#its a maybe eventually thing and also something im just curious abt

[xecat]

played ds game from my childhood for a bit b4 goin to sleep. planning to stream a bunch of the games i have but like on an emulator . kinda related is there a way for a chat command to make a trigger warning list appear on the stream overlay

[our-alterous-experience]

so i just recently discovered alterous attraction and it felt right to me. i have so far identified as panromantic demisexual, and i was just curious how you thought that fit in with my current orientation.

i know its totally individualized, i am just curious to hear someone else's thoughts on the matter, since i cant talk to the people in my life abt it right now.

Well!!!! Depends on how you feel. As you said, it’s individualized so I can throw out some interpretations !!

So I came out as pansexual as a child and always thought I was ace. I flirted with calling it panromantic but never committed. Because I’m aromantic, bc i’m aplatonic, I find it fitting to call myself panalterous. Bc while I am still aspec what’s more important than my romance or sex take or whatever is how i feel alterously. That being said, you don’t need a direct “name” to fit in conjunction with all the other labels and identity. While some people are Romantics and others feel they are that way about Platonic ideals; the same applies to being alterous. I think sunfriend is my favorite alterous term I ever heard but that’s more hyper specific terminology than helpful thing.

For me, I’m also trans, i’m also queer, i’m also aspec, im also arospec.

I don’t think it’s productive all the time to go hello im Vexerin from genderfluid butch transmasc transsexual neopronouner pansexual aplatonic aspec aceflux aromantic alterous land.

Because honestly! It’s much easier to say Hello, I’m Vexerin, I’m panalterous, I’m 20, I’m aromantic and aplatonic. (Within, the context of someone asking me what the fuck i am for the first time at least)

Which is not to say I dislike any of the identities I identify with, it has given me so much freedom to accept these many facets and factors of my life. But for strangers and people who don’t really Know everything about you or even your sexualities, I would recommend just verbalizing “the hits”. The pieces that impact you the most/ are most relevant. For me that’s a lot of my A-spec identities. For me it’s important that I tell a new online friend I’m aplatonic. Is it important for you to tell someone you’re alterous? Are you itching to tell someone?

When I first started introducing myself as alterous in new spaces there was eventually questions and sit downs and I explained my experience and point of view. With new people I was explaining myself for the first time. It was remarkable I got to set expectations in my own way in my own relationships. So the default wasn’t automatically the society standard. I mean it was but it was changed, and that changed me. I will have this conversation over and over again. Like the classic saying, you never stop coming out.

So my perspective is, what do you want to introduce yourself with? Do you want to mention you’re alterous? I think it’s okay to, I think it’s also okay not to. Or it could be something you don’t mention when first talking about your sexuality but you make sure to mention it the second time. or maybe you only mention it when it becomes relevant, you feel alterous or you remember an alterous moment and you bring it up.

There are many different ways to try to go about this. Which one is the best for you? Or rather, which would you want to try out first?

[lesbianneopolitan]

You said you could go on abt how horrible Jimmy and Carmel were so Im kinda curious

How bad were they?

They very much introduce Jimmy Vanille in the book by picking Trivia by her ankles to get her out of under the couch, he holds her upside down, and start shaking her up and down before throwing her back onto the couch, when Trivia's 8

She did accidentally break a vase in this first chapter when she was playing around, but they p much leave the child with a wound in her hand, bleeding, and no one seems to care about it for some reason

Carmel can't even look at Trivia in the eye because she's ashamed of her heterochromia, and both parents force her to wear a brown contact lense over her pink eye so she looks 'normal' when they go out with her

Jimmy is p persistent in having Trivia speak when she just, can't

Of course, the whole isolation thing is very cruel on its own- they didn't want to send her to a normal school because of her 'special needs', when in reality is that they were ashamed of their daughter, so Trivia spends many years of her life (up to 18) on her own, locked at home (except for the brief moments in which she sneaks outside), then, they send her to an all-girls Academy (that happens to be an undercover place for the crime group of Spider to form young girls into becoming assassins and spies- Carmel DID know that, because she also studied there)

Trivia did burn her room in accident when trying to destroy the lock that her father put in her door, because, that's also something Jimmy did, he literally locked her up in her room so she wouldn't have the right to go out of there or around the house due to previous escapade moments (but maybe don't lock and isolate your daughter so hard and she wouldn't have had the necessity to do that)

Jimmy hid boxes of stolen Dust under Trivia's room floor because he was trying to steal from his boss (Hei Xiong (father)), with how volatile Dust is, her daughter could've exploded at any incident, and then what?

While Carmel seemed to try and care for Trivia a bit more, Jimmy never listened, and she never stepped up to make things change, anyway, plus, in reality Carmel wanted Trivia to become an assassin so she could rule the criminal underworld of Vale with her, she intended to keep manipulating Jimmy to eventually push away the Xiong family and Lil' Miss Malachite and the Spiders to have the control in the shadows (alongside her daughter), so she p much wanted her to become a criminal too

They don't know their daughter and her likes, at all, it's Hei Xiong (her honorary uncle) who sent her the most interesting gifts for her bdays and such (because her parents didn't care otherwise), specially books, the fairy tales she loved so much reading

When she's back home after meeting Roman (they're hiding from Spider and Xiong because, mafia wars going on), Neo makes the mistake of trusting that her parents wouldn't try anything weird (spoiler, she was wrong), they actually drug Neo's tea so she's left paralyzed, and her father takes her to her room by dragging her all over the floor of the mansion and up the stairs

only to lock her again in her room and leave her on the bed while she physically couldn't do anything to defend herself, because, paralyzing drugs

They controlled her life to ridiculous levels- some people of Vale (more specifically, it's the cops mentioning it), mention how they didn't even know the Vanilles had a daughter despite being well known because, rich and important people- they really just treated Trivia like some kind of dirty secret

Jimmy also openly admits that he's so deep into his debt with Xiong, that the lives of her wife and daughter are owned by Hei Xiong

Also, whenever Trivia got into trouble when she was younger (her escapades), Jimmy always paid the cops and the shops good sums of money so they would look away

They prohibited Trivia to use her Semblance because they were scared of what she could do- at one point Jimmy even calls her daughter a 'witch' in a derogatory manner

While Neo did seem to have bad ideas and was mischievous since she was young, I think if they hadn't repressed and isolated her so much, she would be a bit better as a person than she is now, period

[44insects]

hi insects (is that how you like being called or do yu have another nickname??? 44 ??? not sure sorry anyways) i love ur art so much i think abt it constantly ur ocs are very very cool i specially like kiwi!!! not sure if u have stories mapped out for them or anything but im very curious about her backstory and also elizabeth's (like, she's made out of meat right. is she alive? is she a meatloaf? is magic involved? what kind of meat is she??? Who made her??)

totally understand if u don't know or don't want to share those things just thought I'd let you know i admire ur art a lot!!!

hi! everyone online calls me insects, you can call me insects! thank you so much for your kind words! i'll reply to your questions under a readmore!

ive had a few ideas about kiwi and stories id like to write about her but it all feels unsatisfying since ive had her since i was like 10 years old! so she feels really important, it almost feels hard to do her justice.. but i think that if i keep making paintings of her, eventually i could figure something out, it might involve her blue friend as well.. its hard to say

as for elizabeth, she was made by nina! nina was originally my idea for a doll i want in real life(but she had blonde hair in my mind), and then i made her in secondlife and she ended up looking the way she does, then i made eliza out of prims in secondlife and eventually in blender.. i have a blog about them where i write from ninas perspective sometimes but its not so great or active. i would say eliza is not sentient and doesn't move, sometimes in my sl gifs she does but thats mostly because it looks fun! meatloaf would be cool but i think the closest that comes to her consistency is like a cloned or 3d printed steak. maybe i will change these facts later but this is the way i look at it for now..

thank you again for your interest! i hope you have a wonderful day!!

[zukkacore]

i can't. remember if i sent in numbers for the writer's ask already. if i did, crying ignore this but: 11, 12, and 30?

11. a wip you'd like to finish someday

Oh god i started so many just w/in the past few days. Jace hireling au obviously. jaceporter first time. Actually, the true honest to god earnest answer is i always felt terrible abandoning my multichap danganronpa talentswap. It's so old i really don't think its indicative of my current skill level but it was so much fun and it means so much to be and its so long and i did have a whole ending planned out but im just not that good at writing detectivework. I do think there's some good shit in there still tho.

The other answer that's kinda cheating is i have a fantasy based Taming of the shrew retelling i've been like retooling for like a goddamn year. It's such a fucked play but i have so many mixed feelings abt it. My feelings on taming are very similar to del toro's on pinocchio in that it's very pro domestication of the human spirit that i think is kinda depressing. Like im very centrist abt whether the play is irredeemable or whether its not meant to be taken seriously, but the themes are interesting. In my mind, there's like. all this stuff abt performance and palability and. Individiuality vs community. Acceptance vs ostracization. This tension between vulnerability n connection vs. power and control and how those are competing needs w/in people. Like. Kate n Petrucchio are both outsiders and petruchio could choose vulnerability and connection w/ his wife and instead he chooses social approval in a patriarchal society which he gains through proving how good he is at subjugating his wife. The themes are INTERESTING it's just the fuckin CONCLUSION (aka its morally good and just to gaslight your wife actually) are fuckin DIRE. On the other hand. Kate and Petruchio have mad chemistry and is it so wrong to think they should fuck nasty?

12. a trope you're really into right now

... 4 jaces? I feel like i have a weird stance on the clonefucking joke poll that goes around every few months (in that its not the same as masturbation b/c the minute their consciousness is different from yours thats like. a full person but not a person i would be compelled to be with but maybe im to arospec for that) so its never particularly compelled me before, like i thought that shit in Loki was kinda cringe. but just bc i don't find the idea particularly compelling for myself doesn't mean Jace can't be a little obsessed w/ himself. Tbh the idea of being a xerox of a xerox of a xerox in general is very interesting for me tho.

There's also something I think i keep returning to abt like. Having to renegotiate or reclaim power and love in a relationship that should otherwise be fucked and heartbreaking. By all intents and purposes, there should be one break at the heart of this that ruins everything, a moment at the beginning that should have ruined everthing from jump. but if we're stuck together, I'm determined to reconcile w/ myself that there's love there. It's very Jaceporter. It's very Kate n petruchio. Very hades n persephone I have another very old school ship that actually has something very similar happen. If you can figure it out based on this text i sent my friend then you were probaly on tumblr when a certain webcomic was updating.

30. share a fic you're especially proud of

I feel like me giving so many answers to these is a total copout. The truthful answer is that I have like a 10k togakure (hiro n togami for those curious) pwp fic thats on my google drive somewhere that i've never posted bc ive been too embarrassed and the ship is NOT that popular so i think like .5 people would read it. But it's like my favorite thing i've ever written. I might post it eventually. If i pluck up the courage. I have sent it to like 2-3 people in my lifetime. I'd cite a scene i like, but I like all of it. And also most if it is smut.

The half-hearted answer is my talentswap bc i am fuckin proud of it im just embarrassed bc i abandoned it. I'm legit so sad. I'm such a Hiro n Mukuro should be proxy siblings truther and im glad their scene was the last thing i posted but now it will never come into fruition.

So i guess. My default answer is my Sky High AU for It chapter 2. It's called Welcome To the Loser Track and it's reddie and in it Richie is the kid who glows and Eddie is the kid who turns into a guinea pig. I actually really like the movie Sky High a lot, I think it's a really good kids movie and it's got a lot of fun setpieces and cool design components and even some of the camerawork is pretty neat and cute stuff in it that's rly underrated. Its like one of the main Things i feel like ppl who are my friends or have been w/ me a long time know about me, and the silly thing abt me is that i really do earnestly like Zack/Magenta as a ship, but mainly bc i just think Zack gives off baby butch dyke vibes (and. I hate to use the phrase. but it's kinda black cat x golden retriever vibes). I actually like it so much that Sky High reddie is probably my favorite version of reddie, and i do think the other Losers in that mode are also very fun (Bill is strong n can fly, Mike controls plants, Stan melts, Bev is pyrokinetic, and Ben is a technopath). The main thing abt it is that it's COMPLETE (i have so many abandoned wips), but i am geuinely proud of it. I don't think the writing is like always the most polished but i think there is a lot of interesting queer subtext in that movie (in that there is basically a coming out scene even if the conclusion of the story is that he was straight the whole time lol) that i kinda picked at and did a good job elaborating on. There's actually a lot of underutilized subtext in that movie that isn't rly interrogated that i think is fun. I just think there's very romantic abt two people with "useless" powers seeing the beauty in each other.

I feel like some old school mutuals from my IT days already know this, but this is probably my favorite scene from the fic:

[familyabolisher]

re: annihilation im glad im not the only one who disliked it lol! ive struggled thru the second book as well bc people keep telling me the third is the best but. we'll see. id be curious abt ur thoughts & if you have similar critiques (lack of interiority for the mc for one, a lack of clarity on Whats Going On but not in a fun way imo but in a way that makes me really unsure what the Point of it all is, & (book 2) just. the most tedious mommy issues ive ever had to read thru) or if its something else entirely. no pressure tho! i just like hearing ur opinions on things.

tbh my immensely pedestrian answer is that i just couldn’t get on with the style at all—it felt very clumsy and, like, amateurish. i got the sense that vandermeer wanted to narrate The Horrors in a quotidian, somewhat clinical tone that established a discordance around an effort to record and empirically tackle something that resisted the boundaries of human language and communication, and i think a more skilled writer could have pulled that off to great effect; however, as it was, he neither leant far enough into that voice that the discordance could fully emerge & exert a significant enough narrative force to make the piece compelling, nor relaxed it enough to allow his language to play around with the lurid, macabre, paranatural setting. 

like, for example, i’ve just gone to a random page to give you some sense of what i mean.

This was really the only thing I discovered in him after his return: a deep and unending solitude, as if he had been granted a gift that he didn’t know what to do with. A gift that was poison to him and eventually killed him. But would it have killed me? That was the question that crept into my mind even as I stared into his eyes those last few times, willing myself to know his thoughts and failing. As I labored at my increasingly repetitive job, in a sterile lab, I kept thinking about Area X, and how I would never know what it was like without going there. No one could really tell me, and no account could possibly be a substitute. So several months after my husband died, I volunteered for an Area X expedition. A spouse of a former expedition member had never signed up before. I think they accepted me in part because they wanted to see if that connection might make a difference. I think they accepted me as an experiment. But then again, maybe from the start they expected me to sign up.

this is like … the first time we get a real, direct account of the biologist’s backstory. it’s like a speedrun of heterosexual our wives under the sea (also a bad book btw lol) and is supposed to pack a pretty hefty emotional punch, but it’s just … well, i mean. “a gift that was poison to him and eventually killed him.” like, the extract falls back on cliches; the prose lands in a very ‘safe’ register and feels a little afraid to push anywhere significantly outside of that. this is pretty representative of (what i read of) the whole book, tbh—and it stings especially when you have things like a mysterious tunnel-tower seemingly made of flesh that only the narrator can see that’s spawning fungi spelling out sentences as other characters in the novel start to die … like, that’s good, and that’s just really not being communicated on the page in any compelling manner. 

it felt as though vandermeer had established this fascinating world and then just failed to communicate any of it to any memorable standard. also, the pacing was all over the place, lol—like, take your time with it a little more, spend some time on setting and description! or if you want to lean into that clipped, clinical account, maybe experiment a little more with the texture that that could lend; like, journals, reports, the kind of temporal weirdness that those can generate (as is common in the gothic novel, for instance) … like, there were just a lot of ins where vandermeer could have negotiated a more interesting piece of work than what i was reading.

it just felt very, like—the word coming to mind for me is ‘timid.’ like the text found its own concepts a little too unwieldy and pared itself down into a very meek prose rather than rising to the challenge that its scaffolding presented. and as a result, i was just, like, bored and irritated trying to read it. i’m told that the film is very different so i might give that a go at some point, but i really couldn’t push through to the end of the book, lmao. maybe it’s worth reading for like the last 70 pages, but i’ll never know. sad! well there’s other genre fiction

[rollercoasterwords]

☕️ the prank! how do u think it went down, when, howd it affect their trust or timeline of getting together, etc. i know its common in fics to make the prank a huge fucking deal that almost breaks the marauders or has remus not talking to sirius for weeks which i find interesting bc i think according to canon sirius wasnt remorseful at all about it? and remus forgive him pretty quickly and casually (either bc he didnt want to lose his friends or maybe he just didnt care - he does after all at one point say they were idiots when they were kids and almost getting caught as animagi several times and not really taking things seriously). obviously it doesnt have to follow jkrs version of events but im curious what u think abt it all!

oh boy oh boy oh boy okay let's get into it i think. this might be a long one. i LOVE the prank as i have talked about on this blog in the past xx

personally i think there are so many ways to write the prank and just SO much to explore with it so. it is difficult for me to choose one set story of how i think it went down because i think it would depend on what story i was writing it into!! however hmmm how can i go about this...i think i'm gonna break it down step by step maybe and kinda talk about my preferred interpretations for each bit? so...here u go!

sirius telling snape

ok so when i am writing sirius. well one thing about him is that he IS a little mean to me. like i do not think kindness comes naturally to him i think it's something he has to work at and that if he isn't watching himself he can just be careless with other people's feelings, which is why he's a bit of a bully to the people he doesn't like. so while i can see interpretations of the prank where he is like...very intentionally and maliciously trying to put snape in danger, for whatever reason, and while i can also see interpretations where it was 100% unintentional and he was even tricked or forced or whatever, i prefer to take an approach sort of in between those two extremes.

so for me, sirius telling snape is generally more of like...a snapping situation. like there's other shit going on in sirius's life with his family (because this is the year he ran away, right? and i usually imagine the prank happening sometime after that) that he's dealing with and i think he is ALSO discovering his queerness and dealing with being closeted or perhaps trying very hard to suppress his feelings for a certain best friend that also make him particularly protective of said best friend and less willing to deal with snape's shit. and i imagine like all this going on and snape getting sirius alone at some point and antagonizing him in some way about remus or where the marauders all keep sneaking off to, and sirius just breaks and snaps at snape in a fit of anger where he's like. giving into that meanness that comes so easily and just wants to insult snape and yell at him. and i think sirius isn't really expecting snape to actually. go down the tunnel that very night but at the same time i think he's a bit careless about it as previously stated and just does not think through the full consequences and like storms off in a huff. and then once he realizes what he's done at first he like tries to tell himself snape probably WOULDN'T because he's embarrassed and guilty and doesn't want to admit he's fucked up...but then eventually he does tell the others and well. that's when james goes to the rescue!

snape going down the tunnel

so this is another point where i think there's quite a bit open to interpretation, because sure we hear that harry's dad supposedly saved snape's life, but...well let's be honest that could be an exagerrated account. as others have pointed out snape's worst memory is not this night, but rather a different instance where he clashed with the marauders. so! i think there's really quite a range here. you could write snape going down the tunnel as if he was barely in any danger at all and james just yanked him out right after he caught a glimpse or heard something that confirmed remus was a werewolf, or you could write a whole dramatic showdown where james had to face down with the wolf and risked his life to save snape.

personally i like to make things a little bit dramatic here, just for the angst. obviously james probably can't actually transform in front of snape if this is canon-compliant because snape didn't know the animagi secret, right? but...well i supposed james could like shove snape down the tunnel shut the door and then transform or something. so i do like this section with a little bit more risk, where james is perhaps put in a bit of danger as well, simply because i think it makes the opportunities for angst in the next section a little juicier <3

the fallout

aaaaand the part that everyone really loses their minds over!! again, quite a range of options here all of which i think are fertile ground for exploration, and obviously however u wrote the scene of snape going down the tunnel and sirius telling snape are going to impact the fallout a lot. again, i can see the interpretation where all of the marauders are really, really upset with sirius and sort of turn against him for a while, where there's some huge split in the friend group, etc etc. i can also see the interpretation that takes the canon more at its word when sirius and remus brush the incident off years later, and say that remus honestly didn't care that much once it became clear that no one was hurt and his secret wasn't going to get out.

however, following along from my interpretation of sirius-snapping-at-snape and somewhat tense tunnel danger, i once again like to take more of a middle ground approach between these two extremes. i quite enjoy prank angst where remus feels incredibly betrayed, even once he understands that sirius didn't intend to out his secret and that it was largely just carelessness, because i think sirius being careless with this secret would still really, really hurt remus. i also love when this is like...just around the time that both r + s are discovering their feelings for each other and still sort of dancing around it, because that just twists the knife a little bit more in them suddenly falling apart for a while as sirius repents and remus tries to figure out whether he can forgive sirius and like...deal with the pain of knowing this person who knows him so intimately in so many ways still doesn't understand how being a werewolf affects him.

however, for me this is not a situation where all the marauders turn against sirius. i think james's loyalty to his friends is one of his biggest blind spots, and i also like to write him with this tendency towards a bit of black and white thinking when it comes to morality as an additional flaw, such that he can't really believe that his friends, the people he loves, could ever actually be bad people. because...they're his friends! of course they're good! and in this way, i think the prank fallout can be used for really good foreshadowing about how these flaws will later come back to hurt james during the war.

so for me, james is upset with sirius, but he forgives him very quickly--perhaps even too quickly--because...well of course sirius didn't mean to!! sirius is a marauder! he's their best friend! he's dealing with a lot of shit, and james has a unqiue insight into that shit, being the person who sirius ran away to! and sirius is a good person, so obviously he deserves forgiveness! it was a horrible mistake, but nobody was actually hurt!

i think peter mostly goes along with james, because to me a canon peter is more concerned with james than either remus or sirius. like, i think him having a sort of secondary role within the friendgroup where he's always sort of following james around fits very much with his canon characterization and also sets up well, again, for his actions during the war. i also think peter wouldn't care very much, because...well. i don't think canon peter is a great person or has the strongest moral compass. i kinda feel like he'd be like "no one was hurt, all's well that end's well, let's just move on," though of course he would never say that out loud, because clearly all his friends think this is very upsetting.

and then. of course. remus and sirius.

to me, the prank is a critical moment in their relationship. like i said before, i imagine the prank happening just as their sort of beginning to explore their attraction to each other and the possibility that they might be more than just friends. for remus, i think the prank is sort of a wake-up call and a reminder that he and sirius have lived very different lives, and there are certain things about him that sirius will probably just...never understand. i also think it's a moment where remus sees a darker side of sirius, in that like...well remus has grown up with sirius and he knows this kid can be kind of mean sometimes, but he's never been on the other end of that. but now he knows that sirius, as hard as he tries, is still someone who just. hurts the people he loves sometimes. in very brutal ways. and the fact that it's largely unintentional almost makes it worse. because how can remus blame him? how can remus hold him accountable when he didn't even mean to do it?

so for remus i think it's this moment where he has to sort of balance the scales and decide if this budding love he feels for sirius is like...worth it, almost. if it's enough to override all the parts where they don't fit, all the ways they can hurt each other. and i think the fact that he does, eventually, choose to forgive sirius is an incredibly important indication of how much he loves him, and what he is willing to do for that love.

and for sirius this is also very much a wake-up call. like, up to this point i feel like sirius has very much sort of been this spiraling hot mess because of just all the shit building up with his family and him dealing with the aftermath of running away and being disowned. but this is a point where he has to step back and realize--hey, i don't want to be this kind of person. i don't want to be the guy that hurts the people he loves just because he's careless, and angry, and lashing out in whatever way he can to try and get a grip on a life that feels so largely out of his control. and i think it's also a wake-up call that there are things he hasn't understood about remus or hasn't really tried to understand, that since remus being a werewolf has never mattered that much to him (and has even been almost this fun thing, where it's like hey let's become animagi and run around during the full moon!) he just....hasn't considered how much it impacts remus's life. he's been selfish. and he doesn't want to be selfish anymore, because remus matters to him so much, and above all, he doesn't want to lose that. the prank, to me, marks a restructuring of sirius's priorities, and a sort of renewed focus on trying to actually become a better person and deal with his shit.

so i like to imagine...like, a pretty lengthy period of time, ranging anywhere from a few months up to like a year, during which remus and sirius are a bit estranged as they're both figuring all this shit out. and of course that places strain on their friend group--and i think this is the perfect time for remus to get a lot closer with lily, as he seeks out other friends when he doesn't want to be around sirius. but i do think that remus begins to slowly forgive sirius, and they just naturally start to float back together, until they finally do have like. one big conversation one day where they talk about what happened and remus forgives sirius. and i think that marks such an important shift in their relationship, and things get a lot more serious for them from there, because they have both now prioritized each other in a way that they were sort of dancing around before. regardless of how quickly they get together afterwards, i feel like it's after the prank that they each really become each other's person, because they both know they never want to lose the other like that again.

and there u have it!! my take on the prank. like i said, i can see lots of different interpretations even within the constraints of canon, but i think this is my favorite one <3

[lunanheartache]

i wrote this to be a whore lore summary but it ended up more as crossroads lore beats after he gets to lot SO heres some crossy lore under the cutt, warning for mentions of underage / child prostitution

crossroads whore lore important beats

* starts out as a survival thing within the first few months of running away from the convent. he is (probably) 15 at most

* it doesn't work the greatest. he and nowhere are both very much social pariahs, more or less assumed / taken as demons

* obviously this is not things im going to write. dont need to think abt it. but its important & relevant to his character

* main things here: he falls into it bc hes seen other street kids do it successfully and get a meal / a room for a night, he is just trying to get nowhere something to eat and a place to sleep if he can. this is clearly a harder sell, asking for essentially 2x payment. also a harder sell bc to the general populace he is more or less infectious. he is scary even as a starving desperate child. it is the skeeviest places in the slums that hes able to get any scores, and even then its very hit or miss

* hes a scary demon child so even creeps (in deeply religious town) dont want to fuck him. basically forced into blowjobs when someone takes him on

* none of this is fun. he is scared & desperate & trying to take care of his brother who still occasionally goes kind of catatonic. hes 15. it sucks. he does not tell nowhere. start of a feeling of personal shame (distinct from before bc they both were "the same." now this is crossroads doing something "bad" himself)

* goes on for a while. it is sporadic & by no means their primary source of income. mostly they are grifting and stealing. crossroads is maybe 17/18/19 when nowhere gets his job with the baker. now they have a relatively stable thing

* with nowheres crime money (not murder yet) they have a consistent room and consistent food (aka can eat once a day for sure). it also means crossy has more time on his hands and more time alone

* he is still a gay teen / young adult. some exploring of the self now that he has a luxury. hes also working more and more magic into his grifts as he figures it out. his grifts get more elaborate bc he can plan them and its just him

* figures hed have better luck magically disguised. cue small uptick in sex work that ends up a little more complicated - hes looking for more money (but they have some) and hes curious. chaotic brain times. agonizing. but hes learning

* starts his priest scam in his early 20s. long con over several months. uses it to get into richer parts of town. early days of it (most human looking) outside of indulgences, hes mostly hamming up the sexually inexperienced & shy priest shtick in bathhouses

* later in his scams, bathhouses stop working. again people dont like to fuck him when he looks how he does & hes kind of into bottoming at this point. he turns more to hanging around the bar of a rich hotel (lion's head) and trolling a bit - hotel is more travelers who arent as bothered by his looks / were going to pay for a hotel escort anyway

* he does not account for this second thing. he doesnt realize the hotel probably has its own sex workers bc in his mind its a poor thing and this place is rich

* (these next few bullet points are whore lore part 1 that i wrote and its technically posted)

* eventually confronted by a hotel employee (technically the owner but crossy has no idea). takes him into a back office and is like essentially like hi. i know youre whoring at my hotel. if you want you can work for me and ull make loads more money

* crossy tries to keep up his priest shtick until the guy pushes that little bit too far for him to do so. he cracks. discussion

* guy (john) is like look. i got clients who talk. bunches r askin me about the priest and i dont have a priest. i can charge like 300% more than what youre charging, you can pick when you want to work (for the enforced scarcity, so ppl pay more when he Is around), and you can keep a good cut. also bc of ur priest shtick i gotta put you in penis jail if ur working. its a bit the clients think its great. hilarious

* crossy is like fantasy jesus christ. youll pay me how much? i dont care what you do, hell yeah. lock me up. i can jack off at home. what do i care when youre paying me that much

* (horny things happen in fic. main important points: crossy, for all of his talk, is still relatively inexperienced bc. people dont want to deal with him. john is like that is fine, i train all my guys :) we'll figure out what you like)

* whore lore part 2 and anything else is crossy trying to navigate this new thing. johns thing is he claims a "reputation for enthusiasm" so cross doesnt have to do anything he doesnt care for. cross is baffled by this & the idea that hes supposed to feel good here. john introduces him to some things. cross falls hard into submissive mode bc he basically doesnt have to think or worry about anything (and thats all he does otherwise. hes an anxious guy). he winds up a little obsessed / addicted to getting to shut his mind off

* starts going to the hotel just for that & the money is more of a bonus. sometimes just shows up when hes had a bad brain day

* he goes wild buying him and nowhere new clothes and sheets and pillows and just everything they couldnt afford before. he still does not tell nowhere what hes doing. when hes not working, waffles between intense shame and like big ol arrogance

[naturallyobsessed]

I posted 108 times in 2022

94 posts created (87%)

14 posts reblogged (13%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@pretty-boy-caswell

@jamazilblog

@disneypsd

@specialcolorfulshabon

@stitchkiss

I tagged 83 of my posts in 2022

Only 23% of my posts had no tags

#hsmtmts - 33 posts

#lab rats - 29 posts

#lab rats elite force - 26 posts

#chase davenport - 19 posts

#ej caswell - 14 posts

#bree davenport - 11 posts

#adam davenport - 9 posts

#villains of valley view - 7 posts

#ricky bowen - 6 posts

#disney xd - 5 posts

Longest Tag: 135 characters

#either tim listened to sour while writing this season or he told olivia his plans for the show so she could write songs based off of it

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Please tell me anyone on here watched the new villains of valley view episode because that ending omfg I was not expecting that. Usually Chris and Bryan reveal the important things near the end of seasons. THIS IS THE FIFTH EPISODE AAAAAAAA

74 notes - Posted June 24, 2022

#4

what would've made the portwell break up SO much better is if we saw Gina actually be a "maybe" to ej.

The whole season we saw ej trying his hardest to be with her, even before the letter from his dad. It's not like he didn't want to be with her, he definitely did. ("A perfect show is how I stay with you.") But Gina was barely trying to help. Ej said to miss Jenn that he was underwater with the show and didn't want the others to know. But was anyone helping? No. Even his girlfriend who loves theater just as much and maybe even more as him? No. She saw the rcosl thing as a chance to make ej jealous instead of talking to him. Do I think Gina was obliged to help him? No, definitely not. But I feel like she should've recognized his stress earlier and talked to him about it.

She was never a maybe to him. Ej always tried his hardest for Gina, even when it meant skipping out on fun camp events during his last summer to be a kid. But ej was a maybe to her.

75 notes - Posted October 19, 2022

#3

Corbin's line in color war "unless you praise nickelodeon, its going in the doc" is so funny to me bc of how many hsmtmts actors were on nickelodeon at a point

Josh, Julia, and Matt were all on game shakers. Josh and Julia had more minor roles but Matt was in like three episodes, one of them being the series finale I think.

Also, remember bella and the bulldogs? Matt was in a few episodes of that as Zach, bellas crush and eventual partner, I think. Idk I haven't finished the show yet.

Oh Matt was also in the weird nick movie (at least i think nick had something to do with it) Alex and me as the older brother of the main character. So yea, I'd say in between 2015 and 2018 Nick LOVED Matt cornett

And saylor was in an episode of Henry danger!

88 notes - Posted September 27, 2022

#2

Few more thoughts and rants abt the show:

S1 chase. Specifically in the early episodes. Everything about him was just so adorable (except spike ofc). His hair, his voice, his outfits, everything just makes me want to squeal while kicking my legs up and down like a child.

Did Donald mention Douglas to tasha while they were dating? Like did he ever say "I had a brother, but he died a while ago." I'm curious.

Once I finished elite force, disney plus had the nerve to be like 'because you watched lab rats: elite force, watch lab rats" I DID AND IM BAWLING MY EYES OUT BECAUSE OF IT THANK YOU VERY MUCH

Sometimes I genuinely forget it's a kids show not only because of the multiple terrorists that show up, but because of how it changed my life. I think of chase, start to smile uncontrably, and then think 'oh right he's from a disney xd show'. It's just such a weird thought, you know?

Kaz's pigophobic line.

Naomi being Leo's half-sister and they didn't even mention him in the episode she showed up in.

Not sure if I already mentioned this, but why did Douglas and perry show up in more episodes than Donald. Also I think Adam was mentioned once and Leo was mentioned once if anything.

Elite force just refuses to acknowledge the existence of those two characters. In 'the list' when we see kaz playing with the bionic action figures, Adam's isn't there. Why tf not?

Do kaz and Oliver have last names?

92 notes - Posted June 16, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

"She remembered. She remembered the lottery ticket"

*closes laptop* wow! What a great way to end the season!

273 notes - Posted October 2, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[nr1roagfan]

possible kriseis (choose your fighter)

how i see different krisei - can be seen as romantic too, idc - dynamics (in conditions of kris not managing to control, ralsei knowing more than we think and sending us to see susie not to prove some point, related to her, but to talk to kris)

tHERE WE GO

type 1 - googley moogley its all gone to shit

ralsei is very loyal to prophecy, considers player a godlike being and doesnt see any reason to complain of being possessed, so he doesnt like kris going off-track in general. kris views him as a lost cause but doesnt say anything

but then player goes for the weird route or decides to make roaring happen aaaand all ralsei's morals and beliefs get crushed. kris isnt surprised, ofc. the point is ralsei starting to validate others and himself as well as the "higher beings" or whatever. and so on kris tries their best to forgive him and give 'im a chance to be a better person. like to think this happens during the end of the world so its pretty tragic cuz theyd be awesome together if they had more time. but the only thing that forms between them in that short amount of time is some kind of special bond and mutual understanding. trauma buddies, if you will. love it for the angst potential, the cute boi not being perfect and kris showing their own desire to give chances

next oneeeeeee

type 2 - "inspiration for living"type romance(?)

kris doesnt like ralsei quote unquote cant stand his fake ass. ralsei pretty much convinces player there's nothin to worry abt and waits for his turn to talk to the actual kris patiently. he understands that an unpleased god is a threat and plays along but still thinks that kris deserves better and encourages them in showing their own way of doing things. he reassures them everyone sees their personality glowing through and that theyre capable of leadership in it all. kris appreciates it cuz yk. hits right in the middle and the thought of it brings them comfort. ralsei is happy to watch kris grow and overcome their fears/problems, make new friends, figure out their relationships and just become their own person in general. also im sure kris isnt pleased with ralsei only thinking of others so they try their best to make him feel worthy. it takes time, but eventually he believes it. then something bad happens probably. idk idc up to you but i have a feeling healthy relationships never last long if youre a trans magical goat boy and a blue hair and pronouns teenage jokester

type three - do mi ti why not me

yeah, you guessed it. angst potential

very short. ralsei's genuinely in love and admiration with player and kris gets used to it with time. theyre annoyed at first but theyve never seen such attachment shown towards them (not them actually but you get it) and when they realise it, theyre rlly sad. there isnt any ending to it, thats just how things are. maybe when the main fountain will be sealed theyll miss him. i dont know

type IV - WHAT DO YALL WANT FROM ME

kris is suspicious and curious of ralsei, asks him what's his deal, but ralsei doesnt fucking know himself. he pretty much does what he's told because of lack of alternatives. he's weird in spamtype situations because he's lacking social experience and doesnt know how to deal with trauma. kris recalls the feeling of not being the one in control and relates to ralsei being tired of everyone's shit too so they like. ptsd solidarity (not actually, ptsd is very different but i dont wanna repeat trauma buddies i mean)

i find not-giving a shit ralsei funny for some reason and the concept is interesting in general

well that's it for now, dear folovers and krisei fans. ill probably post the illustrations separately too. sharing appreciated! have a nice one.

[babysizedfics]

are you still wanting the requests? because after the disaster that was roman trying to act like a cg for baby virge, I'd be interested in seeing it the opposite way around? like who is the bigger disaster here when it comes to trying to act like a cg

this ask.. is from july..... wow i take my time shskdhhs but please accept this vague bullet fic/concept/thing

Vee trying (and failing) to babysit Ro

So. One day (around september 2020) Virgil decides he wants to try his hand at babysitting — but the thing is he doesnt actually want to

he basicaly thinks bc roman takes such good care of him as his big bro that vee should be doing smth similar. he thinks he's a bad brother in comparison if he can't offer the same care for roman

roman always disputes this but vee wants to at least try it, he's curious anyway

He asks roman privately because he doesnt want to tell logan and patton abt it, he’s embarrassed: what if they say he’s a silly baby for trying to be bigger?

also lowkey because virgil hates the idea of being a cg but hes gonna try anyway to try to be a good baby brother (ironically)

it's kind of a recipe for disaster because as we have said before, vee genuinely feels uncomfortable around little roman if virgil isnt little too

it's the fact that he finds so much comfort in being the youngest of their group, he's literally babey on all levels and if roman is actung younger than him vee just feels weird

but they try it out privately in roman's room one day (when the caregivers have said they want to be alone for a while) - roman is actually pretty indifferent to the whole idea, he just wants to help virge try (he’s secretly doubtful it will wotk but won’t say that out loud)

virgil is understandably rlly nervous and uncomfy and generally an anxious wreck

So roman takes charge and is like 'okay what should i call you?' and virgil is shakily like ‘umm… maybe just Virge is fine?’

And then Roman smiles really wide and says ‘Okay, Virge!’

it shocks virgil because Roman has very suddenly become little, his stance and voice very clearly those of a child. there wasnt any time to prepare himself

‘Do you wanna play with me?’ roman asks excitedly

Virge is really stunted like ‘s-sure’ (internally he’s like say kiddo! Just say it, it's not hard! Arrggggh I can’t!!)

And Roman starts talking to virgil about his toys and what they do

at first virgils like ‘oh that’s really cool.. Um, should I?’ points at romans toy nervously

Roman nods and pushes a toy into Virgil’s hand and starts enacting a scene with the two in his own hands

Virgil hesitates to butt into Roman’s game, he doesnt want to get the toy to say the wrong thing and upset roman.. And what if he can’t think of anything to say? What if Roman thinks he’s boring? What if he ruins the game?

on top of that virgil is starting to feel really.... iffy.. he just feels a weird sinking in his chest while he looks at roman's childish behaviour, his tummy is in knots and he kind of wants to cry but he doesnt know how to explain that

so he tries to swallow his nerves and pulls the toy up to his mouth and runs it gently across his lip as he watches Roman play. its comforting

Roman makes the toys in his hands yell at each other and Virgil jumps a bit and whimpers

Roman looks over at the noise and says sorry with an apologetic smile, but then his face changes a bit as he notices something

‘Virge, no,’ roman says gently then he reaches out to gently pull Virgil’s hand from his mouth

virgil realises with a blush that he was sucking on the toy

'You're not allowed to suck things except pacis, remember?' roman says

‘Sorwy’ Virgil murmurs. he puts the toy back down on the carpet and hugs his knees to his chest tightly. he's wiggling a bit on the spot and tugging at his sweater sleeves

Roman pauses for a bit and then ducks in front of virgils gaze with a questioning look

‘Are you feeling little, Vee?’ he asks in his adult voice, using a slight baby tak for vee's benefit

Virgil blushes and quickly shakes his head. ‘No, ’m big.’ he's not supposed to be the little one!

‘Okay…’ Roman squints slightly at him but goes back to playing with his toys, this time getting them to talk to virgil to try to include him in the game

roman obviously noticed that virgil was anxious about jumping into the game so of course he is compromising by prompting virgil gently with questions

But the interaction with romans toys makes virgil feel so much littler

theres a lot of 'what do you want this one's name to be?' 'um... um may-maybe tibble?' 'okay, Sir tibble it is!'

it's usually small insignificant decisions like that and they get virgil to giggle a bit. he does suck the toy a couple more times but roman keeps stopping him with a smile and eventually virge just drops the toy and hugs his knees to avoid it happening again

but eventually roman asks virgil a Very Important question

'Prince Virge, what shall we do with the treacherous thief?'

and that is FAR more responsibility than virgil is comfy with having

‘Um,’ Virgil bites his thumbnail and looks nervously between the toy and Roman. he really doesnt want to decide something so important and maybe ruin the game

also he's feeling really melty in his chest and words are kind of tricky to say at the moment

‘C’mon,‘ Roman encourages gently with a smile, 'you can do it.'

and the softness in Ro’s tone feeds the liquid warmth in Virgil’s chest and he hugs his legs tighter

and he can feel his eyes tear up for some reason that he can't explain. he just feels small and weird and he wants a hug

Roman sees the tears and quickly kneels up and shuffles in front of virgil

he places his free hand on virgils leg and strokes a little to comfort him

'Hey, hey, it’s okay. Don’t be nervous,’ he whispers, squeezing Virgil’s knee

Virgil sniffles lightly and tentatively reaches his hand out to stroke the toy in romans hand. it looks like a nice texture

Roman smiles and lets virgil hold the toy and stroke it for a moment to calm his nerves. When it seems he’s calmed roman tries again.

‘What do you wanna say to the thief, Vee?’ he asks slowly and kindly, looking down at virgil from where he is knelt above him

Virgil looks up at him with wide eyes then back to the toy. His thumb slots in between his lips. ‘Hewo?’

‘Hi, Vee-Vee,’ Roman giggles and shakes his head. ‘I think you’re little.’

Virgil pouts around his thumb then points at him. ‘Wo-Wo lil.’

‘Yeah and now you are too!’ Roman laughs. 'But you're even littler,' he boops Vee's nose

This makes Virgil excited and he giggles and bounces.

Roman laughs at how sweet he is. Okay, looks like it's time to be a responsible big brother again

and really this feels SO much better for both of them. virgil doesnt like being older and tbh? roman doesnt like being younger either

'do you want your paci, baby?'

Virgil makes a mnh! sound that means yes and Roman reaches out to the paci vee brought with him just in case (yeah they both secretly knew this might happen)

Roman holds it up to Vee's mouth and smiles when vee gasps im excitement and takes romans hand in both of his and latches onto the pacifier

Then he thinks. he has one more thing to check before they can both be little: 'Vee, do you remember if you're wearing a pullup?'

vee tilts his head in confusion

roman frowns 'A pullup, remember? Like a diaper.'

Vee seems to remember something at the word diaper and looks around himself with a smile.

It quickly fades when he looks back at his brother, his fingers reach up to tug his paci. ‘Where baba?’

‘You want your papa?’

Vee nods.

‘Um…’ Roman bites his lip and looks to the door. ‘But Mom said they’re both busy. Don’t you wanna stay here with me for a bit? i can just check if you're wearing a pullup then--'

Virgil whines loudly and looks around. He is growing gradually more panicked, shoulders tensed up to his neck and feet kicking at the carpet. he's getting fussy

‘Shh, it’s okay, baby.’ Roman takes his hand.

When vee's wet eyes snap onto him roman offers him a reassuring smile. ‘Alright, let’s go find Dad.'

unfortunately when they do find the caregivers they are busy and not able to take care of vee, so roman actually grows up and takes care of vee until patton comes in later to take over

and that was very ironically roman's first experience of babysitting virgil!

[gayspock]

ok omg sooo<3

- first of all... WHAT i said about dylan before- oh now, IM OBSESSED. how did i not smell the latent dilf energy on him... enchanting.

- however: speaking of... YOU KNOW, i dont get so deep and... hm, conspiratorial isn t quite the right word? speculative? like- i dont do a lot of theorising? at least- im not someone so deep in reddit threads, doing the whole red string thing.... moreso little dabbling<3 and looking at stuff here and there so you know. part of that, i guess, is bc i havent watched a show week-to-week in a while but also jesus christ? that card- like o_o... babygirl you risked it all for that, huh? first of all, its going to be VERY cool to see how dylan deals with this new information (and i think it was the perfect wrench in the works for him, because it doesnt necessarily upset that aforementioned balanced i was talking about in my last dump) & where that takes him

- but also squaints. i think- okay i will get into some neggys next... this isnt #neg but also (cocks head inquisitively, catgirl style) im a little curious about what exactly IS going on and its like. on one hand i dont actually think that the big conspiracy at lumon is, like, the point of the show so it doesnt have to be groundbreaking- but nonetheless i do hope that like... it is still satisfying? because i think as "whimsical" as it can be, sometimes its a little harder to deliver a good and nice fitting explanation if you get a little too out there if that makes sense, and so i hope the show doesnt get away from itself, or leave it so vague that its just sorta UH HUH? but anyways- the card itself... wondering what the hell was so important about it to break protocol like that because jesus fucking christ surely like. risking it ALL like that was some insane shit- LIKE HI, dylan knows he has a kid now? milcheck bestie...

- some negatives: i said what i said last ep(ish) abt helly and mark and now im immediately.... well im not BACKTRACKING. but im like eehhhhhrh. im a little unsure now. at first i was like absolutely neutral- and i guess i still am, as its what i'd sort of EXPECT from a show, you know? like- given any television show with this set up, i would assume they'd put the two leads like that together. and so im hardly furious but i just dont really care and i think, also, a little let down in the execution thus far. i was hoping it would at least be more slow and subtle- but there's something kinda clumsy abt the way it felt in this last episode, that i didnt like. i think it was dylan literally stopping the flow of the episode to literally address it.

- ALSO, it kinda makes me nervous vis a vis alexa: i think she's got a lot of promise and she could be great for outie mark, and maybe i just need to have some faith in the show, but i do worry theyre bringing her in solely for mark's development. both his outer self (who otherwise mightnt be pushing so far with things) and also probably and eventually his inner self. because, if helly/mark DOES happen, i would assume there would eventually be a conflict between alexa and helly and unfortunatrly i think, purely because of what makes sense narratively, helly would be the choice (though i suppose thats not a given- and as developments happen, i could be nicely surprised, but yeah). and whilst im not against that wholly- its moreso, like i said, i worry theyre just bringing in alexa for the sake of that artificial conflict, to further mark, and as a result she herself is going to be kinda... undercooked. :( which i hope not- i hope they round her out well enough for the sake of the show in general, but also bc i do like what i see of her so far. like, i'd prefer her to helly (not that its so far to pitch them against each other) and also hm

- ... again. shrug. sigh. i dont want to say this is minor- but im not, like, extremely mad? just vaguely disappointed, bc this is what ive come to expect and. -_- you know its a little annoying when a cast is diverse, sure but like... the two core characters are white, and the diversity is found in side characters - and its especially srough, when theyre those used for their development. like: it will be disappointing if the most prominent black woman in the show, is the third vertex in the unbalanced love triangle, and her purpose is to fix outer mark and to then be rejected once they all come together. ESPECIALLY when its like... she's shown to have extremely good qualities - like its literally written there, into the text - but theyre taken for granted, whereas the white woman's also good qualities are kind of put on a pedestal by the narrative. (authors note: martha doctor who jones girlie, i am so fucking sorry).

- and again this is all a little hypothetical! the show could totally go another way and. i dont know. and its like its not a nail in a coffin or anything but.... it will be disappointing, is what i'll leave it as. and i hope i wont be disappointed, but im not getting hopes up, yeah?

- and i had more to say but hmm brains shutting off. will speak of it more later<3 i think i wanna rewatch from the top before next ep to revisit stuff so i can get a better grasp bc i miss things a lot... my brain islike swish cheese

[catboymingi]

and the damsel in distress - veninder chap. 2

navi/masterlist

story masterlist

pairing: mingi x reader

genre: angst, fluff; eventual best friends to lovers

word count: 7.2k

warnings: language, insecurities, past trauma mention, somewhat suicidal thoughts (very briefly, one sentence)

a/n: after ages of exams where i focused on smaller writings i finally am updating... this chapter is a ride but it is the ride i decided to take

yo var det mig / der’ dummet sig? - was it me / that messed up?

when you woke up and unlocked your phone you immediately wished you hadn’t woken up, ever. you had more than a hundred messages from various chats, and while you wished you could just ignore them forever you knew that you’d have to deal with it tomorrow latest, and you’d rather do it without an audience. so you had no choice to reply, opening the private messages first and telling all your friends that you’d reply in the group chat, before you opened that one.

[y/n]: sry for that. forgot my wallet, had no way to get home in time

[y/n]: nothing happened tho

the reply came almost immediately, as if they’d just waited for you to come online.

[saranghoe]: u literally didnt even try 2 call dibs n now ur staying the night?? seems suspicious

[model contract when???]: yeah literally!

[y/n]: as i said, better than sleeping on the street

[model contract when???]: just dont go near them again. ever

[y/n]: fine

[y/n]: deal

you hated the idea, but you knew that if you didn’t agree your life would be a living hell. and that was definitely not something you wanted, knowing how they’d made life hell for other people and knowing that there was no way anyone could protect you from that. so, the next thing you did was click on ‘hyung hate club’, not even bothering to read the messages before leaving the group. you didn’t like this, but it was better this way. as much as you liked the boys, you liked being able to go to uni in peace more, and you knew that would be impossible if you so much as breathed in their direction from now on. you sighed, putting your phone down and laying back onto your bed again, wanting some peace for yourself, but you weren’t granted that. less than a minute after you’d laid down your phone buzzed, once, twice, thrice. knowing that you wouldn’t be able to relax until you knew what was up you sat back up, checking your phone to see messages from an unknown number. curious, you clicked on the notification.

[unknown]: y/n???

[unknown]: im mingi

[unknown]: whats wrong??

you weren’t sure whether to be happy he messaged or scream into your pillow. in some way it was nice he cared, but that also meant it would be harder to avoid the boys. and that meant that, no matter how hard you tried, your friends would have a reason to be upset.

[y/n]: why?

[unknown]: you left the gc?

[unknown]: what happened

[y/n]: nothing dw, im all good

he saw the message but didn’t reply right away, which made you think that maybe he’d accept your reply. but then you saw him typing again, and a message you didn’t expect at all appeared on your screen.

[unknown]: did i mess up

[y/n]: wdym

you genuinely had no idea what he meant, or rather, how he could’ve got the idea that he’d messed up in any way. he’d been nothing but kind to you, there was not a single thing he could possibly have messed up on. but when a new message popped up you knew he was genuinely worrying about it, and you felt bad for not being able to tell him the real reason why you left the group chat, why you had to avoid them.

[unknown]: like did i do something wrong

[y/n]: not at all

[y/n]: its not abt you dw

you hoped he’d leave it be with that, but of course not. he wanted to know what was wrong, he wanted to know why you suddenly didn’t seem to want to talk to him, or any of them for that matter, anymore.

[unknown]: then what is it

and while you were thinking of a good excuse, mingi seemed to have caught on to what exactly the problem was, as was made apparent by his next message.

[unknown]: its your friends isnt it

there was no way you could reply to that decently, so you didn’t, staring at the screen in frustration with your friends and him and mainly yourself. you wanted to say something, you really did, but you had no idea what. tell him you were sorry? tell him to leave you alone? tell him that sometimes life just sucked and you had to deal with it? none of that would’ve been a good reply, and in all honesty you also didn’t want to have to deal with the emotional turmoil it would inevitably bring.

you didn’t notice that you’d spaced out and your phone had locked itself until it buzzed in your hand again, another message from the unknown number you now knew to be mingi. it just read ‘got it’ and you felt awful, scared that you’d hurt or upset one of the only people in forever that had shown genuine care for you. but of course you’d had to mess it up.

//

the next day came and you still felt bad, somewhat fearful as well. your friend group’s chat had returned to the usual topics, but you still weren’t sure how they’d react to you when they saw you again. you were hellbent on acting as usual, hoping that if you acted like nothing happened they would as well, and it was somewhat successful, getting weird stares every now and then, but no more comments than usual. you wouldn’t let yourself relax just yet, but this was a good sign, at least.

but then came lunch. you tried to act casual, not wanting to let on to the fact that you were horrified that one of the boys would shout out for you at any moment. your eyes darted around aimlessly, mainly looking for a certain giant sporting bright red hair, simply because he was easiest to spot out of the group you’d spent saturday night with. when you still hadn’t spotted him when you sat down to eat with your friends your shoulders relaxed, but it had been a mistake to think that they’d forgotten about you.

you hadn’t noticed that yunho was on his way towards you until he was standing right there, having moved surprisingly inconspicuously for someone his height. but there he was, staring down at you with an expression you couldn’t judge. you tried to avoid his eyes, feeling so incredibly guilty for ignoring him when he and his friends had been your saviour when you needed one, but you couldn’t help it. even now you could feel your friends’ angry stares on you, when you hadn’t even acknowledged the boy’s presence.

“y/n”, yunho suddenly spoke up. you couldn’t help but look up at him at that, knowing it was a mistake, but your head moved by itself. and he noticed, a small smile appearing on his face now. he nodded his head as a sign that he wanted to talk to you with a little more privacy, and you knew that if you didn’t go with him he’d try to sort whatever he wanted to sort here, in front of your friends, which would be way worse than leaving with him for maybe two minutes and returning, convincing them that you told him never to come up to you again. so you got up, but before you could actually go to a more private area he picked you up and threw you over his shoulder. you hit his back in a desperate attempt to let you down, but deep down you knew that your punches wouldn’t affect him in any way. so you gave up, hanging like a sack of potatoes, feeling everyone’s curious stares on you.

he first let you down at their table, hongjoong scolding him that a less dramatic approach would’ve done the job as well. wooyoung and yeosang were laughing while the others looked at you curiously, and you were still deciding whether or not to kill yunho right there.

that decision was made for you when mingi spoke up.

“you told me you’d see me at lunch.” you couldn’t quite decipher his tone, whether he was angry or disappointed or hurt, but you knew it wasn’t a positive emotion you heard in his voice. you hated that you were the reason for his upset, but you also hated that your decision about how to deal with the dilemma you were in had been made for you, by people that knew nothing about your situation. you weren’t them, you didn’t have a support system, you didn’t have the option to choose who you were friends with, you didn’t have any of the things that were a given for everyone else. you had to take what you got and make do with it, and they’d just made that significantly harder for you.

“i told you i couldn’t”, you replied, your own voice a mixture of sadness and anger. you wanted to be able to, really, but it wasn’t something you could change. and the fact that he’d seen how your friends had reacted to you doing something they didn’t like and still didn’t stop this, maybe even actively encouraged this, made you angry, even though maybe it shouldn’t. he hadn’t had any ill intentions, but that didn’t really matter to you when you knew he wouldn’t be affected at all by whatever happened as a reaction to this. that he - they - had started a battle you’d have to fight.

no one said anything to that and you thought the conversation was over, that they’d realised that you wouldn’t be able to join their friend group or talk to them at all unless necessary, so you turned around, managing to take a single step before someone grabbed your wrist. you turned around again in surprise and saw that it was seonghwa, whom you’d assumed to be kind and soft-spoken, definitely not the kind to do this. but here you were, being kept from leaving by his hand around your wrist. it was mingi who spoke, though.

“they’re not being nice to you. you deserve better.” and you knew, you knew all that, you knew everything he could tell you to convince you that they weren’t the right friends for you, but that didn’t change anything. and you’d had enough hurt, enough mistreatment in your life to want to avoid it at all costs now. if that meant giving up a bit of your happiness but getting to keep your peace of mind that was a price you were more than willing to pay. but the boy looking at you with softness in his eyes didn’t seem to be willing to have you pay that price.

“sit down.” seonghwa had let go of your arm now, moving a little so that you’d fit next to him. it wasn’t an order, more of a suggestion, but you were too tired, too exhausted to potentially risk a discussion you might not be able to win, so you just complied, resting your head in your palms. and because of that the boys at first didn’t even notice that you didn’t have your food, or any of your things, since it didn’t seem like you wanted to eat anyway.

it was san that noticed, already having finished inhaling his meal when you hadn’t even started yours. the surprise at that was what made him realise that there was no meal for you to finish.

“yunho!”, he suddenly yelled out, making everyone’s heads snap up, even yours. “you forgot y/n’s things when you kidnapped her!” at that realisation, panic made its way onto your face. you had no idea what state your things would be in by the time you’d reach them. your phone, your wallet, all your notes were in your bag, and you’d just left it with your friends that without a doubt were plotting how to ruin your life by now. you jolted up and towards the table they’d been sitting at, but when you saw they’d already left your panic only increased. your bag was still there, carelessly kicked underneath the table when you’d been sitting with the others, but you had no idea what the insides would look like. you probably looked like a maniac all but ripping it open, fumbling with the zipper with shaking hands and ransacking your bag to make sure you still had everything you needed, checking your wallet and phone to see just how fucked you were. everything was still in order, though; it seemed like they’d forgotten about your bag, in part thanks to you having kicked it out of sight thoughtlessly. you almost cried at the relief, and mingi, who’d followed you after your sudden exit to make sure you were okay, wasn’t really sure what to do. he kneeled down next to where you were still crouching on the floor, staring at your bag and its content as if it were the most beautiful thing you’d ever seen, and just looked at you, waiting for you to realise he was there as well.

when after a while (was it seconds? minutes? it felt too long for mingi) you still seemed to not have noticed his presence he carefully tapped your leg, making sure his hand was visible before he actually touched you. you seemed so spaced out that he was pretty certain any sudden touch or noise would scare you to no end. but even though he was so careful not to be too sudden your head still shot up with a force that made him fear you’d break your neck; you’d half expected one of your friends to be the one touching you, so your anxious reaction was at least in part caused by that. but when you saw that it was only him you relaxed a little, though your heartbeat still would not return to normal.

“you okay?”, he asked you once it seemed like you wouldn’t drop dead from shock or kill him if he said anything, worry apparent in his voice, and you could understand him, really - this wasn’t a regular reaction to forgetting your bag with your friends. but you didn’t have regular friends either, so it evened out.

“i guess.” you grabbed your bag and got up, wanting nothing more than to get out of that awkward situation, and the tall boy followed suit.

“wanna join us for the rest of lunch?” he expected you to say no. you knew that you should say no. and a look at where you’d sat at the table confirmed that you didn’t even have anything to eat anymore - they’d probably thrown it away as soon as you left. so there was no reason to go, there was no reason to make yourself even more of a target. but maybe that was why you ended up saying yes. you’d already become a target, so now you might as well spend time with them, you didn’t really have anything to lose anymore. and the smile he gave you when you agreed to join them made you think that it’d maybe be worth it, even.

the others looked at you in surprise when you returned to their table, mingi having a triumphant look on his face. they didn’t say anything, though, scared of putting you off and causing another somewhat-freak out like the one earlier. of course, to them it didn’t make sense, they had no idea just what your friends could do. they’d never been their victim, and they’d never been around to see what their victims had to deal with. but you knew. and the thought of it almost sent you into a panic attack, so you let yourself fall onto the bench (a loud ‘thud’ could be heard, so you really hadn’t been gentle with yourself) and put your head on the table, ignoring how greasy it probably was, your focus being on stopping your breath from speeding up before it was too late. you couldn’t see the looks they gave each other, but you could imagine them. you were a mess, a scared, traumatised mess, and that less than 48 hours after first having met them. you honestly wouldn’t be surprised if they told you to go sit somewhere else, or got up and left themselves. but they were still there when you lifted your head again, looking at you worriedly, but without judgment.

mingi was the first to speak, having put the pieces together by now.

“they’re that bad?” you knew whom he meant. he’d seen the message, he’d been the one to figure out they didn’t want you to talk to them, he’d seen the way you’d rummaged your bag, so it wasn’t hard for him to figure out what, or rather whom, you were scared of. yet he couldn’t imagine why you were that scared of people supposed to be your friends.

“worse.” you tried to mask your fear with a bitter tone, but it didn’t exactly work. the boys didn’t exactly know how to react to that, trying desperately to come up with a way to lighten the mood.

“you have eight bodyguards now.” you weren’t the only one surprised when it was jongho that spoke up, but the others were quick to agree, telling you that the girls had to get past them first. ‘mainly jongho, to be fair’, as wooyoung elaborated. and while you still weren’t feeling good about it, you were feeling better now, the fearful expression replaced by a smile. san, not wanting to waste that chance, asked you if he could re-add you to ‘hyung hate club’, and you couldn’t resist the puppy eyes he gave you, so you agreed. as soon as he did so mingi got his phone out, resending the message he’d sent when he’d brought you home. ‘pyjama party this weekend n y/ns still coming’. your reply was an emoji rolling its eyes, but the smile hadn’t left your face. then you saved his number, asking the others to send a message with their name so you could know who was who.

“they’ll never shut up”, hongjoong informed you casually as he sent his name, and while you knew he was telling you, indirectly, that from this moment on you would never be able to have a moment of peace and quiet and no notifications you were happy about this fact, because it meant that at least you wouldn’t be lonely.

“i have my ways.” you grinned at him as you said that, then you went to save all the numbers in your phone. doing so brought your attention to the time, and you noticed that it was time to leave for class, your happy expression immediately disappearing as you realised that they wouldn’t be around to protect you during class. And class was the place you couldn’t escape from; you needed the credits, and part of you also didn’t want to have to give up on something that always brought you joy just because you had to fear you wouldn’t be left alone.

“i need to go.” your expression didn’t go unnoticed, and seonghwa and yeosang, who had this period off, told you they’d be right there if something happened, you just had to send a message. they also insisted on bringing you to your class, and while you did feel a little like a child that needs their parents to bring them everywhere because they’re scared by themselves you also really appreciated it. so you took off with your two bodyguards, waving at the others as they left for their own classes.

“it’ll be fine”, yeosang said after a couple hundred metres during which neither of you had said anything, and you looked at him with doubt apparent in your eyes.

“it will”, seonghwa stated, a lot more sure about it than you were. “and if not, you know we’ll be right there.” that only did little to reassure you, but you had no choice either way.

you reached your classroom way too fast, and you could feel your breath speed up as soon as you walked towards the door, hesitating. maybe you should just drop out of uni and become a shepherd in a secluded village somewhere in a strange country in europe. maybe that was a better plan. but the choice was made for you as one of your now ex-friends waved towards you, a cheery expression on her face that would have fooled you, had you not seen that same expression on her face countless times before, knowing that it meant nothing but danger. but it was too late to turn around now, so all you could do was pretend you didn’t know what you were about to face.

“hey!” your tone was at least as fake as her expression as you greeted her back. then you went to your seat, and for the first half of class things actually went okay. you were tense, you were stressed, you were scared, but nothing happened. but then the teacher told you that it was time to do group work now, and things went downhill. you were grouped by how you were seating, which included you, one of the girls, and two classmates you barely ever talked to, whose names you didn’t even know, but whom you had nothing against, at least. but they would soon have something against you.

as you were working, one of them had her laptop out to take notes and prepare a presentation, as was the task. and that gave your ex-friend an idea. it was an expensive laptop, and you, as always, had a cup of water on the table, fairly close to the middle so it wouldn’t be able to drop by itself. it wouldn’t have to drop by itself, though. first, the girl next to you dropped her pen and kicked it over to the other two, pretending to have done so in an attempt to retrieve it and be able to pick it up.

“i’m sorry, i dropped my pen! can you maybe pick it up, i can’t reach it.” an apologetic smile was sent their way, as if to say ‘sorry for the hassle’. both girls opposite you ducked at the same time, trying to see where the pen was and who would be able to pick it up more easily. that was what she’d planned, though; as soon as they were no longer able to see you, she spilled your water. over the laptop that was still on the table. and as if that wasn’t enough, she got up, yelling your name loudly, asking you why you’d done that. everyone was looking at you by now, and the girl whose laptop had been sacrificed quickly tried to dry it off with her sleeve, asking for tissues, trying to save it. no use, it seemed like it had broken right away. and everyone thought it was you. that you’d broken the laptop on purpose.

“she was writing her thesis, y/n! i knew you were jealous, but i didn’t think you’d go that far!” you just stared at the scene around you wide-eyed, not even fully realising that this was real. by now even the teacher had come to look at what exactly was going on, and your lack of self defense was a seemingly obvious sign of you actually being the culprit.

“i think you should leave the class now. and you will have to replace the laptop.” all you could do was stare at who used to be your friend, unable to believe that she would do this to you. you hadn’t even actually done anything, and you’d been friends with these girls for almost a year now, yet she’d had no hesitation to ruin not only your reputation but also you financially. she was fully aware that you were barely scraping by. she was fully aware that you would never be able to replace the laptop. she knew all that. and she still did it, just because you’d dared to talk to someone they’d called dibs on. you couldn’t believe it.

//

you didn’t really remember how you’d left the class, and were surprised to find that you’d remembered to pack all your things back into your bag, that you hadn’t forgotten anything. you’d just left, going who even knew where, dropping on the floor when your legs didn’t want to carry you anymore, and starting to cry. and you stayed there, crying, losing all feeling for how much time had passed. this had been your last class of the day, so you had nowhere to be, and you didn’t want to be anywhere, either. you wanted to vanish. you wanted to die, in all honesty. if it continued like this your only choice was dropping out, basically having wasted the past year and all the work and money you’d put into your studies.

you were so caught up in your crying that you hadn’t noticed your phone buzzing with message after message, first paying attention to it when someone called you. it was seonghwa, who’d been there to pick you up after class only to see that you weren’t there. you didn’t feel like picking up, so you pressed the red button through your tears. he tried again, with the same result, and first when your phone started buzzing continuously with new messages you took a look at the group chat. now you found out why they were calling you - they’d tried to get you after class, but you weren’t there, and now you’d neither read their messages nor picked up their calls, so they all were quite worried at this point. you felt sorry about that, so you decided to send a message saying ‘sorry for worrying you’, but you couldn’t bring yourself to say that you were fine. it seemed like any sign of you being alive was already a success, though, lots of relieved messages flooding the chat. you hoped that maybe they wouldn’t ask what happened, but of course they did.

[hongjoong]: what happened?

[y/n]: i dont want to talk abt it

the chat was quiet after that, no one really knowing what to say. but, again, mingi sent you a private message.

[mingi]: where are you???

you didn’t want to explain anything and you didn’t want to pretend you were fine, so you just sent him your location, his ‘ill be right there’ coming just a few seconds after you’d sent your message. you were somewhat relieved that you wouldn’t have to be alone right now, but you also dreaded having to explain what happened. for now, though, you should probably focus on looking a little more like a person and a little less like you’d just spent the past hour crying. even though you had it didn’t have to be obvious like that, so you tried to clean off the streaks of ruined makeup on your cheeks, using your phone as a makeshift mirror. once you were done you tilted your head to see if there was anything you’d missed, but it was okay. it wasn’t good, but it was the best you could do right now. then, you waited.

you’d put in your headphones after roughly two minutes of waiting, way too nervous at every single sound that surrounded you, but that also made you miss mingi shouting your name once he’d arrived, and the sudden appearance of his large frame in your field of vision did surprise you quite some, flinching visibly before you took out your headphones and looked up at him, trying to smile but failing miserably. and he immediately caught on, sitting down next to where you were sitting on the floor and looking at you silently for a moment.

“do you want a hug?” he didn’t know what else to offer, but he wanted to let you know that he was there for you, and you willingly accepted the offer. he wrapped his arms around you then, pulling you a little closer so you could rest your head on his shoulder, and then you continued to sit in silence. it was strangely comforting, having someone there for you even when they had no idea what you were even upset about, offering you their presence and leaving the choice of whether or not you wanted to tell to you. you didn’t want to have to leave this situation, the safety you felt when embraced by mingi, who was much taller than you and who made you feel like, even just by virtue of his height, he could protect you. but you had to, you knew you did, you couldn’t spend all day wherever you were now.

“we should go home.” mingi hummed in response, removing his arms from where they were wrapped around you, and the two of you got up. he looked at you hesitantly - you could tell he wanted to say or ask something, so you cocked your head, encouraging him this way to tell you whatever was on his mind.

“they’re all worried, so i was wondering… i told them i’m going to meet you, but i think they’d feel better if they could see for themselves that you’re in one piece.” you nodded, both as a sign of understanding and to show that it was fine with you to meet them before you went home. he nodded as well, slowly starting to walk and somewhat unsure if you’d actually follow him, but you did.

you walked in silence until you reached the train station, where he bought the ticket for you again. you looked at him, about to protest, but when he told you it was his treat again you just nodded, not having the energy to argue and also glad that you could save the money seeing how very soon you’d need every single won. after that, you were silent again, sitting next to each other with your head on his shoulder, which you’d have been embarrassed and shy about if you weren’t so exhausted. you were exhausted, though, and it took all your energy to not fall asleep on him - but at least you succeeded with that, your eyes still somewhat open when he told you you had to get off at the next stop. you sat up, then, immediately missing the warmth and comfort of him so close to you. the boys made you feel weirdly safe, and you couldn’t tell why it was - maybe it was just the unusual feeling of having friends that cared about you even when you had nothing to offer, but no matter what it was, it was nice.

another thing that was nice was that mingi didn’t make you talk, didn’t even try. he’d talk, but he didn’t mind if you didn’t reply. he’d just resume his story, letting you know that he wasn’t ignoring you but that he didn’t expect anything from you. and with this behaviour you slowly started to feel better, feeling ready to tell what had happened by the point you reached the boys’ place.

“mingi?” it seemed like they’d been waiting for him to come home, shouting his name as soon as he’d closed the door behind you.

“and y/n!”, he replied, entering the living room with you in tow. you were somewhat surprised to find them all already gathered there, but mingi didn’t seem to be. he just plopped down on the couch, patting the space next to him to signal you to sit down as well. so you did, staring at your hands as soon as you’d sat down, unsure how to start. and they were unsure as well, unsure if they should ask you or wait until you started talking by yourself.

“i…”, you started, but then stopped again. this was hard.

“i’m sorry for not taking your calls”, was how you decided on starting. “i just- i couldn’t. everything was so much.” and even though you hadn’t even started actually explaining yet a small sob already escaped from your lips, and you hid your face in shame. you looked up again though when you felt a hand on your knee, giving it a reassuring squeeze, and looked at the boy attached to the hand - mingi. he looked at you with soft, encouraging eyes, and you took a few slow breaths before you started talking again.

“they hate me. in class, one of them spilled water on my classmate’s laptop and broke it, and then she said it was me, that i did it because i was jealous of that classmate’s good grades.” you tried very hard to stay calm while telling, not wanting to break down crying before you even finished explaining why you’d ignored them, why you’d run away from class without telling anyone where you were.

“and everyone believed her because no one saw and she doesn’t have a reason to do it but the way she framed it i do, and now the girl is so angry because she was writing her thesis and i think it’s gone now and also the laptop is broken and i have to replace it and i just… i can’t afford that and i don’t know what to do and- ouch!” mingi’s hand had remained on your knee while you spoke, but the more you elaborated the tighter his grip got, seemingly without him noticing, because when he heard you yelp he immediately took away his hand and apologised profoundly for having hurt you.

“i’m just so fucking angry that she’d do that”, he explained. “you literally haven’t done anything!” and he wasn’t the only angry one, either, all the boys visibly fuming.

“but i can’t do anything about it”, you said, sounding defeated, “but i’m so scared that i’ll be kicked out of the course because i need it for my degree and if i get kicked out due to gross misbehaviour, even when it wasn’t actually me, i’ll lose my scholarship and then i won’t be able to continue studying and i won’t have a degree either and no one will hire me and i’ll end up homeless and in debt and… and…” you were unable to continue, your sobs having completely taken over at this point. you felt pathetic for breaking down like this, but your entire future was on the line just because you’d chosen to pick your friends yourself rather than waiting for approval. it was unfair, and it was horrible, and it reinforced the belief in you that if you didn’t do what others told you to do, the consequences would be horrible.

mingi wrapped his arm around your shoulder, pulling you into his chest - it seemed like out of the eight boys he was the one who’d taken on the role of your protector now, always taking care of you like this, ever since you first met. the others were there as well, of course, but they were more of a silent support as mingi actually pulled you in, and it was okay that way. it worked that way, his deep voice and careful touch being able to calm you down enough that you were able to breathe somewhat regularly again.

“i want to go home now”, you said once the worst was over. you were still sniffling, but you didn’t care. you wanted to go back to your bed, you wanted to hug the teddy bear that you’d owned since you were born, you wanted the comfort of your own home. being here with them was nice, and it had helped you calm down, but your own home, your own bed, was still something different. and it seemed like they could understand that wish to be in a familiar environment, because they just nodded.

“i’ll bring you.” the way he’d said it it didn’t sound like you had a choice, but it was okay. the tall boy had been there for you all afternoon, and he (and the others too, really) would probably feel better if he knew you were home safe and sound. you hummed in response which he correctly interpreted as your okay, because he got up with you and followed you to the door where you stopped to say goodbye and thank them for listening. then you left, the red-haired giant following suit silently.

the train station wasn’t far away, as you knew by now, and the two of you walked next to each other in silence. once there, he paid for your ticket again without a second thought, and while you did feel guilty about it you also were glad he did so. your head rested on his shoulder again during the train ride, something you didn’t even think about anymore; being close to him felt natural, maybe due to the fact that there’d been a lot of good reasons to be close to him in the roughly three days you’d known each other, maybe because he didn’t seem to register it as something noteworthy either.

you didn’t talk during the trip, the first time either of you said anything being when you told him, once you’d gotten off the train, that you were glad he’d brought you, and tried to say goodbye to him unsuccessfully because he told you he’d walk you home unless you’d report him for stalking if he did so. you shook your head, smiling slightly, and started walking. it was once more him who kept the (so far nonexistent) conversation alive, commenting on anything with a child-like wonder in his voice. it sounded like he’d never seen a tree before, or a street, or a house - everything seemed to surprise and somewhat excite him, and in all honesty you thought it was sweet. he managed to distract until you reached your apartment this way, but he noticed the way you tensed up as you unlocked the door. a day ago he’d have thought your fear was an overreaction, and maybe its intensity was, but after what had happened today he was fairly certain it was justified.

“do you want me to go in first?”, he asked as you wouldn’t even fully open the door, obviously scared of what would expect you. you nodded and moved to the side, giving him the option to slip inside. and a couple seconds later he was in front of you again, opening the door widely and telling you that everything was okay. first then did you relax even slightly, entering with careful steps as if you were expecting to jump out of the shadows and murder you. mingi was right, your apartment was fine, but you weren’t. you hated this, hated that you didn’t even feel safe in your own home, and that there was nothing you could do about that.

mingi soon caught on to the fact that even though everything was fine you didn’t seem relaxed at all, looking around like a rabbit expecting the fox to jump out any moment and devour it. and it was your scared expression that made the words leave his mouth before he could stop himself.

“do you want me to stay the night?” you looked at him surprised, both at his words and at the fact that he was still there - you’d forgotten about him in your worry.

“you don’t have to.” you didn’t want to be even more of a bother. you didn’t want him to get annoyed at your scaredy cat-behaviour.

“but do you want me to?”

“you don’t have anything here.” really, you were just trying to come up with excuses for not directly answering his question, because the answer would have been a ‘yes’. yes, you did want him to stay the night, but you didn’t want him to do so because he felt like he had to.

“that’s fine. it’s just a night, and i only have late classes tomorrow. do you want me to?”

you couldn’t stand to look at him as you nodded, feeling weak and vulnerable and like a burden, but he just said ‘okay’, then got out his phone and started typing.

“i’m just letting them know”, he explained when he saw your questioning expression, and you nodded again. you felt slow, tired, and you just wanted to sleep. and yet once more he seemed to know exactly what you were thinking.

“you should go to bed”, he told you softly, “i’ll be right here.”

“you need sleep too!” it was first then you realised that you couldn’t offer him the luxury of choosing his bed for the night, that you couldn’t even offer him the luxury of having anything bigger than a single-person bed. but he didn’t seem to care, nodding.

“just get ready. i’ll wait.” and because you were way too tired to argue about anything at all, you just grabbed your pyjamas from your bed and left for the bathroom to get changed. you got into your pyjamas and wiped the worst stains off your face with a wet washcloth, but didn’t have the energy for anything else. this would have to do for today.

mingi was waiting for you on the floor when you got back, jacket, shirt and shoes huddled together next to him. maybe usually you’d have been a little flushed at him being shirtless, but in this moment all that mattered was getting into bed and sleeping. so you crawled underneath your blanket, moving as close to the wall as possible so he’d be able to still comfortably fit in next to you. he joined, pulling the blanket to cover both of you, and as soon as he’d done so you told him goodnight, him replying with a ‘goodnight’ of his own. he was fairly certain you’d fall asleep right away by how exhausted you seemed, but he found himself surprised when after roughly half an hour you were still tossing and turning.

“you okay?” he didn’t know if this was normal for you or something to be worried about, but he wanted to be sure you weren’t suffering silently just because you didn’t want to bother him.

“tell me something nice”, was what you replied instead of answering his question.

“what do you want to hear?”

“i don’t care. something happy.”

he thought for a moment before he started telling you about his seventh birthday, trying to remember as many details as possible so he’d have something to tell until you’d fallen asleep. his low, calm voice calmed your anxious heartbeat a little, and you stopped shifting so much. you did, however, scoot closer to him subconsciously, your back soon pressed against his chest as you sought out his comforting presence, his warmth. he wasn’t sure if you’d done it on purpose, so he didn’t immediately wrap his arm around you, softly putting his fingertips onto your waist first to wait for your reaction, to see if you’d shy away from his touch. but you did the opposite, grabbing his hand and pressing it close to your chest as if it was a lifeline keeping you from drowning. he just resumed his story, not commenting on it, and you were glad he didn’t. and cuddled up like that his deep, steady voice managed to lull you to sleep.

[ihatebnha]

bruh i struggle every day w who my fav character is </3 but!! i do think that dabi or shiggy would be rlly interesting to read abt simping if you’d want to write abt it <33 also idk what kind of skin u have and not to be a hippie but‼️ tea tree oil legit saved my whole face from acne n i use it everyday but obvs u don’t have to listen to me hehe it’s just what helped me but i hope you find something that works for you bc u deserve the healthiest skin ❤️ also ilyt!! and at least you’re able to set goals for your day even if you don’t follow through with them‼️ but i wouldn’t expect anything less from god ihatebnha <3- ihatebhnaism

i actually have a bunch of simping ideas listed out for dabi, so his should come out eventually! shigaraki is good idea too, i know that one will be fun to think about. i’ve been meaning to write more for him foreverrrrr, but im never able to think of my own ideas for him and instead just end up focusing on the suggestions that people send in for me (so maybe send some in for shiggy *eyes emoji*)... it’s also part of why i’m sorta curious about who others like since bakugo is my most highly requested (i love him but sometimes i want to focus on other characters).... it’s kinda funny bc i feel like a lot of blogs are specific character-centric, in that you can tell who the authors write for the most, but i really genuinely like everyone so i never know what to do... almost as if i dont have a very distinct personal image.. 

anyway who are your guys fave characters?

also tea tree oil is a really good idea! i ran out of lil acne patches so maybe i’ll try it on my skin tonight... its been ages since ive used it that way tho... i have combination skin so it probably wont hurt... and thank u for wishing me healthy skin!! it’s usually pretty okay but new products are tough, as always and i dont think this is just purging or whatever... but anyway thats too much about skincare and not enough about porn lol so i feel like im wasting ppl’s time hahaha... 

but i agree about the goal thing... and even if i dont do things it always helps me to remember what i want to, too.. since it’s so easy to  forget!

[just-zenitsu]

oh that makes me curious... do you think zenitsu was thrown between orphanages and foster homes as a kid? or maybe he was in one until he ran away, either when he eloped or some time before and then lived on the street from then... or did he just live on the streets his whole childhood? ive been wondering this for days and its been on my mind for ages

*deep breath* AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

first of all id like to say that i have like three fic ideas that explore his past (whether it focuses on how he grew up or not) BUT THANK U FOR INDULGING ME GUYS IM DEFINITELY RAMBLING ABT EACH OF THEM NOW… (this is a fucking monster tho. so its under read more)

* @anon THATS A WHOLE ASS MOOD TBH. i spend literal hours at night thinking abt whether he was in an orphanage or a street kid. ive wrote him living in the streets  and getting sent to an orphanage when he was caught stealing. whereas i ALSO have mindless scribbled notes of modern au where his parents left him in an orphanage but bc of bad experiences (and thats putting it lightly) he gets sent to different homes A LOT and eventually gets kicked out at some point, ILL GET TO THAT LATER IN A BIT

* SINCE im trying to NOT write a fic here ill just list down headcanons and stuff bc YEET!!!! and for the sake of convenience lets just say he was both sent to an orphanage and lived as a street kid :”DD

* lets talk abt hcs ive seen first,, jpn fandom mostly all seem to hc him as a street kid who lived by working on odd jobs and the sort. ofc more often than not he just gets the bare amount for payment and the people he works for arent really nice :(( they never have the nicest words to say and sometimes they even hit him. zen sometimes endures it bc its not like he has much of a choice in the end. other times he runs away crying and scared.

* he also doesnt really have a permanent home so he wanders a lot carrying what little stuff he owns (probably a few clothes or a worn-out futon or something)

* he’s taken advantage of a lot,, whether it’d be people tricking him into doing some work saying ‘he’ll be given something good in return’ or something equally vague. he usually wonders why their words sound so kind in comparison to their heartbeats that sound… off,, its not until he’s older that he gets an answer to that question

* bc he cant be picky i like to think that its not that hard for him to sleep somewhere uncomfortable. he also curls up a lot into a ball when he sleeps. he likes being cooped up into small spaces, it makes him feel safe and that no one can get him. 

* was initially very verbal about his hearing condition (something along the lines of saying ‘i heard you say that ____’ or ‘hey, do you hear that’ etc etc.) people think hes creepy and/or he’s lying most of the time. he eventually doesnt really wanna talk about it anymore once someone came this close to threatening to cut his ears off.

* i think we can say that zen lived in the city? its why he likes expensive things and the sort, and he has a lot of stock knowledge about how the city works and stuff like that, not to say that he’s ever really participated in it 

* as a child (and even as he got older) zenitsu’s favorite season is spring, autumn being a close second. he likes spring bc the air is fresh and he can find flowers in the outskirts of the city, surviving despite growing in cracked concrete. he makes little flower crowns out of them!

* he likes autumn bc the way the leaves change is pretty! but its only second to spring bc the flowers usually wilt by then and he gets cold :(

* he doesnt like winter simply because it is VERY cold. he dislikes summer the most tho bc the sound of literal thousands of cicadas give him a lot of headaches aaa 

* is very used to being hungry when he goes to sleep. he makes due with it as best as he can. one of his fondest memories is a frail old man who owns a sweet bun cart that gives him buns in exchange for a lower price than what he actually sells them for. on a day where he thinks the old man looks more tired and quiet than usual, zenitsu takes it upon himself to give him a flower crown. 

* unfortunately he never is able to give it, bc the next day, or days after that, zenitsu never sees him again.

* he has experience bein a sneaky little thief! its the reason on why he can easily take sweets without permission at the butterfly estate in canon hehe

* but its this very same reason that he gets sent to an orphanage, he gets caught! and bc he is a Literal Child. they send him to foster care woohoo

* (GOD THIS IS GETTING SO LONG BUT PLS DEAL WITH MY RAMBLING….)

* i dont have a clear idea on how zenitsu couldve been treated in an orphanage. but all in all, he’s just very grateful to be given some kind of semblance of a home and food

* he learned how to speak (barely) when he lived in the streets, but they teach the basic minimum and suddenly he’s learning all these sorts of things

* the people who took care of them arent the most affectionate, neither are the kids he lives with. zenitsu’s crying is often really looked down upon, he tries to stop but he can’t really help it. he’s not really anyones favorite person here

* there’s a small somewhat neglected garden in the orphanage’s backyard. he spends his time here when everyones playing and no one wants to play with him

* every time someone comes to adopt a kid he cries and begs for them to adopt him whenever they show a spark of interest towards him. it goes as bad as u think it does, they dont like that type of kid, and as such they assume everyone else is like that and leaves w/o taking anyone. zenitsu isnt allowed to eat dinner in these nights ;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

* bc of the latter reason, kids gang up and bully him a lot. zenitsu tries to go along w it bc its the ONLY time anyone ever pays attention to him, but at the end of the day the only thing he gets is scratches and bruises from being pushed around and lots of words that hurt his heart

* (WAHH. OPK OK IM SORRY IM SAD NOW AINNFJKKJFDFHKH..)

* people think he’s a nuisance more or less. and then he gets sent to varied foster homes again and again bc he’s ‘difficult to deal with’ and going back to the first bullet point, he gets kicked out again wAH. at this point he might have been 15 and its when he starts trying to date girls, despite hearing everyone’s sounds of deceit and lies time and time again, he still goes through with it. and the rest is canon, 

OK. thats basically my brain vomit about zenitsu backstory. i am deceased and IM JUST PURELY FROTHING AT THE MOUTH EVERYTIME I THINK ABT HIM KDFKLGDFDGHF. thank u sm if u read this far, i appreciate it ;_______;

[gayregis]

which characters are trans this is a scientific inquiry

all of them except vilgefortz and leo bonhart

ok ok jokes, ill go more in depth... some of this is taken from things ive written before but not posted. also for anyone reading this im non bee nary so know that im not trying to describe the experiences of different identities in first-person, i’m basing this off of both my own and my friends’ experiences... none of this is “OMG YES CHARACTER ANGST >:))” but rather depicting personal struggles in fictional characters, so just know that  the more difficult subjects that may be covered are not there just to see the character in pain, but rather to think about their eventual resilience against it and development afterwards

for geralt and yennefer i have more specific reasons why i think being transgender actually fits with their canonical characters & related story arcs, and then for the rest i have headcanons and maybe some reasoning but not a lot.

geralt: geralt already represents how a struggle with toxic masculinity and expectations of masculinity can influence one who wants to be seen as masculine to deny and bury their emotions. him being trans develops upon the aspect of his struggle with emotions, ive seen my friends who are transmasculine / myself when i used to ID as transmasculine struggle with showing emotions bc of feeling like you’re going to be misgendered if you shed a single tear. in canon, we already learn that kaer morhen has a bit of a macho culture (just fyi eskel and lambert and coen are trans too now, don’t go getting any idea that those guys are cis) and i believe that the “witchers have no emotions” thing is like 5% actual biology and 95% being raised to fight and not to feel. vesemir is a good father but he just wasn’t very emotionally nurturing, it’s the caste’s way of raising kids that geralt breaks out of.

i think geralt’s self-image also speaks a lot to the feelings of harsh internal transphobia. he constantly others himself from others and feels like people view him as different, which is metaphorical for any marginalized group under the sun, but also is very common for lgbt ppl. again this is smth ive really struggled with within the past few years so im just projecting/know what it feels like and feel that how geralt sees himself in canon is similar to a view suffering from internalized transphobia.

geralt's character already redefines manhood because he has to learn what it means to be a good father. and i think him being trans would be representative of his constant learning and growth as a person, yet also somewhat involved with his self loathing and feeling like just Him Existing is an affront ... but of course he unlearns this with time and love from others and all of his character development

yennefer: yennefer’s whole backstory revolves around defining who she is and defying the people who mistreated her and told her she was nothing. canonically yennefer of vengerberg is the story of the successful self-made woman... her life as janka she would rather forget, no one calls her by that name, and no one ever would because its not who she is nor who i think she ever was. 

shes incredibly strong-willed and knows what she wanted from life but some things are terrifying to reach out for, like love and acceptance. yennefer has a conflict with love and being loved because that was never a safe topic for her ... (also sapkowski handled this specifically poorly imo, but:) yennefer canonically struggles with being loved for who she is. i think she deals so much with her previous abuse and again, expectations from parents, and coming to terms with the fact that she survived it all. also this isnt even touching upon her arc regarding motherhood. wanting to give a child your everything and everything that you never had... the love and kindness that no one gave you...

ciri: ciri hesitated to ever identify with “girl” or “boy,” she’s also i think the representation of childhood in general, she’s naturally curious about gender presentation as she ages and just never really cares to commit to gender. i think she’d say she was a girl but only reluctantly bc she just doesn’t care much.

dandelion: [from his TV Tropes page:]

he’s an artist and a musician, he’s not gonna be cishet...

ok in a more serious context i think he’s a nonbinary guy, i think him being trans might explain why he has way more friendships than relationships with family members. dandelion, like yennefer, is also someone that had to define who he was for himself, i mean for one his stage persona of dandelion is entirely an artist’s creation/hyperbole of himself, i think he also had to think abt his inner identity too

his gender is also just “your friend that comes to your house and eats all ur chips and drinks all ur beer and passes out on top of you on the couch”

milva: ok unfortunately i currently think milva is the token non-trans friend (she’s nonbinary just doesnt think of herself as trans) but it’s only because her major arc in baptism of fire revolves around her pregnancy and miscarriage and just bc she is not trans doesn’t mean she doesn’t go through her own difficult struggling process surrounding her womanhood. she struggles enormously throughout the series and in her backstory with defining herself between two rigid identities: the feminine maria and the cutthroat milva. in her talk with geralt, she reveals how she feels trapped between these two identities and feels like they cannot coexist. i feel like she’s a nonbinary/gender non-conforming butch* lesbian whose struggles with sexuality intersect her struggles with gender and what it means to her to be a gnc woman. also you have to consider that milva was raised in a small village in lower sodden so she understood gender in the very strict roles ascribed to men and women, so she felt like she couldn’t be a woman unless she was this very traditional idea of what a woman is “supposed to be like,” which she’s both been trying to shape herself to be and also running away from simultaneously. she learns to accept herself within the hansa bc they love and support her for who she is, and she doesn’t need to be strictly feminine or masculine to be understood by them

* i know the terms nonbinary and gnc and butch didn’t exist in the 1260s tyvm, i’m just saying this as how i interpret her in a modern context

regis: gender is a human sociological construct so basically don’t ask him unless you’re prepared to listen for 20 minutes. vampires can exist noncorporeally so they can exist without gender, also i hc the telepathic vampiric language is nongendered as it’s a transmission of pure thought, will, and force, so it doesn’t even use any grammar. i also hc that vampires just appear the way they feel in terms of appearance and age (e.g., regis at around 300 when he died still looked 25 bc he was as stupid as a 25 year old, now he’s calmer and understands more, so he looks middle-aged). when chilling out with humans regis will be referred to as a man bc that’s just how he appears but it’s an identity he had to learn about and adopt, not something he was assigned. most vampires look androgynous anyways bc they just feel androgynous, how are you gonna feel a gender when you don’t know what a gender is... if you HAD to understand him with human labels / put it in a modern context (like if i was making an modern real life AU) i’d say he’s a nonbinary trans man. 

cahir: much like geralt i think cahir’s story is one of living up to expectations, but cahir’s actually takes it a step further because his major motivation in his backstory is trying to prove to his mother that he can be a good son that will make her proud and gain honor for the family... he seeks validation from external sources but faces ruin when he learns that war is not the way to prove one’s prowess and skill

angouleme: shes trans and i simply say so bc shes very cool and funny and i dont think a cis person could be this cool and funny. also i think the story of a runaway teen who was abandoned by her biological family and found solace in a new family is both very good and featured in a lot of trans ppl’s narratives. she kind of exudes this “im finally at a point in my life where i’m safe and cared for, i can start HRT now, let’s gooOOoooOOooo” energy.