#just completely goes against someone elses interpretation unintentionally

[rocaillefox]

orv spoilers ahead

something something kdj is so affected by his childhood trauma that he hates kim namwoon because he hates how he can see himself in knw, the first scenario not only evens the playing field ("everyone in this world is a murderer") given kdj killed his father (in self defense. unrelated but i have to include this lest i misrepresent him), but further deepens his own guilt and distance from everyone else since even with king of no killing, its- borrowed, in a way. stories becoming reality, and though his actions are lauded by others in the first scenario, undoubtedly he has that guilt while hearing others compliment him on finding a way to get out of the situation without murdering a person. BUT on the FLIP side, this scenario also sets the groundwork for a later forgiveness of himself, his actions being different here establish exactly how far he was driven when he was younger

tbh im just starting my orv reread but this scenario and everything going on with lee sookyung is also so relevant in context of how kdj views himself. it isnt outwardly stated but a large factor- due to kdj's self sacrifice- in their relationship isnt only kdj's denial and his focus on stories, but also kdj's self-hatred. he hates that his mother wrote the book not just for its exposure, but that she has the same self-sacrificual tendency as him- and that it makes it even harder for him to sacrifice himself for her in turn, because he cant do anything to save her now. its a very complex situation and i dont want to oversimplify their relationship- some of the emotions are clearly straightforward. but kdj is a notoriously unreliable narrator with a trend of self hateed, and orv itself is metatextualy implied to be a reconstruction of his pov through his interactions with other characters- his viewpoint colors so much of the story, but he isnt an author. his choice to write his own story has been taken from him, just as lee sookyung chose to write their story before he could- and in doing so, protected and saved him, albeit in different ways.

how many books have been written solely for him? his mother's book, ways of survival, orv- three books written just for him, at least. and like- lee sookyung deserves way more prominence in fanworks tbh because the situation she was in is an unbearable one, and the relationship she has with her son strained at times, but- and this is vitally important- it is complex, and done out of love, and like. so much of orv is about accepting the past, acknowledging it cant be changed, but also helping you come to terms with the ideavthat unfortunate things, malicious things, happen. sometimes situations suck. but in those situations you are still human. you are still full of worth regardless of the actions you have been forced to do, of the ways you have had to survive- but also, to remember to keep choosing to do what you can, and that you have to make that choice.

theres so many fucking layers to this book. i could pick any one topic and write a full research essay on how orv tackles it. genuinely, it is a masterpiece that comments clearly on so many topics- and more besides that i havent even picked up on im sure! and besides what is explicitly written, theres so many layers of implication, of potential interpretation, of cultural weight and literary tie-ins, of symbolism and allegory and constructed metaphors/similes, that for every sentence written there is another five of potential explanation behind them. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

[empressapprentice]

Arcana Headcanons: Infidelity + M6

I’m back with more headcanons, and will be sharing even more soon as I have more free time! My last batch was super sweet and fluffy, these are decidedly not. I’m doing these headcanons as character study exercises, and since the LIs are so devoted to you in-game, I wanted to think about what could possibly motivate them to cheat. Not all of these involve sex because I thought that certain characters would consider emotional interactions cheating on their partner. But warning for non-explicit sexual content for several of the M6--I’d say this is PG-13. These are kind of long, but I felt I needed some good exposition to set things up. I hate how much I enjoy angst :( Feedback and requests are always welcomed: if you hate it or love it, let me know why so I can improve! Plus, check out my Ao3 here, where I’ll be posting these as well.

Asra

Asra will never, ever regret giving up half his heart for you. But one night, he can’t sleep, feeling regret for the friendships and relationships he missed out on because it’s so difficult to form connections with others. He wishes that while he waited for you to recover from the resurrection, he’d been able to let others into his life.

He’s slept with people other than you (Julian, for one), but not since you woke up after the ritual. He realizes that he can’t remember any of his previous encounters. He completely forgot what anyone other than you feels like to hold and to touch.

The next day, he tells you that he wants to take a quick overnight trip to Nopal. With such late notice, you can’t tag along. He just wants to spend some time alone and actually get to know the villagers for once, intending to practice his social skills and break the cycle of isolation he unintentionally maintained with the people there.

When he sits around the fire, eating and sharing stories with the villagers, a handsome young man approaches him. He says that he’s always had a crush on the mysterious magician, but could tell that Asra was never open to getting to know anyone. Asra, remembering that he doesn’t know what it’s like to be close to someone else, starts flirting back. Before he knows it, his lips are brushing against the stranger’s.

The moment their lips meet, Asra pulls back sharply, overcome with guilt for betraying your trust. He shakily apologizes to the young man, saying he didn’t know what came over him. He runs back to his hut, gets on the Beast and travels back to Vesuvia as fast as possible. Faust comforts him as he sobs silently, thinking about never wanting to leave your arms again.

Nadia

Nadia is visiting a neighboring territory and sitting through a very, very boring dinner with dignitaries. She’s been away from Vesuvia for a week and anticipates having to stay for at least one more as negotiations drag on. She’s loath to admit it, but she’s lonely. The letters you’ve exchanged via Chandra only make the separation more painful.

So when a diplomat approaches her with questions about Vesuvia, she’s happy to have some company. She clearly admires Nadia quite a bit and compliments the work she’s done to turn Vesuvia around.

While basking in her companion’s kind words, she unconsciously moves closer to the other woman. It doesn’t take long for the conversation to become personal, moving away from professional networking. And even more quickly, the conversation becomes flirty. When Nadia moves her hand to touch the other woman, her intentions are clear. The diplomat is flattered, but hesitant, asking, “Aren’t you married?”

Nadia is momentarily stunned by the question, but refuses to lose her composure. The lie comes easily, from years of schmoozing fellow politicians. She replies that her marriage is open. The diplomat smiles, unaware of the shame pooling in Nadia’s core. She sheepishly invites the Countess back to her room.

Though the dinner is long over and the party moved into the sitting room for a digestif, many having already left, Nadia finds herself worried how it would look for the two of them to leave together. She hates herself for worrying more about appearances than you, but she’s been particularly hungry for the feel of a body next to her in bed and she’s frustrated at not being able to get what she wants for once. So, she agrees.

She excuses herself, saying that she must retire for the night, and waits a few moments for the diplomat to leave as well.

Nadia excuses herself after the shameful act, saying she must be in her own bed when servants come to wake her in the morning. She spends the rest of the night staring at her ceiling, vowing to never tell you about her indiscretion. You find out, of course, knowing your wife too well for her to hide that something’s wrong.

Julian

One night, he goes to the Rowdy Raven and is mid-tankard of Salty Bitters while animatedly telling the story of how he helped defeat the Devil. When he finishes weaving the tale, he heads back to the bar to another drink. Before he can get his coin purse to pay, an extremely attractive stranger tells Barth to put it on their tab--payment for the entertaining story.

Julian gratefully accepts, sliding into a seat to chat with the stranger. Whether consciously or unconsciously, Julian turns his charm up even more, wanting to make sure he keeps them entertained. They swap introductions, Julian’s natural tendency to call people affectionate names and his rakish attitude being interpreted as flirtation.

As the stranger returns the affection, Julian realizes what’s happening but doesn’t want to stop it. He’s practically glowing from the kind words flowing from the mouth of his new friend and is addicted to the feeling. A nagging voice tells him he should get back home to you, but it is quieted when the stranger moves closer to him, running a finger over his chest.

The stranger downs their drink and gets up abruptly. They tell Julian to finish his drink and meet them in the alley outside, with a cheeky comment about seeing what else his mouth could do thrown over their shoulder as they walk out the back of the tavern.

Julian’s breath catches at the thought of a clandestine alleyway quickie, and he can’t deny how appealing the idea seems to him. He stares at the drink remaining in his glass, fighting a mental war over whether to finish it quickly and run to the alley.

Barth approaches Julian, noticing he was about to finish his latest drink and anticipating a request for a refill. While waiting for Julian to finish, he makes light conversation with him. When he asks how you are doing, Julian bolts upright. His face reddens at the mention of your name, knowing he made a grave mistake even considering the stranger’s offer.

Julian leaves the rest of his drink untouched. He awkwardly gets up, says goodnight to Barth and hopes that he won’t run into the stranger when he exits the Raven out the front door. Mercifully, he doesn’t, but he might not have even noticed, he was so focused on getting back to you.

When he reaches the front door of the place you share, he’s sobbing. Even though it’s late, you are waiting up for him, knowing that he often needs you to offer him water and get him to eat some food after a night out. He falls on his knees before you, utterly broken by the kindness of you waiting to take care of him, and begs you to listen to him one last time. He tells you, again, that he is no good for you and it is inevitable he will break your heart. He confesses everything that happened at the bar, his voice breaking when he says how close he was to cheating on you. He admits in a small voice that he will never be worthy of you--despite all he’s changed, he’s always one step away from hurting you.

Lucio

Lucio is dressed in a new outfit, finely made and very flattering. He is about to attend a party at his estate in honor of the summer solstice. The last step in his pre-party ritual before joining you and making a grand entrance fashionably late is to admire himself in the mirror. He poses and struts in front of it, hyping himself up for the night, but stopping short as he notices a grey hair in his meticulously coiffed style.

Moving closer to the mirror, he is horrified that several other grey hairs have popped out since the last time he dyed his hair, not long ago. Stepping back, he frantically tries to change the style to hide them, shrieking as he realizes the wrinkles on his forehead are deeper than he remembers. The time-honored ritual, which has never failed to put him in the right mindset for a night of socialization, has only made him more self-conscious about his age than ever.

He starts pacing around his room, heels clicking and mind racing. He feels a strange sense of longing for his old life, when he had no responsibilities and never worried about the consequences of his actions. He’s old now, and he wishes for the freedom and stupidity of youth.

When he makes the grand entrance with you at the party, his heart isn’t really in it. He immediately heads for a servant, demanding a glass of hard liquor instead of his usual sparkling wine. One glass turns into several, and it’s not long before he’s very intoxicated. You see Lucio drinking more than usual, but you keep getting distracted by guests and can’t figure out what’s going on with him.

Once he’s drunk enough to not care about anything--just as he intended--he makes eye contact with an attractive woman in a slinky gown and winks. His rough flirting works, as the woman comes up to him. He feels a mixture of pride and shame that he’s still attractive and powerful enough to draw someone in with nothing more than a wink.

They chat briefly, but they both know Lucio desires more than conversation and the guest is more than willing to oblige. He takes the woman’s hand, leading her to an alcove far away from the party and they begin to make out. Soon his pants are at his ankles and they’re doing far more than kissing. It’s rough, messy and fast, exactly the thing he would have done in his life before he got the plague and before you.

The woman leaves him panting when they’ve both finished. His stomach drops as he realizes that this cheap attempt at feeling young again only made him feel worse. He realizes with a start that he jeopardized the thing that actually fulfills him and makes him truly happy.

Muriel

Muriel dislikes social interactions with pretty much everyone, especially strangers. How could he possibly cheat on you when he can hardly stand to spend time around his friends?

But as he becomes more comfortable with being around people, he starts spending time around the Palace. Usually, he’s waiting for you to finish your duties with Nadia so he can walk you home or go back to the shop for dinner, but sometimes he comes early so he can spend a quiet moment in the gardens.

The more time he spends at the Palace, befriending some of Lucio’s poorly-behaved albino animals and trying to train them, the more time he spends with a certain servant determined to befriend him.

At first, they don’t even catch his attention, he’s so used to tuning other people out. But this servant notices his gentle nature and sometimes brings him some water or tea and a pastry while he’s sitting by the fountain. They claim that they’ve been trained to always serve the needs of their guests, but they’re mostly interested in getting Muriel to open up.

After several weeks of Muriel becoming used to the servant and accepting that they can be trusted, he begins exchanging a few words with them beyond a grunted thanks for the refreshments. The way the servant approaches him reminds him of you and he finds he doesn’t mind light conversation to entertain him and distract him from Lucio’s pets.

One day, he realizes with a start that he not only trusts the servant and enjoys their company, but that he finds them attractive. He panics, not knowing how to tell you. He feels so ashamed of himself for letting someone new in and he’s never felt attracted to someone like this before, other than with you. He’s confused on how to handle his feelings and how he should tell you, if at all.

He confesses the situation to Asra before going to you. Asra is very kind and supportive, saying that it is natural to find other people attractive and that it’s a good sign that he is willing to let a stranger befriend him. But Muriel can’t shake the idea that he’s done wrong by you and refuses to come back to the gardens.

Portia

Given how much Portia likes secrets and romance stories, I think a part of her would love the idea of a sneaky romance. Portia is a deeply practical person, but there are times where she can get carried away with romanticism. The thrill of getting away with it and using her knowledge of the secret passages in the Palace, etc. to hide a tryst holds some appeal to her, but she’d feel ashamed of even fantasizing about it.

She has to work on the first night of the Masquerade after the events of the game due to her new responsibilities at the Palace. Out of solidarity, you work too, creating real-time magical spectacles to surprise guests. To keep up the aesthetic, you’re both still wearing costumes and masks.

While Portia is in the ballroom, she’s fretting over the floral displays and a heavily intoxicated person knocks into her, sending the vase flying. Before Portia can even react, she falls into strong arms, rescuing her from the splashing water and strewn flowers. She turns to thank the stranger, and they say she can express her gratitude by granting them a dance. In the spirit of the Masquerade, she accepts.

She and the stranger twirl around the dance floor to a fast-paced song. The stranger is a fantastic dancer and leads Portia through the steps flawlessly. They end the song by dipping her low. The music switches to a slow ballad while the lights dim. Still breathless, the stranger pulls Portia close, and she loses herself in the moment. The ambiance is incredible, and kissing a gorgeous masked stranger at a ball could not be more storybook-perfect. Their lips touch, until a swirl of magical energy brushes her and she remembers you. She steps back from the stranger and runs off, forgetting about her duties, the flowers on the ground and the rest of the Masquerade. She feels horrible about kissing someone other than you but can’t shake the smug pleasure deep inside her that loves her fairytale romance coming to life.

[ralphsspiritualstuff]

Moon Sign Interpretations

I used to not be a huge fan of pre-made interpretations, but I remember when I first started studying astrology how helpful they really were in getting me to where I am now. So, that being said, here we go.  *If you resonate with this post (or if you do not), please drop a comment and/or share. Feedback is always helpful! Plus, it’s always fun to hear what people who HAVE a certain placement have to say about their experience with it.* What is the moon? It represents our intuition, of course. How we see the unseen, how we feel what we can’t directly view. Each sign has its own way of doing that.  Moon in Aries: This placement tends to see things as they are. In fact, of all the moon signs, they’re the least likely to assume or read into anything. This is a double edged sword, as they read into something, but they are also extremely likely to miss something “between the lines” in another person’s actions. They also have a tendency to assume that everyone is as direct as they are, and can become frustrated by the roundabout other moon placements go about things. Their simplicity, however, allows them be firm in their opinions and devote less time to forming them and more time to acting on them. Sometimes Aries moons are inaccurately judged as mean or trying to be hurtful when they are simply unaware something was expected of them. This sign is almost never devious, and when they are upset, they are well aware and will make sure you are as well.  Moon in Taurus: This placement tend to decide very quickly whether or not they like something. It takes quite a bit to get them to change their mind, since their instincts are going to insist that they stand their ground. Even when they do change their minds, Taurus moons can be prone to harboring a lingering sense of their original judgement call. This rootedness in their opinion, however, makes them much more difficult to deceive, as they don’t forget their original perception of how something was once they see it. 

Moon in Gemini: This placement tends to be the hardest for other moons to pin down. Gemini is possibly the most versatile placement for the moon, as someone with this placement can feel one way one moment, and then completely different later on. This emotional range can cause them to be prone to a bit of an identity crisis, as they easily identify with very different groups of people. As quickly as they arrived at an opinion, they’ve found someone else with a new way to look at it to listen to. 

Moon in Cancer: This placement has an amazing capacity to gain an intuitive feel for just about anything. It analyzes and feels situations in great depth, far more than other moon placements do. Because of the amount of emotional energy this placement expends in gaining a strong understanding of its initial experience with something, it can become upset when it has to redo this learning in a new environment.  Their strong understanding comes from a tendency to estimate, because they instinctively know they don’t always see the whole picture. So, they fill in the details with their imaginations. On one hand, their estimations can seem almost psychically accurate, but occasionally they get too much in their own heads trying to figure something out and are a bit off. While it is capable of adapting, it takes it much longer to do so than faster placements because of the amount of work that goes into gaining real understanding rather than cursory knowledge. Cancer moons can be prone to “rejecting the new” (people, ideas, ect) as a result, but eventually do warm up to it. 

Moon in Leo: This placement is often hyper-aware, subconsciously, of how precious their time is. They can sometimes appear to other placements as conceited or too self-important to be bothered, but they are probably the only placement who realized how precious life is. Now, they tend to direct this thought more towards their own life, but they can also have extremely warm and inspiring opinions for those they care about because they intuitively feel how precious and amazing those people are. 

Moon in Virgo: This placement, while actually quite peaceful by nature, is easily stressed out. Once they are made aware of an issue (contrary to popular belief, they do not LOOK for things to correct, those things are forced into their awareness) they have an intense compulsion to fix it. Virgo is quite spiritual by nature and has a natural understanding that small things are best handled before they become bigger things. This sense of how things incur over time leads them to want to do everything NOW, despite their frustrating human limitations. They can also feel bitter because they are painfully aware of how many things they can’t control are going to snowball, but without them so many things that are in their control do NOT snowball, and most other placements do not realize how frequently this is the case. 

Moon in Libra: This placement has the unusual ability to understand both sides of an issue and simultaneously empathize with both points and neither of them at the same time. While most people assume those with this placement are stuck between seeing two ideas as equally good, they are more often in the precarious position of seeing both options as equally bad, and are forced to come up with an alternative. To reiterate, they do not have a hard time deciding. Most of the time, when given two choices, a Libra moon’s instinct is to sort of “nope” out of them both, giving the illusion of indecision. This is because they intuitively know there is a better option to be found somewhere. This can, however, take a lot of time to discover, and sometimes opportunities where taking the lesser of two evils would have been preferable to inaction pass them by. Just as often, though, they find an option that is better than either original proposition.  Moon in Scorpio: This placement tends to be pretty chill. While outwardly, they may seem sad, they typically just have resting bitch face (I’m sorry, but you know it’s true.) and are in a calm state. Scorpio moons understand that everything in our world is temporary. They’re actually capable of feeling immense joy because of how present they can be in an imperfect moment. Other placements can’t seem to understand why something makes them so darn happy, while they seemingly don’t care about anything else in the world. The simple answer is that when they’re happy, they know they weren’t owed it and there’s no guarantee it’ll happen ever again, so they feel it all at once. This can also leave them apathetic to others’ pain, because to them, the awareness of something’s temporary nature is so plain it’s almost funny to them when someone else thought something would last forever. They aren’t as callous as they appear, but they will always be reserved around those who do not share their understanding of how fleeting things really are. 

Moon in Sagittarius: This placement has an intuitive understanding that there is always something more to be found, whether it be in a person’s actions, an event they watch happen, or even their own understanding and existence. They are constantly trying to figure out how things relate. The world, however, has many layers and while Sagittarius moons accurately connect some of those layers, sometimes they miss others and think they have the whole picture before they do. Often times, they have enough of the picture put together to make something work that everyone else assumed would fail, but other times they have to completely redraw their mental map from scratch, which they do with surprising glee and fervor. That forward drive allows them to recover from things that would cripple other placements, although they may find those situations are often self made. 

Moon in Capricorn: This placement embody’s survival of the fittest. They can seem cold, but really, the just have a strong sense of what will work and what will not. They are often ashamed of their own flaws far more than other placements, and tend to cope by compensating heavily with growing stronger. Capricorn moons have a very hard time ignoring facts for their own comfort, much less the comfort of others. Concrete truths ring true to their core, and as much as they may try to bend them, they always come back to what they know will work and what will not based on the facts. 

Moon in Aquarius: This placement has a natural curiosity unparalleled by other placements. They can be prone to intrusive thoughts and impulsive actions because they simply want to see what will happen, and may do things that go against widely accepted social codes both intentionally and unintentionally. They learn how to intuitively find solutions to a multitude of life’s problems, but are much more interested in finding the solutions than implementing them. This can leave them in a great position to give advice to other people and even themselves, but unless the circumstances are compelling, their unlikely to follow their own good advice. They simply prefer to find a different way to do something. It looks like reinventing the wheel from the outside, but for Moon in Aquarius folks, life is simply begging to be played with, and doing something the simple way isn’t living at all. It may take them years, but they almost always find a workaround. 

Moon in Pisces: This placement instinctively reverses everything it feels. While they do connect to the opinions and feelings of others, their tendency to also acknowledge the opposite position can leave them feeling equally connected and isolated, as if they have a second personality. Pisces moons can exist in two worlds at once completely, which tends to manifest as inaction on their part. While they may outwardly act one way, their imagination compensates by wondering how things would go if they did they exact opposite of what they do. Their dual nature can make them easy to connect with halfway, but almost impossible to connect with fully. They can seem a little melancholy on the outside because they feel a sense of sadness that other placements can’t keep up with how fast their imagination works and how crucial understanding their imagination is to understanding not just how they interact with the world, but how they feel about those interactions. 

FREE READING OPPORTUNITY

If you liked this interpretation of your moon (or someone else’s moon) and are curious about a reading with me, I’m actively screening for participants in a research project that includes doing a free reading for anyone selected. I have a survey to find candidates who meet the criteria I’m doing research on. 

https://www.survio.com/survey/d/R0Y8Y8C5U8B5U5S4U

I strongly encourage you to share this link with your friends who are maybe on the fence about astrology, as I’m trying to get a decent sample size. If everyone I survey are astrologers themselves it could impact my results. Normally I do not offer free readings to people I don’t know, but it’s essential I don’t have a personal relationship with the person I’m reading for this particular study. 

Anyhoo, I hope to hear from you soon!

-Ralph

[justwritethatdown]

Bechloe Week 2020 – Day3: Drunk Texts 

We were bound to be together

An au where Beca didn't get together with Jesse and that allowed her relationship with Chloe to grow.

or

The way Pitch Perfect 1 should have gone ;)

Set during Beca’s first two years at Barden; everything goes as it should, nothing angsty happens and everyone is happy. Just a sloppy falling-in-love story between two college girls, told through their drunk texts, kind of...

Rating: T

Words Count: 2.5K

Thanks to @viharistenno for being my beta

Read here or on AO3

She took my arm, I don’t know how it happened

 After Hood Night, Beca was lying on her bed; the weird buzzing in her brain caused by alcohol made it hard for her to fall asleep. She wasn’t used to drinking and partying with strangers until late night, but she had to admit it wasn’t the worst thing she’d done. That Jesse seemed nice after all, a little pushy maybe, but Beca knew she needed a push sometimes, maybe she should give him a chance-

Her phone buzzed on the nightstand

CHLOE BEALE: Im so glad that I met you xx

BECA: Yeah, you kinda mentioned that…

Beca bit her bottom lip and a bright smile formed on her face. There was something about Chloe, that didn’t make Beca want to push her away. On the contrary, it was rather a pull, that made Beca want to get closer to her.

She placed the phone on her stomach, letting out a heavy sigh, smile still present on her lips. Beca couldn’t believe she actually auditioned for an acapella singing group, just because a crazy – naked – girl told her to, after crushing her shower and forcing her to sing with her; it was a situation that normally would have made her run for the hills and yet, she went to the audition – and she got in – and to the following party. Beca didn’t even know how that happened, Chloe had dragged her into this whole new world, and she was kinda okay with that.

It confused Beca; for the first time her instinct didn’t tell her to push this person away, it told her to get to know her better, to become her friend, but most of all Beca wanted Chloe to like her, she wanted to impress her. She checked her phone to see if Chloe had texted her anything else, but there were no new messages, so she let out another sigh – a disappointed one this time – and put the phone away.

Maybe Chloe was still with shower guy, they seemed to be pretty close at the party. Her stomach twisted and Beca huffed again; the way Chloe had grabbed her arms and how close she got to her while talking, gave her some vibes, for a moment she’d thought that the redhead was flirting with her – a thought she wasn’t completely opposed to – but then she saw her with that guy while she was busy talking to Jesse, and kicked herself for being so delusional, she was well aware they were having sex in the sowers, they were obviously together.

Beca shook her head and rolled her eyes to herself, turning to her side to try to sleep.

  I felt it in my chest as she looked at me

  CHLOE: Admit you had fun tonight! :P

Beca was a bit more tipsy than usual – okay, let’s say she was drunk – but it wasn’t her fault; Amy arrived there with the clear internet of getting the brunette drunk that night. She dumbly smiled at her phone and almost gave in, but then she remembered their bet.

“I don’t know why I let you drag me to this stupid party” she spat out when they arrived at the ΣΒΘ frat house.

“Come on, I bet you’re going to have fun” cheered Chloe making Beca roll her eyes.

“I doubt it” stated the brunette.

“We’re here bitches!” screamed Amy going straight for the alcohol table, followed by Stacie.

When her head started to spin, Beca realized that maybe she’d let Amy fix her one drink too much, but she didn’t care, not when Chloe was leaning in so close to whisper things in her ear – shout actually, to be heard over the loud music – and had one arm wrapped around Beca’s shoulders; the weight of Chloe on her felt amazing and the way Chloe looked at her made her heart do funny things in her chest.

Beca definitely blamed it on the alcohol, but deep inside she knew it was the same feeling she had the first time they met at the activities fair; that smile Chloe gave her and those blue eyes, so deep that Beca felt like she was drowning in them, knocked all the air out of her lungs and she felt her heart racing.

Even if she did run away that time, Beca just couldn’t stop thinking about her, until that girl jumped in her shower, making Beca incredibly frustrated and embarrassed. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t help but looking – more than once – at the girl’s naked body and her mind wandered without her permission. Chloe was undeniably beautiful, and her confidence made her even hotter.

Beca should have known then that she was gone, but – always oblivious to her own feelings – it took her several weeks of parties and rehearsals to know that she had, in fact, fallen head over hills for the redhead.

Suddenly Beca felt Chloe stepping away from her and saw the girl launching herself into Tom’s arms. The brunette found herself downing the remains of her drink and accepting a new one from Amy. The rest of the night is still a blur, she vaguely remembered Jesse helping her through her dorm room door and saying good night, at which she believed she grunted before the guy closed the door behind him.

Beca frowned at the memory and looked back at her phone; there was a new message on the screen

CHLOE: you disappeared tho. Stacie said you left w Jesse :(

BEC: yoy wr wit Tom

CHLOE: I told you I was going to say hi and when I came back you were gone >.<

BEC: are u tofether?

CHLOE: No, I’m alone

BEC: no I mwan ar you datingm

BEC: ?

Chloe started typing and deleting and Beca started to freak out; she’d known this girl for less than a year, she saw her with Tom from day one, she had no right whatsoever to be upset about them dating, even if Chloe had been sending her mixed signals from the start and was annoyingly touchy and loving and not-so-unintentionally made Beca’s head spin more than alcohol did

CHLOE: No, he’s not my boyfriend. We used to be fwb but I ended it a while ago because I started to like someone… :)<3

  Just keep your eyes on me

 The following day Beca felt like shit; her head hurt, and she felt nauseous, that’s why she was immensely grateful to Chloe for dragging her to that stupid party the night before their special rehearsal’s session.

“Remind me to kill you when this is over” she lamented when Chloe greeted her with her usual bright smile – the girl clearly didn’t drink as much as Beca did the night before – and a quick hug

“Can’t wait” winked the redhead, making Beca’s blood boil in her veins.

Chloe really looked amazing that morning and was clearly making an effort to be noticed by the brunette; she managed to make even that idiotic hostess choreography look beautiful. It wasn’t just the dancing, Beca found every movement Chloe made incredibly sexy, maybe because of that half confession she had made the night before, or maybe because Beca knew Chloe was doing it on purpose; she knew it because Chloe basically never dropped her eye contact with Beca, almost like she was trying to cast a spell on her, and maybe she did.

“You’re on a mission today huh?” Beca hushed to her during a break

“I don’t know what you’re talking about” answered Chloe wearing a shit eating grin

“Well, better for me then, I’m enjoying the show” she shot back without thinking too much about it and regretting it right away, but the fire it lit in Chloe’s eyes told her she’d said just the right thing.

“What’s with all this eye fucking?” suddenly spat out Amy, making the room giggle. Except for Beca who became bright red, and Aubrey who cleared her throat glaring at Chloe, who innocently smiled biting her lip.

“Did you finally hook up or something?” asked Stacie in amusement

“Can we focus on the damn choreography?” asked Aubrey grinding her teeth.

  Deep in her eyes, I think I see the future

 Beca’s plan was simple: to go to college for one year, convince her dad that she tried and have him send her to Los Angeles the following year to finally start working towards her dream of producing music. However, something along the way went incredibly wrong, or rather incredibly right, and now all she wanted was to stay there with those nerds who somehow became her family.

The look on Chloe’s face when they won the finals made Beca realize that her future wasn’t in LA, her future was right there with those girls, with Chloe. In that moment Beca felt like she belonged there; she saw her next few years at Barden, with the Bellas, and in the hug they shared, Beca felt that Chloe would be part of her life forever.

The girls celebrated in the Bellas’ sorority house and they all, even Aubrey, got incredibly wasted. Most of the girls had already moved there from their dorms and wouldn’t have to go anywhere after their party.

During the night Chloe made sure to let Beca know, more than once, how sad she was that the brunette had decided to really leave for Los Angeles in the end, instead of moving in with her, and she never left her side the whole night. They drank together and laughed and danced, and they almost kissed, but Chloe pulled away last minute confusing Beca. When Beca asked her why, Chloe mumbled with watery eyes “you’re leaving, what’s the point?”, but immediately cleared her throat and dragged Beca to dance with the others. In her inebriated state, the music and Chloe’s body moving rhythmically against hers, were enough to distract Beca from that statement. Only later, walking back to her dorm, it carved its way back into her mind.

BEC ♡: I not gng to LA  

CHLO: ???

BEC ♡: im stang heee

Chloe’s reply was a string of emojis Beca was too drunk to interpret followed by

CHLO: yoy styng w the bellassssss

BEC ♡: im staying fr you

CHLO: were gnna be cocaptnsss!!!

  This woman is my destiny

 Beca’s second year at Barden started out completely differently from her first one; she was living in a sorority house along with eight other girls and was co-captain of the acapella group she led to victory the year before.

Her relationship with Chloe evolved in a strange way; they acted like a married couple now, but they never crossed the line, both too scared of ruining what they had. With Aubrey gone, the Bellas were their responsibility and Beca knew that was what mattered the most to Chloe, so she chose to focus on their acapella group. For Chloe, not because she was scared of fucking things up, obviously.

Their mutual pinning was clear to all their friends; some of them – Amy – teased them  about it, while others desperately tried to help them figure it out.

One night, during one of their let’s-get-drunk-because-why-not nights, they were playing truth or dare

“Beca” started Stacie “truth or dare?” she asked with a wicked smile, making Beca sweat

“Truth…” tentatively answered the brunette

“Do you have more than platonic feelings for anyone in this room?” asked Stacie raising an eyebrow. Chloe held her breath at that and Beca was the only one to miss it, too occupied freaking out

“Dare” blurted out Beca “dare, I meant dare!” Beca’s heart started beating dangerously fast, hoping that Stacie would have let her change her reply, but the girl’s eyes twinkled and Beca knew she’d fallen right into her trap.

“I dare you… to kiss the girl you have the biggest toner in the world for and release us all from this ridiculous sexual tension you two generate” commanded the tall girl rolling her eyes.

Beca felt all the air leave her lungs. Everything was silent around her and all she could hear was the uneven beating of her heart. She swallowed hard looking at Chloe to see what her reaction had been and the girl’s hesitant smile calmed Beca a little.

Beca wasn’t one to back down from a challenge and the alcohol in her system only made her more competitive, but most of all, there was nothing in the world she wanted more than to finally kiss Chloe, so she crossed the circle they were sitting in to reach the redhead on the other side of it. Chloe was biting her bottom lip in anticipation and Beca could see in her eyes that the girl wanted to kiss her just as much as she did.

Beca gently rested her palm on Chloe’s cheek. They didn’t speak, but they didn’t need words to communicate; their eyes were saying all they needed to say. They expressed how much they both wanted to do this, but only if the other was okay with that, and that it was going to be okay. They completely forgot they weren’t alone.

Beca leaned in and kissed her, Chloe wrapped her arms around Beca’s neck and pulled her closer, letting out a sigh that made Beca’s heart flutter. They stayed there, kneeling in the middle of the living room, kissing slowly and deeply, their lips moved together as if they were dancing. Beca wasn’t sure who deepened the kiss, but as soon as their tongues touched, a million fireworks went off in her brain, covering the sound of their friends whooping and clapping and wolf whistling – Amy – and making her forget her own name.

Beca couldn’t have enough of Chloe’s lips. When the kiss ended and Chloe tried to move away, Beca desperately chased her mouth and started kissing her again, gaining a chuckle from the redhead. The two girls were only separated by Amy accidently bathing them in tequila while waving a bottle in the air, shouting that they had to drink to that.

After two – or was it three? – Bhloe drinks, as Amy had named them, Beca was still snuggled up next to Chloe. They shared some quick kisses during the rest of the night and when they decided to go wrap it up, Beca really wasn’t ready to sleep. All she wanted to do was kiss Chloe all night long and the morning after, and for the rest of her life. When Chloe pulled her in for another kiss, she was happy to welcome Chloe’s tongue in her mouth again

“Good night, baby” whispered Chloe against her lips before leaving.

Beca was lying awake in her bed; she could still feel the ghost of Chloe’s lips lingering on hers. She took her phone and started typing.

BEC ♡: I lied at trth o dre I dont have a tner for you

CHLO: Bec…

*CHLO IS TYPING*

BEC ♡: Im crazy abt yoy! youre my destiny

BEC ♡: you’re

CHLO: you jst gve me a heartattack yoi asshole1

BEC ♡: srry xD

CHLO: wnna cme here to sleep w me?

BEC ♡: we r drnk…

CHLO:  I jut wanna slp

BEC ♡: Any wll tease th shit out of us

CHLO: I don’t care

CHLO: I miss u

Beca didn’t really use much her bed in the Bellas’ house.

[orangecrane]

ralbert with 25 from the fluff hurt/comfort list? also, your writing is beautiful :)

oh the things i’d do, i’ll take care of you

Dialogue prompt 25: “Do you need a ride?”

Race (ignoring Jack’s explicit warning) goes out to sell right before a snowstorm hits and Albert takes it upon himself to take his dumbass back to the lodging house.

a/n: Thanks for the prompt, I was a bit liberal in my interpretation so I hope that’s okay! Also tysm for the compliment! As always this is crossposted on ao3

CW: Mentions of hypothermia/frostbite, Mild swearing

Race’s day was not going great, to say the least. The sky had been overcast all morning and Jack had warned him that it’d probably be snowing by midday, but did he listen? No. In his defense… okay he’s got nothing, he really should’ve listened to Jack. If he had maybe he wouldn’t be stuck in Brooklyn in what was quickly shaping up to be a proper snow storm while all the trolleys were shut down due to the weather. He’d have to make the entire journey back to Manhattan on foot and he really wasn’t looking forward to doing that.

However, he didn’t really have a choice. Thankfully he’d managed to sell almost all his paper before it really started coming down, no one would be buying anything now Race thought bitterly. He was starting to shake from the cold and his thin shirt and vest did very little to help. Not only that but his shoes were quickly proving to be a major issue as he trudged through the snow to the Brooklyn bridge. He’d known he needed a new pair for a while but he hadn’t realized quite the state of the shoes until now. There were lots of small holes throughout, they no longer laced tight enough to prevent snow from falling in the tops, and the soles were almost completely detached, only solidly against the shoes in the heel. His feet were absolutely soaked and painfully numb by the time he made it to the bridge.

He eyed the bridge warily, it wouldn’t  exactly be safe to cross but it’d get even worse if he waited, and being stranded in Brooklyn with nowhere to go wasn’t an option. So he braced himself and began the trek. He nearly lost his footing a few times and the snow made it hard to see more than a few feet in front of him, but he made it in one piece. Barely. Though even just the thought of walking all the way back to the lodging house when he couldn’t feel anything but pain in his feet made Race want to curl up and sleep where he stood.

“Heya Racer, what took ya so long?” Oh thank goodness, even the sound of Albert’s voice never failed to improve Race’s day.

“Oh I just felt like takin’ my time, enjoy the view ya know? What’re you doin’ here Al?” Though Race was certainly glad to see him, it was definitely unusual for Albert to meet him at the bridge.

“Well someone told me that a certain dumbass decided to sell in Brooklyn today despite knowing that it was gonna snow and I had to come make sure that he made it home. Especially when most a’ the boys only sold the morning edition or came back early.” Albert spoke as if he were annoyed, but his grin showed he wasn’t really bothered. “Now lets get home, it's freezing and you look like you’re bouta shake outta your boots- Oh shit Racer, those are in bad shape, are they doin' anything to keep the snow out?” Albert asked, not even trying to hide his concern.

“Uh… not really, I can hardly feel my feet at all, might as well be out walkin’ barefoot.” Race answered sheepishly, he went to crack his knuckles but it was too cold and he was left awkwardly pressing against his fingers.

That did absolutely nothing to quell Albert’s worry for the blonde. Hypothermia was a real concern in the winter and if Racer wound up with frost-bitten feet it’d be bad news. And if the state Race appeared to be in was any indication, they had to get moving soon, Racer needed to get warmed up. “Well I don’t know about you Racer, but I’m heading back to the lodging house, do you need a ride?”

“Huh?”

“Sweetheart there is no way you’re walking all the way back, c’mon, I’ll carry you.” Albert wasn’t exactly looking forward to lugging over one-hundred pounds of teenage boy around but an excuse to be close to Racer was always a good thing, and besides, if it helped keep Race warm and from losing some toes then it’d be well worth it.

“No- Al you don’t need to do that!” Race protested. He couldn’t ask that of Albert, no matter how nice it would be. Okay, now that he was thinking about it he really wanted to be carried by Al. Walking sounded like hell and Al was very pretty and warm. And he had some nice arms, not that Race would ever say that to him, his ego was big enough already.

“Yeah, no chance sweetheart, hop on.” Albert stated as he turned around so Race could get on his back. It’d be easiest to carry him this way even if he would have preferred to have the boy in his arms.

Race would have protested again but he’d already unintentionally talked himself into doing it. Plus he had a soft spot for pet names. “Thanks Al…” Race said quietly.

“Don’t mention it, now c’mon it’s freezing out here and the sooner we get moving the sooner we can warm up.” Race smiled and clambered onto Al’s back and they began their walk back to the lodging house, enjoying each others company and making small talk as they went.

They weren’t far from the lodgings when Race’s head began to loll on Albert’s shoulder, his participation in the conversation having faded nearly ten minutes ago. “Hey Racer, don’t go fallin’ asleep on me, we’re almost there,” Albert nudged the sleeping boy, “Sweetheart you gotta wake up.”

Race shifted, burrowing his head into Albert’s neck, “Yeah, yeah, ‘m awake.” he mumbled. This let Albert feel how cold Race’s skin was, spurring him on to pick up the pace for the last block or so. As he reached the steps of the lodging house, Albert kicked the door awkwardly, not wanting to drop Race. Mush opened the door almost immediately with a smile, happy to see that they were okay. However, once he took in how tired and cold Albert appeared and how Race was being carried the relief turned to worry.

“Oh dear, we need to get you two upstairs and out of those clothes.” Mush fretted as he brushed excess snow off of them. He called out to the boys in the main room that Albert and Race were back as he dragged them up the stairs and into the bedroom. With Mush’s help Albert avoided dropping Race both on the way up and once in the room, gently helping him into Albert’s bunk. Race’s bunk was up top and he didn’t seem too keen on climbing up and no one else seemed inclined to help him.

“Now both of you out of those clothes, I’m going to go get you something dry and hopefully warm.” Mush instructed as he went to search for some spare clothing. That was when Jack made his entrance, having heard Mush's announcement.

“Hey you two, you doin’ alright? We was gettin’ worried.” Jack looked over both of them, eyes narrowing in concern, before moving to assist Race, who was struggling to take his shoes off. They were soaking wet and his fingers were so numb he couldn’t really untie them. “Ya know what, I’ll help Race n’ you just worry about yourself for a minute Albert.”

Albert fumbled a bit and was much slower than usual but was able to remove his outer layers of clothing by the time Mush returned. He was still cold but he hadn’t been out there nearly as long as Race. Mush handed them the dry clothes and an extra blanket he managed to scrounge up.

“I’ve got it from here Mush, why don’t you head downstairs.” Jack phrased it like a suggestion, but it was clearly an order. Mush nodded and left, shooting one last concerned glance over his shoulder. Albert and Race dressed themselves as quickly as they could, Jack helping them both with some of the buttons on their shirts and Race with his socks. “Albert you should lie down too, you were out there for a pretty long time.”

“I’m fine Jack, it’s not that-” Albert’s protest was cut off when Jack sent him a look. “My bed’s already occupied if you couldn’t tell.” Albert tried again, gesturing towards where Race was sitting silently against the wall, struggling to keep his eyes open.

“You think I care? Just get some rest Albert.” Jack said dismissively, leaving the room.

“C’mon Albie just come lie down with me, ‘m still cold.” Race asked once Jack was gone.

“Race, I already said I was fine, I’m gonna go check on some of the boys downstairs.” Albert insisted, walking towards the door.

“Wait, Albie! Please… please stay with me.” Race begged, he didn’t want to be left alone. He wanted Albert to stay, he knew that people didn’t really know about their relationship and that Albert really wanted it to stay that way, but he really wanted to be held and Albert was warm and the other boys knew they were close, it wouldn’t be suspicious for them to cuddle, especially with their current condition, right?

Man, Albert would never be able to say no to those eyes, would he? “Alright Racer, I’ll stay, scoot over.” Albert said softly. Race grinned softly and moved over, pulling back the blankets so Al could get under easier. He immediately curled in the red-head’s side, nuzzling him and resting his head on his chest. Albert wrapped his arms around Race pulling him closer and let himself relax. He could afford to hold his boyfriend for a little bit, lord knows they both needed it.

“Love you Albie.” Racer mumbled into his chest, teetering on the precipice of sleep.

“Love you too, sweetheart.” Albert said as he pressed a kiss to the top of his head. Race drifted to sleep with a smile on his face, for a shitty day this was a pretty good way for it to end.

[madamemayura]

interesting post you've written about Cass/Raps being a tragic romance. maybe you'll be feel better if you write a longer one on your thoughts on that... ;)

Okay this took me WAY longer than I expected but y’all ask for tragic readings and I deliver, so may I present: Rapunzel and Cassandra as a tragic romantic subversion of the Knight in Shining Armor.

Alright, as a disclaimer I will say that the way this reading works is that it’s just that: a reading. Cassandra and Rapunzel as a tragic romance (while simultaneously remaining a fantastic depiction of female friendship) is an interpretation of TTS that I find incredibly valid and, in a storytelling sense, rewarding. This isn’t to say the creators intended it to be that way or that this is the one and only reading of Cassandra and Rapunzel’s dynamic, but it is a reading I subscribe to and believe to hold evidence, support, chemistry, and immense value in a literary and creative sense.

So let’s get into why that is.

Consider Cassandra and Rapunzel, together. Their friendship is well established even as the show starts, and over the course of the series we watch Cass serve as a foil to Raps in a multitude of ways: she’s the experience to her inexperience, the logical to her creative, the knight to her princess. Cass wears dark earth-tones in her preferred clothing while Rapunzel opts for a vibrancy of pinks and purples; Cassandra’s approach to problems is straightforward and direct, while Rapunzel’s involves planning and imaginative thinking (see: Queen for a Day, the use of the Demanitus Device); Cass is private and reserved, Rapunzel open and outgoing. 

The building blocks of their dynamic are prime material for a developing romance, complete with tension, conflict, and positive growth. They’re complementary opposites in most of their mannerisms, yet both are brave, adventurous, intuitive, competitive, and though they show it in different ways, ultimately good and compassionate people.

So why is this a tragedy? Why is it that Rapunzel and Cassandra’s relationship is inherently doomed, shot through with hairline fractures that lead to a temporary yet heartbreaking betrayal in Destinies Collide?

The answer lies not only in context and circumstances, but even deeper, in the very core of their characters; Rapunzel’s driving force is freedom, and Cassandra’s is control.

While the previous description of Cassandra and Rapunzel as foils lists complementary opposites, puzzle pieces that ultimately still fit together, these two forces are repelling magnets, each of them informing many of Cass and Rapunzel’s individual character flaws and virtues.

Perhaps the root of the tragedy that encompasses Cassandra and Rapunzel’s story is that both are justified in being driven by their respective desires. Cassandra, who has spent most of her life striving for a position she can’t reach, trying to prove herself worthy of respect and trust and arguably doing just that, has yet to see the rewards for her hard work. She is never given the position of control and influence she desires, despite having developed both her skills and her instincts.

Rapunzel, similarly, has every right to the freedom she was crucially denied in her past; after enduring emotional manipulation and abuse throughout her childhood, abuse exacted with the intent to keep her isolated and caged, there can be no other resolution than that she fight against any and all restraints.

Yet freedom for Rapunzel is a double-edged sword. Despite her escape from the tower that was her prison, she finds herself in the position of a princess and future queen, a role that comes with rules, regulations, and no shortage of trials. As Rapunzel and the audience discover in Queen for a Day, her royalty can put her in positions where she is anything but free to act, and if she’s to be an effective ruler, she has to learn to compromise. Sometimes, to devastating results.

Cassandra, likewise, is forced to show some of her more fatal flaws when it comes to her desire for control. Her stubbornness and occasional tunnel-vision are a result of that need to be in charge, that need to be heard and listened to oftentimes above anyone else. Being unfairly ignored, combined with her tendency to keep her true feelings bottled up, leads to her putting ambition over her relationships and sometimes lashing out harshly, going further than she previously intended. It happens in Challenge of the Brave when she competes less than ethically against Rapunzel, Great Expotations when she backs out of her agreement with Varian, and most notably in a brilliantly written yet incredibly heartwrenching episode, Rapunzel and the Great Tree:

“Cass, you of all people should know I can handle myself pretty well out here. I don’t need someone to keep me safe.”

It begins here, with Rapunzel’s honest but unintentionally hurtful remark. As the audience already knows, Rapunzel doesn’t need protecting, but in the moment she says it the question must be asked: if Rapunzel needs no protection, no guardian, no knight… what does that make Cassandra?

Cass, who has chased after a position as a guard of Corona, who promises her king that she’ll keep his daughter safe, whose moment of truth in the first season was stepping up as captain and leading the attack in Old Corona. If she’s not the knight in shining armor, who is she?

And of course, we might be able to come up with a plethora of answers. She’s Rapunzel’s best friend, an excellent strategist and fighter, an adventurer, a hardworker, her own individual woman, and much more. Yet, despite her frustration of being put in second place, of literally waiting in the wings, Cassandra insists on existing in Rapunzel’s shadow. She wants recognition, a position that comes with honor and control, but she wants them in close relation to Rapunzel because of the love she holds for her.

There lies Cassandra’s dilemma: she’s afraid of what might happen if she ever breaks out of that shadow, if she ever achieves her goal and comes center stage. If she’s not Rapunzel’s protector, will she have any place in her life? Cassandra, desperate to remain near the woman and friend she’s fallen in love with, has meticulously sculpted her own future around her, and in doing so has forgotten to take into account that Rapunzel might not follow that exact route.

Now, is there anything wrong with Cassandra wanting to serve as Rapunzel’s protector? Not at all. The two of them have proven on multiple occasions that they’re a formidable team, as well as close friends, and Cass is more than up to the task. Yet we-the-audience know that Rapunzel, driven by freedom and currently undergoing an arc that’s whole purpose is reclaiming her agency, deserves the right to make her own choices (a fact driven even further home as we see Zhan Tiri’s disciples, the most significant of villains in the series, try desperately to take away that exact ability).

And those very choices are what cause the rift between herself and Cassandra.

“I can’t do that, Cass.”

“What do you mean you can’t do that? Are you that obliviously naïve that you can’t–”

“Enough, Cassandra!”

It’s in this particular moment where Rapunzel and Cassandra’s staple characteristics flip: Cass, normally able to keep her feelings tightly bound, is emotional and angry, while Rapunzel (in stark contrast to her uncertainty in Queen for a Day) becomes stern and unmoving.

The brilliance and heartbreak bound in this scene is that Cassandra, though ultimately right in her insistence that the group move on from the Tree of Zhan Tiri, has unknowingly echoed rhetoric that Gothel, Rapunzel’s abuser, once used to keep her in line. The tragedy is that Cassandra is right but goes too far, and that Rapunzel has every right to respond harshly.

Because, when it comes down to it, Rapunzel retains her freedom through having the control Cassandra cannot.

And thanks to the particularly tense events of season two, the two of them have not found a compromise that allows them to share it. As Cassandra attempts to exercise the control she’s worked towards for so long, she is unwittingly depriving Rapunzel of the freedom she’s only just recently found. On the other hand, Rapunzel, in exercising her own agency and stepping into the role she has long been training for, deprives Cass of an agency of her own. 

It is important also to remember that, though friends, Rapunzel and Cassandra retain a professional relationship of a royal woman and her subject, a princess/heir to a kingdom and her sworn protector. It’s this relationship that ties control and freedom so closely together for both of them, further complicating their character progression and dynamic.

And truly, why shouldn’t Cass be respected and her advice heeded after all she’s proven her capability? And again, why should Rapunzel have to sacrifice any of her agency or her own sense of capability for the sake of Cassandra? There’s a balance between them, but one that is delicate and often interrupted, eventually to the point where we realize that Rapunzel and Cassandra’s motivations, however justified, are doomed to clash.

A comparison between the dynamics of Rapunzel, Cassandra, and Eugene is vital to this reading, though not in the ways one might think. Both Eugene and Cass legitimately and truly love Rapunzel, and neither of their love is diminished by the other. The main difference is within Cass and Eugene’s individual characters; while Cassandra and Rapunzel are both in the midst of their journeys of self-discovery (the thing that leads Cass to most of her inner and outer-conflict), Eugene was not.

Eugene and Cassandra parallel one another in their roles as Rapunzel’s support, but Cassandra isn’t satisfied or even entirely comfortable in that position. Her desire for control, for her own agency, provides an obstacle that Eugene simply doesn’t have throughout the majority of the series. This, as it happens, is the root of his crisis in Destinies Collide; Eugene’s betrayal to the group is so brief due to the uncertainty of the situation, and ultimately is overcome by him reaffirming the identity he’s always had.

Cassandra, however, has not yet fully discovered her own identity. She has no deep foundation, no certainty to fall back on, only her contrasting desires and an incredible drive to accomplish them.

Unlike Cassandra, Eugene has already lived center-stage as Flynn Rider. We watch him develop past his selfishness and arrogance, watch as Rapunzel becomes his “new dream,” and continue to watch as their relationship is reaffirmed in the series. One of the most refreshing aspects of Eugene and Rapunzel as a couple is the healthiness of the dynamic, the lack of manufactured drama (i.e. drama for drama’s sake), and the genuine love and maturity woven into their relationship. 

None of this is to say that Eugene is at all better or superior to Cassandra, or Cassandra better or superior to Eugene; rather, the parallels and differences between their two characters help illuminate the inner-workings of their respective relationships with Rapunzel. They both love her, but how that love thrives in one dynamic and hurts in the other comes down to this: Eugene is done with center stage, and Cassandra has never even been in it.

The tragedy of Rapunzel and Cassandra’s romance, then, is this: though they deeply love and care for one another (and always will), though they have helped one another grow, have made each other better people in a way no less valuable than Rapunzel and Eugene have, they’ve reached the point where they no longer can. They aren’t toxic to one another, but static; if Cass wants her moment in the sun, a moment she fully deserves, she needs to pursue it on her own.

And Cassandra is afraid to accept that.

This aspect of analysis will try to avoid going into too much speculation, since the whole story behind Cassandra’s betrayal is still a mystery. That aspect aside, this moment is undeniably where Cass’ inner-conflict comes to a head.

How does Cassandra get everything she wants? How does she stay with Rapunzel while also getting the control and agency she craves? Cass won’t accept a world where she has to operate independent of Rapunzel, yet it’s independence that she longs for. This, possibly combined with a desire to protect Rapunzel and save her life (and/or supernatural influence from mysterious room in Rapunzeltopia), moves her to grab the moonstone, to stop “waiting in the wings” and move center stage.

The tragedy isn’t that Cassandra is evil, or that she’s too selfish or arrogant or jealous. No, the tragedy is that Cassandra is a character perfectly tailored to have her own protagonist’s journey, but cannot let go of being her princess’ knight in shining armor. And it’s that very armor she now wears that might well end up corrupting her.

[commentaryvorg]

Danganronpa V3 Commentary: Part 4.2

Be aware that this is not a blind playthrough! This will contain spoilers for the entire game, regardless of the part of the game I’m commenting on. A major focus of this commentary is to talk about all of the hints and foreshadowing of events that are going to happen and facts that are going to be revealed in the future of the story. It is emphatically not intended for someone experiencing the game for their first time.

Last time, as we began chapter 4, Gonta has become even more desperate to be useful to everyone, Monokuma gave out another motive that makes no sense as a motive from his point of view, Keebo became partially responsible for every future death through inaction, the true nature of this situation was hiding in plain sight in Shuichi’s lab, and Kaito vowed to protect his sidekicks despite having no way to guarantee it (because he’s also become even more desperate to be useful to them).

Kaito also found a Flashback Light, so we’re about to do that. Everyone’s gathered in the dining hall except Kokichi.

Himiko: ��“I guess… he must be a real pro at hide-and-seek. I magically looked all over the school, but he was nowhere to be found.”

And you’d think Himiko would be good at finding hiding places, because her, uh, magic, often involves secret passageways and hidden compartments. So I guess Kokichi really is just that good at hide and seek.

Tsumugi:  “But I’m still uneasy about these Flashback Lights… Are they really okay to use?”

I don’t know, Tsumugi, you tell us.

Anyway, Kokichi shows up.

Kokichi:  “Unfortunately, I couldn’t use the card key.”

Shuichi:  “You couldn’t use it?”

Kokichi:  “Yeah, I had no idea where to use it, so I just gave up instead.”

This is of course a lie, and Kokichi did in fact find where to use the card key and view the outside world. So now’s the time to talk about this.

It could be argued that at this point, Kokichi falls into despair upon seeing the outside world and genuinely wants the mercy kill outcome that he gets Gonta to try and achieve. But that cannot be the truth, because he deliberately outs Gonta in the middle of the trial while everyone is still pretty sure Kokichi did it, and later outright shows everyone else the outside world, even though the whole point of the mercy kill would have been to prevent them ever seeing that. That interpretation just does not make sense, and I’ll be giving more detailed and precise reasons why as we get into the case.

But even if we ignore the events of this particular chapter’s case and the theoretical attempted mercy kill, him falling into despair here still doesn’t fit. See, Kokichi has made it very clear by now that he’s aware this killing game is being put on as a show for people’s entertainment. His entire plan in chapter 5 hinges on the fact that there must be an audience; if he’d started believing here in chapter 4 that everyone was dead, that plan wouldn’t make any sense. And he’s clearly already working on that plan during this chapter, based on his hints at being the mastermind and the fact that he gets Miu to build him some things that he’ll need for it, most notably Electrobombs.

So, since Kokichi is basically certain about his audience theory by this point, when he sees that the outside world is supposedly completely barren and uninhabitable – therefore there’s no people who are watching this? – he has to conclude that it must be a lie.

Upon seeing a supposed apocalyptic world outside that’s really just a big lie to make an exciting story for people’s entertainment, he might even have started to wonder what else is a lie – everything from the Flashback Lights? Maybe even their very talents?

This isn’t the moment Kokichi falls into despair. This is the moment he figures out that everything is fiction.

Kokichi was already angry at the gamemakers for forcing him into this game he hated just for the sake of other people’s entertainment, and he was already vaguely intending to claim to be the mastermind as part of getting some kind of revenge on them. All this would do is make him even more furious at them for fucking around with him on an even deeper level. It’s very like Kokichi to throw a tantrum when somebody else uses lies against him, like he will in this chapter’s trial. So he’s now more determined than ever to get some kind of petty revenge and beat the gamemakers at their own lying, manipulating game.

Kokichi:  “Oh, hey, the Flashback Light. Lemme see that. Kaito doesn’t have the balls to turn on the switch—”

Kaito:  “Of course I do!!!”

Good job making it look like you’re manipulating Kaito to do whatever you want him to when he was literally about to turn it on anyway, Kokichi.

Maki:  “Similar meteorite impacts happened millions of years ago… All living organisms on Earth were annihilated…”

Yeah, no, that’s not what happened. A mass-extinction, sure, but not literally everything. Even if it was a fictional, more intense meteorite impact than the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, I still don’t believe it’d wipe out everything – some organisms are really stubborn little fuckers. And if it did wipe out absolutely everything, then the chances of life arising again, on the same planet, are astronomically small. The person writing this story apparently doesn’t really know their science and is just going for spectacle.

Kaito:  “Then what happened to that plan? The one to save the world from the meteorites?”

Tsumugi:  “Oh right… I just remembered that…”

Sure, you definitely just remembered it and didn’t know about it this whole time because you came up with it.

Miu:  “Sh-Shut up! I’m tired of this! Let us outta here! Let us out!”

Meanwhile Miu has apparently snapped. Based on her reaction here, this might well be the moment she starts seriously plotting murder. I actually find it pretty neat that, for once, we have a character who decides to commit a murder not because of any chapter-specific motive but just because the overall stress of being stuck in here with the constant threat of being murdered has driven them over the edge. Chapter-specific motives shouldn’t have to be necessary. Admittedly, in a game like this one where there’s a much greater sense of co-operation than in most, it figures Monokuma would think they are necessary, so it also figures that it’d be one of the only two paranoid and non-co-operative people who’d snap in this way.

(Kokichi already snapped basically as soon as the game began, but he didn’t consider becoming blackened because he knew that’d just be playing the game and losing.)

Gonta:  “Miu, calm down! It’s okay! Gonta will protect you!”

AAAGFHDSGHDSGH

Kokichi:  “We probably need one more… Everything will start to connect after we remember one more thing…”

Meaning that, based on what he saw of the outside world, Kokichi’s already put all the pieces together and figured out most of the “story”.

Kokichi:  “That’s why, if the meteorites really did fall on us, anything could’ve happened. A mysterious virus could’ve spread, or some weird technology… Or even an unknown substance brought to Earth that could’ve bent time and space—”

And, see, this doesn’t come across as a Kokichi who’s secretly in despair because he believes the outside world is in ruins. If that were the case, he’d just be saying something like “hey, maybe the meteorites really did wipe out humanity, who knows?”, because he likes to drop hints about truths he’s figured out like that. Instead of that, he’s listing all these fantastical possibilities which have no definite correlation with what he saw out there – because he’s figured out this is all fiction, and therefore he knows that any of these things really could be where the writers want the story to go from here.

Kaito:  “Tch, that’s just stupid! It’s like the setting for some third-rate anime or game!”

And Kaito is unintentionally helping out with the implication that this is what Kokichi’s really thinking about.

Kokichi:  “Do you think I’m making this up? But then, how would you explain Flashback Lights, Exisals, and even Monokuma? We may be used to it *now*, but that kind of stuff goes against common sense, y’know? Which means… it wouldn’t be too farfetched if any of the things I mentioned actually happened.”

Kokichi’s laying this on thick. He’s never really talked about this kind of thing to this extent before. This is making me much more convinced that I’m right in my assumption that he just recently figured out this whole thing is fiction. The reason I came up with that idea in the first place is that it’s the only thing that makes any sense, not because I knew of anything in particular hinting at it being the case – but his behaviour here, the first time we see him after he’d have figured it out, definitely seems to be a deliberate hint towards it.

Gonta:  “Oh, before we go, Gonta put manhole cover back how it was. If we wanna challenge underground again, this time Gonta definitely—”

Kokichi:  “Ah-haha, no-one’s dumb enough to challenge that dump again!”

So I wonder – did­ Kokichi see the outside world from the door at the end of that tunnel? Because that might explain why he would want to discourage people from trying the tunnel again now, if he knows what’s at the end of it and wants to keep everyone from falling into despair until he’s ready to have that happen as part of his plan.

Shuichi:  (We can’t keep going like this… We need to find a way out. I need to solve all of these mysteries.)

Not just you, Shuichi! Yes, you’re the detective, but almost everyone’s started relying on you so much that they’ve forgotten there’s things they could do to help, too, leading to you forgetting that you’re not alone in this.

And now it’s Free Time.

Kaito:  “Meteorites all over the world… No! There’s no point thinking about it right now! I’m better off thinking of something else!”

Kaito may be freaking out a little about the possible end of the world.  But, being Kaito, he’s refusing to let himself dwell on that and trying to stay positive! By… ignoring the problem, but, I mean, what else can you do in this situation.

(He’s in Keebo’s lab for some reason. I guess he’s interested in all the sci-fi technology in here. Shame it never occurs to him to try and encourage Keebo to actually use this stuff.)

Tsumugi:  “A biohazard from a mysterious virus spreading… Infecting people with an unknown disease…”

Excuse me, Tsumugi? I know this is just a reference to some videogame or other, but man, that sure is appropriately timed with the recent revelation about the meteorites, now, isn’t it. She’s deliberately foreshadowing while passing it off as one of her usual arbitrary references.

Gonta:  “What can Gonta do… to be useful for everyone? Gonta think he could protect everyone… in underground passage! Gonta… no can take it anymore! Gonta not wanna lose anyone else!”

Oh Gonta; he just wants to be useful and stop anyone else from dying. He’s not even thinking at all about the meteorites next to this much more immediate issue.

Himiko is in Tenko’s lab! Aww. (While apparently being unfazed by the hidden Monokuma that happens to be dancing right by her feet.)

And she’s actually who I’m about to have Shuichi hang out with. He needs to have one more new hangout partner this chapter, and of the remaining people he’s not already been hanging out with who are generally pleasant people (on the surface), Himiko seems like the one Shuichi would have the most active reason to go for. After the hell she went through last chapter, and especially since he helped encourage her through it during the trial, it seems plausible that he might want to continue reaching out to her and trying to be her friend. Plus, she’s the other final survivor, so it seems appropriate. Also, there… may be one other reason I’m picking her, but we’ll get to that next chapter.

Himiko:  “Nyeeeh…”

Shuichi:  “Himiko?”

Himiko:  “Nyeeeh…”

…Unfortunately, doing Himiko’s early FTEs at this particular time is not quite in line with canon, since they’re written for depressed-Himiko and not positive-Himiko. I imagine most first-time players who choose to hang out with Himiko during their main playthrough also get this awkward whiplash, because probably most of them don’t do so before this point. I know I said I’d keep the FTEs in line with canon as much as possible, but it can’t really be helped in this case. Still, the actual topics she talks about are something she’d have talked about regardless of when it happens; the only awkward part is her attitude about doing so.

Himiko:  “It’s real magic, okay? You get it, right?”

Shuichi:  “Real magic, sure.” (I feel like this conversation will go nowhere if I disagree…)

Himiko:  “No, it’s magic. How many times do I have to tell y—”

Pfft, she’s so used to having to correct everyone that she’s genuinely caught off-guard when someone plays along. Having Tenko be all in on her magic thing must have been very refreshing for her, even if she was under too much of a depression haze to really feel happy about it.

Shuichi:  (Isn’t it strange that such a lazy girl would go through so much work for a magic trick?)

Shuichi’s questioning this, but Himiko has occasionally mentioned her reasons for being a magi – uh, mage – before. She wants to make people smile, just like Kaede did!

Himiko:  “A typical amateur question. You don’t need annoying preparations for magic.”

You really do, though. She must put a lot more work into her magic than you’d think to look at her. (And even if it was real magic, presumably you’d need lots of practice to get good at spellcasting, right?)

Shuichi:  “You have a master, Himiko?”

Himiko:  “Nyeh…? Did I not tell you?”

Shuichi:  “This is the first time I’m hearing it. So there are apprentice magicians?”

Himiko:  “Hm, that’s right. My master was an amazing archmage…”

Himiko’s master is going to be the topic of the rest of her FTEs, but the fact that he exists is basically the only thing we learn from this first one. It abruptly ends right after this because Himiko gets mad at Shuichi calling her a magician again.

Nighttime! Which means…

Shuichi:  “It’s time for training!” (I feel like I haven’t done it in a long time… Alright, to the courtyard!)

Training! Shuichi’s so into it now! Kaito would be proud.

On the way out, he runs into Gonta.

Gonta:  “But Gonta think it best not to go out at nighttime.”

Look at him worrying about everyone’s safety. Don’t worry, Gonta – Shuichi, Kaito and Maki would protect each other if anything happened!

Shuichi:  “But the promise I made to Kaito is really important to me. I can’t break it.”

It’s adorable how much this means to him and how determined he is to keep it up already. Shuichi and Maki (and Himiko) will absolutely continue their training every day when they escape from here too.

Gonta:  “Gonta not know you make such important promise to Kaito. Gonta… so useless.”

Aww, Gonta. He’s had nobody that he’s grown close enough to (FTEs aside) in a genuine enough way that he could have made that kind of promise with. Not only is he feeling useless, but even though he considers everyone here a friend, he must still be feeling kind of alone in his uselessness.

Shuichi:  “Not at all, Gonta. Don’t worry about it. We all know how much you care about us.”

We do! Knowing that already helps in terms of emotional support, Gonta! You don’t need to go risking your life to be useful when you’re already important just by being you!

Gonta:  “Shuichi, Gonta come to decision!”

…But that’s exactly what he’s just decided to do.

Gonta:  “Gonta will sleep good tonight and prepare for tomorrow! Good night!”

And he’s suddenly so much happier now he’s figured out a way he can be useful, even though it’s this.

Kaito:  “Ah, good. You’re here, bro!”

Shuichi:  “Yeah… it’s been so long since the three of us have done this.”

The three of them have only done this together once, in fact – and yet they still feel so much like a trio by this point that Shuichi’s talking about it in a way that makes it seem like they’ve done so more often than that already. I love these three so much.

Maki:  “…It’s because Kaito was scared of ghosts.”

Which is to say, it was Tsumugi’s fault. She cheated us out of more adorable training trio scenes. Boo.

Kaito:  “First off, 100 sit-ups! You guys better get pumped up!”

Yeah, they better, because Kaito’s… not going to.

Shuichi:  “One… Two… Three!”

Maki:  “25, 26, 27, 28…”

…

Kaito:  “When you really think about it, the universe is impossibly vast.”

Oh, Kaito. I’m pretty sure the reason he suggested sit-ups rather than push-ups this time is that he knew he was in too much pain to do much training, and so he at least wanted to be able to look up at the stars while he’s “slacking off”. It’s also a clever misdirection that he can make it look like he’s simply being distracted by space rather than that he has a more worrying reason to not be doing any.

Shuichi:  (Kaito stood up slowly, his body hesitant.)

There go Shuichi’s observational skills picking up on evidence that indicates Kaito is in pain… and then not following up and coming to a conclusion from that evidence, because – well, probably because there’s still some truths he doesn’t want to pursue, especially when he’s not in class-trial, if-I-don’t-face-the-truth-we-all-die mode.

Kaito:  “Sorry… gotta use the bathroom.”

Translation: just gonna go cough up some blood, guys, brb.

(Also, look at him apologising. Simply needing to use the bathroom should not ever count as “doing something wrong” even in his warped logic, so he’s not really apologising for that, is he.)

Shuichi:  (Kaito slowly began walking away toward the school building.) “…I wonder what’s wrong. He’s not in much of a hurry for needing to go to the bathroom.”

Again, making relevant observations that he won’t be consciously drawing any conclusions from because that’s too worrying a truth.

Maki:  “Do you want me to go check on him? I just finished doing my 100 sit-ups.”

Shuichi:  “What? Already? But, ah, maybe you shouldn’t go… Because it’s… the boys bathroom…”

Maki:  “…”

Shuichi:  “…Did that not occur to you?”

Yeah, things like gendered bathroom taboos kind of get lost by the wayside when you’re forced through hellish training to become a child-slave assassin.

Also, man, the problems in this game that could be solved if the school just had unisex bathrooms. Shuichi would have found the secret passageway, Maki would have discovered that Kaito is dying…

Maki:  “By the way… this seems like a good time to ask, but… Did you… like Kaede?”

So, of course, Maki’s asking this because she’s starting to wonder if she “likes” Kaito in that same sense and is trying to figure that out.

Maki:  “Well… I assumed you didn’t, because that would be weird.”

Shuichi:  “What do you mean, ‘weird’?”

Maki:  “Liking someone you just met… especially in a situation like this…”

Shuichi:  “… Then tell me… under what circumstances is liking someone *not* weird?”

Maki:  “…Huh? I… don’t know. I don’t… really understand what that is.”

But she doesn’t understand why she would start feeling this way, because regardless of how great a guy Kaito may or may not be, it doesn’t make any sense that she’d feel this way about him, or about anyone for that matter, and it’s inconvenient and annoying. But if Shuichi also felt that way about Kaede in the same kind of situation, maybe it’s not quite so nonsensical after all?

Here’s the thing: the way Maki approaches this and her opinion of this concept here read as incredibly aromantic. I would know – I’m aromantic, and everything she just said sounds perfectly logical to me and is very similar to how I feel about such things. Yet I gather that such an opinion is an outlier and most people don’t usually see it this way.

Obviously, Maki does in fact feel this way about Kaito, or at least is beginning to, since she explicitly admits to her feelings at the end. I’m going to trust her judgement of her own feelings in that future moment enough to assume that she isn’t mistaken about them, since learning to trust and understand her own feelings is a large part of her character arc. So… Maki is demiromantic? There’s no evidence that she felt anything towards Kaito before he befriended her, so it could entirely be that the platonic affection she gained for him once he reached out and started helping her is what this has grown from. (That said, I’m not demi, so I don’t know exactly how that feels and whether that’s applicable here. She could also just be grey-aro.)

I’ll be honest: I kind of doubt that the writers were deliberately trying to portray Maki as being on the aro spectrum here, because haha canon aromantic representation in mainstream Japanese media, especially that which is more complicated than just plain aro, that’s a joke. They were probably just trying to write her as someone who’s been so emotionally numbed by her hellish backstory that she never got a chance to feel anything romance-related until now, now that she’s started to open up and be a person again. But the end result is that they’ve written a character who is incredibly aro-coded, whether they meant to or not.

Maki:  “…Nevermind. Just forget I ever asked.”

Shuichi:  “Forget you asked? Why did you bring this up, Maki?”

Maki:  “…No reason. I was only curious.”

Shuichi:  “No reason? Maki, you’re being… cruel. You ask me a personal question, then act like you don’t care—”

Shuichi’s reaction here strongly indicates that he did feel that way about Kaede, because if he truly didn’t, then he wouldn’t be hurt so much by Maki’s apparent indifference. But I should point out that this is the only actual piece of evidence in the canon storyline that Shuichi felt this way. I never mentioned his romantic feelings towards Kaede during chapter 1 because they weren’t relevant. The most important point is that they were friends. Everything Shuichi was shown to feel about Kaede back then was entirely consistent with a deep friendship brought about by this awful situation causing them to bond very quickly. All of it would have been the same even if he didn’t also happen to have had romantic feelings towards her. The romantic feelings were just an extra thing, confirmed to be most likely the case here, but not remotely the main focus.

And I appreciate that! The writing of chapter 1 could have insisted that we should care about Kaede and Shuichi specifically because there was romantic love involved, but it didn’t. Platonic love is just as important.

(This is also the case with Maki’s romantic feelings towards Kaito, for that matter. This scene and the very end of trial 5 are pretty much the only points at which they are relevant while Kaito is alive. The rest of the time, the focus isn’t on anything except their friendship. Her romantic feelings are a little bit more relevant, but there is a point to that that’s not just purely for the sake of romance itself, which I’ll talk about when we get there.)

Kaito:  “Hey! Were you guys making out while I was gone!?”

So, clearly Kaito is oblivious to what they were just discussing, and I also highly doubt that he really thinks Shuichi and Maki are into each other – at no other point does he seem to think that way or particularly care about that kind of thing. This comment probably came about because Kaito was worried during his blood-coughing session that Shuichi and Maki might have figured out something was wrong, so he deliberately tried to shut down any conversation of that nature that they might have been having by making an awkward comment like this as soon as he returned.

Shuichi:  “*Anyway*, what’s wrong, Kaito? Why did you leave all of a sudden?”

…Not that it was very successful, perhaps because of the very nature of the conversation Shuichi and Maki were actually having.

Shuichi:  “Continue? I… don’t recall you doing even one yet, Kaito.”

Heh, Shuichi is being so sassy about it. He’d… probably be less sassy if he was more aware of the reason why Kaito hasn’t even started yet.

Kaito:  “So, from the beginning! Of course, you guys are gonna restart with me!”

It’s so like Kaito to turn his own problems into an excuse to motivate his sidekicks to train even harder. Plus, this way it might not seem quite so obvious by the end that he’s done way fewer than them, at least if they don’t stop and think about it.

Kaito:  “Let your sweat wash away all your sadness, fear, worry and hardships. Just start moving your body and your pain will become memories before you know it.”

Oh, Kaito. He’s giving such good advice while being so wonderfully hypocritical about it at the same time. (Although, in fairness, he’s specifically talking about emotional pain, and at least some of his own pain is physical, which is only going to be made worse by moving his body.)

Maki:  “…Then you should train, too.”

Maki might have partially picked up on the fact that Kaito is in some amount of emotional pain, if she’s saying this.

Kaito:  “Well, I don’t have anything to worry about. Cuz, I mean… I’m Kaito Momota! Luminary of the Stars!”

But what is she talking about, Kaito is fine. The Luminary of the Stars couldn’t possibly have any worries, obviously. If he did, then he wouldn’t be able to be a very good luminary, right? So, precisely because he is the Luminary of the Stars, he must be fine. He has to be.

Shuichi:  “H-Hey! No fair, Kaito!”

Meanwhile, Shuichi is only finding it unfair that Kaito not having any worries means he supposedly gets out of having to do any sit-ups. He is not disputing the truth of what Kaito just said at all. Kaito apparently really does have Shuichi fooled, at least in terms of his emotional wellbeing, if not necessarily his physical health.

(But Maki is perhaps a little bit less fooled in the emotional department, in keeping with how last chapter made it clear that she didn’t see Kaito as particularly emotionally strong, not that that stopped him from making a difference to her.)

Shuichi:  (In the end, Kaito convinced us to do all of our sit-ups over… But Kaito and I had to give up, and only Maki was able to finish.)

Apparently Kaito did end up doing at least some sit-ups after all. Still, the final tally is: Maki did two hundred sit-ups, Shuichi did a decent amount over a hundred, and Kaito… didn’t even make it to one hundred. Yeah, he is not okay.

(Given that his symptoms include stomach pains, and that sit-ups exercise the stomach muscles… looks like Kaito’s plan to give himself an excuse to look up at space while not exercising backfired on him. Whoops.)

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[Next post]

[taeminsphltrum]

Act of Kindness | 06 |

01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 07

Yoo Kihyun | Fake Relationship!AU | Fluff | Smut

Since day one, boundaries and personal space were never really part of the picture.

[this is fluffy and smutty as hell. enjoy :))]

Kihyun looks just as puzzled as you feel when he walks outside—now dressed in light jeans and a white tee with no make-up—looking both ways before his eyes land on your form leaning against the wall.

“Why are you out here alone, baby girl?” he frowns as he walks in front of you. “What’s wrong?”

“I just needed to clear my mind,” you reply. 

There’s already a tight feeling in your throat at the fact you’re about to open yourself to him and put everything on the table with no way to take anything back. But Hoseok’s words repeat in your mind and give you this little sliver of hope that you’re going to hold onto until the last second.

“Talk to me?” Kihyun asks, lifting a hand to cup your face. You’ve never flinched at or dodged his touches, so it worries you why your body’s reaction to seeing his soft hand reach up to your face is to lean your head the opposite way. His brows furrow, hand falling limply to his side and the hurt and confusion in his eyes makes you feel like you just kicked a puppy right in the face. “____…”

God, you feel like such a shitty person for bringing his mood down and making him worry about you on the night of his showcase. He was just smiling and laughing minutes ago and now the down curve of his lips is like a punch in your face.

“Why… what happened this week?” you hesitate to ask, trying your hardest to maintain eye contact.

The wrinkles between his brows deepen.

“What do you mean?”

“You disappeared for a week then called me like it was nothing. Maybe I sound like a whiny brat but you even texted me in the middle of learning choreography and other times you’ve been really busy,” you elaborate. You know the next thing you’re about to say has nothing to do with the situation but you really just don’t want to sound like a whiny brat that’s overlooking such a simple situation because of your feelings. Hoseok’s words have no meaning as your doubts start getting to you again. “Did you have another breakdown? You said you’d tell me—“

“No, no. That’s not the case,” Kihyun interrupts you, shaking his head wildly before sighing. “God, I was really hoping this conversation could be avoided a little longer.”

Now your eyebrows are scrunched together. Your heart drops to your stomach because you know this is when he’s going to tell you something that you don’t want to hear.

“Honestly, I was avoiding you.”

And there it is. 

His gushing about you stopped because he realized your feelings and he didn’t want to hurt your feelings by rejecting them. The conversation Hoseok overheard was going in the opposite direction of what he thought. Because this fake relationship has been starting to feel real Kihyun’s been avoiding you because that’s not what he wants. He wants you to remain as the therapist that helps him get recognition in the media that he can hug and cuddle with platonically because when his career started he didn’t have the time to have a girlfriend. He put distance between the two of you because you’re just so fucking obvious and he needed you to get a grip and realize what you guys have is fictional. He didn’t really want you to come tonight. His boss knew that if you showed your face at the showcase it would draw attention and have people talking about Monsta X. Kihyun’s too nice to tell you straight up that you need to get over yourself and that you’re here for business and shitty advice and nothing more—

“And I realized that was a dick move, so I apologize for that.” His voice is low and soft and somehow it makes you feel even worse.

Blinking back the tears of embarrassment and swallowing the thick lump in your throat, you ask, “Mind telling me why?” 

Your voice is surprisingly even and you shock yourself.

“I feel like shit for closing myself off from you after we were getting so close but I did it because I just needed some time to get my shit together,” he laughs bitterly with a shake of his head. “Not really an excuse, but yeah.”

Nodding, you clear your throat. “It’s not that big of a deal. I could’ve reached out but I didn’t, so…” you trail off, looking down at your shoes.

He breathes out a laugh.

“I already know you well enough to know you don’t text first unless something important comes up,” he tells you about yourself, your eyes widening in shock. “I went from texting you as often as possible to trying to avoid you at all costs because of some stupid mistake I almost made that night you came over.”

You swallow harshly.

You already suspected that night was what made him go ghost, but the fact that he’s really telling you this to your face is unexpected. 

At the mention of that night, your mind goes back to it, thinking about when you felt as if he was about to kiss you. But with all these self-doubts and bitterness swirling around in your head, you can’t help but think if you were just imagining it after all. What if you just wanted him to kiss you so you interpreted his actions completely wrong? Literally nothing makes sense when you’re upset and overthinking and it’s annoying you even more right now.

“Stupid mistake?” you whisper, too afraid your voice will crack.

As in possibly almost kissing you or inviting you over and getting your hopes up unintentionally?

If he means the latter option, you might just break down right then and there because of how harsh the reality of the situation would be. You’re not even a super emotional person, but if someone were to refer to inviting you to their place as a stupid mistake, how else are you supposed to react? 

If he’s referring to almost kissing you, it’ll still be harsh, but expected. The first interaction you had with him consisted of him telling you he hadn’t been in such close proximity with a female in a while, so that night at his place he could’ve just been so caught up in the moment with him being so exhausted and so close to you on the couch. No feelings nor ill intentions behind his actions. And if you’re being honest with yourself, after a week of saying the situation hasn’t bothered you, that definitely rubs you the wrong way. Such an act with no meaning behind it, and even though he stopped himself it was too obvious and now it’s been a week without speaking.

Kihyun’s eyes close as he takes a deep breath, his head tilting to the ground. 

“I…” he hesitates.  “I really wanted to kiss you that night and I was about to, but then I remembered what we are.” Heart beating out of your chest you almost choke at his confession, eyes lifting to look at him. Kihyun keeps his eyes closed and head down as he continues, “I tried to blame it on how tired I was the next day but if I’m being honest, I’ve been wanting to kiss you for a while now.”

Okay, your mind definitely didn’t consider that possibility and when the words come out of his mouth you can’t help but stare at him stupidly. He finally looks up at you, and when your mouth opens to say something (even though you have absolutely no sentence that you could put together with all those doubts and his confession circling around your brain) he’s speaking again.

“Let me finish before you say anything,” says, eyes widening before quickly adding, “please?”

You give him a dumb nod that matches your stare.

“We’re a business couple right?” he asks, voice only slightly above a whisper.

You blink at him. Yeah, you’ve been saying that to yourself but hearing the words come out of his mouth rubs you the wrong way.

“We go on dates for the public to see. But that night I invited you to my dorm because I genuinely enjoy your company,” Kihyun explains, pushing his bangs out of his eyes. And if you were to say the look in his eyes and his words don’t make your stomach flip, you’d be lying. “I don’t know much about you other than the basics and we haven’t known each other long… but I feel this attraction to you and I want to act on it.”

At this point, he’s back to looking down. You’re registering his words but you’re having a hard time letting them sink in, still trying to wrap your head around the word vomit that’s spewing from Kihyun’s mouth.

“I just don’t know if the feeling is mutual, hence why I didn’t bust such a bold move on you that night. I’m an affectionate person so I’m a hugger and cuddler when it comes to people I’ve known for a while but I just can’t stop myself from wanting to be close to you when I’m around you. It took me a whole week to come to terms with my feelings and this time apart has honestly been torture,” he admits with an exhausted laugh at the end. 

Kihyun takes another deep breath before shyly looking up at you, to find you still looking at him like an idiot.

“Is your silence your way of telling me it’s not a mutual feeling?”

His question has all those thoughts from earlier in the week that you claimed were irrational swooping back to your mind in less than a second it seems. You read his body language, words, and every other fucking sign he gave you correctly. You weren’t being illogical when you kept having what if thoughts. The questions of being anything more than a business thing all made sense and you don’t know if you want to laugh or cry at the realization because a whole week. It’s not even that long of a timeframe but at the same time, all of this extra time and doubt on Kihyun’s end could’ve been avoided if you were just honest with your feelings that you knew were building up for him. If you would’ve just texted him like your body wanted this could’ve been avoided. The two of you were in the same boat at one point when it came to the uncertainty of what the real terms of your friendship/relationship are.

“It is,” you confess, voice barely audible. 

The look of shock that washes over his features is endearing and you let your tense body relax with a quiet laugh, shoulders dropping comfortably with a nod of your head.

The door opens but you don’t hear the creak it makes, too focused on the smile that has replaced the frown that was on Kihyun’s face. 

“I really wasn’t expecting us to have this talk like th—“ 

Kihyun’s eyes get wide and his body jerks forward. He catches himself with his hands on the wall, his arms caging you in and his face so much closer. If this isn’t deja vu you don’t know what is.

His head snaps to the side and you follow his gaze, only to see blond hair and broad shoulders shaking with laughter, walking away from you two and down the alley towards the street.

“He always has to ruin the moment,” Kihyun curses under his breath with a puff of air. 

“If it weren’t for him this conversation wouldn’t have just taken place,” you say softly.

Hoseok gave you a little push and he’s doing the same for Kihyun.

Another puzzled look washes over his face but you don’t let him question what you mean, bringing your arms up to loosely wrap around his neck.

“You know, right now would be the perfect time to finally kiss me,” you sniff, speaking as if you were simply talking about the weather.

Kihyun’s lip twitches in his attempt not to smile, but he gives up and lets it take over half of his face. The mole above his lip and perfect teeth steal your attention once more.

Hands gently land on your sides. 

“Oh yeah?” he licks his lips while his eyes fall to your mouth.

You nod, rubbing your lips together.

“You sure?” 

“Mhm.”

“Positive?” he asks as he gets just the slightest bit closer.

“One-hundred percent.”

He leans in, mouth centimeters away from yours only to take a detour at the very last second and press a gentle kiss to your left cheek.

“Like this?”

“Not exactly,” you laugh out. “Here,” you bring a hand to the side of his face and barely push on it to bring him back in front of you.

“Oh. So like this,” he pecks your forehead.

You scrunch your nose and put your arm back around the junction between his neck and shoulders.

“For someone who said they’ve been wanting to kiss me for a while now you su—”

This is what you’ve been wanting since Kihyun not so smoothly pressed you up against the wall weeks ago. The soft, hesitant presses of his lips are what you were hoping for that night on his couch. The way your eyes shut slowly, lips puckering to meet his timid, chaste kisses, the way your heart slows down then skips a beat before finding a quicker rhythm than before is all worth the wait. How Kihyun’s confidence kicks in at you kissing him back, him parting his lips to kiss you properly and firmly is all worth the self-doubt. 

His grip on your waist tightens when you moan softly at the feeling of his tongue swiping across your bottom lip before he cradles your face in his hands. Kihyun takes a deep breath through his nose, tilting his head to deepen the kiss and nudging your tongue with his own.

“Ki,” you mumble against his lips, smiling when he hums but doesn’t stop kissing you. “We should leave,” you barely manage to say because a moan threatens to slip out when he steps even closer, a thigh finding its way in between both of yours. “Anyone could walk by and see us.”

“It’s dark and no one is going to come back here, baby girl.”

Teeth gently nibble at your lower lip, almost distracting you from trying to convince Kihyun to get off of you for a few minutes so you can continue this is in a more private setting.

“Baby,” you try, clenching your jaw to fight back a smile when the nibbling falters and he backs his head up to look at you with wide, blown out pupils. “We can go to my place. Krystal won’t be home for a couple days.”

◅ ▻

“Are we—”

You don’t let him finish his sentence, cutting him off with your lips pressed to his.

When you were driving he couldn’t seem to get his hands off of you. Touching your thigh, interlacing his fingers with your free hand. The bulge in his pants easy to spot in his light washed jeans, even in the dim lighting of the night, and easy to feel when he teasingly brushed up behind you like there wasn’t enough space between your body and his bed while you two were picking up a pair of clothes from his dorm. The few members that were at the dorm watched as you guys walked from the front door to his room, then back to the front door with a bag hanging from Kihyun’s shoulder, knowing smirks and eyes squinted in amusement. It was embarrassing because not only is picking up clothes obvious as fuck, Kihyun decided to walk close behind you to not-so-discreetly hide the result of making out.

But now that it’s just you and him in your room with no worries of getting caught or listening ears, the embarrassment is gone.

“We could,” you answer his unsaid question, walking backward until your bed stops you. “Seeing you dance has me curious,” you say lightly, trailing your lips to his cheek.

“About?”

His voice is lower than usual and it makes your stomach stir.

“How good you’ll fuck me.”

That sentence alone sets him off and he’s back to how he was in the alley, removing any space between your bodies as the two of you fall onto the bed. Kihyun settles in between your spread legs after reaching the middle of the bed, putting his weight on his knees and his forearms beside your head on your pillows.

His mouth is harsh and sloppy against yours, nothing but teeth, tongues, and spit. You claw at his sides, grabbing the cotton covering them to pull him down further onto you. 

This isn’t at all how you imagined the night turning out. Watch the performances, greet him afterward with compliments, then say your goodbyes to everyone after hanging around for a little bit. Come home, take a bath and watching tv until you passed out. That’s how you envisioned the night. Not Kihyun slowly grinding on you, making your body heat up and everything blurry with his hungry kisses.

“So you enjoyed the show?” his breath tickles your ears, a shiver running up your spine at him mouthing at your earlobe. 

“Ye—yes,”  you barely get out, Kihyun mouth latching onto the skin at the juncture between your neck and shoulder. The breathless moan has his hips rolling down into yours harder, mouth sucking harder. “God, yes.”

Sneaking your fingers down to the hem of his shirt, you crawl them under the fabric. The uneven skin covering his abs feels so smooth under your light fingertips and you feel the way his stomach clenches at your soft touch.

“I didn’t know you sang that well,” you praise him, stretching your neck to the opposite side of where his lips are trailing up. You feel the leftover stickiness of whatever his makeup artist put on his lips but it doesn’t bother you one bit.

He laughs softly, breathily. “I told you to watch the show.” A hand moves to slide up your torso, stopping under one of your breasts to cup it. The action causes spillage, the top of your breast coming out of the low collar of your jumper. “Maybe you’ll start listening to me?” he questions, voice muffled due to the way his mouth engulfs the newly exposed skin. 

The retort on the tip of your tongue is delayed, replaced by a humming noise that squeaks towards the end because teeth teasingly nip at your chest. 

“If I never listened to you, would you be in my bed right now?” Your voice is weaker, softer than you wanted but it’s hard to care if he knows how much he’s affecting you right now when his tongue is drawing patterns over your clavicle. 

Another chuckle vibrates your chest but you don’t get a verbal response. Instead, his hand slides down from your chest to the button holding your jeans together. He doesn’t undo it, but lifts his head to look into your hooded eyes. 

“This is what you want, right?”

The concern in his blown brown eyes momentarily covers the desire swimming around them, and if you didn’t want him before you damn sure do now.

An arm dangling off of his shoulder and a hand raking through his perfectly styled updo, messing the locks up in the most perfect way, you nod, teeth worrying at your lower lip. The fingers in his hair slip down to gently grip the side of his face, his lips once again slanting over yours but this time softer. Soft nibbles on your top lip, his thumb and pointer finger work at the metal of your button and zipper. With a shimmy of your hips, you assist him in pulling your jeans to the middle of your thighs. Cold air hits the wet spot that’s formed in between your legs, but then Kihyun’s warm fingers replace the breeze, two digits sliding up and down your slit, making you shiver for another reason.

Putting more pressure behind his strokes, his fingertips sink into your folds and find your clit. The moan that bubbles up your throat is muffled by his tongue carefully exploring your mouth.

In a blur more pieces of clothes are tugged at, your hands gripping the hem of his shirt and lifting it off of his upper body quickly. Yours is soon thrown onto the floor, fingertips gingerly gliding over the curve of your breasts with his lips trailing opened mouthed kisses down the center of your chest, going lower until he reaches the waistband of your panties. Slowly climbing backward and off of the bed, Kihyun pulls them down and off. He quickly disregards his jeans and boxers in one tug downward. There’s barely a chance to get a glimpse of what’s below his waist because he’s turning and squatting down, rummaging through his overnight bag so you get a view of his backside. His spine is noticeable in his hunched over position, smooth, creamy-like skin unblemished and calling out for your fingers to caress. 

Snapping out of your trance you reach behind you to pull apart the clasps holding your bra together. Kihyun stands up and turns right as you toss it to the side. The fingers holding onto a squared foil packet clench when he looks at you, laid out completely naked and waiting for him. You’re ogling again, but this time your eyes are taking in the way his chest rises and falls down to his half hard erection.

With a hand reached out towards him you beckon him back onto the bed, him interlacing your fingers together when he has crawled back in between your legs. 

Condom placed to the side, Kihyun coats his fingers in your juice before sliding his middle finger inside of you. 

“Fuck,” he bends his neck forward to see the way his finger disappears then comes out soaked. He adds his ring finger and the stretch coaxes a whimper from you, his eyes snapping up to your face. He spreads his digits apart and your chest starts to slightly heave, the quiet noises coming from your mouth barely audible compared to the slick sounds coming from your cunt. “You ready, beautiful?“ 

Swallowing back another moan you nod, knowing your voice will crack if you verbally answer him.

His wet —drenched— fingers wrap around his cock but you sit up slightly to lightly swat it away, replacing it with your own hand. 

"Open it,” you nod at the condom beside you, keeping yours eyes on the way your fingers look wrapped around his dick. He feels thick and heavy and warm hardening in your palm and the thought of him being inside of you soon makes your mouth water, makes your hand move a little faster. 

Kihyun’s breath stutters and when you take a glance up you see the way he bites the inside of his lips. He fumbles with the packet a little so you go back to your initial pace and weaken your hold just the slightest bit. Once the condom is out he hands it to you with a lick of his lips. Pinching the tip of it, you slide it on. Your heart is beating a mile a minute, anticipation and excitement is running through your veins because this is really happening. 

“Lay back for me,” You’ll listen to anything he demands of you with that husky voice. 

He crawls back on his knees to give you room to slump down until your back is flat on the bed, knees bent. The pace he pushes into you is so agonizingly slow but every inch is delicious and has you gasping for air. The stretch is welcomed and feels so good you grab onto his tense biceps on either side of your head.

“Holy shit,” is groaned into your ear once he’s fully sheathed. 

Holy shit indeed. Your fingers and the head you got from Krystal’s friend (Taeyong? Taehyun? Taeyoon?) months ago don’t compare to how good Kihyun feels inside of you. And when he pulls his hips back to start a steady pace you can’t hold back your moans because he feels incredible dragging against yours walls, whimpers becoming hiccuped when there’s a little more force behind his motions. 

He lifts your leg over his hip and keeps his hand on your thigh, sitting up straight on his knees. His other hand runs up your tense stomach and grabs at a bouncing mound, almost using it for leverage when his dick slams into your pussy at a faster rate. 

You choke on whatever noise was about to come out and keen, pushing your chest further into his palm and trying your hardest to meet his thrusts with a roll of your hips. The coil in your lower belly is threatening to snap already, heat rising and slowly making its way down to your core. 

Earlier you realized how beautiful Kihyun’s voice is on stage but nothing compares to the sweet moans he couldn’t bite back, the groans that couldn’t stay within. 

And when nothing but curses start to tumble out of your mouth he understands, letting go of your boob to snake his thumb to your clit and work firm circles on it. You can’t keep your eyes open any longer, the pleasure too intense and causing them to roll back. Your hands feel around your comforter for something to grab onto and your face twists up into a look of pure satisfaction. 

His hot gaze on you is hard to miss even when your eyes aren’t open. His groaning grows in volume and bubble out of his throat more often than in the beginning. 

“I'm— mm. I'm—fuck Kihyun,” you babble when your lower abdomen continuously clenches. Chest heaving and grip on your duvet tightening you find the strength to crack your eyes open. Kihyun’s attention is on his thumb drawing shapes into your bundle of nerves, but when he feels you looking at him it diverts to you. His brows are furrowed in concentration and his teeth are nibbling away at his lower lip. There’s a scrunch of his nose and everything about him just sends you over the edge, the coil finally snapping and the pleasant burning inside of you spreading down to your legs. Nothing but his name is understood from the mess of words that leave your lips, back arching and eyes squeezing shut as your walls clench and unclench around his cock repeatedly. 

You can hear your pussy getting wetter and wetter, his thrusts only getting faster. Compliments of how tight you are, how good you feel around him are growled and your body is curling into itself at the now sloppy thrusts, him chasing his own orgasm. 

His final thrust is sharp, going so deep into you you almost see stars, body scooting up your mattress a little. His final moan is music to your ears and it repeats in your mind, even as he pulls out, takes the condom off, ties it and tosses it in the trash can beside your nightstand. Even when he’s slumped over you with the side of his face pressed into your right boob, sandwiching you between his slightly sweaty body and the bed. 

Your hands somehow find his raven locks, combing through them and watching the way the strands slip through your fingers. 

The relaxing atmosphere after coming down from your highs is ruined when Kihyun clears his throat. “I’m starving." 

Your hands stop their movements and you get a double chin looking down at him. "When’s the last time you ate?" 

"Like, this morning?" 

You roll your eyes. This isn’t the first time he’s gone a few hours too many without eating. 

"There’s food in the kitchen, feel free to eat whatever you want." 

Fingertips gingerly skate along your stomach. 

"You’re not gonna eat with me?" 

You snort. "Only if you bring the food in here because something tells me I won’t be walking straight if I tried right now." 

"I guess you got your answer to how good I’ll fuck you." 

Choking on your spit you lightly tap your knuckles on the top of his head. God, you really said that didn’t you? 

He retaliates with a nip to the side of your chest he hasn’t gotten comfortable on, then pushes himself up with his arms. With one last kiss to your lips and a mumble from you telling him you’re not hungry his body warmth leaves and he’s slipping his briefs back on. 

"Hurry back. I wanna cuddle,” you say cutely. 

And when he’s gone you slip out of the bed, a little wobbly at first as you make your way into the bathroom. This isn’t the bath you were looking forward to but the spray of the shower is just as welcomed and relaxing enough. 

You’re lazily putting lotion on your legs when he comes back, in a silky night gown. 

There’s a smirk playing on his lips and his steps slow until he’s standing at the foot of your bed, hand on his hip. “Are you trying to get me hard again?" 

"Shut up and take a shower. There’s towels in there for you,” you roll your eyes, nodding in the general direction of the bathroom. 

The sound of the shower starting up again brings a big sigh from your chest. All of this is just too good to be true, but at the same time you’d never question the look of pure sincerity that Kihyun gave you after you confessed you felt the same way he did. The look of raw adoration that his face showed as he saw you laid out for him. There was lust swirling around his irises but there was so much more and that let you know he wasn’t just saying those things just to fuck you.

On the way to turn the lights off, you place the bottle of lotion back on your dresser. Back on the bed you switch on the lamp on your nightstand before crawling under the blankets and tucking them under your chin, facing the bathroom door.

Your eyes grow heavy by the time he steps through it, towel around his hips and another hanging from his head. He throws a smile in your direction and you just scrunch your nose a little in acknowledgment, continuing to watch him as he pulls bottles out of his bag and put them on your dresser. You watch as he does his whole skin routine, combs his hair out and slips boxers and sweatpants on.

“Do you enjoy staring at me?” he chuckles, crawling behind you. 

“You literally make a living out of people staring at you,” you counter flatly. You turn to face him and he welcomes you with an arm in the air, silently giving you the green light to scoot as close as possible. The tone of your voice doesn’t match the smile that begins to stretch your lips as his arm falls down around your waist gently. 

It’s quiet for a while and your breath is just starting to even out, eyelids just a fraction from closing all the way. Kihyun’s guided your face into the crook of his and the up and down motion of your hand on his torso slows to a stop. 

“Do your legs really hurt?" 

The question is soft and hesitant and it takes a few seconds longer than it usually would for you to make sense of his words, but when you do, you chuckle. And when his hand dips down and fingers start kneading at your thigh you laugh louder, apologizing when he winces because of the proximity of your mouth to his ear.

The bearable pain you feel is actually on the insides of your thighs, and though he’s not even touching where you feel the burn, you just let him do his thing.

A/N: okay so this is the longest chapter yet and will be the longest. the way i wrote it might seem like this is the finale but nah, the next one is ;) 

[scurvgirl]

Kith and Clan

Ash, Ebasit Kata

Sylmae, Nimronyn, Melarue belong to @justanartsysideblog

Uthvir belongs to @feynites 

Warning for blood mention and some suicidal thoughts. 

She remembers Mama’s kith. Shokrakar was her first second parent in a way. Her smile had holes in it, and her hair was often times knotted and dry, but she was kind. A boisterous woman who was truly Vashoth. She understood Ash’s weird non-connection to the Qun, the curiosity she always felt about it.

Was it that bad?

She never really found out. By the time she was in charge of things, the Qun had fallen – crushed by their fear of magic and in-fighting. The Vashoth were the first to fall, though. Outnumbered, hated, and feared by all. Only select individuals survived.

Mama’s kith was not one of the lucky ones.

Shokrakar died escorting Mama and herself through a dangerous mountain pass that had been overrun by demons. She sacrificed herself so Mama could get to Fen’Harel, but as it turns out, he wasn’t even where they were led to believe he was.

A kith, Mama said, was a group of people you fought with, but also with whom you broke bread with. Survival depends on your kith, and bonds are sown deep. Aili always said that the Vashoth kith was the closest thing to a clan outside of the Dalish she had seen. Not quite the same, but close.

Nimronyn and Sylmae have a clan. It’s not too unlike the kith, but there is no mercenary work. Vashoth have – had a tendency to be exceptionally temperamental people. But as fast their tempers heated, they cooled. Fights were quick, dirty things, but done within minutes. She hasn’t seen if these ancient elves are the same, but she suspects they are different. There is something much more…stable and familial about them all.

Nimronyn the dragon-elf lingers around Ash while Sylmae goes out in search for something for Ash to drink. Kiths often operated as mercenaries, but they sometimes worked out of small settlements. There were children like her running about the skirts of former Tamassrans who assumed a new similar role. But they were all free and they were very proud of that fact.

Vashoth. To the non-vashoth, it meant “grey” but to them it meant “free”. Tal-Vashoth did not mean rebel but “those who sought choice.” But Mama had wanted some sedition in her leaving the qun.

Do you know what your name means, Ashokara? One of the former Tamassrans had asked.

What?

It means “seeker of rebellion”, of choice.

Rebellion is what those in power call people not in power choosing something that they did not want to be chosen.

‘Ash’ for seek. ‘Shok’ for struggle. ‘Kara’ is a variation of kata, a clever one at that, and it means end. When placed with ‘shok’, ‘kata’ shifts in meaning. It can be interpreted as an end to struggle, but it can be inferred that you are wanting liberation. An end to struggle, and end to ‘shok’ as the Qun demands.

Qunari and the Tal-Vashoth subsequently were never big on being too literal when it came to language. And while her name was selected with careful consideration, Mama had chosen something that means nothing.

So she could forge her own meaning in this new world.

Nimronyn hums and takes a curl between her fingers, gently stretching it until she lets go. It bounces back into place and she smiles.

“You are a very cute baby.”

Her traitorous baby hands reach up at Nimronyn’s hands which for some reason seem exceptionally interesting. She wonders what would happen if she stuck them in her mouth.

Baby thoughts. Odd, disconcerting baby thoughts and urges.

“What are we going to call you?” She muses softly. Ash blinks up at her. She doubts they will come across her actual name, it’s not really close to Elven or their naming conventions. Ash means ‘her’ as far as she knows and she doubts that either of them would be willing to call her that.

Her. As in that baby, Her. Or maybe a deity, Her. It sounds a little funny.

Ash wiggles on her little mound of furs. Her feet lift into the air and on a whim she reaches up and grabs them. Nim chuckles again.

“You’re going to have some pretty impressive horns when you’re big, aren’t you?” She coos, stroking a finer over Ash’s horn buds.

She has no idea.

The door to the aravel opens again and Sylmae steps in. She looks even larger than when Ash had first seen her. She seems even bigger than Mama, but it may because Ash is much smaller and everything seems giant.

There is a bottle in Sylmae’s hand, filled with white liquid. So…is this halla milk? Ash was expecting a nursing mother to be brought in, not…a bottle.

Sylmae sits down and Nimronyn picks Ash back up. It’s still odd. She’s too big to be picked up! Sure, there was that one time with Uthvir when she had finally gotten taller than them. She was nine and had bounded over with her amazing accomplishment – already a few inches taller than them. They had smiled then picked her up, completely startling her.

They picked her up again when she was sixteen, tossing her behind them.

Run, do not stop. Do not look back.

Her heart clenches and a cry leaves her. Her little body shakes with her sobs. Nimronyn holds her close and murmurs sweet nothings to reassure her while Sylmae speculates that maybe Ash is too hungry.

No, that’s not it. She’s hungry, yes, but it barely registers.

By the time she manages to stop squalling, the bottle has gone cold. Sylmae sighs, but she wraps her hands around the bottle and Ash can feel the magical heat seeping into it. Her nose catches the scent of the bottle and…it smells good. Not in a mouthwatering kind of way, but in an almost comforting way. It makes her belly ache and she reaches for it.

Nimronyn takes the bottle from Sylmae and there is some finagling to get it to work, but once they have it positioned it’s not so bad. Fat tears eek out of her eyes but the women stay with her, they don’t demand she stop crying. They’re just concerned.

It…helps.  

The milk is warm and it settles her stomach. Slowly but surely her mood feels more stable, even if it edges closer to a long persisting numbness than something content. When the bottle is empty, it’s taken away and she is moved to Sylmae’s shoulder for a change.

Burping is unpleasant.

…

Very unpleasant.

Sylmae sighs but takes both of them out to a large wooden tub attached to the back of the aravel. It is full of water. Cold, most likely. But then Sylmae waves her hand over the water and a rune flares to life at the bottom.

“Not too hot, vhenan, we don’t want to hurt her,” Nimronyn calls.

“Of course.”

No please, make it hot! The heat is comforting. There is a time of exchanging Ash between the two before both Sylmae and Nimronyn are naked and all of them step into the tub. They set to acclimating her body to the water.

They settle in with Ash leaning against Sylmae. She is broad and strong, and her hands feel almost like Mama’s. Her long white hair drifts in the water. Ash could pretend that it is Mama, that she’s just a normal baby and it’s her real mother holding her and bathing her, but it’s not right. These hands are red, this world is not hers and these are not her people.

But they are people. She…she needs to remember that.

They are also kind, merciful. They comment on how her hair is like someone else’s in the clan, and they wash it with care. Nimronyn takes care to rub in balms onto Ash’s horns, forehead, and a particularly bony ridge by her temple. Sylmae floats up little lights to distract Ash with varying degrees of success. She flinches away from the green ones, which are entirely too reminiscent of the Breach. But the blue and purple lights are beautiful and sparkly and they make her reflexively giggle.

She wants to touch them! She reaches forward and grabs ahold of a blue spark to see it slip out of her palm into a dozen tiny fragments. Giggles erupt from her and she splashes at the water unintentionally. It’s…difficult to control but she feels exhaustion of the day seeping into her enough that she doesn’t really mind.

They remove her from the bath and Nim cradles her close to her chest, exuding warmth. Ash is distantly aware of being passed to Sylmae and then wrapped up with the furs.

Her dreams are chaotic. Filled with fire and death while Sol – Fen’Harel’s face stares at her as he pulls her spear into his abdomen. He bleeds away into ash only for the dream to shift to a small Orlesian village, painted in bright colors. They bleed in the Fade in an almost blurry quality.

And in the center of the village is her mother.

The sky darkens and the fountains spill blood over their sides.

I love you Ashokara, I live through –

Her words echo in the Fade, bearing into her skull.

No, no, no, no, no!

Living through it once was bad enough, dreaming about it so frequently is torture. She can’t, she can’t –

Ashokara wakes with a piercing wail. Confusion, sorrow, anguish, and fear all bubble up from her in a cloud around her. Why? Why are emotions in cloud form here? It doesn’t make any sense. It-it-it –

Why is she here? Why is she alive? She should have died, she wanted to die. It was the end of the world and she was going to get to see her mother again –

Large, warm hands pick her body up from the furs and she is brought into a snug embrace. Her mind feels too big for her body and she sees the eyes of those she failed, who died for her. The Andrastians always thanked Andraste dying for them but dammit, it is no gift to have someone sacrifice their life for you.

It’s just guilt. And sorrow.

She sobs, inconsolable. She evades death even when she throws herself head first at it, and it’s monstrously unfair. Her mother and her nanae are united again in her world – souls entwined and dead. Uthvir and Aili. Iron Bull and Dorian. Maryden and Krem. Dead souls get rest, but she just gets to remember in horrifying detail of how they died.

Her mother’s face blooms in her mind, blue eyes laced with silver, full lips spread into a loving smile, round nose, and wide cheekbones. Blood streams down over her head, staining her hair. Rain comes down, soaking her through, drenching Nanae who holds her body, hunched over and so still, Ash fears they have died too.

There is a voice in the real world, the world outside of her head, saying something. Hands impossibly large hold and caress her and there is an almost panic to it.

Will Ash calm down? Will she be all right? What happened to her?

The world died. And she couldn’t die with it. What purpose does this serve? Is there a purpose? What is she doing? What can she do? Nothing like this, she screams because it is the only control she has over the environment around her. Everything is too bright and good, but not nearly good enough. It’s not right, it will never be right.

Even if the person holding them has warm skin and a broad chest. Their hair smells like flowers and the woods. She can feel a heartbeat. Ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-dum, ba-dum. She tries to focus on it. This is the real world, not the world of dreams and world’s past.

This…this is her life now.

It takes her a while to calm down into just small sniffles. Her throat hurts and she feels guilty for waking everyone up. It is Sylmae holding her, arms wrapped securely around her to prevent too much movement. It’s alright, by now Ash feels limp, exhausted but unwilling to return to her dreams.

“I’ve got you, little one, shhh, shhh, shhh,” she coos, rocking back and forth. Ash wishes she could tell her that she can stop, but her mouth is tiny and it just makes an “aaa” noise. When she moves her head, she finds that she has soaked Sylmae’s shoulder with tears. A flicker of guilt trails out of her and Sylmae coos.

“You’ve been through a lot, haven’t you? It’s alright, it’s good to cry sometimes.”

Mama said stuff like that. Crying let you get the emotions out, and that’s important. The similarity isn’t an upsetting one, more calming. Her mother’s words and intentions but…external to her.

Sylmae takes Ash to her bed, and they curl up together. She’s still tired but trying to keep herself awake. Sylmae helps by keeping her close and telling her story. It’s a funny little story about a little dragon who couldn’t find his fire, so he went on an adventure to find it. He met a little girl and they became best friends. He found his fire at the end. It’s a nice story, not unlike stories she’s used to.

She wonders where Nimronyn is. Is she outside in her dragon form? Is that her preferred form?

Sylmae continues to rub her back and comfort her, even though she’s not even sniffling anymore. And despite her best efforts, Ash slips back into sleep. It’s uneasy, but she only dreams of the sky. Blue to green to black to red.

When she wakes, it’s on Sylmae’s chest. There is a small plate of food in Ash’s food – picked over by presumably the woman holding her. The aravel shakes unexpectedly, and she fusses in response.

“Sh, sh, it’s just Nimronyn. She had to patrol last night, she’s simply returning,” Sylmae explains. Alright, that makes sense, her little baby body needs to calm down. Recognize the logic, baby body. Please.

Moments later and Nimronyn is climbing into the bed. She runs a hand in greeting over Ash’s forehead.

“Good morning, little one. I’ve been thinking on what we should call her,” she begins.

“And what were you thinking, my heart?” Sylmae asks.

“Enasalasyl,” because that rolls off the tongue, Ash thinks.

“Gift from the sky? Did you not find her in a meadow?”

“Yes, but it was after the sky opened up in a great flash of light, then she appeared,” Nimronyn explains.

“Don’t you think her name should describe her personality more than how we came across her?”

Ash tries to make a happy noise at the quick sound of ‘ash’ but they don’t seem to notice the significance.

“See? She agrees with me,” Sylmae says. Not quite.

“We don’t know that much about her yet,” Nimronyn laments.

“She…cries a lot.”

“We are not naming her Numin,” Nimronyn scowls and Ash waves a hand at her. This one she agrees with. Cry? No, not her.

“She likes the lights,” Sylmae comments. Nimronyn considers for a moment.

“Ghilan’ras,” she coos and while it’s…cheesy, it’s not too bad, Ash thinks. It could do while she can’t tell them her real name.

“Alright, but we call her Ras for short,” Sylmae says. Ash makes a burbling noise and Nimronyn smiles.

“Perfect, little Ras it is. I will go get her bottle!” She bounds back out the door and Sylmae sighs.

“I thought she already had it, I’m sorry, Ras,” Sylmae says. Ash blinks up at her.

Nimronyn comes back a moment later with more mystery milk and Ash makes quick work of it. They burp her again much to her dismay, but it helps settle her stomach at least. After that, she is clothed in remarkably soft baby clothes that hum with an enchantment. Ash doesn’t know what it does, but it’s probably related to baby care in some fashion.

Nimronyn is the one to carry her out to the camp. Sunlight streams down and plays off the aravels. Colors seem saturated here, and magic pools in some areas. She wonders if these people notice it or if her magic deprived world has made her sensitive to all magical gathering.

It’s like humidity. The magic sticks to her skin just that tad more, seeping into her, over-watering her. She’s a cactus in a rain forest.

Despite the magic, she finds the camp to be familiar. The people are different, of course, but the way everyone is moving around inside the circle of the aravels, how they all look at each other. There is recognition there, understanding, and connection. It’s more familial than a kith, less boisterous, but just as close knit.

Eyes all colors of the rainbow look at Ash, curious. She blinks at them and clings to Nimronyn. She’s the only anchor Ash has at the moment, and there is so much in this world. Colors and magic and new people. Several of the elves are tall, like Vashoth and Qunari tall. No horns sprout from their heads, but they certainly don’t look quite like the elves she remembers. Even Fen’Harel had seemed more familiar than some of the faces she sees her.

Is this Elvhenan?

She doubts it, strangely enough. This is a clan, hardly part of an empire. There is a gentle pace to life with these folks, and no grand structures like she had explored, like Fen’Harel had spoken of.

This is better, she thinks. Sweeter. Easier to adjust to.

Nimronyn strides to the center of the clearing and props Ash up in her arms. Everyone gathers around them, peering at Nimronyn and some at Ash. In the crowd is a small boy who stares at Ash very intently. She stares back, then promptly sneezes.

Someone aws.

The boy’s shoulders shake, but his mouth does not open in laughter, even while his eyes crinkle in mirth. Odd little boy.

“There have been no reports of Keepers falling in the area, nor any reports of fallen People. In this light, this child has now fallen to me and Sylmae.”

Murmurs echo through the crowd.

“This is Ghilan’ras, or just Ras. Our daughter,” Nimronyn declares. The people clap and the boy smiles. Ash wiggles and her baby brow magically furrows! She didn’t know she could do that yet!

Our daughter.

She….

They are nice people. Kind and good. But these mothers are not her mama, even as they hold her, coo at her, and love her.

But she can consider them kith and clan, she thinks.

Couple of things - the story I referenced about the dragon is an actual children’s book! It’s called Ignis. 

Ghilan’ras means “Guiding light” - it is NOT to compete or coincide with Ghilan’nain, 

[trainerjelly]

Okay, so some character rambling/headcanons about my team!

Put under the cut because I decided to give you all of their life stories... (Tbh I expected that, even if I meant to summarize a bit more.)

JELLY as my trainer is this weird mix of a basic self-insert so I can play the game how I usually would + nuzlocke rules and a distinct character that interacts with other characters and fits into the narrative.  She’s probably the least fleshed out because of that and is hard to write about without going “me but not.”

I’m also surprised by how giving Gary/Blue a custom name differentiated his character for me from the canon.  I haven’t spent a ton of time thinking about REESE in general (and nuzlocke-wise we’ve only had the first rival battle and the optional route 22 one), but I’m definitely looking forward to thinking about him and his journey more.  (And his team, that will be fun.)

Now onto the long parts, the pokemon:

PEPPER is pretty “standard” as far as charmander go; she comes from breeding stock for scientific study/professors to hand out for new trainers.  She’s a bit on the larger end of average (measure as length from nose to tail - and she has a surprisingly long tail) and is several shades darker, with a distinctly warm/red orange color.  (She was named after orange varieties of bell peppers because of that color.)

Her “stock” of charmander have been bred to be easier to handle at the cost of being less powerful than wilds (though more likely to evolve because trainers) and from the moment she found this out its been one of the major driving forces of her personality.  She wants to prove that assumption wrong by becoming the very best, like no one ever was personally powerful and great at battling.  She’s both extremely impatient and extremely perfectionistic - she wants to be the best at things right now, no it doesn’t matter that it takes hard work she should be able to do it right the first time!  Her intensity strained most of her relationships with her nestmates (young charmander are raised in large communities), along with her belief that she had to compete with all of them.  Thankfully as a starter-bred pokemon she was basically guaranteed a trainer, but she was extremely anxious about being paired with a poor one, and was therefore wary of JELLY for a while.

Their first battle together was extremely tense and close (the fact that it was against a squirtle of all pokemon didn’t help) but they pulled through and PEPPER’s confidence in both herself and her new trainer shot up immediately.  She has relaxed somewhat since they started on their journey together and let more of personality show through (but she’s definitely the Drill Sergeant of the group).  She’s pretty talkative and comfortable in a variety of social situations (which greatly helps JELLY because That Social Anxiety TM) and has been surprisingly accepting of new pokemon as they get added to the team.  She’s very creative and jumps at the chance to strategize interesting battle schemes that balance out everyone’s strengths and weaknesses.

CHEDDAR (also regularly called “CHED”) was the first addition to the team, a small runt of a field rattata, which are already smaller than both the city and pet variants.  (They also have longer/bushier fur in general.)  He suffers from Chihuahua-syndrome for sure, thinking he is a lot bigger and stronger than he actually is.  He has a very large family that lives in the grassy fields outside Pallet and has regularly had to fight for notice and respect alongside survival challenges of food and shelter and not getting eaten.

PEPPER and JELLY impressed him when they battled (and thankfully for his relationship with PEPPER, he hasn’t challenged her since then), but he was extremely unsure about joining their team.  He never thought he would be a trainer’s pokemon, and he’s not sure how far away from home he wants to travel.  He did join them despite those reservations, but he’s looking forward to bragging about his and the team’s accomplishments when he can return home.

CHED is also a rather dedicated troublemaker and prankster.  He’s good for a quick laugh and can almost always cheer someone up when they’re down, but he also has an uncanny knack for figuring out what bothers someone the most and can use that against them.  Unfortunately he’s is still figuring out what the line is between those things, and some of his jokes or tricks can come off as unintentionally mean-spirited.  If you can’t hear him joking or complaining or lecturing about how much better he is than someone else, he’s probably up to something and you need to go find him.

PEAR is a big ol’ prickly sweetheart.  He’s older than the rest of the team and quickly fell comfortably into the position of “team dad.”  I’m still figuring out my interpretations of the nido- lines, although PEAR specifically is larger (and rounder) than the average/pokedex standard, and might come across as intimidating if it weren’t for his adorable lop-ears.  (They can still stiffen/move with surprising coordination, but at rest hang down similar to a rabbit’s.)

He hit it off with the team in their very first battle, impressed by PEPPER’s skill and unique strategy even at her early level, and he has become the loudest and most encouraging voice of the team since.  He’s of the opinion that if you don’t have something nice to say (or at the very least a nice way to say it), you shouldn’t say anything at all, and he’s generally the one to chastise CHED when he goes too far.  (He’s also the one who originally shortened “CHEDDAR” to “CHED and it immediately stuck.  He tends to shorten the names of other team members as well, but none of those have been so unanimously accepted and used.)

PEAR is pretty ambivalent about JELLY’s and the team’s ambitions, and when pressed swears that he doesn’t really have any of his own.  He was content to live out his life however that happened, veering very close to the point of apathy.  It remains to be seen why he feels this way (if there is a reason), and what effect traveling with the team will have on him.  (He definitely needs more overall fleshing out, but part of that is because I know about as much about him as the rest of the team does, hm.)

HONEY is a small buzzing spitfire of a beedrill, with a mouth as sharp as xir stinger.  Xe jumped out at the team before they could even set foot in Viridian Forest and put up quite a fight before PEPPER bested her (and gave the team their first taste of the panic-inducing poison to come on their way to Pewter).  Despite the fact that early evolutions are the norm for weedle, xe takes much pride in the fact that xe was the first (and second!) evolutions on JELLY’s team.

Honestly, HONEY only pushes xirself to be stronger because xir attitude requires it; xe always has some smart remark or scathing critique at the ready, and a severe lack of tact to go along with it.  Xe is brash with xir actions as well, and would regularly leave the relative safety of the forest to explore farther and farther than any of xir fellow weedle would dare to go.  While xe hadn’t ever considered being a trainer’s pokemon, xe jumped at the chance when it came up - with the catch that JELLY must keep xir on the team for the long haul.  Bug types are not common in the higher tiers of battling, and HONEY wants to prove xe belongs there just as much as any other pokemon.

Xe gets along the best with CHED, becoming fast friends and even faster partners-in-crime.  A hell of an instigator, xe is responsible for encouraging numerous pranks after he started brainstorming and sharing his ideas with xir.

SAFFRON is by far the quietest member of the team, and is extremely soft-spoken when she speaks at all.  She is jumpy and skittish, and her encounter and subsequent battle with the team was a complete accident on her part (she heard someone coming through the forest and tried to jump over a fallen tree to hide... and misjudged its height).  She warmed up pretty quickly to JELLY, however, surprised but flattered by the trainer’s interest in her and awe of her electric attacks.

She’s still figuring out and settling into her place on the team, but hasn’t exactly relaxed around the rest of them just yet.  The fact that their first major battle together (BROCK) was one she couldn’t participate in, she worries that she doesn’t quite belong and might be better off staying in the forest.

(I also actually have a couple more pokemon but I’m not going to include them yet because I haven’t posted them up here or played at all with them yet.  My sp died and despite the fact that we moved two months ago we still haven’t unpacked the charger yet, whoops.)