#like sure its remarkably less effort to interact and be around people i love

[arg0t]

and really i could do to put less effort into people i dont like

[ohmyasmodeus]

𝘮𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘶𝘮 𝘥𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘦𝘮𝘰𝘯 𝘣𝘳𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘴 ❖

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

♡ 𝘭𝘶𝘤𝘪𝘧𝘦𝘳 ; 𝘤𝘭𝘢𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 𝘢𝘳𝘵

✧   Sure, Lucifer is looking forward to appreciating art and the history behind each piece, but he finds himself much more excited to spend more time alone with you. History can be preserved, but every moment spent with you is simply irreplaceable; he ends up surprisingly spending more time gazing at you than admiring the artwork.

✧   You make him feel young again. In between displays, he sneaks kisses, mischievously pulling you away from the crowds just to hold you in his arms for a stolen moment. Lucifer adores the way you fall into his arms with soft laughter, and it makes him cradle your face between his gloved hands while he whispers about the way everyone looks at you like you’re a work of art.

“But do you?” You ask softly.

“I always do, ______.” Silhouetted by the gallery lights, he pulls you into a tender kiss full of emotion; a moment that no doubt belongs among the displays of beauty and immortality that surround you.

✧   Lucifer is the kind of person to actually read the little plaques beside the pieces that go into detail about the artist and the intentions behind their art. It takes a while for him to take it all in, but you don’t mind— it’s very cute to see him have to bend down and squint to read them.

✧   Your day hardly ends there. Even as he takes you home, he very much enjoys discussing your opinions on the works included in the gallery and the artists behind them. It’s Lucifer’s way of getting closer, trying to decipher how your mind works, how you view art pieces that are open to multiple interpretations. It’s his favourite part. He loves you and your brilliant mind.

♡ 𝘮𝘢𝘮𝘮𝘰𝘯 ; 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦 𝘴𝘤𝘪𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦 / 𝘢𝘳𝘵

✧   Your demon is the definition of a kinaesthetic learner. Mammon fits right in with the kids that run around the place, tugging on your hand as he begs you to come play these games with him! He never wants to do anything without you and you end up being basically dragged around the museum. But it’s okay because he’s cute!

✧   While surrounded by so many people, it’s even easier for him to get flustered about affection. His cheeks flush red whenever he thinks too hard about holding your hand, whether it’s to bring you somewhere, or just to hold your hand for the sake of it. The back of his fingers brush against yours, making you smile.

���Hm? What do you want to show me?” you ask as you take his hand to intertwine your fingers with his.

Mammon fidgets with his free hand before shoving it into his jacket pocket, looking away with a brilliant blush. His voice is quiet as he mumbles, “N-nothing, I just… wanted to hold your hand. Or whatever.”

✧   He’s much smarter than people like to give him credit for at times, and surprises you with bits of information he picks up that you couldn’t understand. At the same time, it’s hard to stop him from gushing about how cool it was to see that chunk of sodium explode when dropped in water and how he wants to watch that over and over again.

✧   Mammon runs wild in the gift shop, especially at those little archaeology or mining kits that let you dig through hunks of sand that claim to contain a piece of gold. Of course, there are a million things the both of you want to buy for yourselves, but so little money to do so with. He settles for something small in the end, because he wants to be able to buy something small for his brothers too.

♡ 𝘭𝘦𝘷𝘪𝘢𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘯 ; 𝘮𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦

✧   From the beginning, Leviathan is absolutely fascinated. The calming atmosphere of the museum and being completely surrounded by his element makes Levi relax, even if he’d normally panic and try to hide from the people that walk along the exhibitions with you. But even then, you make sure to hold his hand just to reassure him a little more.

✧   Just like he rants about pretty much anything he has an interest in, Levi rants about the equipment on display and compares weapons or ships from different eras to each other, as if he’s talking about mere video game stats. It’s actually kind of hot to see him act like the Grand Admiral of hell’s navy is supposed to.

✧   Treat him like a Grand Admiral, actually. His brain totally short circuits when you lean into him and put a hand on his chest and gasp about how knowledgeable and strong he is.

“Oh captain, my captain!” you sing as you pepper his face in kisses, making him squirm in your arms. His face is beet red as he attempts to cover it with his hands.

“People are- they’re going to see us!” Levi whines.

You laugh and kiss him properly, arms wrapped around him tight. “That’s the point, baby! I like it when people know I’m yours.”

✧   He actually gets a little sad when he sees the bones of massive whales or the various preserved remains of sea life on display. They all feel like a part of him. At times, he feels like sea animals understand him much better than people do, and he has to give your hand a squeeze as the two of you through the section. At least he brightens up when you tell him that most of these specimens die a natural death or were cared for during their life.

♡ 𝘴𝘢𝘵𝘢𝘯 ; 𝘩𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘺

✧   His choice of museum goes without explanation. Humans are frail creatures that are essentially doomed to make the same mistakes again and again, despite a new era or millennia, but Satan still finds their history remarkable. He’s fascinated with seeing the butterfly effect ripple through time, sparking wars and conflicts. It makes him wonder about the universe’s decisions— especially the ones that brought you to him.

✧   Satan has always been more fond of reading the ancient texts on display or translating archaic inscriptions on bronze age charms, but when he’s with you, he finds himself more drawn to the elegant gowns and elaborately crafted jewellery on display. You always find his emerald eyes lingering on you, imagining what you would look like in something so grand. Your beauty stuns him in every way, especially with the way you smile at him while framed by the display’s lights.

✧   “I thought you wanted to learn,” you mumble with a quiet laugh into the kiss that Satan pulls you into. The two of you are wrapped in each other’s arms in the back of a crowded amphitheatre, making an attempt to watch a historical film.

In the darkness, Satan’s blush goes unseen, but you feel it in the heat of his face as you kiss him back eagerly. “I’ve learned enough about humans, ______. I want to focus on my favourite one now.”

You close your eyes, and so does he. History couldn’t matter less, not when it feels like the two of you are the only beings to exist, the only people that matter.

✧   Despite wanting to learn, Satan finds himself getting dragged into shenanigans with you as you voice historical figures with the goofiest accents and clown around with some of the interactive props. He laughs along and snaps a million pictures of you to keep, and he supposes that humans aren’t the only ones that make recurring mistakes. After all, he lets you loosen him up and lets you force your way into his heart time and time again, but he still can’t force himself to complain about it.

♡ 𝘢𝘴𝘮𝘰𝘥𝘦𝘶𝘴 ; 𝘧𝘢𝘴𝘩𝘪𝘰𝘯

✧   Beauty in its different forms has always mesmerised Asmodeus. Museums have never been his thing, but with a fashion museum, you might just be able to change his mind. He goes between gushing about the textures and layering of different pieces to gushing about you and how amazing you look today!

✧   Asmo is always on top of the latest trends, but there’s something that always brings him back to the ostentatious allure of baroque and rococo dresses. He loves reading about the rise of these styles, but he would rather pull you along into a waltz as the quiet ambient music plays around you, the both of you giggling and referring to each other as ‘lord’ and ‘lady’.

✧   Or ‘your majesty’ and ‘my consort’...

✧   You, as always, expect him to pull you away somewhere quiet to make out and be general public nuisances, but Asmodeus surprises you this time. He’s far too busy taking pictures of you together and of just you alone, his amber gaze so soft as he contemplates your beauty. He ends up leaning in serenely as the two of you find yourselves alone together in a gallery.

“You’re gorgeous,” Asmo mumbles with a smile, delicately tucking a lock of your hair behind your ear. “There’s just something so magnetic about you, I can’t look away…”

“I don’t have to say it back because you know you’re handsome and your ego is big enough... but there’s nothing that can compare to how lovely your soul is.” You chuckle softly, resting a hand affectionately on the side of his face. Asmo rests his forehead against yours, wrapping his arms around the back of his neck with a delighted giggle, delighted in knowing that you see him beyond his superficialities and flaws.

✧   He buys you a set of jewellery from the gift shop, and not one of the cheap ones either. He splurges on one of the most expensive professionally made vintage sets because he really wants to daydream about you dancing with him in those rococo dresses, the most gorgeous royal couple in the world…

♡ 𝘣𝘦𝘦𝘭𝘻𝘦𝘣𝘶𝘣 ; 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘮𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘢𝘳𝘺 𝘢𝘳𝘵

✧   Delighted by the more colourful and almost bizarre applications of mixed-media art (think Yayoi Kusama), Beelzebub enjoys contemporary art the most. He’s easily fascinated with the elaborately abstract displays, and quietly wraps his arm around your waist as the two of you gawk at stunning larger-than-life works that probably get him a little hungry.

✧   He’s a respectful visitor and likes to stay silent so he doesn’t disturb the quiet atmosphere for everyone else appreciating the art. It ends up in him having to lean down and murmur softly in your ear when he has something to tell you, his warm arms pulling you into an embrace that you never want to leave.

✧   Workshops! Please bring Beel to the workshops because they’re his favourite part of museums. No matter how hungry he gets while putting in so much effort, he’ll sit still and work hard to make you something you can treasure.

“Do you like it?” he asks with a smile as he presents you with a little figurine version of one of the sculptures featured in the exhibition, hand painted by him. It’s easy to notice how the colours he picked out match your features. “It’s yours.”

“I love it, Beel! Oh, it’s wearing my coat and everything!” you gasp. The elated smile he gives you is absolutely priceless, and you can’t help but tiptoe to kiss him in thanks for his hard work.

Beel lets out a soft laugh and nuzzles his cheek into yours. “I really liked the art, but it felt like something was missing… Maybe the exhibition would’ve been a lot more beautiful if you were an art piece on display too.”

✧   Bringing him to a museum like that just might inspire him to create art by himself. After creating something for you, he feels hooked on it! You find him doodling a lot more on his homework and giving you the most endearing drawings of things you like, or his own hilarious renditions of what Lucifer looks like when he’s about to burst a blood vessel. Beel definitely has a hidden talent for caricatures.

♡ 𝘣𝘦𝘭𝘱𝘩𝘦𝘨𝘰𝘳 ; 𝘯𝘢𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘢𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘳𝘺

✧   Humans? Belphegor has had enough of them for a lifetime and can’t be bothered with learning more about them, but natural history is something that captivates him. There’s a kind of innocent wonder in his eye as you lead him around the exhibitions, marvelling at the displayed remains of the massive creatures that came before, wondering how they evolved into the tiny little animals of today. (But it’s probably also morbid curiosity with the way he looks at preserved carcasses and skeletons.)

✧   But you’re an exception to him. He's tired of humans but never of you, even if he jokes about it at times. Even if he knows about most of the things on display, Belphie is still asking you to tell him about them because he just loves hearing your voice. Coupled with the soothing silence of the museum, it almost puts him to sleep.

✧   “Don’t fall asleep! You paid to watch this!” you whisper when Belphie rests his head on your shoulder. You want to pay attention to the dinosaurs beating the shit out of each other in the surprisingly well-rendered 3D documentary, but you can’t help but gaze at your boyfriend instead, and the way he looks in those dumb 3D glasses.

“I won’t,” he mumbles, rolling his eyes. “You’re warm.”

“You’re a little leech, you know that?” Despite your snarky tone, you lift up the partition between the theatre’s seats to let Belphie snuggle into you. Just like a leech, he’s immediately all over you with his arms wrapped tight around your waist, chuckling as he buries his face in your neck.

✧   You wouldn’t expect it, but he’s also the kind to go wild in the gift shop, albeit in more subtle ways— like staring really hard at something or carrying something only to put it down for you to get the hint. He ends up getting the both of you a big plushy to cuddle and name on the way home.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

[generallypo]

in all sincerity, kim dokja makes me happy and he deserves to be so too :^(

incoherent yelling and sobbing under the cut. these fEELINGS will not be contained aaauuunnghhh. 

------

anyway i binge-read all 500+ chapters of ORV this week and i honest to god feel bad for this -- completely! fictional! aghhhh -- guy. in case you haven’t figured it out, the following is some spoilerly shit

i went in expecting a fun, brainless power trip fantasy for dudes with an isekai addiction. instead, it turns out ORV is actually a gigantic, self-deprecating prank on the entire genre itself. kdj plays more into the sad -- if high-functioning-- clown trope than the sexy, edgy, chuuni bastard type i was prepared to laugh at. there were -- gasp! -- female characters with personalities! parents (aka ADULTS who act like ADULTS) who actually survive and feature prominently! adorable children! a real sexy, edgy bastard! a power trio with amazing fashion! sexual tension and bickering! friendship! life and death bonding! 

*breathes in deeply* fouND FAMILYYYYYYY.

like, yeah, the plot around the first few arcs seems a little aimless, but the buildup is worth. the world-building is pretty decent. there’s discernible effort put into the fight scenes, and i can appreciate that. but -- but! what i stayed for were the characters -- namely, the fantastic OT3 of KDJ, HSY, and YJH -- who come together despite their initial rivalries and end up saving each other’s asses, like, every other day. granted, the other characters don’t get as much focus, and they do fall into certain character tropes.. 

but a trope done well is nothing i would gripe about. every significant character in ORV has a coherent, and more importantly, respectful take on their respective trope. maybe it’s because sing-shong is actually a married couple, but all the interactions between even minor characters are a convincing blend of awkward rambling, suggestive humor, sharp remarks, and casual banter. in other words, this cast of mostly working adults (plus a teen and two kids) talks like working adults. the relationships built throughout the story are, frankly, some of most realistic of its genre. sing-shong has managed to craft a dynamic that undoubtedly brims with fluffy fondness all around, but also drips with sarcastic tension, with unspoken urgency, with a wariness that softens into sincerity over the course of many, many chapters. it’s the kind of progression that makes even stock characters read like more than just the 2-bit villain or comrade or love interest. here, we have relationships both straightforward and not, strained or otherwise, romantically-oriented as well as decidedly the opposite -- and then numerous others scattered along the spectrum with the freedom to shift either way. 

it’s also an interesting point of note that our MC kdj actually does not end up with a stated romantic partner, much less a conventional heteroromantic harem. he gets teased about that fact from time to time, but it’s with less of the sleazy shonen locker room humor one would expect and more of the good-natured ribbing you’d find among friends or that one especially nosy auntie at the yearly family reunion. kdj is a grown ass man. in the background, i applaud his maturity, and he handles all the prodding like a champ. 

so instead of finding and fulfilling his horny, he builds himself a wealth of loving family. yeah, there are beautiful men and women around him. yeah, they unequivocally adore him. but they’re also adults, and they have priorities, too -- which are not so much finding a way to bang kdj’s brains out and more so simply keeping the damn guy alive. this is truly not ‘oblivious mc with his thirsty, sex kitten harem’. it just so happens that a guy proves himself to be unflinchingly gentle and capable in an apocalyptic setting despite his broken self-esteem, and lots of people find that attractive, romantically and platonically. 

it.. kinda makes sense? he’s a hard worker, thoughtful, and good with kids. kdj is the kind of guy you know would make a reliable partner, and anybody with eyes can plainly see and appreciate that. 

and it’s not that our MC’s a total brick wall. in fact, it’s likely the opposite, and he’s just too darned repressed to admit it. from what has been implied, kdj does indeed recognize and accept love, or at least a primitive concept of it. i like to imagine that the kind of love that he ends up seeking out simply manifests itself more easily as acceptance and safety, as warmth and a home of people to return to every day. even better, the people who surround him know this, and they give him exactly that. it’s refreshing, and honestly, really sweet.

(as a side note, i really, really do appreciate the cosmic bi energy radiating off of kdj, who canonically earns the title of being loved by all and is all but in name married to yjh and hsy. he also respects women and small children and honestly anyone who isn’t total scum to him or his family. i respect that.)

but the happy stuff aside, you know it it just ain’t ORV without the generous screaming dollop of angst. admittedly, there’s self-sacrifice, injury, lonesome wandering, more sacrifice, some epic fighting, reunion and confrontation. all of it is a lot to digest, sure, but never does it feel entirely hopeless, or truly, truly heart-clenching. ORV, up until the final act, is a mostly light read. you relax in your chair, thinking that nothing beyond this point can disturb you. 

yeah fucking right.

------

and then the beginning of the end arrives. when the squad finally break through to their ‘ending’, the scene that kind of breaks me is the reveal of the Most Ancient Dream. it ties so much thematically into the little tidbits that we get of kdj’s past, and it though it feels like almost a joke that the source of the goddamn apocalypse is a kid with bruises smeared across his skinny ass body -- it’s such a pathetic picture that it’s kinda poetic, actually. you’re left mystified but somewhat convinced, like a math problem explained halfway through. this.. child.. is a villain somehow, isn’t he?

and then 999th turn uriel speaks up, and she. just. hugs him. 

[[You are this universe’s most powerless existence, aren’t you.]] 

that. that gets me. kdj’s reaction immediately upon this revelation? absolute murder. seeing him essentially self-destruct upon realizing that all these people he’s surrounded himself with -- some who continuously proclaim their loyalty and affection for him throughout their journey, some who suffered eons of war and loss and trauma because of his existence -- not only forgive his younger self but smother him with unconditional acceptance and love is stifling, is too vulnerable and exposed and he simply can’t cope -- it’s so telling of his true mentality, of his crippling insecurity and crumpled sense of self-worth. kim dokja is a liar, through and through, so much that he fails, or perhaps refuses, to comprehend the veracity of others’ kindness and love towards himself. 

by some miracle, the events at the end of the world somehow resolve.. or so it seems. there is a departing train, a liberated team of ex-gods, and a child rousing from his slumber. in the aftermath, i am left shaking. somehow, despite the ending having been (happily?) reached, there’s still another chapter ahead. what is this witchcraft?

------

and then ah, yes -- the epilogue arc. i teetered on the edge of being critical for a little bit there -- is that display of deus ex machina, of sad, self-sacrificing nobility a bit too egregious to be acceptable? is this some wild last let-me-yank-this-outta-my-ass plot twist to drag out the chapter count? i sincerely thought that the arc before it would have been the finale. i was wrong. thank god.

anyways, as an answer to the above: no, and no. i stake my firm claim on the belief that the epilogue arc was meticulously planned out well in advance of its release, confusing and time-warpy as it is. i liked it. tremendously. even if it entirely invalidates all of kdj’s supposed development (”haha lol yeah sure i won’t sacrifice myself or anything anymore guys don’t worry about me” -- KDJ, at some point because he’s a lying rat bastard). actually, our beloved MC disappears for a large chunk of this arc, and i think it’s great. in his absence, the other characters not only go absolutely fucking nuts, but they have to figure out this new problem on their own, even if the lure of peaceful complacency in the newly saved Korea might convince them otherwise. 

and then the whole time paradox thing comes around. yjh goes to space, hsy saves the only life she can, and kdj grows up. the crew waits, holding onto their hope even if it bleeds them dry. sing-shong does a damn good job of illustrating their fraying calm, their lurking madness, the unseen but pervasive depression that seeps in from kdj’s absence. the kids lose their father, lhs and jhw lose their reliable leader figure, ysa loses a best friend and confidant, lsk -- as distant as she pretends to be from her son -- loses her only child. and then there’s hsy and yjh , who are essentially bereft of the other half of their existences. their pain is palpable, is grounded in the hopeless, gnawing frustration of an utterly meaningless victory. emotionally, ORV hits all the right -- if agonizing -- beats.

however, a story can’t sustain itself just through its pathos. i’m happy to say that ORV doesn’t drop the ball after the first milestone, and after all the hurt, the characters do leap straight back into action. even better, the plot holes actually do get patches, and the poetic cycle of writer, protagonist, and reader comes full circle by making use of all those supposedly throwaway characters from the myriad world lines. 

at the end of the road, there is a distinct sense of unity, of a delicate but undeniable cohesion to the world lines and their origins. sing-shong lets us guess a little here at the finish, but there’s just enough information to feel hopeful. maybe there never had been a definite start -- or finish -- to the story of kdj company, and... that’s okay. everybody ends up where they were meant to be, where they fought and struggled to reach. it’s.. almost like a happily ever after, if we’re allowed to dream of that.

------

now, i realize, this was all an orchestrated maneuver.

i’ll take it.

to me, all of this work sounds like someone put some serious thought into this behemoth of a plot. it cements the entire original premise of the story. it suggests -- but never explicitly confirms! -- the possibility that breaking free of the cycle is possible through the exact same system that sustains it. it’s terribly interesting -- and inspirational! with all the dramatic revelations and life-threatening scenarios  and the cast’s resigned acceptance of them that essentially make up ORV’s entire mood, there’s still that last hint of rebellious and righteous anger that lights up the whole damn nebula. it’s like the kdj company blasting away at the heavens just to yell into the nether: we’re not looking for the happy end, but the free one. stay alive.

it’s subtle, and yet it’s such an emotional gut punch. i came away with the most ruinous, frustrating, bittersweet sense of longing in ages. i pined. for these fictional darlings. god, i am weak.

so. yeah. ORV is pretty good. flawed, but ambitious and impressively thought out.  i’m stoked that the webtoon is making pretty good progress, even if it’ll take an eternity and a half to meet that monstrous chapter count. i’m still gonna follow it. hell yeah. 

------

(by the way the idea that secretive plotter and co are literally gonna take care of and raise baby kdj and spoil him and be the best friggin family a kid could ever want does things to me. protect him. he’s suffered too much. let at least one worldline’s version of him know happiness. and actually, aLL OF THEM DESERVE DOMESTIC BLISS TOGETHER IN A BIG OL MANSION WITH SUN AND FRESH AIR AND TENDER FAMILY MOMENTS UGH)

------

and there you have it, folks. you made it to the end. in the far, far distance, i’m cheering you on and crying my eyes out in gratitude. thanks for tuning in!

[shinidamachu]

I haven't watched anything after ATLA, but I was shocked to find out that Zuko and Mai don't work out. What are your thoughts? Do you think the writers could have gone in a different direction or was it for the best?

I gotta be honest, you're not missing out much by not engaging with the extras. I only watched Legend of Korra and I don't really remember Mai even being mentioned on it.

They did give Zuko a daughter, though. Her name is Izumi. And even though they never explicitly revealed the mother to be Mai (or what was made of her), I just assumed she was the mother due to the remarkable resemblance:

Now, I haven't read the comics (nor will I ever), so if you're actually refering to them, my knowledge is very limited. But it is my understanding, from the metas I've read about them, that Zuko and Mai break up and make up, as it was their modus operandi in ATLA.

Mai not being around in LOK doesn't necessarily mean she's dead or that they broke up for good. The fate of their relationship was purposefully left open and they do end up together at the end of ATLA, so what happens after doesn't really matter since not everybody takes the comics or LOK as canon, anyway.

Now, since you asked for my opinion... I wasn’t shocked to find out about how they were portraying Maiko in the comics at all. First, because Bryke suck at writing romance. Second, because from the interactions in ATLA, this was more or less what I imagined their relationship would play out and that’s why I never shipped them.

MAIKO CRITICISM UNDER THE CUT!

The writers should have gone in a different direction, but in the ATLA finale. I love Zuko. And I love Mai. But I don’t like them as a couple because I think they are not fitted for each other. And I’m not just saying that because I’m a Zutara shipper, let’s get this out of the way right here, right now.

I’m saying this because I would rather they had ended up alone than together. Not only them, but Aang and Katara as well. They were all so young I feel like there wouldn’t be any harm for the story if no couples were canonized. 

Especially because, again: Bryke suck at writing love stories (with the notable exceptions being Yukka and Sukka) and romance was actually the less compelling part of ATLA.

More than that, if Zuko and Mai had to end up with a love interest, it shouldn’t have been each other because Maiko is actually a disservice to their characters. In some aspects, it keeps Mai from growing and it regresses Zuko's development.

You see, their relationship always struck me as something they would eventually grow out of. Don’t get me wrong, I have no doubt they really cared about each other. But the narrative went out of its way to show us that the years they spent apart changed their dynamic fundamentally.

Mai and (especially) Zuko aren’t the same people they were when they first met. And when they finally reunited, no real effort was made to learn who was this new person in fron of them. He tried to open up, but she shut him down. 

Instead of reconnecting, of deepening the relationship, they insisted on jumping head first into dating and picked things up where they left off, desperatelly trying to cling to what they knew and forcing two pieces of a different puzzle to click. Of course it wouldn’t work.

The person Zuko became needed someone passionate by his side. Someone he could open up to and confide in. Someone with the same sense of honor, of justice. Someone who understood him and his actions, who got how important it is for him to take the throne and right the wrongs of his country. Someone he could count on to help him get there. I guess we can all agree that this doesn’t sound like Mai.

The person Mai became needed someone who would focus on her and her needs for once. Someone who would have made her a priority. Someone who could actually see past her poker face. Someone who would take her away from the boring royal stuff she hates so much. I guess we can all agree that this doesn’t sound like Zuko, either.

When he took off to join the Gaang, he left the life style he had always known behind because it didn’t fit who he was anymore. He can’t go back from that. And this includes Mai. She is the personification of that life. And as much as they liked each other, being together just doesn’t make sense anymore. Especially because becoming Fire Lady inevitably traps her in the life she was trying to get away from. It’s one of the worst endings they could have given to these characters.

And the way it was executed? Even worse. They reconciled without as much as a conversation about what happened: his “betrayal”, the end of the war, what it means for their relationship, if their feelings were still the same. In fact, apparently Zuko kind of... completely forgot she was in prison and made no move to get her out because he had been too busy fighting Azula and taking lightning to the chest for Katara.

Mai isn’t even a part of the apotheosis of his arc. He got where he needed to be and she wasn’t one of the characters who activelly help him get there. This is very symbolic. And the apotheosis of her arc? Was saving him from Azula, but she didn’t did it because she understood his reasons and wanted to be supportive. She did it because he is the guy she likes. Which is fine, but not enough to “award” her with Zuko. There were feelings there, but they were never on the same page.

“Mai Alone,” is what she deserved. To travel the world on her own. A different place every day. Never the same, always moving. Maybe that way she would have seen the things Zuko did. Maybe this way she would have understood. And after tasting freedom, she would have realized she would have never want to be confined to palace walls ever again. Not for Zuko, not for anybody.

She would have been much happier as the first woman in the White Lotus or as a Bounty Hunter. A spy who, after seeing what the Fire Nation did to the world, finally found her calling by working on the shadows to make sure nothing will break the peace the Avatar and the Fire Lord managed to achieve.

And Zuko deserved the family he always wanted, with a partner who would not only put up with the political duties, but would have been thrilled to do so. Katara seems like the obvious choice here, but even Jin would have been a better fit.

Sometimes things aren’t meant to be and that’s okay. Zuko and Mai work better as friends.

[laurore-stormwitch]

Did someone say Zoya and Genya getting ready for a ball? I had this sitting in my computer for a while. I've written it at the same time of the Nikolai/Genya interaction and went for that instead, leaving this unfinished, so that's the reason why they're similar. But even if this is not wildly original I decided to post it, maybe some of you will enjoy it anyway!

together now - AO3

word count: 2661 (cause I can’t write short fics sorry)

______________________________________________________________

“Zoya, if you move again, I’m going to turn your hair purple.”

Zoya rolled her eyes. Drama queen. Whoever believed that getting ready for a party with your friends was fun, clearly never had to deal with Genya’s perfectionist and dictatorial tendencies. She purposely shifted in her chair in front of the vanity, making Genya glare at her.

“Do you want me to complete my masterpiece or not?”

No, not really. Nothing about going to Sainkt Nikolai’s ball seemed to be exciting. Dreadful and annoying were the only two terms she could come up with to describe the evening in front of her. Mainly having to do to the fact that she was going to have to watch Nikolai and his future wife simper over courtiers and nobles, with the bride-to-be practically coerced to attend the ball. And she wasn’t even allowed to get drunk; saints forbid someone attempted to murder the king again.

“Do you want your hair up or down?” Asked Genya, moving some strands of her hair over her ears.

“Are you really inquiring for my opinion?” The squaller noted ironically, pouring herself another glass of wine.

“No, of course not. Down is better, they make you seem wilder.”

She winked at her and Zoya huffed again. Genya began braiding some thin locks away from her face, leaving the rest of her mane free on her shoulders. She weaved the fine tresses with silver threads and held them in place with diamonds pins. Zoya relaxed under her delicate touch.

“A bit more practice with breaking Grisha’s orders and I’m going to tailor myself at some point. What are you going to do when the day comes?”

She had meant it as a joke, the tone light. But through the mirror she saw a shadow pass behind Genya’s eyes and immediately regretted her words and lack of tact. They knew only one person who had held as much power as Zoya was wielding now; he was rotting in a cell beneath them, and Genya would forever wear his marks on her skin. Of course her mind would have run to him; she tended to darken whenever they touched the argument surrounding Zoya’s newly acquired abilities.

“I hadn’t meant to make you think about that, Genya. I’m sorry.”

Genya smiled at her, coming back to her delightful self.

“It’s okay. I’m just a bit worried about - well, about everything. How is it going with these powers? I’ve spied on you summoning fire the other day. You were glorious.”

Zoya curled her lips and held up her arm, making the fetter made of dragon scales dangle. Juris rumbled inside her. She had told Genya what happened in the Fold, in broad outline. Zoya knew that even if they didn’t say it, they were all concerned with this. She caught them glancing at her sometimes, as if they were waiting for a ticking bomb to go off. It was unpleasant, but she understood them; after all, she was waiting for herself to go off too.

“I’m managing. I’m still not so sure of what I can or cannot do.”

Genya kept working on her hairstyle thoughtfully, letting the quiet stretch between them. She bit her lower lip before adding something else, voice dropping to a whisper.

“Does it feel good?”

Zoya understood that question too. Power is protection. No matter the cost, it would always hold its appeal for a Grisha. That was the pull they felt towards the Darkling too.

“It feels risky.” She answered after a while, releasing a long breath. It was not like her to betray uncertainty or weakness, but she hadn’t anticipated how both frightening and fascinating it would feel to be in this position. “It’s so much power, Genya. What if I can’t control it?”

“If there’s anyone who can do it, it’s you, Zoya.” There was not hesitation in this answer. Yet, Zoya didn’t feel much reassured. She didn’t have a sense of who – or what – she was becoming.

“What if it’s too much power?” She realized that was not the right question, the one thing she dreaded to come true. She corrected herself. “What if it’s not enough, and I want more?”

At this, Genya paused, avoiding Zoya’s gaze, and fell terribly silent. She looked worried, almost scared. A shiver went through Zoya’s spine at the idea of eliciting something like fear in one of the people she loved most. She felt a stabbing guilt and the sudden realization that she didn’t want to explore this topic more and find out what Genya was thinking. She waved a soothing smile at her friend, hoping to stir this exchange away.  

“Enough of this. Don’t you want to show me the dress?”

Genya’s eye lightened up as she was pulled out from her gloom towards a more delightful diversion. She turned to the bed and pulled up Zoya’s gown, handing it to her. As usual, Genya had outdid herself. The gown matched the decor in her hair: Zoya thought of the dark midnight sky over Pachina while looking at it, one of the few memories she held from her childhood. When Genya moved it towards her, a million tiny crystals sparkled like stars against the sheer fabric. Zoya slipped inside it gracefully and turned to her, making the dress shimmer; the red head was gloating.

“I always give you the best dresses. All eyes are going to be stuck on you.”

Zoya doubted it, considering how equally gorgeous the other girl was looking right now, hugged by velvet the colour of blood. Genya made her wirl around on herself while she smoothed the dress; Zoya tried to reach for the wine, but Genya snatched the glass from her hands. She shrugged her shoulders at her outraged look. “What? I’m not going to let you stain this magnificent gown, excuse me.”

“You know, you have David’s adoration all for yourself.” Zoya pointed out, scowling. “Don’t get greedy. Let them admire me instead. If I can’t get drunk, I can at least have a different kind of fun.”

Genya rolled her single eye turning her gaze to Zoya, furrowing a brow at her.

“I do hope that by now you know that you have someone’s adoration all for yourself, too.”

Genya had clearly noticed the subtle shifts in Zoya and Nikolai’s behaviour, since she had been dropping this casual and mildly vague comments for a while now. At first, Zoya just ignored them; but then it occurred to her that denying what was going on was not the way to fight this. That maybe the right angle was to approach it much like a military campaign: know your enemy before you defy it. Which for her, it meant to understand what was happening so that she could crush it. And since feelings were not an area of expertise for Zoya, she had figured Genya could come in handy. So at some point she had just let it become a mutual understanding that this whatever-it-was-thing was out in the open, and she started posing carefully pondered question of her own. Zoya crossed Genya’s eye for an instant, replying with a sceptical click of her tongue.

“Both his adoration and his efforts better be for Ehri, for all our sakes. Much like his gaze better be kept on her all night like she’s the most beautiful creature to ever grace this earth. If he cannot sell it to her, at least he has to sell it for the rest of the world.”

“With you in that dress it’s going to be a challenge to look at anyone else.” Teased Genya, grinning. Zoya glared at her, pushing down the uncomfortable satisfaction this remark brought.

“He seems rather immune to my appearance and my presence.”

A poor and unconvincing objection, to say the least. Genya scoffed, handing her the wine as if she was going to need it to hear what came next. Zoya gladly took the offering.

“You do realize I’m a Corporalki, right?”

“What would that mean, apart from making people faint every now and then?”

“It means he can keep his eyes trained on the ceiling all night for all I care, because I’ll still feel his heartbeat spike up every time you pass beside him.”

Zoya didn’t much like to have this particular piece of information, that stirred some unpleasant feelings in her lungs. She swallowed the rest of the alcohol, her throat burning for something else entirely.

“Do you peer in all your friend’s visceral reaction for fun?”

“Just the two of you. Want to know what happens with you?” Mused Genya, knowing damn well the curiosity that sparkled in Zoya’s eyes and even more well feeling her breath itch. Know your enemy, right? Zoya grunted, not even bothering to try and look unfazed.

“Fine. Rip the band aid off.”

“Your heart usually beats like it’s at war. On the contrary, it slows down when he’s around, like you feel- I don’t know, safer. At home.”

Zoya fell silent, turning the words over in her head. It was always a punch in the gut when she wondered when things have started to turn and understood just how much they had turned. Instead of lingering on this painful realization, she did what she knew best and deflected the conversation again where it hurt most. She had the strange belief that if the heart was indeed a muscle, you had to train it like any other one in your body. The more pressure and blows you would put into it, the less you would feel the pain with time. Yuyeh sesh. Be cruel to your heart.

“How are the preparation for the wedding going?”

“As good as they can be.” Genya’s gaze turned sweet and affectionate, and she went along. “No one would say anything, you know. If you wanted to stay away for a while or get some distance.”

“We both know that a lot of people would say a lot of things.” Zoya held her chin high. “And you know that’s not my way of doing things. This is my place; I’m not going to let anyone take it away.”

I don’t want to live in darkness. She fought and lost and suffered to get to where she was. She was certainly not going to give it up for a bad timed and poorly chosen crush. An idiotic and simple crush. Genya nodded, getting the hint that it was enough for today. She seemed to remember something and got back to her tailoring kit.

“Speaking of Nikolai, there’s one thing missing. He gave them to me before I came here.”

Genya walked towards her and clipped what looked like a pin on her dress. She made her turn around to look herself in the mirror. Zoya felt something warming her from the inside when she looked at it; it was more of a medal than a pin. Ravka’s double eagle was shining on her chest, pleated gold, with Alina’s sun behind it and an Etherealki blue ribbon. It resembled the medals she saw on the supposedly war heroes’ generals that worked with Nikolai, but it was more elegant. She brushed her finger on it, full of pride.

“Me and David have one too.” Genya showed her the other one she was holding before securing it on herself. It was Corporalki red. “David has a Materialki purple ribbon. Nikolai told me people should always know we are his most trusted generals and friends. That we work for Ravka as much as he does, and we are owed the same respect, even at a ball.”

Respect. Recognition. Another time, Nikolai managed to surprise her. Because this wasn’t just a pretty thing, a nice embellishment. And while she had been his general for almost three years, that didn’t mean people had accepted and treated her with the appropriate regard. This was a symbol of the king’s trust, something that would force the nobles and the army to behave accordingly, even at events where it would be so easy to down-play her and treat her like another beautiful hollow courtier. Stupid thoughtful Nikolai. She was torn between wanting to kill him for making her feel like this or kiss him senseless for the same reason. Get a grip, Zoya.

“You’re not going to be like him, Zoya.” Zoya startled at Genya words, confused for a moment. She cleared her throat, shoving the treacherous thoughts she was having away. Genya had moved beside her, taking her hand in her own. Looking at Genya firm and proud gaze, she realized they were not talking about Nikolai anymore, and that she hadn’t dropped the conversation before because she was scared or angry at her. It was because she understood where Zoya’s fears were coming from, and she was facing them head on now.

“The Darkling.” She added to clarify, lingering on his name with a tremor in her voice. “Even with all the power you have, you are nothing like him. You managed to do what he had always claimed he wanted, and he had never done: you are saving Grishas, you are rebuilding the Second Army and you hold a position as the King’s right hand. What drives you is not the hunger for power; is the care you have for Ravka and your people. The Darkling wanted to control them, to own them. You protect them.”

Zoya tightened the hold of her hand, while looking at their reflections in the mirror, in the stunning gowns and the triumvirate’s pins. Two women who had believed in the wrong man and kept paying the price for their ingenuity, who had saved themselves in the end. She sucked in a breath, seeing someone she barely recognized; there was almost nothing left of the scared little girl. With the medal on her chest, diamonds in her hair and a glowing fierce light in her eyes she really looked like the leader she aspired to be. She wondered if she was still pretending, or some of the act was now true.

“Stop me before I can become like him.” Zoya blurted out, the words unsteady and whispered. Genya shook her head, leaning in towards her.

“You are different in every way. And you have something he never had; you have people who love you. Believe me, Nikolai is going to burn down all of Os Alta before he lets anything happen to you. None of us is going to let anything happen to you.”

“I’m not afraid of something happening to me, rather than to others.” What if I hurt Nikolai? What if I hurt anyone of you? Genya lowered her head on her shoulder, still holding her hand.

“We fought our way out of his grip once. We’re not going to let him bring us down. We’re stronger than we were before.”

“And we’re together, now.”

Zoya needed something to anchor herself on; the words felt uncertain, more like a question. Because she knew, deep down she knew she was still somehow living by what he had taught her: love is a weakness. And she knew that while Genya talked of friendship, Zoya herself was distancing from everyone. That she was suffocating her feelings for Nikolai, effectively cutting out the person she had relied on the most. That she didn’t know how to be close to someone. That, like the Darkling, she felt destined to be alone. And yet a part of her still needed to believe that a strand of what she conquered was going to save her, that someone was going to reach for her.

“And we’re together.”

Genya repeated, more firmly. We’re not going to let him bring us down another time. A litany. It was our blood on the skiffs, in the sand, on the rocks of a mountain. I’m nothing like him. An enchantment. And we’re together. He had taught her wrong. One day she would be free of this last cage, too.

[cadomoisspokenfor]

Ya know thinking about it, maybe there’s nothing more to Syds weird amount of trust for Farouk than gullibleness and pride.

There seemed to be a pattern of her not really internalizing the severity of Farouks crimes, she mostly just thought of him as an “asshole” throughout all the seasons and not someone doing deep long lasting damage to the people around her.

In chap 11 when they find the music box David ask what it is she says, “Nothing just your asshole parasite messing with my head.”

As if its Davids fault Farouks evil, or as if Farouks only a David problem, and not ya know, an extremely powerful supervillain bent on world domination.

I’m trying to figure out what Syds perception of Farouk was, so lets look at their major interactions.

1. Discovers his existence, chap 5. She was wondering what the problem in her and Davids relationship was and now she has someone to blame. I’ll point out, it’s likely she was only thinking of Farouk as an obstacle in the way of her and Davids relationship, and not as a horrifying abuser who’s had a chokehold on David for his entire life. Now the “mission” is clear, snip Farouk outta Davids head, everything’ll be perfect.

2. David and Amys childhood home, also chap 5. Farouk jump-scares them a few times. And I think as far as Syds concerned, that’s a cheap trick. She sheds a tear but then puts on a brave face and keeps moving. Just a horror show after all. None of it “real”. But then Lenny actually jumps out and attacks her, telepathically ties her up then starts grotesquely kissing David while he’s unconscious. And the way she talks, I think Syd internalizes Lenny as being like... a jealous ex. The kissing, the “you stole my man” type language. Man, this relationship obstacle just won’t get out the way. And then...

3. Mental Clockworks, chap 5-7. In the white room Farouk reveals his true form and chases Syd down which scares the shit outta her. But, important note, he doesn’t actually touch her before the delusion is put in place. It’s still very much not real.

Anyways, what’s a horrifying display of control and power for everyone else worked a bit differently for Syd. She was the only one who noticed anything was off. And she couldn’t place it for a while, which worried her, and she eventually gets incapacitated by Lenny. But then, she’s woken up by Cary who takes her into a phone booth and tries to update her on what’s happening, only she’s already figured it out. I’ll point this out as a moment of overconfidence, she’s visibly proud that she was able to see through the illusion. She’s not like the others, she’s a hero archetype. And being that means when Cary hands her the glasses and tells her to go save the others she’s super confident in her ability to do so. She’s the hero after all. And when she does put on the glasses she remarks, “She thought it’d be more interesting.” She’s actively downplaying this nightmare. I don’t hold it against her but my point in saying all this is that it comes back later. This is another instance of her thinking Farouk’s “Not that big a deal.” Underestimating his abilities. I mean, she saw through it after all, she could probably do it again if she needed too... right?

To summarize 3, Syd sees herself as the hero who saw through Farouks cheap illusion. She feels stronger than Farouk here, like he couldn’t hurt her (really hurt her I mean) even if he tried. And in that, she can’t relate to the others who treat it like a big deal or like a traumatizing moment in their adventure. It was just a standard hero vs villain fight to her. Really hope the points getting across cause this’ll come up later.

4. White room, chap 8. Another interaction with Lenny only this time she’s on the ropes, looking a lot worse for ware. Syds not scared of her anymore, or so she tells herself at least. She saw through Farouks tricks. She can do it again if she has too. Nothings gonna get in the way of her and Davids happily ever after. Except Lenny has a good point... she’s still inside David. Still attached to his mind. She could explode his brain if they try to rip her out forcefully. And David can’t handle himself against Farouk, Syd knows this. Cause Davids never won against Farouk up to this point. Getting out of Mental Clockworks was a team effort from her, Melanie, Cary, and Oliver. If it hadn’t been for the crown they wouldn’t’ve gotten out of their. Syds role in this was to keep Kerry and Rudy safe until Cary could complete his end of the plan. And she did. But David was helpless in that, as far she knows. So she, the hero, needs to do something. Just sitting around isn’t good enough. So... she switches with David again. Using a true loves kiss too, a truly fairy tale worthy action, one for the books.

She’s fully possessed now, completely outta control of her own body, but Farouk only used her to get Kerry. It’s a very short moment for Syd, she might not even remember it. When she wakes up she says, “Did we win?” She honestly might’ve just blacked out after the kiss. Because they’re not telepaths their minds are probably much easier to push to the side than Davids. She might not’ve really... experienced the possession is what I’m getting at. And she’s once again most concerned with David.

D: “You should not have done that, as much as I like kissing you.”

S: “It would’ve killed you.” She says that last line not in a concerned way, but in a playful-ish way. As if to say “Obviously I saved you. I’d destroy the world myself if it meant saving you.”

Ya know what, I’ll point out here also that David once again failed to beat Farouk. Syd managed to get Farouk out of his mind but David still couldn’t stop him in the real world.

5. Plaque, chap 9. As explained in show, Syds been part of the team hunting down Farouk and trying to stop him from finding his body. Before chap 12 she and everyone else is under the impression that Farouk is the source of the “maze virus”. A psychological plaque that freezes everyone in their tracks and causes them to chatter their teeth. Disturbing, but... just based on other stuff we know about the character... she probably doesn’t care that much. Her main focus is probably still David. And when David comes back, she immediately blames him for disappearing. Her context here being that he was found in the club they followed Farouk to, next to a bunch of teeth chatterers mumbling, “Help them. Their in the maze.” Clearly, he’s been somewhat involved with the events of the past year, so why hasn’t he contacted her? Why hasn’t he included her in it? Why’d he abandon her? He says he doesn’t remember anything? Ptonomy says otherwise. Clearly he remembers something. He’s keeping secrets. She gets why from the others, but why from her? They’re supposed to be a team. And he abandoned her, to go clubbing with Farouk or whatever it is that he was doing their.

6. Music box, chap 10. Davids back. Maybe she can just pretend things are normal. He leads them to the middle of nowhere and they find her old music box. Farouk. That asshole. His little jump scares and memory tricks won’t get to her. He can’t hurt her, remember? This is all he can do. Illusions, trick. And she’ll see right through them every time. Besides, was reminding her of her childhood really the best he can do? Yeah she’s got a childhood, so does everyone. She’s over it already. (I’m starting to type more and more in Syds perspective.)

6.5 Syd the illusion breaker gets caught in the maze, chap 12. Only... she’s out of it before David even enters her mind to save her. She sees that he’s there, doesn’t know why, but decides to use this as an opportunity to teach him a lesson. We all know the lesson though. The headline in this particular case is, “David never saved Syd from her maze.” He never even saw it. She doesn’t know what he’s talking about when she mentions it. He entered her mind but she’s the one in full control. Scary good control even, props to her. The lesson she’s trying to teach him is sort of... her own thought process on heroism. “Love can’t save us, it’s what we have to save.” Up to this point “love” is all Syds been fighting for. It’s been the driving force behind her heroism. She’s done some messed up things in her past, sure, but all her problems only made her stronger. They made her the “truth seer” she is today. They led her to David, the best thing that’s ever happened to her. No villain can hurt her more than she’s hurt herself. This all... obviously doesn’t translate perfectly to David. That’s just... not been his experience.

(Skippable David Tangent) Farouk hurt David the most that any one person could. And David couldn’t hurt himself more even if he tried. And all Davids pain hasn’t made him mentally stronger, less gullible, or less sensitive. The opposite in fact. Davids minds been split, unbeknownst to Syd. He’s in a constant state of confusion. He keeps getting tugged around by friends and enemies and doesn’t know what to do about it. Davids pain hasn’t shielded him at all, just caused him more strife. He’s even still being manipulated by his abuser. The survivor story just doesn’t work on him, at the moment at least. As far as Davids concerned his “strength” comes from his powers, and he didn’t get a choice in those either. Syd doesn’t see any of this, she’s not a telepath. She hopes her story will help him but... it really only applies to her. Back into her perspective though,

7. Lenny’s back, chap 15. I know this isn’t a Farouk interaction but it is sorta important. Davids not listening to her. She’s trying to remind him of the mission, trying to keep him focused, but clearly it’s not working. Losing his sister really affected him. She understands sure, but he won’t even talk to her about it. Love is what’s supposed to be used to help each other through these dark times, to make sure people don’t feel alone. But he’s isolating himself from her. He isn’t “saving love” he’s pushing it away. That’s not what heroes are supposed to do. Farouk is once again in the way of their love. She can’t blame David, and she knows it’s not her fault, so Farouk.

But the headline there is she’s downplaying his sisters death. As if it’s just another trick to mess with him, an obstacle to be hurdled over. Like the music box thing. But... his sister died. In fact... Lenny was more immediately comforting to him about it than either of the Syds were.

Syd still isn’t internalizing the pain Farouks causing to others. All she’s internalized is her own wins against him and the fact that he’s never permanently damaged her specifically. Or so she says. He’s still just a ghost in a haunted house.

8. Lenny talk, chap 16. Syd comes over to gloat. She sees through Farouks trick. Lenny’s not gonna frazzle her, or David. She’s just another obstacle to their happiness. Only Lenny drops a hard truth on her. And Syd doesn’t seem to want to hear it. She’s stunned at. Tbh... I think she walks away deciding not to believe her. It must be another trick. She just said that to mess with her (again, Syds thoughts). She really really wants to continue thinking of Farouk as “just some asshole” who they need to work with and/or defeat so her and David can finally have their happy ever after. At this point, if she actually started thinking of Farouk as dangerous to her, as a major threat, it’d feel like giving him power. The power of fear, over her. She refuses to be afraid of Farouk, cause she knows that’s how he tricks people. That’s how he controls them. So she doesn’t listen to Lenny. She resolves to continue downplaying Farouks crimes. A dog barking in peoples ears.

9. The cave, chap 18. In between this and the last one David left her again. He really doesn’t get what “saving love” means. But she dedicates herself to him again. If he won’t save love, she will. She’s a hero after all. She’s beaten Farouk in the past and she’ll beat him again if she has too. And then... the cave. Incorporating what another fan has said, even if Syd does pic up on Melanie being Farouk, she knows her future self wanted to work with him for some reason. He was the key to saving the world. He may be a house haunting asshole, but if he saves the world, then there’s gotta be something more to him... right? Melanie complains about Oliver some more, she’s over it. But then Melanie starts showing Syd images. Syd doesn’t know how she’s doing that, but some of the images are from very private personal moments. And they’re all centered on David. These must be memories. Both her and Davids. How Melanie is doing this can go on the back-burner for now, what is she trying to tell her with these? That Davids crazy? No, Farouk’s the one who was behind all these things. Davids “her man.” Her one true love. The problem in their relationship has always been Farouk.

But then... there are all those moments after she got Farouk out of his head. Him keeping secrets. Him not confiding in her, or being there for her. Him constantly leaving her behind. That’s not how love’s supposed to work. A psychopath? Well, when you say that... and you show these images on the screen... and you show him torturing Oliver ( a victim) to get to Syd. And enjoying it, almost like he just wanted the excuse to go all out. Like it’s not really about saving Syd. Or love for that matter. Syd maybe admits to herself at this point that Davids fairly unhinged. He’s had a rough childhood though, there were bound to be some sharp edges here and there. He tortures Oliver for a long time though. And it really starts to feel like he just likes doing it, not that he’s doing it cause it’s “necessary”. It doesn’t even work.

And then... Melanie shows her Future Syd. She matches the description David gave her. And there’s David, in those same pajamas he wears. And... he’s kissing FS. He didn’t tell her about that. It’s not cheating cause it’s her future self. But... they talked about this. David was the one to say it might feel weird. Why not tell her? Why keep that a secret. Even if it’s not cheating, it certainly feels like it. It’s a huge betrayal. And he doesn’t have Farouk as an excuse. Davids just... a bad person. She’s starting to piece together the point of all this. “Legion, The World Killer” yada yada.

David hasn’t been loyal to her. He hasn’t saved loved, he’s not going to save love. The path he’s on is dark and selfish. Could he destroy the world? They’ve known he could since season 1. They never thought he’d actually do it. But wait no, you can’t give up on love that easily. He’s a good person. And then Melanie shows it all again. And she shows him kissing Lenny. And she shows FS telling Farouk about David. And Syd can’t help but concede. Davids too far gone. Farouk may be an asshole, but David lied about everything. He lied to Syd. Again, Davids not going to save love, he missed the mark on that. Davids going to end the world.

Very important to point out here, as I’ve tried to build it up, Syds internalized herself as a hero who doesn’t let anything get to her. Farouk can’t hurt her with his illusions and tricks. She’s seen through them before and she’ll do it again. But David betraying her? Keeping secrets? Playing with her heart? That hurts more than anything Farouks done to her. She invested in David. She was on his side no matter what, but he wasn’t on her side. So if FS says Davids evil and has gotta go, than she’ll believe her. He’s gotta go.

All of this hopefully explains my theory on Syds specific moment-to-moment reasoning thoroughly

I also wanna say though, if I’m right this makes Syds moment on the mountain make more sense. All the specific unexplained discrepancies.

She says she knows it was Farouk who showed her all that. Because she doesn’t perceive Farouk as that big of a threat and again, as mostly a house haunter. Those were clearly memories, she doesn’t care that the infos coming from him, and she believes she can tell the difference between an illusion and something real. so Davids gotta answer for that.

She gets a detail wrong, she says “He went to see her, after you quit.” But we all know he saw her before David quit and specifically set him up. Syd doesn’t know David specifically broke their rules after they set them. She thinks he kissed her beforehand and didn’t tell her for whatever reason.

And again, she doesn’t fully understand what everyone around hers been through. Hence, “The son of sam” thing. To her, Farouk maybe evil, but you can see through his tricks if you just try hard enough. Even though he possessed her she didn’t really register it happening. At a certain point the things you do when he’s in your head are on you (says Syd).

Oh, and also majorly, the “Farouk, your enemy” thing. She never really care about him all that much. He was just an obstacle. David was the one who had a weird complex about him.

Tl;dr Syd doesn’t view Farouk as much of a threat. She doesn’t register or internalize the pain he’s causing to the others cause he’s not doing any of it to her. Syds main focus is David and when she realizes what Farouk’s showing her are memories, and that David’s betrayed her and isn’t planning on “saving love”, that hurts her more than anything Farouks done. Thus, she turns.

[himikiyo]

i’ve been on my lonely // himikiyo week day 5

Himikiyo Week Day 5: Skirt + Lipstick

“This kind of meddling is rather unlike you,” Kirumi remarked that evening. “Setting them up on a date?"

After seeing Korekiyo and Himiko dance around each other for so long, Rantaro takes things into his own hands.

Read on AO3, DRA, or under the cut.

It was that time of year again. The season of parties, reunions, and all manner of other Danganronpa events. They existed all year long for those who wished to embrace their celebrity status, of course, but even the disinterested among them were dragged into the lead up to a new season. Season 53 was one of the biggest hits in a generation.

Without really meaning to, Rantaro had fallen into the role of the group’s big brother figure. Ironic, considering his utter failure at it in his fictional backstory. He liked helping his friends though, found more fulfillment in that than working on his own problems. He didn’t get much time to bond with anyone during the killing game, but he’d more than made up for it.

At the moment, he was in the hotel room of one Yumeno Himiko. One of the most resentful of the fame bestowed on all of them, she always required a little extra encouragement in the days before big events. That...wasn’t always because of Team Danganronpa though.

“It’s okay to feel anxious about seeing them,” Rantaro said, summoning every bit of patient encouragement in his possession. “Or even to be looking forward to it. Other people’s grudges don’t need to affect what you do, you know.”

“It’s not like that!” she exclaimed, sounding downright panicked. The blush spreading across her face told a different story, along with the soft-looking plushie she was absentmindedly hugging. Even at a glance, the long, dark hair and green uniform were unmistakable. It was the official Shinguuji Korekiyo plush from the DR53 line. It had been one of the lower sellers, compared to others like Ouma or Saihara who were sold out for months. Himiko’s copy was clearly well-loved though, if she even went to the effort of bringing it along to a hotel.

“Are you sure?” He raised an eyebrow, letting his gaze drop to the plushie to tell her he noticed it.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” Himiko argued back stubbornly. “It’s just something soft to hug. Theirs was on sale. It’s not like I kiss its forehead and tuck it into bed or something.”

“Mhm.” She definitely did exactly that. “Well, if you don’t care at all about seeing Shinguuji, I guess there’s no need to talk about it anymore, right?”

“Right. No need.”

“On another topic then, I know a good restaurant nearby. We could head over there for dinner tonight if you don’t have plans with anyone else.”

“Sure.” She perked up some then, plushie still securely in her arms. “That’d be good.”

“Then shall we meet in the park at 7:00?”

---

After leaving Himiko’s hotel room, Rantaro didn’t return to his own. No, he had another friend to pay a visit to.

“Amami-kun, what brings you here? I don’t recall making plans with anyone.” Korekiyo tilted their head in curiosity, hand coming up to cover their unmasked face. It seemed a subconscious gesture, a lingering instinct to keep from being seen. Himiko would surely know more about that than Rantaro though. He’d caught her looking at photos and tabloid articles about them more than once.

“Oh, no, we didn’t have any plans,” he said, chuckling softly. “I apologize for catching you off-guard, Shinguuji-san. In fact, I came here to find out if you’d be interested in making some.”

“Making plans with you? Ah, well, it’s kind of you to offer, but...”

“Hoping for someone else?” he asked. Just as predicted, Korekiyo’s eyes widened, a clear sign of someone whose true feelings had been discovered.

“I wouldn’t dream of being so rude,” they demurred. “It isn’t as though I have people lining up to spend time with me these days, yes? I should accept invitations as they come.”

“If you’re sure. I happen to know Himiko’s room number if you’d prefer to ask her.”

“I...it’s not like that. Even if I did wish to invite Yumeno-san out, she wants nothing to do with me. The same is true of most of our group.”

“Then do you want to grab dinner tonight? I know a great place nearby. We could meet in the park at 7:00?”

“That...would be acceptable. Thank you, Amami-kun.”

---

“This kind of meddling is rather unlike you,” Kirumi remarked that evening. “Setting them up on a date? That seems more like something Kaede might do.”

“Maybe I’m learning from her,” Rantaro said with a laugh. “It’s about time those two sort out their differences. They can claim to be at odds all they want, but they’re the only people who really believe they’re enemies. Well, maybe Chabashira-san too, but that’s more wishful thinking than anything else.”

“Here’s hoping it works out.” Offering him a mischievous grin from over the rim of her teacup, she added, “I owe Ouma-kun some money if they don’t get together by the end of the year, and it’s already fall.”

“I don’t think you have to worry.”

---

Where the hell was Rantaro? Himiko had arrived at the park right on time, but there was no sign of him anywhere. It wasn’t like him to be late or stand people up — not without a serious reason to do so. The park was relatively small, so it didn’t seem likely that she could have simply missed him.

Just as she was debating whether she should try to text him and ask where he was, she caught sight of someone out of the corner of her eye. Even before she turned her head to look though, she could tell that it wasn’t him. This figure was taller and didn’t radiate his relaxed confidence in the least.

Korekiyo? An unmasked Korekiyo at that. She still wasn’t used to them being more lax about face coverings these days.

“Oh, um, Shinguuji. What a coincidence seeing you here.” Her voice sounded forced and awkward even to herself. She wished the ground would just swallow her up and save her from needing to interact with them, but no amount of wishing would make that dream come true. The world seemed dead set on reminding her of her (unfortunate, tragic, hopeless) crush at every possible opportunity.

“There are no accidents in this world,” they replied, sounding ominous as usual. “And in any case, it shouldn’t be that surprising, yes? Seeing someone at a park mere moments from the hotel where you’re both staying isn’t a terribly unlikely thing to occur.”

“Well, yeah, I guess so. It doesn’t really matter, I was just making conversation or something.” Her voice trailed off more and more until it was barely a half-whispered mutter, any semblance of confidence stomped out by embarrassment. “Anyway, uh, I’m actually supposed to be meeting Rantaro here to go to dinner together. Have you seen him?”

“You’re supposed to be meeting with Amami-kun?”

“Is there something weird about that?” It was a defensive question, one that slipped out before she was able to stop herself. Surely Rantaro never let any of her secrets slip, right? There was no way Korekiyo could know what kinds of things she said about them to Rantaro.

“As a matter of fact, yes, there is something weird. I’m supposed to be meeting him for dinner too.”

“What?”

Instinctively, she glanced around looking for cameras or anything else that might hint at this being some kind of staged interaction. She wouldn’t put it past some of the entertainment industry to spring something like that on her unannounced. However, there was nothing, nor did she really think Korekiyo would play along with something like that. Of their group, they were one of the most resentful about what they’d been through. Understandably so.

“I was asked to meet him here at 7:00,” they said, briefly pulling out their phone to confirm the time again. “It seems Amami-kun may have double booked himself.”

“Why would he do that?” Himiko wondered aloud. “It isn’t like him to be so careless.”

“Ah, you two are close then? I did notice that you’re on a first name basis.” Kiyo gave her a placid look, fixing their already perfect hair. God, they really were unfairly pretty. So much so that she felt a pang of jealousy at the realization that anyone could look over and see exactly what she was seeing right now.

“No, not really.” They were wearing black lipstick instead of their usual red, and the striking green of their eyeshadow made their amber color even brighter than usual. “We’re friends, but I don’t know if I’d say we’re close. It’s pretty casual.”

“I see. I am not close to him either. In fact, I was rather surprised by his invitation today. If he decided to back out, it wouldn’t be much of a shock. I’m much less convinced he would do something like that to you though.”

“What does that mean?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Why are we so different?” Their outfit was gorgeous too, almost all black but no less intriguing for the lack of variety. Her eyes couldn’t help but trace the lines of their slightly too long sleeves (impressive, given how lanky they were) and flowy skirt.

“You know exactly why. I don’t think I need to give you a refresher course on that, Yumeno-san.”

She just sighed, not sure what she was meant to say in response to that.

“Well, it doesn’t really matter what you think about it. Likely or not, he’s standing both of us up.”

“Unless...” The word was spoken so softly that Himiko wasn’t sure she was meant to hear it. Did they have some other idea about what could be going on?

Clearing their throat briefly, Kiyo continued. “If Amami-kun does turn out to be a no show...I suppose we could still go to the restaurant he chose. Together. If that’s something you’d be interested in.”

“Yeah.” She smiled softly, thinking of the Kiyo plushie snuggled up safe and sound in her hotel room. Could...this have been Rantaro’s plan all along? She still had her doubts about whether Kiyo returned her feelings, but they were asking her to dinner. “We could do that.”

---

By the time they’d been seated in a cozy, dimly lit corner, it was abundantly clear that the restaurant was a romantic one, meant to cater to couples on dates. If it hadn’t already been obvious that the whole situation was some sort of set up on Rantaro’s part, that would have cemented it. He wanted them to go on a date.

She was afraid of getting her hopes up.

“Seems like a nice place,” she remarked, fiddling with the edge of her menu. Aside from the quiet background noise of other patrons talking and soft music, the quiet at their table was deafening. Not much conversation happened on the walk over either, mainly small talk about their day to day lives and those of their fellow alumni.

“Yes, it does,” Kiyo echoed. “Not the sort of establishment I would have pegged Amami-kun as frequenting.” She wondered if they were nervous or if she was just imagining the signs of tension. The stiff slope of their shoulders, the tenuous edge to their voice...

“Yeah, maybe not his type of place. Does that mean it’s yours?”

“It could be. There’s beauty in things like this, even if I’ve grown somewhat disillusioned with humanity as a whole.”

“And...is anything else here your type?” The instant the words escaped her mouth, she felt mortified. A moment’s bravery had been enough to say something like that? It was all she could do not to slink down in shame, face hot as she took a sip of water. “Um, never mind actually, that was a silly question.”

“No, I don’t believe it was. There is something else here that’s my type, believe it or not.” The mood lighting made it difficult to tell for sure, despite the lack of their usual mask, but it seemed like they could have been blushing.

“Really? And are you going to tell me what?”

“I wonder,” they said, lips curving into a smile. “Do you have any suspicions?”

“I might. If I’m right about why Rantaro planned all this out, then that doesn’t leave too many options.” She was far from an expert at the art of flirtation, but she suspected the same might be true of them. As suave as they often managed to seem in the past, it was a facade, part of the character Team Danganronpa created for them. Or perhaps not even that. Even for the ‘ideal’ Korekiyo, the one that only ever existed on paper, that confidence wasn’t so genuine. Not to the extent of really being able to open up and be vulnerable.

It wasn’t the time to make herself sad thinking of what they had to go through. If they saw any accidental hints of pity in her eyes, it could ruin everything. All she could do was try her best at chasing after what she really wanted.

“Care to share your deductions, then?” Was it intentional, the way their hand was sliding closer to her along the table? They’d never been one to take the prospect of physical contact lightly.

“I’m no detective,” she said, needing to suppress a shiver when their fingertips just barely grazed her own. Their nail polish was black too, matching their lipstick. No rings of the sort Rantaro still tended to wear, but she had a feeling they’d suit them. Any kind of jewelry would be lucky to adorn them.

“I don’t believe you need to be. In fact, I’d say the answer is quite obvious.”

Himiko chuckled. Their fingers were tangling together in earnest now, unmistakable as anything but what it was — holding hands.

“I know everyone kind of pushes us to keep up certain appearances. The media, the fans...even our friends, whether they mean to or not. They expect things,” she said softly. It was why it didn’t take her long after the end of the killing game to figure out that she shouldn’t talk about Kiyo too much, or with anyone who couldn’t keep a secret. The others found her interest strange, even repulsive. They were supposed to be enemies, forced into that box largely by people who didn’t have anyone’s best interests at heart.

“Yes, they do,” Kiyo agreed. Rather than launching into a long, anthropology-tinted lecture as they might have been prone to doing in the past, they seemed content to simply listen and reflect on what she had to say, allowing her to talk and draw conclusions on her own.

“Not many people would be happy about the idea of us getting closer, but...” She glanced down at the table, at how nicely their hands fit together. There in the corner, none of the other people in the restaurant had noticed who they were. Danganronpa fans were everywhere, but that didn’t mean it was impossible to steal moments of peace.

“But you’re tired of organizing your life around what other people think, yes? And Amami-kun for one, though I can’t claim to know him on a very deep level, seems supportive. I would go as far as saying enthusiastic. I can’t recall anyone else attempting to pry about my romantic life.” They paused, then clarified, “Not with benign intentions, that is.”

“So you’d be interested in it too? Getting to know each other better instead of always acting like we’re still enemies?”

“I never considered you my enemy in the first place, Yumeno-san. I would be honored to be given that chance.”

There was no doubt those words were genuine. For someone who slipped so easily into the role of villain, Kiyo was remarkably free of malice towards...anyone, really, save for some Team Danganronpa higher ups.

“Then I guess we could even call this a date.”

Still clasping her hand, they lifted it just enough to brush a kiss over the back of it, leaving a barely noticeable smudge behind.

“That we could.”

[grayyxv]

A Comprehensive Analysis of Eustass 'Captain' Kid

I've been wanting to write this for awhile now as Kid is undoubtedly one of my favourite characters in One Piece. Also, I'm majoring in Psychology so I can't help but think about why I love his character so much.

Disclaimer: As we all know, Kid doesn't have much screentime so it's quite difficult to understand his character completely. So, whatever you read will be my own intepretation of his character (based on the little amount of scenes that he has). Of course, you don't have to agree with it but it might give you a bit of a different perspective!

So, withour further ado, let's begin!

*P.s I'll try to make it flow in but it might end up really messy so I apologize for that*

Note: NOT SPOILER FREE!!!

1. Assumptions

I guess I'll begin with some of the common assumptions of his character based on posts/videos I've seen about his character. They frequently refer to Kid as 'cruel' or 'heartless'. Basically, there are many negative remarks about his character that makes him seem like a total psychopath.

Their reasoning for this would be because:

- He mentioned that he would kill anyone would mocked him

- His high bounty = He's notorious & violent

- The way he acts makes him come off as a bloodthirsty pirate

From another standpoint, I can see why people might think that way about him. The way he speaks and acts does make him look villainous. In addition, his primary role in One Piece is to be Luffy's rival. (I'll expand on this point later.) So, one might think that his morals would contrast Luffy. Whereas Luffy is the kind and benevolent pirate, Kid is the 'bad guy' who is cruel and heartless. The question is, though Kid is rival character, why does that necessarily mean that he would be a bad guy? I strongly disagree that Kid is a psychopath and that he is heartless. Firstly, the term 'psychopath' shouldn't be used so loosely. A true psychopath would have no regard for other's feelings which is not true of Kid because he cares very much for his crew. On the other hand, Doflamingo would be a good example of a psychopath. Next, even if Kid WERE a psychopath, not all psychopaths are violent. So it'd be nice if people stopped misrepresenting psychopaths.

Now, if there is one thing I learned in psychology, is that people tend to make assumptions about a person's actions as part of their personal dispositions rather than because of situation. This would be the Fundamental Attribution Error (FAE). What do I mean by this? Let's take a look at Kid's scenario. He mentioned killing people who mocked his dream. Killing people would make people automatically assume that Kid is 'violent'. But here is a different perspective, what if 'mocking him' had meant that they tried to start a fight with him? Provoking other people repeatedly would cause anybody to get angry. There are many other characters who acts this way as well. Sure, Luffy doesn't go as far as to kill them but I'm sure that many other characters do because they are PIRATES.

In contrast, I think of this situation as Kid standing up for himself. He believes in himself and he would beat anyone up who tells him otherwise. If you think about it, Luffy is kind of similar because he ends up fighting anyone who tries to stop him from attaining his goal.

That is pretty much all the assumptions that people make about his character. It's sad how they don't delve deeper but fret not!! I still have more to say.

2. Pre-Timeskip vs Timeskip Changes/Growth as a character

During Pre-timeskip, Kid is seen as overconfident. I actually agree with this statement quite a lot. His high bounty was a result of his reckless behaviour. He could easily triumph over anyone before the timeskip. That was when he started to become a little too full of himself. Consequently, he suffered heavy losses. His arm was taken by Shanks, his crew was utterly defeated by Kaido (curse you Apoo) and his reputation as the top supernova was instantly lost to Luffy. His true character development was in the Wano arc where we see how he starts to take a step back and re-evaluate his situation. The most obvious evidence for this was when he got captured in Udon. He was quiet (before Luffy's arrival) and deep in thought. So many things had happened to him, you could even argue that he was feeling slightly lost and helpless (not depressed) because he was utterly defeated. The motivation and drive he had in pre-timeskip was shattered- Until Luffy arrived of course. When Luffy arrived, he was battered and bruised but he was still ready to fight. Kid, who saw how Luffy still had his fighting spirit, was somehow inspired to keep on fighting. It's almost as if Luffy is Kid's drive to be stronger.

So, what does this all say about Kid?

I think that this makes his character believable as it can represent real life. There are some points in our lives where we could be the greatest but, sometimes, life can be pretty cruel too. If you get too cocky or overconfident, the world will punish you. I saw a comment that says Kid is Luffy but without the plot armour. That is very true. Kid isn't perfect. He made tons of crappy decisions and dealt which the consequences. I'd say he's as reckless as Luffy, perhaps LESS reckless than Luffy but he suffers more than Luffy does. While Luffy could bask in glory, all Kid got was the short end of the stick. I think that is the reason why I find Kid such an appealing character- because its an accurate representation of real life. Sometimes you can try as hard as someone else but you won't always get the spolight.

The other appealing aspect is his persistence. He made mistakes and bad decisions but he knows that he can't undo them and has to move on. Kid isn't as lucky as Luffy because he didn't have someone like Rayleigh to train him so, he had to put in more effort somehow. The main point is, he had to learn everything the hard way. Yet, he still strives to be the best which is very befitting of a rival character.

3. interactions & Personality

Another thing I frequently see when people Kid and Luffy is that: People say that while Kid makes enemies, Luffy makes allies which is why he has so much support from others around him. I was thinking about this a lot and I can't help but disgaree. I saw another post where they mentioned Kid's MBTI personality is INFJ which made me think even more about that statement. From here on, I will include several headcanons about his character as well.

Let me offer you a different perspective. Perhaps Kid isn't good at expressing his feelings. The way he speaks may come off as cold which makes other people dislike him because they think he is rude whereas he simply doesn't know how to communicate with others very well. Luffy is no doubt an extrovert, seeing how he is easily able to interact with others. Kid on the other hand, if he is an introvert, it could be an explaination to why he doesn't have many interactions with others. I don't see him as someone who's very 'sociable'. So he could experience some difficulty when communicating his feelings. He's shown to be closer to his crew more than anyone else. He is deeply respected by his crewmates because he is sensitive to their needs as well. He isn't the tyrant that everyone paints him to be, he earned that respect by first respecting his crewmates. Also, he would essentially DIE for any of his crewmates. This part is quite self explainatory if you've read the chapter where they revealed what happened to Kid and Killer in Wano.

I just want to add that while Killer suffered so much in Wano, imagine how much it hurt Kid to see his first mate suffer and how he couldn't do anything about it. The expression on his face is perfectly the anger he had towards Kaido, Apoo and more importantly, HIMSELF for not being strong enough. Yet, people call him heartless though he would literally die for Killer.

But anyways, Kid is an excellent listener and he cares very deeply for people he is close to. I just think he's bad at communicating. Look at the way he talks to Luffy. In Wano, you can see how Kid actually does LIKE Luffy as a rival. He just has trouble expressing himself. Anyways, this is just a headcanon but I think that he's rather sensitive to other's feelings- Especially when it comes to his crew. I really like the idea that he's an INFJ because he seems more like the 'advocate' type of character. I still think he makes a very good leader but his approach would contrast Luffy's.

4. Intelligence

I could probaly go on forever about why I love Kid but this is another thing that I see about Kid and kind of annoys me. I'm not sure why everyone seems to think he's a dumbass. Like REALLY. I think he's pretty intelligent. He even kept tabs on the whole SMILE situation and Doflamingo and planned the alliance. He IS intelligent but his recklessness just makes him seem like an idiot.

Kid isn't perfect, he is flawed just like a real human being would be. By no means is he a GOOD person but I don't think he is as 'cruel' or 'bad' as people paint him to be. He cares a lot for his crew. He is very driven by his own personal values and he wouldn't 'change' for anyone. He believes in himself and if anyone tells him otherwise, he would simply beat them up. He isn't happy go lucky like Luffy, he is much deeper than that. He would consider his options and plan- to a certain extent because he is also quite idealistic. Hence, the reason why I feel like his character is such an interesting one is because there is a lot of opportunity for him to grow and stray away from stereotypical anime character traits. His character is believable because his personality is realistic, it could reflect a real human being.

TLDR: Stop sleeping on Kid.

With that, thanks for coming to my ted talk.

Anyways, that's it for now! I'll make a part 2 if I feel like I want to add something. If people like this, I'll consider making another analysis for other characters. Currently I have Law, Ace and Sabo planned in mind but we'll see how it goes.

Thanks for reading!

[dindjarindiaries]

Collide - Chapter 3

summary: Bella survives her first full day at the office with Steve and Javier and earns an unexpected guest on her trip to the market.

warnings: angst, flashbacks/trauma, soft!javi

rating: R

word count: 3.204k

masterlist

chapter 3

Willing yourself to get to work is a challenge the next day. You hate yourself for the way your heart’s about to fly straight out of your chest and take off for some faraway destination. This is precisely why you left Texas behind, to get yourself out of these situations where you’re constantly haunted by the things of the past. Instead, possibly one of the biggest parts of it is going to be sitting right there, at the same cluster of desks as yours, inevitably in contact with you for most of the day.

And what you despise the most is the way that thought makes your heart skip a hopeful beat.

Javier doesn’t deserve your attention, much less your affection. He left you high and dry in Texas for years, leaving you to think that he hated you and regretted all the thirteen years he’d known you—especially your most intimate moment together. Not only that, but his engagement and almost-marriage to Lorraine—her of all people, and you laugh to yourself as you think about the irony—wasn’t much of a secret in Kingsville, especially your lack of an invitation. Your supposed best friend didn’t even want you at his wedding.

And now, he’s your partner at work—and he’s sent you gifts of things you never would’ve expected to receive.

You hate the way Javier can still play such a vicious game of tug-of-war with your heart, and you fume on this as you sit inside the car the embassy had supplied for you and take off for the office. Your thumb drums against the steering wheel as you recall the easy directions Steve had given you before you’d left his apartment last night, trying your best not to dwell on the thoughts that’d plagued not only your morning but also your slumber. Javier never left your mind or heart as easily as he left your life, and now that he’s snuck his way back into the latter, you know it’ll be much harder to kick him out of the former.

When you pull into one of the parking spaces at the office, you release a sigh that you hope will take all your worries with you. You realize the effort was in vain when you get out of the car and step onto shaky legs. Cursing under your breath, you wish you would’ve been able to get more than a sorry excuse for a granola bar down your throat this morning as you walk inside the building. You receive a few stares of confusion as people see you enter, and you simply give them polite nods as you walk by. You hope that when your face is more well known, you’ll receive kinder acknowledgements—though, you’re not sure how thrilled all of these people are to have another woman around.

Steve and Javier are already in when you get to the cluster of desks. You can feel Javier’s gaze on you the minute you’re in their range, and you try to ignore its heat for moment as you drop your keys onto the desk and start pulling out your chair.

“Morning,” Steve greets, looking up from his work briefly to give you a small smile. “I’m glad we didn’t scare you off already.”

You scoff, returning his smile as you sit down. “Luckily. We’ll see what today brings.”

Both men chuckle at your words, and you bite back a smile at the easy interaction. You feel some of the dread for the day already starting to fall away, only to feel something completely new arise when your gaze finally drifts over to Javier. He’s temporarily looked away from you, and so you take the time you can to observe him completely. His beige button-up leaves a few undone, providing a clear view of his upper chest and neck. You try to blink back the memories of the kisses you’d left there under the stars that night, but surprisingly it’s Javier himself who saves you from the torment. He looks back up to you to catch your gaze, offering a hopeful lift of his brow.

“How are you feeling?” Javier asks, and you’re taken aback by the question. You weren’t expecting him to say something so… well, personal.

“I’m alright,” you assure him, trying to hide the smile you want to show him so badly.

“Did you, uh… get everything alright?” Javier sounds almost shy continuing his interrogation.

You can’t help giving him that smile now. “Yeah, I did. Thank you so much for that.” Javier nods, and you notice that he’s barely able to hold his own smile back as he looks down at his work. Despite all the problems left unsolved between the two of you, the interaction triggers a familiar instinct and a nostalgic feeling, as if you’re falling back into your old ways again.

You blink a few times and look down at the files in front of you. No, you try to scold yourself. You can’t do that. Not without resolving things first. You fear that if you fall in step with Javier again in the way you used to, he’ll refuse to open up at all regarding the things he did and has done since you two last saw each other, and you can’t have that. You must know what happened in the in-between, and you know that eventually you’ll have to tell him the same about yourself.

For the workday, though, you’re able to shelve these thoughts as you start to dive deep into what you’re doing. You, Steve, and Javier read through the files you have and discuss them, tracing patterns and making notes of anything that makes more appearances than usual. You start to get the hang of all the codenames and people you’d previously read up on and heard about yesterday, and by the time you’re heading home—which, thanks to Escobar’s sheer invisibility and the lack of action, is at quite a reasonable hour—you feel as if you’re fitting in perfectly.

Steve tells you the same thing as the three of you walk out to your cars, reflecting on your first full day at the office. “You know, it’s really great to have you here,” Steve confesses. “I think that’s the most productive Peña and I have been in a long fuckin’ time.”

You chuckle. “Well, like Connie said: too much testosterone. I’m glad I can help the balance.”

“I never even realized how much we didn’t get done until today,” Steve continues, looking past you to catch Javier’s eye. “Javi, we were shit at paperwork, weren’t we?”

Javier scoffs. “That’s one way to put it, Murphy.” Javier’s gaze then switches to you. “But I’m not surprised. She’s always been able made any situation better.”

You try your best to keep the heat from rushing to your cheeks as you shake your head. “Cállate, cariño.”

“Hablo en serio,” Javier insists with a chuckle. “I see that not much has changed.”

Your soft smile soon starts to turn into a grimace at his words. No, you dipshit, everything’s changed. “You’d be surprised.” You try to look at him and force a smile, but you can tell he doesn’t buy it. Desperately wanting to change the subject, you turn your attention to Steve. “Where’s a good place to go for groceries around here? I haven’t loaded up my fridge or my pantry yet, and I’ll need something to eat tonight.”

“Oh, yeah, we actually go to a market that’s right down the road,” Steve answers, and as you step outside of the office, he gestures to the left. “They’ve got a lot of good stuff for cheap.”

“I… was actually about to head there myself tonight,” Javier says, demanding your attention once again. “I can bring you there.”

You force another smile, this time making it more realistic—despite the drastic change in pace at which your heart now beats. “Great.”

Steve heads to his car, waving his hand as you and Javier do the same. You both continue to walk through the parking lot, heading in the direction of the market. Tense silence fills the air between the two of you until Javier dares to break it.

“So, you—uh, you liked everything?” he asks, his arms swaying rhythmically with his body as he walks alongside you. His dark gaze turns to you, and you meet it to see something familiar sparkling inside of his eyes.

You nod. “Yeah, I really did, Javier,” you assure him honestly. “I actually didn’t expect you to remember my obsession with 100 Grands.”

Javier raises an eyebrow, chuckling a bit. “How could I forget, bella? Those shits were practically all you ate growing up. I must’ve spent at least a hundred dollars fueling your obsession.”

“That’s an exaggeration,” you remark, biting back your smile as your gaze returns to the road ahead of you.

“Por favor, bella.” You throw him a playful glare, and Javier gives you a guilty look in return. “Okay, well, at least fifty.”

“That’s better.” You both laugh to yourselves for a moment, and you let out a soft breath as you decide to continue pressing about what else was in the bag. “What about the pillow?”

You can sense Javier tensing beside you, and you look over to see his shoulders raised just a bit higher towards his ears. It was always a habit of his before to tighten up like that whenever he’s feeling shy or uncomfortable. You used to remedy it by placing your hands on them and easing them back down or wrapping him in an embrace to make him calm, but neither of those are things you’d even consider doing right now. “What about it?”

You hold back a scoff, looking over at him with a single eyebrow raised. “It’s identical to the one I got you. Where’d you get it from?”

Javier’s fingers begin to fumble with each other as he looks at them—another shy habit of his. “You know mi abuela loves to sew,” he begins to answer. “I had it done… I don’t know, a year after you gave me yours.”

Your gaze softens as you continue to look at him. “Really? Why?”

Javier shrugs, finally looking back over at you. “I just felt like it needed a match.”

“And so you kept it? Even after… everything?”

Javier’s dark gaze flashes with pain at your reference to the time and unspoken events that occurred before you saw him again. “You may not believe me, bella, but I really missed you.” You feel a pain in your chest when you realize it’s the second time he’s said those exact words to you. “And having both of those just… I don’t know, it made it feel like I still had part of you.” Javier scoffs to himself, looking to his feet. “I know, it sounds fuckin’ lame.”

“No, cariño, it doesn’t.” You give his shoulder a nudge, causing his gaze to snap back up at you. “But if you missed me that much, why didn’t you give me a call?”

Javier sighs heavily. “I thought you didn’t want to see me ever again.”

“What made you think that?”

Javier raises an eyebrow, giving you a look of confusion. “You told me so. That night.”

Your heart plummets into your stomach and you swallow hard, suddenly remembering the details your conscious has left out over the years.

“So, that’s it?” You scoff as you stare at Javier, crossing your arms defensively. “You’re just gonna go and pretend nothing ever happened?”

“I don’t know what you want me to do, bella,” Javier mutters, his hands fumbling with the bag you’ve given him—something you now wish you could steal back.

“Tell me it meant something.” You’re starting to beg at this point. It’s been eating you alive for so many months, chewing away at your every heart string and shredding your confidence. “Tell me I wasn’t dreaming when I saw the look in your eye that night. Tell me you didn’t regret it.”

Javier’s silent for a long moment as he stares in your gaze, and you eagerly try to find that same look—but all you can detect is his frustration towards you. “I… I can’t do that.”

You frown, feeling your eyes burn with oncoming tears. “Thirteen years, Javier! We’ve been so close for thirteen damn years, and now you’re just gonna leave me in the dark, and tell me that you regret something like that?”

Javier’s now frowning along with you, taking a step closer to look down at you with a furrowed brow. “Are you seriously throwing our friendship in my face? What are you trying to do, prove some kind of point about how you’ve managed to put up with me that long? Are you calling me difficult?”

“No, Javier, don’t be so dense! I’m trying to say that I would expect you to actually be honest with me and not fucking hurt me like this!”

Javier swallows hard, but the anger doesn’t leave his expression. “I am being honest. And if you’re willing to throw our friendship out over one night, then maybe none of it was worth it in the first place.”

His words become the stone that breaks your heart of glass, and you feel the shards slicing at your chest as you nearly fall to your knees in grief. Yet, the pain also fuels your anger, and now you’re taking a step away as you seethe at him. “Maybe you have a point. Maybe I was nothing more to you than a prize to win, all these years.”

Javier huffs. “That’s not true.”

You shake your head. “You’ve already made it obvious, Javier. I get it.” You pause to swallow back your tears of shared pain and rage, giving him the most lethal stare you can muster. “I hope I never have to see you again.”

The pain flashes across Javier’s face quickly, but he tries to disguise it by twisting his face with anger. “I can make that happen.” Javier says the words with certainty, and before you can stop him, he’s already stalking off to his truck. You don’t try to stop him, or remind him that he’s your ride back, or admit that you’re not being truthful—and you don’t know how you’ll live without seeing him ever again, because you love him so much. Instead, you watch as he leaves you behind, and your knees finally give way beneath you as your hands collect the sobs that spill out so violently from your chest.

That’s not a memory you were looking to remember.

You blink a few times, trying to get rid of the painful images and feelings it brings you. “I—I did, didn’t I?” You manage a chuckle, starting to rub your neck in your anxious manner. “Damn, I’m sorry. That was a bitchy move.”

“And just about everything I said and did were dick moves, so don’t worry, we can call it even.” Javier nudges your shoulder in the same way you’d done to him, causing you to smile slightly as you look back at him. “I think we’re mature enough now to realize that we were just two teenagers with a lot of hormones, bella.”

You stifle a laugh, shaking your head as you start to come upon the said market. “The sad part to me is that even when we became adults, we failed to recognize that.”

Javier rests a hand on your shoulder, holding your gaze with hints of heavy regret and hidden pain. “The in-between was never easy, bella. But we’ll work it out.”

You swallow hard. Yeah, I really fucking hope so. But you doubt you’ll be able to get anything out of Javier anytime soon, and you don’t know how the hell you’re going to be able to handle telling him everything about your life as well as how you’ve felt about what you’ve learned of his.

“For now, we have to focus on filling your kitchen with something other than 100 Grands and whiskey.” Javier chuckles with you as he says the words, gesturing to the market in front of you.

You give him a skeptical look as he leads you through the market. “Do you even need groceries, idiota? Or did you make that up as a sorry excuse to come here with me?”

Javier gives you a guilty look while also offering a shrug of his shoulders. “I do need some more coffee.”

You laugh and shake your head, letting yourself revel in the temporary feeling of old as you and Javier explore the market together. He tells you about all the foods he usually seeks out, and which ones are probably best to avoid. He tries to guess on the things he remembers you liking, and most of the time you’ll confirm his estimations while sometimes having to inform him that you’ve since grown a distaste for certain items. You’ll throw together a ton of things—some that you need and some that you honestly don’t, but have been encouraged by Javier to splurge on anyway—and, after about a half an hour of this, you’re heading back to the office to get your cars. The sun is just starting to sink lower in the Medellín sky, and you can tell it’s having an effect on Javier as he slowly starts opening up to you again.

“I feel like I need to thank you, bella,” Javier confesses, looking over at you as he carries some of your bags for you.

“For what, cariño?” you remark, returning his gaze with softness.

“I just—uh, I haven’t felt this much like myself for a long ass time,” Javier informs you. “It’s almost like… I don’t know, like you’re the only person who can bring that back out of me. So, um, thank you.”

You give Javier a warm smile—a genuine smile—and feel yourself beaming up at him. “I’m glad you can be yourself around me, Javier. No matter what’s happened since we’ve last seen each other, or whatever the hell I said before you left that night, just know that you can always be yourself around me.”

“Noted.” Javier throws you a wink with his word, and you playfully roll your eyes as you give his shoulder a shove.

As Javier helps you get the bags into your car, you’re torn between being scarily happy and rightfully pissed at yourself for what you’ve just allowed to happen. You know you shouldn’t be letting Javier get off the hook this easily, that you should be making him work harder to earn your good graces again, but you also can’t deny the relieving feeling of becoming close to him again. When you watch him wave goodnight as he gets into his car, you can’t help smiling to yourself at the way you’d both so effortlessly clicked again, even though you know there’s a lot more shit waiting in a storm cloud that’s hovering dauntingly over your mind and heart.

But you know what they say: old habits die hard.

chapter 4

translations:

Cállate, cariño = Shut up, sweetheart

Hablo en serio = I’m serious

Por favor, bella = Please, beautiful

tags: @tarrevizslas @none-of-your-bullshit @lavenderl3mons @gooddaykate @flower-petal-blooming @stilllivindue2spite @mrsparknuts @fionnthebandersnacc @pisss-offf-ghostt @gaydreamland @longitud-de-onda @literallytrashhhhhh @kkgraham @arrowswithwifi @rage-isaquietthing @awesomefandomsunited @theforceofdarkandlight @murdermewithbooks @blushingwueen @rachelloveseveryone @madadlorian @ah-callie @mrsdaamneron @lokiaddicted @arcadianempress @benakenalove @wickedfrsgrl @pascalisperfect @absurdthirst @weirdowithnobeardo @lcandothisallday @sailorflowermoon @engineeredfiction @souls-rain @kaylaylaylayla @cailoleaf @unintentionalwriter @earthtokace + irishleesh93 & moonlightmrvel

[jalapeno-princess]

In it to Win it

Kindergarten Teacher Jinyoung X Reader

Genre: Angst with a fluffy ending (Cocky and narcissistic Park Jinyoung)

Word Count: 3.9K

Summary: You’ve been a kindergarten teacher for the last three years and it’s been such an amazing experience other than the fact that one of the other teachers had it out for you for the last year and you’ve had enough of his brutality. Little did you know the reason why he was so cold toward you was because he had developed feelings for you from the minute the two of you were introduced to each other. Jinyoung never did relationships because he was so dedicated to his job and he wasn’t going to allow you to be the one to change that.

A/N: To the anon who requested a kindergarten teacher Jinyoung imagine a couple of weeks ago I’m so sorry for the delay and I apologize if it’s not what you were expecting but feel free to request again!

“Okay class, raise your hand if any of you have suggestions on how to decorate the door for Halloween.” As soon as the question fell from your lips, every tiny little hand raised and you couldn’t help but stifle a laugh at how eager your students were.

“Hmmm, how about you Subin?” The little girl beamed at you before speaking up.

“We could draw a big haunted house and then have ghosts flying out of it?” You smiled gently at her while writing down her suggestion.

“That sounds cool! What do you think Woojin?” He sent you a toothy grin before pointing at his shirt.

“I’d like a big, scary monster with sharp teeth and blood coming out of his mouth.” A few of the girls shrieked while most of the boys cheered on his idea. You however, weren’t a fan and shook your head in disagreement. Being a kindergarten teacher had its ups and downs. You’ve been at this for almost three years now and you’d like to say you were finally getting the hang of things.

Kindergarteners were at that age where they were still learning the basics; manners, abcs, 123s and your responsibility was making sure each and every one of your students had the basic curriculum down before sending them up to first grade. It was almost the end of first quarter which meant the start of the holiday season.

This was always one of your favorite parts of the semester. You loved preparing for the last three months of the year; specifically the door decorating contests. Every year for Halloween, thanksgiving and Christmas, there would be a door decorating contest for each grade level and the prize was a pizza party.

Every year, you had your students come up with ideas on how they would want to decorate the door and you were always so excited to see the effort and enthusiasm they put in to making sure your door stood out. When you first became a kindergarten teacher, you didn’t think much about being competitive; all that mattered to you was that your students had fun.

Unfortunately, you soon changed your mind about the entire event when a fellow kindergarten teacher made it aware that he took the “friendly competition” very seriously and went through great lengths to make sure his class won every single time. Park Jinyoung, in more or less words was the biggest pain in your ass.

From the day that you met him, you believed that he was one of the most arrogant and selfish people you’ve ever met. He was assigned to show you around on your first day of school and when you first laid your eyes on him, you had to bite your lip to prevent you from drooling. He was extremely good looking. Watching as he interacted with his students made your heart warm. Not only was he a sight for sore eyes, but he seemed to get along really well with children and he was very charming from what you observed.

However, Jinyoung made it aware that he wanted nothing to do with you unless he really had to. You never understood why he was so cold towards you, especially because you were nothing but nice to him but it didn’t matter. All that you cared about were your students and your work ethic as a teacher. From that day on, you made a promise to yourself to avoid Jinyoung and his snarky remarks at all costs, no matter how attractive you found him.

There were much more good looking men out there with genuine personalities. Park Jinyoung did not deserve your kindness nor your patience. At one point, you’d find yourself observing him in the hopes that you’d find out he was like that to the rest of the teachers and staff. To everyone else, he was quite the gentlemen.

He held doors for whoever was walking right behind him, always asked how the other teacher’s days were going and you found out that he would buy Christmas presents for the entire staff. You couldn’t remember if you ever did anything to upset or insult him and sometimes you wanted to confront him for his rude personality, but you didn’t want to cause any problems and end up getting fired for something you had no control over.

At the end of the day, you walked outside with your students and sent them off with their parents one by one. After saying goodbye to the last of your students, you were right about to head back in to your classroom when you heard someone call out your name.

“I overheard Mirae telling one of my students that you guys are going to win the door contest this year. Ha! I have to laugh. You stand no chance y/n. We’ve practically already won, so there’s no point in wasting your time.”

You sent him a chilling glare before scoffing. What was his problem? He was acting like such a child. If you weren’t mistaken, he could pass as one of your students.

“You overheard correctly. I plan on beating you this year. Why are you so confident huh? I wasn’t too impressed with your wicked witch last year. Honestly, if you want to win you should just put a picture of yourself on your door. That’ll scare everybody.” He let out a sarcastic giggle before crossing his arms indifferently. God, why did he have to be so handsome yet such an asshole?

“You’d like that wouldn’t you? Well whatever, just be prepared to see a bunch of sad faces when my students come running over to your class with pizzas in their hands. Have a nice—you know what? You don’t deserve a nice day. Just have a day y/n. Can’t wait to win.”

You wanted nothing more than to slap that egotistical grin off of his face but you knew you couldn’t. As much as your school believed in equality and treating every employee fairly, you knew they would end up choosing Jinyoung if the choice between the two of you ever came up. Not only was he there a couple years longer than you were, but he was quite the social butterfly and everyone in school seemed to like him. You on the other hand despised him with every fiber of your being and you were going to make sure your class was going to win each and every door contest.

As the days went by, your students worked diligently to color, cut and paste their drawings on your door. Going with Subin’s idea, you placed a big brown sheet of construction paper on the door and stuck on windows and some silly string to use as cobwebs. Then your students made themselves in to ghosts and scattered their drawings all over the door.

Once you were done with the finishing touches and stepped back to take a look at the final product, you were quite impressed with how it turned out and you could only hope the judges liked it just as much. When the day of judgement came, you watched nervously on the side to see what the scores were like. Jinyoung’s door was quite impressive and you weren’t surprised. He always put so much time and effort in to decorating. However, you couldn’t help but feel as if he was the one to do the entire project all by himself.

As talented as the kindergarteners were, you knew they weren’t capable to draw intricate shapes nor cut the paper perfectly. This contest was meant strictly for the children; therefore, you sent in an anonymous tip before the judges could come up with a decision. The day before Halloween, you were notified that your class had won the contest and you were extremely over the moon. In your three years of working at that school, this was the first time your class won the Halloween door contest.

Jinyoung won every single year for the last three years and you knew it was all because he was the one actually working on the door. He was a cheater and you hated that he’s been getting away with it for so long. A huge part of you wanted to march over to Jinyoung’s classroom and rub it in his face that you won, but you weren’t one to stoop down to someone’s level like he seemed to be. You just let your student’s cheers of happiness speak for you.

The beginning of November came and went and before you knew it, Thanksgiving was soon approaching. As much fun as it was beating Jinyoung just a month prior, seeing the broken expressions on his student’s faces made your heart hurt. This wasn’t even considerably fun to you anymore. You enjoyed the idea of winning against Jinyoung, but at what cost? The sadness of twenty three five-year-olds?

How could he be okay with putting his students through humiliation just so that he could win the contest? It wasn’t even about winning the pizza party for his students. His main goal was to beat you and you still couldn’t find a legitimate reason as to why he had it out for you. Your students were excited to work on the door again, but deep down you knew you weren’t going to try as hard so Jinyoung’s class had a chance at winning. Sure, you enjoyed seeing your students so overwhelmed with happiness as they enjoyed their celebration, but you felt bad with the way Jinyoung’s students looked at yours in envy.

After the judges talked to Jinyoung about why he lost last time, he made it his duty to make sure each and every one of his students were involved. Your students drew hand turkeys and it the effort they put in to coloring and cutting them made your heart flutter. No matter how frustrating it could be as a kindergarten teacher sometimes, seeing the smile on all their adorable faces at the smallest little things made it all worth it. The day before the judges came to look at your door, you had a unpleasant visit from the person you wanted to see the least. Before school could even start, you heard an all but gentle knock on the door and you released a frustrated sigh when he entered without you allowing him in.

“What are you—“ he rudely put his hand out in front of you and blatantly interrupted you. You were quick to pick up on his furrowed brows and the way he stormed in and you knew he was upset.

“It was you wasn’t it? You lied to the judges and told them that I work on the door all by myself so that my class would get disqualified didn’t you? I know you were pathetic, but that’s another kind of low. Even for you. You’re going to regret that.”

In most situations, you would’ve allowed him to talk bad about you and just kept your mouth shut, not wanting things to escalate but you were tired. He had no right to talk to you like you were the scum underneath his expensive pair of dress shoes. You did nothing for him to treat you so impolitely. Deep down, you knew you could report him for workplace bullying, but you didn’t want all the unnecessary drama that came with having to list down exactly what he was doing to you.

To both your surprises, you found yourself standing up and walked over towards him. You were so angry to the point where you poked your finger at his chest while releasing all your built up anger and frustrations that he caused you over the last three years.

“I’m pathetic? I’M PATHETIC? You’re kidding me right? Even if I didn’t say anything, it doesn’t take a genius to know that there is no way a five year old, no matter how many worked on that damn door could execute such precise and accurate designs. You would’ve been disqualified whether or not I reported you. Do you hate me that much for you to want to win so badly that you did all that work by yourself? You’re forgetting the entire point of this door contest! It’s for the kids! It’s for them to work together and to have fun while doing it! But no, this is all a competition for you! And it’s not even to win best door! You couldn’t give less of a shit about that. You just want to beat me! Well guess what Park Jinyoung, I don’t give two shits what you think about me or if your class wins the damn contest! You and I obviously have two different mindsets here. I want to win because I love seeing my students happy. You want to win because your God damn ego and pride is so fucking huge and the only person you care about is yourself. From the day I arrived to this school, you’ve been nothing but a prick and a jerk and for what? What reason huh?”

You were so in to his rant that you weren’t able to see the way he was looking at you with an apologetic look in his eyes. What you didn’t know, was that the reason why Jinyoung was such an asshole to you, was because he harbored feelings for you. It may not seem like it, especially because he treated you so unfairly, but it was his twisted way of showing his interest in you. It was also because he never wanted to develop feelings for you. Jinyoung was always focused on his education and his job. He never had time to date nor did he feel like it was necessary to do. But the minute he laid his eyes on you and witnessed as you taught your class and got them to fall in love with you so easily, he knew he was in deep shit.

You were also the talk of the board of education. Even before you graduated from your university with your bachelors degree in education, there were so many schools that were looking at you and interested in hiring you from the get go. Teaching was one of the hardest occupations out there but you did it so effortlessly and made it seem like such a simple task. Which is why Jinyoung felt as if he needed to stay away from you.

He felt like if he were to be so closed off and mean towards you that you would want nothing to do with him. But as you continued to be nothing but nice to him albeit his coldhearted demeanor, it only caused him to fall for you even harder. He hated being so mean to you; you didn’t deserve it and hearing the effect that it had on you made his heart hurt. He was surprised that you put up with his bullshit for so long. Anyone in their right minds would’ve told him off a long time ago but not you. You allowed his hostility to continue all the while keeping that beautiful smile on your face that he loved so much.

“You are the biggest asshole I’ve ever met. I can’t believe all the teachers fawn over how kind-hearted and generous you are. If only they knew the real you. The you that only comes out when I’m around. I’m sorry for whatever I did that made you hate me so much but I refuse to allow you to continue stepping all over me. Now get out.”

You didn’t dare look at him and you were afraid of what was going to happen now that you told him exactly how you felt about the mistreatment, but what you didn’t expect was the five letter word that fell from his lips.

“Sorry.” A sarcastic chuckle fell from your lips and you finally allowed yourself to look up at him in disbelief.

“I’m sorry?” He shook his head and began pacing the room back and forth. This was all too much for your mind to process. You didn’t think you’d be confronting Jinyoung for his negative behavior today nor did you think he’d be apologizing to you for how he’s been acting towards you. Were you still asleep? You had to be. There was no way this was all going on right now.

“No, I am. I admit, I was being a dick. I have no excuse for the way that I’ve been treating you and I hope you know that you don’t deserve that kind of treatment. I’m sorry. Genuinely—and there’s no excuse for my actions. I don’t deserve your forgiveness and I know you’re probably in shock by my apology, but I’m deeply sorry for everything that I’ve put you through. I knew my behavior has probably affected you and you should’ve had me reported for harassing you so much. I know my apology probably means jack shit to you, but if I were to tell you why I’ve been acting this way you’d probably laugh in my face—“

“Tell me.”

He looked at you for a few seconds and you felt extremely insecure under the weight of his stare, but before you knew it he hesitantly brought his hand up to your cheek and began caressing right below your eye. If it was anyone else, you would’ve slapped their hand away and honestly even after hearing his apology, you should’ve yanked his hand from off your face but you didn’t want to. His touch was soft and comforting and you’d be lying if you said you didn’t like how it felt. But what did it mean? And how did he go from accusing you of turning him in for cheating to cupping your face with his hands? You felt as if you were about to throw up.

“I—I um—okay I’m going to start off by saying this, Park Jinyoung never falls in love. I don’t do relationships. I don’t believe in them. I feel like they’re a waste of time and effort but fuck—ever since I met you I found myself craving to be in one with you. I know it’s hard to believe and you probably think I’m just messing around with you but I’m serious. I don’t know how you did it, but you’ve gotten me to fall for you. I haven’t felt this way for anyone before and I think that treating you like shit was my defense mechanism because I didn’t want to develop any sort of feelings for you. It was hard not to. I mean—look at you. Fuck, all I ever seem to do is look at you, do you not understand just how beautiful you are? And when I see you getting along with each and every one of your students, it makes my heart feel things I never thought it was capable of. Love. Admiration. Adoration. You—you’re the most wonderful human being I’ve ever met. You’re so hardworking, so selfless and passionate about your job. You’re everything I wish I could be.”

His hands left your face and right as you were about to complain, he brought them down to your hips and pulled you closer to his body causing your cheeks to warm up. You absentmindedly wrapped your arms around his neck and wanted nothing more than to kiss his stupidly handsome face while beating him up for treating you like shit for so long. Hearing his confession made your heart flutter and as much as you wanted to hate him and continue being upset with him, you were just as head over heels for him as he claimed to be for you.

“If you didn’t already know by now, I like you y/n. Hell, I think it goes beyond that. There aren’t enough words that I can put together that can explain to you just how sorry I am for everything—but if you let me, I’d love to take you out on a date and then we can see where it goes from there? But I completely understand if you want nothing to do with me. Just know that I have every intention on treating you the way you deserve—the way I should’ve been years ago.” You took a few minutes to come up with your decision even if you already knew the answer.

“You’re an asshole Park Jinyoung.” He giggled softly before agreeing with you.

“I know. And I’m sorry.”

“I deserve someone better than you. Someone who would tell me how they feel rather than push me away because they can’t accept their feelings.” Although you had your arms around his neck, your words sent a pang of hurt to his chest because he knew you were right. He was afraid that it was too late. But the gentle kiss on the corner of his mouth broke him out of his self pity and he found himself smiling against your lips.

“I like you too. Prick. More than I’d like to admit and more than you deserve. But you need to promise me that you’ll change. I refuse to be in a relationship with someone who treats me like shit. The minute you start acting cold towards me again is the minute I throw hands. You hear me? Man, I’d hate to see how you used to pick up girls back in college. Maybe you’re such a hard ass because you’re single.”

His laughter filled the room and you found yourself laughing along with him. Hearing him laugh every now and then sent butterflies to your tummy especially because of how adorable his laugh was and because of how cute he looked when he tried to cover up his mouth every single time. His eye crinkles were also very adorable and you found yourself getting on your tip toes to kiss both sides of his face out of habit.

“Correction, I was single. And so were you, but now you’re mine. I meant what I said baby, I’m going to take really good care of you from now on. God, I love kissing you. I’ve dreamt about kissing these pretty lips of yours for the longest time. To think I could’ve done so sooner if I wasn’t so stupid. It doesn’t matter anymore, all that matters is us, right now. However, I hope you know that just because we’re dating doesn’t mean I’m going to go easy on you y/n, I’m still going to win that door contest.” You playfully slapped his chest before motioning him out of your classroom.

“We’ll see about that you cocky asshole.” Right as you were about to open your door, he gripped both of your wrists and pinned them up against your head before placing a rough and passionate kiss upon your lips.

“I can’t wait for Christmas time. I’m going to purposely put up mistletoe in my room so I have an excuse to kiss you. Thank you for giving me a chance y/n. I’m really excited to see where things are going to go for us.” With one more kiss on your lips, he was making his way out the door. But before he could leave, the cutest little voice spoke up and you found yourself stifling back a laugh.

“Our door is way better than your door Mr.Park! Can’t wait to beat you again and eat our pizza in front of you!”

[nobodyfamousposts]

Gabriel’s Lament

Posting this here in reference to the previous ask, and because I apparently neglected to do so before.

________________________________

Be careful what you wish for. Wasn’t that the old saying? He hadn’t considered it before—never bothered to in the face of his wish. Because how could saving someone so wonderful and pure be a poor choice? How could acting out of love be wrong?

He had gotten his wish and seemed all the better for it. His wife was alive and by his side. His son was safe and had no secret life as a superhero nearly getting himself killed on a regular basis. And with his family whole and as it should be, Gabriel had no need to become a villain. He had no need for any Miraculous. As such, he had no concern that the Butterfly Miraculous was no longer in his possession—and may not have fallen into his possession in the first place. He had no need for it, after all. His wish was granted, his life was complete, and he finally felt satisfaction.

He was able to maintain that satisfaction for two months before it all started to fall apart.

A super villain appeared. One with the ability to turn people into monsters. One bearing the symbol of a butterfly. One calling himself Hawk Moth.

Only it wasn’t Gabriel.

He should have acted sooner. He should have thought things through. He had been too caught up in his own happiness that he hadn’t considered the full effects of the changes.

He got what he wanted. But it didn’t stay that way.

His wife was alive, but he was constantly at risk of losing her again with each time she tried to resolve the latest upset. Since she didn’t suffer her previous fate, she remained a hero and was regularly putting herself in danger to fight akumas that were no longer at his command.

His son wasn’t Chat Noir, which he had initially found relief in. But without the protection of the Miraculous, Adrien was more susceptible than Gabriel had realized, and he was now terrorizing Paris as an akuma under the mask of Chat Blanc while his wife desperately attempted to free him.

There was no Ladybug to hinder his plans, but now that they were complete, there was no Ladybug to save anyone and restore order either.

He no longer had the Butterfly Miraculous—or any Miraculous for that matter. He was forced to watch from the sidelines as his wife and son fought each other—completely incapable of doing anything and leaving him with a sense of powerlessness that he hadn’t felt since losing Emilie the first time.

He thought he had won. He HAD won. He had finally gained both Miraculous and used their combined power to complete his one goal. After all of that effort, after all that heartache, he thought that was the end of it. But it’s never that easy, is it? He’d gotten his wish, but not how he wanted. This new life was a mess. His family was in tatters. He was helpless to act.

And the only thing worse was being stuck here with the cat.

“I can hear you, you know.”

God, he hated that cat.

“You’re not on my list of top favorite people either, buddy.”

The kwami was much different than Nooroo had been. It was snarky and all too eager to delight in his misfortune. Where Nooroo was gentle and submissive, this new kwami was more direct in its vocalization of disagreement with Gabriel’s choices and much more inclined to act if it didn’t like them. When it wasn’t causing chaos in its disruptions and so called ‘accidental bad luck’, it was being infuriatingly lazy—particularly when it came to finding a solution to this nightmare they were both trapped in. One would think the creature would care about its former holder.

“Funny.” The creature had snapped back at him. “I would have thought the same of you about your son.”

Gabriel held himself back from reacting. Less because the creature had a point and more because he knew full well that’s exactly what the little devil wanted and the last thing he needed was for someone to burst in out of concern only to find him seemingly yelling to himself.

Again.

________________________

When it had first appeared, he had hoped that the little kwami’s arrival was indicative that he would be granted a Miraculous he could use to try to rescue his son and save his family.

“BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA—OHMYGOD, OH MY GOD—AHAHA—YOU-YOU ACTUALLY THINK—HAHAHAHA—I MEAN, YOU? HAHAHAHAHEEHEEHAHA—OH MY GOD I CAN’T—AHAHA—I CAN’T BREATHEHEEHEEHEEHOO—HOO—hoo—”

Needless to say, that hope died rather quickly with the resulting boisterous laughter that was both needlessly exaggerated and gratuitous, leaving Gabriel glaring at the thing in increasing annoyance which did nothing to stifle its cries. If anything, it only got worse as it became loud enough to get his wife’s attention and nearly led to them both being caught had Gabriel not somehow convinced her it was just a phone call with an overly enthusiastic client.

The fact that the cat’s laughter didn’t stop until well after she left certainly didn’t help his first impression of the thing. Or his desire to shove it into a shoebox.

The fact that it wouldn’t leave him alone afterwards only compounded that.

He had come to learn a couple things after this less than pleasant initial meeting. That the little creature before him was, in fact, the Black Cat kwami. That its name was Plagg. And that it hated him.

A lot.

“You can stop laughing at any time.”

“Can’t. Heehee—not until it stops being funny.” It replied, wiping away a tear.

“This is hardly humorous!” Gabriel seethed.

It only continued to grin at him. “An egotistical screwball thinking I’d actually partner with him? That has to be the world’s best joke!” It gave another chuckle. “Thanks, I needed that laugh.”

Gabriel glowered.

“And if we’re being honest,” the little kwami added, rising from the fancy mahogany desk and lazily floating around Gabriel and ending at his impeccably quaft hair. “You wouldn’t look good in the suit anyway.”

Oh now that was just uncalled for.

As far as first meetings went, it was easily among the most aggravating—which seemed to be the intent. And it was only the beginning. What came to follow was by no means a partnership or indeed anything resembling an amiable relationship. For all that they should have been allies, their relationship was less than mutually beneficial and more than once did Gabriel question why he continued to host the damned thing.

Then he would have the unpleasant reminder shoved in his face (either by Plagg’s words or his own traitorous thoughts) that this was his fault in the first place and that he really had little choice in the matter.

It quickly became evident over the course of their interactions that the kwami remembered everything from prior to Gabriel’s wish. While that was fortunate in that it meant he wasn’t alone in his knowledge of the world being altered, that also meant that it knew full well that he was the one responsible. And the damn thing wasted every bit of time and effort it could to verbally lambast him for it as much as possible.

If the knowledge of what he had caused wouldn’t drive him to insanity, he was sure this creature would.

“I would be able to do more to fix this if you would just work with me.” Gabriel grumbled at one point, increasingly frustrated after multiple failures. And why wouldn’t he be? He had finally gained a glimpse of hope only to have it torn away by a vindictive little brat of a kwami.

The thing continued to chortle a bit although its laughter had finally gotten under control. “Even if I were inclined to help you—which I’m not, you would still need my Miraculous to do any good—which you don’t have.”

This gave him pause. “Where is the Black Cat Miraculous?” He had wondered but hadn’t chosen to ask before given the kwami’s blatant ire.

“With the new big bad. Why do you think I’m hiding out here?”

He stared in surprise. “You can leave your Miraculous?”

It shrugged, uncaring. “We’re not supposed to, but yeah. Got any cheese?”

Stunned and somewhat overwhelmed by the strange turn this entire situation had taken, Gabriel numbly paged his assistant for some cheese—vaguely realizing that the little black thing taking up residence on his desk had apparently been the cause of his son’s sudden and rather bizarre requests for Camembert. Things were starting to make more sense now, except that it was only after all of it ceased to matter.

That was how he had come to be the reluctant caretaker of a similarly reluctant but much more antagonistic kwami. Keeping it hidden was difficult enough. Keeping it appeased so it wouldn’t do anything foolish to undermine his attempts to hide it was even more so.

He had hoped to have an ally in resolving this mess—even if it did not come with a Miraculous he could use. Instead, he found himself carrying more of a millstone quite intent on being dropped on his foot even to its own detriment. It would not speak to him if it could help it, and even on the occasions where it did (usually only after multiple offerings of its favored and horribly expensive cheeses), it offered nothing useful—simply more scathing remarks and less than helpful commentary on his failings.

And there were many more of those than he would like.

The kwami, on its end, seemed to care very little about Gabriel’s disappointment or even the situation in general as it continued to gorge itself on the disgusting cheese he had been forced to order for it just to get it to even talk to him. When it wasn’t eating, it would either ignore him or meddle in his attempts to keep some semblance of normalcy in his life.

And such was how the time passed.

________________________

“Can’t you tell me anything?”

“No.”

________________________

“Would you just tell me?”

“Still no.”

________________________

“How about a trade?”

“Camembert for information?”

“Yes!”

“No.”

________________________

“What will it take?”

“Not for all the cheese in Wisconsin.”

________________________

“Fine! Then I will handle this situation myself!”

“Yeah, because you’ve done a great job of that so far.” It replied with a roll of its eyes before it went back to its nap.

________________________

The kwami raised an eyebrow as Gabriel entered the room with a black eye.

“How’s progress on the whole ‘handling the situation yourself’ plan going?”

“Shut up.”

________________________

“Aren’t you supposed to be out there?”

“Emilie didn’t want me to be involved.”

“So?”

“She locked me in the house.”

It fell to the desk and started rolling around in laughter.

________________________

It takes a lot to force Gabriel to drink.

“Well, it could be worse. Your wife could divorce you and take your kid with her, though from the looks of it, that possibility isn’t off the table just yet.”

“Surprisingly enough,” Gabriel growled, “this isn’t helping.”

“I wasn’t trying to be helpful.”

This is enough to call for another bottle.

________________________

“…”

“…So…?”

“Not. One. Word.”

________________________

Another day, another failure. His wife had survived another skirmish, but had come no closer to saving their son. Her being unaware of his knowledge of her identity only hindered his own attempts to aid her or his work to rescue their son. She was so concerned for getting him out of the conflict that neither of them had been able to effectively act to the best of their ability. The two of them ended up unintentionally impeding one another as he attempted to reach his son while Emilie was trying to purify him.

He had been so close, though. Close enough to try to talk to Adrien for all of a few minutes at least. But if anything, that only made the situation worse and Gabriel was regretting acting so rashly as to attempt to confront him directly.

On his own, Chat Blanc was confident and mischievous, acting out of a juvenile and destructive sense of “fun”. But as soon as Gabriel made his appearance to try to appeal to him, his attitude had completely changed. And the longer he remained, the more unsettled the boy appeared to become. He had thought at the time he was making progress, but things quickly escalated despite Gabriel’s attempts to calm him as Chat Blanc became more incensed and his ferociousness increased. It was as though the boy lost all rational thought—hissing and spitting much like the creature for which he was named.

He had expected some anger or aggression—an akuma was the emotional state made physical, after all. But he had never expected Adrien would ever raise a hand to him, yet here he was, covered in bruises and nursing the headache that came with colliding with the ground when the boy finally had enough and literally threw him into a billboard featuring his own fashion line.

Gabriel groaned, covering his face in his hands and trying to mind the growing bruises. “This is a disaster.”

“You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?” Came the caustic reply he really should have known to expect by now. No sympathy, of course. The damned thing wasn’t capable of it.

“So there was a miscalculation—”

“MISCALCULATION, he says!” It barked out with a laugh. “Did somehow the whole ‘godlike powers’ not work out as you expected?”

He tensed, anger coursing through him. “I had no way of knowing this would happen! The Miraculous didn’t come with instructions!”

It crossed its arms, clearly not buying his claim. “They came with kwami! Who told you not to do it! You even had an entire freaking instruction manual detailing what would happen! The only thing you DIDN’T have was the common sense to figure out why messing with the laws of nature would be a bad idea!”

It wasn't wrong, though that didn't stop Gabriel from wanting to throttle it. However, he needed information, not an argument. So it seemed Gabriel would have to attempt to be the rational one here. “I know you’re unhappy with me.”

“Unhappy is putting it mildly.” It said with a huff.

“And I understand why.”

If looks could kill, Gabriel was certain he would have been dead a hundred times over from the creature's expression.

“No, I really don’t think you do. Because altering reality isn’t even beginning to touch the list of reasons why I despise you.”

He raised an eyebrow at that. “And I suppose you’re going to be the one to tell me?”

“Would you listen if I tried?” It asked with a shrug before turning away from him to go back to nibbling on the cheese he was regretting to have ordered for it. If he’d believed the thing was capable of feelings beyond spite, he’d almost have said it sounded melancholy at that. Nothing further was said as it simply shrugged at any further inquiries and remained silent.

Attempts at conversation or any sort of legitimate answers or planning ended similarly. Usually with the kwami huffing and turning away like it had any right to be the one vexed by the situation.

Having gone through more than enough for one day, Gabriel chose to return to his own room for rest and left the creature to its petulant silence in his office.

________________________

More days. More attacks. Nothing changed and Gabriel would have been inclined to pull at his hair if he wasn’t already finding himself becoming depressingly used to the current state of things.

So this was what his life had come to. Stuck watching matters get progressively worse from the confines of his office where the only one he could talk about any of this to clearly hated him and would be all too happy to spend the days mocking him. It made him miss Nooroo, and not for the first time he wondered how the little kwami was doing under the new Hawk Moth.

Which begged a question.

“Where did Hawk Moth come from?”

“Well,” came the smarmy reply from the still very angry and in no way sympathetic black cat kwami, “When some asshole finds a Butterfly Miraculous and decides to be reeeeaaaaaaally stupid—”

Which begged the insight that he should perhaps stop trying to ask questions.

But he hadn’t gotten this far being ‘smart’, apparently.

“Where did this Hawk Moth come from?”

“What, you changed reality without thinking anything through and actually expected everything to be better? What kind of cotton candy dreamworld do you live in and where can I get a ticket there?”

Although even that would still involve insults.

“How is there a Hawk Moth at all in this new reality?” He rephrased. He had come to learn over time that while the kwami would needle him relentlessly given the opportunity, it would at least answer questions honestly—but only depending on how he asked. So he had to watch his wording and phrase things specifically to get a real answer, though even that would still take multiple attempts before it would relent and actually answer in any way appropriately.

“Isn’t it obvious? You never lost your wife, so you never went searching. Someone else was bound to get ahold of Nooroo eventually. You were just too lazy to follow up on that this time.”

“Do you at least know who it is?” If he can know the new Hawk Moth’s identity, he can target the other using non-magical means and hopefully help to end this situation all the sooner.

But the creature shook its head. “No clue. We kwami don’t automatically know who the other holders are. And now that my Miraculous is compromised, I can’t risk getting close enough to find out or else I’ll end up like Nooroo, and things are already bad enough as it is.”

“Then…why come here?”

Its eyes snapped up to glare at him. “I was trying to get back to my kid. But it looks like I was too late.”

He bristled at that. “He isn’t yours.” And Adrien never would be if Gabriel had any say in things.

“Isn’t he? I cared for him, consoled him, supported him, actually spent some fucking time with him—which is more than anyone can say for you!” The creature hissed back at him. “He’s more mine than he ever was yours!”

It floated up and jabbed a paw at his nose. “I stayed by his side through everything! When he was sad, when he was lonely, when he was scared or uncertain, I was there! When he was being attacked—by YOUR minions, I was the one who offered protection! I was the one who actually worked to keep him safe! And where were you?”

“I was trying to bring her back!” Gabriel shouted, taking a swipe at the damned thing because how dare it suggest he wasn’t there for his son!

“Don’t you even start trying to say you were doing it for him! You were trying to drag back the past instead of looking at the present!” It countered, spinning away from his reach and gesturing widely. “You went further than any rational person would—more than anyone SHOULD, looking into magic and fairy tales you didn’t know were actually true for an answer to get back someone who was gone while completely ignoring the people you still had!” It turned back on him, making Gabriel jump. “Your wife was gone, but your son was still there! He was always right there behind you, just waiting for any scrap of affection from you! So he waited and he worked, only to be disappointed time and again. But he still kept holding on to that hope and trying to earn your acknowledgement—more than anyone should have had to and certainly more than you deserved!”

It shook its head, glaring at Gabriel in sheer disappointment. “It’s no wonder he was akumatized this time around! If one good thing came out of this new timeline, it’s that he’s finally had enough of your treatment.”

How dare he? To question Gabriel’s parenting and his devotion to his family? “I did what I had to! And he wasn’t an akuma last time!” He huffed, angrily.

“Sure wasn’t.” It agreed, flippantly. “But things were actually better over there, so…”

This gave Gabriel pause, drawing his focus back to the main issue at hand. “So how could the events vary so drastically but still be the same?”

“Wibbly-wobbly timey-whimey.”

He drew back in confusion. “What does that even mean?”

“Wait—you mean that’s not a thing here?” It asked in surprise, only growing more vexed and pointed at him threateningly. “Oh, heaven help you if your screw up did anything to ruin that series!”

Now he was completely lost. “What series?”

“You know. That series? The one your son used to like before he was TURNED INTO AN AKUMA!”

“Enough! A television series is not relevant here!”

“Your son being an akuma is!”

“And I am trying to fix that and make things right!”

“No, you’re only trying to clear away a portion of the mess you’ve made so you don’t have to deal with it! If it weren’t for the fact that this is affecting you directly because of your wife and kid, you wouldn’t even be discussing this right now!” It shouted, throwing up its arms in frustration.

Gabriel slammed a fist on his desk, sending a tablet clattering to the floor though he ignored it in favor of the irritant before him. “They’re the only reason I even did this in the first place!”

“And look how that turned out! You prevented yourself from losing them one way only to risk losing them another!”

“And what would you do then?!” Gabriel demanded, growing frustrated and desperate to end this conversation if nothing else.

It only gave him a look like it thought he was an idiot—which he had no doubt it likely did. “Your wife is a Miraculous user. You know she’s a Miraculous user. Tell her what’s going on!”

This actually took Gabriel aback. A simple answer, and yet one he had not previously explored. One he had not wanted to. Emilie loved him, and like him would do anything for family. But if she knew…

“And say what?” The fashion mogul uttered in a defeated tone.

“The truth.” It responded. He could almost hear the ‘duh’, like it should have been obvious.

In retrospect, maybe it should have been.

Gabriel froze, actually uncertain for the first time. His analytical mind plotting out the possible course of events that could follow.

It was the most straight forward solution, clearly. If Emilie knew he knew about the Miraculous and her involvement, they could work together instead of clashing when they each try to act. Emilie was distracted in the conflict because he kept getting in the way. He was similarly distracted when trying to act on his own because he was so fearful of her finding out.

But that brought back the matter of why he did not want her to know.

A mother would die for her son. But to find out that he did this—caused their son to become this just to save her?

He wasn’t sure she would forgive him. He knew he wouldn’t be able to in her shoes.

“I can’t.”

Plagg frowned at that, but didn’t seem surprised. “These things have a tendency of getting out, and you’re far from subtle—about as subtle as a brick to the face.”

Gabriel sighed and leaned back, resting his head on the back of his chair, but didn’t comment.

________________________

Time passed and animosity remained. At the very least, the stodgy silence was diminished. Gabriel continued with his paltry efforts to little effect. But at the very least, his unwilling companion had ceased to endlessly mock him for them. With each day that went by with no change, it grow more weary. If Gabriel had believed it capable of feelings, he would have thought it to be concerned.

A thought occurred to Gabriel at one point as he was overlooking the latest news report about the heroes facing yet another akuma. They were different heroes from the Ladybug and Chat Noir of before, but there were still two of them and the akuma they fought appeared familiar to him.

This gave him pause and made him stop to consider something he hadn’t before.

“Why did things turn out this way?”

“You mean besides the obvious?” It shot back before taking another nibble of the Camembert.

“No, this is serious.” Gabriel frowned at it, pointing to the screen. “This is a new reality. New Hawk Moth. New heroes. But for all that things should be different, they’re still somehow the same.” He had heard the saying the more things change the more they stay the same, but that couldn’t the case, could it?

To his surprise, it actually put the cheese down and turned to face him from its seat on his desk. “You knew there would have to be a balance.”

“Yes, I was aware—”

“No, clearly you weren’t. Did you really think people could be traded so easily? That it’d be as simple as your wife being restored to life in exchange for some random stranger you’ve never met and won’t have to deal with the fallout from? No! No, no no! It’s hardly that self-contained!” It scoffed with a shake of its head. “See, the universe likes balance and hates it when people try to mess with that balance because they think they know better. But balance isn’t just about the number of lives or the perceived importance of individuals to a single person—that’s much too small minded.”

At his look of surprise, the kwami floated up until it was eye level with him before continuing, gesturing widely with its paws for emphasis.

“It’s the series of events, the roles people play, the overall impact! It wouldn’t be enough for you to switch someone else’s life for hers and have that be the end of it where you’re happy, they’re sad, and everyone simply has to deal with that. Because it wasn’t just one life that was traded, it was how everyone else was affected by that life as well! The missing wife, the grieving husband who turns to villainy, the heroes who step forth to stop him, and all the shenanigans and drama that arise from the ensuing conflict between them! You know, the good ole status quo!”

It did make a strange, twisted sort of sense. Though he hardly wanted to admit the cat was right, he had indeed believed it would be a simple matter of reviving his wife with no other effects. He hadn’t even been aware another life would be taken, and honestly, would hardly have cared even if he had known.

Seeing that it had his attention, it continued. “Why do you think we try so hard to prevent anyone from doing it? It’s because it becomes a cycle of continuous world-changing that alters reality as we know it while never actually resolving anything! No solution is made! Nothing moves forward! And it’s a major pain to be stuck living the same year over and over regardless of any changes made to it that are actually pretty damn minor in the wake of an eternal time loop!”

“So there is still a Hawk Moth.” Gabriel asked, turning away from the annoyance to his desk to glance through the book he fortunately managed to retain possession of through the change.

“Yeeeeees.” Came the annoyed drawl of one who was dealing with someone abnormally slow.

He dutifully chose to ignore it. “But because I wasn’t the one to lose anyone and go searching for the Miraculous, it’s not me.”

The cat rolled its eyes and settled down on the edge of the desk where the cheese was still waiting. “Given that your hideout is missing and some other lunatic is making akumas without your input, I’m gonna guess you’re not.”

Gabriel ignored the sarcasm and smell of cheese as he flipped through the pages of the book until it settled on one in particular—the Fox, if he was accurate. He needed to focus and work this out if he was going to be able to come up with a suitable plan. And right now, he needed to clarify the full extent of the changes. “And there are still heroes.”

“Obviously."

“But they aren’t Chat Noir and Ladybug.”

“Clearly they aren’t.”

“Nor are they Adrien or his former partner.”

“Them either.”

“But why?”

Plagg shrugged. “Different circumstances lead to different choices. I can’t speak for the girl who was Ladybug, but your kid was chosen after he escaped your suffocating and overall horribly misplaced sense of overprotection. If dead mom wasn’t dead, he may not have had reason to do that.”

So he had affected more than he thought in regards to his son’s destiny and prevented him from becoming a Miraculous user. He wanted to be pleased to have spared his child that stress and pain, but the fact that this led to him becoming akumatized instead gave him very little to be happy about among everything else going wrong with this situation.

“Then why are there different Miraculous active as heroes instead of the Black Cat and Ladybug?”

Here, the cat kwami sent him a dry look. “Part of it may have to do with the fact that since a certain someone used our combined powers to alter all of reality, we’re pretty drained and far from in the best condition to try to fight or use any of our powers to prevent someone else from doing the same. Guess who we have to thank for that.”

Gabriel was hardly impressed. “And yet you’re here.”

“Not by choice, mind you.” It sniped before taking a bite of the cheese. Clearly it was a petulant little demon.

“You’re active.” Gabriel reiterated. “You’re not dormant and sleeping in your ring.”

“Wish I was, but with the ring being part of an akuma right now, that wouldn’t be wise."

“But you’re able to help that.” As much of an irritation as the creature was choosing to be, it said something that it was able to be active and had been able to abandon its Miraculous. Though why it chose to come to him of all people if it hated him so much was a question all its own.

“You should be grateful. If I wasn’t, Chat Blanc would be an unstable self-destructive mess instead of simply Hawk Moth’s favorite lackey at this point.”

For the sake of his own sanity, the father had to try very very hard not to think further on that.

“So how are you active if you are so drained?”

For once, the small cat creature actually appeared pensive instead of looking like it wanted to tear Gabriel’s head off. “Tikki took the brunt of it.”

“Tikki?” How curious. That was not a name he’s heard yet. “Is that the Ladybug Kwami?”

The smaller being didn’t answer, merely turning away and giving every indication that he didn’t want to speak further. Unfortunately, this discussion was not over and Gabriel needed more information if he was going to be able to take any steps from here.

“Why is Adrien an akuma?”

“You mean besides the fact that his father is a horrible excuse for a person?"

“You know what I mean.”

“And you know I’m angry with you and not feeling sensitive to your needs.”

“This is important.”

“So is my mealtime.”

Gabriel sighed and set down yet another container of that blasted product the thing so enjoyed.

“Now then, let’s try this again. Why is Adrien an akuma?”

“Akumas still function the same.” It stated as it popped a piece of the cheese into its gaping mouth. “He got upset and one was attracted to him. That is kind of what akumas do.”

“How is Adrien an akuma when he’s Chat Noir?”

“Should be plain to see. He wasn’t a Miraculous wielder this time around—for obvious reasons.” Here he shot a knowing glare that Gabriel chose not to respond to. “So no, he’s not technically Chat Noir, and no Chat Noir means there was nothing to protect him from the new Hawk Moth.”

“That doesn’t explain how he is still an akuma. It has been over a month and he is still Chat Blanc. None of my akumas ever lasted more than a day.”

“Does that say more about the heroes or you?”

“Just answer the question!”

Plagg rolled its eyes. “The shorter answer is that the balance of the universe means the plot has to stay the same and the roles still have to exist despite the switch in players. Only problem is—other than morals and time/space shenanigans—just because new people have been stuck with these roles doesn’t mean they’ll be nearly as good at them. Or as bad in the case of the new Hawk Moth given that he’s already one Miraculous away from rewriting the world a second time when it took you over a year to even get that far.”

“I am well aware of that issue, thank you.” Gabriel bit out through gritted teeth.

“Really? You sure? Because I’m sure I could put together a slide show if you need me to.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

“Or a puppet show, since that seems more up your alley.”

“Enough!”

“Hey, I don’t judge.”

He absolutely does, the little devil.

Nooroo had been passive. Quiet, skittish, and eager to placate Gabriel in the midst of his many failures. He had been downright pleasant in comparison to this.

It, in true cat fashion, ignored his growing ire and continued. “This time, we’re in a reality where someone competent is Hawk Moth.”

“I was—”

“I said someone competent!”

Gabriel frowned at the insult but still mulled over the rest of the kwami's words. For all that it may have had a point, there was something off.

It couldn’t be enough that there was simply a different Hawk Moth. His various akumas had managed to bring all of Paris to its knees. He’d come close to success multiple times. The public was easily cowed. The police weren’t even a speed bump to his goals. There was not even so much as an obstacle to his takeover. Even without the Miraculous, there had been plenty of akumas that had successfully gotten him control of the city. Nothing ever seemed to truly stand in his way.

Nothing except—

That’s when it hit him.

“Ladybug…"

His eyes widened. Of course! Why hadn’t he considered it before?

His multitude of attempts in his time as Hawk Moth were always subverted—not because of himself or Chat Noir or circumstances, but because of the girl who was Ladybug. She had been the central cause of the failure of his plans back then. With nothing more than a random object summoned by her creation powers, she was able to defeat his warriors time and again. She was the one who constantly restored the city to normal and undid any of the damage caused. If she was active now, it could change everything!

“Ladybug!”

The cat blinked up at him. “Eh?”

“That’s it! That’s the solution!” Gabriel exclaimed. “It’s Ladybug!”

“Right away, no.” Immediately it realized what his ‘solution’ entailed and tried to nix that line of thinking.

“Every time! Every plan, every akuma, every attempt—it was HER!”

“Stop this. Stop this right now.”

“If I can just find her—”

“She’s not Ladybug anymore!” The cat tried to insist nearly in a panic. “You won! She lost! She doesn’t have her Miraculous anymore and none of her memories or experience carried over with her!”

The creature flew up right to his face, jabbing angrily at his nose. “If you go after her, she’s just going to be a normal girl.”

“She was a normal girl before as well. She became something greater. She can again.”

“Let me reiterate: a normal girl who is going to be freaked out that some stranger is coming after her wanting her to run around the city in a spandex suit with magical powers which—in case I have to remind you since I’m sure I do—SHE DOESN’T HAVE ANYMORE!”

“If Adrien still had his Miraculous, then it’s fully plausible that Ladybug may have retained hers as well!” Gabriel continued, ignoring Plagg’s outburst.

“Would you just listen for ONCE in your life!” It shouted at him in a desperation that actually gave him pause.

Seeing that it had his attention, it grabbed his cheeks and looked him straight in the eyes. “She’s not Ladybug anymore! She is just a scared girl trying to survive as best she can in a city constantly under siege!”

“She can change that!” Gabriel exclaimed as he pushed away from its hold to return to the book that had offered him so much insight.

Not to be deterred, the kwami flew down to sit right on top of the book and glared up at him, pointlessly continuing the argument when his mind was already set. “You don’t know that!”

How could he make it understand? Much to its annoyance, he lifted the creature from the book with one hand and used the other to turn to the page that featured the spotted heroine. "Ladybug is the bearer of all the powers of creation. If anyone can counter Chat Blanc's destructive nature, it would be her!"

The kwami forwent a response in favor of swiping at the hand holding it, forcing Gabriel to release it. But he was not to be deterred. Everything was right there, even if he couldn't read it completely, he knew this was the answer he had been seeking.

“Don't you see? The situation isn’t beyond salvaging!” He insisted, gesturing to the picture of the warrior on the page.

Unimpressed with his claim, it started ticking off claws as it counted. “Your son is an akuma. Ladybug is in no position physically or mentally to purify him. The current Hawk Moth has a tighter grip on the city than you ever managed, and seems particularly fond of using Chat Blanc as one of his top enforcers with very little intent to loosen that control. The ‘Situation’ as you call it is way past salvaging at this point!”

“But she can help!”

“And how exactly do you expect that to work, huh? Go around stalking a teenage girl, trying to convince her she’s a magical girl in another world with the power to make everything sunshine and rainbows?!”

“It would at least be a starting point!” He exclaimed, not willing to let go of perhaps the one decent plan he’s been able to turn to since this entire mess started. “As Ladybug, she is the greatest force to counter the akuma and the only one who can fully restore order! The entire reason I failed as much as I did in the previous timeline was because of her!”

“Yes, because it had absolutely nothing to do with you being an overall crappy villain. Or the fact that the very first thing you decided to do with a Miraculous was become a supervillain.”

He intently ignored the snipe. “There’s every likelihood that things wouldn’t be to the state they are now if she had still been one of the heroes this time around. She was the reason that Paris was able to function as well as it did with the constant attacks since she could undo any of the damage! She is what we need right now! You know that! If you could just tell me who she is—”

It turned away in a huff. “I’m bad with names.”

“I can bring you photos and you can point her out—”

“I’m bad with faces, too.”

Gabriel glared at the cat kwami. “You are going to be insufferable, aren’t you?”

Plagg glared right on back. “If you think this is what insufferable is, then clearly I have to up my game.”

“You know I’m right!”

“Whether you’re right or not,” the kwami hissed, not willing to in any way agree with the man, “the problem is that you think you’re entitled to this! You’re trying to play things again! Using people to fulfill your needs and obsessing over things you can’t change! Instead of moving on or going forward, you try to force your will on everything else to get the result you want even if it’s not healthy for anyone!”

Gabriel simply ignored him and left the room. He didn’t want to hear this. He didn’t need to hear this from some know it all magical creature with an axe to grind about his parenting.

________________________

So he attempted to locate the girl on his own. But without a current Ladybug being active, he had no leads. And he had little information to go on from what he knew prior to the change. He soon realized—or rather was forced to acknowledge that for all his current resources and efforts, he had absolutely no way of determining the identity of the girl who was once Ladybug in a world she no longer was. Too much had changed, and he was unable to reconcile anything he knew of the hero in the previous timeline to any specific individual in this new reality. If not for Plagg’s vague comments, he wouldn’t even be sure she was still alive.

He didn’t want to admit it, but he was stuck. Not for the first time, he cursed his short sightedness and that he didn’t take steps to verify Ladybug’s identity when he finally obtained her Miraculous. Eventually, he gave in to his desperation and turned back to the insufferably smug creature in a vain hope at obtaining answers.

“Isn’t there something you can tell me? Anything at all?” He did not beg. He was not so low as to beg for answers. But damned if he wasn’t close. For his son…yes, he would beg if he had to, but everything in him railed against showing weakness to this creature and his pride and anger kept him from that final step. He knew full well it wouldn’t make a difference even if he did.

To its credit, it seemed to consider his words.

“She should have been mine, did you know that?”

Gabriel blinked in surprise at this strange response, uncertain what the kwami meant and what it was getting at.

Plagg on the other hand, smiled softly to itself. “That girl made for a pretty good Ladybug, don’t get me wrong. Optimistic, supportive, nurturing, and all around more inclined to the ‘high road’ that Tikki so loves. She took to the fortune and creation powers like a champ and was generally able to come up with the best plans and ways to use what she had to the greatest effects—to the point that she could have accomplished just as much outside of the mask as she could in it.”

It paused, looking up wistfully and thinking of things that could have been. “Yeah, she was a good pick for Ladybug, but she had all the makings of an amazing Black Cat given the chance. Protective, sneaky, graceful, territorial, cautious, observant—everything a good Cat should be. And she had a sort of resiliency in facing bad situations that would have made her perfect for the bad luck of the Black Cat Miraculous. I could have molded her into something extraordinary if she’d been put in my hands.”

It nodded contemplatively. “Similarly, Tikki would have made something good out of your kid as well. She’s all about order and structure and whatnot, and your kid was always by the book in that regard—you made real sure of that.” It added with a brief glare in Gabriel’s direction before softening again. “With their personalities, they would have gotten along splendidly. She would have made an amazing Ladybug out of him.”

It smiled, almost fondly for a brief moment before remembering where it was and growing somber.

“But the thing about the Miraculous is that when it comes to picking and choosing who we go to, we tend to wind up with the people who need us rather than the other way around. And of the two of us, Adrien needed me more.”

Gabriel bristled at that. “My son did not need some miscreant who encouraged him to put himself in danger on a regular basis!”

“He needed someone who helped him to assert himself!” Plagg countered.

“He was perfectly able to be assertive!”

“Only when it didn’t inconvenience you!” It sneered at him. “And lets not mince facts, he was always an inconvenience to you! You barely spoke to him! Hell, you spoke more to him through that secretary of yours than anything! You dictated every aspect of his life without so much as a thought to how he felt about any of it, and you willfully ignored any of his attempts to protest. Anything he tried to say fell on deaf ears. His wishes, his hopes, his desires for what to do with his own life didn’t matter! And through it all, you were completely blind as to just how miserable he was!”

They both glared at one another for a good half minute before the kwami chose to continue its initial point. “It doesn’t matter who would work best with the powers, but how they can grow the most with the kwami. Tikki’s a pillar of stability. Stern and motherly and lecturing—always with the lectures, I kid you not. But other than the spurts of creativity she tends to inspire in her bugs, Tikki wouldn’t be able to offer your kid anything except for more of the same he’d been dealing with up to that point. More responsibilities, more structure, more order, more nagging. Sure, she’d be a bastion of support for him—and certainly more than anyone else in his life at that point had been giving him, but Tikki’s thing is that she tends to try to caretake for her holders and push them to the straight and narrow, and Adrien’s had more than enough people doing that for him.”

It looked up at Gabriel, a stormy look in its eyes.

“I went to Adrien because he needed me. Tikki’s girl needed someone who could rein her in—help her focus and look past her initial impulses. But Adrien needed someone who would push him out—to encourage him to break out of the cage he was trapped in and actually have fun for once in his life. You know, fun? That thing children are supposed to have? I honestly didn’t think you did, since you never let Adrien have any. But then you went and fully encouraged it in all of your minions—and what does that say when you’re encouraging everyone else BUT your own child to have a good time?”

“I will not have one of you creatures speak to me in such a way!” Gabriel thundered.

“You mean like how you talk down to everybody else in general? And not even because they’re doing anything wrong, but just so you can upset them enough that you can use your dark powers on them? It kind of says something when your child’s happiness or well being ranked as less important than making people miserable so you could manipulate them!”

“That’s not true!"

“You refused to let your son have a freaking birthday party just to upset his friend enough to turn him into one of your minions! Do you have any idea how that made Adrien feel?”

“I was not going to let a number of unknown miscreants in my home!”

“So you couldn’t let them arrange something elsewhere? There are events and plenty of places that would have been happy to host them, but you refused to let him even celebrate the day of his own existence! And that’s not even getting started on the birthday gift. You know the one, right? Hah! I’d be surprised if you did, seeing as how your assistant stole it from one of Adrien’s classmates to claim it was from you because you couldn’t be bothered to get him anything yourself! Hell, it says something when the girl clearly cared more about his feelings than you did since she never told him the truth just to let him be happy!”

That the gift he ordered Nathalie to get was stolen was not something he was aware of, and if this was that same world, he likely would have stern words with her about that. But that did beg the question—

“How do you know who it was from?”

The pest shrugged and looked away from him. “I could smell it.”

He rolled his eyes because of course the little monster could.

“She made that gift for him with her own two hands. Every part—from the materials to the time and energy she put into it were all for your child solely with him and his happiness in mind. It was more thought and love in one single gift than you’d shown him in years, and she never said a word even after she discovered what you’d done! She stayed quiet and let you take the credit just so Adrien could believe that his father gave a damn about him! What the hell does that say about you?”

“Nathalie was supposed to have—”

“Nathalie is not his father!” It shouted at him. “She’s not the one who he desperately wants attention and approval from! And she’s not the one who is supposed to be raising him! THAT’S YOU! But where have you been?”

“I’ve been trying to make my family whole—”

“By neglecting the only one you have left! And what if it hadn’t worked, huh? What if you’d managed to get both miraculous and it still didn’t bring her back? What then? Would it still have been worth it or would you have neglected and outright tortured your own son for nothing?”

Gabriel froze.

Plagg saw this, but didn’t relent. “You were a terrible father! The absolute worst! And that’s not even counting all the times you nearly killed your own son with your antics! Hell, how many of his friends did you turn into monsters without a thought of whether he would be in the crossfire?”

“I never meant for him to be a target!”

“But you never really tried to see if he was even potentially in the line of fire!”

“I didn’t know he was Chat Noir!” He had suspected at times, but for the most part he hadn’t actually known until the end.

But that didn’t matter to the cat.

"I'm not even talking about when he was Chat Noir!" It shouted, actually knocking the cheese reel aside to Gabriel's surprise. "It was when he was Adrien! Just plain Adrien going to school or events where you set your akumas to attack people without considering he would be there!"

He didn't always know his son's schedule or where he would be, but he had been certain that he could reign in his akuma if Adrien was in danger. And even if anything had happened, he would have been able to fix it once he had both Miraculous in hand. "I would have protected him. I could easily have freed him from anything the akumas did. I would not have allowed it if I was not certain he would be fine."

It gritted its teeth in frustration. “How could you have been so certain? You didn’t hold back! You didn’t even try to change tactics! And when you did know, you put him in danger!”

“It was just to prove if he was Chat Noir” And it turned out that he was, so it wasn’t like he was wrong.

“YOU HAD HIM FALL TO HIS DEATH TO PROVE A POINT!” It bordered on shrieking, possibly the first time he had ever seen it truly angry and not simply spiteful.

He looked away, hiding his hands and their growing tremors. “He wasn’t in any true danger.”

“You could have KILLED him!" Plagg shouted, pointing at Gabriel accusingly. "And what if he HAD transformed? What then? He would have revealed his identity in front of the entire world! How well do you think THAT would have turned out? He’d have an even bigger target on his back since people would know to go after him as a civilian! Did you even think of that?!”

“I would have protected him!” Gabriel insisted, ire growing.

“Because you’ve done such a wonderful job of that so far!” It hissed, unimpressed.

“I was simply trying to confirm my suspicions!” He argued. And really, Adrien should never have been out there in the first place.

“And that makes it okay? What if he transformed, then what?”

“Then I would know."

“AND SO WOULD THE WORLD!” It screeched back.

Silence.

The two glared at each other, as if attempting to will the other to burst into flames with mere thought.

One of the two might very well have been capable of that.

Fortunately, it instead took a breath in an attempt to force itself to calm. “If I’ve learned anything from my time with you, it’s that you don’t think things through. You create grand, overly elaborate plans but don’t consider the consequences. Say Adrien is revealed to the world—then what? Just keep him locked in his room for the rest of his life?”

Gabriel forced a neutral expression. That hadn’t…not been a possibility he had considered.

As if it could read his mind, it glared up at him. “Even if he isn’t allowed out into the world, the world is still going to be after him. What would you even be able to do against real criminals, huh? Can you protect him from poison? A sniper? A BOMB? Plenty of people out there have even less scruples than you do—if this new Hawk Moth should have taught you anything, it’d be that!” It started off speaking lowly but was shouting again by the end, pulling at his—its ears in frustration. “What lengths do you think people would be willing to go to in order to get ahold of that type of power? Do you really think murdering a model is really beneath them? That they wouldn’t be perfectly willing to take his life if they thought it was the only thing between them and all the powers of a Miraculous at their command?”

“I would have confiscated the Miraculous once it was confirmed.”

“And you think that would have made him safe? People are stupid! They won’t care it’s gone, they’ll care it was there and assume he’d have some means to getting it again.”

Gabriel frowned at that. “I would have sent him outside of Paris. They wouldn’t know where to find him.”

It shook its head. “Even if you did, do you really think he would be grateful? His friends and family would be all the more in danger for it because desperate people will do anything, target anything, lash out at anything to get what they want! And that’s not even getting into the mess it’d have left Ladybug with. Not only would she have been stuck dealing with your akuma alone, but she’d have everyone else homing in on her as well now that the people know for sure that their heroes are just kids.”

“She wasn’t a concern.” Or at least she wouldn’t have been for long. Every advantage was necessary to defeat her, and under those circumstances, even the reveal of his son would have been to his advantage. Once he had her Miraculous and altered reality, none of it would have mattered anyway.

It seemed to catch on to his train of thought as it glowered at him. “Right, right. Because that would have only been to your benefit.”

“It ceases to matter anymore regardless.” Gabriel stated flatly. Because going over what-ifs and could have beens are pointless in this new world and served no use other than for the kwami to try to instill a belated sense of guilt for actions he did not regret.

No matter how badly his hands were shaking.

________________________

Another day. Another failure. And he was only growing ever more desperate.

He had managed to get close to his son again—enough that they were able to speak. He had tried yet again to encourage Adrien to return home. But despite his heartfelt words, nothing he said could pierce Chat Blanc’s rage.

And he certainly did rage. The things he had shouted at him hit Gabriel hard. And as much as he wanted to simply chalk it up to the akuma’s influence, he knew full well from his time as Hawk Moth that anything the akuma said or did was still based on everything the victim felt.

That meant that everything Chat Blanc said, Adrien truly believed.

As much as Gabriel tried to force the encounter from his mind, he could still vividly hear the words his son had shouted at him, leaving him with tremors he couldn’t calm.

While he somewhat suspected Adrien might have held a level of resentment towards him, he still found himself shaken by the encounter and the things that were said. He had thought that Adrien perhaps remembered the previous timeline or that some other irritation in his life had resulted in the akuma targeting him. He hadn’t given much thought to how his own attempts to keep Adrien safe would have negatively impacted him. Once he had realized a new Hawk Moth had risen, he had tried to take steps to protect his family—increased security, limited their travel beyond the walls of the mansion, and rejected public school in favor of private lessons for Adrien. And to think that his very attempts might have been the cause of his corruption…

Had he really caused this like he had caused everything else?

No, no, no! He found himself turning to the Book for answers, searching for anything—ANYTHING that would give him guidance and hopefully tell him this claim was wrong.

Seeing his frazzled state and how he immediately rushed for the ancient book he should already have memorized by this point, Plagg rolled its eyes. “Looking for another trick to pull?”

Gabriel didn’t even look up at him from his fevered searching. “There has to be some way to fix this!”

“Haven’t you figured out anything yet?” It hissed at him. "You can’t keep turning to magic to fix your problems!”

"Given that magic is the source of my troubles so far, it seems an apt solution if not the only one." He snapped his gaze up to the kwami. “If you would just tell me who Ladybug is, this could all be over by now!”

“Could it really? Or is that just wishful thinking on your part?” It jeered, disgruntled.

“Of course it could!” Wasn’t that obvious? “If I know who she is, I can locate and explain the situation—“

Plagg cut him off. “So you’re telling me you would rather talk to a teenage girl than your own wife?”

“YES!” He froze, realizing what he just said. “NO!” He gritted his teeth and grabbed at his hair. “How did you get so awful?”

It grinned cheekily. “Your son’s friends. You know, back when he had friends at any rate.”

Gabriel grumbled under his breath. “I knew they’d be trouble.”

“Really?” Plagg asked with a smirk. “Because I thought Adrien was quite the good influence on them.”

How ironic was it that while it was the other who was supposed to be the cat of the the two, it was Gabriel who was feeling rather inclined to try to claw someone’s face off.

“Listen.” Gabriel started, trying to be the reasonable one and get back to the original point while holding back his growing anger. “It’s been months. MONTHS. And nothing has improved."

“I am aware.” It replied, neutrally.

Seeing they had at least that in agreement, Gabriel continued. “Hawk Moth has Chat Blanc as a constantly active minion now and isn’t inhibited in making another akuma in addition to him! The heroes currently active are barely able to handle just one akuma, and that’s even with my wife helping out despite her experience and training. None of them are a match for Adrien as he is and they certainly aren’t going to be able to purify him anytime soon. They need help.”

But Plagg only shook its head. “Throwing another kid into the mix isn’t going to help matters.”

“But we could find Ladybug and—”

“And what? Restore the world to how it was? Would you really be satisfied with that?”

He bit his tongue, unable to respond. He didn’t have an answer for that. How could he? After everything he’d done and even after the harm it had caused, would he really be willing to give it all up?

“This is the reality you asked for, so this is the reality you have to face.” It told him, calmly. “You need to think long and hard about what you’re wanting to accomplish here.”

What he wanted to accomplish?

He forced himself to relax and mull over the ancient being’s words.

What he wanted was simple.

He wanted his family whole.

He wanted his wife safe.

He wanted his son restored.

That was what he wanted. That had been all he’d ever wanted. If he could at least rescue his son from the akuma possessing him, he would be satisfied. Even if—

He froze, realizing.

Even if it meant Adrien became Chat Noir again.

Yes. He despised the thought regardless, but he would gladly take Adrien being Chat Noir over Chat Blanc any day.

And there was only one way to accomplish that.

Only one person who COULD save him…

“Could Ladybug resolve this?” He finally asked.

It sighed, weary. “Trying to ‘fix’ things won’t cut it. It’d cause more problems if we did.”

“But could Ladybug resolve this?”

Plagg hesitated.

Gabriel continued, steadfast in his resolution. “What it comes down to is that this is the reality we must now live in, even if there are things we don’t like about it. Adrien is an akuma. Neither you nor I have the power to save him. But in another lifetime, Ladybug did. And in this lifetime, Ladybug can.”

It was unfair. It was cruel and unfair and horribly selfish of him, he knew that. To bring a girl into this battle because of a life she now never lived because of him in the first place was horrible. But if it saved Adrien, wouldn’t it be worth it?

And if she was still Ladybug—or even anything like the Ladybug she had once been, wouldn’t she feel the same?

“You’re not thinking this through.” The cat warned him.

He closed the book with a sense of finality. “No, I think perhaps I’m finally seeing the situation for what it is.”

“No, you’re not. Because you’re still focused on Adrien.” It looked up at him, solemn. “And I get that, I do. I don’t want him to stay like this anymore than you do, but there’s something you need to consider.”

“Right now, I’m more worried about saving my son.” Gabriel retorted, angry that even now the creature would try to impede him. It had been months. He could tell the kwami had been growing more worried as time passed and the situation remained unresolved. The bite of its spitefulness dulled with time and if anything, there were a few points where it almost seemed to want to help him. That may very well have been wishful thinking on his part, however, as even now it refused to help him.

It simply shook its head. “Here’s what should worry you. You’re trying to bring the Ladybug back into the spotlight without considering what it will mean. See, bad enough if this new Hawk Moth rewrites history again and starts everything over in a new cycle and thus setting off yet another game of ‘Miraculous Merry Go Round’." It started, waving a claw in a circle to emphasize the last point. It looked up at him with a shrug as it continued. "Maybe you’ll remember this time. Maybe you won’t. But what should really concern you if he wins isn’t what will happen the next time around if he does make the same wish you did, it’s what will happen THIS time around if he chooses NOT to."

He didn’t understand what it was talking about. Something told him he should, given the slowly creeping feeling he was getting of something terrible in the works. How it could be worse than the current state of things, he didn’t know. But he needed to if they were going to be on the same page. “What do you mean?”

“You wished that your wife never left.” Plagg explained. “So she didn’t, and history changed to accommodate that new route with someone else vanishing in her place. But different people respond differently to situations and wish differently for things if given the opportunity. There’s every chance this new Moth could reset things and we’ll be going through this all over again. But there’s also every chance that he DOESN’T make the wish to reset everything again—in which case, we’re going to end up with a super villain with ultimate power and a world to play in.”

He still didn’t see the issue. He had already been in that position and when both Miraculous were in hand, the thought to not use them for his original wish never crossed his mind. Surely this would be the same?

“What are you talking about?”

“You immediately chose to become a super villain and decided to get the Miraculous not only to get your wife but to rule the world in true super villain fashion.” It gave him a dry look. “Seeing as how this is a much more intelligent villain than the one who came before him, he could decide he rather likes having a city under his thumb and two Miraculous users at his beck and call. He’s already got one in Adrien, and the Black Cat and Ladybug were specifically meant to be a team—and an unmatched one at that.”

Gabriel felt something inside him go cold at that realization. He hadn’t wanted to think of what could happen if the madman won before now, and certainly hadn’t even considered what said madman would choose to do. He was dangerous in a way Gabriel had never been—had never wanted to be, and was already one step closer to success in half the time it had taken Gabriel as Hawk Moth to accomplish.

He had thought finding and restoring Ladybug to some capacity could undo the damage—and perhaps she could. But once in the open, the new Hawk Moth and Chat Blanc would  have a direct target. Instead of spreading out over a city, they could focus in on the Ladybug holder. The last piece they needed—in more ways than one.

It finally hit him just how badly things could go.

“If he gets the Ladybug Miraculous—”

“He’s going to get Ladybug, too.”

Ladybug, who was the main instrument of his defeat time and again with nothing more than her wits and random luck. Ladybug, who was the only one able to truly purify the akumas and save those possessed and their victims. Ladybug, who had the power to restore the world to its previous state and was the only one who could keep things in some semblance of order even in the middle of the worst of attacks. Before the change, she had been the biggest hurdle to his victory. Now, she was the only hope he had of saving his son and protecting his family. But if the new Hawk Moth got to her as well…

That was not an enemy he wanted to face. Not like this.

He clenched his hands in an attempt to hide how unsteady they were. “But she doesn’t remember being Ladybug! You’ve even said as such!”

“She doesn’t right now, no. But trying to bring her back when she still doesn’t remember anything won’t help matters. It doesn’t protect her now and it won’t make her not just as dangerous if Hawk Moth gets to her. Chat Blanc is already evidence enough of that.

He felt he was grasping at straws at this point, but there was one benefit to this mess, it was that he was the only one with clear knowledge and memory of the timeline before. He almost felt himself starting to calm as he remembered this. “At least she’s an unknown variable at this time. We could find her and start training her in secret. Hawk Moth has no knowledge of her and no one even knows to start looking.”

Plagg didn’t seem heartened by this. He simply looked up at Gabriel solemnly.

“But Adrien does.”

Gabriel froze, eyes widening in horror at the realization. Because of course Adrien would recall his partner—he had a Miraculous still and had been downright obsessed with the girl previously. He was fully aware of how much Adrien spent on her merchandise. Any free moment he had was spent on the Ladyblog or other internet sites discussing her deeds and debating her identity. And how many times had he put himself in danger for her sake? His love for her was clear to everyone except the heroine herself and worried him in how similar it had been to his own love for his wife.

Adrien loved that girl. And if some things truly carried over, his feelings would no doubt be one of them.

Plagg nodded, seeing that Gabriel finally understood. “The Black Cat Miraculous is a half of a whole. Romantics would call it fate or destiny, soulmates and the like. Which sounds all nice and overly cheesy in theory—and not the good kind either.” It shook its head and looked back up at him. “But what it comes down to is that if Adrien retains anything of his time as Chat Noir, he’s going to know at the very least that he’s supposed to have a partner. Even under normal circumstances, he would have every inclination to find her and restore that previous balance. And as an akuma, he will have no inhibitions or restraint keeping him from trying to get that back.”

“So you’re saying…”

“The instant she becomes Ladybug again, Chat Blanc is going to know. And he will stop at nothing to find her." He rose up to eye level with Gabriel, arms crossed and looking quite possibly more serious than the man had ever known him to be.

"So if you really want Ladybug’s help, you’d better hurry.”

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Thank you for reading! Please check me out on Ko-Fi.

[lgcrp]

GREETINGS, LGC SUPERSTARS!

we are officially ONE ! to celebrate the occasion we come bearing gifts !!! everyone who is in the roleplay as of today will receive freebie points as follows:

ACTOR / MUSICAL ACTOR MUSES : +20 ACTING ; +6 NOTORIETY

BAND MUSES : +20 PRIMARY INSTRUMENT ; +6 NOTORIETY

ENTERTAINER MUSES : +10 HOSTING / MCING ; +10 VARIETY ; +6 NOTORIETY

MODEL MUSES : +20 MODELING ; +6 NOTORIETY

PRODUCER MUSES : +10 COMP ( MUSIC ) ; +10 COMP ( LYRICS ) ; +6 NOTORIETY

ALL OTHERS : +20 PERFORMING ; +6 NOTORIETY

if you’re confused about what your muse has received, you can also check out the spreadsheet here. please let us know if there are any errors ! and also, you can link directly to this post or the linked spreadsheet as proof of points in your own spreadsheets !

below the cut we have messages from each of our admod staff !!! thank you all again for a wonderful first year ! we love you !!!

from admin l (el):

her message will come in the next post !!!

from admin * (kristin):

“wow! one year! funny how time passes so fast, huh? so much has happened in this past year: i graduated college, landed my first full-time job—not to forget the whole pandemic, too. but lgc’s always been the constant throughout these big changes in my life, and i’ve never been more grateful. i think i speak for a lot of people when i say that roleplaying, like any other hobby, is less about the actual roleplaying and more about the community—i mean, don’t get me wrong, i love my characters and the development i’ve had with them since their creation, but there’s just something about lgc that’s the reason i’m excited to log onto this terrible website everyday: and it’s you guys. i’ve been in the krp community since 2012, and it’s sad to see that it’s devolved into having more downs than ups throughout the years. i can’t remember that last time i stayed in a roleplay for more than a month or two, nor the last time i’ve created online friendships and connections as strong as i have here. i’ve been a member longer than i’ve been an admod, so believe me when i say: so whether you’ve just joined us or you’ve been here since the beginning, thank you. thank you so much for fostering such a welcoming and fun environment for everyone here. thank you to always bring such love and creativity to the dash, and thank you for constantly inspiring me. thank you for the excitement and the commitment, and thank you for understanding when i spend more than two months replying to a thread (lol). thank you for giving me and the rest of the admod your trust to ensure that our atmosphere’s only further expanded upon, not erased, and thank you for all the suggestions on how to make lgc a better place. it’s important to remember that lgc wouldn’t be what it is today without our members, so this anniversary is as much of achievement for us as it is for y’all. we have so much in store for this group—we promise, we’re not going anywhere!—and i personally want to honor the torch leo and ori have passed onto me as the new graphics admin. expect bigger and better things, lgc. it’s only the beginning!”

from admin g (grace):

"how has it already been one year since we’ve opened??? it feels like just yesterday when the three of us decided that we wanted to go through with opening up a new roleplay. i’ve admined many roleplays in the past, but usually, that initial lull of getting apps or the disinterest that ends up plaguing many roleplays in the early months has always left me disenchanted at the whole thing that i give up even before the six month mark so to hit such a milestone is really something remarkable for me. needless to say, it’s also just been amazing for me to be working with such a dream team who really fill in the areas in which i lack. however, at the end of the day, we also wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for all of you members. without you, lgc simply wouldn’t exist. thank you for helping this place thrive. thank you for always being excited about the events that we plan. thank you for being so willing to share your thoughts and ideas ( we’ve had so many wonderful events come to life because of our members’ suggestions and we’re always excited to receive more of those that we can incorporate ). from the moment we started brainstorming about this place, our vision has been for lgc to be an interactive community that would be shaped by its members and less by us as admins. we hope you’re able to see that vision come to life, and we know that we might be lacking still, but we hope to continue to refine our systems so that we can allow for more of that. finally, thank you all for loving my muses as well and for being so willing to plot with them. i know i’ve also been personally overwhelmed lately that i haven’t been able to plot with everyone, but i hope one day that my muses will get to meet all of yours. thank you again to all of you ( and also to all of those who have passed through lgc in this last year! ). love you all!”

from mod a ( cloud ):

one year already?? i’ve been in this rp for almost half of that and a lot has changed in those months! from joining the rp around march to becoming a mod, i have to say that it has been a pretty crazy journey! during my time in lgc, the one thing that always impresses me time and time again is the community that has been created and developed during the past twelve months. from a mun standpoint, it warms my heart knowing that the community is so welcoming towards each other. every time a new ( or returning ) muse is being brought to this lovely community, i love seeing how engaging and friendly the members are. not only that but there are also the posts that i see on the dash and while it can be a lot to go through sometimes, it’s reassuring knowing that people are willing to take the time to participate in these events and develop their muses! to me, these elements are what makes lgc what it is today and i hope that this continues in the future as well! i know that there are a lot of people i want to thank for but at the end of the day, there are two groups that i want to give my shoutouts to. the first is the admod team because they have entrusted me with this role and even though it’s only been a few weeks since i was appointed as a mod, i can attest to the amount of passion and hard work the whole team has with making sure that everyone has the best experience possible! i know that we can’t be a perfect rp, but we really do appreciate all of the feedback that has been given to us since that is what motivates us to become better. and ofc my second shoutout is to all of the members ( both past and present )! thank you for the support and effort you have given to the admod team! whether it’s posting on the dash to reading your reactions to the events, we appreciate all of that! i hope that this rp continues to prosper for many more years and once again, HAPPY ONE YEAR, LGC! 🎉

from admin c ( marie ):

“one year. it might not seem like a lot to some of you guys but when we created this project we didn’t even expect to last until christmas and that’s if we even got enough members to open. even though we’ve always planned for the long haul we didn’t think we’d be writing a first anniversary message in 2020. what a year, right? so many events happened both within our small community and in the outside world. i won’t lie, legacy requires a lot of work, organization and dedication. but we’re proud when we see you guys participate in everything with so much enthusiasm. i wanted to write a long and touching message but i can’t really find the proper words right now so i’ll just leave it as simple as possible. thank you for trusting us, for investing time and energy in your wonderful character, for choosing us and sticking around, for sending suggestions on events you’d like to see, for being respectful of us and the other members too. we could work our hardest and none of this would be possible without you guys interacting with it and being excited about it. thank you for being patient and understanding with us, and for taking minutes of your time each week to read all of the new events because we truly don’t give you any rest i’ll admit that LMAO. we’ve always wanted for lgc to be a peaceful, fun and stimulating writing environment for everyone and we hope we were able to be that for some of you. we’re still lacking and by no means perfect but we’ve always tried our best and will keep doing so for as long as you guys are on board with us ( or until we get a life maybe idk hghgjfdk ). i don’t know what the future holds but no matter what, i can say i’m proud of this project and how it turned out, not only with the admod team ( past and present ) but with every single person who helped build this place by just becoming a part of our community. i love you all and look forward to see your muses grow in the upcoming year!”

from mod y ( lissa ):

“thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all. thank you for putting your faith in us. words can never describe how much we appreciate you guys. ily all.“

[silkylious]

Hi dear. I’m the anon who requested an istp reader earlier and i’m so sorry I completely missed the requests closed sign. Congrats on 400 followers!! Your event is so cute and I’m here to request a matchup! I’m a straight 5’7 girl whose personality type is istp. I have long brown hair and brown eyes. I’m a figure skater who loves to read, write and watch anime. I also like to bake whenever I have time. I’m rather analytical, with my strengths lying in math and science and history as my weakest. My writing style is more poetic, consisting of long sentences, metaphors and personophication. I’m blunt and my humor is dry and witty. However, even though I usually can keep a cool head, I get flustered easily (it’s one of the things I hate most lmao). I generally don’t take BS and my style is minimalist. I prefer to stay in by myself rather than go out with large groups of people. If I had an SO, I would much rather stay in and enjoy each other’s presence than go out on elaborate dates. I have a really low social battery too. My music taste is all over the place, but I love Chase Atlantic and Arctic Monkeys. I’m more of a cat person, though I do love dogs, and I like nature and spending time outside. Hopefully that’s enough information! Thank you so much! - 🧩 anon

Thank you so much for sending this in!! <3 I hope you like your matchup! :3

I ship you with...

general relationship dynamic: 

A match made in heaven or hell depending on who you ask

Similar enough to maintain stability, but different enough to keep things unpredictable and fun

Katsuki appreciates your rational nature, as he himself is extremely pragmatic. That common denominator relives the stress of having to deal with problems caused by emotional misunderstandings 

I can definitely see this dynamic as a slowly building friendship at first

Your tendency to not let anyone walk all over you and keep a calm aura about you immediately attracted him, but simultaneously frustrated him to no visible end

The blatant contrast between your personalities instantaneously made him want to break that collected demeanor of yours. 

All in the name of competition. At least it started out that way.

Battle after battle, bruise after bruise and trail after trail, the more hardships you faced together, the more teasing your remarks became.

What started out as him hurling every curse word known to man in hopes of shattering that nonchalant exterior of yours (and you ultimately ignoring him), slowly but surely turned into both of you exchanging well-crafted remarks.

Your sardonic humor was such a good match for him. Both knocked him off his high horse and left him in complete awe (and affection. Though he’d never admit it) of your quick, sarcastic wit all packaged in a light-hearted tone that didn’t wound his ego (too much).

More often than not, you’d fluster the hell out of him. Not that it was hard to get a reaction out of Bakugo Katsuki to begin with.

Your sharp responses just made him want to see you lose your cool even more. He never wallowed in his embarrassment too long, always too eager to grasp the next opportunity to turn the tables on you.

You bet your ass the first time he saw your composure slip, the bastard basked in it. Laughing to his heart’s content while you indignantly screeched at him to shut up.

He’d never forget that moment; and he made damn sure you wouldn’t either, not hesitating to bring it up whenever he wanted to put you in your place or just to get a rise out of you for the hell of it.

And from there it just doesn’t stop. He’s a quick learner and oddly observant, and he uses both those traits to his full advantage when picking on you. His relentless teasing never ceasing to give him the satisfaction of seeing your disheveled composure.

He also loved the gentle crease in your brows and that adorable pout on your lips whenever he verbally pushes you into a corner but that’s beside the point-

Not that it mattered anyway, you had plenty blackmail material of his less than dignified moments to spare.

Your friendship was easy going, trustworthy, reliable. But neither of you could admit your feelings to each other to save your lives. Much to the dismay of your friends, who had to watch the absolute clownery of you tip-toeing around your feelings in muted agony.

Cue perpetual pining.

Once you finally confess your feelings for each other, I honestly don’t see the relationship shifting much.

You act like really, really close friends who just happen to be affectionate and completely enamored by one another

I see Katsuki as a high energy person. Regardless of where he chooses to focus that energy, he needs external stimulus. More often than not, he directs his abundant energy into training and sparring. But generally, a lot of his excess energy is expelled through social interaction. Whether or not this social interaction is mirthful doesn’t really matter so long as he’s depleting his excessive energy.

Your low social battery might pose a small issue, dealing with Katsuki alone is like dealing with a dozen other less intense individuals. But you can easily work around it through your common interests and hobbies that can stimulate you both without depriving you into mental exhaustion

trivia:

Katsuki loves going on outdoor dates with you. A picnic in a secluded park, hiking, stargazing, camping- you name it

These dates are perfect for you two, combining your love for nature and privacy all the while giving him an activity to expel his stamina

Though he can’t say no a good at home date with you.

I absolutely adore the one headcanon about him being an amazing cook but a horrible baker

With a bit of coaxing on your part, you somehow manage to get him into baking. His skills are fucking abysmal.

He’s also distracting

Every time you try to bake together it almost always ends with both of you covered in flour with like three batches of burnt cookie dough, and childlike grins on your faces

Katsuki doesn’t really mind what the two of you do on dates, so long as he’s spending alone time with you, and you wouldn’t have it any other way

He’s a lost cause you figure. But he'll secretly practice at home, to his mother's dismay. But he doesn't care, it's all worth it in the end as he catches sight of pride and admiration in your eyes the one time he baked you a simple treat for your birthday

He made sure to learn your favorite baked goods, if only as a back up plan when he fucked up and needed to worm his way back into your arms

His curiosity was peaked when you’d told him that you’re a figure skater. So much so that one day he asks (read: demands) that you take him to an ice rink

As you show him one of your choreographies, he’s in a state of silent admiration

Katsuki is extremely kinesthetic, so he could easily pick up on the countless hours of hardwork you’d spent mastering your form, perfecting your footing, building up astounding flexibility to be able to preform and make it seem so effortless

The way your muscles pulled taut and relaxed again from stance to stance, the way small bruises lay proud on your skin as an indictive of all the effort you’d put into this sport all but made him fall in love with you again

When you strike a final pose, looking at him expectantly, noiselessly, he doesn’t say anything. But the star-eyed gaze and gentle smile he gave you spoke louder than any of his crude words ever could.

The cherry red in his eyes every so often melted so softly, it set your heart ablaze each and every time

He ended up reluctantly swallowing his pride and asking you to teach him a couple moves that day

You have study dates. All. The time.

He’s a jack of all trades so history is a no brainer for him. When you ask him to help you with it he begrudgingly complies.

Now whether or not his teaching actually helped is up to your imagination lmfao

I think one of Katsuki’s main love languages is quality time; you don’t even have to be actively helping each other while studying, just your presence around him sedates his mind exceptionally

Seconds tick by on his digital clock, each thirtieth tick he discreetly glances at you to make sure you’re still there, if he’s in the mood he’ll have to touch you in some way or another. Doesn’t even have to be affectionate, just your skin on his is enough to spur a content sigh out of him

when you’re simply reading a book or watching an anime together, he’ll lay his head on your lap without a word, or he’ll sit behind you with his arms wrapped tightly around your waist. Give it some time and his roughed-up hands will snake their way into your long hair, making a mess out of it, braiding and unbraiding it as he pleases. Tease him and he’ll instantly move

He loves reading your writing! To him, it’s like you’re inviting him into a corner of your mind. A corner very few get to explore, and he takes pride in that privilege

Can be a bit hesitant to give his full interpretations of your works at first, often just replying with one word “encouragements” but he quickly recognizes your discontent and tries to be a bit more open with his thoughts.

Slowly but surely he lets you into a corner of his mind as well, and you couldn’t be happier in those moments

[bus ride home]

The sun lovingly cast its last embers upon his face, framing and sculpting it with sharp shadows and soft reds into a breathtaking portrait as his matching crimson irises look far away, far beyond the sunset. He’s unfairly handsome. You huffed, forcing yourself to look away from what you could only describe as perfection, lest the last remnants of breath elude your lungs.

With your stare finally detached from him, all your senses started bleeding back into reality. The hum of soft rock buzzing through your plugged earbud caught your attention. Ah, this was one of your favorites. Your mind started painting his visage behind your closed lids, the music only added to the vividness of the dozen or so shades of oranges and yellows. You hummed along; the crescendo was steadily approaching.

“… But I crumble completely when you cry…”

The gentle tenor in your voice lulled Katsuki away from his muddled thoughts, instead focusing on your serenity. You’d always being good at keeping your cool, but this was different. With a tiny tug at your lips as they moved with each delicate syllable, you looked truly in your element. Angelic in a sense as the warm rays of dusk embraced you. He couldn’t look away from what he could only describe as perfection. His flushed ears barely picked up on the porcelain notes leaking from the unplugged earbud before his tongue started imitating your own.

“… In my imagination you’re waiting, lying on your side, with your hands between your thighs and a smile.”

One brown eye blinked open, surprised at the gruff bass joining your little jamming session. Katsuki snatched the unused earpiece and put in his own.

“Weren’t you the one that said my music taste is trash?” You raised an eyebrow.

“It is trash.” The glimmer in his gaze told you otherwise. You scoffed and looked away, attempting to hide the smile pulling on your lips.

The next song started playing.

<3

[arlingtonpark]

Harrow the Ninth Act I Thoughts

This is all your fault, @ghostmartyr. If you hadn’t reblogged what seemed like heavy metal boy band fanart, I wouldn’t be in this hole. And for that, I hate you.

So.

When I first encountered the Locked Tomb online, I couldn’t tell if it was a story about edgy, neogothic, teenaged angst, or something better than that.

Turns out, it’s both.

But in a good way.

I love it. It’s great.

It’s unabashed, it’s thoughtful, it’s entertaining, it’s suspenseful.

Gideon the Ninth is finished, and after starting Harrow the Ninth, I decided to blog about it as I go.

I’ll be doing one post for every act of the book. I hope.

Let’s start with our new main character, Harrow. Newly reborn as a god and one of the only survivors of the last book.

So….

Right now, Harrow’s…

Um.

She’s uh…

-gestures at everything-

She’s fucked.

Fucked, broken, in the shit, started godhood on the wrong side of the bed.

200 babies were killed in the name of birthing her. Her parents died in front of her because of what she did. Death has always seemed to follow her, and she carries the burden of all that death.

Harrow despises her existence and wishes she were dead because of the circumstances of her birth, and yet for that very reason she is committed to living, because if she dies, all those sacrifices would be null.

She takes up the duties of governing the Ninth, she applies herself rigorously to mastering necromancy, and when the opportunity arises to become a lyctor, she jumps at it.

Harrow does this because it’s why all those people had to die. She was birthed to carry the Ninth’s legacy; its traditions and obligations and to some extent its very existence.

The twisted nature of the Ninth and her parents is inseparable from that legacy, so in a sense it was that legacy that led to her infanticidal birth, but regardless, this legacy is all she has. It’s all she was ever meant to have. And so she devoted herself to it.  

Now that she’s a lyctor and her house’s future will be guaranteed, but to do it, she had to sacrifice Gideon, whom she loved.

It’s more of the same shit from her perspective: more people dying for her sake. 200 babies die to grant her obscene necromantic talent, her girlfriend dies so she can gain even more power. Harrow doesn’t mean to step on innocent people to get what she wants…but that’s always how it’s turned out for her.

But to add insult to injury, even after all she’s sacrificed, she still didn’t get exactly what she wanted.

Her house will have a future, but she can never return to it. She’s essentially divorced from the only thing that gave her life meaning.

She can never return to her old life; to the extent she saw that as desirable, she can’t have that. Her old life is gone forever.

Something also went wrong with her ascension to godhood. She’s violently sick, mentally unstable, and the powers she should have are…half baked, for lack of a better word.

Nobody said you could get hungover from ascending to godhood. Harrow should sue.

It’s like going in to surgery to remove a tumor and coming out lobotomized.

Is she even immortal?

It all stings of pointlessness. All that effort for nothing.

Worse than that; She lost everything. Her home, her love, her pride and dignity.

Her only purpose in life now is to fight these hell beasts that she’s never heard of before. Happy days ahead, surely.

Oh, and one of the people she’ll have to work with is named Gideon.

Does God hate her?

And then there’s God.

This guy is sus as hell.

He’s gracious and humble. Perpetually calm and soft spoken. Empathetic and understanding. That’s what He’s like in person.

But He’s…maybe the villain? I guess.

God works in mysterious ways, and I have no damn clue what His are, but it’s probably ugly.

Yes, He’s a cordial Dude…but he’s still the God-emperor of a galactic undead empire.

Dude wears a crown made from the bones of dead babies FFS.

Not to be accusatory, but this guy definitely has skeletons in his closet.

-bu-dum-tish-

One of the things that really got my attention while reading this series is how the magic system in this world is depicted. Usually, in fantasy stories, the magic system is depicted as being morally neutral. Good guys use it, bad guys it, but the magic itself just is.

The Locked Tomb Trilogy isn’t like that.

Necromancy is bad. Perverse, even.

All the necromancers are frail and sickly. Practicing it is deleterious on the body. Doing too much too fast with it causes even more pronounced harm. As in, bleeding from your sweat glands.

Necromancy works by manipulating the life force of living beings and, primarily, the death force those being give off when they die.

The forces of nature that necromancy utilizes are (apparently) fundamental to the universe, akin to the laws of nature, but the use of those forces in this way are clearly a perversion.

It’s sort of like a bad tv show, like Sword Art Online. Sure, the things that went into making the show are natural parts of the world, but you just can’t put those things together like that.

John and his empire epitomize that.

All known beings in the universe are fundamentally thalergetic in nature. They are beings who radiate life energy. Except for the planets of the empire. Those planets and the star they orbit are thanergetic in nature.

They literally radiate death. And they are apparently one of a kind in that regard.

John is the first necromancer. John used his newly harnessed powers to “resurrect” multiple planets that had died.

Except he didn’t really resurrect anything, he turned them into an entirely new form of being using his entirely new form of science that uses some kind of mechanism that doesn’t occur naturally.

What I’m getting at here is that everything about John, his power, and his empire is artificial. Man-made. Perhaps even John-made.

We don’t actually know what happened during the Resurrection. What killed off the planets, how John attained his God-like powers, and what life John lived before it.

Oh, yeah, and every planet the empire conquers is systematically killed over generations to fuel their necromancer’s powers.

Every planet God touches literally dies.

One thing I appreciate about this series is how layered the story is.

The Locked Tomb series is a fun, irreverent romp. It’s about allowing the past to rest in peace. It’s also surprisingly political.

The metaphor is pretty blunt: it’s about capitalism. What’s more, the metaphor seems to be from a progressive or maybe even socialist perspective.

Ok, so hear me out on this. This is less fan theory than speculation about the author’s intentions.

The empire is a society built on a system that requires them to move from planet to planet, gradually killing those planets until they have to evacuate and move to a new one.

This process of gradual death takes generations to play out, so apparently they don’t even consider it to be an event that happens.

The heart of this system is necromancy, a perverse science that is ultimately derived from natural phenomena.

This system places the most powerful necromancer atop a literal throne and worships them as God.

God’s disciples are the lyctors, second only to Him in power. They attained that power by a very special process.

The lyctoral process is exploitative. It requires the necromancer to use their cavalier as a sacrifice and to turn their soul into a power source.

The lyctoral process is built around domination. The necromancer, in sacrificing their cavalier, subsumes the cavalier’s soul into their being to gain power.

The lyctoral process is dehumanizing. The cavalier is degraded from a person to a mere battery, but the necromancer is degraded in a way as well. The necromancer can never return to their house, or any of the other houses for that matter. Instead they must fight and die for God in his battle against the Revenant Beasts.

If you’re progressive, this may sound familiar to you.

Relationships of exploitation, domination, and dehumanization. A society built around perversions. That rewards people with talent in those perversions with idolatry. That cold-heartedly and shortsightedly extracts every drop of usable resources from a planet until it is dead, then moves on to the next one.

To a socialist, this may sound a lot like capitalism.

Saying that is already bold enough for me, so I won’t try to argue that it’s a one to one allegory. Necromancy equals the profit motive, lyctors represent the relationship between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat (So I guess that means the non-lyctor necromancers are the petit bourgeoisie) and the empire is humanity.

You could make a case for it, but the hot takes in this post are already pretty spicy, so…

OMG Mercymorn. XD

Mercymorn is my favorite out of the new characters. She’s a bitch.

Snide, rude, assertive, bitchy, and standoffish. No, it’s not that I want her to step on me, I just can’t get enough of her interactions.

I guess in real life she wouldn’t be fun to be around, but as a character in a book, she steals every scene. Her arrogant and bitchy remarks always make me laugh.

My one wish heading in to Act II: that Mercymorn is in charge of Ianthe’s training.

Just so she can kick her ass for not measuring up to her standards.

[understanding-media]

Is there a shift in how celebrities are viewed, and is it good?? would you agree??

BA (Hons) Media Production

Kane O’Brien (Student ID: s5314184)

My case study for this essay - "is there a shift in how celebrities are viewed by, and interact with fandoms, and is it for the better?"

This essay intends to delve into some new shifts in celebrity perception by a new form of fandom that celebrities are cultivating and how there's a change in how they present themselves and interact with these fandoms. Also looking briefly at the importance of this for society, how with more accessible celebrities there can be less of an invisible social wall between them and how "normal" people feel locked off on one side of it while celebrities know the secret to get over it. But also, with this wall crumbling, celebrities can become more in tune with the real world and less outcast, and seemingly ignorant to the real world and its issues.

I find this case study important to look into even though is still a fairly new shift but such a significant shift because with this change people goals become less impossible. From my experience with getting into music production and with finding a large music producer that casually streams on twitch himself giving advice and showing what he does but just like any other person and showing I can get where I want with effort and that they aren't so far away from normal people.

The two concepts I will use to analyse my case study are Fandoms and Participatory culture. Fandom being looking into the people who have these celebrities as a part of their life more so than just liking their content and participatory culture where the fandoms participate in the content and life of the celebrities. A prime example I will be using throughout this essay will be a music producer by the name 'Kenny Beats', he's a prime example of both a fandom where he's built a community he regularly interacts with and live streams with other celebrities that the fandom tunes into daily and bond over their common "idol". Participatory culture is his main allure to his fandom, he runs a discord community that he gives free royalty-free content, and also linked with his streams the community participates in 'beat battles' where he reviews, gives advice, and has even gotten people signed to labels. He contributes to his fandom and also has the fandom casually participate in his content with even offering salary paid jobs at his business "D.O.T.S"

To state the cores of my chosen concepts are "Fandom as a whole is a subculture that celebrates a mutual bond formed between people over a book series, TV show, movie, band, or other forms of pop culture" (Morrison, 2016), and "the idea that various peoples, societies, and cultures to interact with new media in a way that allows them both to add and take away information from this medium." (Jenkins, 2006) is the core of Participatory culture. These are the most important concepts for this case study as having a good fandom allows for a blossoming community that can feel connected to and understanding of the celebrity, having good participatory culture allows for that fandom and other participants to offer something to the media or industry they desire to be a part of and feel a connection rather than separated as people and the media and its celebrities. Of course, though with fandoms there's the risk of them becoming toxic with a higher feeling of entitlement and gatekeeping to others making the celebrities even more dejected from normal society and even less accessible.

although I do firmly believe that the integration of participatory culture it levels that out allowing the celebrity to intervene and shape their community. As with participatory culture being endorsed in new fandoms, it allows a level of self-governing where they can communicate with the celebrity in question to allow changes to be made that the people want and can solve issues of toxicity directly.

This is the basis of what I desire to focus on and evaluate to reach the answer of my case study with my research to bring this to light and create discussion on the topic.

is there currently a shift in how celebrities are viewed by, and interact with fandoms, and is it for the better? In the past and up till recently celebrities were viewed in a very specific way as idols and out of reach and touch with "normal people", they are regularly presented as beings above the rest of us and people obsess over their lives seeing them as "the best of the best" or remarkable idols, it's a strange obsession developed over years. (Levy, 2015) (for example, how people are obsessed when they date "normal" people rather than other celebrities)

with this presentation and obsession, celebrities are dejected from societal norms and the issues that go on around them. For example, "A-list" celebrities like Drake, Jamie Fox, and others don't interact commonly with "normal" people or have their fans/fandoms participate in their lives casually or in their work having suggestions or adding something to the content these huge celebrities create and fans love. But in recent years there's been a shift in a few of the "lower tier" celebrities where they develop a community that feels involved but not entitled to the lives of these people. The best example of this and who I will regularly refer to is music producer 'Kenny Beats' who has produced some of the biggest Hip-Hop songs in recent years and is extremely idolised and respected.

Kenny Beats started a YouTube show In March of 2019, in this show he casually met up with huge celebrities in Hip-Hop and it showed these people and himself joking around in a studio that seemed 3rd rate, it showed a human side to these people and started a fandom around him and these people that weren't obsessed in the common way celebrity fandoms are. Then at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, he started a Discord community for his fans to talk to each other and communicate with him in, as well as a Twitch live stream where the new wave finally began for this shift in celebrity representation and community. He would casually talk to this community as a member rather than "the face" a sole reason for it, he would take fan advice and that would go into real songs, his fandom actively participated in his work and he actively participated in theirs. This wave of participatory culture developed his fandom into an organic and casual state where he would get people jobs and signed to a label but also where these "normal people" were a part of his content and art. His Fandom became something casual, and the people never saw him as some famous pariah they idolised and obsessed over, they don't pry or feel entitled to his or his celebrity guests/friend life like most fandoms act.

Although this sounds great and progressive on the surface, with this shift towards this new wave of fandom and fan interaction there comes risks. People are so set in their ways of idolising and believing in their right to know about their favourite celebrities. If the more "A-list" celebrities with these already obsessive fans and invasive swamping paparazzi culture around them take a step in this direction of cultivating a fandom with real participation between them and their community, without a smart and smooth transition and commitment they run the risk of cultivating and growing the toxic and entitled way of thinking further removing them from "normal society" and have a huge surge of gatekeeping and people feeling more entitled as they now have a community the celebrity is involved in. especially with cancel culture growing and growing where even then with a casual approach they run the risk of people not liking if their expectations aren't met. And this causes celebrities to become more detrimental to themselves and is what creates the commonly seen narcissism in celebrity culture, this toxic isolation and obsession with their lives creates many issues for celebrities and their fans (Brian H. Spitzberg, William R. Cupach, 2008)

But this is changing, slowly but surely. With a couple of celebrities that are much more high profile than 'Kenny Beats' but following in his footsteps with this shift in. fan interaction, these being 'Snoop Dogg' and 'T-Pain' now also doing regular streams on the platform Twitch and shows them doing pretty normal stuff and grounding them. Snoop Dogg now regularly streams games he plays and takes recommendations from his fans and just using twitch, in general, entices participatory culture on the fan side of actually having a part in this new venture of his into streaming.

T-Pain also streams and has a discord very similar to Kenny Beats, but T-Pain focuses more on a discussion about the music industry and helping his fandom to feel secure and capable but in a realistic way rather than the old "you can do anything" crap. He shows a side we don't get to see from most other huge celebrities and shows the truth of how he's just a guy that worked hard and slowly became famous and that it doesn't happen overnight. Showing that this shift so far is positive and has created very friendly and inclusive fandoms where participatory culture plays a huge role in its success and casual nature rather than the toxic obsession format we're used to.

The celebrities we see taking part in this shift are also far more involved in talking about the real-world problems which is a great thing as celebrities are a huge factor in what people care about and are exposed to, especially where fewer and fewer people watch/read news sources and its mostly through word of mouth and public figures addressing it, celebrities that have these more caring and social fandoms are detrimental these days for the awareness of distant suffering issues and it's improving from the old ignorant ways of celebrities and their narcissism due to their activity and participation with the fans who are caring of these issue's and contribute to the celebrities world education and vice versa (Scott, 2014)

Personally, for this topic, I do find it important. I'm very passionate about getting g into the media industry and more specifically into music production, but that sort of career was always a very far-off dream and so very inaccessible to some random kid from a small town in England where nothing ever happens. But finding 'Kenny Beats' who I spoke on in the main essay changed that way of thinking for me. I originally had a lot of disdain for the sort of celebrity culture and the fandoms that surround them as most are toxic, obsessive, and filled with gatekeeping. For example, used to be extremely into metal music but the fandoms in that are elitist and unwelcoming to anyone who doesn't know everything, but when I found Kenny Beats fandom and how he interacts with everyone and that they participated with him I was amazed and felt welcomed, and everyone is there teaching each other all the time about music and even just talking and helping people just with anything. It re-inspired me to do what I was passionate about as I saw him as just another guy that was good at what he does and that he cares and helps people, he even ended up getting a 16-year-old boy from Scotland signed to 'XL Records' (the label that does Adele and Radio head!) this new, completely different fandom to what I'd ever seen before inspired me and helped with my anxiety of wasting my time working for a "silly pipe dream of a career"

So, in conclusion to my case study. I feel the answer is yes, in my opinion, we are starting to see celebrities more and more as people rather than commodities and it's an incredibly good thing for society as these people are important to the public's decisions and what we are exposed to and care about. And with them being more grounded they can be more involved in the world rather than dismissed because they're "dumb celebrities". Although yes there are the risks of cultivating a more toxic and entitled community with higher-profile celebrities but with something as simple as starting with a good social presence on a platform like Twitter, especially like 'Lil Nas X' who is rather huge now but is seen as a rather normal person from his casual and human-like tweets that ground him and make him relatable. because that's all it is in the end, celebrities need to take this shift and become more grounded and relatable to the "normal" person, and this shift is that starting to happen, and it will help the world and its people be better. slowly but surely, at least in my opinion. what's yours??

(please use this link to see sources used, recommendations for future use are welcomed)

[lady-divine-writes]

Insecure

When gaggles of women start flooding his shop on their lunch hours just to gawk at his sexy husband, Aziraphale begins to succumb to the new doubts and fears that come as a result of going native.

Luckily, Crowley has a cure for that. (2260 words)

(AO3)

Aziraphale has noticed a disturbing trend in the customers who come into his shop lately. No longer do they seem to be interested in purchasing one of his many immaculate and prized first editions (thank God), but, instead, they come to gawk at his husband, who spends a great deal of his time draped over a chair in the corner reading. Or pretending to read. He’s mostly there to annoy Aziraphale – make suggestive remarks when the angel bends over, persuade him take long lunches and close up early, rearrange the books by random indicators like whether there’s an animal featured on the cover or not, the author’s hair color, or their perceived sexual orientation. Since Aziraphale can’t afford to waste miracles, that means he has to spend all day reorganizing his shelves.

Or leave them as is, which is Crowley’s aim really.

But the gaggle of teenaged girls who come in before and after school, and the business women who stop by on their lunch hour, annoy him more.

He’s tried to juggle his times of operation to avoid them – open later, close earlier, take off Mondays. But they don’t seem to mind being late to where they’re going just to catch a glimpse of his demon.

And it’s beginning to wear on him.

Crowley doesn’t seem to notice the attention. Aziraphale brought it up to him once over lunch, asking how it felt to be objectified by the female clientele that his presence has been attracting day after day after day (in part because he was irritated and in part because he was genuinely curious), to which Crowley said, “You’ve been getting customers? When was that? Last week?”

Since Aziraphale can usually tell when Crowley is lying, and he wasn’t this time around, that was the end of that discussion.  

But this influx of admirers has begun to spotlight certain doubts in Aziraphale’s mind that have been hiding there for some time.

Do they belong together? Are they really a match?

He’s not even talking about the angel/demon dynamic. A lot of people would say that opposites attract and well, you can’t get much more opposite than good and evil.

Then again, they’ve come to discover that Crowley isn’t completely evil, and Aziraphale isn’t necessarily 100% good.

And that’s part of the point.

So many things have changed for Aziraphale lately, ever since he and his demon became husbands. Changes in life, changes in his shop … changes in him. Inadequacies, doubts, fears, no longer simply about himself or his job efficiency as an angel, but about this relationship – a relationship that had been a constant in his existence, one he didn’t have to think too hard on or worry too much about. Perhaps it’s a side-effect of going native, but being married to a sexy demon on a planet that values youth and beauty over wit and intelligence makes him question a lot of things, things he hadn’t thought to question for all the years they’d been friends.

If Aziraphale has begun to notice these things, will Crowley begin to notice them, too?

Will they become important to him?

Crowley is a demon, bound (for the most part) by demonic rules. When one takes into account the seven deadly sins - a page straight out of the demon playbook - technically, they already should be.

The door to the shop opens and a new wave of women walks through. Aziraphale rolls his eyes mentally but confronts them with a smile. He walks straight up to them, effectively blocking their way further than the counter unless they admit to wanting a book, which, at this point, he may just be willing to sell them if it means they leave without the requisite drooling over his husband.

“Good morning! May I help you young ladies?”

The three of them do their best to get around him, but with the only entrance into the belly of the shop being the narrow aisle behind him, it would be impossible to do without shoving him to the side.

Which one lady in a houndstooth jacket and blonde bob looks fully prepared to do.

They try to peek over him but to no avail as the chair his husband lounges on has been moved out of sight of the door. All three women deflate when they realize their trip to this otherwise dull and dusty little shop has all been for naught, and they sigh in unison.

“Uh … no. No, we’re … okay,” one of them says, and they turn and leave the shop, grumbling about the pudgy old troll popping out from under his bridge to ruin their fun.

The door slams shut and Aziraphale sighs, returning to his task of restocking the shelves.

“Now what was all that about?” Crowley asks, coming up behind his angel, having caught the final few seconds of that unfortunate interaction.

“Nothing,” Aziraphale replies, doing his best to try and smile as he tosses books onto shelves, barely paying mind to where they belong.

“Is that so?” Crowley rescues the next book, which had missed the shelf, before it lands on the floor. “The way you’re abusing these poor books, it doesn’t seem like nothing. What has …” He glances at the cover of the one he’s holding before sliding it into its place on the shelf “… Allen Ginsberg ever done to you?”

Aziraphale stops. Full stops. Stops stocking the shelves, stops smiling, stops trying to pretend. In the grand scheme of the universe and God’s ineffable plan, Aziraphale’s problems seem shallow and petty. But they are his problems, and right now, they’re bowing his back, weighing his shoulders down.

“Why did you ask me to marry you, Crowley?” he asks, staring down at his husband’s snakeskin shoes and hugging the remaining three books to his chest.

Crowley smirks since he knows full well his husband can’t see. “Well, it was about flippin’ time, wasn’t it?”

Aziraphale’s head snaps up, his eyes, full of angelic fire, meeting Crowley’s behind his dark glasses. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

But Crowley doesn’t fear that fire. He welcomes it.

“It means I’ve loved you forever, Aziraphale. And the second I got my head out of my arse and figured it out, I wanted to make it official.”

Aziraphale nods and goes back to the task of examining his husband’s shoes. Crowley takes the books out of Aziraphale’s hands and places them on the shelf so he can wrap his husband up in his arms.

“Tell me. What’s this really all about, hmm? Does it have anything to do with that wench that called you a troll?”

“Don’t say that. I’m sure she’s a perfectly nice young woman, all things considered,” Aziraphale murmurs, not sounding all that convincing.

“Well, she’s a perfectly nice young woman who just dropped her lunch, missed her bus connection, and now has a huge runner in her stockings, so hopefully that makes your day a little bit better.”

Aziraphale smiles softly into the fabric of his husband’s shirt. “No. But I thank you for the effort.”

“What do you care what these mortals think of you?” Crowley squeezes his husband tight, hoping for a giggle. “You’re an angel! You’re Mr. Holier-than-thou! You perform miracles! You fight for the greater good! You’re not concerned with those things, right?”

“No.” Aziraphale clears his throat and straightens his back in an attempt to pull himself up from his bog of self-pity. “Not at all. At least … I wasn’t. I don’t know. This new life of ours … it’s doing things to me.”

“Well, I should hope so,” Crowley growls.

This time, Aziraphale does giggle. “That’s not what I mean.”

“Look …” Crowley leans back a few inches to look into his angel’s eyes “… you chose your human form, right?”

Aziraphale’s head bobs left to right, giving that some thought. “More or less. There were parameters.”

“And if there was something you didn’t like about it, you could change it?”

“I guess.”

“So, why haven’t you? I’ll tell you why. Because deep down inside, you like yourself just the way you are. You like your face because it’s kind. And you don’t mind the shape of your body because you feel your favorite clothes suit you. You’ve never had a single negative thought about yourself that wasn’t put into your head by someone else. You love yourself. And so do I. Because you’re not your body, Aziraphale. You’re your heart and your soul and your mind. You also happen to be one hell of a, as they say, bad ass.”

“Really?” Aziraphale says with a bitter little hiccup. “And how do you figure that?”

“Aziraphale! You wield a flaming sword! You stood in front of Satan himself, ready to defend the world! Humans who walk into this shop every day should genuflect and worship you.”

“That would fall under the category of false idols, so that’s a no-no.”

“Plus - and this is a huge plus - you’re the only being I know who’s looked Beelzebub in the face and asked for a rubber duck! Do you think there’s anyone else on this measly little planet that even compares to you? Because, to be honest, if there were, that would be terrifying!”

Aziraphale rests his head against his husband’s chest, melting into his words of praise. He’d never considered any of that, which proves how native he’s actually become. Humans, he’s noticed, do the same thing. What do degrees and accolades and charitable works matter so long as you’re aesthetically pleasing to any and all sexes? But he can’t allow his husband to lead him into the sin of pride. He knows Crowley isn’t trying to tempt him. He’s being supportive.

But as a demon, leading Aziraphale astray would fall under the umbrella of an occupational hazard.

“Would it make you feel better if I made a few alterations to my form?” Crowley asks. “Give myself a bit of a pooch? Perhaps a double chin?”

“No! I know how much you like the form you’re in. I know that you’re afraid to lose it. I don’t want you to go changing yourself for me.”

“Now that’s funny, because I feel exactly the same way about you.”

The clock on the wall strikes the hour and Crowley looks up. Through the window, he sees another wave of women heading for the shop, huddled together as if they’re embarking on a secret quest. “Do you really want to stop those women from coming in here all the time?”

“Not that I’m purposefully trying to drive away business …”

“Of course not.”

“… but it would be nice.”

Crowley pinches his angel’s chin and gives him a wink. “I’ll handle it.”

The bell over the door tinkles as it swings open. This time, instead of the shop’s portly proprietor greeting its customers, the tall, slender man they’ve been coming to see – the one who fills out a tight fitting shirt and black jeans like no one else in the world - does, and they’re instantly delighted. Their collective eyes brighten when they see that the object of their lustful gazes has finally risen out of his chair, and is now standing in front of them to see.

“Hello, ladies,” Crowley says to the obnoxious tittering of all, and Aziraphale shakes his head. How this is supposed to keep the birds out of the roost, he had no idea. This will probably make them stop by more.

“Hello.”

“Hi.”

“We didn’t realize you worked here,” one woman says, her eyes glowing with the possibilities.

“Ah, yes, yes. Alas, I do. Is there anything you ladies need? Something to tickle your literary taste buds?” Crowley meets them glasses to eyes, flashing the most charming smile he can conjure. “Some Shakespeare, a little Whitman … some Wilde, perhaps?”

“Why, yes,” one brave woman dares, taking Crowley in from head to toe, not even being subtle about it when her whole head moves, which makes the smiling brood beside her titter even more. “As a matter of fact, there is.”

“Well, well, well. One second and my husband will help you.”

It takes a moment for those words to hit, but the fallout is precious.

First comes the silence, then the confusion, followed by the disbelief.

“Husband?” Aziraphale hears one of the women say before Crowley grabs him around the waist, pulls him against him, and kisses him hard.

The gasp from their lips is positively delicious. Aziraphale would guffaw if not for his husband’s mouth on his, his serpent tongue slipping between his lips and giving him the most inappropriate things to think about in public. By the time Crowley lets his husband come up for air, the women are gone – vanished as if in a puff of smoke since Aziraphale never heard the bells over the door ring to announce their departure.

Of course, that could be because of the thoughts his husband had been projecting into his mind using a soupçon of his demonic power.

His sexy serpent has one vivid imagination.

“So, that’s the solution you came up with?” Aziraphale fixes his vest, tugging at the hem, pretending to act scandalized by the whole process even though the smile he can’t suppress begs to differ.

“Yup. I’d say it worked a treat, too. Besides, the best part about it is …” He slaps his husband playfully on the ass before he finishes “… we get to do that again for every lot that comes in.”