#like the lighting is soooo bright that nothing even looks creepy anymore its all like fluorescent

[boruosys]

I miss the early seasons so much everything about the later ones is just. Eh.

in my opinion it’s almost never the outfits themselves that are the problem in recent tv/film. it’s the fact that it all looks unworn. there’s no wear. there’s no tear. there’s no signs that it truly belonged to a character. in some cases, that’s fine. but with warriors? travelers? the first example that comes to mind is how supernatural went from sam and dean driving across america living out of duffel bags wearing distressed heavily used workwear to…whatever this is…….. looking like every outfit is Brand New

[gureishi]

I really love your writing! Could I request #2 for Saeyoung? Perhaps a hurt/comfort :)

Ohhhh, thank you so much!! That makes me really happy to hear ♡

And here is the fic! I think a lot about making Saeyoung go to sleep and honestly don’t know how I’ve never written this scenario before. Darling sleepy overworked boy.

two: fall into your arms again

SaeyoungXReader, T, words: 1764

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・

You’re dreaming of driving when he calls you—it’s a recurring nightmare of yours, where you’re at the wheel and suddenly you realize the car has no brakes. The ringtone makes its way into your dream, and you’re panicking, you’re panicking—where is the phone, why can’t you stop the car?

You wake abruptly, eyes flying open in the way they sometimes do after a nightmare. The phone is still ringing. You scramble for it and find it tangled in the sheets.

You squint at the screen: it’s after three in the morning.

“H-hello?” You yawn as you answer, your head falling back against the pillow.

“Ohh…did I wake you up? I guess I lost track of time,” he laughs, but it sounds forced. You push yourself up a little in bed.

“Saeyoung, are you okay? Did something happen?” There’s a sinking feeling in your stomach. Things have just finally started to go well.

“No, no!” He’s too loud, too enthusiastic. “We’re okay! Saeran is asleep.”

“Saeyoung, it’s almost four in the morning.”

He yelps. “Really? I didn’t even notice! I’m sorry, babe. Ignore me and go back to sleep. Please.”

You sigh, sitting all the way up, propping the pillows behind your head. “Will you tell me what’s bothering you?”

“God Seven is bothered by nothing! God Seven was just doing some work and wanted to hear his kitty cat’s cute voice! Ha-hah!”

“Saeyoung…”

“Activate kitty communication mode! Meow! Meow? Meeooow!”

He’s too adorable—his distraction tactics are too good. Once upon a time, you would’ve given it to it, would’ve let him ramble nonsensically until he wore himself out. You know better now.

“Saeyoung, when was the last time you slept?”

You hear him counting to himself. “Twelve, thirteen, fourteen…twenty-six, twenty-seven…” Oh no. “Forty-four hours ago!” he sings triumphantly.

“Saeyoung!”

“Whaaat?”

“Forty-four hours ago was when I last spent the night. You haven’t slept since then?”

“Nooope. But it’s okaaaay! God Seven can work for much longer without sleeping because it’s what he was programmed to do!” He draws out his syllables, speaking in a sing-song.

“Hey. Stop. Listen to me.” You know he hears the frustration in your voice because he shuts up right away. “You do not work for the agency anymore. Even Saeran is sleeping right now, like a normal person. You do not need to work through the night anymore.”

“But I do,” he says. His voice sounds a little more subdued now. “The agency may be done, but there’s still so much cleanup work to do. There’s so many loose ends. If I’m resting, they’re tracking Saeran, tracking Vanderwood, tracking you… I can’t—”

“No,” you say. “Uh-uh.” You’re already slipping out of bed, groping around in the dark for some sweatpants. “I know there’s still work to do and I know you’re worried about keeping us safe. And you can do that work. After you’ve slept for eight hours.”

He laughs and it sounds almost like a sob. “I’ve just found him,” he says, so quietly you can barely hear him. “I’ve just got him back. If anything happens to him…”

“I know,” you say. “I know, babe. But none of that matters if you work yourself to death in the process.”

You’ve got pants, you’ve got shoes. You grab a jacket and the keys to the rental car Saeyoung insisted on paying for so you wouldn’t be reliant on him while he was holed up in his bunker with Saeran.

“Hah,” he says. “It would take a lot more than a few hours of work to kill me.”

You’re outside, the cool air bracing you, waking you the rest of the way up.

“I’d like you one hundred percent alive instead of just barely hanging on,” you tell him.

You throw open the car door with perhaps slightly too much force.

He hesitates. “What was…are you outside?”

“Yes. I’m coming over.”

“You—g-gah, what?!” He sounds frantic. You hear a crash—almost as if he’s sweeping something (realistically, a pile of junk food) off his desk.

“I’m coming over right now and putting you to bed. If you don’t want me to stay, I won’t, but you are going to sleep one way or another,” you say. You start the car and you know he hears it through the phone—you’re not playing around.

“I’m perfectly capable of—” he whines.

“Thirty minutes. Love you,” you say, and hang up before he can respond.

。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。。

You get there in no time because the roads are empty. He’s cleverly disabled the car’s built-in GPS so that the rental company can never access any of the data, never pinpoint his address (not that his bunker actually has an address). It doesn’t matter: you know the way by heart.

You give the password that will let you into the garage, park, and peer into the retinal scanner by the door—he’s added this feature for you, only for you. The door welcomes you by name and swings open with a soft click.

The bunker feels bigger and emptier at night; it’s completely dark except for the tiny ray of light coming from his office door, which is cracked open just a hair. You sigh. You’d had hope—just a little—that knowing you were coming would guilt him into just going to bed already. But he is stubborn.

You pad across the huge living room and knock gently on his door. He knows you’re here, of course—he’s probably been watching you on the cameras ever since you pulled into the driveway. But just in case—he’s not someone you want to ever catch off guard.

“Hi,” he says softly—his voice sounds far away. You push open the door.

“Oh, Saeyoung…”

His office is never exactly tidy, but this is a disaster zone.

There are chip bags and other assorted wrappers strewn over the desk and on the floor around it. Several creepy, half-built robots lay at odd angles on the couch and floor, as if he’s been fiddling with them as he works and then tossing them aside—one blinks eerily at you with its single eye. There are clothes thrown over the couch and the backs of his various desk chairs, as though he’s been managing to periodically change outfits without ever setting foot in his bedroom.

And there he is, your precious, anxious, manic boy, sitting in his chair with his knees pulled up to his chest, hunched over his desk, fingers still moving over the keys even as he turns to look at you.

“You didn’t have to come,” he says, his voice hoarse.

“That’s a crappy greeting for your favorite person in the world who just drove here in the middle of the night,” you say, but you’re not not really angry at him—how could you be, when he’s in this state? You cross the room, stepping over the piles of junk. Up close, he looks terrible—there are dark circles under his eyes and he has that pale, hollow look he gets when he goes too long without seeing the sun.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters. “Bright, wonderful people like you should be asleep at this time of night.”

“Everyone should be asleep at this time of night,” you tell him. You brush the messy, tangled hair off his forehead and kiss him on the cheek. He closes his eyes for a moment, humming contentedly; then he reaches for you, tilting his head up for a proper kiss. 

“Nuh-uh,” you say, and he deflates, pouting. “Find a stopping point—the first possible stopping point. Then you are going to bed.”

“Orrrrr…” he murmurs, nuzzling his head against your waist. One hand trails up your leg, leaving goosebumps in its wake.

“Saeyoung.”

“Fiiiine.” He reluctantly spins his chair around, types another line. “You go get in the bed,” he says, eyes on the screen. “I’ll be there soon.”

“Nope.” You cross your arms and sit on the couch, moving aside half of a robot dragon. “I don’t trust you.”

He makes a sound somewhere between a hiss and a groan and starts typing more quickly. Good. If he’s motivated to finish faster because you’re now losing sleep, then so be it. At least he’s stopping.

The sound of his typing soothes you. You fiddle with the little dragon—it will be very cute, once he builds the other side of its head. His typing slows. He hits a few more keys. You recognize the sounds of him finishing up—god knows how much collective time you’ve spent listening to him work.

“Okay,” he says at last, and you look up to see him getting out of his chair, a little clumsily.

“Yes?”

“Yes.”

You skip to him and grab his hand. “Bedtime,” you say seriously, tugging him behind you: through the door, down the hall. He laughs, and it’s the most genuine he’s sounded all night. You throw open the door to his room and take a running leap onto the bed. He’s still laughing, watching you from the doorway with warm eyes.

“Come,” you say, wriggling yourself into the blankets, holding out your arms to him. Obediently, he shuts the door and comes to you, falling headfirst onto the messy pile of pillows and blankets and you. He groans quietly, his shoulder muscles finally relaxing. You pull him toward you and he settles his head onto your chest.

“S’feels nice,” he slurs, snuggling into you. You see how hard the exhaustion is hitting him now that he’s closed his eyes; you make a snug nest of blankets around him, tucking them up to his neck.

“I’ve got you,” you whisper. “You can rest now.”

“Mmmmmm but…” His words are hard to make out, his voice already thick with sleep. “But there are soooo many other things we could be doing…in this bed…”

He tries to lift an arm, vaguely brushing his fingertips over your neck. You giggle.

“Shhhh, love. Maybe in the morning,” you tell him. You kiss the top of his head, nuzzling your nose into his messy, sweet-smelling hair. He doesn’t respond. “Babe?”

His head is heavy on your chest. You feel his breath on your neck, slow and steady. You smile to yourself—he’s already asleep.

So you wrap your arms tightly around him and close your eyes, head propped on top of his. You are a mess of blankets and limbs and heartbeats and you feel impossibly, indescribably safe. “Goodnight, Saeyoung,” you whisper.

[briars7]

💣Crazy Capers #3💣

Imagine this: young, preteen kid strolling down the sidewalk, admiring the blue, polluted sky, graffiti on the walls passing by at a blur, and the patter of footsteps close behind him.

Okay, so...I wasn’t strolling, or admiring. Maybe I was running instead? And admiring much of anything, including the final glimpses of the modern world I’d ever see, was the last thing on my mind.

That was before. I don’t think much about it now. Between the blood under the bridge and the homesickness for a place that I wouldn’t fit into anymore...it’s all past. But hey! Ya’ll wanted to know a bit more of my backstory, so there ya are. Or maybe you didn’t and it was me wanting to prevaricate about myself. Eh, either way.

Hop, skip, and a jump later, I’m in medieval Europe. Standing out worse than a sore thumb and causing a stir that bull in a China shop would be proud of. See, I thought I was all that and more back in the future. Street smart, alley wise, annoying punk of a kid, but always one step ahead. Here? Just a punk kid who’s gonna get his throat slit before the first hello. In short, I was terrified.

Bright copper hair that didn’t blend in well with the brown, black, and blonde majority, strange speech coupled with an accent, a lilt I was in the wrong country for, and a penchant for troublemaking that didn’t stop just cause I was in way over my head. Don’t know what might’ve happened to me had not a bored gentleman decided to take me home. Had I been better off in a gang of pickpockets? Maybe. Probably would’ve lost my hands by now. Or maybe I’d have joined a circus. You’d see me performing death defying feats on the trapeze before one day taking it too far. What if’s that are too late to consider. Oooh what if that’s you showing up here one day? I do wonder what life ya’ll might’ve stumbled into should you be inclined to make a trip into this era. Maybe leave us a comment, eh?

Back onto the gent and what soon became his neverending source of headaches. That’s what he said, but I’m pretty sure he was laughing behind his third wine glass.

We get to his house and guess what? The gent wasn’t just some hoity toity rich dude. He lived in a massive fortress I later learned was called The Citadel. You’d think the scary lookin’ doors, weird stains on the stones, and butt ugly gargoyles would give me the clue that I should be running. Nope! Not so much...

Having seen Hunchback of Notre Dame, I wanted to go exploring. Learn every nook and cranny of this place as fast as possible, make friends—yes I know they’re imaginary—with the statues, and traipse about the crenels. Pretty sure by this point I thought the man had to have been a lord of some sort, maybe even the king! ...But deep down something felt off. Once the adrenaline wore down, I was paying attention to the people giving my supposed savior deferential bows or avoiding eye contact. Respect wasn’t the feeling I got off these folks. Fear...flinching when the well dressed man adjusted his cloak or spoke to one of them.

The ones who weren’t practically hugging the walls to be on the opposite side of us...they were strange too. I get that this is a whole other time period so like everyone is gonna be strange to me, especially as a kid. But these guys, I’m telling ya! It was like...they were dead. 

An oppressive gloom surrounded them, sucking the light from flickering lamps and the warmth from one’s own bones. Some of them appeared jovial enough, a grin or leering smirk cheering their pallid faces. Had I believed in such, might’ve considered them to be vampires. Time travel was one thing though. I wasn’t going to start with creatures of the undead. Those eyes though. The spark was gone. You know? That merry twinkle when you smile and are happy that means you haven’t met your maker yet? Yeah...that. Not there.

Decided I’d had quite enough of this creepy place. Something was seriously wrong with these people, and even if I did end up losing my hands, at least I’d still have my soul. Or whatever you wanna call that sparkle.

The thought hadn’t fully formed in my mind, but before I could duck out, the man’s hand had wrapped around my arm in a vise grip. It was like he was a frickin’ mind reader!! I looked up into his eyes, my voice muted by fear. Realizing too late he had the same dead, empty eyes as the others and my fate was sealed.

🍊🍊🍊

Fast forward a few years. Sure got to know The Citadel real well. Top to bottom, side to side...from scaling the exterior of its stone face and the mountain it was built on to traversing the interior unseen by its occupants. Comes in handy for more than just training...escaping where even those sharing the domicile can’t find me is definitely a plus.

Couple of things changed. Lilting Irish accent remained, but my haircut went from the short style of the modern age to...uh, is shaggy a style? I cut it myself every so often. Hey! And even comb it on occasion too! So proud of myself. *Nearly breaks arm patting my back.* 😜

Can’t remember now if I ever tried giving them my real name. They never used it. Sure gave me a litany of options though!! Scalawag, miscreant, rogue, caitiff...and so on. My fav was Rapscallion, so I started answering to that. Smart bunch, they are! Picked up real quick when they actually wanted my attention which name they should use. Didn’t hurt their pride half as bad if they thought they were being demeaning when asking for me, but they didn’t understand. I wear this name as a badge of honor. Win win!

Still a kid, really. Not quite left my teens, but I’d learned a lot. The regular stuff, you know. 

Things like, never to let anyone get close emotionally cause they’re weak and can be used against you. If they’re a fellow assassin and have half a chance of not being captured, tortured, and killed to control you, then your partner is definitely using you. 

Then there’s the physical stuff, which soooo many of these peeps think they can get into without becoming attached. Idiots. For argument’s sake, let’s say they don’t get attached. You’re letting another human being into your personal space. On purpose. You are putting yourself into a vulnerable situation where quite often, you’re not wearing clothes. Which means no weapons hidden away with which to defend yourself with. Ya think your partner doesn’t know about the one under the mattress? No semi protective layers from glancing, tainted knife blades or poisoned darts. Nothing. Really?! 

I’ll tease your socks off—er stockings—and make a lady lose her cool with suggestive flirting and a touch here or there. Maybe it was just my training and theirs didn’t cover it? I dunno. But I can’t let anyone get close. Any more than I’ll eat food I haven’t seen prepared or drink a stranger’s mead: I’ve seen too many of my fellow assassins lose their lives to lust. Allowing a person to break that personal space for more than a few seconds’ time. Even arrogance hasn’t killed as many, and that’s saying something.

There’s another factor making it untenable to me...being betrayed by a loved one or losing them because of your occupation is one of the fastest ways to lose your spark. Kicks you into the maw of darkness; no passing Go or collecting two hundred dollars.

Well, back to the reason for all the name calling. Once I’d been told what these guys do, and that I’d be this dude’s apprentice, there were some basic ground rules I laid out. Course, none of them mattered a single bit to my mentor. In time though it did help him understand some of my...quirks. Still didn’t care, but that was alright.

Rule one: I wouldn’t end up fish eyed and lookin’ all zombie like. Mentor didn’t mind, cause I was never allowed to play a prank on him. Nobody else wanted to “allow” it either, but their laws said they couldn’t kill me. Didn’t mean they couldn’t make my life a living hell. Finally saw something spark in one of their eyes though! Gave me a glimpse that they weren’t all the way gone yet, so I kept annoying them, learning new ways to avoid repercussions...and learning coping techniques for what things I did outside The Citadel or were done to me that I couldn’t deal with. There’s a reason they looked as they did. They didn’t want to feel...but I wasn’t ready to give that up. Ya see that crazy gleam in my eye, and you’d better watch your step!! Hahaha!

Since the people I stayed with were definitely on the more affluential side of things, they had access to the best of whatever food they wanted prepared. Being from the future, I had an idea of what eating rich meals would get me. Gout is not pretty. Not to mention the whole eating what I haven’t seen prepared thing and...well I’ve hung out in the kitchens a lot. Learned to like fresh things if I don’t have time or inclination for cooking. It’s a long process here without microwavable meals. Favorite is fruit, especially those with a peel. But I’ll eat just about anything, and learned of some unusual looking stuff we don’t see in most modern supermarkets.

Annnyway, my life probably appears pretty odd to regular folk. Hey, it’s been called...esh. Let’s maybe not get into what my coworkers want to call it. They certainly don’t approve. I’m alive though! More than I can say for most of the walkers wandering wide corridors with vapid smiles and dire thoughts. If you’re still reading and curious about that guy from the first story—the one who interrupted a would be lesson?—stick around. He’ll make his debut in the next installment of my absurd tales. 😉 Thanks for hangin’ with me!