this is not gonna be pretty."

A chuckle couldn't help but slip from Bentley's lips, immediately relaxing as he recognised the voice. "Is that your attempt at sounding threatening?"

"I was actually trying to be reassuring," August countered with a bashful chuckle of his own.

"Oh, well then consider me reassured," Bentley laughed, still idly toying with his paintbrush. "As reassured as anyone can be when they're randomly blindfolded on a Wednesday afternoon. What are you doing anyway?"

"I need to take you somewhere, so put the brush down and get up - but don't go too fast; I've gotta make sure you don't bump into anything," August ordered, tying the old t-shirt in place before clumsily helping the blonde stand, taking him by the shoulders and leading him towards the door.

"Where the hell are we going?" Bentley asked, after they had navigated the stairs in a (somewhat) successful manner - consisting of only one giggling fit, and one almost-total-collapse - as he felt them move from the wooden deck to the uneven grass.

"I'm not allowed to tell you, but it's nothing bad, trust me."

"Who's forcing you to kidnap me and parade me across camp like a prisoner?"

"You'll find out in a minute," August chuckled, steering him around a tree stump. "But just know that it's nothing bad."

"Well I'd hope not - I'd hate to think you'd willingly be involved in leading me to my demise," Bentley snorted, before continuing with his idle rambling. "Who's roped you into taking me captive anyway?"

"I don't know if I can say; they didn't give me much briefing, and I don't think they expected you to be this…chatty."

Bentley laughed. "Well then they should have sent a more intimidating kidnapper."

"They didn't want to scare you, they just needed you away from Vivien," August admitted, immediately falling silent for a few steps. "...I don't know if I was supposed to say that."

"Ohhh, ok then, so I'm being taken hostage by the competition?" Bentley chuckled through a smirk as he began to piece the puzzle together.

"...Maybe," August confirmed as he rounded the blonde and started to lead him up a new set of steps from the front to make sure he didn't lose his footing. "But if they ask then you figured it out on your own - you didn't hear it from me."

"Well it's not like I had many options; it was either that or some weird camp event I didn't pay attention to the announcement for," Bentley laughed to himself as he blindly stuck his foot out, almost completely missing the step until August repositioned him. "What do they need me for? Information about how our rehearsals are going? And how are you in cahoots with them anyway? Are you abandoning our show for theirs?"

"What? No, just… Hang on, gimme a second," August fumbled through his excuses, fighting to nudge the door open with his foot before carefully pulling his friend inside. "Alright, we're here. Just sit down and listen to what they've got to say, they'll explain everything," he continued, keeping his voice down as he offered the boy further reassurances he was sure he wasn't supposed to.

Once Bentley was situated on what felt like a metal fold-out chair, August gave his shoulder one last reassuring squeeze before untying the old t-shirt and lifting it away from his eyes. Oddly though, even with the blindfold removed, Bentley could hardly see a thing; whatever cabin they were in had black-out cloths draped across the windows, leaving the room in complete darkness. Well, at least that explained why it had taken August so long to navigate him across the room.

"Uhh… Hello?" Bentley tried, calling out into what felt like a completely empty room if the thick silence he was met with was anything to go by.

But before he could question his situation any further, a light sprang to life beside him, so bright he had to jerk his head back to save himself from temporary blindness.

Wincing, he tried to take in his now significantly more illuminated surroundings, only to find that he was sitting at a scuffed, fold-out table, occupying the very lamp that seemed to give off more light than the sun itself. Other than that, the rest of the room was swimming in darkness, creating a rather effective interrogation set-up, which he suspected the masterminds behind his kidnapping had hoped for.

And speaking of these masterminds, just as the afterimages were finally starting to fade from his vision, a figure rolled out of the darkness and up to the table. Yes, quite literally rolled.

They set their hands on the tabletop in front of him and presented the boy with a smug smile. "Hello, Bentley."

"What are you doing?" Bentley asked, snorting out a laugh at the surreal nature of the entire situation.

"We have a…preposition for you," Riven slowly explained, his smug smile only broadening.

"We?" Bentley questioned. "There are more weirdos than you tied up in this thing?"

Suddenly the lamp head was wrenched back, sending the beam of light directly at his face, once again making him jerk his head back. "And just who do you think you're calling a weirdo?"

Eyes watering from the visual assault, Bentley squinted through the brightness until he found a tanned hand clamped around the lamphead. Following it up, he found an all-too-familiar, shadowed face, framed by a mane of unruly golden curls. "Not you?" Bentley offered with a lopsided smile.

Thankfully, the gesture was enough to appease Carrie, who tilted the lamphead back into position - but not before she shot the boy a satisfied smirk in response.

"You got any other questions? Or can we get down to business?" Riven asked.

"Uh, yeah: what's with the kidnapping?" Bentley fired back, sporting an amused smirk of his own. "You so worried you'll lose the bet you're turning to torturing the competition?"

"What? No! We just needed you away from the boss," Riven laughed, his comically threatening act disappearing in seconds as he referenced his pint-sized figure skating partner. "Like I said, we've got a preposition for you."

"Couldn't you have just asked me in the dining hall? Or in my room or something?" Bentley went on to ask, still having to squint from the light.

"Well yeah, but where's the fun in that?" came Riven's snorted reply, to which Carrie just grinned and nodded in agreement.

Bentley shook his head at the pair, evidently equally matched in their passion for dramatising the most menial things. "This is so dumb," he breathed, fighting back a smile at the ridiculousness of their whole set-up. "What do you want then? What's this preposition thing?"

Carrie and Riven exchanged a glance, giving each other a confirmatory nod before turning back to the blonde. "…We need your help."

"With what?"

"With the show," Riven clarified.

"The show? Your show?" Bentley spluttered, eyes darting between the pair, looking for any evidence of jesting, yet finding nothing. "I don't understand," he slowly continued. "Why do you want my help? I've got no idea what I'm doing with all this theatre stuff. I'm out of my depth with Viv's show as it is. Plus, I already agreed to be in her's - I can't help out the competition."

"Why not? I am."

Bentley's ears pricked up as a new voice entered the conversation, and to his amazement, when he turned to follow it, he saw a grinning brunette emerging from the darkness on Carrie's right.

"Mick?! You jumped ship?" Bentley asked, gawping at the grinning girl as though she'd just grown a second nose. "Does Viv know?"

"No, I didn't jump ship," Mick chuckled as she perched on the edge of the fold-out table. "I'm helping out with both."

"What? Why?"

"'Cause I wanted to," she snorted simply. "It's not like there's rules against it. This whole thing's just for fun anyway."

"Yeah, it's not actually a competition - we just both wanted to put on different shows," Riven added.

"Well could you let Viv know that? She's treating this like we're at war - we've all been sworn to secrecy," Bentley said, chuckling at his friend's competitive spirit.

"Oh we know, we already tried to get Mick to squeal but she wouldn't budge," Carrie said, sharing a knowingly playful glance with the brunette.

"And luckily, they had a cool job for me besides just being their spy," Mick cheekily added. "Or else all the effort it took to brainwash me would have been for nothing."

"Which is…?" Bentley tried.

"I'm building the stage," Mick revealed with a proud grin.

Bentley's eyes went wide. "You guys need to build your own stage?"

Riven and Carrie shared another knowing smirk. "If we want the show to be as awesome as it deserves to be then yeah, it needs a custom stage," Riven confirmed.

"And since Butchy and Miles refused to even hear us out, Mickie stepped up to the plate to handle it all on her own," Carrie added, looping her arm through the brunette's with a fond grin. "And she's doing a way better job than either of those two bozos would have done anyway."

"Well, I don't know about that…" Mick said with a roguish chuckle. "But I am doing a pretty damn good job."

"Does this mean you're helping with both shows too?" Bentley then asked, turning behind him to look for the friend who'd brought him here, who could do nothing but offer him a sheepish smile.

"...Yeah," August slowly admitted, before adding a quieter: "You know I'm terrible at saying 'no' to things."

"So your solution is just doing twice the work?" Bentley asked incredulously, the information just serving more of a purpose to fuel his growing need to help August grow a backbone.

"Well they're not big parts-" he tried to reason.

"You're actually in both of them?" Bentley demanded, his eyes practically popping out of his head when he saw the knee and elbow pads the boy was sporting. "But you don't know how to roller skate."

"They're teaching me," August chuckled, shooting Carrie and Riven a grateful smile. And when Bentley's disbelieving gaze found theirs, they just offered him smug grins and little waves, showing off their own elbow pads as they did so.

Bentley's shock jumped to a whole new level when he spotted Mick's elbow pads though. "You're in it too, Mickie?!"

"Well I didn't like how quickly Butchy dismissed them when they asked him to take part," Mick began, smirking at the very thought. "So I thought I'd teach him a lesson about not judging things at face level."

"Well, we should have known not to expect his neanderthal brain to be able to comprehend such complex concepts as 'having fun'," Carrie retorted with a cheeky dig Mick luckily started to laugh at.

"I've gotta admit, it did sound really corny at first. But once you get past the fact it's all about trains, the show is pretty fun," Mick confessed.

"Duh, of course it's fun, we're directing it," Carrie added, gesturing to the auburn-haired giant behind her, who just laughed in his approval.

"The whole show's done on roller skates - I still don't understand how anyone could know that and not automatically think it's awesome," Riven said between his chuckles.

But at that revelation, Bentley's eyes started to grow wide again. "Hold on, you're not expecting me to have a part in your show too, are you?" he asked, horrified at the very idea. "I barely have a handle on what I'm doing in Viv's already, and that's just one show. Plus, I can't even roller skate so-"

"No, we don't need you to be in it," Riven cut in with a chuckle before the blonde's anxious ramblings could make him run out of breath.

"Unless you want to be in it, then we'd totally find you a part," Carrie tagged on with an encouraging grin.

"And teach you how to skate," Riven added with a mischievous smirk. "If we can teach Mick, we can teach anyone."

And although Mick's playful whack of Riven's arm did help him relax a touch, Bentley's stance on their offer was still firm: "No thanks, I'm good." But his curiosity was still running rampant as the others giggled at his reaction. "Well if you don't need me to have a part in the show, then what did you need my help for?"

"We wanted to see if you'd be willing to help us with designing and making the costumes," Riven explained.

Bentley thought he had to have misheard him. "The costumes?"

"Yeah," Riven chuckled at the boy's expression. "What's that face for?"

"I don't know the first thing about making costumes - I've never worked with fabric in my life."

Riven and Carrie exchanged another glance. "That's kind of why we need your help," Carrie started.

But when Bentley just looked more confused than ever, Riven went on to explain. "None of the stuff in the playhouse storage bins will work because, well, they're just regular people clothes, so we need to design our own stuff. Juliet's already said she can help construct any actual clothing garments we need, but our main problem is how to actually use the outfits to make us look like trains."

Bentley's thoughts came to a screeching halt. "Wait…you guys are the trains?"

"Yeah."

"You're acting as trains? Singing trains?" They had to be pranking him, right?

"Uh, yeah," Carrie said, sharing another quick glance with Riven.

"What did you think the show was about?" he snorted.

"I don't know, I thought you were just like people working on a railroad or something," Bentley retorted with an incredulous splutter.

"Well we're not, we're the trains," Riven chuckled.

"Yeah, why else would we need to do the whole thing on wheels?" Mick added with a playful wiggle of her skate-clad foot.

"So what? You want me to…make you look like trains?" Bentley warily asked. "Like with big chimneys coming out of your heads and stuff?"

Fondly rolling her eyes at Bentley's poor attempts at stifling his laughter, Carrie stepped in to try to explain the proposal a little more clearly. "No - we just need to capture the vibe of trains - you don't need to shove us all in cardboard box models. We can show you the costumes of the official productions so you can get an idea of the sort of things we're looking for, but we don't have a huge budget, so we're gonna have to get creative - hence why we came to you," she finished with a proud grin.

"All we want you to do is draw up some concepts that make us look enough like a train to sell the illusion to the audience. And as long as they're moveable enough for us to skate in, and can be constructed from stuff we've got access to, the rest of the design can be totally down to you," Riven added.

"So basically you've got free reign to make us look as ridiculous as you want," Mick tacked on with a chuckle.

"But try to be a little nice with it," August gently offered from behind, which just set Bentley off to laugh more.

He did have to admit that the offer sounded quite tempting. After all, he'd never worked on anything like costume designs before - and from the sounds of things, this concept would let him get pretty creative with it; these weren't just average costumes - in fact, they were probably more sculpture than costume anyway. But there was something still holding him back. "I don't know, guys. I don't know if I've got the brain space to work on two shows at once-"

"Oh please, Bentley - come on," Riven pleaded. "We'll look like complete morons out there if we don't have good costumes."

"We will," Mick earnestly confirmed. "Trust me, It's not pretty."

"Well if I'm on Vivien's side then don't I want you guys to look like complete morons?" he asked with a mischievous giggle.

"Maybe, but where's the fun in a landslide victory?" Riven countered with a smirk.

"Come on, Benny, please," came Carrie's attempt at begging. "I'll sit with you and help you learn all your lines whilst you work on the costumes."

Bentley's ears pricked up. "...Really?"

"Mhm," she confirmed with a kind nod. "And I can give you all my tips for breaking down the script into easier parts to manage; I know they can seem really daunting when you try to go through them all at once."

Now that sounded like an offer he could get behind. He'd already been toying with the idea of asking Carrie for help with the seemingly impossible task of learning his lines, but had chickened out every time. There were just so many - it was like they all blurred into one every time he'd even open a page. And he hated the thought of letting Vivien down because he couldn't get his brain to work how he wanted it to, so if Carrie could actually help him get through a scene without having to look at his script the entire time… Maybe it'd be worth giving up a few pages of his sketchbook to designing train-transformer-wannabes.

But he couldn't let them think he was that easy of a target… "I don't know guys, it just doesn't feel right going behind Viv's back like this-"

"Oh come on, Benny, please," Carrie tried again, with a touch more dramatic desperation.

"I'll do your dish duty for the rest of summer," Riven attempted to bribe.

But that just spurred on Bentley's reluctance even more. After all, he was rather curious about what else he could squeeze out of the pair to help sweeten the deal. "...I'm listening."

"You can have the rest of my pudding cups with dinner each night?" Riven offered. "And you don't have to go behind Viv's back," he added. "Don't go and tell her outright, but if she asks you about it then you're totally free to tell her. And if she's not happy about it, you can back out any time you want."

"Well, okay, but I still don't know if I'll have the time to-"

"If you say 'yes' we'll get you that rare Spiderman comic you want," Riven threw out in a moment of sheer desperation.

Bentley's heart skipped a beat. Damn, they really did want his help.. "...Seriously?" he breathed, eyes widening at the very prospect.

"Sure, Carrie'll cover it - won't you, Carrie?" Riven confirmed with a smirk as he gave the blonde's shoulder a squeeze.

Shooting him a sharp glance, she hissed a tight: "I will?"

"Of course you will," Riven verified, his mischievous smirk only broadening as Carrie's mildly murderous glare was replaced with Bentley's whole-hearted satisfaction.

"Alright, done. Pass me a pen and some paper," he said, sealing the deal with a barked laugh and a cheesy grin before either one of them could back down on their offers again.

"Welcome aboard, Bentley," Riven replied, shooting him a victorious smile as he reached across the table and shook the boy's hand.

But just as Riven and the others were starting to unload all their ideas for potential costume concepts onto Bentley, with what he found to be startling levels of enthusiasm, the room's main lights flickered to life, illuminating a seething head of green hair in the doorway. Before Bentley could question the girl's sudden appearance, or could let his eyes adjust to the drastic shift in brightness though, she called out to her band partner with thunderous urgency.

"Riv, you've got a hell of a lot of explaining to do; I just looked up this 'Belle' character you want me to play - care to tell me why she's described as 'ancient' and 'peeling'?" an outraged Jade demanded. "Or why you thought I'd be so perfect to play her?"

Rolling his eyes and just laughing off the girl's anger, Riven quickly tried to appease her with a teasing: "That's not the version of her we're using, dummy. And don't you dare try to tell me you're not perfect for her - you nap all the fucking time."

As Riven and Jade broke off into their own friendly spat, and Mick and Carrie started up their own conversation about what Mick had been practising last on her skates, Bentley found himself turning to August - this time taking his turn to wear the awkwardly sheepish smile. "Why do I get the feeling I've signed up for way more than I can handle?"

"Oh come on, don't worry, it'll be fun," August reassured before offering a joke to further set him at ease. "And hey, at least you're getting a backstage job and a comic book out of it - all I'm gonna get is on-stage embarrassment and massive quads."

The guffaws spilled from Bentley's lips before he could stop them - and after glancing around to watch Carrie clumsily catching Mick (who looked as if she'd just stepped on a banana peel in an old cartoon) before she could fall, and Riven playfully bickering with Jade in the doorway, he started to think that working with them on this project might not be so bad after all. Plus, a whole costume concept all to himself? He could definitely have some fun with that…

#again - i can only apologise for the sheer insanity that is this post #but hopefully it was at least a bit of fun to read through!#it was certainly a lot of fun for me to put together - that's for sure haha #and i hope you liked the little collages i put together too; i thought some visuals would help to sell the concept a bit more #anyway - i've rambled waaaaay too much for one night - and one post #i'll love you and leave you - at last #hope you're having/have had fun at camp!#sorry i couldn't be pestering you with a more exciting post lmao #hopefully the little drabbles made up for it though!#they're about 9 pages long each - which is probably longer than what drabbles are supposed to be #but i'm still quite impressed with myself for managing to keep them that short tbh - that's quite a feat for me hahaha

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puppetmaster13u · 1 year

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Oh boi even more of One au in like 3 hours lol

I like to think that like how in @phoenixcatch7's Doll au there's gas versions of like cures and such in the batfam's gas masks since they don't need to breath when possessing the puppets right? I like to think there's an organic version of that with the meat puppet bodies, at least with Bruce, where the plates on his neck opens up into vents of sorts, pictured here with a few spikes removed for visibility reasons.

This gas could be some cures for like Joker venom & Fear gas and such, or it could also be sedatives, paralytics, could even vary between each member. (For example in the Cryptidverse Steph has Anesthetics on her claws, Jason has reflective powder that mimics embers/sparks, Cass has paralytics, etc). Honestly I am just brainstorming so this could definitely change lmao

I do like to think they start developing their own venom though, gotta' have those fangs & tusks for some reason lol

#meat marionette au #batman au #cryptid batman #cryptid batfam #body horror #batman #dcu #dc #Sorry Phoenix if I am spamming you lol #Honestly I feel like Bruce & Kane are the only ones with like big-ish tusks as though to show they're the fully grown ones of the group #Batwoman has set up shop in Bludhaven while Bruce usually sticks to Gotham me thinks but they still help each other out because family <3 #God I want to ramble about their language and body language and stuff so bad lol I love world building #I also totally haven't been writing a drabble for this for the past hour lmao #The caves have a favorite mortal and It's definitely Bruce lol #Okay but now I am thinking of how Bruce & Clark could meet the first time lol #Bruce can definitely sneak up on Clark if he wants to and it's probably terrifying lol #Something I will have to think about for later I suppose #What are the tunnels? Fuck if I know lol #The drabble totally isn't from Its pov tho lol (definitely not)#Tumblr don't eat my tags 2023 #Bruce definitely freaks out the first time he sees his second body #Not helped by the fact the first time he sees it he is piloting it and emerging from a flesh wall #All stumbly like a newborn deer (not helped by long limbs and body all differently proportioned & more limbs lol)#The secondary body's face is something between a human and an animal's muzzle #Dick deserves electric organs like an electric eel so he can shock people #Y'know what Cass deserves pitch black flesh & organs- like I am talking vantablack barely lets in any light black #Bruce is probably more wary about taking in kids what with the whole eldritch thing beneath the streets but really what choice does he have #All of them were already trying to do vigilante work & they'll end up killed if he doesn't help them :/#He loves them but he *really* wishes the tunnels didn't take a liking to them as well because they're already traumatized enough #He wishes it didn't call to them like it did to him so long ago

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unknownarmageddon · 1 year

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Who in the hell are you

Dust belongs to Ask-Dusttale Horror belongs to Sour-Apple-Studios

Death’s Doorstep (this band au) belongs to me

When he was a teenager, roughly seventeen, Horror joined an underground fighting ring to get money to feed his brother, and himself. In hindsight it definitely wasn’t the smartest of decisions, but it paid well if, and he was god at it. And he was desperate.

He went about his business for months. Maybe a year or two. He didn’t keep track.

Then one of his opponents decided to fight dirty. In the ring they pulled a pipe on him they had found god knows where. Weapons of any kind were contraband.

Before he could really even think they had bashed Horror over the head with it, effectively caving in a part of his skull and knocking him unconscious. When he came to he was surrounded by utter anarchy as his attacker was being restrained, though far from willingly. A mob of people swarmed around him in a panic. There was shouting, god there was so much shouting. Horror could barely see or think through the blood pouring out of his head.

He, somehow, managed to pull himself to his feet. He burst through the commotion and out of the building. He eventually found himself stumbling aimlessly through a sudden downpour past houses with covered windows. He wondered to himself how he wasn’t dead. Though he wouldn’t have be surprised if he dropped to the concrete right then. He stopped at the first house he saw with any sign of activity; its garage was open. There, he met eyes with another skeleton with a broken guitar in his hand.

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good-beanswrites · 9 months

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If it's okay with you, could you write a drabble about the hypothetical aftermath of Amane getting attacked by Kotoko?

Welp thank you pal for making me absolutely insane with this request 👍 I ran through a few hypotheticals and realized I had to shift some things around since there were so many absolutely tragic outcomes. I worked something out but damn if it didn’t make me emotional to think about how uniquely rough Amane has it. Even making sure she's in a good place at the end, this got pretty serious, so warnings for child abuse and cult references.

(So in canon, Kotoko goes in order and attacks Fuuta, but Kazui steps in. Then she attacks Mahiru while he’s distracted with his injuries. She’s about to attack Amane, but Mikoto gets in the way (my hc that he did it on purpose survives!). By the time they reach a draw, Kazui is back, and the two of them can prevent Kotoko from any further action against Amane. Sticking to this apparent system of three attacks and one rescue, I’m just shuffling around the injuries for this story. Fuuta’s attack went unnoticed, and he’s in the same state as canon Mahiru. Mikoto steps in before Kotoko can fight Mahiru, so Mappi’s the one who get out physically unscathed. While Mikoto checks on Mahiru, recovers himself, or discovers Fuuta, Kotoko is able to attack Amane next. Kazui comes to help, but not before she leaves Amane looking like canon Fuuta.)

Mahiru could practically feel her heart shatter into a million pieces when Amane finally cried in front of her. She hadn’t shed a single tear yesterday – it was the shock, Shidou said. Mahiru was skeptical. After all, she had been shocked, too, and cried plenty.

Amane woke as she came in with breakfast. She took a moment to survey herself, bandages peeking out from beneath her pajamas and an eyepatch securely over her right eye. As calmly as one might say “good morning,” she started to cry. Mahiru might have missed it, if Amane hadn’t wiped at her good eye with her sleeve.

“Oh, sweetheart…!” Mahiru rushed over to her. “It’s okay, I’m here.” She wanted nothing more than to wrap the girl in a secure embrace, but she remembered the mass of bandages that were around her chest. Shidou had mentioned broken ribs and bruises. It took everything in her not to cry along with Amane, at the thought.

“I can get you another ice pack, if you need. Or more medicine.” Her mind spun with ways to help with pain. Many of the first aid supplies had been used to keep Fuuta from the brink of death, but surely there were extras to spare for Amane.

The girl just shook her head.

She muttered, “I can’t… I…I’m going to be punished, I’m going to be punished…”

“No! You’re safe now.” Mahiru placed her hands gently on Amane’s arms. “Kotoko’s not coming back. We’re all watching over you. You’re safe. She’s not going to hurt you anymore.”

“That’s not…” Amane pulled away. Her voice stayed level, despite hiccups interrupting her. A hand reached up to her eyepatch. “It’s this. It’s all of this. It’s sinful. I took it off last night, but he must have…” She started unwrapping it. “They’re going to punish me...”

With a careful motion, Mahiru held it in place and took Amane’s hands into her own. She’d been picking up on the signs ever since they arrived here together, and a final wave of understanding washed over her.

“I can’t let you do that.”

Amane’s expression twisted, though words came out far more frantic than fiery. “Let me go.”

Mahiru didn’t. “I’m sorry. Amane, you need this treatment.”

“That is not your decision to make. That is not any human’s decision to make.”

Mahiru pressed her lips together. “I know. But I can’t watch as you… I can’t sit by again while someone…” She was careful not to apply any pressure, but she could no longer fight the urge to gather Amane up in her arms. “You don’t need to be afraid of those people, anymore.”

“I’m not afraid.” Amane hiccuped. “They love me, and I love them. I need to be good for them.”

“I love you, and I don’t want to see you in pain.”

“You just pity me because I’m young.”

“Why does your age matter? You are a lovely young woman – you are my friend – and I can’t bear to see you in pain.”

The two sat in silence for a moment. Mahiru doubted she would take that as an answer; Amane had refused to call any of the others her friend. At least she didn’t argue. In fact, it seemed she was leaning into the embrace a bit more. She sighed a shaky breath into Mahiru’s uniform.

“Listen, Amane. Can you do me a favor? I’m trying to be a good girl, too. To make up for something awful, I need to make sure you’re alright. Can you help me? Can we be good together?”

A long pause followed. Amane’s voice spoke up, ever so gently.

“I suppose I can consider it.” She added quickly, “for the sake of your redemption. Of course.”

“Of course.”

#milgram #amane momose #mahiru shiina #thank you so much! i dont want to be bubbly on such a serious drabble but i want to give an enthusiastic thanks because this one really got #the gears turning!!#i started making plans as soon as i saw the ask and it took so long finding something that wouldnt result in straight up tragedy :(#if i kept to the initial timeline and said kazui didnt step in until amanes attack then both fuuta and mahiru would be close to death #and given there seems to limited supplies i think one of them would have died if shidou needed to treat three critical patients #so i moved people around to make sure everyone survived #which brought me to the main problem of amane self sabotaging her medical care #even minor injuries could have resulted in death if she got her way and removed bandages/refused treatment #but the mental strain of keeping the treatment would be just as bad as the physical pain -- shed be paranoid 24/7 of #divine punishment and repeating the mistakes that led her here.... it would hurt more to be forced like that #so i needed someone to be able to get through to her gently #but the only one who shes been able to trust just got the shit beat out of him and is in no position to talk!!!!#everyone else would just make her more upset or not know how to convince her the right way :(#still - i think mahiru could do it the best! with her own trauma from allowing loved ones to die in front of her i think shed be motivated #so. yeah.#i know amane is supposed to be talking in the plural pronoun now but i couldnt get it to work - lets just say that kicks in soon after this #tw cults #tw child abuse #drabbles

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sisterdivinium · 2 months

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Now is the time to place your bets on whether or not this hyper self-indulgent doctor superion Vampire the Masquerade AU fic will or won't get to 100 handwritten pages...

#i'm at page 65. there are about four or five scenes to go before the end.#THIS WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THIS LONG #especially considering how i stopped work on another longer doctor superion fic to do this #i guess we're in for a strange period of longer jillian and suzanne AUs from me. it even feels weird to say that #i know that 20-30k words isn't exactly long for many people's standards but it is to me. i've written longer original work but not fic #anyway. i get all nervous because i want to share the damn thing and can't so here's a useless post about it #just don't hold your breath because i write these longer stories with a sort of powered by the apocalypse mindset #so instead of play to find out it's write to find out #meaning the first manuscript is a flaming pile of shit which will likely be fully rewritten later. AND THEN typed up.#the novel i wrote a few years ago needed to be rewritten. the first five pages were DOUBLED in the revision i never finished lol #that's to give you an idea #so. yeah. the only thing i'll be posting for the time being is drabbles. maybe some meta in between as i haven't done that in a while #silly blabbering

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cacoetheswriting · 1 year

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Hello! I hope all is well. I had a fluffy request if that’s ok? Eddie x fem!reader where reader is an art nerd that likes to draw for their campaigns. One day, they’re hanging out preparing for the campaign and maybe Eddie had a run in with Jason earlier and was feeling a little down that day so then reader just starts aggressivley complimenting him out if nowhere. I really love your work! ❤️

thank youuu for this request & for your sweet words, makes my heart happy that you like my little fics ❤️ hope i did your vision justice!

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader word count: 2.6k content warnings: adult language, use of pet names, a little mutual pining, insecurities / self-doubt, mentions of bullying, mainly just fluff - very much unedited - pls let me know if i missed anything!

Your friendship with Eddie was an odd one — if you could even call it that. More colleagues than friends, to be honest. Or better yet, acquaintances by association.

Freaks. Geeks. Social outcasts.

There was however, one big difference.

Your status at Hawkins High was by design. A strategic decision you put into play long before you even stepped through the building doors. Growing up in a busy house with a younger brother too loud for his own good, solitude was your best friend. Art was your escape. Often you only found time for both at school. So no, you didn’t wanna socialise or try out for the cheerleading team. You were quite content being left alone.

Being neighbours with Nancy Wheeler, and your younger brothers being practically attached at the hip, helped with staying invisible ‘cause who’s gonna bully the girl that sometimes hung out with Nancy and King Steve.

Eddie unfortunately was not as lucky. His label wasn’t his choice — not at first anyway. It followed him through the years from an age arguably too young. No kid deserved to be treated the way he was simply ‘cause of how/where he was brought up. The curly-haired boy couldn’t escape the names, the teasing, the dirty looks. He couldn’t change his fate. So eventually he stopped trying. The Freak.

And perhaps that’s why he’s never fully warmed up to you. You were a fraud, not actually understanding what it’s like to be an outcast.

But it’s not like you cared what Eddie Munson thought of you or if the metalhead liked you in any way. Hanging around him was simply a means to an end. He needed someone to immortalise his D&D campaigns and you needed continuous inspiration as well as material for your portfolio.

Most of your meet-ups were surrounded by quiet.

Thinking back, that was the first mistake since it was in that congenial silence, you noticed how he sucked his lip between his teeth whenever he was deep in thought, and how he’d scrunch his brows together if what he came up with didn’t quite make sense. He was undoubtedly pretty. The faded freckles on his face are reminiscent of a million stars. The dips in his cheeks, appearing whenever he smiled, comparable to picturesque valleys. Those big brown of his eyes were like chocolate buttons and the more time you spent together, the more you thought you caught him glancing in your direction with that cocoa gaze, but that would be insane. Right?

It was also in those moments, as you drew the monsters he described in grave detail, you got to see the Eddie he so desperately tried to hide away from the rest of the world. The real Eddie. He was ridiculously smart. Not many people in Hawkins, if any at all aside from your silly little brother with his band of friends, could come up with such intricate ideas. Funny too, making you snort a laugh one too many times with practically zero effort. And he was kind. Asking you how your day was, seeming genuinely interested in your answer.

The small talk was kept to a minimum in the hours you two spent working on the campaigns, but whenever you did have a short conversation, Eddie always made sure his attention was focused solely on you. The second mistake was letting him, because being his priority, if only in the moment, made your stomach flutter.

But today Eddie hasn't uttered a single word aside from a measly hello when you opened your front door earlier that afternoon to let him in.

Normally the silence doesn’t bother you. If anything, you welcome it as it helps you concentrate on the details of any piece you’re currently working on. There was just something about the way Eddie was sitting that made you feel uneasy. He didn’t seem present. Leaning against your dresser, legs sprawled out in front of him, gaze focused on something out the window as he fidgeted with the pencil in his hand.

At first you thought maybe he was planning the next move in his new campaign and just needed a minute, but then fifteen minutes passed and the metalhead still hadn’t moved. If you didn’t know any better, you’d doubt he was even breathing. As still as a rock.

A sudden wave of concern rushes through you and without taking a second to consider what you were doing, you grab one of the pillows from your bed and throw it in his direction.

“Shit, what the—”

“Are you okay?”

Eddie’s not sure how to answer that question, especially when he looks at you. Eyes wider than normal, accompanied by delicate worry lines that he's never really been on the receiving end of — aside from Wayne's constant frown. Eddie first thinks you're clearly faking the concern 'cause why would you actually care? But the longer his gaze remains connected with yours, the more he wants to believe your sincerity is genuine. And that's fucking scary.

“Yeah,” he says eventually. “Just a lot on my mind. Nothin' you need to worry about.”

But you don't give up as easily as he hoped you would.

“Wanna talk about it?”

His lips twitch though he never actually smiles and you are certain then something definitely happened because it's as if he really wants to offer you a glimpse of happiness, but his body is refusing.

Dropping his gaze to the pencil in his hands, Eddie sighs. “You don't have to do that.”

“Do what?” You ask, stringing your brows together.

“Pretend like you actually give a shit,” he replies with a little more disdain than intended while once again catching your eyes with his own.

You don't mean to scoff, but you do. “Look, Eddie, I know we're not like best of friends or anything,” you begin, hopping off the bed with an elegant bounce. “But considering lately I spend more time with you than Nancy or Steve, I feel like we can at least talk about shit, no? Like when something is bothering us, we can talk about that.”

He's slightly surprised at your words. The admission that you hang out with him more than your actual friends didn't seem right to him. In his mind, you and Wheeler are inseparable. He sees you two together all the time, sharing a ride to school, having lunch at the same table. And in the evenings or at the weekends, you're always around Harrington and that other girl, Buckley. Not like Eddie seeks you wherever he goes... He's just... observant.

“Come on, sweetheart.” Eddie rolls his eyes, tone full of disbelief. “You don't gotta lie to make me feel better.”

“I'm not,” you defend and sit cross-legged at his feet, knees brushing against the soles of his dirty Converse in the process. You know you don't owe him an explanation or reasoning, but it seems Eddie won't let up about what's on his mind without one.

“Nancy and I have drifted apart since I kinda took Steve's side in their breakup. Sure we carpool and sit at the same table in the cafeteria, and our idiotic brothers are good friends, but that's pretty much it.”

Eddie starts to feel like a jerk for assuming shit when he clearly had no clue, but you don't give him a chance to interject.

“And yeah, I see Steve often, but it's not like we're all buddy-buddy. He likes it when I stop by the video store to literally sit on the counter and draw his stupid head of hair just so he can make other girls jealous.”

“Jesus, that's shitty.”

You shrug, a small smile circling your lips. “I don't mind. Free film rental and peaceful sketching time.”

The lighthearted tone of your voice makes the corners of Eddie's mouth curl upwards, matching the expression currently present on your face. There's a semi-second of quiet. He's no longer feeling bad 'cause you've taken those worries away with one simple look. And when you knock your knee against his shoe again, Eddie's completely relaxed.

Lost in the way the sun reflects in your eyes, the metalhead doesn't really think when he asks, “So how come you've never invited me over for movie night, huh?”

You smirk. “Horrors aren't really my thing. I actually like to enjoy what I'm watching,” you tease, “Even if the shit is free. Don't wanna see any decapitations, thank you very much.”

Eddie huffs a laugh. He pulls his legs up before sliding along the carpeted floor of your bedroom until he's about a reach away from you. Closer than he's ever been. His arms make way around his legs, ring-clad fingers hanging low, poking at your calf.

Surprisingly, you don't flinch at Eddie's sudden proximity or the delicate touch.

“Quite presumptuous of you, sweetheart.” He affirms, gaze focused on where his skin brushes against the denim of your jeans.

“So you don't only watch gruesome things?” You challenge, your own fingers hesitantly reaching towards him, stopping before you can actually graze him in any way.

Eddie's smirking. “Not the point.”

“Sounds like I'm right,” you muse, your smile growing wider. “But I'll make you a deal.”

He looks up to meet your eyes then, hiking a brow. “Oh, yeah?”

You nod. “If you tell me what you were thinking about earlier, I'll let you pick a movie we can watch together. Even something horrific.”

This was uncharted territory — (and also your third mistake). The two of you have never hung out outside of working on D&D campaigns, but since Eddie asked a mere minute ago, even if he was just teasing, you figured why the fuck not. What's the worst that could happen? Plus this seemed the only way to get him to open up.

Eddie tugs his bottom lip between his teeth as he mewls over your proposal. On the one hand, talking about feelings or problems isn't something he's necessarily into. And when it comes to spending time with you, part of the allure is congenial silence, unless he's the one fishing for information. On the other hand, his heart rate has increased tenfold at the thought of you hiding in his embrace during a particularly gross scene or before any jump scare.

In the end, the physical urge to be close to you, an unmistakable desire he's been experiencing for far longer than Eddie would care to admit out loud, wins.

“Carver just got in my head.”

The instant frown on your face, and how your fingers are suddenly reaching for his, looping together, make Eddie want to elaborate.

“Called me talentless. Usually the shit that douche and his gang of imbeciles spewer doesn't bother me 'cause I've been called many things throughout my life and whatever they come up with is more idiotic than hurtful, but I dunno, that comment just rubbed me the wrong way.”

He drops his gaze, focusing instead on your hands now perfectly intertwined. He began to rub gentle circles into your soft flesh and although this was completely odd behaviour for the two of you, it felt more than right.

“Because it's not true, Eddie.”

The metalhead's heart flips at your words and the encouraging tone behind them. Although he didn’t let it show, focusing instead on the dips between your knuckles and every single crease in your skin as he squeezed your hand just a little tighter.

“You're not talentless,” you affirm, dipping your head lower in hopes of catching his brown eyes. “If anything, you're one of the most talented people I've ever met.”

“Bullshit,” he mutters, still refusing to look up.

“Eddie, you can't let those idiots make you feel worthless. You've got more talent in your left pinky than Carver and his band of bullies have put together.” You declare, rather passionately at that. “These campaigns you come up with, do you know the imagination that takes? I-I also know you play the guitar a-and sing too. Plus those extra curricular activities of yours require a mathematical brain. That's already also more talent than I have.”

He glances up at you then. “Shut up. As if you actually think I'm more talented than you?” he disputes and jerks his head towards some of the drawings covering the walls. “No one I know could do that and I know I never told you, but my campaigns would be nothin' without your art, sweetheart.”

Although heat rushes to your face at the unexpected compliment, you don't let Eddie's kind words steer you off course. This wasn't about what he thought of you, this was about what you thought of him and, as it turns out, how badly you wanted him to know.

“My stupid brother won't shut up about how fucking cool you are,” you reveal, chewing briefly on the inside of your cheek. “He's never said anything remotely as nice about me.”

Eddie lets out an airy chuckle. He drops his hold on you, but he doesn't give you a moment to even register how you instantly miss his touch, how your hands are burning with invisible imprints of where his skin brushed yours. No, because he's pushing your legs apart with little to no effort and sliding in-between them.

“Well, I happen to think you're cooler than me.”

It's your turn to laugh while again choosing not to comment on his closeness and ignoring how it made you feel. Ignoring how your stomach fluttered as he pressed his legs to your sides, hands hovering near your face as if he debated whether he was crossing some sort of line.

“Right. Don't fuck with me, Munson.”

“Cross my heart,” the metalhead promises. “Why do you think I asked you to help me out in the first place? Why do you think I willingly spend most of my afternoons with you? Like, there's no need for us to do this together. I can come up with the campaigns on my own then share the concepts so you can draw them out.”

You swallow 'cause the thought has never crossed your mind.

Before Eddie approached you with the offer, your knowledge of Dungeons and Dragons was definitely limited, only privy to whatever your brother and his friends shared. When Eddie asked you to draw something that very first time, and every time after that, you didn't stop and think if it was really necessary for you two to sit together for hours on end, crafting and creating on opposite ends of the room. Now that he's mentioned it, you really didn't need to.

“I-I don't—”

“There's no cooler chick than you, sweetheart.” Eddie interrupts, hands now cupping your face, no longer hesitant, and you're left wondering when the topic shifted from a conversation about his talents to whatever this was shaping up to be.

“Eddie...”

“How Harrington can use you to make other girls jealous instead of realising he should just ask you out, I-I don't understand.” The sentence fades with each word until his voice is a low muffle and you're not entirely sure you heard him correctly.

But every fibre of your being is screaming, so you know he definitely said it. And the way his doe-eyes are glimmering, your own reflection prominent in the pretty brown, only cinches that feeling.

Your final mistake is not asking then and there what Eddie meant.

He stands shortly after and extends a hand to also help you up.

“Speaking of, is the King of Hawkins working right now?” Eddie asks and when you nod slowly, still recovering from the small bomb he's after dropping, he claps his hands together. “Let's go then. I'm thinking we can start with My Bloody Valentine and because you're providing the entertainment, I'll get us some snacks.”

thank you for reading!

eddie munson masterlist | main masterlist

#gosh this is a lot longer than i intended it to be #twas only supposed to be a drabble eek #but I hope you enjoy <3 #eddie munson #eddie munson fic #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fanfiction #eddie munson fluff #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson drabble #eddie munson oneshot #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson x female!reader

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malulurivers · 1 year

Text

birdsong trickled through the window much like the morning sun. you groaned, burying your face into your blankets. still hazy with sleep, you felt the hand flung over your waist shift as warmth enveloped your back.

breath tickled your neck as Link wished you a good morning, pressing a trinity of kisses into the bare skin of your shoulder. you hummed, lethargically tracing his arm in soothing circles.

his legs were entwined with yours, blankets lost to your side of the bed. and so he melded with you, hiding from the sun and the real world that came with it.

☾ ₊ ˚ ✩ ˚ ｡ ☽

masterlist | buy me a hot chocolate <3

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maplleaf · 2 years

Text

《 Solace 》

Kaveh x gn!reader drabble

cw: angst but ends in comfort, slight insecurity, stress is sexy /j

Kaveh is emotional. Even in his work he places his heart and soul into his creation. It's no surprise that he's emotional in his personal life. That brought many great moments in your relationship, the suave architect who pours out his feelings for you; causing your heart to beat faster each time he talks.

Kaveh is not the type to bottle up his feelings until it bursts out, but he does keep it to himself if he finds a reason to do so.

When Kaveh does let his vulnerable side out, he finds solace in whoever's shoulder he's leaning on. Even with how stressed or frustrated he feels, the tears would slowly stop pouring as he stayed close with his significant other.

Which brought him to this moment.

Kaveh was recently assigned on designing a project for a well-renounced scholar. Problem is that he just couldn't keep up with his endless requests and redesigns.

The scholar wanted this to be implemented, only for him to change his mind right after Kaveh finished the design. As an architect who pours his heart into every project, every time the scholar made changes or dismissed his designs in the first place; it pissed him off.

...But it's not like he could do anything about it, this client is important after all; the payment too high for him to pass on. It could even cover a large sum of debt he finds himself drowning in.

To make it worse, this particular day just isn't it.

There's only two more days until the final sketch has to be finished, but Kaveh had to sleep late due to this project, and when getting more materials outside the house his roommate accidentally brought two keys instead of one.

Luckily, you were there to save him, his lover.

You weren't using your office room for the day and offered Kaveh to work there, since he is locked out of his house after all. When you offered him the room, you swear you saw him fall in love all over again.

Kaveh sighed as he snapped back to reality, as annoying as Alhaitham is, he has to agree with one of his points; work is work. So he sucked it up.

He can't be distracted right now. Leaning heavily against the desk with his back in an uncomfortable position from sitting like that for so long, Kaveh continued on sketching on the rough paper.

After what feels like eternity, the sketch was done. Kaveh couldn't help but lets out an air in relief; a huge smile all over his face.

He's done! The final sketch is done two days before the deadline! That indecisive scholar might want to change something, but he can tweak it a little. What matters is that his back would have the well deserved break tonight!

Right when he stood up to finally rest in your arms peacefully, his arm accidentally made contact with the worst object he could ever think of; a mug filled with water.

As gravity worked perfectly, the mug fell and poured water all over the paper.

Panic ran through Kaveh's mind as he hopelessly tried to take the paper away from the cursed mug. At last, when he sees the finished sketch, it's wet, the graphite from his pencil barely visible, and the paper barely holding on before breaking into two.

The entire week's stress seems to hit him all at once. Kaveh can't help but let his frustrations out. Placing the paper on the dry area of the table, Kaveh leaned back against his chair and buried his face in his hands. He worked so so hard on this but it was ruined because he didn't look at the area around him.

He couldn't even hear the mug breaking as it rolled off the table. Hearing what sounds like glass shattering from the other room, you went to check your office space out. Kaveh told you he'll be staying here until the project is done so you didn't want to disturb him, but glass shattering doesn't sound good at all.

After a few simple knocks, you opened the door slightly. "Darling, are you okay?" you asked, peaking your head through the door. When seeing Kaveh with his hands on his face, you knew what exactly is going on.

Walking over to the blonde, carefully avoiding the mug's remaining on the floor, you placed your hand behind his head and leaned him over to your frame. It didn't take long before Kaveh wrapped his arm around your waist, face against your stomach as tears fell out.

Combing your fingers through his hair, you observed the area around you two; spotting the paper he excitedly showed you earlier that day drenched in water.

"Even if I care about it, I-I just messed it up..." his hold of your growing tighter. It's so frustrating, to work hard on something only for a simple mistake to erase all that progress and push you back to square one. "What kind of architect would drown in my kind of debt?"

"Kaveh..." you couldn't help but murmur, rubbing his back in hope it would soothe him. "It'll be fine, I'm sure the client would understand this type of accidents," Kaveh's tears is getting slower the more you make contact with him.

"You worked so hard on each of your project, and all the results were beautiful," you leaned back to look at Kaveh's face, wiping away the tears with your fingers. "You're the kind of architect who draws your creations with your soul, that's what kind of architect you are."

Kaveh's tears stopped forming, but the blonde still took short breaths and sobbed before properly calming down. Kaveh's red eyes look up to yours, his glassy and uncertain whilst yours brought him a sense of comfort; home.

Leaning down, you pressed a kiss to Kaveh's forehead. "One of the reasons I love for you is because you weren't ashamed to have emotions, even in your line of work. A single mistake won't define yourself as an architect."

Kaveh couldn't utter a single word; a culmination of all the pressure he felt earlier turning him quiet. He's frustrated, but your words slowly calmed him down. The messy blonde locks being combed through by your fingers soothing him.

It was in this moment that Kaveh realize how much he loves you, how much he's glad you still take him in your arms even after being in debt from his project; it was all too much for him to place into words.

So Kaveh stayed quiet, letting your voice guide him through the next few days as he re-do the sketch.

#man im on a roll #kaveh #kaveh x male reader #kaveh genshin #kaveh x reader #kaveh x gn reader #genshin x reader #genshin impact #genshin x male reader #this was supposed to be a drabble for every Sumeru chars when they cry but I only felt good with kaveh'#he is bbygirl fr fr #kinda ooc tho #usually i wld learn from voice lines but those doesn't exist yet #kaveh genshin x reader #☆works

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courtingchaos · 2 years

Text

Rent the Space Inside My Mind

1 I 2 I 3 I 4 I 5 I PT 6

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Female!Reader

Summary: During a hazy afternoon y'all get a little lost in your heads. Eddie tells you a really funny joke.

A/N: Jesus christ this got away from me. I've had this open for two weeks (???) just chipping away and rewriting and deleting everything. I need it off my phone. I'm so sick of looking at it! I really hope you guys enjoy it! This one gets a little spicy? Nothing crazy, just some daydreaming and just All of The Pining Imaginable. I'm not sick of these two being oblivious yet, so strap in friends. (AlsoAlso, just tossing this out there this is 18+, and will just get worse as it goes on so like don't interact if your a lil baby please) Y'all wanna see the gif again?

Friday afternoons were very specifically You and Eddie hangout hours. Typically quiet, never boring, it now usually started with a blunt since someone (you) had broken someone else’s ( Eddie’s) bong. It had truly been an honest mistake and while Eddie held no grudges, he did miss watching you pull on the thick smoke, so many thoughts rushing at him in those few precious seconds. You’d cough, eyes watering and he’d wonder if you’d make the same sounds with him buried in your mouth.

Slow your roll, cowboy.

It’d been maybe an hour since you kicked his bedroom door in, a McDonald’s bag held in either hand.

“Oh my queen, is that what I think it is?”

“Literally six large fries dude.”

You toss one bag at him where he’s laying on his bed, and beeline for his dresser to drop your stuff. You glance up at his first love while you shuck your jacket off and he’s obviously watching you because he playfully says “Go on, give her a kiss. You know you want to.”

Looking over, you’re 100 percent right. Fries sticking out his mouth, he’s got that shit eating grin plastered on his face, his dimples deep and soft and you just want to grab him there with your thumb and middle finger pressed in and push him back into his pillow.

“I’m not kissing your guitar.” You say flatly.

You on the other hand…

He pouts at you while you start digging around the top drawer, looking for the party supplies.

“You know, I wouldn’t go all haphazard in my drawers like that if I were you.”

“What, afraid I’m gonna find something dirty again?” You throw that over your shoulder while you search for the pre roll you know should be in there.

“Ha ha ha”, Eddie mock laughs, getting up from the bed to open a different drawer in the dresser. “I moved it, made more sense over here.” He pulls out a small wooden box and closes the drawer quick. You quirk an eyebrow at him and dart your eyes between him and the drawer his hand is still on. He just smiles easy and shakes the wooden box at you.

“Oh look at you, a whole box now? What, loose weed in your socks not your thing anymore?” You tease him and pluck it out of his hands to dig through it.

“Aha!”, the blunt you had so lovingly rolled on Wednesday in his van, parked outside of your own trailer before you went in for the night. Made like a pinkie promise for Friday afternoon, he’d taken it with a bow of his head; a knight receiving the fair lady’s favor.

“I’ll guard it with my life.” He meant it too.

Eddie had watched you, completely enraptured, run the tip of your pink tongue along a seam of the blunt, the smallest glint of metal peaking out of your mouth. He had tried being as sly as he could be, but he was sure he’d been actively panting by the time you handed it to him. This little fucking thing clutched in his hand had seen more action from you than he ever would. For that, it stayed in his possession.

“You better, that’s the last of that bag.” You’d held the empty ziplock up when you got out of the van, shrugging at him. Eddie promised to pick up only the best from Rick before Friday, so you dug forty bucks out of your wallet for him.

He’d long ago stopped arguing with you about paying since you were the one with an actual job. The bookstore downtown took up three of your afternoons normally, which is why Friday Fundays were created. If Hellfire wasn’t meeting and he didn’t have band practice, he’d sometimes bum around bothering��you and your few coworkers.

They had all taken a liking to Eddie, firstly because he was pretty well read, and could quote Tolkien at them fast as lighting. Most of the older women you worked with were just as easily charmed by his big dimpled smile and his abundance of ‘ma’am’s’.

Secondly, he was typically quiet but always respectful so because of this, every single one of them had asked you on multiple occasions if you two had started dating yet. Always prefaced with a big sigh, you’d tell them ‘Why no, of course not, he is actually just my friend.’ It would always end with them tittering and smiling, talking about how boys were never friends with girls like that when they were younger.

“Georgia, it’s 1983, times do change.” You’d reminded your coworker one evening while you both watched Eddie rifling through books on a bottom shelf. Georgia had leveled a look at you and said, “I think after 62 years, I’d see when a boy likes a girl.” You’d wanted to remind Georgia of her coke bottle glasses but kept that one to yourself.

Eddie didn’t like you, not like that. You were positive. The two of you had come together as friends, nothing more. It wasn’t his fault you’d turned 16 and suddenly became aware of his dimples when he smiled at you, or how big his hands were when he’d grab at you when the two of you roughhoused. You’d kept this attraction on complete lockdown for two years and you weren’t about to let Georgia from the bookstore pry it out of you.

Firstly, and Most Importantly, he was your pit buddy. Very early on in the friendship, still both 15 and fresh faced and trying desperately to get into local shows, you’d realized you were both pretty hardy individuals. After saving Eddie from a beating by a Senior boy and then the next week starting a fight over one of the first uses of ‘Freak’ towards him, it’d given both of you an idea of what you could handle.

And it was glorious.

You’d only ever had girlfriends before meeting Eddie and while you did genuinely like doing the girly things, no one ever wanted to do the tomboy things with you. Now though you suddenly had someone who wasn’t afraid of getting into it with you, especially in the middle of a crowd of moving bodies. The first show had been some local band playing just outside of Hawkins, they were metal-ish and loud and fast and it was everything Eddie had promised it’d be. The two of you had spent the hour after the show waiting for your mom and wrestling in the grass next to the venue, taking turns throwing each other on the ground. That night had been the most fun you’d had in a long time and by the time you both climbed into the back of your mom’s station wagon you were breathless and covered in grass and laughing.

Your mom dropped Eddie off with Wayne, apologizing for the dirt child she was leaving on his doorstep.

“I have no idea what happened in an hour.” She’d kind of laughed, and Wayne waved her off telling her Eddie had come home looking worse.

“Tell Ms. Helen thank you.” Wayne said, herding him inside while Eddie yelled out goodbyes and thank you’s. On the short ride to your trailer on the backend of the park, your mom had tried to grill you for information about Eddie. You were honest with her, that the grass and dirt was from play fighting and the few cuts on your knees were from going nuts during the concert. Obviously she was concerned, but she admitted to you before turning the car off,

“I’m just happy you’re making friends hun, that’s all I want.”

Holed up in Eddie’s room, the window cracked just barely to help circulate air and keep as much warm in, you take your normal position on the floor, leaned up against the bed. His head is hanging off the edge while he tries to blow smoke rings.

He waves the blunt in front your face and you wave him off while you dig through your book bag to find your D&D notes. Diamond Head is on low in the background and you hum along while you look for the scribbles you’d jotted down during lunch earlier.

“What tragic character have you created now?” His voice is deep from the smoke and the angle he has his head tilted at. You don’t even chance a glance sideways, just clench your jaw and flex your toes in your shoes.

“No one new, I was thinking of some like, extra story for my cleric.”

“Oh Christ, not the corn god again.”

“Yes the corn god, all praise Helio.” You say it with no emotion but hold your hands up in praise above you. Eddie rolls his eyes and copies you, muttering ‘Praise Helio’ under his breath.

The two of you fall into quiet conversation, passing the blunt back and forth until it’s hard to pinch, stubbed out in the ashtray next to your leg.

Honestly you thought Eddie had fallen asleep with how quiet he was so you’d shifted away from the bed to lay next to it on the floor. Engrossed in notes from one of Eddie’s DM binders (and a good steady high), you don’t notice him slowly moving to keep you in his line of sight. He had been close to sleep but you shifting had stirred up your perfume from your hair and pulled him from his daze. Something sweet and deep that hung around his room long after you’d left.

He had only recently really admitted to himself just how head over heels he was for you so this attention he was leveling at you was still surprising to him. In fact, he’d picked up a new little habit: small things of yours that just happened to find their way into his pocket. Stuff you’d never really miss but little things that made him think of you. Hair clips that he actually used sometimes. A few chapsticks and one of your eyeliner pencils, a guitar pick you’d use when messing with his acoustic and a minifig that he knew you were looking for but it wasn’t important to this campaign so it didn’t matter right now. If a t-shirt of yours found its way in there it was none of his business.

Under the assorted stolen tchotchkes was a single Polaroid he kept tucked deep in the drawer under the little cigar box he’d handed over to you earlier.

That lived face down in the drawer lest you almost accidentally ever see it again. He’s not a pervert (Don’t lie to yourself Munson) but this was an accidental photo taken at an opportune time. Halloween the year before and you had shown up to his trailer in an Elvira getup that had Eddie clutching the counter to stay upright. Complete with black wig and tits out to the universe he was sure he’d never seen so much of you on display. Standing in the doorway you’d had to call his name a few times before he invited you in, Eddie stuck in a staring contest with your chest. You’d done a little half turn for him once inside where he all but vomited compliments at you over your painfully accurate costume. If he followed you around like a dog all night, it was only to make sure he was somehow marking you as untouchable to everyone else.

This was just one of the rich kids parties so Eddie was there to sell and you had tagged along for an excuse to dress up. Normally Eddie would plant himself in his van for an hour or two and then head home but you seemed to be enjoying the party, even though you barely left his side. He never actually partied with this crowd of rich assholes but the combination of you, beer, and everyone being moderately decent to him all night lent to him letting his guard down. By the time midnight had rolled around the two of you were a drunk giggling mess, looking everywhere for the wig you had eventually torn off in the heat of the house.

The morning had snuck up on you though, both of you jolted awake by an errant ray of light seeping through the blinds in the strange living room. You found your shoes by the front door and you two snuck out to Eddie’s van and headed home.

It wasn’t until he was sat outside his own trailer, smoking before heading in, that he found the Polaroid in the breast pocket of his jacket. Eddie had found a camera at some point, he can vaguely remember that. And he had taken this crooked photo of you, legs stretched out and propped up in front of you with the slit of your dress hiked up around your hip. Your head thrown back against the couch while a cigarette hung out of the corner of your mouth. The long line of your neck mapping a trail down to the deep cut neckline and just cleavage for days. Eddie stares and stares for so long before he notices in the bottom corner of the photo, your hand resting on his thigh, painted black nails digging into the dark denim.

It takes his forgotten cigarette burning down to the filter and burning his finger to snap him out of his lust daze.

That photo had lived beside his bed for a good while, serving as a bookmark in many things. (Which is how you’d almost found it one afternoon in his copy of Salem’s Lot.)

He’d stare at it before bed, imagining whatever scenario he could that involved you crawling over that couch and devouring him. Your lips painted dark red, leaving marks all over his neck and you hair, curled and soft from being pinned up all night dragging over his shoulder. He’d never been with a girl that had really taken her time with him but he imagined you would. He knew how soft your hands were, could imagine what they’d feel like dragging down his ribs over his stomach, tugging at his belt. You’d push his shirt up while pulling his jeans down and look up at him with that glint in your eye, the one you’d get before you really threw yourself fully into something.

Sometimes this would be the softest imagined scenario all quiet moans and gentle kisses, you handling him so carefully. Featherlight touches down his thighs, your hands soft around him while you whispered little praises up at him from between his knees. Those were nights where he was feeling especially lovesick (like when you were out on a fabled date). Getting deep into his feelings in the dark, sometimes not even actually jerking off, just thinking of you while he lay in his bed trying to sleep.

The other times though, those times he’d grab you up in front of everyone at that party and find a dark corner of that rich kids kitchen. He’d walk you backwards, up against a wall and cage you in with his body, one hand cradling the back of your head, the other ghosting down your side to grab at your hip. Without shoes on your only a few inches shorter than him, but you’d still have to look up at him from under your lashes. Your hands would wrap up the sides of his face and wind in his hair and you’d pull him down to you, lips soft and warm. He’d hook a finger in the neckline of your dress to try and get your tits out and he just knew they’d fit so perfect in his hands. You’d mewl at him and make all the little noises he could imagine you might make when he runs his fingers over the lace of your bra. He’d smirk at you while you pulled at his neck, trying to get him closer, pulling your body flush up against his. Slot your leg between his and grind up on him to feel the hard length of him against your thigh.

It didn’t take much for him to picture you bent over a bathroom vanity, hands braced on the sink in front of you and crying for him. His hand fisted in the velvet of your dress and pushing it up to your waist so he could watch himself bury his cock in you while you whined and moaned for him to not stop, never stop, keep going your gonna make me cum-

The shuffling of paper brings him back down into his room. Remembers that you are also in his room and he has to keep his fucking imagination in check because you can clearly see the raging hard on he has from your place on the floor. Only if you looked over that is, just a turn of your head and you could see him straining against his jeans-

He mentally slaps himself back in place and takes a deep breath to try to focus on something literally anything that isn’t you and your tits and your thighs and your breathing…

From your position on the floor you can see Eddie lying face up on his bed, eyes closed, fingers tapping on his chest along with the drum beat. The notes you’ve been looking at are held at such an angle that you’re actually just peering at him like a little creep over the top. Watching his fingers tap, watching his chest rise and fall, watching his face scrunch up when he hears the bass really kick in. It’s lulling you into a stasis of sorts; you’ve been good and toasty for a bit now, the two of you no longer essentially hotboxing his room. The floor was supposed to be grounding you so you’d stop imagining things like climbing up on the bed with him. Would he even open his eyes or would he just smile?

Assume you were trying to get comfortable.

You could surprise him. Tangle your hand up in his hair and pull his head back to hold him in place while you attacked his neck, leaving little red marks up and down the column of his throat. Maybe he’d laugh, all breath and a little gasping, the vibrations making you smile against him. You could move your way up to his mouth and he’d taste just like you’d imagined a hundred times before. Tobacco and weed and a little salty from the fries he’d been eating earlier.

This is not the first, nor will it be the last time, that you sit and wonder what secrets that mouth beholds.

You are slowly spinning out on the floor of his room, your mind going…well, more like an inch a minute rather than a mile. Eddie’s notes long forgotten next to you in the carpet, you’re just about to drift off into your daydream about his fingers tap tap tapping down your sternum when he clears his throat and turns his head to look at you, says something you don’t catch.

“What?”

“I said ‘can I ask you something?’” He repeats himself and rolls over to lean on an elbow. His eyes are fixed on you, a notch between his brows making him look worried.

“What’s up?”

“Can I rain check next Friday?” He asks you almost hesitantly. It takes a few seconds for you to catch up before you frown a little yourself.

“And postpone the Friday night french fry extravaganza? What, you got a hot date or something?” You think you’re being slick but a blush starts to creep up his neck.

“No way! Did Gwen change her mind?!” You sit up from the floor to crawl over to the edge of the bed where you prop your chin to grin up at him. Your daydream is left with the notes while you rush into his space, face close to his own. Weed is still hugging your faculties pretty warmly so you don’t get a chance to stop your eyes drifting down his face to his lips.

He absolutely does not miss that look, but he’s also dipped pretty deep in this high so he lets it go because this is new. He’s never seen you look at him like that before; bites his bottom lip because he’s not entirely sure what’s happening in this moment.

No harm in letting you stare.

No harm in him watching you worry at your own lip.

Please let me bite that for you.

Your eyes finally snap back up to his with a questioning look in them.

Yes yes yes do it first please I’m too much of a coward.

Time is molasses the way the guitar in the background is molasses and you’re just staring at each other when you huff lightly.

“So…Gwen?”

Yeah, Gwen. Who’s Gwen?

“Uh yeah kind of? Nothing like crazy or whatever.” He breaks eye contact with you to stare at his blanket and pick at it. He’s not even sure why he’s still set on hanging out with her honestly, not with this huge fuckin’ crush he’s got burning for you. That first time he’d asked Gwen it had been with some actual feeling behind it. It’d only taken her a week to come back after turning him down though, a quiet question on her lips. Cornering him in the parking lot after school she’d made it a point to get him alone by his van where they were out of eyesight of everyone else. That should have been his first clue that this wouldn’t be a real date, but he’d been too caught off guard by the god damn cheer outfit.

“Does that offer still stand?” She’s sweet and a little naive maybe and he’s kind of weak for that so of course it does. Anything to get you off of his mind.

“For what?”

“Going out for a bite.”

“I mean sure, if you’re free.”

“Of course silly. Next Friday though.” She giggles and tucks a note with her number into his vest pocket.

He tells you all this, not looking up from his blanket the whole time. He admits that he knows she probably isn’t really interested in going out with him but she seems fun and nice and like who cares right?

“Yeah, she gets to test out what kind of freak I am and I probably get laid so…” he trails off. You’re still all up in his space so you can see his eyes darting around his blanket, looking for a distraction. This isn’t the first of these kinds of conversations between the two of you and you’ve seen that hurt in his eyes before. It’s not like Eddie is laying waste to all the girls of Hawkins High. He’s got maybe a solid handful of conquest under his belt, but they’ve all mostly treated him like a big secret. Something they got to do on a weekend or three and then moved on to something better. Something brighter. Something more well rounded and presentable.

“It’s not like she’s gonna take me home to meet mom.” His laugh is small and hollow when he rolls back over to stare at his ceiling. You pull yourself away from the edge of the bed, the cozy little spell broken.

“Listen man, you don’t have to go out with her. Just cancel it. What’s the worst that’ll happen? She doesn’t talk to you anymore?” You’re trying to break the sad tension with a joke and a gentle punch to his shoulder. He doesn’t budge, just sighs real big and continues to stare up at nothing.

You’re not super worried about this. Either he doesn’t hang out with her and you two get to have your normal Friday, or he does and you wait it out like you have with the others.

See, Gwen is an easy obstacle. She’s one of the nice cheerleaders, and she’s a year below you guys but she has no idea what she’s dipping her toe into. Eddie is a special brand of person and with his ability to talk an ear off, he’s sure to scare her off quickly. They’ll go out on their date and probably fool around a few times and then she’s going to comment on Hellfire. Or his band. Or his music. And then Eddie is going to get bored. He’ll remember what it’s like to talk about his interest unhindered with his little group of misfits and he’ll come back, acting like nothing ever happened.

So you have nothing to worry about.

Gwen will be easy.

💕Tags List💕

@edsforehead, @fracturedarkness, @munsonsguitarpick

Thank you again you guys!

#Stranger Things #Stranger Things fic #My work #fic #Eddie Munson #Eddie Munson x reader #x reader #Eddie Munson smut #but only like a little #It'll get there I promise #This one really got away from me #4k words????#these were supposed to be drabbles and shorts wtf #lmao do you guys like my Dimension 20 reference?#blink and you'll miss it #Rentfic

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queenofapeacefuldawn · 1 year

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Rudy's favourite nickname for Mini is jaan. It means life, but it's also a reassurance for the daughter of death. A child who's so well-acquainted with her father in one of the worst ways. She's surrounded by death every day— she sees it in her patients, she herself had to protect them from death several times. He could see it wearing down on her, that shadow of death dimming her bright spark of light, so he decided to whisper that nickname. In an unguarded moment, when she laughed freely, hiding a perpetual sadness. She was confused, and she asked her question with a laugh: "Why that nickname? I hope you're aware you sound like every main character of every Bollywood movie,"

He just smiles and buries his face in the crook of her neck, saying, "Well, it's true, you are jaan."

She just snickered, calling him sappy and cringey, but he couldn't help but notice how she brightened every time he called her that. Like a spark turning into a new flame.

#[grips you by the shirt] do you see my vision #ALSO WE DO NOT TALK ABOUT MY SPELLING OF CRINGEY #this one got away from me ngl #i'm supposed to be doing 2 comprehensions rn #but i Do Not have the emotional stability to #so here #you get a weird drabble on why rudy calls mini jaan (he's only called mini jaan in my mind)#my brain went: “haha. what if funny snek boi called his wife 'jaan' bc it cute nickname”#and then my brain went: “wait give it backstory”#mindy

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iaxsl · 9 months

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restarted the zolu fic after i started changing too many things. now it's zoro's pov and im back at 500 words with a better outline of what i want to write. i'll probably repurpose the old one into a luffy pov version since there were some things i really liked in it that i want to include, though it may end up being shorter than the zoro pov one.

#again this was only supposed to be a drabble that somehow turned into me writing a whole fic #im a terribly slow writer and somehow can only bring myself to write at night when i am the sleepiest #the original fic was supposed to be a luffy pov fic. like super cute stuff but then i started writing too much zoro #im in my 20s. i should be at the club not writing fanfics #just kidding. this is exactly what i should be doing right now #one piece #zolu #ari's writing adventures

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waltwhitmansbeard · 1 year

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Critter Genfic Bingo: Mystery

VETH.

The woman in question jumps, the disembodied yet familiar voice in her head startling her so badly she drops the wine glass she's holding.

THIS IS AN EMERGENCY. I THINK FJORD IS BEING MIND-CONTROLLED. WE NEED TO INVESTIGATE IMMEDIATELY. HOW FAST CAN YOU GET HERE?

There's silence, but Veth waits.

Tell Yeza hi!

There it is.

Veth has just finished her return message—I'll be there in fifteen. Assemble all your evidence; we're gonna crack the case!—when Yeza pops his head into the kitchen. "Are you okay? It sounds like something broke in here."

She looks down at the shattered wine glass. "Jester," she offers as an explanation, before quickly conjuring an unseen servant to clean up the mess. Once that's taken care of, she darts around the Brenatto house, packing her bag with whatever accoutrements might be needed for freeing Fjord of the alleged mind control he's under.

Yeza, patient, understanding Yeza, merely leans against the door frame and says, "Well, I guess I'll get Luc from school."

"You don't mind?"

"I mean, this seems like an emergency."

Veth pauses. "Well, this is Jester we're talking about, so there's a...sixty-two percent chance it's not."

"Better not take the risk." Yeza snags her by the waist as she tries to dart past and kisses her. "Go solve the mystery, detective."

Veth grins. "She says hi, by the way."

"Tell her I want you back in one piece."

"The only one who gets to split me in two is you." She slaps his ass, and then she's off and out the door toward Jester and Fjord's.

Jester has chewed all of her fingernails to the quick by the time Veth arrives. "Finally!" She doesn't wait for pleasantries, just drags her friend by the arm to the back of the tiny house that she and Fjord have claimed as their home when they're not on the high seas. There's a window overlooking the postage stamp of a back garden, where Fjord is trimming a hedge—or rather, he's opening and closing a pair of hedge clippers in the same spot, over and and over and over, even though there are no longer any branches to cut.

"See?" She gestures emphatically toward the window. "He's being weird!"

Veth frowns. "He's always weird, Jester. Remember that time he ate a fucking ball?"

"This is different. He's been…distracted all week. Erratic. Two days ago, he put all the clean towels in the icebox. And he keeps muttering under his breath." She takes a deep breath. "What if it's Uk'otoa?"

"Uk'otoa," Veth whispers obligatorily, before shrugging. "I doubt it, because we killed him. Listen, you've had a good run. But so much time on the sea is enough to drive anyone crazy, and he's long gone." Veth pats her arm in sympathy.

Jester frowns. Veth isn't taking her seriously. "I am telling you, I know him, something is—"

She's cut off by a strangled shout from outside, and they both whip their heads to stare outside. Jester's stomach sinks as she watches two figures in head-to-toe black and masked, one tall and broad and one shorter and slimmer, wrap their arms around Fjord from both sides. The smaller one claps a hand over his mouth as the larger one pins his arms together, and the two start to drag him away, not deterred by his thrashing.

"FJORD!" Jester spins around and bolts for the front door. She feels so foolish; Fjord told her that this place was a fire hazard, with only the one exit, and now it might mean she doesn't get the chance to tell him he was right.

"Holy shit!" Veth is on her heels, but Jester is taller, faster; she whips open the door and runs along the side of the house. She stumbles into the back garden, but it's empty, the clippers half-sticking out of the hedge.

"Oh no, FJORD!" Jester's heart is pounding in her ears. She whips her head around, but there's no sign of him or his attackers anywhere.

Behind her, Veth pants, "Where are they? We can take 'em!"

Jester can barely think. Someone took Fjord. And because he's been so cagey these past few days, she doesn't know who or why. She drops to her knees, the panic setting in.

"Hey, Jes, we'll find him." Veth squeezes her shoulder. "No mystery that you and I can't…hang on."

Jester watches her scurry over to where Fjord had been standing and crouch down to rifle in the dirt. "Look at this!"

A sharp spike of hope pierces Jester's chest. She scrambles over. "What is it?"

Veth's holding up a small, shiny piece of sea glass, foam green and about the size of Veth's fingernail. It glints in the sunlight. Jester frowns. "It's sea glass, Veth. We're by the ocean. The garden must be full of it."

"No look!” Veth turns it, and Jester can see now that the piece of glass is perfectly smooth, each of its edges even and carefully beveled. “This sea glass was cut by a jeweler.”

Jester frowns. She’s right, but she hardly sees how that’s relevant. “How does that help us find who kidnapped my boyfriend?”

“One of the campers at Wilde Out! has a parent who does this kind of work with sea glass. They’re right here in Nicodranas!”

Jester’s starting to pick up what Veth’s putting down. “Maybe one of the attackers dropped it! Maybe the jeweler knows who it belongs to!”

Veth grins from ear to ear. “Brenatto and Lavorre are on the case!”

“Yeah!” Jester is now also grinning, until she remembers that Fjord was violently kidnapped not two minutes ago. She schools her expression into something more somber. “Let’s go get my fucking boyfriend.”

The jeweler is a little hole-in-the-wall place on the first floor of an apartment block. Jester presses her face up against the glass of the door, right over the Heflin Fine Jewelry written in gilded script. The store is dark inside, which makes asking the proprietor for help difficult.

“Maybe they live upstairs?” Jester offers hopefully, stepping back from the door.

Veth takes the opportunity to whip her lockpicking kit out of her bag. “I’ve got this.” After about a minute of grunting and low cursing, the door to the jeweler’s swings wide open. Jester looks up and down the street, but there are no Zhelezo around, and no one seems to notice the tiefling and the halfing breaking into a shop in broad daylight.

They slip inside and close the door. “Okay, what are we supposed to do now?” Jester whispers. “There’s no one here!”

“Then why are you whispering?”

Oh. Right. In her normal voice, Jester says, “Maybe there are papers in the office? Some kind of purchase records?”

“Right.” Veth leads the way toward the door that they presume to be the office, and after picking that lock, they’re inside. There are rows and rows of filing cabinets, and Jester groans. “This is going to take forever.”

They each take a filing cabinet and start digging. Jester learns quickly that the easy solution she’d been hoping for, a picture of the piece of sea glass right next to the name of its purchaser, was a pipe dream. Apparently this jeweler does a lot of work with sea glass, and there’s no telling which of the hundreds of rings, bracelets, necklaces, or watches the piece they found could have come from. After about half an hour, Jester throws herself into the office chair with a frustrated groan. “This is useless! We need to try something else.”

Veth slams shut the drawer she’d been rifling through, and the movement causes a gust of wind to shuffle the papers on the desk. One such scrap drifts off the desk and onto Jester’s lap. She picks it up and reads out loud, “Fifty gold to glass pirates at wharf. Stone’s Throw won’t deliver under threats.” She gasps and leaps up out of the chair. “Stone’s Throw! That’s Fjord’s company!”

“Let me see!” Veth snatches the paper from Jester and reads it again. “So…Fjord worked with the jeweler?”

“Or the company did! Glass pirates…” Jester begins to pace. “Maybe this sea glass is valuable. Maybe Stone’s Throw has been shipping it for the jeweler, and maybe these pirates want a cut of the action. Maybe that’s why they took Fjord!”

Veth snaps her fingers. “We’re cracking the case!”

“We’re cracking the case!”

“To the wharf!”

The Restless Wharf is restless indeed. There are dozens, hundreds of people, sailors and dock workers and entertainers and Zhelezo and customs agents, all intermingling in a dance that, frankly, smells really, really bad. Jester has a hard time imagining pirates getting away with much with this many eyes and ears around, but then, she knows well enough by now how sneaky pirates can be.

Veth seems to be on her same wavelength. “We could be looking for anyone. Everyone looks suspicious here.”

“You think that because they work on boats.”

“Never trust a sailor!”

Jester frowns. “Well, my sailor was taken, and someone here knows something about it.”

They start to skirt around the edges of the chaos, catching what scraps of conversation they can. It’s so loud, and the talk Jester hears is mostly of shipping dates and locations. It’s all becoming overwhelming, until Veth tugs hard on her sleeve. “Jessie! Look!”

Jester follows her pointing finger until she sees a pair of dock workers half-hidden beneath an awning. They’re shrouded in shadow, but Jester can just tell that they’re up to no good. Still, she has no idea if they know anything.

“They’re ne’er-do-wells,” Veth whispers dramatically. “I can feel it.”

She’s getting desperate, so Jester casts a furtive glance around to make sure she’s not being watched before going invisible. She scurries over to the dock workers, and she just manages to make out their low conversation—“damned green menace wouldn’t stop fighting, heard his tusks pack a nasty punch”—before the invisibility ends and she’s grabbing one of the dock workers, one with shaggy, dirty red hair, by the shirtfront and slamming him against the wall. “TELL ME WHAT YOU KNOW!”

“Holy shit, Jester!” Veth scurries over, snapping, “Mind your business!” to the gawkers around.

The other dock worker, with dark skin and pale eyes, barks, “Hey, crazy lady, what do you think you’re—”

“Shut it!” She slams the guy she’s holding against the wall again. “The green menace! Where is he?”

The redheaded dock worker’s eyes are wide. “Fucking hell, where did you come from?”

Jester hovers her face an inch away from his. He smells like fish and sweat and, weirdly, ink? “From your worst nightmare. Tell me where he is, now.”

The other one reaches for something behind his back, but Veth yanks a dagger from her bag and aims it straight for his balls. “Stay still or shore leave is gonna be a lot less fun going forward.”

“Fuck, they don’t pay me enough for this.” The redhead looks around briefly before muttering, “They took him to a cave along the eastern shore. Something about gold and glass, I don’t know, I was just keepin’ an eye out for the Zhelezo. Contract work, am I right?”

Jester releases him and steps back. “A cave along the eastern shore?”

He shrugs. “They use it to house people they want to smuggle out of Nicodranas. It’s still light out, so he should still be there.”

“See, was that hard?” She points a finger at one, then the other. “Don’t follow us!” Then she spins around and marches off to the east.

“Jester, wait!” Jester knows that’s she’s going too fast for Veth to keep up for long, but she’s so close to getting Fjord back she can taste it like salt in the air. “We should get back-up!”

“Back-up?” Jester frowns down at her. “Why? We know where he is, and they won’t be smuggling him until later.”

“Yeah, according to those two dumbasses. What if they’re wrong? What if it’s a trap?”

“A trap for me?” Jester thinks about it for a moment. “But this has nothing to do with me. Fjord didn’t even tell me there were pirates after him.”

“A trap for someone. Jester, it’s a cave. By the ocean. Anything can happen in there!”

They’re almost at the end of the docks now, the rocky beaches stretching out ahead. Jester comes to a stop, puts her hands on her hips. “If you want to go get help, go get help. I’m going to get Fjord.” And then she starts running.

As she goes, she doesn’t hear any footsteps behind her over the crashing of waves, so she assumes that Veth did in fact go get help. That’s fine. She’ll save Fjord on her own. She runs along the beach, slipping and tripping through the sand and rocks, until she catches it around the curve of the shoreline: the slim opening of a cave, maybe only a head or two taller than she is. She slows, trying to catch her breath, and peeks inside. It’s dark and narrow and very scary. She grips the symbol around her neck and whispers, “Traveler, guide me,” before stepping inside.

The cave is damp and cold. Soon, she’s out of the range of the sunlight from the cave entrance, so she digs around in her pocket until she finds a paintbrush she doesn’t remember putting in there. She casts daylight on it, illuminating the cave with warm, bright light. She blinks rapidly, her eyes slow to adjust to the light, but a muffled sound reaches her ears from deeper in the cave.

Fjord.

"I'm coming!" She stumbles her way forward, and finally, when she can see without squinting, a shape emerges on the cave floor: Fjord, hands and feet bound, a gag in his mouth, a bruise blooming spectacularly over one eye. "FJORD!"

Jester crashes to her knees beside him, paintbrush scattering aside, heart pounding as she yanks the gag from his mouth. "Thanks, Jessie," he pants. "I knew I could could on you."

And yes, her hands may be shaking as she works at the knot tying his hands and feet together, but she still preens, just a little. "I saw them take you! It was really scary, but it's okay! We'll get out of here." The rope falls to the rocky floor. "Come on!" She grabs Fjord's hand and tugs him up to his feet.

"Jessie, wait." Fjord tugs his hand from her grasp.

"Fjord, they could come back at any minute! We have to go!"

"They took something from me." He starts to root around in his pocket.

"What is it?"

"My last name. Can I have yours?"

Jester blinks at him in confusion, and before she can have a single coherent thought, Fjord is on his knees, a small, velvet box in his hand. He opens it, his bruised face blushing furiously, and it isn't until she sees the ring, a silver band worked around gorgeous, glinting shards of sea glass, that it hits her.

Her scream echoes, magnified by a thousand, and Fjord winces. "I'm gonna take that as a sign to continue." He clears his throat. "I've been a bastard and a sailor and a hero and a pirate and a god's soldier, but the most important thing I've ever been is someone who gets to love the most lovable person in the world. And if it's alright with you, I'd like to keep doing that...well, forever. Jester Lavorre, will you marry me?"

In all of her years of chaos and trickery, Jester has never been so taken aback by someone else's scheming. All of this, the kidnapping and searching and panicking and running—this was a proposal? Part of her wants to dash his head against the cave wall for letting her think that he was taken by pirates who wanted to kill him.

But...he's looking up at her, his big eyes shining and so very sweet, and the ring really is so beautiful, and how well he knows her to know that her favorite thing is a good mystery to solve. Oh, she's defenseless against him, the most charismatic captain on the high seas. "Okay," she squeaks out, wiping at her eyes, which are obviously wet from the ocean. "Yeah, that sounds good."

Fjord grins like he's just been set loose in the biggest candy shop on the continent. "Really?"

She nods vigorously, and then launches herself at him, throwing her arms around his neck. "I can't believe it!" she sobs. "I can't believe how mad I am at you, and I can't believe we're getting married!"

Fjord laughs. From the direction of the mouth of the cave, hoots and hollers and applause draw Jester's attention away from Fjord. All of a sudden, four globules of light dance along the path, and all of their friends are there, waving and cheering. "What..."

Fjord stands them both up and steers her toward them. "You don't think I did this alone, did you?"

"I got to punch him in the face!" Beau announces, clearly ecstatic.

Caduceus grips his staff. "And I healed him up a bit when she went way too far."

Yasha and Kingsley are wearing all-black clothes, and the latter dangles a black mask in the air. "Tip your local kidnappers."

Jester looks to Caleb and Essek, who, she now notices, are wearing the exact same clothing as the dock workers she'd interrogating not ten minutes ago. Her jaw drops. "Even you, Essek?"

He shrugs. "Subterfuge is my specialty."

Veth rubs her hands together conspiratorially. "I love it when a plan comes together. Congratulations, Fjord: this one's almost as good as Fluffernutter."

Fjord ducks his head in a bow. Jester squeezes his arm. "I can't believe you did all of this for me."

"An over-the-top woman deserves an over-the-top proposal. Which reminds me..." He takes the ring out of the box, which goes back into his pocket. "May I?"

She holds her hand out, and the ring slips perfectly onto her finger. She extends her arm so it catches the sunlight peaking into the cave. "It's beautiful," she breathes.

"Just like you." And Fjord kisses her, and Jester has never been happier in her entire life.

#critter genfic bingo #critical role #critical role fic #cr fic #mighty nein #mighty nein fic #fjorester #fjorester fic #my fic #a little shaky on the dismount but this was supposed to be a DRABBLE #only four more to go!

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