#kay snippets

[kayzero]

For the ideas wanted post, I always find people's different interpretations of how Quark functions after different endings in VLR so so interesting, since they're a character i've analyzed so so much. so a Quark-centric writing of them after one of the endings in which they're alive and get out?

This takes place during/after Luna END.

Weeks and months and years ago, when Quark was little, littler than he is now, he would sometimes wake up without Grandpa. He would panic, he would cry, he would be convinced that this was it, Grandpa finally got tired of having a little kid around, he’s gone and never coming back. And always, without fail, Grandpa would come back, see his sorry state, and calm him down, explaining that he just had to get an early start on work, and Quark looked too comfortable to disturb.

He grew out of that phase when he started helping Grandpa out with scavenging in earnest. He started to understand why it was so important that he get up early, get to the good stuff before anyone else. The memories fell to the back of his mind, like baby teeth from his mouth.

When Quark wakes up after being sedated in Rhizome-9, he knows for a fact that Grandpa is dead.

The surety comes from the same place that screams for freedom, howls at being chained up in this flesh prison where he could die at any moment. The visions he’d been having in the first round of the AB Game with Dio and Grandpa crop back up. He could be sliced with a scalpel, buried under trash, killed by a cultist — and even if he could avoid all the ugly, violent deaths, he couldn’t avoid death by sickness or old age.

But the sedative still floating around in his system combined with the shock of his Grandpa’s death make him numb, and let him see the tantrum he threw objectively — and it was a tantrum, albeit one over his very life instead of some toy he wanted — but more than that, it reminded him of something he had seen on the streets with Grandpa.

The people who got infected with Radical-6. The Cultists and the Damned. They ranted about the state of the world being divine judgement, that humanity would shrivel up and die out eventually, that there was no point in struggling because they would do it to themselves.

The Cultists grew in fervor, shifted to talking about the world that would rise from the rubble that the world was covered in. The Damned all ended up dead by their own hands.

Quark had almost joined them.

Might still. Grandpa’s dead, what’s the point?

Quark put his hands on the ground and pushed himself so that he was sitting against the wall instead of laying on the hard metal floor.

“Oh good, you’re awake. I didn’t wanna have to struggle to get you into this suit.”

He tilts his head up and sees Miss Phi, dressed in a spacesuit but missing the helmet. Looks at her with dead eyes that were still too alive because his body is still moving while his soul is screaming that Grandpa is dead—

He tries to tune out the howling. “Why do you want me to get in the suit, Miss Phi?”

“There’s some sort of pressure difference between this room and the outside world, and the suit’s what we need to survive it.”

“But what about the AB Game?”

The flinty, cool look Miss Phi usually wears gives way to something close to what the people Grandpa used to talk to wear when they look at him. Kinda sad, kinda frustrated.

“You’ve been asleep for a while. The AB Game’s over. We won.”

He doesn’t feel like a winner. He doesn’t say that out loud.

Instead he goes, “So you want to leave?”

“Yeah, and I have to bring you with me because you’re too young to be on your—“ She stops herself with wide eyes and a hand that stops halfway up to cover her mouth, because—

Because Miss Phi knows. She knows Grandpa is dead, she thinks that Quark doesn’t know, she doesn’t want to tell him (right now? ever?). The howling starts snarling at her now, his mind starts whirling with mean things and bad words to say to her, things he said when the adults wouldn’t let him—

Well. He doesn’t feel like being mean, but he doesn’t feel like being nice either. He settles for polite and factual.

“You know there’s nothing out there, right?”

“What? What do you mean by that?”

He doesn’t have a bracelet on, and Grandpa’s already dead, so nothing stops him from saying, “We’re on the moon.”

“…What?”

“We’re in a research base on the moon. Grandpa told me before we got on the ship. But the pilot knocked us out, so it was probably a one-way trip.”

As he talks, Miss Phi backs up until her back hits the wall, slowly sliding down until she’s sitting on the floor like he is. She doesn’t move, except to wrap her arms around her shins and bury her face into the collar of the space suit.

They stay like that for a while.

[warmsol]

cleaning out my screenshot folder, don't mind me 🧹

[anoant-haikyuu-dump]

More Nekoma hcs

• One time after an intense match Kuroo makes the mistake of taking the whole team out for hot pot, his treat. Never again. His wallet is in SHAMBLES, especially after the menaces that are Inuoka, Tora, Fukunaga, and Yaku get their hands on the meat menu. At least Kai helped with the bill

• Yaku is secretly super sappy— he gets emotional when reminiscing about the past, he loves romance manga, he tears up at sad movies, etc etc. Kai and Kuroo know about it and love teasing him in private but would never expose his softer side to the rest of the team. He totally bawls at graduation though and no one's suprised (they all knew)

• Shibayama and Inuoka are little gossips, they're always whispering to each other and giggling behind their hands (kinda like Tsuki and Yamaguchi but less bitchy lmao). They're the types to have conversations entirely made of inside jokes so if you hear them in passing it sounds like incoherent gibberish

• Thinking about that panel of Fukunaga holding an entire bunch of bananas, I think he'd bring whole-ass watermelons to school and scoop them out with a spoon for lunch. At first Tora’s appalled by it— as he is with most things Fukunaga does— but eventually he joins in. You’ll often find them hunched over a melon in the courtyard shoveling away like maniacs and spitting seeds into the air. Kenma thinks its the most disgusting thing he’s ever seen

• While we're talking about manga panels look at Inuoka swinging his tie around in the bg. He never ties it right, it drives Shibayama insane so he fixes it for him.

• One thing I like about stage play Kai is that he kinda has a short fuse and is a bit more sarcastic. I think he deserves a good scream in the club room at least once a week (Kuroo and Yaku guard the door so he can do it in peace)

• The third years are kinda like the Date Tech Alums in that they just show up to random practice games and heckle the team from the stands. Yaku's screaming at Lev about his form, Kuroo's teasing Kenma and Tora, Kai made a bingo sheet.

• Fukunaga has the kind of ADHD where he picks up a new hobby every week. Sometimes he's in the club room crocheting, sometimes he's learning yo-yo tricks, folding intricate paper cranes, rubix cubes, cup stacking, card shuffling, juggling, you name it. His favorite will always be cooking though, he uses the team as a test audience for new recipies.

[s0ull3ss-p3rs0n]

The ninja are fighting against the Forbidden Five, and at one point, something happens that injures Rox fatally, and Nokt immediately runs up to her, trying to wake her up, but to no avail. The other ninja go towards Nokt, but Kai stops them, because for a brief moment, he saw what Nokt was like before shattering his soul. A brother who failed to protect his younger sister, fucked up the one thing he was supposed to do, now mourning the loss of the one he cared about the most.

He saw himself.

[kaymarie-bell]

Odysseus: Hermes, thank you!

Hermes: Don't thank me, friend, I'm not the one who fought for you

Odysseus:...then who?

Hermes:...ha ha, good luck!

WHEN I CATCH YOU MISTER JALAPEÑO-

[number1villainstan]

Overhaul's jacket puffs up with wounded pride. "Well, Shigaraki Tomura, I don't exactly fantasize about killing people--"

"I do," Shouta interrupts.

The room goes quiet--dozens of heroes and villains, gathered together in some tense, contrived conference whose host hasn't even made an appearance--and all eyes turn to Shouta. He dislikes the attention, but right now it serves his purposes.

"I," he says, "have fantasized about killing a lot of people, to tell the full truth. It's quite easy. And very tempting. You see, when you work undercover, and when you're actually committed to trying to make things better, you start to see all the weak points in the systems around you. You start to see who, exactly, is making it so that hundreds of men join gangs and don't leave, even if they want to--as just one example. And you start to think, if only I could hit those weak points, if only I could kill this person, this whole card tower would come crashing down, and I could save so many. And one day, maybe, you try it."

He sighs, and continues. "But it doesn't work like that. If you kill one person in that kind of position, another one just ends up taking their place. And it's tempting to kill them too, yes. But threats and violence are only effective in the short-term, and only on the superficial level, and besides, who are you to decide who deserves to live and die? Still, though, even if you know better, once those fantasies start, they're hard to stop. Sometimes they even extend past the villains to the heroes."

Shouta doesn't continue, because he has nothing more to say. The silence holds. He notices Nagant, especially, regarding him with something like wariness or perhaps respect. His students are all staring. He'll have to reassure them later. But for now, he's said his piece.

"...Jesus Christ," Endeavor pronounces, and somehow that sets all the rest of them off again.

[kaistinlove]

Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers! Spread the self-love 💞

ooooohhhh this looks so fun!! thank you for tagging me @becausebuckley 💖

Of Chocolate Parfaits and Cherry Pies (3.7k words | Teen & Up)

Or the one where Eddie Diaz is good at denying himself life's little indulgences. And mostly, he gets by fine. Perfectly fine, actually. But he can't seem to keep away from Buck.

I'll start off with my absolute favorite fic that I've written. I've written so much more since then but this will always hold a special place in my heart.

Homemade (They Don't Make 'em Like This No More) (5.8k words | Explicit)

Shame welled up inside of him and he snapped, "Stop that, okay? You don't have to - I'll just put it back on". He reached for his shirt that was chucked to the floor when Eddie grabbed his arm.

"Shit, Buck, no. Oh my god, I didn't mean to react that way. I'm so sorry, I really am," Eddie rushed through his words.

Buck opened his mouth to retort when Eddie brought his other hand up to subtly wipe at the edges of his lips. Huh.

I'll follow that up with my first ever written smut wholly inspired by Buck in aprons. The reason why I start writing although I kept it hidden for longer because of *waves hand abstractly*

Riding the High (6.7k words | Mature)

OR the amusement park Buddie meet cute

I loveee writing Chris in this because he absolutely would babytrap Buck with himself. It always Eddie babytrapping Buck or Buck babytrapping himself. So this was kinda a fun twist on that

been there, done that (once or twice) (21.5k words | Explicit)

OR the one where Buck wants to make a boudoir album and enlists Eddie's help as a photographer

I'm so proud of myself for finishing this because it's the most times I've questioned myself when writing. I didn't know if the words make sense or if readers could picture because this relies a lot of imagination and images. but apparently a lot of people like this and I'm like😭❤️

First Step Towards an Addiction (6.1k words | Explicit)

Eddie can never understand why Buck is adamant to stay with that one guy who makes him miserable. But he will keep being supportive — playing his role as a best friend, giving date advice, listening to him rant, occasionally fucking him. The last one is entirely the fault of Tommy. This is the start of how it came to be.

My Buckfidelity contribution hehe

I don't have anyone to tag yet but if you're seeing this, join with your own self-rec list!! ❤️❤️

[brandtsstuff10]

🔙 to February 2024.

Monte and Jule talking about going to visit Kai in London and also Bravertz playing together.

[pinkgrapefloyd]

wip word game

tagged by the amazing @zannolin! tysm!

Rules: you will be given a word. share one sentence/excerpt from your wip(s) that start with each letter of that word. my word was RUIN.

R (little excerpt from Ruin My Life (anti hero sequel). in this household, R is for Robby <3 have a little snippet of the miyagi fang gang playing never have i ever)

Robby crosses his arms. “I’m not, like, morally opposed to it. Just never happened. Didn’t know I was on trial here.” “You’re not,” Sam interjects. “Let’s move on.” “Hell no!” Demetri protests. “So you and Diaz never made out?” Miguel coughs into his drink next to Robby and honestly, Robby doesn’t blame him. This is just ridiculous.

U (from my spirk WIP. part of a little conversation between kirk and uhura which i really love)

Unfortunately, his mouth didn’t care much for his brain’s command orders. Mutinous bastard. “Dinner was great. So great, in fact, that I… um... tried to have the good old ‘what are we’ conversation with Spock.” Her face softened. She didn’t seem surprised by the monumental implications of such an announcement, and Jim couldn’t decide if he found that insulting or comforting.

I (garashir WIP my beloved... still in the very early stages but it's a ten course menu of miscommunication. fifty percent silly, fifty percent vulnerable. i cannot wait for you to read it)

It’s in his body, and it’s in the implication of his body, and in the air between them. I was trained to break people like you. Maybe it’s unwise to ask me to unearth the kindness I buried in the yard like a dead pet before you were even born. I’m not so sure what’s left of it now. I’m not sure you’d like looking at it.

N (another Ruin My Life snippet because I feel like most of you aren't here for Star Trek lmao. The worlds needs more Sam and Johnny scenes in my opinion!)

“No, I meant… singular they. Like when you…” Sam takes a deep breath. This day is already stressful enough without the prospect of explaining singular they to Johnny Lawrence. “It’s a girl.” Johnny frowns. “Why are you looking at me like that? I got a boyfriend, man. What do you think I’m gonna say, your father and I are super disappointed in you? You can have six girlfriends for all I care. Just don’t come home with that vegan shit.”

my word is STAR and I'm tagging @vimesbootstheory and @blinkasaurus and anyone else who sees this and is looking for a good excuse to share wip sneak peeks! :D

[multifandom-nerds-blog]

The first days (part 1)

After the portal closed, they walked. They didn't really know where, it's not like either Kai or Bonzle had a map for this dimension, but they kept walking. Kai just hoped they wouldn't randomly meet with on of the forbidden five, or four, since one of them swapped places with Kai after all. He didn't like to admit his own weakness, but if the storys about them were true, then there was no way for Kai to beat the four or even just one of them on his own. Especially when he would probably need to protect Bonzle in a fight as well.

"Do you have a plan?", Bonzle asked, pulling him out of his thoughts.

"Find a portal somehow, I guess. Or create a new one. Either way, we should check out how this place works. Aside from the random gravity rules."

Though, to call that a plan was probably to much. More like a general idea to get back to if the chance for it ever comes. Lloyd and the others would be able to deal with the one of the five that escaped, right? So they would be fine eventually, it was all that mattered.

But he wouldn't tell Bonzle that he basically gave up hope to get out of this place. Not after he just told her that 'Ninja never quit' and everything. Just like he never told Nya when they didn't have enough food for the two fo them, or couldn't afford her school materials, after telling her that he earned good money that month.

Lying wasn't very hard for Kai if it meant not making others worry. The situation may be vastly different, but he would adapt. Eventually.

A little voice in his head, honestly sounding a lot like his sister, tried screaming at him how this was one of his many bad habits he should get rid off. But ignoring that voice was another thing he just learned over the years.

He would just have to deal with this situation live gave him. He always did. One way or the other.

[kayzero]

I've been exhausted for three days straight so I don't think I can come up with any decent prompts atm but I'd love to know how you write Roxas! I'm compelled to say maybe something between kh2 and kh3? Despite the fact that during that he's y'know

Here’s a personal headcanon: Xion (and other Replicas) had the capacity to grow a heart like other Nobodies should be able to do. Her process was slowed by her function, to absorb Sora’s memories and eventually become a clone of him, and eventually halted altogether as the intake flow increased to an uncontrollable speed.

But the process did start.

As Roxas sank into Sora’s heart and fully disappeared from the outside world, he allowed his (plastic, fake, liar) smile to fall into a frown. Of course he wasn’t content to just fade away for the sake of someone else’s life — even if that someone else was instrumental in dismantling the Organization and saving an untold number of worlds.

Not that he was bitter enough to blame Sora. He didn’t ask to have his heart ripped out, he didn’t know that in order for him to be whole, someone else would have to be sacrificed. Roxas has the feeling that if Sora had known, if the cost of becoming whole was someone else’s life, he would still be walking around with a broken heart.

No, if anything, Roxas blames Riku. Riku, who had turned to the darkness in the first place. Riku, who had let himself get possessed and tore out Sora’s heart. Riku, who resorted to turning back to that source of power, resorted to soaking himself in darkness, in Ansem’s power, just to get the upper hand in a single fight at the cost of his very self!

Riku, who had the privilege of a heart, had the privilege of a self, and threw it all away.

Had the choice to throw it all away.

And then! And then! He gets it all back in a freak fucking accident! Like he didn’t have to sacrifice anything when Roxas had to give up everything! His self, completely irrelevant! His heart, crammed into Sora’s! His friends, dead for Sora’s sake!

He wasn’t bitter enough to blame Sora, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t part of the problem.

…Friends?

Come to think of it, when did he form a self? When had he grown a heart?

Roxas, now sat on the edge of Sora’s stained-glass heart, tries to think.

He remembers…

He remembers being overwhelmed. He was angry at Axel, who was hiding information from him. Who was lying to him. He was afraid of Saix, who barred him from leaving. He was hurt, and exhausted, and victorious, forcing Saix to the side and dragging himself out of the castle.

And then…

He was furious, running through the streets of the Organization’s undercity, tearing through endless numbers of Shadows and Neoshadows. Disbelieving of an unknown who wasn’t unknown, who tried to stop him from trying to free Kingdom Hearts. Shocked by a stranger who was his best friend in another life as he tried to use memories that weren’t his to convince him to give up.

Victorious again. Until he wasn’t.

But…

He wasn’t hurt when he fought Riku.

Think harder.

He was overwhelmed, but by information, not emotion. He was indignant, because that was the proper response. His anger, his fear, his satisfaction, they all felt distant, shallow.

But his rage, his fury toward Xemnas, and then Riku, it was potent and volatile. He relished tearing through Heartless on his way to the castle. His disgust when Riku caught his Keyblade left him nauseous, his shock when Riku got back up left him breathless.

There was a… divide. Something in between. A day, maybe two.

He… dragged himself through a corridor to Twilight Town, bought hi-potions and hi-ethers from a moogle, but not elixirs, because they made him nauseous and dizzy and left him achy after they healed him in a way that potions didn’t. He hid in the train station, in a supply closet that held specific tools and chemicals — too far away for the janitors to bother with, Demyx had told him, a perfect place to hide out and pretend that work took way longer than it actually did.

And then…

Come on. Think.

He brought himself to the top of the clock tower. He stared at the sunset.

He fought on a magical platform that rose and rose until it reached the heavens, that twisted and became other worlds.

Xion.

He had forgotten Xion.

Xion, his best friend. Xion, who was kind and understanding. Xion, who learned from Roxas, and who Roxas learned from in turn. Xion, who fled from the Organization, fearing her self, fearing becoming someone else. Xion, whose fears came true, who begged Roxas to fight her, to kill her, so she could die as Xion rather than live as Sora.

Xion, who was never meant to be remembered.

As if he could forget such an important piece of his heart.

Even if no one else ever did, he would always remember Xion.

[creepiecreator]

I was damn near asleep when my brain cursed me with this silverusso snippet

"If Terry was the snake, forever tempting humanity to sin, to endulge in their truest dark desires, Then Daniel-who was once Eve. Innocent and oh so naive, was now the apple. Sweet and beautiful, flesh tainted with sin, mine consumed by knowledge never meant for mere mortals. Both of them cursed to remain side by side for all of eternity, standing together in defiance of man, government and god"

[guplia]

I hate how this unrelated paragraph is the longest of all in an upcoming fic (will probably post today)

[merlyn-bane]

For the foelu snippets I'd like Cody and or Rex with precious toddler.

I decided to go with just Rex, hope that's okay! He's just so very dad shaped and I was sad not to have had a good place to put in some real good one-on-one time with him and the baby in the main story 😊😊

[Requests for Foelu missing scenes, future snippets, and extra vignettes are STILL OPEN. Please submit any requests you might have to my ask box. They will all eventually be cross posted on AO3 as well 🥰🥰]

~~~

“No! Bubu!”

“We're still going to go see the biffleflies, Tal'ika, you've just got to let me carry you there.”

“No! Down, Bubu!” the toddler demands, kicking her little feet in a vain but less than pleasant attempt to free herself. “Wanna walk!” 

Rex sighs and stares dead ahead as his daughter continues flailing and scowling at him severely. “Kai-Tal,” he says patiently, “if you walk now, you'll be too tired to run around in the flowers.”

“No I won’!” Her complaints are starting to rise in pitch, now, and Rex sighs again as he resigns himself to having to decide whether he wants to deal with this the ‘Jedi way'—pausing this entire enterprise to discuss what she's feeling, why, and how to address it, which is a model all of her buir'e are still trying to figure out—or 17's way—giving her what she wants and letting her experience the consequences. Typically Rex prefers the former, even if he's still practicing at it. Today, though, his gut is insisting on practical application. 

So he lets her down. She takes off at speed for the lifts immediately, of course, but Rex just lets her and follows along behind her at his regular pace; the odds of her managing to actually leave him behind are low, and even if she does, they are in the Temple which is the safest place in the galaxy for her to be. At worst, Obi-Wan will have to retrieve her from Master Yoda’s tonight after an impromptu tea-and-swamp-pie party. 

That's where Luke usually seems to end up when the twins are in-Temple for classes, at any rate. 

Kai-Tal lets him pick her up under the armpits once they get into the lift just long enough to be able to press the right button and then starts squirming again, so Rex sets her back down and fondly watches her all but vibrate in place waiting for the doors to open back up. Apparently the urge to go go go as one becomes progressively more mobile is endemic to all younglings, even jetiise.

Obi-Wan insists this was not the case with him. The créchemasters have informed Waxer and Boil that they in fact seriously considered leashing him when he first came into their care at three standard and immediately attempted to stage a breakout. 

The lift lets them out into what the jetiise insist is not a dimensional pocket despite being a sprawling outside space that is contained inside one of the Temple’s obscenely large number of sub-basements, and the toddler immediately takes off at a wobbly run in the direction of the field where her favorite biffleflies can usually be found. Rex is pretty sure she'll run out of steam before she even makes it past the stables; she usually does, and then she'll insist that he stops at each occupied stall so that she can say ‘hi’ and pet them on the nose. 

She might not be the most animal-inclined child in her generation of Jedi, but that's mostly because she's age-mates with Ezra Bridger, and even then it's pretty close. Not that any of them are surprised; they've all seen Obi-Wan befriend everything from a womp rat to a rancor, once.

Sure enough, Kai-Tal starts dragging her feet right on schedule (if a little longer than last time), and she starts tugging at Rex's pant leg before he can even push the stable door open. “Bubu, ‘m tired,” she mumbles, pouting up at him, and Rex is glad that these little excursions are just the two of them because it means there's no-one there to see him fold like wet flimsi. 

“Alright, ad'ika,” he sighs, stooping down to scoop her up and settle her on his hip. “I thought you said you weren't gonna get tired if I let you walk, huh?”

Kai-Tal buries her face in the side of his neck, little hands fisting in the fabric of his shirt. “Don’ be mean, Bubu.”

Rex chuckles and cranes his neck to kiss the side of her head. “You've got a funny definition of ‘mean’, kiddo.”

The toddler just shrugs and snuffles into him further. “Go see bif-biffa-biffafies now?”

“Yeah, Tal'ika, we're gonna go see the biffleflies now.”

[kaitontenchu]

Unwritten Bonds

-

"...Thanks for comin' to talk with me, Esti." The slightest bit of hesitation caught Kai's tongue at the utterance of his adoptive brother's name. "I - It's been a while for sure...!"

Keenly catching on, Estinien let out a sigh before taking another swig of his ale. He approached the younger man and placed a gentle palm atop his head.

Kai's ears perked up at the sudden weight.

"What are you getting flustered over, boy? You used to call me that name when we were just naive little kids. We both grew up, but that's it. Our lives may have run a different course and will continue to do so, but you will always be my little brother in the end."

Kai felt his face flush in a rush of comfort. He lowered his ears and simply nodded. A content smile being the only response he needed to give back to Estinien.

[princess-of-purple-prose]

Yoo Joonghyuk vs. Online Shopping

In which Han Sooyoung and Yoo Joonghyuk disagree on what Yoo Joonghyuk’s post-scenarios wardrobe should look like.

786 words; read on AO3!

“And now that you don’t have to worry about blood showing through, we can get you some other wavelengths of light in your closet, too,” Han Sooyoung says breezily. Yoo Joonghyuk, who had been tuning her out for a good ten minutes, finally feels some faint alarm bell go off in his head at those words, and he pauses his game to turn to look at what she’s brandishing a finger at: her computer screen, filled with rows and rows of images of… trendy modern clothing.

“What,” he says.

“Colors, Yoo Joonghyuk, colors,” Han Sooyoung says, rolling her eyes. “I’m saying you can branch out with, like, a blue shirt or two. Maybe green if we’re feeling adventurous.”

“Why would I do that.”

Han Sooyoung’s mouth slants at his flat tone. “Well, you’ve always kind of stuck to permutations of your outfit from scenario one, and the black coat... I mean, it’s hot, yeah, but is it even practical anymore? Let me tell you right now: we’ve all noticed it isn’t sweat-resistant anymore.” Kim Dokja, sitting away from the other two at the dining room table, makes an indeterminate sound—possibly a smothered protest, possibly a chuckle. “You can’t only ever alternate between that and lame tracksuits and identical goddamned black sweaters, is what I’m saying. You suck all the light out of the room just by standing in it.”

“Yah, Sooyoung-ah, give his face some credit, too,” Kim Dokja calls. Yoo Joonghyuk glares at him, and Kim Dokja beams—first at Yoo Joonghyuk, then at Han Sooyoung. “See! He’s doing the face right now!”

Han Sooyoung sighs gustily. “Either help me get this idiot a new wardrobe or just shut up, Kim Dokja,” she calls back, unnecessarily loud for the scant distance between them, before following it up with a disparaging mutter about Kim Dokja’s tastes that Yoo Joonghyuk doubts he was meant to hear. Or—no, actually, Han Sooyoung absolutely intended for him to catch the derisive comment on his chuunibyou tendencies.

Han Sooyoung turns away and points demonstratively at the screen. Yoo Joonghyuk stares wordlessly at it, then at her. She sighs again, with less affectation this time. “Listen. It won’t kill you to expand your wardrobe, is all I’m saying. Actually do some justice to that physique, why don’t you?”

Yoo Joonghyuk’s lips tighten. “I like my coat.”

Han Sooyoung looks up to squint at him quizzically. “I know??”

“And I like black,” Yoo Joonghyuk says, still toneless.

Han Sooyoung scoffs. “We’ll get you a new coat if it matters that much, dumbass. But you—”

“And,” Yoo Joonghyuk glowers, “I am going to continue wearing both.”

Han Sooyoung visibly restrains herself from putting her face in her hands. “I’m not saying you can’t keep the fucking coat, okay. I’m just saying—begging—for you to wear something other than identical black turtlenecks. Fine, I won’t put you in a crop top, but we’re going to get you in something brighter than navy blue if it’s the last thing I do, you hear?”

“No.”

There's a long silence, broken only by Kim Dokja cheering under his breath at whatever mobile game or webnovel it is that he’s been entertaining himself with.

“No to…?” Han Sooyoung prompts, voice hovering at a precarious edge between incredulity and unbound fury. “Answer me, moron. No to what? To buying a single piece of clothing that doesn’t look like it came from that shitty dragon’s shitty merch line? Is that what you mean?” 

Yoo Joonghyuk is silent.

“... Stop bullshitting me, Yoo Joonghyuk.”

“...”

“No, are you serious?”

“...”

“You know what? Fuck you. What the fuck do I even try for,” Han Sooyoung says spitefully. She navigates away from the page she’d been on with great vindictiveness, muttering with bloody intent. “Goddamn protagonists and their one-note wardrobes, who do you think you are, you clow—” She jabs a key so hard it’s difficult to believe in its continuing functionality. “I’m getting you cargo shorts.” 

Yoo Joonghyuk nods and settles back against the couch, clicking resume with his controller. “That’s fine.”

“What the fuck?!” Han Sooyoung cries over the renewed sounds of Mario Kart pinging through the room.

“It’s the pockets,” Kim Dokja calls without looking up from his phone.

“It’s also Yoo Joonghyuk!” Han Sooyoung shrieks, flailing her arms at him.

“You don’t have to get the cargo shorts,” says the man in question.

“Fuck you, obviously I have to get the shorts now!” Han Sooyoung shrills. Yoo Joonghyuk sighs. Kim Dokja, apparently less absorbed in his screen than it would seem, snickers.

“Just for that, Kim Dokja,” Han Sooyoung promises darkly. “I’m buying you shorts too.” He looks up, protest hanging off his lips, and she growls. “Khakhi ones.”