#ive got. several things i need to clean. and i really need to get the rust off of the tin i want to turn into a travel altar too

[coriander-candlesticks]

Found some stuff for the altars today!! I don't have photos of them yet; I want to get photos of all the things I've been collecting after I wash them all, which will have to wait until I'm able to get my room cleaned & re-set up. But I finally have something to burn things like bay leaves in now, and I have a teacup to use for libations & liquid offerings for Aphrodite!

[lesbiten]

i told my roommate who works at the same clinic as me about one of my coworkers who has done very little both times ive worked with her and spent most of her time on her phone while i was still doing shit, and she told my boss what was going on so now my boss sent me home with a checklist to fill out of all the stuff she claimed she did but actually didnt

[tongue-like-a-razor]

Less Talk | Part V

Jake Seresin x F!Reader

Summary: Jake can't stand Bradley's best friend. What's more, he's probably in love with her, which really pisses him off.

CW: swearing, pining, unresolved sexual tension, slow af burn

Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV | Masterlist

Jake is watching you shift your weight back and forth in your heels with a mixture apprehension and exhilaration. You’ve got your arms crossed over your chest as though you’re severely irritated, but you haven’t left yet. Which is a good sign. He’s barely looking at your legs; smooth and shiny and perfectly illuminated by the string lights adorning the patio of the Hard Deck.

He’s still wrapping his head around the fact that you are, as of five or so minutes ago, unattached. You’re single. Jake could kiss you right now. You’d probably punch him but he almost thinks it might be worth it.

He shuts his eyes briefly, trying to clear his mind of your pouting lips, and your pretty hair, and your goddamn legs. “So,” he says finally. “You want a ride?”

You look up at him sharply. “From you?” you ask in mild disgust.

Jake takes comfort in the fact that your aversion seems relatively minimal considering he just sucker punched your boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend. He gives you a flat look. “No, from the Tooth Fairy,” he retorts sarcastically. “Yes, from me.”

Your mouth parts as though you’re about to say something but, instead, you graze your teeth over your bottom lip. Jake, in turn, sort of forgets how to exhale for a moment. “Okay,” you say quietly. “Thanks.”

It takes him a moment before he realizes that you’ve somehow, miraculously agreed to his offer but, when he does, he springs into action. “Let’s go,” he says, hoping the casual words are enough to offset the tension in his tone. He extends an arm to point you in the direction of his truck.

You make your way to the passenger door and he follows you, pulling on the handle and holding his hand out to help you climb inside.

“It’s a bit of a step,” he says as you lift your foot into the cab.

You give him a cryptic look before placing your hand in his, a faint smile materializing on your face in response to the gesture. Jake cautiously returns your smile, not quite ready to let his guard down.

You lean your weight into him as you lift yourself off the ground and Jake manages to keep you steady despite his attention being almost entirely usurped by your ass which hovers invitingly in front of his face before you land gently on the seat.

“Thanks,” you say.

Jake breathes out wearily, resting one arm over the open door and the other on top of the roof as he peers into the vehicle. “You okay?” he asks.

You eye him suspiciously. “Yeah, why?”

Jake squints slightly, running his tongue across his teeth in thought. “You haven’t insulted my ride yet,” he says. “You know this thing is a gas guzzler, right?” He pats the roof of the truck.

You smile at him. “Well, give me a minute,” you respond, getting comfortable in the seat. “Let me get situated.”

Jake chuckles, pulling on the seatbelt behind your head and placing it in your hand. “Take all the time you need,” he says, briefly meeting your gaze.

You glance around the cab which, to Jake’s relief, he just recently cleaned. “I mean, if you want my opinion” – you say, but Jake cuts you off with a laugh.

“I think you and I both know,” he says, sliding your seat back to give you more leg room, “that I can’t get enough of your opinions.”

Your smile widens as you glance at him in amusement. “The clearance of your pickup makes it especially dangerous for other vehicles on the road.”

Jake raises his eyebrows. “It makes it especially safe for its passengers in a collision,” he says.

“For you,” you reply pointedly. “Your bed sits so high off the ground, it can go right through somebody’s windshield.”

Jake scoffs. “They should get a truck, then.”

You sigh. “It always comes down to ‘what’s best for Jake?’, doesn’t it?”

He blinks at you. “I don’t like this game anymore.”

You purse your lips and look away, buckling your seatbelt. “You asked for it.”

“I just thought we could talk about fuel economy or the bumpy ride,” he says, feeling slightly deflated. “It certainly ain’t no Mustang.”

You glance at him curiously. “It’s definitely a little rough around the edges,” you say.

Jake takes this as a personal attack and immediately starts defending his truck. “Might be a bit less polished than you’re used to,” he says. “But it’s a hell of a lot tougher.”

You raise your eyebrows. “Mustang’s probably faster.”

Jake narrows his eyes. “You like fast?” he asks.

You let out a laugh. “Not typically.”

Jake pauses to ponder over what that might mean. Then, he gives his head a slight shake and continues, “Truck has more power.”

“Mustang is a muscle car.”

Jake stares at you irritably. “Do you even know what that means?”

“It means it’s just as powerful as your truck with less weight to carry.”

“Truck has higher torque,” Jake retorts.

“What the fuck is torque?”

“The truck is bigger,” Jake continues, ignoring your question as he affectionately strokes the roof of the cab.

You press your lips together to hold back a grin. “Are we still talking about the car?”

Jake glances back at you with a smirk. “Truck’s more reliable,” he says.

Your eyes meet his as you consider his words at length. Finally, you look away, settling deeper into the seat. “Won’t know until you give me a ride, will I?”

Jake nods with a soft chuckle and closes your door. He stands for a moment outside the passenger side door, marvelling at the fact that each successive conversation he has with you seems to be his favorite one yet. He walks around the back of the truck, spinning his keys around his index finger as his heart performs a series of well-meaning flips in his chest, to which he doesn’t take too kindly. He climbs into his seat and sticks the key into the ignition, glancing over at you with a mischievous grin. “Mustang probably doesn’t even have a key,” he says.

You snort. “It’s called a key fob.”

“Oh, is that what it’s called?” Jake asks facetiously, turning over the engine.

“Starts the car all the same,” you respond with a shrug.

Jake reaches out to grab the back of your headrest as he looks over his shoulder to reverse. “I prefer the classic key in lock scenario. Guess I’m old school like that.”

You give him a withering look. “You would.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks, turning out of the parking lot.

“I mean, the idea of inserting a phallic object into a fitted slot would entice a simple-minded man such as yourself,” you say smugly. “But, just so you know, there are other ways to get a motor running.”

Jake eyes you with amusement. “Enlighten me.” He would love to see how far you could take this metaphor.

You shrug. “You could hot-wire. Bypass the lock cylinder altogether.”

Jake laughs. “Depends on the car, of course,” he notes.

You shake your head with a chuckle. “I think this is the weirdest conversation I’ve ever had.”

Jake glances at you with a smirk, his gaze slipping briefly to watch you rest your hands over your bare thighs. He grips the steering wheel tighter to refrain from reaching over and placing a palm over your leg. “Every conversation I have with you is fucking weird, Y/N,” he responds.

You scoff. “You’re blaming me for the weird?”

Jake grins, watching the road ahead. “You’re the weird one.” Out of the corner of his eye, he sees you cross your arms. “C’mon, you’re not offended, are you? Weird is good,” he says. “Weird is interesting.”

You turn your head to look at him and he grimaces at his slip. “You think I’m interesting?” you ask.

“I didn’t say that.”

“You said that I’m weird and that weird is interesting,” you reason. “Ergo –”

“Please don’t say ‘ergo’.” Jake cringes.

You reach across the console to smack his shoulder.

Jake ducks with a laugh. “Don’t hit the driver!”

“Don’t be an ass, then,” you retort.

Jake steals a glance at you with a smirk. You’re shaking your head but you’re smiling, so he forms the split-second decision to make a detour, turning toward the beach.

“Where are you going?” you ask, noticing the change in course.

“It’s a surprise,” Jake responds, eyeing you cautiously.

You lean forward and squint into the darkness. “Are you heading for the beach?”

“What part of ‘it’s a surprise’ don’t you understand?”

You slump back into your seat with a resigned sigh. “Fine, I’ll be patient.”

“Sure, you will,” Jake replies skeptically, turning into a parking lot.

You peek out of your window at the stairs in the distance leading down toward the water. “Are you planning on going for a swim, Seresin?”

Jake pulls on the handbrake and takes the key out of the ignition. He looks over at you with a grin. “Not without you,” he says.

You start laughing. “No way.”

He shrugs. “Another time, then.”

“What are we doing here?”

“Well, I feel kind of bad for ruining your night,” he says. “Thought maybe I could make it up to you.” He pulls on his doorhandle and hops out of the cab. Walking around, he finds that you’ve already got your door open and your leg out of the truck, a heeled foot dangling about fifteen inches off the pavement. He reaches in to take your hand.

“Thanks,” you say, wrapping your fingers around his and stepping out.

Jake pulls a blanket out from the backseat before shutting the door while you watch him with furrowed brows. “Come,” he says, ushering you toward the back of the truck. He walks around back and lowers the tailgate, then he throws the blanket down onto the bed. “Hop on,” he says.

You look at him suspiciously. “Why?”

“To play duck, duck, goose, what do you think?” he responds flatly.

You stare at him, unamused. “I don’t know what to think,” you say pointedly, but you turn around and place your hands on the tailgate.

Jake grabs your waist as you hop and helps you land your bottom onto the blanket. Then, he jumps onto the bed and sits himself down beside you.

“Now what?” you ask, a note of cynicism in your voice.

“Now, we count the stars.” Jake lets out a sigh and lays his back down onto the truck bed, resting his hands over his chest.

You glance down at him in disbelief. “You’re not fucking serious.”

“Well, not about the counting part.”

You lift your eyebrows and lower yourself backward onto your elbows, still watching Jake. “This is absurd,” you say.

Jake glances at you with a serious expression. “Well, don’t watch me. The show’s up there.”

You look up to see a meteor cut across the inky sky and gasp. “Oh my god! Did you see that?” you squeal, pointing upward.

Jake laughs. “I saw about five while you were sulking.”

“Wow,” you breathe, staring at the night sky as the meteor shower continues overhead. “It’s so beautiful.”

“Get comfortable,” Jake says, nudging your elbow with his shoulder. “This only happens a few times a year.”

You rest your back on the blanket and Jake glances at you furtively as you blink up in awe. “You cold?” he asks. “Want to wrap the blanket around yourself?” he offers.

“Yeah, sure,” you respond absently.

Jake lifts himself onto his forearm and leans over you to grab the edge of the blanket. You glance up at him as he reaches and Jake, thrown completely off his game by the proximity of your face, freezes and stares at you like an idiot. There are about a dozen things he could say or do that might persuade you to dismiss the meteor shower in favor of less dignified pursuits. But Jake is convinced that, even if you were to temporarily let your guard down, you’re not the type of girl he can just get out of his system. And, truthfully, at this point, he probably wouldn’t want to.

You look away first, your gaze focusing instead on his arm, still stretched over your head, mid-reach. Jake fumbles with the corner of the blanket, suddenly aware that he’s been perched over your body for a solid thirty seconds, and pulls it over you as he moves away. “Thanks,” you mutter.

Jake squints up at the sky with a partially suppressed sigh and brings his hands behind his head. “We won’t stay for long if you’re uncomfortable,” he says. “Let me know if it gets too cold.”

You turn your head to look at him, but he keeps his gaze squarely on the heavens. A moment later, however, you’re shifting yourself closer and Jake, without a second thought, extends his arm out so that you could rest your head on his shoulder. He nearly jumps out of his skin when you drape an icy leg over his, cozying up to the warmth of his body. “I’m comfortable,” you say quietly, tucking your frozen hands under his back.

Jake winces.

“Sorry!” You laugh.

He takes his hand out from under his head and holds it out for you. “Here,” he says, reaching for your hands. Tentatively, you put your balled up fists into his palm and he closes his fingers around them. “Better?” he asks, resting your cold hands over his chest.

“Mm-hmm,” you respond softly, and Jake all but melts.

After a short while of watching meteors streak across the sky without really seeing them, Jake brings his arm up around your shoulder, gently pulling you closer. “You warming up?” he asks.

He feels your body shift further into his side. “Yeah,” you say.

Jake swallows nervously and clears his throat. “Sorry I punched your… Mustang.”

You snort. “Sure, you are.”

He smiles. “Well, I am sorry that it upset you.”

“That’s funny,” you mutter. “You usually go out of your way to upset me.”

Jake cringes. “That makes me sound like an asshole.”

 “Hate to break it to you, Seresin,” you respond with a chuckle.

Jake purses his lips. “I guess I deserve that.”

You stir and then sit up slowly, looking down at him. “I accept your apology,” you say.

He nods and lifts himself up. “You ready to get going?”

“Probably should.” You look down at the clock on your phone. “It’s getting pretty late.”

Jake hops off the bed of the truck and then helps you get down, perhaps holding your waist a little tighter than necessary in the process. He walks you toward the passenger door.

“One time I asked Mustang,” you say, glancing over your shoulder at Jake with a playful grin, “if we could drive out into the middle of nowhere and lounge on the hood of his car and just, I don’t know, see if we can make out any constellations.” Jake watches you purse your lips and lower your head. You let out a bitter laugh and Jake furrows his eyebrows. “He said there’s no way in hell we could sit on his car because we could scratch the paint or leave a dent or –”

But before you could finish your thought, Jake bends down to hook his arm under your knees and you yelp in alarm as he lifts you off the ground and sets you down on the hood of his truck. You hold your arms out to balance yourself when he lets go and turn to look at him in shock, hanging your legs off the side. Jake leans into the hood, his arms on either side of your legs. “He didn’t let you sit on his car?” he asks in disgust.

You chuckle lightly and shake your head. “He wouldn’t even let me lean on it.”

Jake stares at you, bewildered. “You are really making me want to key that damn Mustang.”

Your eyes widen but your smile remains. “Are you kidding? That would be so much worse than beating him up. That car is his most prized possession.”

Jake glances over your face with a mixture of pity and disbelief. “And he had you.”

You scoff. “I’m not a possession.”

Jake patiently holds your gaze, confident that Mustang saw you as exactly that, and, prompted by a flicker of courage – or perhaps weakness – he lets his thumb graze the bare skin of your outer thigh. He studies you carefully, preparing himself for a wide range of possible reactions, but you don’t move a muscle. Your eyes bore into his, effectively disrupting every thought process in his head while simultaneously setting fire to his insides. He wants you so badly, he’s probably never wanted anything more in his life. And yet, even within his reach, you continue to be unattainable.

He exhales, finally looking away. Jake isn’t the kind of guy who cares terribly about right and wrong. In fact, a state of obvious vulnerability would be something he might have previously taken advantage of. But not tonight. And not with you.

Jake backs away from the hood, leaving you sitting solo. “Go ahead and scratch it up,” he says nonchalantly, as though the paint job is still the only topic of conversation. “You ain’t gonna hurt it.” He glances up to see you smiling at him and grins back. “I could put you on the roof if you like. You could dance on it. Just don’t fall off.”

You laugh. “Is this all part of your ploy to prove that the truck is superior?”

Jake smirks. “Have I convinced you?”

“I mean, it’s not without its flaws,” you say, tapping on the hood with your palm while you swing your feet.

Jake raises his eyebrows. “Well, completely flawless would be boring.”

You nod. “Let’s just say I’m pleasantly surprised.”

Jake chuckles, shaking his head. “I’ll take it.”

Read Part 6

A/N: Wooh hope you guys liked this one!! Someone requested stargazing and Hangman for my 3k celebration last week and it was so hard for me to not be like just wait for the next chapter of Less Talk! XD Love you guys!!

Muah!

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[sleepyfan-blog]

Five + One

Author’s Note: This is set before Cedric was brought to Ancient Terra! I hope that you enjoy this. Masterlist of BT shenanigans here. Thanks to @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan for allowing me to borrow her OC Jerahmiel!

Tagged: @egrets-not-regrets @kit-williams @bleedingichorhearts @i-am-a-dragon34 @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan 

Warnings: blood, violence, murder, medical terminology, medical practices, please ask me to tag something if I missed it/something bothers you 

Summary: Five times Cedric was able to save injured Brothers and one time he didn’t. 

Ansen limped into the med-tent that Cedric as working in and leaning heavily on Malachai, who had helped him get back to the temporary encampment where injured marines and other Imperial Forces could be tended to. The system they were fighting in was embroiled in a huge border war between The IMperium and the duplicitous forces of a new but irritatingly persistent xeno race.

Cedric looks him over, a small frown appearing on his face as he instructed the pair “Please sit on the exam table, Ansen. Are you injured as well, Mal?”

Malachai shook his head “Not really/ I brought Ansen over due to his fucked up leg. My right hand is damaged, but nothing that an hour or so of letting it heal on it’s own won’t fix. My sqord broke and I need to get a new weapon while this one is being reforged.”

“Alright then. Be sure to stop by the food tent before you leave.” Cedric responded, already starting to look Ansen over.

“Heard. See you both later.” Malachai answered with a cheerful wave as he headed off.

“How’d you get injured? Whatever injured your leg it doesn’t seemed to have cut through your armor at all, somehow. Perhaps some kind of phasing technology? How much feeling do you have in this leg?” Cedric asked as he swiftly removed the other’s leg armor and began to clean, suture and bandage his wounds “These stitches are absorbable, so you need not come back to have them removed. If you notice signs of infection or if one or more of your wounds opens up again, please return for treatment.”

“.. One of the xenos cowards managed to sneak up behind me in the bushes while I was taking a piss. Malachai decapitated the motherless bastard while I put my armor back on. It was only after that I realized the blue fuck had managed to stab me several times before it’d been killed.” Ansen huffed. His helmet was on, but Cedric knew the other was blushing.

“That is some shit luck, brother. Keep your weight off of that leg for an hour or so and you’ll be combat ready again… So long as you don’t get stabbed while pissing.” Cedric consoled his brother, just barely able to keep a straight face. He was not going to laugh. Stealthy, cowardly xenos attacks could happen to anyone. “Any other injuries?”

“Other than my pride and reputation? No, not really.” Ansen grumbled.

Cedric patted his fellow Primaris on the shoulder. “Go forth and slay the alien scum in an hour, brother dearest. You’ll be able to reclaim lost honor that way.” 

“... Thanks Cedric.” Ansen sighed as he got up and hobbled out of the med tent.

~

It did not take long before another Brother was brought to Cedric in need of patching up.

Lieutenant Aldenbrech was rushed onto the surgical table by his squadmates. Cedric immediately started an IV drop as the amount of blood gushing out of the nasty wound  along the firstborn’s abdomen and the ashen tint to his skin spoke of a concerning amount of blood loss, even for an Astartes. The second thing he did was swiftly clean the wound and stitch up the major artery that had been pierced, his hands stone-steady.

Cedric then had to suction the blood that had pooled in the lieutenant’s abdominal cavity, battling the other’s own high healing factor to do so thoroughly enough to ensure that no blood remained where it shouldn’t be to cause trouble later.

“Are you certain that you only want mild local anesthetics? This is going to take some time and it won’t be pleasant in the least, sir.” Cedric asked, a medium-high dose of morpha held in one hand, as he continued to tend to the other’s injuries.

“I want to get back into the fight as soon as possible. A large dose of a heavy anesthetic like that will take me out of the fight for longer than I’m willing to wait and recuperate. I must get back onto the battlefield as soon as possible.” Lieutenant Aldenbrech grumbled, shifting just a little on the surgical table.

“Sir you will need to take the next twenty four hours to recover… Ideally, you should take forty-eight hours to recover, but I am well aware of the fact that the xenos scum are showing no signs of stopping the invasion of this world.” Cedric warned the other marine.

“Are my guts back in place?” The lieutenant demanded a heavy scowl on his face as he looked up at Cedric.

“Yes, the wound wasn’t wide enough to spill organs, nor intestines sir. Bit-” Cedric answered, sighing internally at how stubborn the older marine was being.

Aldenbrech interrupted him “Then pull the IV needle out of my arm. I need to be out there now!”  He shifted, as if to get off of the table. He sat up quickly and nearly fell back against the table, his skin going an ashen color “I told you none of the heavy medications!”

“And I obeyed your orders, sir. But you need to wait until the IV has finished at least. You’ve lost several listers of blood on your way to treatment and all that blood needs replacing, or you won’t have the strength to stand, much less fight.” Cedric pointed out, suppressing the annoyed sigh that threatened to escape him. 

“You don’t understand! My apprentice Dylies… He was… He was cut down by one of the xenos commanders. He took a blow meant for me, and I must avenge him!” The lieutenant hisses, eyes flashing with determination and desperation.

“I can increase how much it infuses into you at one time by a certain amount, but you must wait. You can’t avenge Dylies if you’re about to go into the Emperor’s Embrace yourself, sir.  Dylies would want you to take care of yourself before avenging him” Cedric quietly reminded the firstborn marine. He was pushing aside his own grief at the loss of a Primaris Brother. It was likely that more would fall before the xenos threat were driven from this system. His job was to tend to the living.

Lieutenant Aldenbrecht huffed but nodded, still disgruntled but he said “... YOu have a point. How long must I wait?”

“Three hours sir. However the window of time where you need to be monitored by an Apothecary for possible allergic or other negative reactions has passed. SO long as you keep the IV pole with you and allow the infusion to continue as it is currently set, you may walk about the base camp and tend to light duties as you feel capable of doing them, sir.” Cedric  responded, aware that the officer was likely to be needed in the ongoing tactical planning and execution meetings.

“Good. I’ll come back if I start feeling worse, or more likely, when it’s done infusing.” the lieutenant rumbled, nodding as he heaved himself up onto his feet and slowly shuffled out of the tent, followed by his squadmates.

~

Olivar carried Lestras into Cedric’s medical tent, skidding to a halt from the dead sprint that he had galloped into the space with. Lestras had been carried in on Olivar’s back, and their breathing was fast and shallow.

Some of their wounds were immediately apparent to the young Apothecary as he grabbed the wound cleanser and burn ointment “What happened?” cedric asked as his rock-steady hands swiftly took off the rest of Lestras’ ruined chest plate and greaves before he started to clean the other’s extensive and bubbling burn and laceration wounds.

“Xenos bastards implanted bombs in some of the mortal civilians they were tormenting and that our squad had been tasked with rescuing.” Olivar answered bluntly, a slight shudder running through the other Primaris Marine “Lestras spotted the surgical markings on the affected civilians and separated them from the rest of the group… He’d managed to get most of them away from the untainted civilians when the bombs were triggered.”

Lestras looked up at Cedric from where they lay on the table, eyes glassy with shock and pain “Oww…” He mumbles “Everything hurts.”

Cedric’s eyes softened a little as he injected them with a moderate dose of morpha. They were going to need it, as cleaning burn wounds felt truly awful for the patient in question. “Tell me when the pain killer kicks in. You will be able to tell with how much I gave you.”

Lestras let out an agonized laugh through cracked and bleeding lips “That bad, Cedric? We’ve been taught that pain and suffering is good for the body and soul.”

“But excess of anything attracts the attention of the foul despoilers. Burn wound treatment is going to be miserable, even with morpha helping you with the pain. There’s no need to go looking for more Les.” Cedric reminded them kindly.

Lestras nodded, closing their eyes for a couple of moments. Their body relaxed and a soft sigh left them “Ohh… You gave me some of the really good stuff… Big ouch impending then?”

“Yes. There is a lot of wound debridement in your immediate future.” Cedric warned his brother. WIth how fast Primaris Marines healed, for Lestras’ health and safety, ,the first few layers of burned flesh needed to be debrided off in order to encourage even, healthy growth of the other’s injured tissues. Cedric looked over to Olivar “Unless you are injured as well, I would suggest that you head out, Olivar. This is going to be a very unpleasant process.” 

Olivar nodded “I’m going to get something to eat, then find an outgoing squad to keep up the fight. May the god emperor guide and protect you both,”

“Oww…” Lestras sighed as he internally braced himself for the agony that he wos about to endure.

“Tell me when the morpha starts to wear off. This process is going to take hours.” Cedric warned his sibling.

“Okay Cedric, I promise. Give me a few moments to get into a meditative state and I’ll be ready for this trial.” Lestras murmured.

Cedric nodded, watching his sibling and started once they had achieved that internal state.

~

Brother Felixald was brought into Cedric’s medical tent on a stretcher, carried there by his squadmates. All five of the firstborn marines were in varying states of injury, but Felixald was unconscious and barely breathing.

One of his legs was gone from the knee down with a makeshift tourniquet in place to keep him from bleeding out. Cedric immediately began assessing the five older marines, suggesting ”You two should seek immediate help. THose puncture wounds look like they need  immediate assistance… I think you’ve been poisoned, from the way those wounds look and smell.” Cedric was already getting the cauterization tool ready as he assessed the bloody and raw leg stump, in case he needed to cut off more to ensure that the older marine would heal properly.

The two firstborns he suggested to leave did so immediately. The other two marines sat down heavily on the far side of the tent. One of them asked “Do you want us to recount how we got the injuries, or would you rather we stayed quiet while you take care of Feli, and get report when it’s our turn?” Brother Nulik asked.

“His most obvious injury shouldn’t take me long. Sir, I am going to administer a dose of morpha, as cauterization hurts like hell. Injecting now.” Cedric answered, speaking mostly to his barely conscious patient.

“Have… Ontel. Need to share.” Brother Felixald managed out, his grey-brown eyes flittering open as he stared up desperately into Cedric’s face “No morpha! Need a clear… Fuck! I do feel better. The xenos! They.. They are camouflaging themselves. It’s how I got this way.”

“The intel will be shared immediately. What are they pretending to be?” Cedric soothed his patient as he carefully cleaned and sanitized the older marine’s recently exploded or pehrpss cut off leg stump before he applied the cauterization tool. The sizzle of heat against wet and teh unpleasant smell of burning flesh was an eye-watering stench that Cedric had long become used to. He makes a quick note in the other’s file flagging him for an immediate prosthetic fitting.

“Some of them look like Astartes from an unknown chapter… Others took the colors of the ULtramarines. Their duplicity was revealed when the fuckers tried to kill us. God-Emperor damn them!” Brother Felixald growled, his exhaustion and the morpha causing him to slur his words together a little.

Cedric dutifully sent that urgent bit of intel off to his mentor to handle as he continued to batch up the badly injured marine and his two remaining squadmates. “I have informed Apothecary Xonfried, who will ensure that this information is disseminated quickly. Is there anything that you or your squadmates would like to report?”

Nulik and Bekith both shook their heads “No, Apothecary. That’s the relevant part of what happened, other than the numbers of foul xenos we murdered.”

“Alright. You two are free to go, and they’ve got the food-tent up and running.. Brother Felixald, you’ll need to stay for a bit as you’ve lost a significant portion of blood, and I’m going to start you on an infusion to get your volume back up to what it should be.” Cedric murmured.

“Aye, I can tell by how the world spins unpleasantly beneath me.” Felixald answered, laying back on the table and letting Cedric care for him properly as his squadmates headed off to get something to eat.

~

Cedric was carefully re-sanitizing his workspace when he heard the tell-tale sounds of running astartes headed in his direction. The young Apothecary swiftly finished cleaning, the coppery tang of blood and the chemical-bitter scent of stressed Marine hitting Cedric. 

A half-dozen Astartes rushed into his medical tent, carrying Brother-sergeant Jerahmiel between them on a stretcher. The firstborn Marine was very badly hurt, with dozens of armor-piercing wounds inflicted all over his body. To make things worse, the sargent appeared to have lost his helmet during battle, given the extensive new burns all over his head and face.

It did seem as if the older marine’s eyes were still fully functional, despite the awful state they were in, from the way they narrowed at Cedric's approach, a low hiss leaving the sergeant’s ruined lips and broken teeth.

“Honorable Older Brothers.” Cedric began, just loud enough to cover the wordless sounds of protest from the injured marine now on his surgical table, doing his best to protect a sense of concern and urgency “Each of you are also badly injured and I can only tend to one Brother at at im. I urge each of you to seek treatment immediately. I will do what I can to save the honorable brother sergeant.” He did not allow himself to feel anything but concern and determination in this moment.

It worked! The other battered and bleeding first born brothers quickly left to get their own wounds treated without so much as a backwards glance. Aware that if they stayed, Cedric would need to triage all seven of them, and would be forced to leave the brother-sargeant to be treated last, due to his all too tenuous grasp on life at the moment.

Cedric’s hands were steady and his face a mask of calm as he worked to clean, treat and bandage Jerahmiel  wounds, listening to the sounds around the two of them. He also double checked to make sure that the sergeant’s armor was, as he methodically checked over the other’s injuries.

If his hands slipped a little occasionally, pressing too hard ,causing more pain than was necessary… Well that was due to his inexperience and exhaustion. Cedric had been diligently tending to his injured Brothers for weeks with minimal sleep or rest and food. Cedric had yet to administer any pain relievers because he needed to conserve supplies. Suffering was good for the body and soul, after all “Stop struggling. You are under my care nd you will take what I give you, BRothe.” Cedric commented.

THe twitchy, badly injured firstborn marine stilled compeltely as he said those words, his half-ruined yes locking onto Cedric’ss. Dread perfumed the air as the sergeant rasped out with ruined vocal cords, barely able to speak “Wh-what did you just say?” He was clearly familiar with the phrase.

Cedric smiled benignly down at the Brother-Sargeant and answered with “I need you restrained. You are resisting the inevitable and what is necessary. Resistance is not just futile, but heretical.”

The dread intensified and the badly injured bastard attempted to stand up and escape Cedric.

Hah

The firstborn Marine had barely managed to sit up when Cedric raised up one hand and lightly shoved Jerahmiel back down onto the surgical table, pressing against the other’s fractured ribs. It truly was remarkable how badly injured the fucker was. A pity he didn’t qualify for dreadnought entombment. He did not possess the skill and experience to save this astares’ life “If you are free of sin, the god-Emperor will ensure that you survive this trial, Brother.”

“How… Why… Why are you saying that? How do you know what I had told that mouthy abomination I culled under the orders of Chaplain Petras?” THe sergeant wheezed, fear and confusion clear on his face, along with a tremendous amount of pain.

“His armor recorded his last moments, and the proceeding conversation… Sir. Unlike yours, his armor was fully functional at the time of his death. I found the recording of you beating him to death for no good reason.” Cedric answered placidly “He was beaten to death because he was going to report your… Indiscretion with that civilian woman that he witnessed. DId you really think he would’ve confronted you about it without ensuring that should something have happened to him, that you would escape justice? The Emperor’s light shines upon us all equally. As does his judgment.”

“Are you..What are you … You… Agk!” Jerahmiel sputtered, clearly trying to make sense of Cedric’s words, and failing, from his clear confusion.

“The honored Primarch decreed Primaris Marines to be made. He sent us out to help our firstborn Brothers in protecting the Imperium. The high marshal has declared that we are not heretical. So what right do you have to brand us as such, for merely existing? Do you believe yourself more righteous than one of the loyal sons of the Emperor?” Cedrc purred, leaning more of his weight onto the badly injured bastard, helpless before him.

Renewed pain bloomed across the sergeant’s face, along with understanding and a primarl fury “You… Fucker! He hissed, spitting up at him, blood bubbling at the corners of his lips. Hisbreathing labored and uneven. Jerahmiel’s hearts were beating rapidly Cedric could feel them under his hands.

Cedric had injected the other with a paralytic which kept him helpless on the surgical table. The much younger marine grinned boyishly as he avoided the flying and bloody spittle “It’s suchc a shame you were too badly injured for me to save you with the resources I have available, sir. I’m sure your loss will be felt by the Crusade… But the relief that your loss by those who were inflicted by your temper and tyranny far outweigh the sorrow caused by your death.” He keeps increasing the pressure on the other’s broken ribs, feeling them shift.

The jagged, broken bone-shards dig into the bastard’s lungs deeper and deeper. 

Jerahmiel’ glare was scorching.

Cedric was wholly unthreatened by him. He had the upper hand here, not this firstborn bastard.

Cedric laughed, breathing and victorious as he felt the other’s rib bones slide up into the fucker’s hearts. He kept pressing and shoving until the sergeant’s hearts had stopped beating and his body went limp.

Cedric then removed the other’s geneseed, placing it carefully in the appropriate container for viability testing. After that, Cedric removed all viable useful organts, implants and prosthetics. He had the other stripped of his rumor armor and weapons. Everything of value was sent off to their proper places.

After that, Cedric carried the bastard’s cooling body over to the promethium-fueled flaming body pit and tossed the sergeant’s corpse into it. As his body caught fire, Cedric dutifully logged Jerahmiel ‘s injuries and that he was KIA.

The young apothecary returned to his assigned medical tent, carefully cleaning all of his tools and the table, his hearts light and his conscience clear. 

As an Apothecary, two of his jobs were harm reduction and threat nullification. Brother-sargeant Jerahmiel had killed a half-dozen primaris marines with no good cause, and his kills had begun to become more frequent and starting to cluster together. As were the excessive beatings and other acts of cruelty the fucker had visited upon living primaris marines. Cedric took pride in every aspect of being an Apothecary, and would neutralize other threats as the opportunity to do so came up. So long as his curtailing of cruelty did not cause more suffering amongst his fellow Primaris marines, of course.

Cedric hears more running footsteps and greets his next injured Brother-patient with a gentle and concerned smile on his face.

[andkisses]

♡ roman holiday | sunghoon ♡

will this bucket list trip be the thing that finally forces you to face your feelings? or will it be the thing that tears the two of you apart for good?

♡ sunghoon x gn!reader | wc. 9.4k ♡ genres/tropes: childhood friends to lovers and the fluff and angst that comes with it, college!au (not obvious but implied), road trips ♡ mentions of/warnings: arguments, references to a toxic family environment, allusions to drowning, i think that’s all but lmk if there’s smth else that needs added! ♡ a/n: this has been a wip for SOO long we’re talking YEARS and has changed muses several times but i finally sat down to finish this and im so proud of what i managed <3 truly some of my favorite things ive ever written ! inspired by roman holiday by halsey! this is also the longest thing i think i have ever written <3

♡ masterlist ♡

The coffee ring on the counter stares back at you, warm brown against a stark egg white. You can’t tell if it’s old or new, and part of you doesn’t care. Another part wants to know, though, when the coffee stain was made and why it was never cleaned. The motel is practically empty, the older lady behind the front desk and a tired-looking family in the corner of the dining room are the only other inhabitants.

Through the windows, dressed quaintly with homesewn drapes, you see the tall mountain trees, dark green and prickly, stretching up to the crystal blue sky. The television across the room is set to the weather station, and the anchor talks about how a cold front could potentially lead to an early snow. 

A tray with various breakfast items clunks against the table, and the boy you’ve been traveling with settles in across from you, faux leather chair seat squeaking beneath in subtle “I’m hardly ever used” protest. His dark hair falls into his eyes messily, as if he only just now got up and rolled out of bed. The red flannel and vest he wears matches the surroundings, but looks absurd on your best friend.

“Sunghoon,” you start, interlacing your fingers and resting your chin on the bridge they form. Your eyes scan the tray, accounting each and every tiny portion of food. Eggs, both scrambled and hard boiled, some toast with an assortment of little jam containers, a little bowl of butter, two pancakes, half a waffle, and a few strips of bacon. “Thank you for getting everything,” you continue, leveling a stare over the top of your nose, “but you forgot the syrup.”

The boy in front of you blinks, bites his lips, and nods his head. A soft yeah, I forgot the syrup escapes his lips as he slides out of his chair, the pleather squeaking once again. “Give me like two minutes,” he says, “the breakfast bar is crazy to navigate. Do you see the things I do for you?” His smile is teasing.

“It’s no problem, Hoon—” Your voice trails off as he jogs off into the distance. You shake your head, feeling lethargic and sleepy beneath the slow-turning ceiling fan. Your gaze follows its metallic clink, and the fan seems as if it’s never been replaced in the 50-something years this establishment has operated.

You’re brought back down by a small tug on your sleeve, and when you look, it’s the little girl from the tired family across the room. She blinks up at you, not much unlike Sunghoon, innocent and full of curiosity. You nod your head, encouraging her to talk. The little girl takes a big gulp of air, dual pigtails bobbing, before, “I think your boyfriend is very nice and I like how he gets you your breakfast.”

The laugh that leaves you is easy, the statement hardly shocking at all. You’re used to it, strangers and acquaintances alike assuming the relationship status between the two of you. It’s nothing new. The little girl’s face is confused, her head listing to one side. You nod again, swallowing any additional laughter. “He’s not my boyfriend,” you reply, and you see a little bit of the light in her eyes diminish. “We’re just really good friends. He’s my best friend, actually.”

The girl’s brows furrowed together, a small pout forming on her lips. Obviously not the answer she was expecting. Then she nods, lips pursed. “Yeah, okay,” she mutters, seeming confused. Before she turns to walk back to her family, she looks back up and adds, “He’s a good friend. I would keep him as my friend for a long time.”

“That’s what I intend on doing, kiddo.” Your voice is quiet as the little girl skips back across the old, faded carpet towards her family. You see Sunghoon emerge from the breakfast bar, where everyone else at this motel must be. He waves small packets of syrup in the air. The smile that flits across your face is fleeting. You try to ignore, again, this feeling in your chest. Your voice is small, talking to yourself. “For as long as possible.”

***

The candy-colored Valentine stared back at you, practically mocking you. Third grade and only one Valentine. You tried to fight back the tears, attempted to sniff them back inside, but nothing worked. They fell, one by one, onto the homemade card, soaking through the pink construction paper and leaving roundly-shaped wet splotches across your only card.

You read the simple message, “Happy Valentine’s! – Sunghoon”, over and over and over again. You racked your brain, trying to figure out why, why, why no one else gave you a card. You were nice, you offered to help them when they needed it. It seemed like everyone liked you. They even let you sit by them at lunch.

So why?

The hand on your shoulder startled you, your head whipping up to face the figure standing beside the desk. It was Sunghoon, the boy who gave you the only Valentine in your possession. The edges of his dark hair curled around his eyebrows and the corners of his eyes. His brow scrunched with worry, and he ducked down to see your face.

“Are you okay?”

You shook your head, a bitter pout filling out your lips. “Does it look like I’m okay?”

Sunghoon shrugged, removing his hand to pull out the seat beside you. “I guess not.” He pursed his lips, hands clasped in his lap, before looking back at you. “What’s the matter?”

You flung the single Valentine—his own Valentine—back at him. The construction paper flew through the air before catching, floating down to land on the table by Sunghoon, who deftly picked it up and turned it over in his hands.

“It’s the only one you got?”

You nodded, crossing your arms on your desk and sinking into them. A heavy sigh left your chest and you sniffled, trying to keep the angry tears from falling again. You wished the day would end; that the bell would ring and release you so you could go home and cry somewhere comfier instead.

There was silence, then, “Does it matter if you only got one?”

You scoffed, still hidden in your arms. “Uh, duh? It means no one in this class likes me.”

“Then… why does it matter if everyone else doesn’t like you? Shouldn’t one person liking you be okay?”

You bit your lip. You can’t tell if you like his thinking or not. You decided not to respond.

You heard the chair scrape against the wood floor beside you, and you figured it was Sunghoon leaving to return to the other students. That was fine, you figured. It’s what you should expect, anyway. Even if he was the only one who gave you a Valentine, it was probably only because he gave the whole class Valentine’s. What a guy.

Then the chair was drug against the floor again, much closer this time. You popped your head up, a scowl still on your face, to see what was happening. Sunghoon had scooted it closer, and in his hands was another Valentine. You watched as he flipped the card over to the decorated side and skillfully pulled off the foam heart-shaped sticker, as if he’d had to do this thousands of times before.

His question is one you didn’t expect. “Where do you want to go?”

You look up at him, incredulous. “What do you mean?”

“Well, if you don’t have many friends here, you must want to be somewhere else?” Sunghoon shrugged, as if the thought made perfect sense to him. “Right?”

You pursed your lips, mimicking his shrug. “I guess you’re right...”

“Then,” Sunghoon began again, “where do you want to go?”

“Uhm, my house?” you answered. Crying on your fluffy bed would be much more comfortable than crying on this hard desk. Your arms were sore from resting on the edge and your back was stiff from the awkward angle.

Sunghoon shook his head. “No, think bigger. Like, vacation places and stuff.”

“Hmm... then, maybe, the big cities? The ones you always see in TV shows. And... the beach, because the ocean is really nice.”

Sunghoon nodded, diligently taking note of every place you suggested. His handwriting is a little crooked, but it fit on the now vacant front of a Valentine’s card. He looked up at you, eyes wide with question. “Anywhere else?”

You frowned, deep in thought. Then, as if someone tapped you on the shoulder and whispered it in your ear, an idea sprung to mind. “A really tall mountain, where it’s snowy all the time. No matter the season”

The pencil lead pulled across the paper, leaving information behind. Sunghoon returned to the top of the page, tapping the pencil’s eraser on the side of his cheek before scribbling a final note down. “There! It’s finished!” He slid it over in front of you.

You read the title of the list aloud: “The Wanderlist? But that isn’t even a word.”

Sunghoon shook his head. “It is now.” He leaned over, pointing at all the places you had stated. “And that’s everywhere we’re gonna go, because I’m your best friend now. We won’t be lonely, because we have each other. And we’re gonna travel all over.”

You sat up, leveling him a stare. “Well, this is gonna be expensive, you know. Trips aren’t free. They cost a lot.”

Sunghoon smiled, the kind that, even for a tin moment, makes everything seem like it’s possible. “Then we better start saving now!”

 ***

The pink paper stares up at you from its place on the dashboard, stuck with a random sticker right next to the air vent. The edges had aged, curling and warping, and your tear stains from 3rd grade are still faintly visible. You read over the list—your wanderlist, as Sunghoon had named it all those years ago.

1. Big cities (because TV) x2!!

2. The beach (because cool ocean)

3. Tall mountain (because always snow)

The big city had been marked off in 6th grade, when the class had a trip to the modern art museum, and again in 8th grade for a series of school-wide competitions, from writing and art to band to mathematics and science. Sunghoon had excelled at creative writing while you swept the math category for your region.

The beach was crossed off the day before the two of you left for college. How bitter it was that you had to be separated, together for ten years only to be settled in two different places. Yes, you weren’t that far away. A half day’s drive. But you both knew, deep down, how likely seeing each other was.

So you did something about it. The day before, you woke up before the sun. You loaded his car up with everything you would need for a daytrip, and you took off for the coast. You spent the whole day, afternoon, and evening parked at a spot on the beach. If you think about it now, you can still smell the seabreeze, imagine it in your hair. You can hear Sunghoon’s laugh, about what, you can’t remember. You do remember how happy you both were.

You remember sitting side by side, sharing a blanket over your shoulders as the seabreeze grew colder, watching the sun disappear on the horizon. You remember the thoughts you had–the ones you normally stamped down and annoyed. You should tell him. You’d been so close before. You wouldn’t even say the word to yourself, but you knew.

You didn’t say anything

“Can you believe these clouds?” Sunghoon says, slipping into the driver's seat and shutting the door. He places his keys into the ignition and turns like he always had. You watch the keychain you got him freshman year of high school swing from momentum. When you look back up, Sunghoon is watching you, leaning one elbow on the center console, hair in his eyes. “I suppose even the weather believes my sunny disposition is more than enough.”

“Oh, please,” you scoff, smacking his shoulder. You turn to look out the window, biting your lip. You’ve got to get it together. You blame that little girl from breakfast. You’d been doing just fine not thinking about Sunghoon in That Way. Now here you were, all these stupid feelings drummed up.

It doesn’t help that Sunghoon pulls out a cassette–MT-PSH-5–and pops it into the player. His smile grows wide as he turns out of the parking lot and onto the road, heading further up the mountain. “Nothing like some classic tunes.”

It was dumb. It didn’t mean anything.

It’s all you can think about.

Sneaking out late, hot summer heat still sticky and oppressing. You could feel the waves rise up from the concrete as it finally felt relief in the moonlight. You’d felt like dressing up, sneaking into your mother’s room and applying her fancy department store perfume to the nape of your neck. Your fingers gracefully found her pearls in the glass bowl on the dresser as you left, and you pulled them over your head, letting them rest against your collar bone. They’re still cool against your hot skin.

You escaped through the back patio, walking past the fist-sized hole in the drywall you wished you could forget about. The dusty edges kept raining down debris if someone walked too close to it. You let yourself out the gate in the fence, pulling it shut behind you. You felt for the keys to the front door in your pocket, and they jingled in response. You clasped your hand around the cool metal, the cuts sharp and edgy beneath your palm.

He met you at the corner of his street and yours, his dark hair swallowing up the soft moonlight. It made his features seem younger, softer. It felt like you were kids again.

You fell in line beside each other, walking the empty streets without fear. Who was to stop some teenagers walking the street at midnight? Random cars passed by, people finally returning home from the late shift but paying no mind to you two. And that was fine; you didn’t want them to care.

The black gates around the community pool glinted in the yellow streetlights, reaching out to you like a beacon. The closer you drew, the more the overwhelming scent of chlorine filled the air. You walked forward, hands in your jacket pockets, one wrapped tightly around your house keys. You took a deep, steadying breath. This was fine. You had this.

“Hey, [Y/N], do we really have to do this?”

You rolled your eyes, pulling your hands from your pockets and grabbing the top of the fence. You’d have to pull yourself up, and be extra careful of the metal pickets at the top. It’d be tough, but you could make it. “What?” you snapped back lightly, voice echoing amongst the night. “Scared of hopping the fence?”

“No, that’d be ridiculous,” Sunghoon replied, crossing his arms and shifting his weight to rest on one foot. “Jumping fences is nothing for me. Jumping fences into property that—” he pointed to a white and red sign just beside your knees. “—considers jumping fences into property after hours as illegal and trespassing? That sets me on edge.”

You sighed, rolling your eyes again. “It’s not like they’ve got police roaming around or anything, and the owner’s too cheap for security cameras. I’m sure if we tried hard enough, we could just pull the fence down instead of having to jump it.” For emphasis, you grabbed hold of the rods and shook. A loud metallic echo escaped into the night, and before you could pull back and shake a third time, Sunghoon had dashed to your side, placing his hands on yours to stop you.

His brown eyes caught the light as he shook his head back and forth and hissed, “If you’re going to do something illegal, do it quietly! Especially when I’m here.”

You leaned forward, head inching towards his, with a scowl on your face. “Then shut up and hop the fence.” You drew back, replacing your hands at the top and pulled yourself up and over with ease. Maybe mandatory PE did have benefits.. Your sneakers landed on the pavement, and when you stood upright from the landing, you stared at Sunghoon through the bars. “You can either join me,” you began, a smirk on your face, chin tilted up, “or you could just wait while I go and find my car keys.”

You turned on your heels, walking towards the lifeguard’s shack. You could have sworn the sigh you heard was strong enough to blow the fence down altogether

Your shoes scuffed against the concrete, and you felt the humid air of the pool spill over and try to reach out to you. Its arms clung and bit at your ankles as the water inside sloshed around with the teasing wind. You shook them off, changing course from the pool’s edge to the guard’s shack. The padlock on the door seemed old—really old—and you crossed your fingers before giving a giant tug and having it pop open in your hands.

The wooden door swung open and you stepped inside the dingy shack. Various lost pool toys littered the floor, and a box of deflated tricolor beach balls appeared to have seen better days. But you weren’t interested in any of that: you needed your car keys. Above you, nestled nearly at the top of the peaked roof was a loft filled with white plastic bins. One of them, you noted, was closer to the edge than the others, as if someone had lazily swung it up there.

You crossed your fingers again, reaching up to pull the basket down to you. “Please be there, please be there, please be there,” you chanted under your breath. You peered into the basket. On top, someone’s embroidered handkerchief. You pinched the soft material between your finger and thumb before tossing it aside in the basket. Someone’s crazy straw, two Rubik’s Cubes, a school ID lanyard, and—yes!

You fished your car keys out with one hand and swung the basket back up into the loft with the other. You turned to leave, ready to find Sunghoon, reunite with your car, and drive home, but before you can even take a single step back out you’ve run into something.

Or someone.

Your scream’s instantly shushed by your best friend, a single finger coming up against your lips. Sunghoon was so close, and you felt the pool humidity roll off his shoulders as he looked at you with confusion. “Are you done?” he asked. “And why are you screaming?”

You shook your head, holding up your keys. “Yes. Also, you scared me. How did you get in here? I didn’t think you’d hop the fence.”

“Didn’t have to.” Sunghoon held up a matching padlock to the one you’d pulled off outside. “Looks like the owner’s too cheap to buy actual locks for his gates. I simply walked in.”

You left the lifeguard’s shack, replacing the lock and headed for the entrance, where Sunghoon easily swung open the wrought iron gate. You walked towards your car as Sunghoon redid the lock, simply looping it through and clicking it shut.

You kissed your car keys and unlocked the doors, swinging down into the driver’s seat. Sunghoon slid into the passenger seat beside you, and as soon as his door shut, the engine was starting and you were pulling out of the parking spot.

“Let a guy put on his seatbelt first?” Sunghoon joked as he clicked his into place. “I don’t see you wearing yours, [Y/N].”

“Then you’re not looking close enough,” you replied, taking one hand off the wheel to pull at your own seatbelt. “Seems as if someone isn’t paying attention.”

“Forgive me, I was busy making sure no one saw our illegal activity. I would like to graduate high school next year with a clean record.”

You laughed something similar to a scoff as you flicked on your turn signal and made your way down his street. “You say that as if we robbed a bank. Is it really trespassing if the locks don’t even work? The wind could have undone them.” You turned to catch a glance at your friend, and what you caught was a judgmental glare in the green glow of the dashboard.

With a simple curve of the steering wheel, you pulled in front of his house. You shifted the car in park and rotated towards the passenger seat. “Thanks for breaking the law with me, Sunghoon. It means a lot. I’m touched.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure,” he muttered, running a hand through his hair. He leaned towards the door, making as if to pull the handle and open it, when he reached inside his pocket. His eyes lit up and he turned back towards you. “Oh, yeah!”

You shook your head, confused. You hold a single hand up. “Oh, yeah, what?”

“Here’s that mixtape you wanted,” Sunghoon answers, placing a cassette tape in your unintentionally outstretched hand. You scowled. You didn’t know how he had the technology to make a cassette in this day and age, but then again, you were the one with a car so old it still had a cassette player. You two were a pair, you supposed.

“When did you finish it?” you asked, spinning it around in your hands. The clear, Sharpie handwriting read MT-PSH-5 on the short white label.

“This morning,” he replied, fiddling with the hem of his shirt.

“Why didn’t you give it to me earlier, then?” You turn to look at him. The yellow glow of the streetlights blend in with the green of the dashboard lights. His eyes remained that entrancing brown color, though. Romantic and homey all at once, untouchable by any other shade.

Sunghoon shrugged. “Perhaps it was because you didn’t have a car to play it in when I finished it? It was unavailable to you, shall we say.”

“Ha, ha, very funny.” You kept turning the cassette in your hands, as if you’d find something new and exciting on each turn.

“Oh, and—” Sunghoon leaned across the center console, reaching to take the tape from your hands, like he had something to say or show you. But he stopped. His brows furrowed together, and he turned to you, face mere inches from your own. “Are you wearing perfume?”

You nodded. “Yeah. My mom’s, and I got mad at her since she got mad at me about the car so I...”

An eyebrow quirked up. “You’re showing your mom up by stealing some of her perfume?”

“It’s expensive,” you muttered, sliding down into your seat. “She’ll have to pay for it later. Literally.”

And with that, he laughed. Nice and hearty and his eyes turned into tiny crescent moons and you felt your heart flutter—something that had happened a lot as of late, and you’re not entirely sure why. Yes, Sunghoon was a good friend. A best friend. But that’s all he was. He—

“Hey.” Your attention snapped from a distance spot on the road over to him, and he felt even closer now for some reason. Your heart registered how soft he’d spoken and proceeded to beat faster because of it. His eyes searched yours, but for what you don’t know. When he spoke again, his voice was quiet. “Make sure you get home safe, okay? Wouldn’t want anything happening to the city’s greatest delinquent.”

“Yeah,” you laughed, but it was short and stilted. You barely heard what he said over the thumping of your own blood in your ears. You felt the red flush creep up your neck, dusting your cheeks and turning your ears a cherry color. When you swallowed, your mouth suddenly dry, all you could think about was how loud it seemed. Your grip on the mixtape tightened, it seemingly the only thing tethering you to the real world.

You couldn’t tell if the radio was one or not or whether you’d turned car off and left the keys in the ignition. All you could tell was Sunghoon, so close and so real he almost seemed unreal. And then it happened. He leaned in, eyes fluttering shut before placing a soft kiss on the side of your cheek, right next to your lips. It happened too fast and it was the slowest moment of your life all at once. Your heart was practically screaming now, hands rattling around the mixtape.

When he pulled back, he kept going, opening the car door and stepping out. Before closing it, he leaned in and nodded. “I meant what I said about getting back safely. Promise?”

You nodded. “I promise.” You were surprised your voice worked at all. That you were able to form a coherent, albeit a simplistic, sentence. That you could think at all. The door swung shut and you shifted the car into drive.

The whole way home felt automatic, limbs working separate from your internal instructions. When you returned home, you pulled up beside your mailbox and turned the car off, pulling the keys and letting them rest in your hand. You sat motionless, seatbelt still in place, as you stared, eyes fixated at someone mindless spot on the dashboard. The pearls were cool against your heated skin.

It was dumb. It didn’t mean anything.

It’s all you can think about.

You flip the mixtape over in your hands, reading the slightly-faded yet still legible handwriting. MT-HVC-5. You’d run through the songs already, and Sunghoon had switched to some CD mixes he had brought. Why he didn’t get a car with Bluetooth, something you’d done a while ago, you’d never know. Maybe that was part of his charm. 

You’d managed to learn to forget about that kiss, or at least ignore it. But Sunghoon pulling out the mixtape he’d given you that night pulls it back up to the surface. You aren’t even sure how it even got into his possession. The longer you recall the memory, the more you can feel the burn on your cheek from where his warm lips touched your skin. The rest of the flush comes back from how you wish so badly it would happen again.

  “What’s up?”

“Huh?” You turn towards his voice, away from the window.

“I asked what’s up,” Sunghoon repeats, looking over at you for a split second before returning to the road. “You seem like we’re on another planet.���

“Just thinking about when we were younger, you know...” Did he? What did you want him to think about? The day you’ve been obsessing over? And then what would he do about it? Pull over and confess? Kiss you, but mean it this time?

Sunghoon laughs, breaking your thoughts. He spares another quick glance in your direction. “Younger like what? Like third grade or two days ago?”

You reach across the center console to smack his shoulder. “Why would it be two days ago?”

“We were younger then. Wild, foolish.” Sunghoon takes one hand off the wheel and places his knuckles on his forehead. “The way we were is actually unimaginable now.”

“I’m done with you.”

Sunghoon scoffs. “Sure you are.” A quick beat, a hum to the music. “Anyway, what were you thinking about?”

You’re quiet for a moment. Then, “Do you think we'll change?”

“We have changed.”

“Really?” He said it so simply, it takes you off guard. You turn to look at him, even though you know he’ll keep his eyes glued safely to the road.

“Yeah,” he shrugs. “We’ve totally changed. We don't like the same kinds of music as the old us used to. We don't eat mac and cheese for every conceivable meal—except for the day after that one chem exam.”

“That final was hard!” You reach across the center console to shove at his shoulder–oh, god, why do you keep finding ways to put your hands on him?–earning a smug grin. “None of it was covered in class and you know it!”

“See what I mean?” Sunghoon asks. “We're different, but like, a good different. We’ve adapted.”

The silence that fills the car after isn’t weighty or overbearing. It’s comfortable and common, safe like a child-loved security blanket. Yet, somehow, your stomach fills with stones of dread, and all you want to do is sleep off any bad feelings.

You keep your eyes trained ahead, the curving mountain road, when you ask, “Do you ever think we'll be bad different?

Sunghoon spares a confused glance at you, brows knit together as he switches focus between you and the road. He shakes his head. “No, not us. Never us.”

“Is that a promise?”

The hand closest to you leaves the steering wheel and drifts over the center console, pinky out. “Always.”

You wrap your pinky around his, and try to ignore the heated flush you feel creeping up your neck and the backs of your ears. You focus, instead, on how real Sunghoon feels. How solid the mixtape is in your hands. How, here out in what feels like the middle of nowhere surrounded by evergreens and roadside snow piles that have started to pop up and tall mountain views, time doesn’t feel like it can get you.

Maybe he’s right.

Maybe, out here, there’s only good different.

Maybe, that’s all you need.

The clouds from the morning have turned darker, more potent. You can smell rain in the air, hear it as the wind rushes through the trees. It’s so cold though, you wonder if it will snow instead. The mountain weather you’d been looking forward to for so long.

Sunghoon knocks his shoulder into yours, cheeks pink from the cold. He swings your duffle bag towards you, letting go of the strap before you’ve gotten a good grip on it. “Your luggage,” he declares, before marching towards the hotel entrance.

You’d both decided, with your combined measly college student incomes, that wherever the last hotel would be, it needed to be the best you could afford. Standing in front of it now, styled like a fancy chateau with white walls and a red roof, you think the two of you made the right choice.

You had forgot what made such a nice place so affordable, until Sunghoon swipes the key, opens the door for you, gesturing for you to walk in first. The room is cute and delicate, with pretty yet aged wainscotting, petite floral wallpaper, a nice view of the surrounding mountains and–

And one bed.

You freeze. You can’t help it. Maybe the you from this morning, before that girl talked to you, could handle this. The you of right now? The lady at the front desk calling you a cute couple, and Sunghoon going along with it and not correcting her, didn’t help. You aren’t sure if you’re strong enough to keep everything the same.

“Rats,” Sunghoon says, and you breathe a sigh of relief. He’s not cool with this either, you think. He turns toward you with a coy smile. “I’m gonna go back downstairs and ask for more pillows. Three simply won’t cut it. Want me to ask for some fancy water?”

You shake your head, voice gone, and you don’t move until you hear the door shut behind Sunghoon.

And that’s when it starts, as you drag your feet in circles trying to think your way through this. Your hands clench and unclench, fists forming so tightly you leave half-moons from your nails in the fleshy part of your palm. Your breath comes ragged and shallow, and you feel like drowning, except from too much instead of not enough. Too many memories reminding you of too many things. Too many emotions leading to too many feelings you neither want to recognize or acknowledge.

But one keeps pushing its way to the forefront, demanding attention and definition. The one that’s been bothering you all day. It makes you dizzy, to the point you feel you need to lay down and clutch at your stomach. Maybe that’s it, you think as you sit on the edge of the one bed. You’re just sick. Breakfast was bad. But you know it’s not. It makes you angry, because how dare you feel this way about him. It makes you flustered, since you shouldn't look at your best friend's face and have your gaze wander to his lips and wonder what they'd feel like against yours.

It makes you happy, so undeniably happy that you feel like crying, because it feels so right. When you allow yourself to think more about it, and imagine what life would be like if you were able to confirm and agree with all the strangers who already think you’re dating. Lovers. It fills you up with breaths of fresh air to the point it's like floating on cotton clouds.

It makes you fearful. Its dark side claws at your heart, threatening to tear at the tender seams and leave you bloody and raw, so intensely damaged you're afraid of doing anything along the same lines. You had asked about a bad different, and Sunghoon said it wasn’t possible. Right now, you feel like you have to disagree–confessing this? Altering the relationship you’ve carefully crafted for so long?

That would be a bad different.

That’s why, when Sunghoon comes back, three more pillows and a bottle of sparkling water, you don’t answer. You roll over on the bed, curling up away from him, hiding with a pillow on your head. You hear Sunghoon say something about it being a long drive, and he gets it, you should rest. You hear him open the closet door, then feel the spare blanket get draped over you.

And, as you lay here, hot silent tears threatening to spill over and run down your cheeks, you let yourself think about it. You're in love with your best friend. Your nail-bitten palms come to swipe at your eyes, you make the mistake of sniffing aloud. Sunghoon calls your name, and you hate how much you savor the worry in his voice.

But, it’s also too much. He can’t know, you decide. Not now, not ever. That is what would be best, you decide, for the two of you. To be able to get through the rest of this trip.

“[Y/N], what is it?” he calls again. Sunghoon’s voice is laced with care, something tender and soft and so distinctly him it pulls at the tears in your eyes. How can he make this so unfair? “What's wrong?”

“You wouldn't understand,” you snap, pulling yourself to sit up, the pillow falling off. You don’t look at him, but instead at your hands, fists in your lap. Sunghoon easily notes your posture, and confusion floods his features. You hate how quickly he can figure out something’s wrong, that something is bothering you.

“Can I try to understand, at least?” You look up at him, lips pursed, tears smarting your eyes. You take him in–turned towards you in the chair, sitting on the edge, like he can jump to your rescue at any time. The confused look in his eyes hurts—you've always been straightforward with one another. But you know you can’t about this. “I can’t try to fix it if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.” 

     You shake your head, wiping one of your cheeks with your fingers, a half laugh falling from your lips. “No, Hoon it's—”

   “No.”

The force of the single word hits you, and it hurts more than the angry look in his eye.

   He stands, takes a step toward you, then sits hesitantly on the edge of the bed. He's close, and he's been closer, but it's still too much. The rushing sound is back in your ears and your heart pounds against your ribs, telling you to do something, anything, but you stay still.

   “Hoon—”

   “I said no, [Y/N].” Sunghoon’s words are ice, colder than the breeze outside and sharper than butcher knives. His eyes, once warm and homey, that romantic shade of brown you love, are now dark and piercing. “You don't get to call me special names when you aren't telling me what's wrong. When you aren't acting like the [Y/N] I've known since third grade.” His hands come up to run through his hair, and it flips slowly back into place. His voice drops, the softer, confused Sunghoon returning. “You've been acting weird this whole trip, and especially since this morning. It's driving me insane that I can't figure it out and fix it. I know you better than this.”

   He's so close, so, so close. Much too close. Somehow he’s scooted towards you on the bed. You can smell his cologne—when did he start doing that? Why hadn’t you noticed earlier? His eyes are back to the romantic brown, the warm and homey color, the ones that remind you of so many good memories—his eyes are so pretty. Your gaze follows its past patterns and drops to his lips, redder from being gnawed on with worry. A kiss would—

   A shaky breath leaves you, and you're talking before you realize, voice so small it's hard to hear. But Sunghoon is listening. He always does.

   You blink. “Do you want to know what's wrong?”

   “Of course. I need to know if I can do anything or—”

   “It's you.”

You want to be upset, angry. How dare it come to this. But you can’t, you realize. You can’t be angry at him. Whatever energy you had coursing through your veins leaves after your pseudo confession, and you turn away, resting your weight on the headboard, hoping he’ll go away. 

This, for certain, was bad different. You can feel it, weighing you down. Here, in a chilly, single bed hotel room, you’d ruined everything. Your brain told you to shut up, to be quiet, to try and save anything you could manage from this shattering relationship. But your mouth—or maybe your heart—kept going, and going, and going.

“It’s you,” you repeat, turning back towards him. He’s still there, frozen in place, face filled with concern. “It’s everything you do. The way you... you tell me bad jokes when I’m upset over a grade or make me mixtapes because you want to share your music with me. It’s–I’m–I’m sick of it. I hate it. I hate you”

Sunghoon recoils, eyes wide. He looks around the room, as if the answers to what to say are hidden around. He stands, backing up without turning away, like you’re something he has to keep his eyes on or he’ll get hurt again.

Again.

Sunghoon’s voice is flat when he speaks, like he’s out of breath. Shaky, like he’s about to cry, too. What have you done? “I’m… I’ll go downstairs and ask about if there’s anything nice around for dinner. I’ll–I’ll wait for you in the lobby. Whenever you’re ready, you know.”

Even now, after the nasty things–after I hate you left your lips–he’s still trying to make peace with you.

What did you do to ever deserve him?

And would he even stay with you once you return home?

The door falling shut is what starts your tears again. You slump down off the bed, between it and the window. You pull your knees up to your chest, put your head in your hands, and you cry.

***

It still isn’t over.

You’re breathing heavy, tears still stinging your eyes, but you aren’t sure if you’ve actually cried yet or not. Your fists are balled at your sides. Years of friendship are stuck in your throat, enough to make you want to scream or cry or vomit from the nauseous feeling it induces. The pouring rain, those clouds finally opening up, doesn’t help.

Dinner had been awful, awkward. The only person either of you talked to had been the waiter. You can’t remember what the food tasted like. You can’t remember what, if any, songs played on the radio on the way back. Sunghoon hadn’t bothered to pick anything out. All you could remember, or hear, or see in your head–I hate you. The look in his eyes. How he has barely looked at you since.

You aren’t sure what you have to do to get away, but you’d be willing to make a deal.

Anything to get away from this moment.

Anything to get away from your best friend.

Sunghoon stares at you like he’s only just now met you, and maybe he has. He’d stopped you halfway between the car and the hotel’s entrance, despite the rain. He’d called your name in such a way you froze. Your angered confession from earlier hangs in the air, untouched or acknowledged. A single parking lot light illuminates you two, dim yellow casting shadows through the rain.

“Do you mean that? What you said?” he asks, daring to step forward. You don’t move, anchored in place. By fear or something else, you aren’t sure. He takes another, then a third. The gap between you has been halved. “I know you don’t mean it. I’ve been thinking about it this whole time. You don’t mean it.”

“What makes you so sure?” you spit, taking a step closer in your upset. You level Sunghoon with a stare you hope is intimidating, bitter. You hope he sees the duress. You have to push him away. “I said what I said. I hate you, Park Sunghoon.”

The boy shakes his head, hair stuck to his forehead from the rain. He seems almost incredulous, and it angers you even more. Why doesn’t he get it? There’s a small smirk at the corners of his lips, but you’ve known him long enough to recognize it as mock confidence. “You didn’t mean what you said.”

“I did!” Another step, and now you’re nose to nose with him, staring into the eyes you’ve had memorized for so long, that romantic brown even in the rain and yellow streetlight. Your gaze betrays you and you drink in the slope of his nose, see how his eyes examine you as well. Note the downturn of his lips, almost unnoticeable. Your voice is weaker when you speak again. “I did mean it, Sunghoon.”

He leans in, closer and closer until he stops–a breath away from your lips. He freezes, closes his eyes, and waits.

And you cave, despite your best interests. You find yourself tilting your head and wishing he’d do something more. This can’t be how your first kiss with Sunghoon goes? When he pulls back, and you nearly stumble forward. You look up at him, and the smile on his face is no longer mock. You know what his question will be before he says it, and you know he’s caught you in your lie. “You hate me so much–why did you kiss me back?”

You want to spit back, I didn’t! You want to argue. But the truth is, ever since you’d remembered that day in high school, you’d been imagining what it would be like to actually kiss him, and again, and again. You wanted to know what kissing Sunghoon would be like, even if it meant redefining the relationship you worked so hard to keep as is. The one you said you hated him to protect.

Sunghoon gently cups the sides of your face, forcing you to look at him, and you see worry and concern etched into the space between his brows, spilt in the color of his eyes. “Tell me,” he whispers, voice almost breaking, “what’s wrong. Let me try to fix it.”

You shake your head, trying to form words to explain everything, but all you do is shiver drastically beneath his touch. You watch as Sunghoon’s eyes grow wide, and he leads you inside, arm over your shoulder. The woman at the front desks awards you a quirked eyebrow, but that’s all you get before she returns to her clipboard.

The room is icy cold when you return, but Sunghoon adjusts the temperature in silence. “You get dry first,” he says, pointing at the bathroom. “Take a shower and get warm.”

“But about you?” You want to point out the subtle shake in his hands, and the way his breath catches. “There’s not enough towels to share.”

“I’ll ask for more at the front desk. I’ll be fine. Go.”

The shower water never feels hot enough, but you do stop shivering. You do your best to towel dry your hair. When you peek the door open to see if he’s back, and if you could get your things, you see that Sunghoon has already done it for you. Everything you could need taken from your bag, folded and placed nicely right outside the door. You have no idea when he did it–you’re thankful he did.

When he comes back with extra towels–which, surely, did not take this long–you’re curled up on the bed, similar to before. You rest your weight on the headboard, looking out the window at how the rain patters against the glass. You wish you could see the stars.

Sunghoon is fast, but who’s to say? You aren’t exactly keeping track of time. You know he’s back because you feel the mattress shift. His voice is almost silent when he speaks. “Can we talk?”

“About what?” you ask, turning towards him. You haven’t seen Sunghoon look this tired in a while. And you know it’s your fault. “How I was mean to you?”

Sunghoon smiles, looking down at his clasped hands. He takes a moment to determine what he actually wants to say. “Let’s start with…what it is about me that made you say that?”

His eyes are pleading in the dark. The room is barely lit, the overhead light off. There’s just a lamp on the desk and the streetlight from outside. The rain sound is almost overwhelming in the silence. “If there’s something I’ve done that hurt you–”

“It’s not that. It’s–” You pause, trying to find the right thing to say. You decide to start with the obvious. “There’s a reason I kissed you outside.”

Sunghoon rolls his eyes. “Yeah, because I’m charming and irresistible.”

“This is serious!” You do what you always do when he makes some kind of quip–you reach out to push his shoulder, scooting closer, but Sunghoon catches you by your wrist.

“I am serious. Do you know how much you hurt me when you said you hated me?” He levels you a stare, one that makes you want to shrink away, but you can’t. “When I left, I didn’t ask the front desk about restaurants. I went to my car and sat down and cried because the person I love just said they hated me.”

“You love me?”

“Not like that,” he corrects, and now you have to know what he means.

“Tell me how then.” You take your free hand and grab his other wrist, a mirror of what he’s done to you. “When you say you love me, what do you mean?”

“It’s not like you think, not like what it has been.” Sunghoon looks down, takes a deep breath, then carries on.  “Not like friends, or like siblings, but like–”

“Lovers?” you offer.

Sunghoon swallows, sets his jaw. Then, “Yes. Like that. And I don’t know when it happened. I don’t know if it was overnight or gradual or all at once. I do know that I woke up one morning and I realized that I didn’t want to imagine my future with anyone else. And I didn’t want to see you with anyone else, either.”

“Kinda selfish,” you say.

Sunghoon laughs. “Yeah. I couldn’t help it.”

Somehow, you’ve both moved closer to each other. The knees of your crossed legs knock into each other. You still have a hold on the other’s wrist. Sunghoon levels you another stare. “Will you tell me why?”

“Why I said I hated you?” He nods, and you take a deep sigh. “Do you remember the night we snuck into the pool to get my car keys back?”

He nods again, a small smile on his face. “You mean the first night I got enough courage to kiss you? You looked so pretty, with the pearls and the perfume.”

You blush, hearing Sunghoon talk about you like that. “That night. I’ve been thinking a lot about it. And you know how all these people always say we look like a couple or whatever. And it all just stuck together and made me realize that I haven’t seen you like a friend in a long time. I’ve seen you like–”

“A lover?” Sunghoon offers, copying you from earlier.

You smile. “I said I hated you because I was afraid and overwhelmed, and I need you away from me. I thought that if you hated me, I could get over you and just move on. We could make up, and I wouldn’t have these feelings anymore, and we could go back to being friends.

“But if I’m being honest,” you add, moving even closer. Your shoulders knock into one other. “Even though it wasn’t even that long, those hours over dinner just now were some of the worst things I have ever had to do. I was ugly to you, Sunghoon, and you’re the last person on earth who would ever deserve to be talked to that way. But if you could forgive me, I…”

You try to look down again, but Sunghoon lets go of your wrist to place a finger under your chin, tipping your head up to his gaze. “You what?”

“I love you. I’m in love with you, I’ve been in love with you. I love you, Park Sunghoon.” You take a deep breath, just as lightning strikes somewhere far away and the thunder rumbles through the room. 

Sunghoon reaches out for you, his hands reach cupping your face again. It’s the most reverent you’ve ever seen him. His eyes roam over your every feature, as if you’ll break if he breathes too hard. It’s thrilling. “Genuinely?” he asks, voice fragile. “You love me?”

“Yes,” you whisper. It feels wrong to be too loud right now, like someone else could join in this moment between the two of you. “And if you would have me, I’d like to love you for a long time after this.”

Sunghoon pulls you to him, resting your forehead against his. He takes a deep breath. Then, “We’ve both just been really, really stupid about it, haven’t we?”

You laugh, savoring his touch and his warm and his smile. You stare into his eyes, those romantic brown ones you love so much. “I guess so.”

“Can I kiss you?” he asks, and your heart jumps. “I know we did outside, but that’s a terrible story for a first kiss.”

“And the one from so long ago doesn’t count, because you just gave me a kiss then,” you say, not sure why you’re rambling when you have the opportunity to just kiss him already.

So, you shut up, and you do.

This kiss is reverent, unlike any that came before. You probably shouldn’t even bother comparing them. Maybe it’s the intentions behind the kiss—that you both want to be here, doing this, for the sake of just being, not proving. Maybe it’s because it hasn’t followed any dramatic late night outings or arguments. Maybe, it’s how you shiver closer to his frame, hands on his shoulders, and his own find the small of your back. You feel his smile against your lips, and the butterflies against your ribs.

Maybe, you should have said something a while ago. You could have avoided the whole I hate you stint, but then would anything else have been dramatic? Some couples are like puzzle pieces, perfectly fitting together with no stress. And maybe you two are a puzzle, one that fits together with ease, but you both intentionally hid pieces from the other, making it difficult to complete. Maybe airing grievances is the only way to get all the pieces back on the table.

You sigh as Sunghoon’s lips travel from your own down the line of your jaw, tickling in a delightful way. You feel safe in his arms, a safe you’ve always felt, but now it feels like something more, something even greater. Your heart jumps, and you throw your arms around his neck, pulling him close. Sunghoon instinctively holds you tighter, his hands against your shoulder blades.

“What is it?” he asks.

You shake your head, finding any words to be incredibly difficult. “I’m just—I’m glad.”

Sunghoon pulls back gently, quirking his head to one side as he looks at you. He uses the pad of his thumb to gently wipe away a stray tear. “Glad for what?” he asks, still cupping your cheek.

You lean into his touch, feeling dizzy with excitement and relief. “Glad that it’s you,” you say, your voice quiet. You lean in, placing a chaste kiss against his lips and, for once, he’s the one to shiver. “I’m glad you’re the one I love. Glad we’re here now, finally.”

Sunghoon pauses. His eyes dart between yours, your lips, and back. He rests his forehead on yours again, and you can already imagine getting used to this, and craving it when you can’t have it. “I waited so long, and I didn’t even know if...” There’s a catch in his voice, and he sounds like he’s about to cry. When he opens his eyes, there’s an honesty to them, a gaze you’ve only seen in Sunghoon’s eyes a handful of times. He smiles, his eyes going soft once more, like you are the most beautiful thing he has ever beheld. And to him, you are. “I always knew we were meant to be.”

***

The lady behind the desk did, in fact, look at you two like you were crazy. The night before you were acting like you were gonna tear each other to pieces. But now you’re walking out in each other’s arms? His around your shoulder, yours around his waist?

The sun is out, and there’s hardly any evidence of the downpour from last night. Maybe the earth needed to be just as dramatic as the two of you.

With the luggage in back, you two climb into the front seats. Sunghoon leans over the center console to press a kiss to your temple, just like he did when you woke up in each other’s arms and just like he did when he insisted on getting you whatever you wanted for breakfast.

“That’s not something new though?” you laugh, as he brings you small portions of everything the hotel had to offer. “You did this before.”

“Well, it’s obviously different now,” he replies. “I didn’t get to kiss you before.”

Now, Sunghoon taps at the Valentine heart on the dash–your wanderlist. What started this all. “We need a new one,” he says. “It took us a while, but we did everything on here. Should the new one be full of cringey couple things?”

“Only if you’d like to go back to being single.”

Sunghoon fakes shock as he shifts the car into gear. “You wouldn’t.”

This time, you lean over to give him a kiss, and you relish how quickly he blushes. “You’re right, I wouldn’t.” You sit back down, still turned towards him, hand atop his. “Maybe, we make the list up as we go. I mean, we’ve never been here before.”

“Didn’t stop third grade us,” he says. “Honestly, they seemed like they had everything together. We should think more like third grade us.”

“You mean complaining about how much things cost? Because I can think of so many things we could do together that would put major dents in our wallets.”

Sunghoon turns to you, a mischievous twinkle in his eye, and you know you’ve got this right, even if it took a while to get here. He reaches over, poking your cheek, before turning out of the parking lot. “Then let’s go find it, together.”

[lithominium]

I feel like what neurotypicals have got to understand is that yes, you CAN have symptoms of a mental illness like ocd or adhd or autism or many other things (these are just the “popular” ones for neurotypicals) but it doesn’t mean you Have it. “Having” a disorder is experiencing those symptoms often enough to have it be a Problem in your life.

Everyone sometimes goes “argh, i want to do this thing, i Need to do this thing, but my body wont let me” but it only becomes an adhd symptom when its Every Day and Every Task to the point that it hinders your day to day functioning both inside and outside of work

You would THINK this is easy to understand, but ive explained this to my father so many times and he doesnt get it

He goes “i might have ocd because i like the kitchen clean” but he doesn’t have the intrusive thoughts about cleaning the kitchen when theres a tiny speck of dust to the point its hindering his flying. He sometimes gets distracted from some activity but its not often enough to be adhd

Mental illnesses are just regular everyday things (for neurotypicals) that happen so often that it hinders day to day life, and the more often those symptoms occur, the more “severe” the disorder

Im talking out my ass with the only source really just being my own mild adhd but if anyone can support or correct this id be happy to hear it. Thanks

[crushedsweets]

tumblr user crushedsweets i am here to ask you another question about toby nat and nina. if nina was able to convince them into having a sleepover, how do you think it would go. what games would they play? what snacks would they make? who would inevitably wind up passing out on the floor with the other two comfortable on the bed? who would fall asleep first? i love them so much and i love your hcs for them

tumblr user anon i am here to cry because this is the perfect ask.... ok im starting now. this is mostly nina-centric cuz toby and nat are just following along. much more playful type headcanons

ok. ok.

toby would totally let nina and nat stay the night at his cabin if the other proxies were gone, he wouldn't need much convincing cuz nat already stays over a lot and ninas ... sweet enough. but in that case he wouldn't let them do any sleepover type stuff bc 'its my house im not watching twilight' (twilight reminds him of lyra). it wouldnt really be a fun sleepover or anything, but they'd bake cookies or something with nina for sure. prob got high/drunk too

now for more cutesy less edgy stuff...... i will be babygirlifying them all for these hcs... sorry not sorry. not canon to creeped(MAYBE).

BUT she'd definitely have to do more coaxing to get toby to come to her apartment. she lives in the city and that's not really his thing, but nat works over there so it's whatever to her.

assuming jeff is gone (only way tobys coming over), nina would be so cute about it. she'd have a blow up mattress set up in the living room, brought several bags of different candies and chips, put up random fairy lights, lit some candles so it smells sweet. her apartment is usually a little messy cuz she's a busy girl but for them . . she cleaned.

i could see nina being a really touchy person, constantly hooking arms with people and hugging them and playing with peoples fingers and stuff. it would take toby and nat forever to get used to it bc its admittedly kinda weird and invades personal space but she's so genuine with it and sweet and like :D theyre like OKAY FINE . so they'd just be walking around doing whatever and nina would pop up grabbing them like 'what r u doing in my kitchen :) the movies still playing :) youre missing the climax :) theres food out there :) youre making me mad :)'. or sitting watching a movie n she dozes off on their shoulder. etc.

nina would be swapping movies between things like 'to all the boys ive ever loved' to like... saw. oddly enough nat and toby are more likely to sit still and watch the romcoms just cuz they get invested in the plot ... LMFAO

i cant see nina actually getting them to play any sleepover games, BUT she'd hook up a switch. she'd try to play smth like overcooked with them but they rage too fucking hard and she has to swap to like. a mario game.

ok maybe she could get them to play like 2 rounds of truth or dare or never have i ever.

nat would like sour and hard candy... toby would like chocolate candy and baked stuff.... so nina would get the candy together and make them all bake some brownies.

she'd also make them make normal sugar cookies and try to decorate them but toby would make the ugliest fucking cookie possible and give up and let the girls decorate.

realistically nat and nina would end up on the air mattress and toby on the couch, BUT if they were stuck with just a bed, toby would take the floor. he'd offer cuz he's not about to share a bed with either of them.. but he'd prob wake up with nina on the floor too cuz nat KICKS in her sleep. nina curls up like a cat

nina falls asleep first. toby falls asleep last.

nina would try to convince them to let her do their makeup but toby would get irritated that she'd even ask. .

she'd defintely make them do skincare with her though .. nina uses snail mucin and the other two think she's weird.

the next morning ninas awake first and making pancakes. she walks away to go to the bathroom and gets distracted by washing her face and doing her hair and stuff and burns them so bad it wakes toby up... he comes in and turns off the stove and just waits for her to come back to call her dumb.

nat wakes up last and is so disorientated for like 30 mins after waking up... she just eats the food like a zombie until nina makes her wash her face again and shes up properly.

she'd try to get them to stay as long as possible, but theyre exhausted and as sweet as nina is, she's a bit much . . so they go home LOL. but nina would send them the cutest little "thank u for coming over i had fun i love u guys :3" text the next day and theyll feel kinda bad for leaving.

nina is just such a genuinely nice girl .... she just wants to live the teenage dream well into her 20s because she was um. Um. she behaved in a way. that um. highschool was not the most pleasant. and threw many of her teen years away for Um. a man. of sorts.

[teecupangel]

So i got a AC x Venom/Marvel crossover idea that ive been toying around with recently that i wanted to share:

So the reason that Symbiotes dont work so well with bonding is mostly the whole "We need to eat brains to live" thing clashes with most superhero morals, but Assassin's kill all the time so that could be a match made in heaven?

So, we could do this 2 ways: 1) is that desmond gets a symbiote when he and Lucy break out of Abstergo. Desmond stepped in some weird white and red goo, but with Lucy running ahead he couldnt really spare a thought to it. So, when he gets shoved in the trunk he gets to bond with the symbiote. Its a misfit just like him, completely alone in a world where you cant tell anyone who you truly are for fear of being discovered/abandoned/abused. So why not be misfits together? Desmond gets major flak for being such a chocolate addict, but hes losing hus mind over here so he gets his chocolate. He doesnt tell anyone about his friend until the templars show up and he and symbiote goes on an all you can eat buffe to everyones horror.

Or 2) where Desmond's body is recovered by Abstergo and during a containment breach a symbiote gets to his body and revives it(Isu bullshit FTW!) and goes on a rampage before dissapearing. Until Erudito gets a call on the emergency line from someone claiming to be Desmond.

Thoughts & Notes:

I imagine the symbiote to kinda look like Carnage & Anti-Venom, mainly being white with red details: his fingers are blood red that fade into black the closer to the hand you get until the black bleeds to the white in the middle of the fore-arms(the legs are the same). Instead of the spider symbol on the chest and back, he has the AC logo.

In option 1, idk what name would fit the symbiote, but in nr.2 id defo say they would name themselves Revenge for what Abstergo did to them.

Desmond would at first have issues eating people, but the symbiote does need it to live and if they stick to Templars and bad guys hes happy, so eh. Just make it a quick and clean kill, its the assassin way.

Idk how the others would really react really, but Bill would defintly go "This we can use, you are the perfect Assassin now", much to Desmonds frustration. Does Bill even see him as his son anymore?

Im all out of ideas now, what do you think? ^^

The origin of the Symbiote can be:

If we’re sticking to keep this as a Marvel/Venom/Spider-Man crossover, the Symbiote keeps its Marvel origin

If we’re keeping this contained into AC world, we can morph the Symbiote into a failed Isu experiment. In this route, the Symbiote could have been a failed plan to create an armor that can withstand the Solar Flare. It gained sentient due to some sort of Solar Flare-induced mechanical failure in its containment or lab and it spent centuries being alone until Abstergo got it.

Regardless of which route we choose, the idea would be: In Abstergo’s hands, it was studied and experimented on without realizing it was sentient which meant Abstergo was hurting it without realizing it.

This way the symbiote would have a reason to hate Abstergo and the Templar Order.

Or, you know, he could just like Desmond and be like “I like you so I’ll eat them.” kind of deal.

Another way that can be a combination of Way 1 & 2, Desmond got the symbiote when he returned to Rome to rescue Bill.

During the chase and ‘fight’ scene between Desmond and Cross, Cross could have accidentally shot the symbiote’s container and Desmond stepped on it in his mad dash to take down Cross as soon as possible.

The symbiote only started talking to him once he’s back in the Grand Temple and he believes it’s a more severe version of the Bleeding Effect first.

Actually…

Regardless of which Way we go for, Desmond wouldn’t immediately believe that he has a symbiote. He would cling to Lucy’s words that he’s hallucinating thanks to the Bleeding Effect and he would think the symbiote is more or less his mind trying to keep him sane by creating a weird sorta-not-sorta-shapeless being that seemed to be a mirror image of himself: completely alone in a world where he cannot tell anyone who he truly was for fear of being discovered, abandoned and/or abused.

The first time the symbiote would make itself known to everyone would be either from a battle with Abstergo (for Way 1 &2) or to actually protect Desmond from the device’s recoil because, while it cannot take the full brunt of the Solar Flare, the device’s recoil? Yeah, could totally do that.

Other Unorganized Notes:

I’m kinda imagining the Assassin insignia to start out more like ink blots with small veins stretched outward and the more Desmond and the symbiote ‘connect’, the more the Assassin insignia becomes clearer until the ink blots disappear but it’s an Assassin insignia that has small vein-shaped lines stretching outward.

I kinda like the idea that the symbiote’s name would be connected to either having an Assassin as its host or eagles in general. On the top of my head: Revenge (like you explained), Soar (which gives us a chance to make a lame joke of someone mishearing it as “Sore”), Flight, Leap, Hidden… or, you know, we can go for “Assassin” because no one can think of a better name or even “Bleed” because sometimes the symbiote suit looks like it’s bleeding and as a reference to the wrong idea they have that this might have been some kind of genetic mutation caused by the Bleeding Effect.

Shaun and Rebecca would freak out (Lucy too if we’re setting this in a timeline where the symbiote’s connection to Desmond made him stop before he stabbed Lucy) but they’d try to understand. Shaun would definitely be more on the side of poking it to see what it does because his self-preservation flipflop a lot while Rebecca is more worried about its effect on Desmond’s overall health in general.

Bill would definitely go “we can use this” the first time he heard of it then ask if Desmond’s alright later but, by then, the damage has been done. Even if Bill is genuine in his concern, Desmond don’t fucking care anymore.

The symbiote is the easiest way to stop Desmond’s Bleeding Episodes although it also likes to talk to his Bleeds. Altaïr finds it fascinating. Ezio is wary of it. Ratonhnhaké:ton just talks to it normally although there’s a hint of cautiousness in his tone.

It would be funny if the symbiote starts Bleeding Desmond’s ancestors once they reached a certain ‘connection level’ but instead of its personality being overwritten by the Bleed, it’s like the symbiote creates another ‘head’ to house the Bleed instead. This turns out to be the best way to keep Desmond from Bleeding but they can’t control who Bleeds, him or the symbiote… not yet anyway.

[mariatesstruther]

maria miller facts that are 100% true because i said so - for @clickergossip because you’ve been feeding me so well

she was the copy editor of her high school yearbook AND a cheerleader AND captain of the debate team

she still does her stretches every couple of days even post-2003, so even in her 40s she can still do some flips, a backbend, the splits, and a pretty decent toe touch

tommy is a big fan of this 😏

she TOO used to smuggle and do some shady, morally dubious stuff when she was living in a QZ with her father, mostly to keep them both fed and safe and healthy. she never tells him, and he never finds out. the first time she admits this to anyone in jackson is to tommy after he tells her about his past with joel and tess

while the world ended she was at work all day, while kevin was at home with her husband. she never fully found out what happened to them; all she has is that, by the time she got home, the house was trashed and there was blood all over her floor and her walls. she tries her best not to think about this at all

she and dina’s older sister talia are best friends. after talia is killed, maria pledges to herself that she’ll watch out for dina as much as she possibly can, and she basically ends up being dina’s #1 supporter during the pregnancy and first year with JJ. she and dina trade stories about talia and promise to make sure JJ knows how amazing his auntie tal was

sometimes JJ reminds maria so much of kevin that she has to step out of the room

maria has a secret stash of weed that her and talia kept in a jar under a loose floorboard in her house. she rolls joints with rose petals 🌹

maria is lowkey extremely scared of horses, but she doesn’t tell anyone for the sake of keeping up her reputation. one day when she and tommy are cleaning out the stables, a snake startles one of the horses so bad it bucks and kicks over a metal barrel. maria jumps so high and screams so loud it startles tommy, too, and suddenly he and her and this fucking horse are all needing to take a deep goddamn breath together. when she finally admits it, he’s like: ??????? ive seen u ride and get on a horse like you were born on a farm????? what?????

still, from then on, tommy is almost always at maria’s side when she has to mount and dismount her horse. because he talked to a few certain people about a few certain things, she pretty much exclusively rides this calm, beautiful blonde thoroughbred named cleo

maria first recognizes joel in ep 1x06 by his accent and the cadence of his voice. it’s so close to tommy that it immediately throws her, and when he says he’s looking for his brother, well—she obviously needs to know his mf name right away

maria needs to move closer to joel on her horse in that scene because she is severely nearsighted. homegirl needs glasses BAD. she can’t see for shit

tommy searches for glasses for her on every patrol. it is his ultimate life’s goal to find his wife some mf corrective lenses

it takes maria three weeks to convince tommy she is okay to go out on patrols while pregnant. it’s not like he’s being controlling or anything, but her pregnancy is very triggering for him anxiety- and nightmare-wise, and she wants to wait until both of them are comfortable with the decision before she takes any risks. they both settle on the compromise that it feels safe enough for her to go out on patrols with larger groups, as long as they stick to areas that have already been cleared of infected and are accompanied by the dogs

maria is a cat person. she would take care of her neighborhood strays as a kid. by year 10 in jackson, there is a thriving colony of strays that basically live out of her and tommy’s tool-turned-cat-shed at the back of their house

along with tommy, the entirety of the jackson community is invested in making sure maria has a safe and peaceful pregnancy. people start going to tommy and joel with problems that used to come to her, and part of it really annoys her because she knows she’s just as capable as she’s always been. still, a larger deeper part of her is deathly terrified to have this baby, so she ultimately appreciates the extra help and rest

she doesn’t ever tell joel or ellie, but she has a Very Emotional Pregnancy-Brain Breakdown because she’s anxious that ellie will never like her and joel will never like her and then tommy will leave and she’ll be alone with a baby she id scared to have and then the baby will never like her, either. it takes tommy an hour to calm her down—by the end of it, he’s crying a little bit too. he hugs her and kisses her and promises that he’ll never, ever leave—that’s it’s in his dna, his blood, to love her, just as much as it’s in his blood to be joel’s brother—and that he’ll spend his life at her and their child’s side. she believes him

when he does leave in tlou 2, she goes into their bedroom and trashes it completely—rips all the clothes out the closet, pulls down the dressers and shelves, throws his stupid fucking knick-knacks at the walls until they break, strips their bed her bed and rips the sheets. she locks herself in her home and doesn’t speak to anyone for two days; it’s the longest in jackson history that maria goes without working, aside from the week baby miller was born. the members of jackson make sure to leave her alone

when tommy gets back, she continues to refuse to speak to him while simultaneously sitting at his beside in the infirmary for a week straight

seth and maria have had beef that literally stems from the very start of establishing jackson. he’s just a fucking ass. FUCK seth like i will make a whole post about her beef with seth

maria and joel have mutual hate for seth. we’ve discussed this already over here lmfao, they get together and drink and talk shit about him at least twice a week while tommy and ellie have mischief time

sometimes maria and ellie will hear joel or tommy say some southernism that’s so unfamiliar and twangy to them it’s ridiculous, and together they instantly break out into hyper-exaggerated accents to mock them. the miller boys rolls their eyes but they obviously find it to be pretty adorable and hilarious

maria and ellie are not allowed to be on the same team for board game night anymore because they win everything and it is no fun for tommy >:(

tommy does metalsmithing and makes trinkets and jewelry with charms for maria whenever she gets the chance. the first time he makes a loc charm for her, she cries

maria knows how to make those cool patterned woven bracelets out of string and yarn. she teaches ellie how to make some so that she can make valentine’s day bracelets for dina

she visits jackson’s preschool sometimes and it’s so fun because all the jackson littles absolutely LOVE her. at first they think she’s kinda scary because she’s the Serious Boss Lady everybody and their families talk to upon first entering jackson, but one day at the beginning of the schoolyear she comes in and shows the preschoolers that she can do a cartwheel—from then on they’re all absolutely obsessed

[smolweeblets]

Be my partner forever?

Hange Zoe x GN reader

“Y/n! Glad to see you arrived.” Hange greeted cheerfully as they ushered you in their apartment. It smelled faintly of cinnamon and spruce. The place was nice and homey and looked unexpectedly clean. No offense to your lab partner but they didnt exactly seem like the most organized person.

“Of course id come, we’re partners in this project after all.” You smiled. You were happy when Hange invited you over for your project. They were a joy of a partner to have, and youve always admired them. Being invited to their house felt like a new step in your friendship, even though it was just for school reasons.

“Here, lets go to my room so we can discuss and research everything that we need. I already did a little bit of research myself beforehand though, so everything we need should be spread out on my floor.” You nodded in affirmation while still surveying your surroundings.

The place seemed very lived in, in a good way. Small knick-knacks littered the surfaces. you were willing to bet that almost each of them had a little story, and that Hange would love to ramble about all of them.

Youve harbored a crush for your eccentric classmate for a while now, and everytime they got excited about something its never failed to make you feel the same excitement they have about whatever it is that they were talking about.

“Here we are, sorry if its a little messy, ive been preoccupied with getting everything we needed.” They sheepishly smiled.

“Its fine, theres no need to apologize especially because it really isnt even all that messy.” You could swear they just let out a breath as you said that.

You made your way to their bed and promptly sat down. You opened your phone to check the details of your project and showed them to Hange. They were sat on the floor and hummed in acknowledgement.

“So, we need to get this vial…” It only took a second for you to find what you were looking for because all the materials were neatly labeled with easy to see stickers.

You could help but comment on their almost out of character neatness. “Wow, these are all very organized! I wish my stuff were this neat.”

“Haha, well i wanted my things to look nice since you were visiting. These chemicals usually arent labeled and i just figure things as i go–” They picked up a beaker and swirled it around as if for emphasis.

They then held an almost embarrased smile. “Heh, and well, that may play a part as to why my glasses are so heavy duty… they explode on me– a lot–”

You giggled softly. “Really? What kind of substances do you experiment with so often where they explode that much?”

They awkwardly chuckled as they averted your gaze. “If I told you youd probably leave.”

“Aw, you should know that some chemicals wont just magically make me leave, but i wont press in the issue. Id gladly stay ignorant if i could continue to be with you.” You chuckled as you sit down beside them and put your hand on their shoulder.

They heat up at the contact and at your words.

They cleared their throat. “Well then– we should uh, start soon yeah?”

“Oh yeah! Sorry, lets start” You looked down to the vial in your hands and tried to remember what to do next.

“I think we mix a few drops of that with this stuff” They held up a beaker so you could see the label.

“Oh yeah! Then the result should be the first common solution for everything else right?”

“Yep! Exactly!” They excitedly chirped.

Time flew by fast as the both of you worked together. Hange already knew all the steps beforehand, but they kept asking you questions and let you do things throughout because you were absolutely adorable when you enthusiastically answered sonething you knew about.

You didnt notice or mind all the questions, even though they were supposedly the smartest kid in class. You were just happy the both of you spending time together.

Hanges hands brushed with yours several times, and almost always it causes them to jolt a little. They cant help it, years of pining can have detrimental effects on a person. Everytime you get something wrong and sheepishly laugh, they find that all they want to do is kiss you and tell you its alright. They find themselves settling with just the latter, as difficult as it is. And every time you thank them for something, the try their hardest not to squeal and roll around the floor in happiness.

Before the both of you knew it, you were almost finished with the project. The sky was already dark yet neither of you wanted this moment to end.

“So, after we do this, we should be done! Working with you has been such a pleasure, I hope youre my lab partner again in the future!”

“I agree! Hell, you should be my lab partner forever, since we both love working with each other so much.” Their eyes widened as they realized the implications of what they said. They quickly scrambled to fix that, they didnt want you to have the wrong idea. Saying that was dumb, they should stop just saying everything that came to mind. Their mind was racing as they spoke.

“Well– i mean, uh, as long as school allows it because, obviously being lab partners forever is just quite impossible and i dont think wed even know each other for that long, i mean not that i dont want to but im just saying and uhh…” Their words stopped in their throat as they felt your hand holding theirs.

“No, I think forever sounds good” You smiled at them as you intertwined your hands together. A newfound confidence has found you. And you were going to make the most of it.

“We could work on something friday night, around… 5pm? Is that okay for you?”

“What– I mean yes! Yes of course im good at that time! Im good whenever!” Their words were failing them, but words really could not show their enthusiasm for your proposition.

“Great! I like the aspect of us working together, and i would like for it to be forever, i also would like to stay close with you forever.”

Hange was a blushing mess and couldnt believe their ears. Were you saying you like them?

They never would have expected this in a thousand years, they were fully expecting you just go on with your life and they would just watch quietly by the side. But your were saying you wanted to be together. With them.

Its almost like a dream come true to them. They could only stare at you wide-eyed as you smiled at them.

After staring at each other for what felt like hours, stood up to stretch.

“I think i have to go now, this has been a great day with you, im hoping we will have many more moments like this in the future.” You winked as put emphasis on the ‘many’, letting their imagination run wild.

“Uh– yeah… same here.”

And with that, you got your bag and left Hange a flustred, blushing mess. Oh how they could not wait for friday.

[dannyphantom-justiceleauge]

I kinda wanna see Jason & several others get a bit of a reality check.I've seen comments that Bruce trains kids as 'child soldiers' &??? The only child soldiers are Damien & Steph?? And they didn't become them because of Batman??

From what I recall, Dick, Jason, & Tim all insisted on vigilanteism. Like, Bats TRIED to get them to just stay home where it was safe, but they refused!

Like, what do people expect Bats to have done? Lock them in a dungeon & never let them out?

It's about a 50/50 that would've even worked & on the 50% chance that they did get out, they would've immediately started crime fighting again!

Or, should Bruce have just left them to their own devices, like "not my problem?" They would've either died trying to be heroes on their own & without guidence or grown up to hate the Bat even more for his apethy towards their problems.

Like, whether Jason, or anyone else, likes it or not, Bruce training them was a best case scenario.

All Batman did was try to heard them in the least dangerous direction that he could by giving them the tools to not die a horrible death.

Obviously, it didn't always work (i.e. Jason), but what does Jason expect Bruce to have done in his situation? What would've been the better alternative?

Honestly, I think the problem is that his anger is too big to pin onto just one person, but at the same time, he doesn't want to admit that he got himself into the situation that got him killed. Jason decided to chase after his birth mother without Bruce's aid. Jason went to Ethiopia. Yes, it happened because the Joker believed that there was some sort of connection between Todd & Batman, but how could Batman control that?

Like, I'm not saying that Jay doesn't have a legitimate right to be furiously angry at Bruce. I just think that he should focus on the things that the overgrown furry could actually control & did not handle correctly.

Like, the fact that he was hurt about Tim becoming Robin is understandable, but he didn't really have all the facts to understand the context surrounding Tim becoming Robin. Like the fact that Bruce was not functioning well without a Robin or that Tim refused to just stop when he wastold to. There was more to the situation than what Jay was aware of.

At the same time, his arguments about Bruce not avenging him or burying him with the Wayne name. I can understand that & actually very much agree with him.

Batsy should've killed the Joker or, at least, walked away while Dick did it if he wasn't strong enough to do it himself.

But, he didn't. And I get not wanting your kid to have to walk around with that kind of guilt hanging over his head, but reviving the effing Joker went WAY too far.

At the same time, Jason also should've just killed the Joker the moment he got the chance to. Deciding to use the sack of shit to punish Bats, was a dumbass idea. He should've shot his ass & then double, triple, & quadruple tapped, just to make sure.

Then, if he wasn't to be a dramatic asshole, put the Joker's head on a pike in the most visited part of Gotham with a sign with some sort of literary quote. Something to the tune of "Hey ho, the Wicked Witch is dead" or something with that sort of message.

As for the rest of the Joker's body? I'd suggest going the route of John Haigh. Just to be safe...

Gruesome, I know, but you know what? Whatever it takes to clean out the garbagio.

I know what you mean. I think the fandom and people outside the family give brice greif about the child soldier thing more than the kids themselves do. As far as ive seen dick, jason, tim, damian, and even steph own that robin is something they chose. It wasnt sething batman necessarily made them, its something they needed to do. Batman gets a lot of critism, like wise the league has argued about having sidekicks and teams like the titans and yj because theyre children. More often than not i see conflict about the adults trying to take the hero persona away, than about being given the cape in the first place.

But it can be complicated. I have heard the kids regret being vigilantes and regret what they've been made into by the job. So dick will never regret saving lives but he does regret his inability to settle down, the trained to a fault paranoia, the physical scars and mental wounds. The blame of that doesnt fall on batman or bruce. But on some level all kids feel like their parents are supposed to protect them and there's a point where you realize they can't. This is even more true when your a vigilante and exposed to untold danger. Bruce is a man and he isnt perfect so he can't protect his kids from everything. That hurts him more than it hurts his kid. But its still difficult to get hurt and be disappointed that yoir dad, that your hero wasn't there to save you.

Which brings me to jason. I recognize where you're coming from with jasons anger being irrational and all over the place. But what you gotta understand is that

1. He went through a rediculous amount of trauma. Like the time line of events is: bruce accused him of murdering a guy who commited suicide, jason got mad and found evidence of his birth mother, so he ran away to Ethiopia, he and bruce met up their almost coincidentally because bruce was tracking the joker and that communicate bruce didn't care that jason ran away, jason gets beaten with a crowbar and his mother also gets hurt because the joker is a bastard. The joker sets up a bomb and jason struggles to get he and his mom out despite his wounds. The bomb goes off and jason dies right as batman arrives. Then 6 months later jason wakes up and has to literally claw his way out of his own grave. Afterwhich he is catatonic qnd living on the streets until talia finds him

2. He was being manipulated. Talia found jason and trained him with the league and put him in the lazerus pit so he could recover higher brain function. She gave him everything he needed to train and get vengeance and framed it as a favor to her beloved. But she didn't tell the whole truth and didnt have all the information. Her actions here weren't altruistic. Its heavily implied she was sending jason as her loyal soldier to get rid of tim to clear the way for Damian.

3. The lazerus pit is essentially a drug that amplifies emotions. You could think of it as jason being on steroids. While his actions and emotions are his own they were amped up and irrational. So a lot of his irrational behavior and half thought out plans and stupity can be tied back to him having this 'drug' in his system. Emotions take the wheel and make people stupid without drugs amplifying things

But as i said his actions and the root of his feelings are still his own. So as to the why jason is so angry... well its not just that he was replaced or that he died. It that his death seemingly meant nothing. Jason died and seemingly nothing in gotham changed. He didn't see bruce greive. He didnt know that bruce almost killed the joker twice or that dick temporarily succeeded. He didnt know tim wasnt chosen but decided for himself to be robin. What jason aw was that within months of him dying there was another kid in his cape running around gotham and making quips like jason never existed. He saw the joker, his murderer, still on the steets still torturering and killing people. He saw bruce wayne with a new adopted kid. He saw his tenure, his life, the job that he died for reduced to a memorial in the bat cave with a plaque saying "a good soldier". Not a good son. No one but bruce and alfred were at his funeral.

So jason wasnt mad that tim replaced him. He wasnt mad that he died trying to save his mother. He was made that it seemingly effected nothing. That his death meant nothing to his family and it meant nothing to gotham.

If he wasnt mad at tim than why did he almost murder him? To send a message and to teach a lesson. He wanted tim to understand that robin is dangerous and that Bruce's protection was an empty promise. Jason could have killed tim in titans tower, but he didnt. Because tim dying wasnt the goal.

Why go through a convoluted plot to make batman do it? Well, initially it was jason being irrational. He got it into his head that bruce needed to prove that he loved him, to prove that hed protect him by defeating the monster. Jason wanted Bruce to choose being his dad over his no kill rule. And bruce chose the rule.

So that seemingly said, bruce doesnt love him, possibly never loved him. And this is further exhasperated by bruce sucking at communication. Bruce didn't just chose not to kill the joker when given the ultimatum, he threw a batarang at jason. Bruces will said jason was his biggest mistake. Bruce meant it in a 'i fucked up' way but jason took it as further 'adopting and you was a mistake'. Its shit and with the magic equivalent of .drugs further clouding things. Jason having tantrums and always shotting on bruce and the fam is understandable even if its not fair.

Why not kill the joker himself? Well part of that is fear. Jason has tried a few times to kill the joker and between the fucker being somewhat immortal for convoluted reason, trauma making jason freeze up, and outside interference it just hasnt taken.

As for bruce himself not killing the joker or bruce reviving the joker after dick killed him... well that comes back to the rule itself and bruces motivation for never killing. When bruce was younger he wanted to kill the guy who killed his parents. And alfred explained that taking a life is permanent and puts a weight on your soul. Its something you cant take back and something you have to live with forever. Showing people mercy, giving people a second chance is always the kinder option. Bruce made his rule initially because hes a kind person and he didn't want to carry the weight of murder. Likewise he revived the joker after dick killed him because he doesnt want dick to live with that weight, to live with that regret. Later on the rule took a more sinister tone because batman has seen who he becomes when starts killing. He also knows that if he starts killing hed never stop. Its a weird moral absolute but he knows if he could excuse killing the joker he could excuse killing anyone. And eventually anyone would include people who can change and innocents.

Its a little dumb of a moral absolute but its part if Bruce's character. I think its important to recognize the strength that it takes to show mercy to someone a shitty and undeserving as the joker. That kinda why theyre locked into being nemesis. The joker is ar his core nihilistic. He creates suffering because life is hopeless and nothing matters so may as well laugh at the pain. Batman is someone whos felt a lot of pain and is angry at the world that hurts people, but he is someone who gave himself hope and he is someone who sees the good in people even when they dont recognize the good in themselves. He is merciful and that is an act of kindness.

I do think the joker is beyond redemption at this point. It's the trolly problem at the end of the day: is the jokers recovery worth the lives of everyone hes killed tortured, drugged, and maimed? No. If the joker were to get suddenly better and regret his actions, it wouldnt bring anyone back and very few people would forgive him. Hed never be able yo reenter society or have a normal life. Hes never been a character who deserved mercy, but mercy isnt something you give because it's deserved. Personally i'd be more merciful to the jokers victims and put the fucker down.

But thats not my call. It isn't even really batmans call. At the end of the day batman is just a man in a suit. He isnt god and he isnt judge, jury, or executioner. To kill is a choice and batman chooses not to.

A better question is why the jokers life and death is considered batmans responsibility? And why is murder what jason needs for bruce to prove he loves him? I think thats where jason needs the wake up call. Murder isnt a normal response to having your kid murdered, even if im sure all parents going through that think about it. So why does jason need bruce to kill him so bad?

To feel safe. Jason can never feel safe so long as the joker is around and a dad is supposed to keep you safe. Bruce didnt.

Murder and mercy is where their breakdown of communication is. Bruce choses to be merciful to the villains he's fighting. Jason choses to kill the monsters so the victims can feel safe again.

- Hestia

[macgyvermedical]

Treating Diarrheal Illness

Someone recently sent me an ask about vomiting and diarrhea. I got almost all the way through writing it and then tumblr ate it. Didn't save it as a draft, didn't even put the ask back in my inbox, just poof'd it into oblivion.

But it was a good ask, and not one I get very often, so I still want to answer it- it essentially said the following:

How could a non-medical person in an apocalyptic setting treat someone who had severe diarrhea and vomiting, assuming the person in gastrointestinal distress was a doctor and could give them some direction? Can/should they give antidiarrheal medication and how would they go about doing that since the patient would probably throw it up?

So very glad you asked:

Diarrhea

The nice thing about most diarrheal illness is that as long as the person stays hydrated, they have a really good chance at surviving. Water is okay for hydration, but if the caregiver can get their hands on some salt, some potassium-based salt substitute, and some sugar, they can make a really easy and effective oral rehydration solution. The recipe is as follows:

Mix together:

1 liter of water

1/2 tsp salt (you want this to be slightly less salty than tears)

1/8 tsp potassium-based salt substitute (if you have this, great, if not, you can leave it out and it will still be effective)

8 tsp sugar

The goal is to get them to drink more volume of ORS than they are pooping- think at least a cup of ORS per poop.

Vomiting

The nice thing about uncontrollable vomiting is, again, that as long as the person stays hydrated, they will probably survive. Hydrating someone who can't keep anything down is a little trickier for the lay caregiver. Fortunately, there's another entrance to the GI tract.

The colon absorbs water. That's the colon's job. It takes the liquid coming from the small intestine and pulls water out of it until it becomes solid poop. A lay caregiver can take advantage of this process to hydrate someone if necessary by inserting a flexible tube (enema tip, catheter tip, NG tube, IV tubing, whatever relatively clean tube you have lying around that fits) a few inches into the rectum and SLOWLY instilling saline (1 liter water to 1/2 tsp salt). The colon can absorb between 2 and 6 liters of water this way per 24-hour period, which can absolutely keep a person hydrated even without an IV.

Diarrhea AND Vomiting

The annoying thing is that when diarrhea comes with vomiting severe enough to prevent being able to keep liquids down, neither of these really work.

So either your caregiver character needs a method that doesn't involve the GI tract at all, or they need to get creative.

IV hydration has a lot of drawbacks in the apocalypse. For one thing, it involves a lot of specialized equipment- the tiny catheters that sit in the vein, sterile tubing with a drip chamber, sterile fluids, and saline locks- all of which are nearly impossible to improvise. Plus, in the case of this ask specifically- doctors generally don't know how to start IVs. That's a nursing skill and unless a doctor is an anesthesiologist they probably haven't put an IV in since med school (where they did it exactly once).

Subcutaneous (subq) hydration is slower and requires all the same supplies. The nice thing about subq though is that unlike an IV catheter, which has to sit in the vein and takes skill/experience to place, in subq hydration the caregiver only has to place a catheter into the patient's fat (something a lot easier to talk someone through). This can instill about 60ml/hr (about 1.5 liters/24 hr). If they have the supplies and can throw more than one catheter in the person, they can probably keep them hydrated this way.

Recommendations

What I would recommend for this story, however, is to pile a bunch of anti-nausea remedies on top of each other to try to get the puking under control, then work on the diarrhea.

If this were my patient and I was in the apocalypse, I would start by putting a cool rag on the back of my patient's neck and have them smell an alcohol pad or some mint, help them wash out their mouth so it doesn't taste like puke, and try to keep them from puking for about an hour. If they make it that long, I'd start with having them drink about an ounce of clean water. If they don't throw it up over the course of the next half hour, I'd give an ounce of coca cola (I don't usually do brand names, but coca cola has a high concentration of phosphoric acid, which is a great anti-emetic plus the bubbles can help with nausea as well).

I'd then drop to an ounce every 15 mins, then an ounce every 10, alternating water and coke, or ORS and coke. The goal is very small amounts of liquid with time in between. If they become severely nauseous, back off and start again after a half hour. If they throw up, start the whole thing over again.

If at any point during this they had a prescription medication available like ondansetron, compazine, or promethazine, they could crush it and have the patient put it under their tongue- that way they wouldn't have to swallow it and risk throwing it back up. Some of it would absorb, and if they happened to swallow some, that would also be great.

Once the vomiting is moderately under control, they could give bismouth subsalicylate (pepto-bismol) and loperamide. Both work against diarrhea. For loperamide, the dosing is two tablets after the first loose stool, then one after each subsequent loose stool. Bismouth subsalicylate and loperamide can be taken together.

Stopping Things Up

A question a lot of people ask is whether you should take anything to stop diarrhea. This usually comes with the idea that the person with diarrhea must be pooping for a reason, and stopping it up is trapping an infection in there and making it worse.

If the diarrhea is being caused by a bacteria or virus, that infection is in the walls of the digestive tract, and it spreads to other people via infectious poop. Pooping does not get rid of the infection. It just makes it more likely that someone else will catch it, and that the patient will become dehydrated. So taking medication to slow down the poopcano is generally a good idea here, since the goal is basically just to wait until the immune system kicks the infection or antibiotics wipe it out, and pooping doesn't help with that.

Now. If the diarrhea is being caused by a toxin, including a toxin from, say, c-diff (an infection from a bacteria that takes over the gut after some antibiotics and causes life-threatening diarrhea/colitis), taking a medication to stop the poop is a bad idea- since the toxin will get trapped and continue to cause problems. Same if it's something like a food allergy or intolerance- it's going to keep messing you up until it's out, so better to let it get out.

How can you tell? Well, here's where I refer you to a doctor. In this situation, the doctor might be able to make an informed choice on whether they wanted to take an anti-diarrheal medication based on what they thought was causing the vomiting and diarrhea.

[girlhorse]

I understand you might not want to share, but if you dont mind, what happened? no judgment of course shit happens

under cut bc its long and boring kinda but i need to vent lol

it's like... literally nothing. not even interesting really. when i got hurt last week it was while breaking company safety policy - in the salon I'm in, literally everyons breaks several policies daily, bc our manager doesn't enforce them and most of us including me don't know the actual rules because of this. I got "caught" essentially because i got injured, so now my boss has been giving me so much shit for it. I'll concede that i knew i was breaking the rules leading up to the incident, but it was a rule i thought was "safe" to break in that particular salon bc i was told it was ok by another employee that worked there.

fwiw i still don't think what i did caused the incident to occur, they are only related in that they happened close together. and it doesnt matter if they're not related bc corporate will see them as related either way

on top of this my boss since i started has been really hard on me for seemingly no reason. She called me rude & irritating to my face many times, which stopped after we had a meeting with the gm. she consistently has accused me of things i havent done and has it in her head that I'm slow at my job and incompetent.

I struggle to understand what she wants from me. Recently I left late due to being stuck on a difficult groom that was taking a long time, ans her response was to accuse me of purposely staying late (again mind you) in order to make more money ig. She then continued to threaten me with retraining. today i left on time despite having a busy day, after asking her if she wanted me to stay and clean or if she wanted me to clock out. she told me to clean my station and leave. i did that and I left, and after i left she got mad that i didnt clean and asked me to come back to clean which regrettably i did go back to do like..off the clock lol.

today was the first time ive worked with her since i got injured and since she became like... mad at me about it idk. and shes been kind of being snippy more than anything..i literally had a nightmare about working today last night bc I've been so out of my mind anxious all weekend (her way of communicating that I'm in trouble is to just hint at a looming meeting, tell me shes unhappy and like let me fuckin simmwr with rhat for hours or days) and while she disnt outright yell at me or anything today she just kept making snide remarks or criticizing me constantly, not just privately but in front of others too. today was just so busy and i was anxious and fawning the whole damn day because of it and im exhausted. i worked so hard and did my damn best to please her like..almost subconsciously. i felt like i was dissociating. i was very anxious all day and frazzled and had trouble focusing. it ended up getting me in trouble during closing too.

its just really frustrating bc it only seems to happen to me. My othsr coworkers stay late with her on busy days. and i feel confused about what she expects from me.

[thescribblings]

Question; if this's your future leo after war what about the rest of his brothers? Are they dead? Alive? And what are they doing?

Ooo, you're asking the big plot related questions 👀

I haven't gotten into this part of my AU yet due to, well, not being able to properly tell the story. But since you asked so nicely :]

LORE INFODUMP TIME!

(Seriously this got out of hand so fast-)

Here's a bit copied and pasted from my personal notes

*ninpo, he's more practiced than leo due to his portals vanishing at age 20-30, he doesn't need his nagamaki to portal anymore, and is very skilled with his portals all in all.

-can create countless tiny apple sized portals as long as he has enough focus to plan the trajectory of the apple, he can do tricks like that with little difficulty, and loves using it in battle

-he can phase his body between reality and the portal dimension, letting him pass through physical objects, and people

-he can summon his nagamaki, but he can also summon Leo's swords, depends what mental state he's in, along with which is closer. Same goes for teleporting to his, or Leo's weapon

-

*his inability to portal wasn't due to having lost his ninpo, per se, he had just used it up, kinda like being burnt out, but on a whole nother level

-his ninpo vanished due to his body using it as a life source, keeping him alive, at the very least. It did have severe side effects, his ninpo making up for skipped meals, dehydration, lost sleep and more.

-ninpo side effects consisted of being severely underweight from his habit to skip meal after meal, his scales dry and dull from his lack of water, and a constant wear and tear on his body from the lack of sleep for nights on end. When he'd finally crash due to his energy literally running out, he'd collapse on the spot, passing out and finally getting some well deserved sleep

-after appearing in the past, his body was so used to its survival tactics that he couldn't sleep, despite the undeniable safety. he couldn't eat without a trashcan in arms reach, and after his third time violently upchucking his food he avoided eating entirely, having to get iv fluids and a feeding tube with the lightest nutritional liquid they could manage, instead. He did still drink water, after marveling at how clean it was

-to combat the previous point, they slowly started introducing foods easy on the stomach more and more, eventually deciding to have him snack throughout the day instead of full meals. To help with his sleep issues, they tried giving him a small dose of a drug to knock him out, he didn't like it but it worked for the most part, casey would often spend the night in the medbay with him as a comfort for them both.

*His brothers, after meditating and talking with karai for the first time since his portals vanished, he saw three pairs of eyes staring into his, across from him. his brothers signature colours were swirling around him. He then passed out, and the colours shot out in a multicolored shockwave of sorts, wrecking his surroundings. his recovered ninpo completely drained from his body in mere seconds. In this scenario his ninpo had been drained despite his brothers ninpo having fused with his own, this however means that when he recovers his ninpo, it's as strong as the four of them combined, along with being multicolored from then on.

-he wasn't aware of what happened, afterwards, not remembering the encounter with his brothers

-his ninpo started recovering four times as fast, which wasn't a lot, but it was an improvement

-the stronger his ninpo got, the more his brothers could interract with the world. They were completely invisible, and not really there physically for the first few weeks, but as their ninpo grew, they started doing things around the lair, Akari (donatello) going into his counterparts technology, leaving notes on how to fix coding, improve tech. Michaelangelo helping everyone out with aches, illness, bad moods etc, giving them a mental and physical boost. Raphael protecting them by redirecting projectiles, acting as a shield if necessary, and even helping them find things they misplaced.

-eventually his brothers are visible to mikey, but the transition from invisible to visible was freaky, seeing glimpses of eyes, tall silhouettes around corners, feeling watched, the horror movie experience. Unlike mikey, the others needed to activate their ninpo to be able to see his brothers, but the latter are always capable of physically interracting with the world

-later on donnie and Akari work together to create cloaking brooch esque pendants that let his brothers be visible to the naked eye

-his brothers can still use their ninpo seperately, but they're usually careful, as they could easily drain nardo if it got out of hand

Here's just a bit of clarifying info ig?

Orions brothers are dead, they're tethered to him, in a way, but they're not stuck to him. The further away from him they are the less of their ninpo he has access to, it causes them no harm to wander around and he encourages them to live their lives the way they want to, and not just stick around him because them leaving affects him, it just so happens to be that they want to be around their brother, their family.

Like i said, it causes them no harm to wander, including Orion. Physically, at least (more on that later). Ori is just fine with just his own ninpo, he's still as powerful as he needs to be to protect himself and those he loves,

Their fused ninpo works kinda like a tracker, if Ori were to lose his brothers he could search until he felt more of their ninpo, and then follow that until he finds them, so on and so forth.

when they're all together, everyone can feel the others ninpo, Ori is just the vessel when they're together. This does however mean that one of, or all of Orions brothers could accidentally drain all of their ninpo, so they usually stay out of petty fights and let Ori handle them, but if there's something that needs a bit more teamwork? You'll get to see what they can *really* do when they fight as a unit

If their ninpo were to be completely drained, Orion would pass out and his brothers would fade and be put into a foggy dreamlike state, they won't be solid or visible anymore until their ninpo recovers. By the time he wakes up again he'll be exhausted, dizzy, and suffering from a horrible migraine.

This dreamlike state is how they first came to be in the present, after he spoke with karai and triggered the explosive reaction in the training room, The little bit of ninpo he'd recovered was completely drained. Which led to him collapsing on the spot and waking up a few minutes later, dizzy and with the worst migraine he'd ever experienced. After this, his ninpo recovered four times faster than before, but he wasn't aware that his brothers were with him again

As his ninpo recovered, his brothers became more tangible and aware, their perception growing clearer by the day. Eventually they started kinda haunting their family, in their own unique ways

Aaaand here's a whole set of notes on Orion and facts under the cut :p

(All words btw, it is split up a bit and i think i made it okay to read?)

*specifics

-weight, 230 kg

-height, 7'4, 223cm

-age, 40

-calorie intake, 6377, eats 1600cal meals, usually getting the last 1500 through snacking

*Will throw out food (especially meat) the day after it expires, the smell of rotted meat is too reminiscent of krang/sickness. Any and all leftovers are eaten within days most times, often not more than two as he has nothing against eating the same food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner

*often very resourceful, knows survival tactics and avoids wasting food (the previous point being an exception), is usually a very efficient meal planner, he's an omnivore, but he likes to lean more towards a carnivorous, protein rich and high fat diet. occasional keto meals

-any type of meat, often favoring red meats

-most fruits, berries, favorite is peach (sliced)

-any and all nuts, common snack, but he does also like incorporating them in meals

-vegetable enthusiast, loves trying different combinations and adding them in smoothies and the like

-has a sweet tooth, usually satisfies it with fruits, rather than candy and the such, although he does eat the occasional pastry, in moderation

-He avoids overly sugary foods, as they affect his more feral state, making him jittery, paranoid, and anxious, similar to being overcaffeinated

*basically immune to spice due to tastebuds being obliterated by the atrocious sensations he had to put them through

-figured this out when he had no issues eating one of mikey's extra spicy meals, leo tried a bite and struggled with the sheer amount of spice mikey had crammed in there

-it's a 'can handle spice' scenario, rather than a 'can't feel spice' scenario, find something outrageously spicy and he'll still have the typical 'ate something too spicy' reaction; reclined, fanning face, sweaty, flushed, panting with a slight grin, the masochist.

-he likes spicy food, since it scratches a masochism itch in his brain, though he rarely goes over his spice tolerance

*coffee enthusiast, his energy levels are on an all time low, so he can rely on the stimulant a bit much. Around five cups on bad days, though he tries to limit himself to max three, most days

*stress stims

-clicking in back of throat, very common one, usually represses it

-scratching at self, pants, furniture

-rubbing prosthetic thigh, often when phantom pains flare up

-compulsive hissing, uncommon, usually if he feels threatened, rather than stressed

-bursts of growling, more common than hissing, usually used as a "back off" sound, also if he feels threatened

-fiddling with clothes, nearby object, bracelet, nearby person

*sometimes, to comfort someone he'll start humming very quietly, not to be heard, but felt. The vibrations of his voice a comforting sensation to his family

-he started doing this in a desperate attempt to quiet casey down as a kid, when they couldn't afford to make noise, then it stuck

*has his occasional 'off day' where his feral tendencies are greatly exaggerated, memories of off days tend to be foggy. Easy to trigger episodes during off days

*despite his over all lack of energy, he loves exercise and is borderline a workaholic at times, the others having stepped in on numerous occasions when he starts getting too close to 'won't be able to walk tomorrow' territory.

-his favorite thing is running, will often go on early morning, late night, midnight, mid day runs, sometimes multiple a day, but usually just his daily ones

-enjoys the peacefulness of yoga, flexibility training, compared to his other interests

-weight lifting multiple times a week

*ninpo, he's more practiced than leo due to his portals vanishing at age 20-30, he doesn't need his nagamaki to portal anymore, and is very skilled with his portals all in all.

-can create countless tiny apple sized portals as long as he has enough focus to plan the trajectory of the apple, he can do tricks like that with little difficulty, and loves using it in battle

-he can phase his body between reality and the portal dimension, letting him pass through physical objects, and people

-he can summon his nagamaki, but he can also summon Leo's swords, depends what mental state he's in, along with which is closer. Same goes for teleporting to his, or Leo's weapon

-

*his inability to portal wasn't due to having lost his ninpo, per se, he had just used it up, kinda like being burnt out, but on a whole nother level

-his ninpo vanished due to his body using it as a life source, keeping him alive, at the very least. It did have severe side effects, his ninpo making up for skipped meals, dehydration, lost sleep and more.

-ninpo side effects consisted of being severely underweight from his habit to skip meal after meal, his scales dry and dull from his lack of water, and a constant wear and tear on his body from the lack of sleep for nights on end. When he'd finally crash due to his energy literally running out, he'd collapse on the spot, passing out and finally getting some well deserved sleep

-after appearing in the past, his body was so used to its survival tactics that he couldn't sleep, despite the undeniable safety. he couldn't eat without a trashcan in arms reach, and after his third time violently upchucking his food he avoided eating entirely, having to get iv fluids and a feeding tube with the lightest nutritional liquid they could manage, instead. He did still drink water, after marveling at how clean it was

-to combat the previous point, they slowly started introducing foods easy on the stomach more and more, eventually deciding to have him snack throughout the day instead of full meals. To help with his sleep issues, they tried giving him a small dose of a drug to knock him out, he didn't like it but it worked for the most part, casey would often spend the night in the medbay with him as a comfort for them both.

*His brothers, after meditating and talking with karai for the first time since his portals vanished, he saw three pairs of eyes staring into his, across from him. his brothers signature colours were swirling around him. He then passed out, and the colours shot out in a multicolored shockwave of sorts, wrecking his surroundings. his recovered ninpo completely drained from his body in mere seconds. In this scenario his ninpo had been drained despite his brothers ninpo having fused with his own, this however means that when he recovers his ninpo, it's as strong as the four of them combined, along with being multicolored from then on.

-he wasn't aware of what happened, afterwards, not remembering the encounter with his brothers

-his ninpo started recovering four times as fast, which wasn't a lot, but it was an improvement

-the stronger his ninpo got, the more his brothers could interract with the world. They were completely invisible, and not really there physically for the first few weeks, but as their ninpo grew, they started doing things around the lair, Akari (donatello) going into his counterparts technology, leaving notes on how to fix coding, improve tech. Michaelangelo helping everyone out with aches, illness, bad moods etc, giving them a mental and physical boost. Raphael protecting them by redirecting projectiles, acting as a shield if necessary, and even helping them find things they misplaced.

-eventually his brothers are visible to mikey, but the transition from invisible to visible was freaky, seeing glimpses of eyes, tall silhouettes around corners, feeling watched, the horror movie experience. Unlike mikey, the others needed to activate their ninpo to be able to see his brothers, but the latter are always capable of physically interracting with the world

-later on donnie and Akari work together to create cloaking brooch esque pendants that let his brothers be visible to the naked eye

-his brothers can still use their ninpo seperately, but they're usually careful, as they could easily drain nardo if it got out of hand

*protective over his leg port, when his prosthetics are detached

-often growls if someone comes to close, bites if you're unlucky

-only lets leo touch it without arguement, even his donnie always got growling during check-ups

-rarely goes without a prosthetic, if his leg is gone he'll use the built in spare, reminiscent of an endo skeleton

*The colour pink is traumatic, for obvious reasons, will trigger episodes, but he comes back quick when the colour is out of sight again. Not without agressive hissing, growling, and possibly pouncing if you're unlucky. If you're very unlucky he might go straight for the 5'7 nagamaki blade that he can summon on demand

-donnie designs contact lenses that cancel out the colour pink, until the exposure therapy pays off

*Recurring flashback dream, vividly relives sister krang torturing him as slowly as she can, slowly snapping his arm off before tossing it to some krang hounds as a treat, but mainly carving off most of his thigh, cutting into his femur from hip to a bit below the knee, before reaching into his leg and excruciatingly, slowly twisting the bone out of its socket, doing the same to his knee joint. Then ripping the last bits of flesh keeping his leg even remotely attached before holding up the femur as if in amusement (cue his screaming)

*dissociates quite often, can be completely gone, or barely there at times, other times he's just a bit out of it

*michaelangelo helped him teach his brain to wake up to certain triggers due to their special circumstances, words, patterns, etc

-krang

*when a panic attack is triggered he will flee, running as far away as possible (kilometers) before hiding somewhere quiet, dark, and secluded. Tends to scratch at neck, thigh, nape etc as a form of unintended self harm, the pain helping him stay somewhat grounded

-this can result in deep gashes from his nails, but due to his healing factor, they heal within days, and rarely ever leave a scar. If there is a scar it's usually barely noticable

-

-

*when an anxiety attack is triggered he'll likely dissociate, along with a lot of stress stimming

*neat freak due to being forced to live in filth for two decades, keeps the lair spotless, always does chores in time, daily showers at least, just feels most at home when everything is tidy and genuinely enjoys the process of cleaning

[qr-sa]

a visual analysis of saezuru c50

prefacing this with: I didn’t end up going to art school but I have done a lot of drawing, so these are just my personal notes and thoughts on yoneda’s visual language

I’m not sure if people will actually enjoy this kind of thing, or if it’s redundant… let me know either way!

I really enjoyed the saezuru notes @eidolon-azii writes, and Ive been wanting to throw out some ideas about the art bit. This is incredibly late but I hope someone will love these things with me

I… actually wanted to review chapter 52, but I got sidetracked and I guess this will be focused on chapter 50 instead!

Yoneda uses many types of shading, along with lines, to create mood. Usually, she uses light, clean lines with white and black, and a wash of shading, which is consistent with normal lighting, as seem above.

This changes a bit when we get to moodier or more emotional scenes.

Right after yashiro grabbed doumeki , we see a glow around doumeki, basically chiseling him out from the dark background. The halo of light serves as a focal point, drawing your eye to doumeki’s expression. His expression could be considered placid, and many characters from nanahara to kamiya have noted that he is hard to read. Bringing focus to this expression was a really great way to push the intrigue. We, from yashiro’s pov, are brought to wonder what doumeki is thinking about. Is he upset? Does he feel like he’s being pushed away again? What does he want to do now? Personally, I feel that the (faint) rough pencil shading brings the panel from a doumeki fashion shoot (which… he’s fucking gorgeous here, hello) to a really raw moment. It’s details like this that really control the mood.

We also see a tone shift when they go to “doumeki’s woman”’s club. Rather than shading consistent with the rest of the club or environment, we get liberal use of shading, with crescents of light left to indicate volume. In this context, it seems to convey a quiet sort of turmoil. You see that yashiro’s shading is often darker than his environment warrants… which is something that I’m really enjoying. The framing of yashiro in the center of the stairs with harsh shading is a lovely severe touch to set the dark mood he’s in while he’s probably grappling with jealousy

Something I think we all need to commend sensei for is her incredible, sensuous shading. From her early doujin days, her shading has come leaps and become truly masterful— you can see the effort she has taken to study volume, and to convey the softness and suppleness of flesh. I can’t find this amazing panel of misumi’s old man abs, but somehow they looked to me to be amazingly soft… the slight slackness of collagen loss from the aging process on top of muscle. This sort of feeling is one of the hardest things to convey visually, and I really admire her touch… IF ANYONE KNOWS WHERE THIS PANEL IS PLEASE TELL ME I’ve been crying over being loss of misumi’s old man abs for a while now!!!

Here are two panels from chapter 50 where there is also sensuous shading. In these two frames, there is a great use of highlights and shading to create volume. I love the way the doumeki’s hands and yashiro’s legs seem so real and full— you can imagine the plushness of the leg and the firmness of the hands as the light hits it. The gradient in the shading brings a softness to the otherwise sharply defined volume, making it dramatic but sensuous, which I would say is a signature for sensei is work in saezuru.

Note: sensei also occasionally does fully soft panels where the shading and the gradient are both done gently, but they are rare— likely because saezuru is not a soft story and cannot or should not be conveyed in that way

Another thing I really enjoy seeing yoneda use are what I will be calling “moments of impact”. These are composed of totally flat panels of high contrast colors: black, white, or flat shade. She uses clean, crisp lines, and the strength of the contrast is so great that the impact gives you a tiny pause. This is a moment that she wants you to see. She doesn’t use this style often, so when she does, I feel the need to pay attention. Below, both of these panels are cropped in a way such that you only see one singular action. Starkly, we see below a moment of rejection and a moment of protection.

***

I can’t really think of anything else for this chapter, but I hope you enjoyed these panels and my thoughts on them! Stay winning (or crying, because I am tired and I really just want them to get together yesterday, for my peace of mind)

[writing-plurals]

okay so ive had this idea floating in the back of my head for a while, so here goes: how should i handle stuff like a relationship between two headmates of two different systems if the rest of the systems happen to not like each other at all, kinda like plural romeo and juliet except hopefully with a happier ending.

and on a tenously related note, would it be in bad taste if the systems in question had only two headmates? as far as i know this does happen in real life but far less often than in fiction

First of all, this sounds like a really good story idea that I'm sure some systems will relate to!

The first question you need to ask yourself is why do the systems not like each other? If the reason isn't very severe, it's much more likely to be resolved and you can get your happy ending. But if the reason is severe (e.g. one system abused the other), you can get into things such as the headmates feeling a lot of guilt over having a relationship with the headmate in the other system. So you can explore all that internal conflict if that's something you wanna go with.

But a big point is inner-system conflict. Conflict is never good in any relationship, and being a system is sort of like being in a weird relationship with a lot of people who you'll always be more connected to than with anyone in the outerworld.

First of all, are your systems amnesiac? Maybe you can have one of each or different levels of amnesia, but that'll raise different plot points. A headmate in an amnesiac system could get away with the relationship much easier. Depending on how they communicate, the rest wouldn't know about them meeting up, or if they deleted messages after speaking they wouldn't know about them texting. If one system has amnesia and the other doesn't, would the non-amnesiac system tell the amnesiac system about what the headmates are doing to get them to help put a stop to it, or do they dislike each other too much to collaborate in that way?

And in the non-amnesiac system, if they've got no amnesia barriers at all, there's nothing they can do to hide the relationship, so they'd be more fearful. Perhaps they start doing persecutory things so the system can't stop the relationship. For instance, if they have the power, they could lock everyone else out of front so they never find out about the relationship. But this won't last, the mental health of this headmate could get very bad if their system wasn't designed to have someone front for that long, and especially if that headmate's role has nothing to do with handling everyday life (and the headmate could also accidentally be negatively impacting the system's life, leaving a big mess the next fronter would have to clean up). Other headmates may be able to break into front again, such as a gatekeeper. And how would the headmate's partner feel about them doing this to the system? Oh! Another point I just thought of, do the headmates in the relationship also hate the rest of the other system and only love their partner? In that case, they may be completely fine with the headmate taking over front and think it's a good idea.

When the rest of the system finds out about the relationship, they could block and delete the contact of the other system if they hadn't done that already (but the headmate could try to retrieve it again), and if there's anyone in the system with the power to do so, they may lock the headmate out of front, or even try to put the headmate into dormancy to keep them from doing anything or to give them a sort of mental health reset (but handle this with care, as dormancy can be a sensitive topic for some systems). If the system has a therapist, you could show a healthier way of them dealing with this conflict, as in they tell the therapist what's going on and the therapist works with them to relieve the tension and conflict. This could be one way to lead into your happy ending.

Onto the last part of your ask, while you could have the systems only have two headmates, I think it would be better for the plot if they had more. Also, it'd be unlikely that both systems only have two, considering how rare that is. You could still have them be small systems, but I think two is too low. How would a bigger system be better for the plot? Well, it would raise the conflict. You could explore what each headmate thinks of the relationship once they know about it, for instance maybe there's at least one headmate who's actually okay with it, maybe they feel sympathetic towards the headmate in the relationship and want to help them. Maybe there's headmates who feel neutral about it, who don't care. And then there's the headmates against the relationship, they could hate the headmate, or feel betrayed by the headmate, or any number of things. But the more people in the system who hate the other system, the higher the stakes will be for the headmates in the relationship, and the harder it will be to solve the conflict, which I think will be more interesting.

So yeah, lots of things to think about, good luck on your writing!

-Mod Mountain