#just a few weeks ago my hyperfixation had returned but i seem to have

[aphel1on]

happy 2 year anniversary of yi city exploding my fucking brain

(assuming i started reading this on the 16th and bookmarked it 3 days later)

[wangxianficrecs]

I'm in the mood for a fic where...

(Y’all came too fast for me this week, so I had to save about ten requests for the next post:  so if you don’t see yours here, it’ll show up next week!)

(These posts don’t show up in the tags anymore... because of the links, I guess.  Grrr.)

~*~

1. Hi!!! mojo, I am trying to find untamed fics where wangxian is in a secret relationship like they are dating but everyone else doesn't know about it and think they hate each other. I really want to read some fic with this theme and Thanks in advance.

Marital Claims by yeolinski (M, 6k, wangxian, my post)

Rivals by The_peregrine_falcon (T, 4k, wangxian)

~*~

2. Good morning! I opened around fifty new tabs last night and the result was it crashed my phone, which I haven't had happen since my hyperfixation on BLEACH. I love and appreciate you so much. [Hee, hee, hee.  Thanks so much!]  Can you recommend any stories where someone gets poisoned or bitten by a venomous animal? People don't seem to tag for such things haha.  [I had a ‘buried alive’ kick a few years ago, and found some fics by searching bookmark tags instead of work tags.]

Forgotten by Elwen_of_the_hidden_valley (G, 14k, wangxian)

if eve ain't in your garden by w_wxsparkles (E, 7k, wangxian)

Venomous Bites by waffles_4_breakfast (E, 2k, wangxian)

golden as they come (but he's bleeding out) by Shializaro (T, 14k, wangxian, WIP)

Honesty by nirejseki (G, 1k, 3zun, truth serum), [PODFIC] by sisi_rambles

~*~

3. I was wondering... Is there a fix like this??? Thanks in advance! [Link is to a post that says, “post-canon idea that wei wuxian starts working on a flute language as a mirror/companion to the lans' qin language and lan xichen picks up on it bc it allows him to communicate without having to leave the hanshi, talk verbally, or meet anyone face-to-face”]

~*~

4. hi mojo✨ i read love, in fire and blood by cicer  and absolutely loved it! do you know any other war prize!lwj fics? thanks so much 🖤🖤🖤

❤️Fated by LtLJ (G, 31k, wangxian, my bookmark)

Imperfect Memory by xantissa (E, 62k, wangxian, my post)

❤️spider lilies to sunflowers by cicer (E, 33k, wangxian, my bookmark)

❤️tie a knife with a ribbon by iliacquer (E, 6k, wangxian, my post)

the shadow of a name in skin by iliacquer (E, 9k, wangxian, my post)

hot necromancer singles seeking dom daddies in your area by Mikkeneko (M, 19k, wangxian)

Possession by trickanery (M, 52k, wangxian, WIP)

for our love is a ghost the others can’t see by sheepwell, snackmon (sashimini_central) (M, 23k, wangxian, WIP) - courtesean lwj offered to general wwx

~*~

5. I just read Dignity and Animality, it was so good and I wanted to know if you know of other fics like it? Even just fics where wwx spends the 13 years w lwj and then returns to him as mxy? It doesn't have to involve rabbits but something similar maybe?

The Cruelty of Fate by Procrastination_Sensation (T, 16k, wangxian, my post, ghost wei wuxian)

Response by Aki_no_hikari (G, 12k, wangxian, my post, ghost wei wuxian)

❤️ Lan Sizhui Sees Dead People by darkbrokenreaper (T, 26k, wangxian, my post, ghost wei wuxian)

「Comeback」; Wei Ying's Night-Hunt Diary by Shinocchi (E, 155k, wangxian, series in progress)

~*~

6. Hi! One of the things I enjoy seeing the most across the various adaptations of MDZS is Wei Wuxian’s intelligence and problem solving skills, especially when he works with Lan Wangji. Do you know of any fics that feature this? ~ @amatorstellae

I have a tag for #genius wei wuxian that offers 14 works with what you want

no stranger would it be (if we met at midnight) by chatonnerie (T, 16k, wangxian)

Clinomania by malkinmalkout (E, 6k, wangxian, my post) - kinky product testing, mind the tags!

Prompt fill by @shanastoryteller​ (sadly not on AO3)

Prompt fill by @shanastoryteller​ (which may grow into an AO3 story someday)

~*~

7.  Hi! Thank you for your hard work on this blog! Do you happen to know any modern AU where lwj and wwx meet when they're already dating/married to other people? ~ @hicchanpicchan​

the people who were not in the papers by biscutpoo (M, 28k, wangxian, WIP)

Trace amounts of poison won't kill you by SalarianScientist (M, 36k, wangxian, WIP)

your lips are undeniable by worldwidemochiguy (E, 12k, wangxian)

~*~

8.  i love your blog! it's delightful!!!! [thank you!]  could you rec some fics with yiling laozu topping hanguang-jun? preferably not in modern aus! have a great day!!!

❤️spider lilies to sunflowers by cicer (E, 33k, wangxian, my bookmark)

so full of love i could barely eat by cicer (E, 40k, wangxian, my post)

Imperfect Memory by xantissa (E, 62k, wangxian, my post)

❤️tie a knife with a ribbon by iliacquer (E, 6k, wangxian, my post)

the shadow of a name in skin by iliacquer (E, 9k, wangxian, my post)

Claiming Life from Death by MarbleGlove (E, 25k, wangxian, Part 4, my post)

~*~

9.  YOUR BLOG IS A GODSEND! ^.^  [You’re so sweet, thank you!]  can we have some fics with WWX going BAMF Yiling Laozu in casefics? pretty please with cherry on top?

love what's burning right in front of you by seularen (E, 10k, wangxian)

hidden bodies by seularen (E, 5k, wangxian, WIP)

the field meets the wood by astronicht (T, 8k, wangxian)

Of Hats and Flutes by FixaIdea (G, 7k, wangxian, Ch. 4: each chapter is mini-fic)

❤️Resolutions by incendir (E, 204k, wangxian, my post, parts 5, 9)

❤️moonlight caught in mutton fat by Raitelzen (T, 45k, wangxian, my post)

「Comeback」; Wei Ying's Night-Hunt Diary by Shinocchi (E, 155k, wangxian, series in progress)

The Good That Won't Come Out by raisedbyhyenas (E, 26k, wangxian)

❤️爱不释手; never let me go by yiqie (E, 69k, wangxian, my post)

~*~

10.  Hello, and ty so so much for this blog, it's been an absolute godsend lol.  [I’m so glad!]   Would you happen to know of any fics where LXC and LWJ's relationship never really recovers post-33 lashes/WWX's death? I love LXC a lot lol, but I also crave fic of the flavor where LWJ realizes LXC doesn't love him quite as much or as bravely as LWJ loves him. Fics with similar vibes I've read include this blood in my mouth, And Miles To Go Before I Sleep, and (kinda) Born to Blossom, Bloom to Perish

its all winter here by tricksterity (T, 11k, wangxian, WIP)

kick at the darkness 'til it bleeds daylight by AlfAlfAlfAlfAlf, tardigradeschool (T, 75k, wangxian, my bookmark)

~*~

11.  For the next round of "I'm in the mood for..." I'd like to request recs for fics that explore WWX's relationship with the dead! One of the things I love about WWX is the fact that he holds just as much love and respect for the dead as the living, and really genuinely cares about the trauma and grievances of the dead. I'd love to read more fics that explore that aspect of his character if you know some! [none of the three I thought of are exactly what you’re looking for.  Hopefully someone else will come up with more appropriate suggestions... I’d like to read them, too!]

like the setting sun by silversshadow (T, 60k, wangxian, my bookmark)

The Guests of Cloud Recesses by cafecliche (T, 11k, wangxian, my post)

The Tale of Hanguang-Jun's One Hundred Ghosts by enea (T, 18k,w angxian, my post, this is about lwj’s relationship with ghosts)

when I look over my shoulder by cafecliche (T, 10k, wangxian)

5 TOTALLY TRUE STORIES OF THE YILING PATRIARCH TO TURN YOUR HAIR WHITE!!!!! (and one story that actually happened) by dragonofeternal (T, 3k, lan sizhui & wei wuxian)

Prayer for the Dead by Shinocchi (E, 22k, wangxian)

The Company We Keep by Kyani (G, <1k, wangxian)

~*~

12.  Hello! I have an "I'm in the mood for" request, whenever it fits into your queue! There are tons of great yunmeng siblings reconciliation fics out there that end with them rekindling their childhood relationship, or as close as they can get... i'm just curious, do you know of any that went in the opposite direction, where they end up going in different directions from one another because of everything in their history?

this comes as no surprise by retts (G, 2k, wangxian)

~*~

13.  Hii ! You're doing such a good job on your blog and you're basically my daily fic supply haha (・∀・) [Hee, hee, hee, that makes me so happy!]  .. I was wondering if you know any fics that focus on WWX having very low self esteem .. I've read a few but those never really focus on that , but i really want the angst of it ..  Thank you (＾∇＾)ﾉ♪

ghost out on the water by twigofwillow (T, 15k, wangxian, my bookmark)

❤️put your heart where your mouth is by protos_metazu_ison (T, 20k, wangxian, my post)

❤️this river runs to you by sundiscus (T, 53k, wangixna, my post)

sudden nature by everbrighter (M, 97k, wangxian, my post, Part 7)

❤️hunters seeking solid ground by Attila (E, 24k, wangxian, my post)

❤️ Fallen by Jaywalker_Holmes (M, 151k, wangxian, my post - his low self esteem comes up a lot in this one)

❤️And I Will Call You Home by Spodumene (E, 43k, wangxian, my bookmark)

A Well-Heeled Man by littlelightbeams (E, 53k, wangxian, my post)

like a saturated sunrise by moonsteps (T, 26k, wangxian, my post)

❤️the best of you by sysrae (E, 42k, wangxian, my post)

Mourning Robes by Starlight1395 (T, 17k, wangxian, my post)

Above the Mist of the Cloud Recesses by EquinoxSolstice (T, 8k, wangxian, my post)

Just As Much by Gemiblu (E, 24k, wangxian)

in all my dreams i drown by idrilka (E, 9k, wangxian, my post)

Three Wishes - Substitute Regrets, With Exchange, No Refund by Director_XuanWu (T, 14k, wangxian)

underneath by guttersvoice (M, 2k, wangxian; warning for extreme body dysphoria and unreality issues)

~*~

14.  hi mojo! first of all i wanna thank you for your fic recs they are a god send!  [You’re welcome!] second of all, do you know any fics where jin ling is wwx’s biological kid? or any fics that explore their relationship and talk about the stabbing incident rather than just pretending it didn’t happen. have a good day!

Sorry and Thank You by Morgana_avalon (G, 57k, wangxian, jin ling & nie huaisang) - all about the stabbing and repercussions of it

Happy in these hills by deliciousblizzardshark (not rated, 4k, wangxian) - they raise JL but he’s not theirs biologically

~*~

15.  hi!! i absolutely adore your blog and it’s such a lifesaver in this fandom.  [thanks!] i was wondering if you or your followers had any fic recs where wwx and wen ning are just best friends because i adore their relationship/interactions. thank you so much!!

This One Shadow by LtLJ (G, 3k, wangxian, wei wuxian & wen ning, my bookmark)

Take Care by winterhill (M, 5k, wangxian, wei wuxian & wen ning, my post)

~*~

16.  Do you happen to have any modern, long songxuexiao? or any writers to rec who write a lot of songxuexiao? I thank you <3

vinculum by Skadiseven (Star Trek fusion, E, 21k, songxuexiao, background wangxian)

pettecal72 and aphilologicalbatman might be authors you’d like

~*~

17.  Hello! I hope I'm not breaking a rule by asking this here (feel free to disregard if so!) [Of course not!], but I'm wondering if you know of any fics where Lan Qiren is Good Actually, and somehow changes his opinion on WWX pre-timeskip, and supports/helps/protects him in some way? Thank you!!!

Life by scifigeek14 (T, 66k, wangxian, my post)

Righteous at a Cost by thunderwear (G, 21k, wangxian, lan qiren & wei wuxian, my post)

decay by antebunny (G, 16k, wangxian, lan qiren & wei wuxian, my post)

sentimental education by everythingispoetry (G, 5k, wangxian, nielan, xuanli, my post)

Polyphonic by nirejseki (not rated, 7k, wangxian, WIP - everything by this author is usually lqr-positive)

Company by WithBroomBefore (T, 30k, wangxian)

No Strings Attached by stiltonbasket (G, 3k, wangxian)

~*~

18.  Hey Mojo! I love your In The Mood For posts and would like to ask you and the hivemind if anyone knows any (preferably modern) on/off relationship fics or Second Chance stories? I've been craving a little bit of angst lately. Thank you so much, hope you have a nice day!

❤️Love wakes me by dea_liberty (E, 46k, wangxian, my post)

Tempo Rubato by Spodumene (E, 108, wangxian, my post)

sudden nature by everbrighter (M, 97k, wangxian, my post)

Three Wishes - Substitute Regrets, With Exchange, No Refund by Director_XuanWu (T, 14k, wangxian)

你吃饭没有 / have you eaten? by heuheu_the_goose (T, 35k, wangxian)

to chase away loneliness by emowangji (M, 53k, wangxian)

Trace amounts of poison won't kill you by SalarianScientist (M, 36k, wangxian, WIP)

~*~

19.  hiii! thank you for your hard work. i just wanted to ask if you happen to know fics where wwx has an older brother? im just feeling that protective bro feels. Thank you ^o^

❤️shades of grey by cl410 (M, 59k, nielan, wangxian, nie huaisang & wei wuxian, big brother nmj)

The Light That Fails to Dim by glowingreverie (T, 311k, wangxian, big brother nmj)

MingYu by Fino_Al_Cielo (T, 77k, wangxian, WIP)

~*~

20.  I absolutely freaking adore this blog💯💯 I check it out everyday without fail, you are an angel for maintaining this so well⭐⭐❤️❤️.  [Thank you!]  Do you happen to know any fics in which people have a crush on wwx or just people observing that he's really attractive? Or just any fics in which someone pays too much attention to wwx and lwj, the juniors, JC anyone really protects him from it.

❤️ Resolutions by incendir (E, 204k, wangxian, 14 works, Part 5, warning for attempted sexual assault, my post)

Transcend by covalentbonds (not rated, 8k, wangxian, WIP)

That Time Everyone Assumed the Yiling Patriarch was Ugly by tinitin (M, 5k, wangxian)

~*~

21.  hello hello hello! hope you're having a nice day ❤ for the next i'm in the mood for, could you rec some merpeople aus? mermay is really getting to me ajagshsgshs

I have this post (but it needs updating, so y’all make suggestions!)

claws of steel, hearts of glass by SnowyK (E, 26k, wangxian, siren wwx, merman lan wangji)

The Treasure of Maroon Bay by skulltoki (M, 31k, wangxian)

A Secret Place by SerenadeStrong (ninja_orange) (E, 2k, wangxian)

Tears of Pearl by FleetofShippyShips (T, 34k, wangxian, series in progress)

sun beneath the sea by cringewerewolf (M, 19k, wangxian, just posted today!)

The Pirate of Lotus Pier by antebunny (G, 56k, wangxian)

never love an anchor by tardigradeschool (T, 31k, wangxian, selkies)

bring you home by Alasse_Irena  (T, 28k, wangxian, selkies)

there & there & there, the sea by bleuett (M, 7k, wangxian)

Secrets of Yunmeng's Lotus Lakes by Cy_anne (G, 73k, wangxian)

~*~

22.  I recently found your blog and just wanted to ask if you or your followers know any stories where WWX comes back from the burial mounds different: obviously psychologically scarred (I mean he always is, but with that as a focus), dead or not at all. Maybe he's a demon or sth.  I love both Angst and People caring about WWX (or not) and have read quite a few fics in that direction, but I am wondering if there are some I missed. ~ @nagisamin​

between the shadow and the soul by cl410 (M, 22k, wangxian, qingli, chengsang, my bookmark - heh, this one’s in my queue for tonight actually)

Grief Kindly Stopped by ShanaStoryteller (not rated, 5k, wangxian)

ghosts do not speak of lies and truth by LunaChi_KuroShihone (T, 6k, wangxian)

Scrimshaw by Verse (T, 2k, jiang cheng & wei wuxian, mind all the tags for this author! )

Tarrare by Verse (M, <1k, wei wuxian, mind all the tags for this author! )

Silver bell, ivory tusk by Verse (T, 6k, mind all the tags for this author!)

Three Months, but One Day Shy by mondengel (M, 1k, wei wuxian, mind the tags!)

~*~

[My ko-fi.]

[northernscruffycat]

Tagged by @101flavoursofweird

I’ll tag @pandirpus @krokonoko @my-artblog-is-ssjumi @yallemagne @amberrgalaxy @swamp-y and anyone else who wants to do this. But this is a pretty long one, so don’t feel like you have to :3 (On that note, I’ll be putting most of this under a cut for exactly that reason)

How many works do you have on AO3?

131 at the moment. But some of those are different oneshots from FFN that I posted into one fic when porting over to AO3, so I’d be fascinated by what the actual amount of fanfics I’ve written is.

What’s your total AO3 word count?

1242922 words

How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

Just counting what’s on AO3, so far I’ve written for 17 fandoms. They are: Free!, Professor Layton, Hades Game, Steven Universe, Pokemon, Ace Attorney, Yu-Gi-Oh DM, Yu-Gi-Oh GX, Yu-Gi-Oh 5d’s, Sonic the Hedgehog, Super Mario, Dr. Stone, Tintin, Night in the Woods, GetBackers, Good Omens and Cooking Mama What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

‘just wanted to write a fic where senku says ‘get excited’ during sex’ (My SenGen oneshot that gets a wave of attention whenever a new chapter or episode of Dr. Stone comes out)

‘laughable’ (An Ares/Hypnos oneshot I wrote purely as a sample for a zine app and underestimated how popular that ship is lol)

‘the prince with specific tastes; the king with specific regrets’ (THAT Theseus fic. My absolute fave thing I’ve ever written)

‘Shallow Grave, Shallow Bae’ (A Reigisa fic based on Octopimp’s 50% Off! abridged series of Free!; I honestly do think this fic slaps and I’m glad folks like it)

‘Barrel of Monkeys’ (The AsaIku & KisuHiyo collab fic I wrote with Amber that was a lotta fun and I’d love to do something like this with them again one day for a different fandom. Also, I feel like we captained the small KisuHiyo fandom with this fic back in the day)

Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

I generally respond to comments. Almost always, unless I really can’t think of anything to say in reply, which is pretty rare. Comments make me so happy and I just want to let people who do comment know that I appreciate them.

What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

I think the angstiest fic I wrote was a Free! fic called ‘Moves Across the Land’ - the premise of which is that Makoto died as a young adult of an illness and each chapter is a different person in his life receiving a letter that he wrote for them before he died. But that one had an optimistic ending, with Haru and Kisumi unexpectedly finding a newly strengthened friendship in sharing the grief of Makoto’s death. So I guess technically the angstiest ending I wrote was a short Archie/Maxie oneshot where Maxie gets killed by Kyogre lol

Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Yes, but I ended up agreeing with it! Waaay back (probably more that 10 years ago at this point), I wrote a bunch of Layton/Rosetta oneshots that I now don’t stand by. One of them, in my naivety, I went too far with and breached uncomfortable territory. I got a couple of comments about how uncomfortable it was, so I ended up deleting that particular fic and felt better after it was gone.

Do you write smut? If so what kind?

I am a fledgling at writing smut, which is probably obvious to anyone who’s read my smut haha. When I do write it, I prefer to focus on the dialogue between the characters - I like a banterous smut scene. Also, they’re usually pretty tame. I like writing about handjobs, blowjobs and wanking the most when I do write smut.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

Again, not that I know of, but that would be awesome! A few years ago, a kind person messaged me about potentially translating my Layton fic ‘Grasping Liquid’ into French, but I don’t think they went through with it in the end. Though honestly, the dialogue and slang in that fic is pretty much illegible in English, so I reckon it’d be a tough fic to translate.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes, the aforementioned ‘Barrel of Monkeys’ that I co-wrote with @amberrgalaxy It was a lot of fun and I love it :D

What’s your all time favorite ship?

Hmm... I don’t think I have a single all time favourite. I jump through a lot of OTPs and they always mean a lot to me, but it wouldn’t seem fair to pick out a single one that’s always shined brighter than the others, because that’s not really how my hyperfixations work. But my current favourite ships are Momus/Heracles (to be narcissistic) and TheseZag from Hades Game. While my oldest ship that I’m still invested in is Yami/Seto from Yu-Gi-Oh DM.

What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Shockingly, I don’t have any right now. A few years ago (I think 2018?), I made a point of going back and finishing ALL my old WIPs that I’d left hanging but intended to finish, even for fandoms I didn’t plan on going back to. So that freed my conscience of them and felt pretty good. At the moment, my only WIP is ‘if found please return to the underworld’ - an AU where Zagreus does make it to Olympus, so Hades sends Theseus, Asterius and Meg to try to get him back. But I’ve only just started writing that one, so I do hope to stick with it until it’s finished.

What are your writing strengths?

Dialogue. Definitely dialogue. I’m told that I capture the canon voices of characters pretty well and that’s always what I’m trying the hardest to get right, so it means a lot to me. I also feel like I’m good at keeping a fic flowing, without being bogged down by too much detail. But the downside of that is that I often sacrifice description, so I still hope to find the balance. Since Hades Game has more flowery prose than I’m used to, I think getting into that series actually helped me with this.

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

I do not think I am experienced enough to be able to pull this off well and would worry too much about making mistakes.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for?

It was Pokemon, but those fics aren’t online anymore. The oldest fics you can still find buried somewhere with my name attached to them are Sonic fics.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve ever written?

‘the prince with specific tastes; the king with specific regrets’ - Sometimes I look back at that fic and wonder if I actually wrote it, since I avoided falling into all of my usual traps: I researched it properly and frequently, I kept the focus on the five main characters instead of getting distracted by introducing a million other character like I usually do, I plotted the fucker out from start to finish instead of winging it, and I worked the flashbacks into it in a way that balanced the present-day out instead of distracting from it. Also, I got the whole thing written in about two months, instead of staling for years. ...Whatever possessed me when I wrote that fic, please come back. (It was the first time I’d had two weeks off together in about three years, so I think that had a lot to do with it) OH YEAH and that same kinda villain OC who I recycle in every fandom I’m in actually landed this time. It brought me so much joy to see how much people loved to hate Momus. Those two months when I was posting that fic are easily a highlight of my life. :D

[ethereal-ineffability]

HELL YEAH, DUDE! INFO DUMP ABOUT YOUR OC, OR SO HELP ME!

eyyyyyyyyy. CW for discussion of violent fictional bigots leading to body image issues. Okay so here's the thing. My boy Curio a sweet, kind of shy, well-meaning, socially awkward 28-year-old wizard. Tallish, no muscles whatsoever, big round glasses, kind of stupid facial hair, your standard stereotype.

Except that's not what he looks like, really.

That image is missing a Hat of Disguise (grey irish flat-cap), which he wears constantly, even while sleeping unless he can be sure he's alone. His full first name is Curiosity and what he actually looks like is somewhere around these two pictures, except with broken horns and a helluva lot more faded-over-2-decades facial scarring.

That childhood scarring is the reason why he literally never takes the hat off, no matter what; not because of the scarring itself, but because of what it represents. He grew up with so much baggage attached to his identity as a tiefling because, apart from a very supportive but imperfect and over-her-head single human mother, he had no support network in a small town where he was the only tiefling and almost-if-not-all of the entire town were superstitious humans who were very not interested in examining their biases. The children his age and a few years older were the ones who gave him most of that damage. But there's a reason his mother named him Curiosity; ever since he was old enough to explore, he did so enthusiastically and constantly, and after enough of that (and playing mostly alone) he developed skills that other kids his age didn't have, and he essentially became a gifted child. His mom took advantage of that (and some favors with an old friend) when the bullying got especially bad and got Curio scholarships to send him away to a mage's college in a more open-minded area where he would be protected and taken care of, in exchange for helping with tasks around the college until he was old enough to become an official student. The college became his life. He threw himself into the study of everything having to do with magic - history, mechanics, culture, ethics, etc. - partly as distraction, partly as hyperfixation (I do imagine he's neurodivergent in some way), and partly, subconsciously, as a desperate way to grasp at some sort of explanation for why he exists the way that he does and why the world around him is the way that it is. The enchanted hat was something he got at some point during his time at the college, and it essentially became a comfort item for him, and even though he probably could have gotten by without it with *less* problems than he had in his hometown, he just refused to go without it for years after the fact both out of fear of what could happen again and out of what had become, at that point, a deeply ingrained sense that he was just *wrong* and that he needed to hide himself to avoid burdening others. And all of that is just background for his situation in the current campaign, as a 7th-level wizard who has been traveling with a southern sweetheart druid satyr, a young-looking and mysterious dreamfolk warlock, a puss-in-boots-esque tabaxi fighter, a sweet grandmotherly minotaur barbarian, and a tiefling sorcerer in his late 40's who has a lot of backstory commonalities with Curio, particularly being raised by a single mother, having bad experiences as a kid due to his fiendish heritage, leaving home young, and hiding his appearance when he was younger. (Side note, the sorcerer's player and I *did not plan this*. We both came up with backstories independently, we didn't really have a session 0, and we just now found out how weirdly similar our characters' lives have been, though there's obviously been some differences too.) I started out this campaign by letting all the players know openly that Curio was not human, because I knew I couldn't keep a secret. In the 9 months we've been playing (we had a hiatus for a few, so it's more like 6-7 months of weekly to bi-weekly sessions), the character that's come the closest to figuring it out has been the sorcerer, Turavel, because he has obvious advantages when it comes to picking out which things just don't seem right for a human wizard to do. For example, on top of the weirdness of Curio never taking the hat off, sleeping alone often, bathing alone often, etc., he barely (roll of 15 vs 14) caught Curio tearing up when Turavel was talking about where he came from, and he thought it was weird that Curio could cast things like Hellish Rebuke. (The player, actually, was the only one of us to call this out when it happened, so I made note of it.) At the time (months ago irl, about 2-4 weeks ago in game time), I as the player didn't think Curio's cover had been blown, because I was convinced that Wizards could cast Hellish Rebuke, and I

even informed the player that Curio has fake entries in his spellbook for Hellish Rebuke, Thaumaturgy, and Darkness, just in case anyone ever saw it who also saw him cast those things. But I discovered today while searching for level-up spells for him that I was wrong. As soon as I realized, I sent Turavel's player these messages:

"Looking through wizard-only spells and realized that I as the player made ANOTHER mistake, specifically about which spells would be natural to see a wizard use, which means Curio made another mistake because I'm not retconning anything I said about what he's done. Whoopsie Since you actually called it out at the time (not the latest nat 1, the one time Curio used it before that) I'll be clear with you: Hellish Rebuke is a 2nd level, Warlock-only spell. Curio has the Magic Initiate feat, which might explain why he knows Thaumaturgy which is a cleric-only spell, since his 1st level spell for that feat is Healing Word which is exclusive to clerics, bards, and druids... but if that were the case that wouldn't explain why he can also use Vicious Mockery, which only works with bardic magic. He would have had to have learned Healing Word in a bardic way, leaving Thaumaturgy unaccounted for, unless there's just some explanation other than fiendish heritage or magic initiate that Turavel has literally never heard of before. Maybe there's a bardic college that would allow for the learning of Thaumaturgy? Unlikely. In that case Hellish Rebuke would still be unaccounted for, unless Curio has a secret patron and is a multiclassed warlock/wizard. Occam's razor. And since Turavel's the only one who asked to see his spellbook [in return, after Curio asked to see the spellbooks of all the other spellcasters], help me remember and I'll let you contest me on arcana with advantage to put all this together when we meet next."

And that's where we are. Curio's about to get fully found out because of overthinking and overprotecting himself in ways that weren't necessary, after just casually and confidently trading spellbooks - for strategic study - with the one person in the party who was always leagues more likely than anyone else to figure out what was going on. The same sorcerer who is old enough to be Curio's father and knows almost *exactly* what he's going through, and who Curio would probably be the most ashamed to be found out by, because he would probably be worried that his disguising of his tiefling nature would be interpreted as an insult even though Curio has terrible anxiety about the whole thing and literally can't help it. And I just think it's extra fun that the reason this is happening so soon is because of decisions I made intentionally as a player to make it *harder* to find him out, while truly thinking about what he would actually do. And I swear to god if that roll at advantage doesn't work I'm giving him all the inspiration I've got, because this is too good. I'm excited for the ensuing cathartic drama and for this precious boy to finally start learning how to love himself. p.s. in case any readers haven't picked up by now it's a closeted-trans-youth meets open-trans-elder allegory. This is what happens when you play DnD with other trans people

[scorbusfest]

Scorbus Fest 2020 Masterlist

FIC:

Break The Ice (T, 7.7k) by Honeysworks

Prompt: Scorpius is a figure skater, Albus plays ice hockey. They train at the same ice rink. Albus finds himself looking for excuses to hang about in the locker room after training just so he can bump into Scorpius.

An Issue of a Dragon (G, 5.7) by @truemeg

Albus returns to school with an extra little something in a box: a dragon. Albus is confident he can take care of it on his own. But Scorpius knows better.

A Million Times (M, 14k) by bellatrix187 @greenandgreyeyes

Albus has been pining after his best friend for two years now. After almost a week of house-sitting with Scorpius for his parents’ friends Dean and Seamus, he has had enough of keeping it inside him. He has no idea what Scorpius is feeling, how to bring it up, or what it will mean for them, but will the discovery of a few dirty magazines spark a conversation about their sexualities and force him to confess?

Turning Circles (T, 38k) by roonilwazlib @xpectopatronerd

Scorpius is a figure skater, Albus plays junior hockey. A random schedule change causes them to bump into each other for the first time - and from there, it’s a slippery slope into mutual pining and endless maybes. They might train at the same rink, but will any of them be brave enough to break the ice?

Featuring secrets, crushes, secret crushes and everyone’s favourite Father of the Year, Draco Malfoy at his very finest. This is basically forty thousand words of fluff and fun, set in a Muggle AU in the North of England.

Our Golden Age (E, 2.6k) by @ladderofyears

Scorpius Malfoy is sixty years old and has just lost his wife Cecily after a long marriage. His best-friend of many decades Albus Potter comes to stay with him at Malfoy Manor.

You Being Okay Is All That Matters (G, 3.4k) by @accioscorp

A final shift before a well deserved break for Scorpius is flipped upside down when an accident at the local creatures sanctuary sends Saint Mungo’s into chaos but Scorpius’ mind is only focused on one thing … whether Albus is okay or not.

Five times Albus noticed a thing about Scorpius and one time he didn’t (M, 4.4k) by @eleonorapoe

Albus has known Scorpius his whole life. He knows how he likes his sandwiches, which side he falls asleep on, the noise he makes when laughing his ass off. Until one day, on “The Morning of Bed Head”, Albus discovers there are things about Scorpius that can still surprise him. They say the third time's a charm, but it takes Albus five times to realize that he hadn't noticed the most important thing about Scorpius at all.

I’d Take Every Jump For You (G, 12.7k) by Augurey_ray

Scorpius is a dressage rider and spends every second of his free time at the stables. Albus? Albus isn't as much of a fan. One day their paths cross and, well, they have their hurdles.

Five Times Things Did Not Work Out as Planned, and One Time They Did (G, 11.3k) by WhenSheReads

Pretty much what the title says--things may not always work out for Scorpius and Albus, but that doesn't mean things are bad.

Different kinds of “addictions” (G, 7.3k) by @sapphicfangirll

After a fight with James, Albus rushes to Malfoy Manor to seek comfort from his favourite blonde. Once he goes back home Albus might just realise that there's more to his brother than meets the eye.

(This one-shot involves two of my hcs: a)Albus having adhd b)Albus knowing sign language; it's the first in a series of one-shots centered around adhd!Al)

brainfunks and cereal (G, 1.1k) by ivermectin

In which Albus worries, and Scorpius reassures him.

Under False Pretenses (G, 7.2k) by scorperion21

Albus Potter is a highly trained magizoologist, but he's not opposed to a little help from a Creature Healer every now and again if absolutely necessary...

Scorpius Malfoy doesn't need to know that the only reason Albus keeps calling on him is because of his all-consuming crush. Does he?

A Force To Be Reckoned With (G, 7.3k) by @rinrin-obliviate

Lily Luna Potter was a force to be reckoned with.

At least, that was how she viewed herself. Being the youngest, she was responsible for carrying four brain cells--one for her, one for Albus, and two extra ones for James. She was blunt but tactful, short but unrelenting, but mostly, she was brave but not stupid.

So when Albus landed himself in trouble more serious than time-turners and world domination, it was Lily who just had to help her brother pull his actual shit together.

She shot a last, warning glance at James. “I’d like to be your voice of reason at this point, but right now I’m sleepy and I need to go to bed.” She turned to Lily. “Try not to let your brother blow up the whole school.”

She unblinkingly returned Rose’s gaze. “Which brother?”

“Both.”

The One in Which Albus Should Have Been a Bit More Clear (M, 2.1k) by ringelchen @lordofthegoods

Albus just wants to be a good friend and deliver a love letter to Scorpius. It doesn't quite go as planned.

Edible Flowers (T, 21k) by @littlerose13writes

Albus Potter has grown up in the wizarding world, has been around magic all his life and is used to the eccentricities being a teenage wizard can bring. But when he’s struck down with muggle flu, he wakes up in a world that seems to have turned upside down.

His sister is a bully, Polly Chapman is his friend and, weirdest of all, his best friend Scorpius suddenly seems to be his boyfriend. Albus would quite like to get back to normality in time for the fifth year Summer Ball if that’s not too much to ask.

i want to be the only one (but you are) ; scorbus (T, 5k) by dungeondreams

albus isn't the fondest of physical touch with most people. luckily scorpius malfoy isn't most people. (alternatively; albus is kinda touch starved and scorpius is more than happy to change that.)

lemonade roses (T, 40k) by @dustyspines

By some calamitous twist of fate, Albus Potter finds himself faced with the realisation that he’s not okay; his sleep has been hijacked by vivid nightmares detailing the night his life fell apart on the Quidditch pitch, his sense of self is slipping away as he drowns in a sea of expectations, and his relationships begin to fracture when the vicious ghost of inevitability snaps at his heels. The solution should be simple: break up with Scorpius Malfoy. But this is Albus Potter, and nothing in his life has ever been simple, so why should that change now?

this is me trying (M, 15k) by @fidgetyweirdo

Just a few weeks ago, Scorpius's life was on stable footing - perfect grades, infatuation with a brilliant woman, and, most importantly, his best mate, Albus, at his side. But when Albus kisses him and Scorpius is left with no choice but to break his heart, for the first time since they met, the future of their friendship is in question. Scorpius can't lose him, though. So even if it involves blundering through awkward conversations and setting up multiple, disastrous blind dates, Scorpius won't stop trying.

Amuse Me (G, 19k) by @rinrin-obliviate

Albus didn’t really find amusement parks entertaining.

Even with Scorpius Malfoy spending the entire day with him, Albus never really fancied the concept of crowded areas, roller coasters that would intentionally plummet you to death, or rigged carnival games that served nothing but stuffed toys and candy floss. Honestly, if him falling for his best mate was not going to be the death of him, this one was.

He just wanted to survive the day.

My reason within (T, 9.7k) by Patronuslight7

Albus and Scorpius have now seen their Patronus forms. One of them is completely disheartened, the other hasn't given up trying to explain just yet.

A special day (G, 6.3k) by @sapphicfangirll

The one where Albus hyperfixates on pjo, Scorbus and their favourite third wheel go to muggle comic con, they make some new friends and they might just participate in the cosplay contest. Ft trans!Scorpius, adhd!Al and questioning Albus+nonbinary boy!Al who uses he/they pronouns.

I Pour Light Into You (G, 4.5k) by @motherofmercury

Albus is a top Magizoologist and is assigned a new and exotic creature that spits toxins, landing him in St. Mungo’s. His husband, Scorpius, is the Healer in charge of his recovery, leading to some small angst and much hair stroking.

A Love Like Old Boots (T, 20k) by @thealmostrhetoricalquestion

Each time Scorpius glanced his way, Albus made sure to smile as though nothing was amiss. As though it wasn’t exceptionally odd to come out of your morning lesson and find your ex-boyfriend of three years standing in the grass with his hands in his pockets, waiting for you.

To be a Boy (E, 17.8k) by @shipperysails-bookofspells

Scorpius’ life was perfect. He was talented at school, had the best friend anyone could ask for, and his boyfriend, Albus Potter, was making him happier than he’d ever dreamed possible.

But all of that began to unravel when suppressed insecurities are brought to light, causing Scorpius to question what it means to be a boy.

FIC AND ART: 

Same Order Every Time (G, 2.1k) by evie_adams273

Albus didn't want to take the job as a barista. He hadn't intended to have it for this long. Not because he actively disliked it. Simply because it was so dull. At this point, he knew who all the regulars were. He knew every second of every day. Until today.

ART: 

Albus’ oral fixation (G) by @eleonorapoe

Albus has a bad habit of chewing on his hoodie lace which makes Scorpius unable to focus on studying.

What Happened In the Weeds (G) by @motherofmercury

Just two soft boys kissing in a field for scorbusfest!

something you didn’t even have a name for (G) by @lumoshyperion

A tender moment shared between two boys in love, inspired by a Richard Siken poem.

until you hear that music play again (T) by @marisdrawings

Albus is a singer/guitarist at a local pub. Scorpius is a stressed newbie in town who lands himself on the same bar as a customer. He caught himself incredibly flustered and smitten for the pub's own singer to the point where it's the first place he visits every night. They get to know each other, Albus offers to be Scorpius's guide in exploring the whole city, and the rest is history. (prompt by @rinrin-obliviate)

[nsheetee]

Wifi

Pairing: Renjun x Reader Genre: Roommate AU || Fluff, slightly crack-ish Length: 2k Warning: one mention of an adult theme, implied female reader Summary: You and Renjun have been rooming together for a while, not knowing of your hidden feelings for each other. Surprisingly, it’s the bad wifi connection in your room that brings you together.

〈〈〈━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━〉〉〉

You sigh for what seems like the umpteenth time that evening, your fingers angrily keyboard smashing on your laptop when the wifi bars at the top of the screen show only one small, weak bar barely hanging on.

Ever since you moved in with your new roommate Renjun, you’ve noticed how every once in a while around 11pm, the wifi in your room goes weak. Being a creature of the night that always gets their homework done during this time, it frustrates you that you have to take small breaks every few minutes for your computer to catch up with the internet connection.

Finally fed up with waiting for your computer to load, you pick up your supplies and march over to Renjun’s room, which is the closest room to the apartment’s wifi router. You knock on the door and after hearing an affirmative, you walk into the room. Renjun is buried under a pile of blankets on his bed with his hoodie pulled up to his lips and the hood over his forehead. The only light in the room is coming from his laptop and he hisses when you turn on the room light.

“Good God, turn that off before you blind me. What do you need?” You turn the light back off and instead turn on Renjun’s desk light, setting your stuff down on top of his abandoned homework.

“Can I finish my homework in here?”

“What’s wrong with your room?”

“The internet’s being dodgy again.” You explain and Renjun silently nods, shutting his laptop and putting his airpods into his ears as he looks through his phone. You sit at his “organized mess” of a desk, open your computer, and sigh contently when the wifi works smoothly.

Renjun peers over his phone to look at you. You’re concentrating hard on whatever paper you’re writing; your pajama shirt is so big that it covers your shorts and your hair is only held in it’s messy bun by a couple of pencils. He can’t see your face, but admiration pools in his chest.

He’s been lovesick for you ever since you interviewed to be his roommate. When you introduced yourself and answered all of his questions in your own quirky way, Renjun just about handed over the lease for you to sign then and there and called off all the other interviews he had that day. Since then, his small crush has grown bigger, but seems to be unnoticed by you. Renjun, instead of doing the obvious thing and confessing, decided to help you find out about his feelings “by yourself.”

Renjun found out that he can manually decrease the bandwidth of the apartment’s wifi just by logging into his internet service provider account online. So, he began to weaken the wifi every few nights around 11pm, when he knew you were doing your homework. Like clockwork, he’d hear your groans of frustration for a few moments before your feet pad over to his room and knock on the door, asking to do your homework in his room.

Was Renjun being ridiculous? Maybe… Was he going to stop this game he has you unknowingly playing? Not until you realize he has feelings for you or he gets enough guts to confess. Renjun sighs dejectedly when he thinks about the likeness of either of those events happening anytime soon. He sinks down further into his nest of blankets in an attempt to stop the feelings from taking over his chest, but to no avail.

Renjun has a total, major, embarrassing crush on his roommate.

〈〈〈〉〉〉

You knock on Renjun’s door once again, sighing when he tells you to enter from inside. You walk in with your books and pens in your hands, your computer haphazardly balanced on top of it all.

“What’s wrong?” Renjun asks from his spot on the floor. His project for his biology class is spread out on the floor; some sort of visual presentation that involves a lot of paper cut outs and glue.

“Internet’s bad.” You look over his work, “Are you actually doing your homework? I didn’t know that was possible.” Renjun glaces up from gluing paper to his presentation, a blank stare on his face. He didn’t manually decrease the bandwidth of the wifi tonight. Are the internet gods smiling down on him and bringing you to him through their own will? He hopes so.

“Those are bold words for someone who needs internet and the only place to get it is in my room.” It’s your turn to give Renjun a blank stare as you drop off your supplies on his desk. “Come here.” He commands. You sit down criss-cross applesauce across from him and he hands you a thick permanent marker.

“Write this here.” He points to a small passage in his notebook and a blank space on the presentation board before moving to glue a different piece of paper.

“Why? I’m not going to do your homework for you in return for wifi. I live here, I pay with this wifi.” You point the marker tip at him but he ignores you, too focused on gluing a piece of paper to the cardboard.

“Once again, this is my room.” You sigh at his stubbornness, deciding to help him just this once. You take time to look around; although you’ve been rooming together for a few weeks now, this is the first time you’ve casually been in his room. The wall above his bed particularly catches your eye; his drawings, the quick doodles that he seems to be proud of, are hanging over his bed. Some are of people he’s seen at the coffee shop he usually hangs out in, some are of your house plants that you bought for the window sill in the kitchen.

Your heart softens when you look back at Renjun; he seems to be hyperfixed on gluing a particular piece of paper to the cardboard, his lips open in concentration and his eyebrows slightly furrowed. You feel courage build up in your chest and your gut fill with fearlessness. This is it. You’re going to confess your feelings for your roommate right here and right now.

“Nice drawings.” You mumble out instead, cursing to yourself in your head when the courage fades.

“Really?” Renjun asks, looking over his shoulder to the drawings. “They’re just doodles…” He tries to sound humble, but you can see the tilt of one side of his lips as he tries to hide his smile.

“Yeah, golden hands, they’re good.” You roll your eyes, deciding to feed his ego. It distracts him long enough to allow you to stand up and escape to Renjun’s desk chair. You start your own homework, a yawn leaving your lips. Maybe tonight isn’t the time to confess your crush on your roommate, but you hope he’ll be able to see the little hints you give of your feelings.

Renjun once again can’t help but stare at your back as you work, not minding that you’re not helping him anymore. He hates that your small, seemingly insignificant comment about his artwork makes his heart pound. He wishes the wifi could stop working by itself more often so he could see you naturally, like he did tonight.

〈〈〈〉〉〉

You don’t knock this time as you enter Renjun’s room, throwing up a peace sign as you close the door behind you and walk to his desk.

“Hey,” He raises his voice. “I get you have homework to do and the internet is weird, but at least knock. What if I was… masterbating in here or something.” He mumbles the last part and you snort.

“I still need to use the internet. So if you’re gonna masterbate anytime soon, please go do it somewhere else.”

“This is my room.” Renjun whines, throwing the drawing pad he was using before you barged in next to him and flopping onto his bed.

“Or so you keep saying.” You tease some more, setting down your supplies on his desk.

Renjun hasn’t touched the wifi bandwidth in weeks for fear that his meddling has caused the wifi to actually turn bad in your apartment. His wish came true: the wifi kept breaking and messing up in your room, all by itself. Now, you were constantly in Renjun’s room doing your homework and although Renjun likes you (literally), he doesn’t like how you welcome yourself in.

You surprise him by laying down next to him; you’re both facing the ceiling, hands on your stomachs and sighs escaping your lips every few seconds. Renjun can’t tell what you’re thinking, he’s too afraid to look at your face for the fear of not being able to quit looking. He doesn’t know if you’re as affected as him by your arm meeting his every time you breath, or if you can sense his thoughts racing at 1,000 miles an hour in his head. He tries to breathe evenly when he catches a whiff of your moisturizer, the one he said he liked a few weeks ago and that you’ve been using everyday since.

“Aren’t you here to do your homework? Why are you laying down?”

“No.” You gulp at the words that are about to leave your lips. “I’m here… for you.” You hold your breath after you finish talking.

“What.”

“The wifi has been working fine for weeks. I’ve been coming here to spend time… with you.” You can’t imagine how Renjun was dense enough to believe that the wifi has been poor almost every night for the past 2 months, but you hope it has something to do with him liking spending time with you. You got tired of waiting for Renjun to pick up your hints and stopped waiting for the wifi to cut out in your room to join him in his-- it’s not like he would ever know if the wifi is actually being dodgy on your side of the apartment.

You’re still nervously waiting for Renjun to say something or to tease you and kick you out of his room and tell you to find a different place to stay and then you’re going to be homeless and then you’ll definitely never have good wifi and then…

Renjun sits up and you don’t let your eyes meet, instead pulling your hood over your head and tightening the strings to hide away from your indirect confession. Renjun untightens the strings and pulls the hood off of you; he looks like he’s about to laugh at you and it makes you nervous.

“You’re a fool. I was the one that was cutting out your wifi.” His words make you sit up straight. Your jaw unhinges as embarrassment floods you. You thought you were only going to confess your feelings tonight, not the fact that you’ve been sneakingly lying to Renjun to hang out with him every night.

Renjun starts laughing and in your flustered state, you pick up his forgotten drawing pad and hit him with it. Renjun only laughs harder at your reaction, clutching his shoulder. He’s partially laughing because of the dumb situation you got yourselves in, but also out of joy because you just confessed your feelings to him.

“You! Do you know how angry you made me? I couldn’t get any of my work done for weeks.” You yell. You’re sure the neighbors could probably hear your mixed voices, but you don’t care. “Why did you purposefully cut out the wifi?” You groan.

“Because I knew you would come to my room if I did.” Renjun confesses, leaning back on his bed with his hands. Your heart soars at his words; it’s what you’ve wanted him to say to you for so long. You raise the drawing pad to hit him again but he catches it, fingers covering yours as he stops your second attack. You let him pry the pad out of your hands and he drops it to a different corner of the bed.

“C’mere, dummy.”

“Who are you calling a dummy?”

“You. Now get over here so I can finally kiss you senseless.”

[dweetwise]

day 21: i don’t feel so well

prompt from: whumptober pairing: felix x ace notes: the hanahaki au nobody asked for. i’m still a little confused about the trope but i tried <3 warnings: descriptions of illness, injury and blood, temporary character death word count: 3130

“That was awesome! She didn't stand a chance!” Steve cheers.

“That's what she gets for camping. What a bitch!” Nea laughs

Ace grins despite the pain, steadying himself against Jeff's sturdy form while the four of them are making their way back to the campfire after a successful trial.

His head is swimming and there's blood staining his teeth, his back stinging from numerous bloody gashes from the killer's katana. But he's alive, even if he had to crawl out through the exit, his teammates not letting the Spirit secure the kill on him.

When they get back to camp, Steve and Nea are off to spin the tale of their rescue to the others, and Ace can't help but smile when they generously color the experience; just like he would.

Jeff supports him to sit down against one of the logs, offering a somewhat awkward "There you go, buddy" in encouragement.

Ace sees Quentin hand Claudette one of his med-kits and then the group's resident healer approaches him with determined steps.

“Hey, sweetheart—” Ace starts with a grin.

“Stalling isn't going to work,” Claudette shoots him down quickly, seeing right through his act. So Ace sighs dramatically and shrugs off his jacket, and the girl immediately hikes up his shirt to start cleaning the wounds on his back.

Ace hisses from the sting of some kind of alcohol, turning his attention back to the others to try to distract himself from the pain.

Most of the others are listening to to Steve's and Nea's story while the rest are scattered around camp, doing their own things. Kate is tuning her guitar, Jake is stocking one of his toolboxes, and Cheryl seems to be practicing the card trick Ace taught her a couple of days ago.

And then there's Felix.

Finally giving himself permission to look at the handsome German, Ace's heart immediately starts beating faster. He's not even doing anything, just sitting by the fire engrossed in a conversation with Zarina, but Ace is so infatuated even just Felix breathing is almost enough to make him blush.

He thought he was too old for schoolboy crushes like these, but then again how could he not fancy Felix? The guy has some absolutely god-tier genes, a chiseled face and ice blue eyes and a body to die for. He’s also smart, and sophisticated, and filthy rich.

And god knows none of those qualities had ever been Ace's strong suit.

At first Ace had thought his hyperfixation on the man was jealousy, but then his body showed him that was definitely not the case; he didn't want to be Felix, he wanted to be in Felix. The realization didn't phase him as much as it maybe should have, because even the straight-as-a-board Ash had commented on Felix's good looks. And Ace sure as hell wasn't even straight to begin with.

No, his panic had come from when he'd caught himself looking at couples like Jeff and Adam being mushy together and imagined himself and Felix in their place.

Ace had a healthy amount of confidence, though the others might not describe it that kindly, but he wasn't blind. Felix was younger than him, maybe not by an impossible amount but still enough to be noticeable. He was also model-tier gorgeous with a body to match, and while Ace wasn't bad-looking he also had a crooked nose and a build solely used for drinking and gambling.

All in all, he recognized when someone was out of his league, and even though he couldn't resist a cheeky flirt ever now and then, he knew his feelings would never be returned.

But he still allowed himself to look; sue him.

He's in the middle of an indulgent daydream about laying his head on Felix's lap like Kate is doing to Yui on the other side of camp, all the while effortlessly keeping up small talk with Claudette tending to his wounds.

And then he starts coughing.

It's not a normal dry cough, it wracks his entire body and keeps going, and he curls in on himself because damn it’s making his throat hurts and his lungs ache something fierce.

“Ace, what's wrong?” Claudette's worried voice cuts through the attack. He tries to reply but it just makes him cough more, and it's not stopping—

Something slimy lands in the palm he's using to cover his mouth and then he can breathe again, taking sharp gasps of air while his throat tingles from the abuse.

He looks at whatever piece of his organs he managed to cough up, the Spirit's blade probably having rearranged some of his guts. He opens his hand and sees—

A flower?

It's absolute covered in blood, but there's no mistaking it, a single flower sitting in the palm of his hand with some loose petals surrounding it.

Why did he cough up a flower? Where did he even get it? It looks like some sort of cherry blossom, a far cry from the Entity's pustulas or the forest bouquets they pick and use for offerings.

“Are you okay?" Claudette asks, moving to kneel beside him in worry. When she sees the flower, she gasps in surprise.

“What happened?” Meg is quick to join her friend, coming up behind Ace to peer over his shoulder. “Uh… did that flower come out of you?”

“I… guess so?” Ace says, his voice raspy and throat protesting being used.

“So you just, like… ate it? Before?” Steve cocks his head in confusion.

“Come on now, I'm not that stupid,” Ace snorts, some of his worry giving way to amusement over the incredulous situation.

“Then what the hell was that?” Meg asks, scrunching her face up in thought while poking at the gross flower.

“I’m pretty sure I know what’s wrong,” Adam raises his voice from across camp, straightening his back when all eyes turn to him. “It’s an illness, I recognize the symptoms."

“Can't say I've ever heard of a disease that makes you barf petals,” Ash offers, clearly skeptical, and Ace shares the sentiment.

“Shh, hear him out!” Laurie scolds.

"It's a Japanese folk story,” Adam explains. “Flowers start growing in a person's lungs, causing coughing and bleeding and..." he hesitates.

“Well?” Meg demands.

"And ultimately resulting in death, unless the condition is cured," Adam says grimly.

“Are you talking about hanahaki?” Yui pipes up before anyone can question the weird statement. “You know that's just a shojo manga trope, right?”

“It's also mentioned in historical literature,” Adam argues, though from the way he refuses to meet Yui's gaze, he seems to be embarrassed over the subject.

“Dude, nobody cares if you read girl comics, just tell us what the cure is,” Feng snorts, and that's probably the most concern Ace has ever seen her display over his well-being.

“It's—” Adam starts, before faltering, awkwardly scratching at his neck while looking at the ground. “Supposedly caused by unrequited love.”

There's dead silence in the camp.

And then Nea bursts out laughing.

“Jesus, what a story!” the tagger snickers. “Can you imagine Ace as a fairytale princess?”

“Honey, I think you might have gotten some myths mixed up,” Jeff says diplomatically, patting Adam's knee affectionately.

“Yeah, you probably just inhaled a flower in your sleep or something,” Steve encourages Ace.

“I'm pretty sure this is just a practical joke from our dear spidery overlord,” Ace chuckles and pointedly doesn't look Felix's way. Come next trial, his injuries will have healed anyway, including the weird burn in his lungs.

But they don’t.

Trial after trial, the Entity resurrects him and heals all of his wounds but the coughing persists, more and more flowers following.

Even the others are getting worried.

“That's it, bud,” Ash offers, patting his back while Ace is wheezing for breath after coughing up some more petals. “It's just a weird flu, you'll be good as new soon.”

“At least the flowers go with my shirt,” Ace jokes, voice reduced to a rasp, clearing his throat. “Pink was always my color.”

He's trying to keep his and the others' spirits high, since there doesn't seem to be anything they can do to fix the situation.

“We need to do something,” Ace hears Laurie hiss to Dwight, apparently disagreeing with his sentiment.

“B-but how can we even help him?” their leader, bless his heart, looks genuinely upset over Ace's condition.

“Maybe we should try Adam's suggestion," Laurie says.

“Yeah, except you know he wouldn’t tell us even if he did like someone,” Yui huffs from beside them. “Good luck getting an answer out of a compulsive liar.”

Ouch, but also fair. Ace sure as hell isn't going to reveal his dumb little crush, especially since Felix has avoided him since this entire goddamn flower thing started. He knows there's only a slim chance that Felix realizes what's really going on, but it still feels like rejection nonetheless.

He can deal with this. Even if it kills him, the Entity will just bring him back anyway. It's not even that bad.

But then it gets so much worse.

After a week, Ace is laying on his side while black spots dance around in his vision and he struggles to draw enough wheezy breaths into his lungs. His chest hurts, and his throat is so sore even just the air passing through burns like fire. He hasn't been able to speak in days, and that's almost worse than the pain, not being able to use his only coping mechanism of running his mouth until something sticks to lighten the mood.

His head is cushioned on Kate's thigh and he gets a tiny bit of satisfaction from the knowledge that at least he managed to lay in one pretty blonde's lap before dying, even if it’s the wrong one. The touch is comforting nonetheless, though the fact that it’s accompanied by Kate's girlfriend practically screaming in his ear kind of puts a damper on the whole thing.

“I swear to god, I will make every single person in this camp kiss you, do not test me,” Yui threatens, one of the few who haven't given up on curing him. “Is it Jane? Bill?”

If Ace had the energy, he'd probably laugh about her choices, curious as to why those two were the ones she picked. As it stands, he merely stares at her, wondering if his eyes look as dull and lifeless as he feels.

“He's going to die,” Jake says from somewhere to his side, but Ace doesn't even bother turning his head or denying the statement. Hurried voices shush the saboteur while Kate starts humming a melody to distract him, Yui glaring absolute daggers in Jake’s general direction.

His next trial, Jake's prediction comes true.

Ace collapses to the ground in the midst of a coughing fit. The flowers are growing even bigger now, he can feel them tearing at his throat and vocal cords, retching when they trigger his gag reflex on their way out. His vision blurs and then goes black, body finally giving up as the illness consumes him.

He's not even injured from the killer, but the pool of blood he falls into is big enough to cover the entire side of his face. He lays there, not sure if he's even breathing, just thankful that the awful coughing has stopped for at least a moment.

When he comes to, he expects the small comfort of the campfire before he has to go through the same thing again. Instead, he doesn't have enough energy to even open his eyes, slowly realizing he's still in the trial.

It takes him even longer to realize he's being held partly off of the ground, his body hanging limply in someone’s grasp. He idly wonders if a killer is going to mercy hook him, but then he hears something.

Crying.

Focusing on the sound, Ace realizes he's not just being lifted, he's being held in someone's arms. Someone is holding his near-dead body and crying.

With both his mind and body broken from suffering for so long, he allows himself to imagine it's Felix, even though he knows it's not true. Felix has shown he doesn't care, not talking to him and being so grossed out by his symptoms he’s barely even looked at him—

“Das tut mir leid,” is whispered against his hair, and Ace wonders if he's hallucinating or if his brain has given up on speech comprehension, because that sounded an awful lot like German.

Suddenly, he gains some of his strength back, his chest not feeling nearly as tight as it has for the past few days.

“Felix?” Ace asks, and even though it comes out as a raspy whisper, it's impossible to miss in the stillness of the quiet moment. The surprised hitch of breath he gets in response sounds impossibly loud, and he manages to blink awake just enough to see the tear-streaked, wide-eyed face of the person he never thought he could have.

And that's when the Entity decides he's bled on the ground long enough and he blacks out from blood loss.

When Ace comes to, he's no longer in pain. He can breathe. And he wants nothing more than to get back to camp and be reassured that he wasn't imagining Felix being there for him in his final moments.

He runs to the campfire, panting from exertion once he's illuminated by the familiar glow and shocked faces turn to look at him.

“What the—did you run here!?” Meg exclaims incredulously.

“Yeah,” Ace says, eyes scanning the small crowd of familiar faces, so focused on finding a particular one he doesn't even realize the implications of managing to speak without issue.

“Your voice!” Kate exclaims happily, and Ace pauses to collect some of his thoughts.

“Shit, you're right,” he says, a smile tugging on his lips for the first time in what feels like weeks.

“Welcome back, you bastard!” Nea cheers and flings herself at him in a sideways hug, and Ace stumbles to catch himself from falling, chuckling at her antics.

Claudette is sobbing, looking impossibly relieved, and the others are cheering among themselves, though Ace can't make out the contents because he sees a familiar figure making its way to camp and his entire world zones in on that person.

Felix looks up at the sound of the commotion, and Ace's heart breaks a little over how puffy his eyes still look, but then their eyes meet and Felix looks so hopeful—

“Hey,” Ace says, and it probably gets drowned out by the others, but Felix's eyes widen in recognition and he starts walking faster.

“Are you…?” Felix asks, close enough for Ace to hear him over the others shouting.

“He's fixed!” Nea answers for him, finally letting go of the almost painful hug in favor of smacking Ace on the back encouragingly.

Felix glances at Nea but quickly looks back at Ace, waiting for confirmation.

“Yeah, I… guess I'm cured,” Ace says, and it almost feels weird to hear his own voice again. “Or... You know, I hope so.”

Because he's still not sure about Felix's feelings, and he has no idea where they're going to go from here.

But he doesn't need to worry, because Felix's face lights up in a way he's never seen before, letting out a disbelieving, genuine laugh. And then he's stepping forward and cupping his cheek and Ace only has time to blink in confusion before his head is tilted up into a kiss.

“Woah,” Ace hears Nea exclaim, her hand leaving his back like burned. “This, uh… this is new.”

Ace smiles into the kiss and tunes out the rest of her and the others’ surprised babbling, grabbing Felix by the collar of his dress shirt and pulling him deeper into the kiss.

When neither of them are making a move to pull away, their friends seem to be getting fidgety from the show.

“Why don’t we go for a stroll in the woods?” Kate suggests, and the chorus of “Sure!” “Great idea!” and “Oh fuck yes get me out of here” that follow are enough for a laugh to bubble up in Ace’s throat and get swallowed by Felix’s mouth.

When the last pair of footsteps have hurried away, Felix deems it appropriate to finally break away from the kiss. Though he doesn’t go far, burying his head into the crook of Ace’s neck and shoulder and wrapping his arms around him in a tight hug.

“Welcome back,” Felix murmurs against his skin, and the warm affection spreading through Ace’s chest is a welcome change from the constant pain he’s been in for way too long.

“Didn’t expect such a thorough welcome,” Ace can’t resist flirting, hands sneaking up to rest on Felix’s incredibly firm back. The chuckle he gets in return reverberates through both of their bodies due to how close they are, and Ace wonders if Felix can hear his heart frantically beating in excitement.

“I’m… shit,” Felix eventually sighs, lifting his head to meet Ace’s eyes. “I don’t know how to make up for being an idiot. I just watched you suffer and didn’t know what to do.”

“It’s okay,” Ace says, but now he’s curious. “Why did you avoid me?”

“Because I was afraid that I'd get the illness too,” Felix says, looking at the ground in shame. “I thought any one of us could get it, and because of how I feel about you… I was scared I was next.”

The confirmation that Felix had feelings for him even before this whole clusterfuck started is enough to make more butterflies dance in Ace’s gut, a flush creeping up his neck over how the other is openly spilling his heart.

“If I’d have known I was the one causing it, I would have done something sooner. I’m so sorry," Felix murmurs, looking at him with sad puppy eyes.

“Hey, it's not like I was being very cooperative,” Ace points out, giving his most encouraging smile. “It's not your fault, it's the dumb flower sickness.”

“I'm sorry you had to go through that, regardless,” Felix frowns. “But… I'm glad it lead us here,” he adds with a bashful smile that makes Ace’s heart do a couple leaps.

“Figures the best and worst things of my life would happen simultaneously,” Ace flirts, and apparently Felix enjoys being called the best thing in his life, because his sappy smile widens even further.

Ace can’t resist diving in for another taste, capturing smiling lips in a kiss that lasts even longer than the first one and makes their friends groan and complain about “Geez, you’re still going?” when they rejoin them at the campfire.

[xxmisty]

My Big Humiliating Torchwood Confession - Part 1 :P

Warning: this will be a LONG post, and i’m sorry about that! 

Lucy is sat opposite me asking me repeatedly if I’ve started typing yet because she knows how desperately i’m putting off making this post!!1

This is awful, this is.... probably the most embarrassingly intimate confession i’ll have made since the day I opened up about my fetish way back at the start of 2013. And on the surface of it it probably doesn’t seem like that big of a deal but IT IS TO ME! And a big chunk of the trauma i’m about to express is tongue in cheek but it’s genuinely been - and continues to be - a huge bundle of DISTRESS AND HUMILIATION AND UTTER RESENTMENT!!! Because this year has been.... one hell of a personal journey and i don’t even mean anything to do with the pandemic.

It all started on New Year’s Day. I was feeling horrendously ill; the miraculous medication that had started to give me my life back had run out and thanks to the festive postal delays my new lot hadn’t arrived yet. I was in agony, I had a horrible headache, I felt sick and I could hardly move. We spent the day watching a bunch of muppet stuff, and that night we watched the first ep of season 12 of Doctor Who and, y’know, it was a pretty damn good episode (plus thirteen in the suit.... fuuckkk) 

So afterwards we started having a discussion about Chris Chibnall - we’ve long held criticisms about some of his writing (not all of it, but it’s a mixed bag) and Lucy told me I still hadn’t seen his worst writing because that was for Torchwood...

Which I had never seen. Which I had been desperately trying not to see, although I didn’t know why. I just always had this vibe like a big “NO ENTRY!” sign at the idea of ever watching it. It’s not as though I had a logical reason for it, it’s not like I’d read up about it and thought, ‘naahhhhhh, I don’t fancy watching that’. I just had a big WARNING sign in my head, telling me not to go there. 

Several years ago Lucy made me watch the first episode (after i’d been avoiding her threats of showing it to me for like 2 years) and like... it wasn’t horrible? It wasn’t... great either... but it didn’t kill me. Then a couple of years ago she showed me Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang because we were having a big Runaways phase so she wanted to show me an episode with James Marsters in. Again, it didn’t kill me. It wasn’t horrible. But I still had those big NO ENTRY!!! signs up in my head. I was still trying desperately to avoid actually being shown Torchwood as a show.

And the the new year happened and I was too WEAK AND DEFENCELESS to know what was happening when Lucy and I cuddled up in bed that night. I was too sick to really comprehend what she was doing or to fight back when she announced she was going to show me the very worst of Chris Chibnall’s writing... and put on Day One followed by Cyberwoman.

Oh. My. God.

All day I had been in a state of physical agony. Suddenly my mental and emotional state was far, FAR worse!!! The sex gas alien was bad enough, then by the time she put on Cyberwoman my brain was trying to shut down. I used to suffer blackouts and, god, I kept blacking out all the way through it, and instead of being her usual loving, wonderful self she KEPT FORCING ME TO COME ROUND TO WATCH IT!!!

By this point it was gone midnight and I was in a state of utter distress!! This was the worst double helping of tv I had ever sat through in my life and I sat up and let forth a tirade of absolute distress! This, I decided, had to be the reason I’d been avoiding Torchwood. Because it was more like.... Torurewood :P 

Yep, that had to be it. Couldn’t possibly be anything worse, could it? 

At least now lucy had shown me those two terrible Chibnall eps I would NEVER EVER HAVE TO WATCH THEM AGAIN. Or ANY Torchwood episodes. Yes, my ordeal was over. Had to be.

Nope. We went back to bed and she put on Out if Time. And i’ll admit, the story was much stronger but goddddd I had issues with the endings! And my level of despair started to rise even higher. I HATED Torchwood! This was the most distressing night’s viewing ever and I just wanted to go to sleep and be done with it all! Lucy put one more episode on afterwards: They Keep Killing Suzie. And that was much better but halfway through we finally fell asleep - so surely my trauma was over with.

Nope.

I had horrible nightmares of a very thirsty Gwen coming onto me all night, over and over again and it was HORRIBLE!!! Like, you have no idea how distressed I was! And when I woke up I blamed lucy whole-heartedly and she very sympathetically laughed at my plight!

But yeah. My trauma was over. No more Torchwood. I’d suffered the night from hell. Now it was time to pick up the pieces of my shattered life and move on! My medication arrived that day, I started work on some new pet portraits and life went back to normal.

Until that night, when I saw the telltale sign of Lucy putting a video on and turning her iPad around and then there they were - the opening titles of Torchwood - and I wanted to jump out the boat and into the canal and swim as far away as possible!!!

But the episode she put on was Fragments. She said she wanted to show me Chris Chibnall’s finest episode. And y’know what? It was really pretty fucking good. And god, I was fURIOUS about that!!! When we went to bed she pulled a real double whammy though by putting on Adam - which became instantly one of my favourite episodes of ANYTHING, EVER. And I looked at my wife, shook my head, sighed and told her, ‘nice save, Lucy... nice save...’

Over the next couple of weeks we also had a major Doctor Who rewatch and revisited most of the New Who era, and - to my mixed feelings - she dotted various other episodes of Torchwood in around them. I was conflicted - after the Adam and Fragments double bill I was no longer in brain-screamy hatred territory. I did however keep having flashbacks to that godawful night. Plus i’d had several further nightmares about a thirsty Gwen and I did NOT like it! But by a couple of weeks into January I’d seen a fair bit of Torchwood. Some of them twice. 

Around this same time I’d started back in testosterone after not being able to afford it for the last 3 years. And then I started to notice I was getting some..... urghhhhhh..... unusual... and very uncomfortable feelings... about certain.... things... and characters.

And I started falling headlong into a great big gay panic :P

And here’s where the whole story becomes a HELL of a lot more embarrassing so i’m going to put it under a read more :P

Did ya click on that read more? Wh-why? there’s nothing to see here... especially not a long tale of shame and distress :P ugggghhhhhhh ok, FINE;

Basically there were two things happening at the same time. One was that I started to feel something I hadn’t felt in two decades. When I was a kid/teen we didn’t have the phrase ‘hyperfixation’ so I just called them obsessions. I always had obsessions, at any given point there was always this ONE THING that was my entire life. i lived it, breathed it, became it. It was my whole world, my whole personality, my focus, my lifeline. 9 times out of 10 it would be a tv show. Between the ages of 12 and 15 I would generally change my obsession about once a month. There were several ‘usual suspects’ that would cycle around over and over - Red Dwarf, The Brittas Empire, Sonic the Hedgehog, Halfway Across the Galaxy, Parallel 9, Out of this World... 

late in 1995 I became obsessed with The X Files and - bizarrely - that obsession just ran and ran. I was so used to my obsession changing around once every month that it was bizarre to still be absolutely hyperfixated on it almost 9 months later. And then, in June 1996, my longest ever obsession took its place, a little known uk fantasy show called Bugs. 

That... was my longest running obsession. And oh my god, was I ever obsessed with it. I have no idea how that one obsession kept going for 3 years. i’m sorry this is particularly wordy but this is kind of personal and I want to explain this right.

If you’ve been following me for a while you’ll probably known that one of the most defining moments of my life happened in the summer of ‘98. My cousin’s husband sexually assaulted me and my life spiralled into total despair. While that night was bad enough, the slow breakdown I went through over the course of the year that followed was harder to recover from. And eventually I came out the other side to some degree but i’d lost my love of three things that made me the person I was: writing, drawing and being obsessed. All three were so closely entangled with that night and surviving afterwards that it changed something that had always been a fundamental part of me.

I was no longer able to feel obsession. To hyperfixate the way I previously had. It was like something was broken inside me. And that was like a loss unto itself. It was SUCH a big part of me. It had been the only way i’d survived years of depression when I was young. My obsessions were what kept me afloat. 

In the last decade there are a few things that I called ‘obsessions’ and I thought were as close as I would ever get to the way I used to feel. I thought maybe it was because i’d ‘grown up’ (pah). That’s not to say that i wasn't thoroughly into Ashes to Ashes, FNAF and Homestuck, for example, because of course I was! I even called them obsessions, but there was something that just... wasn’t the same, no matter what I did.

And over time, I got back the other things I’d lost. I started writing my A2A fics in 2010 and Lucy helped me to start drawing again in 2018 and god, both times it was like finally having a piece of myself returned after so long! As for my ‘obsessions’, I just thought I wasn't able to feel the way I used to because I wasn’t a kid any more.

But then, I thought that about Christmas Eve too, and then lucy came into my life <3

Still, the last thing I was expecting was... for *those* feelings to start sneaking back in my life. Feelings I hadn’t been able to experience since the summer of 1998-9. And to my further distress I discovered that they were relating to a certain show that I’d had a traumatising introduction to on new year’s day...

Suddenly it was all I could think about; TORCHWOOD! TORCHWOOD! Aargghhhhh and yet I still hated it! It was still awful! And yet... at the same time... it was so goooooooood.... arghhhhh, every time we watched an episode there was a  knife twisting in my guts, reminding me that I hadn’t even felt these feelings over things we’d been HUGELY into... the fandoms we’d met through, the fandoms we discovered together. Nope. It was Torchwood that brought back my ability to hyperfixate! And I have SO MANY ANGRY FEELINGS ABOUT THIS!!!! Grrrrrrrrr!!

And believe me, I kept thinking it was going to stop and go away BUT IT HASN’T! It’s only gotten worse! And as of yesterday Torchwood officially became my second  longest obsession ever!!!

I. AM. FURIOUS!!!

It’s... urrghhhh I hate this fact but it’s almost like I have a crush on the *show*??!!! I... can’t explain it better than that??? It’s like, if I could throw Torchwood on the bed and make sweet, sweet love to it I would :P and yeah, i’m saying all of this tongue in cheek but i’ve had a fucking sky high libido ever since I went back on T (ohhhhh and believe me I am LOVING it!!! 💙💙💙) But it’s like... there are elements of Torchwood itself that are so fucking hot that I get.... reactions that I am SO FUCKING EMBARRASSED ABOUT for so many reasons deidjdhdggjhaaahhhhhhhhh

Lucy literally only has to say ‘Torchwood’ at me and I end up in a gibbering heap half the time - I am not even kidding!!!

This, however, is NOT the worst thing that happened as a result of Lucy making me watch this god damned show.

But honestly this post has gone on WAY too long already so i’m going to save that for part 2.

Oh god... my shame.... my total and utter shame....

To be continued :P